…part of the reason I’ve stuck with my 5 (beside the great drive) is up till now it’s been nice to work on and unlike the modern car only the important things are controlled by computer. Recently however, everything seems to be so corroded together its becoming a case of skills at freeing seized nuts and bolts rather than any mechanical knowledge. Annoying and no longer fun to work on.
MPG has been consistently poor for the last few weeks so decided to replace aforementioned sensors. Just been out for the last two hours and results are - not even a fraction of a mm movement in lambda sensor despite plety of plusgas and a homemade lever to exend the spanner to nearly 4ft in length. Tried exhaust both hot and cold (well after 2 hours it cooled down). And I tried to remove the coil pack to get at the coolant sensor and found the garage that modified my head last year has rounded the drivers side bolt and nut and screwed it in so tight there’s no chance I can get the bolt undone without doing even more damage. THought I’d get a nut slplitter on there to at least get some purchase on it but the gap is so tight I cant get any of my nut splitters on there.
Now I’m thouroughly p’d off because once again I’m going to have to take it to my local garage because rust and seized bolts have turned what should be a realtively easy job into virtual impossibility. Unless anyone has any inspiration they could share?
Sorry to hear that mate - sounds like a mare. First positive thing that comes to mind is that the seemingly welded in temperature sensor wouldn’t be my first port of call for high MPG figures (or should that be low? anyway…) Now if you were having high revs on idle, I’d be looking at trying to get that little chap out. As it is, I’d say the Lamba sensor needs cleaning / replacing, but you should also check the air filter / MAF - assuming you’ve a stock engine…
HTH