All over for G164 CKV... didn't make the moon after all.

[HighwayStar]

Firstly my many thanks to Tiamat and the rest of the committee for taking the time to consider the issue and for unlocking this thread to enable me to respond to the most recent posts. Due to the sensitivity of many elements involved I propose to leave the meat of my dispute with Luke to be dealt with in my other thread in the Trader Feedback section which of course you are all welcome to follow should Luke ever choose to respond to it.
What I would like to do is respond directly to Ollie's points and explain why I feel so aggrieved.

This is a public forum and I choose to frequent it precisely because I enjoy hearing and considering the views and opinions of others.. often I find my own perspective shifted by the impact of others carefully reasoned and forcefully argued views.
However whilst Ollie writes "It seems clear you are unhappy when people offer their opinion (which is all I'm doing)" he seems to have overlooked his earlier post which stated "Seems a catch 22 for Luke here, customer doesn't want to pay any diagnosis yet wants to know what is wrong. Communication issue aside Luke didn't break the engine, it came to him broken"
I'm sorry Ollie but that last sentence sounds to me like a statement of fact you are simply in no position to make. If as you are now saying it is in fact just your own opinion I would love to know what it is based on. To have reached this opinion you have obviously had to form a view on what the electrical issue was that killed the batteries (and in my view then the engine also) and to have decided it either wasn't Luke's fault or simply wasn't related to the engine failure. I have to say I am very happy about this since Luke has so far refused to explain it to me.
Tell me... what is your explanation?

I also have to take issue with the first part of that paragraph. It is not that I do not want to pay for any diagnosis it is rather that I do not see why I should be paying for any diagnosis of a fault which began with Luke's work.

You go on to say that "dragging up stuff like this is just clutching at straws, it's just a weak attempt to rubbish someone who you used to be friends with". Well again I must disagree and suggest instead that what you have written is as accurate a description of your own actions as I could make myself. I am not clutching at straws but am asking direct, relevant questions which still one month on remain unanswered. Frankly I have no need to rubbish anybody when their own silence on this matter achieves it with much more eloquence than I could ever muster myself.

Lastly I would refer you to the inaccuracies you persist in using even after I have taken the trouble to point them out to you and ask you to either explain why you continue to persist in them or to retract them. You write "I say it how it is. How it is for me is that you've had issues with that engine overheating for at least 3 years". I'm sorry but I thought I'd been very clear already that the only serious issue this engine has ever had was the overheating which was resolved by the replacement of the H/G. It certainly didn't start 3 yrs ago and hasn't recurred since the work was done. Perhaps you could explain again in a bit more detail just how you have formed this opinion and just exactly what it is based on?

The hour is late and I'm tired and a little fed up of having to continually carve through the (as far as I can tell) unreasoned 'opinions' of Luke's close friend so I'm off to the land of nod. I'd love to hear more theories and welcome ideas but please... it would help if you based them on the facts and some sound logic.

R.

[Slarty]

I think part of the problem Rob, is that you "seem" to be hell bent on blaming Luke (or by an act of his work, Luke) on the demise of your engine, yet openly admitting that you don't know what killed the engine (I can only surmise this by the very existance of this thread). Compound this with the fact that some of us are "friends" of Luke and as such, seem to be dismissed out of hand as being biased.

From a purely subjective point of view, I honestly can't see a link between the electrical system of your (or indeed any) car being linked to the engine failure. The only theory that I can come up with is that just before you last shut the engine off, there was some kind of catastrophic failure in the electrical system that caused the ECU to fully open the injector on the offending cylinder, causing massive bore wash which in turn made the cylinder pick up on the bore leading to the siezure.

Having now typed that, I look back on it and think "hmmmm, there's a chance, but hell, it's a one in a million, at best". Even if that were (unlikely as it is/sounds) the case, would changing the alternator/battery cause that? I don't honestly know and I guess due to the above points, it's difficult for me to say anything more as I'm in danger of being dismissed as being a friend of Lukes, even though in truth I'm just an aquaintance at most.

Also, diagnostising a fault over the interweb is difficult enough with relatively simple problems. More in depth ones such as this are near on impossible. All most of us can do is offer ideas/theories which in all honestly could be wide of the mark at best.

[tonigmr2]

Rob get it transported to another specialist, at least then you will have a second opinion.

[KarlBristol]

Rob get it transported to another specialist, at least then you will have a second opinion.

