Back to fiddling again

After a long gap since finishing (ha!) Skylark in time for summer I must admit I've not done much else, but as usual a few niggles to sort so back to Sat morning fiddling.
First was an annoying rattle coming from the drivers seat since I moved it to do the oil last weekend, turns out in the end it was the air box lid which was not fastened down properly, one clip bent so probably never fitted properly. Sorted clip and its now tight and snug. When I fitted the Smart seats I must have fluked it with clearance so Mr Lump Hammer came out to play...no clearance issues any more.
Also had a roar noise when I accelerated, thought exhaust had gone but loose air box cover I now think explains the noise as both started at same time coincidentaly.
Then next on the list was the rear brake light not working. Had this issue of intermittant lights before. This time tracked it down to just dirty multiplug connection, cleaned it up, evicted dead spider (how that got in I'll never know) and all working again.
I changed the instrument lighting to LED strips last year and been great but last couple of weeks one strip taken to flicker. So off came the facia and it was the two prong connectors that the LED strips came with. They were just too loose, a slight nudge produced a flicker. Out came the soldering iron and I took them out and now no flicker.
While I had the instrument panel off thought I would have another go at connecting up a lights on warning buzzer as I left them on again this week but fortunately someone noticed and everyone now knows whose the van is on the car park now. I'll update the thread with how I get on with the last job as light was going when I had done the LEDs.

Post 2001 vans have a lights on buzzer fitted into the loom.

Unfortunately the earlier vans don't have the connector there for it

But the door switches are ground switches, and the side lights are live switched.

So if you got a buzzer, connected one wire to the back of the drivers side light feed in the footwell, and the other wire to the dome lamp, with a diode in series, then it would work fine. Without the diode the side lights will be permanently on, fed by the interior light!

Interesting... I'm planning for a little project where I make a buzzer do the Super Mario tune if I ever get the time.

HighlyJetted wrote:

Thanks, thats interesting, left lights on again yesterday so its definately a christmas job. Bought a combined relay/buzzer so going to fit it inside the steering column cowl where I can get to acc power and lights etc easily (a tip from Woody)

The Warning Buzzer that I have found in my " Goodies" is this Sparkrite one probably from the late 80's or early 90's. Sparkrite were primarily known for producing Electronic Ignition Systems that clipped onto the Ignition coil and also replaced the points with the a "Hall Effect" Pickup Module and Ferrite Rods Rotor. They also made Car Alarms and other accessories.

Motor Manufacturers started fitting Electronic Ignition as and inbuilt Alarm Systems which was the death nell for Sparkrite presumably.

This Lights on Buzzer is very simple to wire into the vehicle electrics.

Hall effect pickup hey, ahead of their time. Every rotation sensor is hall effect nowadays, wheel speed, steering angle, crank, cam, vehicle speed sensor!

In 1973 Lucas came out with the Electronic Distributor which used the Hall Effect System in it, for a few British cars to start off with. BMC A Series engines, Ford Pre-Xflow and Cross-Flow, Lotus Cortina etc.

I had a very highly tuned Cross-Flow in my 1600E Cortina so I bought the Lotus Electronic Distributor for it. Unlike the other Lucas Distributors it didn't have a Vacuum Advance/Retard unit on it. It was blanked off. It just relied on the Centrifugal Bob weights on the Rotor for minimal Advance/Retard.

I had read about the release of the Hall Effect Distributor by Lucas in one of the Car magazines, most likely Motoring News. So I just had to buy one. It was serious money at the time.

They did explain how Hall Effect worked in the article, how it had these tiny Ferrite Rods in a plastic rotor passing the Sensor. It had been known about for quite some time apparently but that was the summation of matter.

So I have just Googled "Hall Effect" and was amazed to find that it was discovered in 1879 by an American called..... Edwin Hall. He discovered it 18 years before the Electron was even discovered. Not that means a great deal to us today for things electrical that we take for granted.

Woodie wrote:.   He discovered it 18 years before the Electron was even discovered. Not that means a great deal to us today for things electrical that we take for granted.

Aye, bring back candles I say, none of this fancy new fangled electricity, work of the devil I tell ye!!!!

Www.12voltplanet.com

Eventualy got a warning buzzer fitted because Mr Numpty cant remember to keep turning his headlights off! Easy job in end, steering column off and all connections you need are there. Job sorted.

I screwed up replacing something and mine came on all the time. I carefully removed it......
Now i have a wee jump pack