Ask The Guide

The starter motor on this vehicle is located down low on the front of the engine. Conventional wisdom is to remove the air-box and part of the intake trunking to access the starter motor's fasteners and wiring, and then remove the starter itself from below the engine bay after removing the plastic underbody protection panel. Don't forget to remove the negative battery terminal before starting any of this.

I can assure you the 2013 BT-50 was, indeed, engineered with a heater and this came standard with any BT-50. The dial that controls the coldness of the air-conditioning is the same one that controls the heating. Turn the dial all the way clockwise and you should have warm air entering the cabin through the various vents.

If not, then I'd suggest that a previous owner has blocked off the car's coolant supply to the heater core by rerouting the plumbing so the hot engine coolant no longer enters the heat exchanger in the cabin. This was probably done because the heat exchanger was leaking and this was a quick way to stop the leak and keep the vehicle operational, albeit without a heater. It's one of the oldest tricks in the used-car book.

The best bet is to take the car to a radiator specialist who will be able to figure out what has been removed or bypassed and reinstate the necessary hardware so that your car is heated once again.

This sounds like a case of low transmission fluid. Check the transmission dipstick according to the instructions in the owner's manual to see if the level is where it should be. Low fluid level can cause all sort of problems from slipping to a lack of drive to uneven shifts and shifts occurring when they shouldn't. Also, try to find out what fluid was put in the transmission when it was last serviced. The wrong type or grade of fluid can cause the same types of problems as not enough fluid.

If the fluid checks out, then you need to start looking at other causes such as glitches in the on-board computer that controls the driveline. An electronic scan of the vehicle would be the next step.

The Daimler with its V8 engine retailed back then for the princely sum of $188,500 which was comfortably more than a family house in a decent suburb of most Australian cities at the time.

But it's also interesting to look back at what the Daimler was selling against in those days. In this case, it was cars like the Mercedes-Benz S420 S-Class which retailed for an even more impressive $229,300 and the BMW 7-Series 740iL at $208,000.

The great news for fanciers of these cars now is that thanks to buyer trepidation at the thought of complex, imported components going expensively wrong, any of this trio are bargains today. Any of them can be found in good condition for comfortably under $20,000 of today's dollars and, if you're prepared to take a punt and walk away if it all goes wrong, they can be brilliant cars for weekends away, even if their projected running costs precludes them as everyday transport.

I'm not sure how an electric piece of equipment continues to function when its fuse or relay has ben removed, so maybe you need to check that you're pulling the correct fuse. The car's owner's manual should contain a list of fuses, their location and what circuit they relate to.

In any case, problems like this one are often the fault of the car's body computer which can fail, allowing all sorts of random errors to crop up in anything from the climate-control stuff to the central locking. If that's the case, a new body computer may be required, but these can be obtained second-hand to keep costs down.

But before you do any of that, try these simple tricks: Using the key fob, press the door lock button and hold it down for at least a minute. Sometimes, this is enough to reboot the computer and restore normal settings. The second thing to try is to park the car and disconnect the negative battery terminal. Wait at least an hour (overnight is better) and then reconnect the battery and see if the car's computer has reset itself. It doesn't always work, but it's free and definitely worth a shot. Just make sure you have access to the radio's security code to restart it after disconnecting the battery.

Good news; Haval extended its factory warranty to seven years back in 2018, meaning that your car is still under factory warranty. So make it Haval's problem. Assuming you haven't damaged the screen (and the car hasn't been under water or anything similarly drastic) and the failure has been caused by an electronic or hardware fault or flaw, Haval's warranty dictates it needs to fix it.

Some oil consumption is normal for engines, and modern engines seem to use a little more than some older designs. That's because modern engines are designed with low-friction piston rings which are great for fuel economy but can lead to slightly higher oil consumption. However, 700ml per 1000km does seem high for what is not an especially high-performance engine, and one that has not travelled very far in the scheme of things.

It wouldn't be the first time a dealer (of any brand) has tried to fob off a customer concern with such a response, so I reckon you're on the right track by contacting Kia Australia's customer service division. I'd also follow up with a phone call as well as an email, but experience suggests Kia is one company that takes customer satisfaction seriously.

Your car is still covered by the factory seven-year warranty, so provided it's been serviced correctly, if there is a fault, it should be covered. Further investigation is warranted, including a compression and leak-down test to show if there's any deterioration in the performance of the engine's piston rings. Your local state motoring club is a good source for these tests, particularly as manufacturers tend to take the clubs and their mechanical inspections seriously.

This definitely does sound like a build-up of carbon and soot inside the intake system of the engine. Believe it or not, this is not an uncommon problem and occurs partly because of the emissions controls forced upon engine manufacturers.

The diesel engine in your car features an EGR (Exhaust Gas Recirculation) system which means the engine inhales a portion of its exhaust so that it goes through the engine twice and is burned more completely. That's good for emissions, but it means that exhaust soot is being consumed by the engine via the intake system.

Combine that with the oily fumes from the crankcase ventilation system (which also feeds into the intake) and you can soon wind up with a black, sticky, sooty glug that blocks the internal airways much as cholesterol blocks human blood vessels. In some cases, the only way to fix this is to remove the intake system and manually clean it out. This can be time consuming and expensive, but could easily be why your check-engine light is being triggered.

The other bads news is that this could happen again over time. The solution to that is to fit a quality air-oil separator (also known as a catch-can) which keeps the oil fumes out of the equation.

This automatic stop-start is an increasingly common feature on new cars and it's designed to save fuel by switching off the engine when you're, say, waiting at a red light. A lot of people find this function annoying and wish to turn it off permanently.

Depending on what version of the H9 you have, there should be a small switch down low on the centre console (near the hazard flasher switch) This will be marked with the same A-in-a-circle and, once you press it once, will disable the stop-start function. The catch is that you have to press this button every time you restart the car to disable the function.

But if you go into the Settings menu on the info-screen, you should also be able to find a listing for the stop-start function which, if you disable it this way, should keep it switched off.

It all depends on what sort of car we're talking about. If it's a relatively new car, you might have to buy a brand-new part. Even then, there are options, because you can buy a genuine replacement part from a dealership, or shop around for a differently-branded part (that may well be the same part number, from the same manufacturer, but in different packaging). Just be careful if you're shopping online as plenty of people have been scammed by fake websites offering the parts they need.

If it's an older car, don't rule out the good old parts recycling yard (or wrecking yard as those of us of a certain age know them). Something like a wiper linkage is unlikely to be in high demand, so if the yard has your make and model in stock, there's a fair chance it might have the part you need. The only catch here is that some yards insist you remove the part yourself, so you might have to take your tools with you. Generally speaking, a second-hand part from a wrecking yard should be a fraction of the cost of a new part. But check it carefully, as there are often no guarantees with second-hand parts.