+1 it'll set your mind at rest and resolve this one way or another then
Besides, a fresh pair of eyes sometimes sees things that others don't/can't

[HighwayStar]

I've already had it removed.

Sorry guys to all who think I'm having a pop at them simply for being Lukes friend but I honestly can't grasp why you cannot see my point since I thought I'd explained myself quite well.

Slarty, just to be plain I strongly suspect that what killed my engine was a massive electrical short since that is the only reasonable explanation I've had and I've had it from several other specialist garages and engine designers who I've discussed the symptoms with. The massive power drains on batteries which are apparently a classic symptom began after Lukes work. I have asked Luke why and what his thoughts are of said electrical short and had no reply for a month and as yet no alternative explanation.

I've laid down the facts here time and again only to have them continually ignored so it seems to me therefore that the time has come to conceed that future discussion here is useless.

[PW@Woodsport]

I'm afraid as a subjective onlooker/Mr2 specialist, i agree with Slarty, i cannot see any credible direct link between the alternator/charging system and a mechanical engine failure, of course experience tells me that nothing is impossible, god knows we've come across some very strange mr2 issues over the years.

The probability of an alternator causing the engine to fail is extremely low, so improbable that we really shouldn't be even considering it but as with anything it can't be discounted. As Slarty says only something like a main charging cable shorting to ground (even then it should blow the main fuses first) and possibly causing an electrical problem on the harness making an injector stay open for example, filling a cylinder with fuel (Luke diagnosed that i believe) and causing bore wash/ring problem/seizure seems to be the only explainable link between the two, however i say that with a raised eyebrow as it really is stretching mechanical reasoning somewhat.

I would have thought that diagnosing what has actually happened should be relatively straight forward, i would start by finding out what has fundamentally caused the engine to stop turning over, be it a big end bearing, ring/bore problem or something else mechanically preventing the engine from turning over.

After that you can immediately dismiss or include other factors as being relevant to that failure, for instance a big end failure cannot in any way be linked to the charging system no matter how wild you think about a possible link.

I agree with the others, you need a second opinion, you may also find that your two faults (electrical and mechanical) are in no way linked and has suffered a coincidental failure.

The only thing i cannot get my head around is how an engine runs perfectly the night before and you wake up to a seizure.

I do think you need some cold hard facts about what has actually happened before blaming anyone. As before there's a free engine here if you want it.

[HighwayStar]

Paul I have never said the alternator might be to blame. You are just wandering away from the facts. I suspect a massive short as I have just said in my previous post and which you have just agreed might be an explanation. As stated already several others agree with you and indeed consider it the strongest possibility on the information to hand thus far.
What none of you wish to debate it seems is why Luke himself will not discuss this electrical issue with me nor the possibility it opens. I am the customer here, I have specifically asked him to explain this electrical problem, the only problem that can be proven to exist just before the failure with the potential to cause it (and which started after his electrical work) and he has not.

You may very well be correct and it is not connected in any way to the engine failure but until it is addressed we'll never know will we. Luke should have been the one addressing it and certainly for free in the circumstances. If you changed an alternator but a new battery then lasted less than 3 days would you refuse to explore and explain to your paying customer why?

We go round in circles and there is no future in continuing to make my point if nobody intends to listen so lets leave it that Luke is just brilliant and completely infallible, never making an error he maintains great communications and is well within his rights to refuse to re-examine or discuss work he does which might appear to be substandard even when the customer who has paid good money for it asks it of him.
There, I take it everybody will be happy now... except of course for me who happens to be that customer.

[Nails]

Just stick my oar in and show my support for Rob. I've seen this time and time again on forums and its always the same. The question is never 'if' the trader is wrong though as all the cling on's crawl out of the woodwork and point blank refuse to believe that there's a chance that their own demi god may in fact be wrong.

I won't pretend to guess on what's caused it, but it would be very strange for a coincidence like this also. What the others seem to be failing to grasp as well, is that robs car has had some electrical problems that have been paid for to fix and they haven't. How can you take your car with this kind of problem to a trader, to be told alternator and battery, pay your money and it still not work? Fair enough the problem isn't always the first thing you try but you'd imagine the demi god would have far more knowledge than us mere mortals and would have checked things out rather than just going for the first things that anyone would when faced with this kind of problem .

