I didn’t see a thread of home mechanic tips and tricks.

Several of us like to work on our cars at home. Since these vehicles can be enormously difficult to work on I figured a “tips and tricks” thread might be useful to help other forum members get lessons learned on project(s). I came across one yesterday.

I had the entire exhaust off my car and trying to get the mid section back on the cat down tubes was proving to be impossible. Even with the wife’s help. The cat down tubes have lips on them that even when spreading the resonator clamps as wide as possible there’s no chance I was strong enough. Even with a brass mallet and wiggling. Fought it for 30 minutes before going…I need to think of something else.

So, a ratchet strap around the front resonator and around the transmission mount. Ratchet it down home in 5 seconds with one millionth the physical effort

That’s my tip for this.

https://ibb.co/gLQ901kf

 

Supercharged XJR, the tip I used all the time is when doing the rear brakes, there is no need to go through either de-powering the car to force it to relearn the e-brake or having the need for some electronic device to reset the e-brake. On the earlier cars (2010 to mid 2016 from what I can figure), you simply do the brake job like you would any car. But, before putting the tire on, use your thumb or a pair of pliers and operate the e-brake lever a few times to get the pads close to the rotor. This should put things close enough that the car will not trigger any warnings for the e-brake.

The other common one that people go looking for how to reset the windows and sunroof. For the windows, start with the window closed. Now, press and hold the down button for the window. Let the window go all the way down and when it hits the bottom, keep holding the button to lower the window an additional 5 seconds (after about 2, you may hear a click, you can release any time after the click). Now, lift up on the switch and close the window. Again, continue trying to close the window once it reaches full travel. Listen for the click or 5 seconds. Repeat for each window. This should reprogram them.

As for the sunroof, press and hold the button for the sunroof. Let it run through the whole sequence of opening and shutting. Once the sunroof is shut again, release. tada, done.