Declan McCormack Vehicle Repairs

19/02/2025

Another lovely little belt on the little Puretech PSA engine. Seeing lots of these at the moment as well as the wet belts

09/08/2023

N57 BMW in-house inlet valve walnut blasting to remove heavy carbon build up and allow this lovely girl to breath again

07/07/2023

I love how shops and fuel stations always have Adblue stacked outside in the sun and it’s been over 30 deg in places. it’s no wonder some cars fail the urea percentage test when we test the Adblue as part of the diagnosis on SCR systems.
Do the Adblue suppliers not educate their customers on how it should be stored

16/05/2023

Diesel Injector seal blowby leak today. some lovely hardened carbon to remove and clean

12/01/2023

Glad it’s not Friday 13th yet with orange cables in the workshop today

04/01/2023

Sometimes you can have all the diagnostic equipment in the world but a simple volt drop procedure can w**d out a little gremlin like this little fellow causing a non start on a 6.0 litre VXR8. It’s had a new battery and a shiney new starter fitted somewhere else but the non starts persisted. Some very basic old school checks found this little fellow causing chaos and mayhem. Wiring connections cleaned and a new nut fitted and she starts on the button. Keep your nuts tight and bright!

20/10/2022

Land Rover Discovery Sport power transmission unit replacement with some very expensive but correct oil going in to protect and lubricate

01/08/2022

2016 Honda HRV presented to the workshop with intermittent electric handbrake operation. Carried out fault scan with no fault codes stored for EPB system so back to basics and find intermittent voltage drop effecting the system operation. Charge rate drops intermittently to 11.8 volts. This alternator uses a LIN controlled charge system controlled by the engine PCM to between 12 and 16 volts. So took control of the LIN wire to force the alternator to full charge proving the alternator was capable of full charge proving the alternator was ok. Carried out voltage drop testing of cables and proved a poor connection at the positive battery fuse box was effecting alternator control lowering voltage and effecting network operation. It was also found that battery terminals suffered from green corrosion so they were cleaned and as the poor connection was inside the sealed fusebox that was replaced with full EPB hand brake operation restored. This type of fault proves that the scan tool will never find every fault so if you ask your garage just for a plug-in it would be hard earned money down the pan.

08/06/2022

Always like a challange that AN Other hasn’t been able to fix. Freelander TD4 non start with multiple fault codes stored and multiple faults it would later transpire. Previous garage replaced the high pressure fuel pump with a questionable reconditioned unit and still a non start. Fault codes as per whiteboard list with no fuel pressure generated. Test faulted sensors and find missing live feeds and traced to missing fuse and relay in wrong position on relay board. Replaced fuse which promptly blew so worked back and found shorted fuel pump suction valve. Replaced suction valve with now low fuel pressure generated. Visual check found kinked fuel supply rubber pipe so cut pipe back to correct length to remove the kink with no improvement in pressure. Tested primer pump and dead head tested to prove its maximum pressure which was well within specification. Carried out cranking injector leak back test with no excessive leak from any 1 injector to lower rail pressure so remove and replace high pressure fuel pump which was unable to generate the minimum starting rail pressure. Cleared down fault memory and started vehicle with inlets off to confirm no leaking fuel. One wonders how this vehicle had multiple issues which can only be down to human intervention trying to track down the reason why the assumed good “Reconditioned” pump still caused the vehicle not to start. You can never assume any part even if new is good so you have to test and not guess.

18/05/2022

Summer is on its way, air-conditioning repairs have started

18/03/2022

A diesel with poor hot and cold starting and poor running issue recovered in for a second opinion after diagnosis in another garage of injectors required with fault codes stored for camshaft sensor and number 2 and 4 injectors open circuit. After 2 quick tests I confirmed this 4 cylinder was now only a 3 cylinder and no amount of injectors was going to solve this problem. There was no apparent misfire when running which may have sent the previous garage off on the wrong path and the injector codes may have influenced their decision to advise injectors required. Proof you must test and not guess.

31/12/2021