W126 SEC auxiliary fan replacement

Once I got the air conditioning working on the 560SEC it was apparent the auxiliary fan was not working. As can be seen in the wiring diagram below, the W126 SEC auxiliary fan can be triggered either by high coolant temperature or by refrigerant pressure. The diagram is for 1986-1990. In 1990, the W126 went to a dual fan setup. The fan can operate at two speeds based on a resistor.

My fan would not work even when fed 12v directly. I struggled to find a replacement fan from a brand I trust. I wasn’t that keen on a […]

Citroen DS Instrument cluster repair

Earlier in the week I had identified the lack of instrument cluster lighting was due to a crack in the instrument cluster circuit board. The crack was causing an intermittent broken circuit. I wasn’t able to find much on the internet about Citroen DS Instrument cluster repair. Looking at the board it looked like a very simple design. That gave me the confidence to come up with my own solution.

The easiest course of action would have been to solder a wire in place. I didn’t go with that approach as there is no soldering used on this circuit board […]

Citroen DS Instrument Cluster Lighting

Recently during a night drive I discovered my Citroen DS instrument cluster lighting had failed. In Sydney, where I live, this is a huge problem as the city is bristling with speed cameras. So many that I could lose my entire licence in about 10 minutes driving near my house doing only 10 km/h over the speed limit. I regularly drive at night, so I needed to find a solution.

My first assumption was the rheostat had failed. The rheostat is the dimmer that lets the driver control the brightness of the instrument cluster lights. Over time, these can develop […]

2020 Shannons Sydney Summer auction

I went to preview the 2020 Shannons Sydney Summer Auction today. If you had a budget of about $20-$35,000 AUD, there are a lot of interesting cars to choose from. Shannons do a pretty good job of finding a good variety of cars for each of their auctions – both in price range and types of car. They are a bit more picky than other firms such as Lloyds or Grays Online.

This auction also had a large number of the numeric numbers plates at massive prices. I’ve never seen the appeal of these.

Any fans of big German coupes, […]

Auto Brunch St. Ives February 2020

I attended the monthly Auto Brunch event in St. Ives Showground today.    This time I took my DS.   It was pretty dusty from all the smoke in Sydney, but still got a lot of attention.     Even though I have been four times,  there can still be a lot of variety and different cars I have not seen before.   This month there was a whole line up of Jensen Interceptors.   I’m a fan of the interceptor – it’s a big brute of a car combining Italian Styling, British engineering and an American (Chrysler) powertrain.

The Mercedes Club also […]