My Quick Fix

Project: I want to restore my old GT6 brake calipers and the old chipped paint us very VERY tough so I plan to use paint stripper. To do this without harming the seals and soft alloys I need to split each caliper and remove pistons.

Problem: The pistons are stuck in, and will only come out under pressure.

Fix: I took an old piece of copper-nickel brake line and re-attached it to each caliper with the bleed nipple closed. The other end of the brake line has a flared end and tube-nut which just happens to perfectly fit into the Schrader adaptor on my bicycle Track Pump. Once attached I pumped the.. uh.. pump and watched the pistons move out of the calipers. They both popped out at around 20-30 PSI. Of course if you want to do this spectacularly and potentially damage the pistons, use a compressor

Important: When you pump the pistons out, you don’t want them to fire out and spray residual DOT 4 everywhere, you also don’t want the pistons to lock together, so it’s important to find a peice of wood slightly thinner than the brake discs and place it between the pistons.

Wood spacer inserted...

Brake line attached again...

Pump attached to brake line...

Pistons popped out...

So.. there’s a new version of EE available, and I want a free geek-shirt!

Have a looky at this linky…

Problem: Every time I open a Sherbet Fountain in the car while driving I always get some on my trousers!

Fix: Just flick the side of the tube a few times! wohoo! (keep one hand on the wheel at all times!)

Problem: I needed to set default timezone for a site to get Zen Cart installed. The usual way would be to call date_default_timezone_set from a globally included script, or to use the date.timezone option in a php.ini file. The problem is that I don’t have access to the php.ini file and there is no script that will be called across the board.

Fix: Turns out PHP flags can be called from .htaccess file. So assuming you are using Unix type hosting (or another server that can interpret distributed configuration files), you can add this to your .htaccess file to set the timezone:

php_value date.timezone Europe/London

Save that, upload it, and if you then look at the output of phpinfo() (create a php file with this in and upload it), you should see:

The Local Value should show what you set in the .htaccess file

Problem: Today I needed to add some code to a Shopp (ver 1.1.9) product.php template so that related products (that have same ‘Tag’) would show up at the bottom. The ‘Related Products‘ template tag was not behaving as I expected it to.. i.e. it was stopping the product page rendering anything at all.

Fix: After chatting to some of the support Mods on IRC (thanks @TheWebBaker and @umargl0bal, it seemed I might need to reset the category query (category docs- see ‘reset’ option) after calling ‘Related Products‘, but this didn’t work. I turns out (sort of obviously in hindsight) that the product query needed to be reset instead (product docs – see ‘reset’ option). Here’s some working code inside product.php:

<?php shopp('catalog', 'related-products'); ?>
<?php shopp('catalog', 'product', 'reset=1'); ?>

That code can be placed anywhere in the product template but it makes sense to put it at the beginning or end of the product listing.

Tips:

• If you want to show random products you can use the ‘order=random’ option in the ‘related-products’ tab (see below for an example).
• If you want to limit the number of related products shown, use the ‘show=#’ option also (see below for example).

<?php shopp('catalog', 'related-products','show=3&order=random'); ?>

• The related items will be rendered using the category.php template. If you want to create a custom template JUST for related items (you really do) then copy category.php as category-related.php and customise that. This new template file will be called to render the related products.

Any Questions? Try me, or IRC or the Shopp Support site

Fix: You don’t need to enable Japanese input languages or anything like that, just press and hold the zero ’0′ key and a ° symbol will pop up.

• Open Terminal
• type “sudo dscacheutil -flushcache” (without double quotes)
• press Return, you’re done.

Problem: My Fabia’s temperature indicator light started flashing and beeping at me a few minutes after the engine was started, each time I used the car. The coolant level was fine, and the car seemed to get up to temperature quickly and stay there, never overheating. A quick search of the Briskoda forum revealed that this is a common fault, caused by faulty terminals and/or electrodes in the expansion tank vessel.

Solution: On the VRS models, and possibly others, the electrodes that measure coolant level cannot be replaced or cleaned, so a complete expansion tank replacement is needed. Thankfully these are cheap (about a tenner) and easy to fit. Here is a fitting guide, with photos where necessary:

1) Unhook the loom carrier from the two fixing holding the tank in place.

Un clipping the loom thing from the tank.

2) Now disconnect the terminal on the rear of the expansion tank that connects the coolant level sensor to the loom. There are clips on the top AND the bottom of this clip. Don’t force it, if it doesn’t come off easily it’s likely because the lower clip is not being squeezed firmly enough.

Disconnect the level sensor teminal

3) Remove the overflow pipe (or maybe it’s a return pipe) at the top rear of the tank. This is most easily done with parallel pliers or mole-grips, by squeezing the sprung hose clamp, then easing the pipe off. Make sure you don’t lose the hose clamp in the engine bay. I found it best to tuck the pipe backwards under the strut brace to keep it out of the way.

Remove overflow pipe

4) Unclip the vacuum pipes from the vacuum thingy (if you know what this ‘thingy’ is, please leave a comment below telling me, and I’ll put the right name in). The two sprung clips are easy to press by hand as shown in the photo. You might hear a little ‘hiss’ (i did) when you do this. Doesn’t seem to be a problem.

Remove vacuum hoses from vacuum unit

5) Remove the two  front nuts that hold the vacuum thingy frame in. The plastic loom support will probably be right in your way for this. If you’ve completely unhooked it (see step 1) you should be able to manhandle the wiring backwards for the right-hand nut, and pulled right forward for the left-hand nut. The nuts have captive washers which is nice, but be sure not to let them drop in the engine bay!

