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I'm a bit nervous coding it out as I don't know the full consequences. However if it knows all about the other airbags it can fire, then surely it should fire them if the seatbelt is on - like it must do on the drivers side. Got to be better than an emulator that most likely says to the car that there is no-one on the seat (otherwise the seatbelt warning would go off all the time).

Just before I went away on Monday, a box arrived... Some ebay bargains; all from one seller and tbf, most of them were a job lot. Only the boxed Vanguards Rover was an individual sale, and after bidding on the job lot, I just added a couple of singles to make up the parcel. The Rover was the only one I won, of I think three or four. But then I don't bid very much! And then another box arrived! Now this one, wrapped in Happy Birthday paper, is bloody heavy, what can it be? A Birthday box from @FakeConcern, that's what it is! (And like the Danbox recently, I did actually send money for it.) I don't know what to do with the yellow Dinky caravan. I mean, I want the interior for another project, but apart from not having a door (normal) it seems too nice to break. The beige and blue caravan behind it, on the other hand, looks nice enough but the blacked-out windows mean no interior anyway, so I have no qualms at all about breaking that one up. In fact tonight I've been measuring it... The Express Services truck is something I already have, but now I have it on both types of wheel: the early spun hubs, and the later cast wheels. Happy bunny. Oh and two trips to the charity shops have brought in some more treasure too. Yes, a third yellow truck to go with the two I picked up recently. I'm guessing they were a set from new. Transporter (rigid chassis) with what looks like a Mercedes cab, but wait, is that a Corgi Toyota Supra in 1/36 scale? Why yes, so it is, and in very very nice condition too. The parcel shelf has got a bit displaced which is why the tailgate is up; but I've now fixed that with a pair of small pliers. I may have to start spreading my 1/36 fleet over more shelves! Oh and the pop-up headlights still work. Speaking of work... You don't need much in the way of words really, the pics tell you enough. Two batches through the stripping baths, and some shells in primer. Now here's something different... what would you think if you walked into a Carers' Support Cafe and saw this? I had arranged to run a quiz at today's meeting, just for fun, no prizes. Two lines of cars, ten from films and ten from TV. Each one identified on its tag, along with a star or two from the relevant production. All the carers had to do was identify the film or show in question. Actually there were 11 cars because for one film I used a matching pair, which was a clue in itself. From a possible 20 points the winner scored 10.5, which was pretty good considering my entire audience was Women Of A Certain Age, one of whom didn't even live in Britain when half these shows were on the air. It certainly got them thinking about something outside their usual "care" routine!

It's a trend that doesn't want to die isn't it? I remember Fast Ford magazine (or similar) talking about rat look Escorts in South London as long as 20(?) years ago.

The temperature slider on my heater panel is quite stiff. I'd never really thought about trying to amend it, but maybe I do need to lubricate something (everything) around the cable and heater valve. I wonder if the routing is quite poor and even when new it would have shown reluctance to move.

Seat occupancy sensor is an old BMW favourite and he scourge of every e46 owner.

Good sleuthing. Not sure it was the most sensible trick pulled by said driver. At least he could have topped it up...

The 1968 Fiat 124 Sport by Moretti. Due to the missing roof, the press dubbed it the Moretti Forgetti This was, at one time, owned by Jocky Wilson up in Kirkcaldy.

That airbag light. Programming the module was a massive pain. The steps aren't clear on what to do to actually flash it, not helped being in German. So ended up thinking it was flashed so carried on but got coding errors. Anyway ignored the guide and used instinct on the GUI. Ended up flashing okay. As a firmware engineer by trade, these progress bars especially make me nervous as I see them fail all the time when developing but I have other ways of fixing it when my own stuff. This stuff is bricked if it fails. Once that was sorted I realised that I was missing the expert profile in NCSExpert. Found a package with that and got the coding reset to default. But then the light didn't clear. INPA error code gave an error of unterbrechung sbe1. Not sure what that was I googled it. Which helpfully gave all results for German websites too. 😬 Plugged in my Foxwell and it gave something more intelligible. Ah! Okay a proper error. Quick Google of seat occupancy detectors find loads of emulator modules to make the car think it's okay with aftermarket seats. So with a failed sensor, it possibly means replacement seats are needed. Either the box is at fault or the mat. The error is coming back as open circuit so I presume it's the mat at fault. I'd rather not buy replacement seats if I can just make it think it's all okay. Checking the coding of the drivers side I found it was disabled. Unsurprisingly as it assumes someone is there all the time. Anyway I reckoned that it would be safe to disable the left occupancy sensor and it'll just fire the airbags as if someone is there. So coded it out with NCS Dummy and sent the code in with NCSExpert. VAG coding with VCDS is a million times easier and simpler than this shit. Taken all bloody night but I've managed to get the airbag system sorted and the light is now out. Success! Now just need to figure a solution for the fan resistor. Pretty sure I'll just chop the connector and solder it directly on. But first connect it all up on the terminals to make sure the resistor pack is indeed good.

