While resurrecting a slew of over-the-hill computers from my computer graveyard, I came across an interesting challenge that’s inspired me to catalog the repair. The heat sink to the North Bridge chip popped off because an anchor holding down the spring dislodged itself from the motherboard. I looked online for ways to replace the anchor with the least amount of effort, but couldn’t find anything that didn’t involve soldering. As much as I enjoy removing the entire motherboard from the chassis and soldering electronic components onto a board coated with anti-flux, I opted for an easier, albeit less scientific approach. I hope this post will be helpful to anyone who comes across a similar challenge.
I can say with a fair degree of certainty that the repair method depicted will not be sanctioned by anyone who’ve had the slightest training in basic electronics and logic design, and much less the manufacturers of the motherboard. I’ve tested the hardware after the repair and everything appears to be in working order (hardware and software). Personally, this ghetto repair method was justified for a computer ten-years past its prime.
Recently, I’ve had the good fortune of helping my famous Corvette-owning Author friend with a minor repair to his Vette’s burnt out driving/parking lights. Below are a few lessons learned from the experience designed to help those who may share my similar good fortune fiddling with a marvelous piece of American Engineering. Before we begin, the tools you’ll need for replacement of these two pesky light bulbs are your hands (Preferably small, dexterous, sensitive, yet heat resistant), good mechanical inclination, good spatial-abstract analytical abilities, and the ability to read and comprehend what’s written here.
Before we begin, study closely the casing that encloses the light bulbs. Print out the attached pictures to help with visualization.
The housing that holds the pesky turn-signal and parking lights on a 2001-2004 model Corvette Z06. Note the location of the inserts. Also note the small plastic extension next to the big hole in the middle.
Note the squeezable plastic lock mechanism on the big light bulb holder and the plastic bar next to the big hole that we spoke of earlier. Squeezing on the plastic tab while turning roughly 1/4 turn counterclockwise will make the removal process more efficient and effective.
Press down on the air duct to temporarily allow access to wiring and lights. Insert hand, reach in and up to access parking light. Study other pictures in the series and follow recommendations.
Hand will enter through the vent hole. Hand will feel for L-shaped light bulb seat. Hand will depress plastic clip on the rim of L-shape seat. Hand will turn 1/4 counterclockwise, with slight wiggle, to unseat light bulb assembly from housing. The small light bulb has no plastic locking clip, so just counterclockwise turn will release it from the housing.
The light bulbs for this repair (2 large amber bulbs – part number: 3157NA/4157NA) and (2 Little white bulbs – part number: 194) will set you back roughly $6/pack for a total of roughly $12. We bought one set at a local auto parts store and the other at a local Wal-Mart. We learned after stopping at Wal-Mart that both sets were available for $0.30-$0.70 less than the auto parts place the day of the repair. Regardless, small price to pay given the circumstances. All the best with the repairs. Feel free to link this article or share with us your repair experience in the comments. Toodles.
Hello and welcome to another exciting episode of: fix your ride. Today we are going to cover how you’d go about replacing a radiator for a 1998 Nissan Frontier. Although you may not own a Nissan Frontier, the lessons presented in reference to radiator replacement is universally applicable to most cars. This issue was selected because I drive a Nissan Frontier, and it just so happens that my radiator decided to explode after just 200,000 miles of use, causing me to have to go out and replace the damn thing. I’ve enclosed a bunch of pictures taken during repair that will be arranged in chronological order. The level of difficulty involved with this process is just slightly harder than that of changing the oil. If you have any mechanical inclination whatsoever, you will do just fine.
Before delving into pictures, make a mental note of the few items listed below for a safer and more enjoyable repair experience: Firstly, before heading out to your favorite store, call to make sure that the radiator that fits your model car is available and in stock. Secondly, pick up a radiator flush kit to rid any residual coolant in the system and pick up a gallon of coolant for after the installation. Thirdly, be sure that the vehicle has been off for awhile and that all engine components are cool to the touch.
Note the three point of contact: inlet and outlet marked by the red cap, and the overflow connector at the neck of radiator cap.
Remove mud pan from the under-carriage.
The bottom hose connected to the radiator. NOTE: Drain radiator fluid before disconnecting. Otherwise, you’ll get coolant all over the place.
Engine coolant all over the place.
Remove the left-hand (facing vehicle) bracket for better access to the intake hose. This step needs to be done later in order to remove the radiator.
Remove the right-hand bracket (facing vehicle).
Remove overflow from the old radiator.
Left-hand bracket unhinged and top hose near removal.
Unscrew the fan box from the radiator: there are two screws.
Fan box and radiator separation. There are two rounded rectangular pegs at the bottom of the fan box that is seated on a small plastic ledge with holes built into the radiator. After unscrewing the fan box, push the box towards the engine and lift the fan box off its seat.
Once the brackets on top are removed, the hoses disconnected, and the fan box separated, it’s simply a matter of carefully lifting the radiator from its slot.
Radiator cavity with proper lighting.
Note the two holes that the rubber cushion must be inserted into at re-installation.
Note the rubber cushion from the old radiator and the empty peg in the new radiator.
Rubber cushions are recycled from the old to the new.
Pop in the new radiator, connect the bottom hose.
Reverse the disassemble process to make whole your vehicle. Once everything is replaced, fill the new radiator with 50/50 water and antifreeze coolant. The aftermarket radiator that I purchased had a minor defect where the fan box was seated to the ledge. The distance of the rounded-rectangular cut out in the ledge where the pegs from the fan box were to have been inserted were off by 2mm. The 2 mm caused me an extra 20 minutes of improvised sawing to make the thing work. Best of luck with your radiator repair adventures. Feel free to drop a comment with further questions or concerns.
If you find the pictures are too small, right click and download them to your computer. I’ve not yet the time to re-code the html for the neat pop-up feature because I’m lazy. They are now click-able :-p
In our previous episode, we uncovered the door panel of a Honda
Civic in order to replace a defective auto doorlock mechanism. Upon
further investigation into the root of the problem that’s inspired this
exercise, we’ve discovered that the problem is attributed to the
breakdown of a $2 DC motor component. Honda, you need to have a serious
meeting with the manufacturer of this inferior component before this
potentially cancerous trend of defective crap plagues your entire
product line. Things like this have happened before, and it can and
will happen to anyone, even Honda. Enough blabbery. For those of you
really interested in what went wrong with the auto doorlock component,
behold:
The doorlock assembly. Top portion is actual mechanism (metallic),
bottom is auto doorlock motor (black).
The white nipple structure on the doorlock motor is what actuates
the mechanism.
Note the simple gearing construction inside the auto doorlock motor
(black).
Closer view.
The $2 DC mortor burnt out, which led to my having spent $60 on this
component, which leads me to having to throw all this stuff in the
garbage, which will eventually end up in a landfill somewhere. Now,
where’s the environmentology in that? To exacerbate my frustration, the
doorlock motor on the driver’s side door also burned-out recently.
Support this amateur car repair blogger.
I sincerely hope that somebody at Honda will look into this issue and
take care of this nuisance. I’m certain that a quick database search
into the parts sold will quickly reveal the deficiency in this
department: If 500,000 Honda Civics were sold in 2001 and 6 Million Lock
Assembly (part number 72110-s5p-A22) has been purchased since, it
doesn’t take a genius to figure out what the problem may be.
This article is yet another transplant from 10-25-2007, from an older version of chisheu.com powered by Drupal®.
