My 300 just failed MOT today on a few points. Its a 92 Z32 TT Manual. Below is what it failed on most are easy to remedy:

 

nearside registration plate bulb not working

 

nearside front brake caliper has restricted free movement

 

offside rear wheel steering ball joint has excessive play

 

nearside rear wheel steering connection has excessive freeplay

 

and brakes not tested due to caliper problem

 

now the first 2 should be no problem as long as i can get the caliper to free off i think it is just binding slighty any advise on this?

 

i saw it on the ramps for the rear wheels and the offside rear hicas link bush looks a bit worn so if anyones knows where i can get a pair of these to do both sides please advise.

 

on the nearside when the rear wheels were raised and he tested the rear bearings the wheel would move a bit suggesting freeplay and looking underneath it looks like its from inside the hicas boot. Ive not much knowledge of the hicas system so any help will be grateful and is it meant to move slighty with the engine running and rocking the wheel side to side?

 

Any help or links to parts would be good as ive got 10 days to do it myself plus is there any performance bushes for the hicas link arms.

 

Thanks everyone

sorry to hear about the fail not to bad though !!, mike at mjp would be a good first enquiry on the bushes

 

Chris

this may help, its how i done the inner outer balljoints

 

http://www.300zx.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=92607

Not good when your told its failed, but at least the items arent serious and should be pretty straight forward to repair.

 

One concern though!

 

nearside front brake caliper has restricted free movement

 

WTF do they mean by that? take it the caliper pistons are sticking and causing the bind you mentioned. If thats the case they should still have carried out a brake test, I cant really see a valid reason not to. What happens now if you fix all the points, take it back and the brakes dont meet the efficiencies or something else is highlighted, it means more time of the road and also likely that they will charge a full test fee as technically you are only entitled to one partial retest!

I was thinking the same.The caliper doesnt have sliders like a single pot so how can that failure apply.I think the testers been over zealous.The failure critera has been mis interpeted.That should have failed on excessive bind if the calipers sticking.

basically, the new rules and regs mean that they cant get as many cars through a test an hour as they could, i know most retest's now are free, but they hope they get the work out of it to make up the revenue lost on mot's per hour-where as before they didnt want to be tied down to piddly brake probs when they could whack another test through for £40

I know i changed the front brake pads before and the piston on that side was a little stiff but wouldnt think it was a fail plus mot prive is up due to new laws it was 48 quid.

 

i have just seen another one i missed too which is drivers seat insecure. I had a look and the electric motor to make the rear bottom of the seat go up and down (the bit you sit on not the part of the seat against your back) isnt connected. The motor works fine but it seems a collar is missing which joins the shaft from the motor to the splines onto the seat to control the up and down movement af the back of the seat. The one for the front works fine so any ideas on this part as well.

 

Any ideas about the hicas ball joint fault ive seen the shortcut for changing the ball joint on the link arm and thats fine for the offside but he failed it on the nearside for steering connection has excessive play. Now i quizzed him about hicas and he didnt seem familiar with it but need some sort of spec to show if it is meant to have freeplay when staionary with engine running. Ive looked at diagrams for the hicas and can see the rod that goes into the actuator is on a thread so wouldnt think this is loose and the bush the other end seems fine.

 

Thanks for the help so far guys