For this part of the puzzle not to be mentioned or addressed by luke on why he hadn't fixed the charging issue only adds to the feeling that something isn't right here

[Steve Horrocks]

How can you say Paul is wandering away with the facts, but then seem set on a suspicion? (also, not being argumentative, but can't type it as it'd be said!)
I can't "realistically" see a link, as Paul said, it's really stretching possibilities.

Firstly, before even finger pointing, you/we need to know what exactly is seizing the engine then work backwards.
I agree Luke's communication seems (from what we can see) non existent, but he may just be wary (spelling) of suggesting something for fear of it being taken as gospel & then later be told that he's wrong.

From his business perspective, he's not going to want to spend hours/days not getting paid to find something that could not be his fault, so would you foot the bill if that's the case?

Just a shame there's no simple explanation, realistically, take Paul's offer of free engine, and get yours opened at leisure to find the issue? Would cost a lot less than buying a new car....

[PW@Woodsport]

Paul I have never said the alternator might be to blame. You are just wandering away from the facts. I suspect a massive short as I have just said in my previous post

Rob i'm afraid that is exactly what you have been blaming the engine failure on from the start, as a mechanic i'm telling you that it is extremely unlikely that the two faults are connected. So unlikely that it barely counts as a possible. A massive short would be something directly linked to a poor alternator fitment, however it is a million miles away from explaining a seized engine.

If the two can somehow be linked directly together then you have every reason to feel aggreived, but until the time that it is proven you appear to be looking to blame Luke for everything.

I would agree with you that there has obviously been a misdiagnosis with a charging fault or possibly even a workmanship issue with an alternator, who knows, but at this point blaming a dead short on the seizure of the engine is quite frankly tenuous at best.

I have no vested interest with Luke or yourself, just looking at it from a straight on mechanical viewpoint.

Mate, have it properly diagnosed and take it from there, it could get embarrassing for you if the two faults are completely unrelated (and in my opinion that is 99% going to be the case) , but there is that 1% element of possibility. I wouldn't blame Luke for that 1% until you have proven otherwise.

Please take my comments as constructive, i do agree with you there has been an underlying charging issue, new batteries don't die without reason, but in the same breath, nor do engines sieze up on driveways.

[Super_red]

The injectors are given a permenent live once the ignition is on meaning that only a single wire to the injector would need to short to any source of earth for the injector to stay open. Maybe this has happened and as soon as the ignition was turned on the injector poured fuel into the cylinder. If the ignition was on for a while without cranking it would easily fill a cylinder up leading to a hydro locked situation but this would then not seize the engine, even bore wash wont happen that quickly, you need to have an engine running rich to get bore wash. The alternator wire runs through the same loom as the injector wires (on my turbo car at least).

Turning a starter against a hydro locked engine could damage the starter and then lock the engine up but its a long shot, starters are pretty robust. Removing the starter would clear the fault and I am sure that has been tried.

If you drive a car you know has a fault though you are at least partially responsible for the outcome.

[jasongtr]

its a shame when these threads appear to go in the direction its going in.

The OP obviously wants an explanation as to why his car was fine then wasnt, the trader obviously doesnt want to be drawn into a war of words on an open forum because of potentially damaging his reputation.

Nobody other than the OP and the trader is going to know the real truth in the matter and everyone else can only offer advice as the information is stated here. Other good traders have offered mechanical advice based on the stated facts and their knowledge cant seem to confirm a likely link between the problems, very generous of Paul to offer a free engine too.

Any other input about the OP making a bad decision not changing the engine years ago is just pointless, i seem to remember a thread about the cars mileage and people commenting on how good it was to see one still going strong with that mileage, maybe if the engine was changed earlier the thread would still be viable but its a bit like triggers broom then, several new heads etc......

I do agree it would be a shame if it was the end for the car especially when a free engine is on offer, i assume the OP couldnt fit the engine himself to save costs. The comment about selling a couple of items like the rear spoiler and rev6 lights to pay for the engine transplant has got to be a consideration (maybe after the OP steps back and thinks about the long term rather than being angry right now)

just my 2p's worth

[HighwayStar]

I should just like to update all who are following this thread with the news that Luke has just called me to discuss the matter.

Whilst we are still at loggerheads over many issues he has now taken steps to try to explain to me both his thoughts and actions (and perhaps more importantly some of his inactions) with regard to both my main issue and the root of my subsequent suspicions... his initial electrical diagnosis/work and the continuation of electrical problems with the car prior to the engine failure and his previous lack of an explanation for them.