Remove two front bolts for cage above turret

6) Remove the 3rd frame bolt right by the bulkhead. The angle can be a bit tricky and I found that an extension was needed with the socket set.

Remove the rear bolt from the frame

7) Now to get the frame out, you will need to pull the loom wiring and plastic support thing right out of the way forward. It hooks over the expansion tank socket quite nicely as you can see in the photo. Lift the frame gently off the two front fixings, then pull it towards the front of the car to get the frame off the rear fixing.

Moving the loom over the tank

 Lift the frame completely out of the way. I found that if you turn it 90 degrees it sits between the suspension turret and the rubber bonnet seal quite well.

Moving frame out of the way

9) Now remove the 2 fixings that hold the tank in. As shown in the photo below, the fixing is a bolt, a captive washer, and a screw all in one. A 10mm socket removes the fixing. Once both are removed, the tank will stay where it is until you lift it out.

Tank fixings

10) Now the tank is ready to come out, clamp the bottom hose near as near to the tank as possible (see pic for step 11) with a pair of mole-grips.
Caution: if you clamp it too right you risk damaging the hose, especially with the mechanical advantage that mole-grips give. It’s soft hose, so only needs to be squeezed a bit.
Then siphon the tank into a bottle or something with some tube. I’m not sure how corrosive G12 coolant is, but um.. don’t drink it.. or get it on your paintwork.. or eyes.. or sensitive bits.

Siphon the tank

11) Now that the tank is empty (more or less) you can use some pliers (parallel or adjustable ones are best for this) to loosen the sprung hose clamp with one hand, while pulling the tank free with the other hand. I found that the hose came off easily once the sprung clamp was very loose. If the hose doesn’t want to come free, it might be best to use a second pair of mole-grips on the sprung clamp, thus leaving two hands free to wrestle the tank and hose apart.

Unclamp the tank

12) If this is done carefully, there should be no spillage. The tiny amount of coolant left in the neck of the tank after it was siphoned should stay in the up-turned hose.

No spills

13) Now, fit the new expansion tank by reversing this process completely. Note: If G12 coolant is already in the system, G12 must be used when  the new tank is filled up. It’s best to use new coolant, and the OEM pink stuff is readily available for about £5-10 from any VAG dealer.

Problem: According to many websites and a few mechanics, replacing the nearside headlamp on a Mk1 Fabia vRS involves removing the battery and battery box. This is because the clear plastic light-cluster cover almost touches the plastic battery box. Thankfully this is not true, as I’ve just found out… you don’t even need very small hands

Fix: The bulb can be replaced by removing the cover and fitting the new bulb in a certain fashion best illustrated with some photos:

Very little space between the plastic light wiring cover, and the plastic batter box.

Detail showing the two plastic clips still in place... see next image.

Plastic clips pressed and popped backwards. The cover has two locating tabs at the bottom which it can partially hinge on.

Lift the cover slightly both sides to disengage the locating tabs on the bottom, then twist the whole thing clockwise, raising the left, and not pushing it too far towards the battery box. There is only one way this thing comes out.

Remove the black plastic connecter containing to spade terminals (large green circle). Unhook the spring-retainer clip from the notches (small green circle) in the bulb carrier.

Remove old bulb, taking note of the way it came out, tab upwards.

Insert new bulb. I found holding the terminals at 90 degrees between index and middle finger worked best. DO NOT TOUCH THE BULB GLASS!

… then replace the spring clip, and terminal connector, then replace the plastic cover in the exact reverse of the way you removed it.

Simple… but as people were actually taking their cars to a garage to do this I though it was worth posting a quick how-to. Happy to correct anything I have wrong, or explain things if you leave a comment!

Problem: Ok not really a problem, but I want to be able to launch Google Chrome straight to Incognito mode from a shortcut. This is useful when logging into multiple bank accounts, Google Apps accounts, or testing session based websites. etc etc etc.

Fix: Thankfully the Google Chrome.app can be launched with the –incognito switch to do just that. The terminal command to do this, assuming the browser is sitting in /Applications/ is this:

open -a /Applications/Google\ Chrome.app --args --incognito

Note: –args has to be passed to satisfy the ‘open’ command’s arguments first.

Launching it from a shortcut: If you want to create a shortcut to do this, open AppleScript Editor and enter the following:

tell application "Terminal"
	activate
	do script "open -a /Applications/Google\\ Chrome.app --args --incognito;"
	delay 1
	quit
end tell

Note: The space in the Google Chrome.app name must be double-escaped with two backslashes like that to work. Also, without the delay I found that the script exits too quickly or something like that, and it doesn’t work.

Save the above script as an Application, and call it something like ‘Incognito’. Running this app will launch Terminal, Chrome Incognito, then exit Terminal. Bingo!

Giving your Incognito app an Icon: I’ve added the app to my Dock, and given it a special icon (see below for a downloadable PNG icon). To do this:

• Open the image you want to use as the icon – it should be a 512×512 24bit PNG if possible – and copy the image to the clipboard. If you are using Preview to view the image, do cmd+a to select all, then cmd+c to copy it… this works for most other graphics packages also.
• Locate the app you created above in Finder, then press cmd+i to bring up the info window (alternatively right-click the app then select ‘get info’).
• In the resulting pop-up, click on the icon at the top to highlight it like so (notice the blue halo around it):
  
• Then use cmd+v to paste the new icon from the clopboard into the icon area and it should look like this:
  
• Close the info window, and it’s done. You should now have a nice looking shortcut that opens Chrome Incognito with one or two clicks!

Feel free to use this icon. It’s just the standard one with some ‘colour replace’ work to make it blue. You could paste some tacky sun glasses over it if you wished