Feb 3 - rust welding

Who needs fancy equipment when you've got Ontario MOT salt on the roads ?

I started work on Sandy's brakes.  Rims off, easy.  Calipers off, easy.  Caliper holders off, easy.  Left rotor ... retaining screw basically welded in place by the rust.  Stripped the allen head.  Next step, screw extractor (haven't done it yet though).  Right rotor, retaining screw came out easily.  Didn't go any further, no point in replacing one rotor.  Brake pad wear sensor ... welded to the brake pad.  Picked up a new one at Advance Auto Parts (haven't done it yet though).

Pads in place, calipers seem to be working ok, car is drivable.  I wanted to get those rotors done, and the hand brake pads, before Sandy drives too far.  She's taken Abby to the vet now and I'll get back at it once she's home.  I could probably leave it as is but might as well do the entire job.

I've ordered tires for her car as well, today.  With new tires in place we'll see if the residual vibration is balancing or the drive shaft.  It's a process.

As with our aged X5, we could easily put as much into the car as it's worth, but that's ok.  If we were replacing the car, we'd end up spending more.

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Well, not much progress.  I replaced the sensor wire but the light is still on.  There's very little to these so I'm not sure what's wrong.  Perhaps I have to do a reset somehow.  At this point Sandy can live with the light.

I picked up an extractor kit and the extractor broke off inside the bolt.  Great.  The next step would be to use the angle grinder or simply to drill out the head of the bolt.  While that might get the rotor off, it won't likely help extract the bolt.  At this point I'm going to leave it.  The rotors are fine; the calipers are working (BMW shops wouldn't replace calipers unless there's a problem). 

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I ordered the trailer hitch for the X5.  The cost is unconscionably high and even higher than they'd quoted before I bought the car.  P's me off but I'm not going to have U-Haul drilling holes where they shouldn't be, so I'm going to have to live with it.  I'll drop the car off next Tuesday for this work.

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We had pork chops for dinner.  Luckily they weren't organic. 

Onward !