I still do not know what to think about either these electrical issues (other possibilities were not put forward) or the engine failure and I am still massively unhappy about the disastrous communications that led us to this point and helped me to my conclusions. I cannot forget nor forgive the accusation of lying.

That said however, I must conceed he has made contact with me to confront these difficult issues and regardless of all the rest that alone has gone some way to at least lessening if not eradicating both suspicions and anger.

I'm still miffed with those whom I believe have posted here out of blind loyalty or friendship without regard to the facts (occasionally despite them) but I accept that this is a public forum and that they are entitled to do so regardless of whether or not I consider it fair or justified. Perhaps I would hope for it myself from my friends in the event of a similar dispute if I were a trader. I should also like to take this opportunity to again thank the committee for their impartiality, time and effort for they have afforded me equal rights to respond to and question those aforementioned posts.

Where to from here? Trust is hard won in any arena in life from business to love and I'm afraid once damaged it shatters all too easily. I will have to accept that I will never know why my pride and joy will never turn a wheel again and likewise have to accept that whilst suspicions still abound I cannot prove that Luke was a factor in it. Since our conversation and his genuine attempts at reconciliation I am less sure of it anyway although I still believe it a possibility. The trust has gone though, the uphill struggle to examine and understand and repair looms too large and too steep and the whole depressing, anxiety forming and expensive experience is too much to ask my ever patient better half to continue to support me through. It is this real human relationship rather than the one I have had with my 2 for the last 13 years which must now take priority and without doubt the second has been having a detrimental effect on the first. Oh well. At least I aimed for the moon eh?

Goodbye all. My very best wishes. Safe driving.

R.

[PW@Woodsport]

Rob i understand your frustrations with the car, but i do think you are blowing its failure out of proportion somewhat, i still believe it could have something easy wrong with it, going back to the driving fine the night before and failed on your driveway.... but anyhow.... surely the easy thing to do is just stick another lump in there and enjoy more years of Mr2 ownership?

For gods sake Rob, if it meant the life and death of the car and you have no money get the car to me and i'll put another Mr2 engine in the bloody thing for free for you! (i have a long waiting list but if you're happy to wait that offer is genuine)

We all suffer mr2 trials from time to time, if you genuinely want to save the car let me know.

[jasongtr]

awesome offer, free engine free fitting

no brainer

[Peter Gidden]

Rob i understand your frustrations with the car, but i do think you are blowing its failure out of proportion somewhat, i still believe it could have something easy wrong with it, going back to the driving fine the night before and failed on your driveway.... but anyhow.... surely the easy thing to do is just stick another lump in there and enjoy more years of Mr2 ownership?

For gods sake Rob, if it meant the life and death of the car and you have no money get the car to me and i'll put another Mr2 engine in the bloody thing for free for you! (i have a long waiting list but if you're happy to wait that offer is genuine)

We all suffer mr2 trials from time to time, if you genuinely want to save the car let me know.

If Paul gets the engine to me, i'll fit it FOC.

[PW@Woodsport]

Outstanding Peter, i'll actually bring the engine down personally and we'll both stick it in one Saturday or something. (it needs a rev3 harness and ECU, otherwise all good to go) . Anyone got a rev3 engine harness/ECU they'd like to donate to a good cause?

Come on Rob, two of the countrys Mr2 specialists working on your car at the same time

[alanmr2turbo]

no-one could get a better offer than that. Anyone who passed up that opportunity needs their heads seeing to........ well, providing they want to stay with their MR2

[jasongtr]

i can supply a free rev3 NA engine loom if this goes ahead

[vtecpower]

Rob i understand your frustrations with the car, but i do think you are blowing its failure out of proportion somewhat, i still believe it could have something easy wrong with it, going back to the driving fine the night before and failed on your driveway.... but anyhow.... surely the easy thing to do is just stick another lump in there and enjoy more years of Mr2 ownership?

For gods sake Rob, if it meant the life and death of the car and you have no money get the car to me and i'll put another Mr2 engine in the bloody thing for free for you! (i have a long waiting list but if you're happy to wait that offer is genuine)

We all suffer mr2 trials from time to time, if you genuinely want to save the car let me know.

If Paul gets the engine to me, i'll fit it FOC.

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