Who's a dickhead? I'm a dickhead. The piston rings arrived today, and wouldn't you know it? The parts seller was correct, they weren't the right ones I needed - I needed 1.75mm thick rings, these were 1.5mm. At this point, I've ordered another set from Autodoc and thrown in the towel - this isn't going to NL any more. I can't get it rebuilt, MOTd and tested in a suitable timeframe. Disappointing, but it's entirely my own bloody fault To cheer myself up, I made a lunchtime trip to a random address in the next village over armed with some cash and came away with this: A brand new Hella remanufactured alternator for the MX5, for just £50. Bloody stoked with that result! Had to drill one of the bolt holes out to remove the thread in there (I had to do it on the old one too) but that was it. I'm getting good at fitting these now! Took the battery off charge and went for a test start: And all is working once again. To celebrate, I moved the MX5 and uncovered an old friend. Going to look at the exhaust this weekend to see if the replacement exhaust section I've got will bolt straight in, or if I have to get a new flange welded on. Whilst the Beat aired out, I cracked on with the bits I had received yesterday, starting with the No.1 crank bearing hockey stick seals. These had a dab of hylomar applied to hold them in place. In order to get them fitted in place without rolling or puckering, the Haynes manual recommends using thin strips of metal to allow the bearing cap to be fitted. Step forward, the glorious Tennents can. This was suitably chopped up and the cap manoeuvred into place. Once in position, the crank bearing caps were torqued up. Following advice from Phill, he recommended turning the crank after every cap is torqued to check for free movement. This all felt fine so I'm happy. The tails of the seal need to be trimmed to 2mm but it's advised to wait 24 hours for the seals to settle, so that's what I'll be doing. A smearing of hylomar was applied to the corners of the cap to ensure a oiltight seal. After that, the exhaust manifold studs were fitted. And the clutch lever arm bush was fitted. This ended up being a bit of a faff, as the new one had slightly thinner lugs than the original, and wouldn't hold in place. I tried hammering the lugs to expand them, but they weren't playing ball, so I melted the lugs flush to the arm with a soldering iron, drilled a couple of holes and attached it with screws and washers. The bush was filled with rubber grease and the contact points of the release bearing got a thin smear of moly grease. With that, I'll down tools on it until the rings get here. There's still a tiny chance I can get it all together and tested in time, but it seems unlikely now. Cheers.

2002 Maserati “spirite sanctum” edition receiving a blessing shortly after completion

Utilising the Targa roof concept once again, the Fiat Dino Coupe and Spider became one model for 2015. If anyone knows this road on the Amalfi coast, it just wouldn't be possible to stop right there, due to the constant flow of traffic. Therefore: AI fail.

I got the last of the shite hooked up to the pump this evening: I think the kick down cable is a bit slack so I may tweak that, but otherwise I’m 97% certain everything is as it should be. I was still a bit unsure about the pump shaft and sprocket so I marked it (badly). Time to throw all the other junk on: The good news is that when turning the engine over, the sprocket and shaft stay aligned. The bad news is I’m a twat and I forgot to bleed the fuel lines. The engine won’t run on air, sadly. I’ve also managed to get diesel in my mouth again and everything tastes sour. Inlet manifold back off then. Cracked the injectors open, cranked it, one line primed and then the battery went flat. Probably for the best as it was getting late. Battery on charge and we will resume play tomorrow! Unfortunately it won’t be until later in the day though as I need to swap the carb on my mower and then go replace some lights for my parents. Bums.

I loathe the (fake) patina / rusty look. It doesn’t seem funny or clever to anyone who has had their cars ruined by genuine rust. Back in the day Mrs A. and her then Mr. put every penny they had into a V reg Cortina only to see it rot away to scrap well before it was ten years old. The front wings and the door skins were just flapping in the wind at the end. Their’s was a base 4 door. (Did UK get any 2 door mk 4s?) Despite the rat-look, the dice and the wanky roofrack, that Taunus does look cool. Somehow.

"How did you keep a fleet of Mk1/2 Mondeos alive under hard use Warren?" is a question that maybe one or two of you might be semi curious to know the answer to. Most fleet owners who ran the same type of car worked on the total neglect basis due to them always having a dead car and a couple of spare engines. To them, a Pound spent on servicing was a Pound wasted. If a cambelt snaps then they'd just lob in another motor the following day. To me this seemed like hard work and I'd rather keep the fleet maintained so at lest I could have a life away from the taxi trade without getting called out to recover a dead car every week. Although my fleet was usually split 67% petrol and 33% diesel I ran the same service schedule regardless of motive power. Every car was treated to an oil change every six weeks and unless the car had a full service history prior to my ownership it'd get a new cam belt before it was either sold or rented out. Contrary to what you might think I didn't do oil changes myself. At the time Kwik Fit were really competitive on oil changes, especially on my Zetec petrol Mondeos. As everyone following this thread knows, the Zetec is a pretty fickle lump regarding oil and hates shit oil. This meant that every six weeks I'd tell the driver to get the oil changed at Kwik Fit, get a recept and I'd knock the cost of about £30 off their bill that week. One lad who had a non metallic red 2.0LX hatch off me decided to take the piss. He clearly had a mate who worked at Kwik Fit and for a few months chose to submit receipts for oil changes that hadn't happened. One day he brought his car back to me for front pads and after I'd fitted his brakes I did my usual trick of checking the fluid levels. His oil wasn't just like treacle, but low as well. What this lad didn't know was that at the time Kwik Fit didn't have a drum of Ford Zetec oil on site to do Mondeo oil changes. In fact they didn't even have 5 litre containers of oil to put in the sump. What they actually did was fill the engine using 1 litre bottles of oil and this meant that there was always half a bottle left that their servicing lad would leave in the boot as a top up between oil changes. Needless to say that despite his car allegedly having an oil change two weeks prior there was no half litre of oil in the boot. When I asked him when the last time he topped the oil up he told me that he hadn't needed to and when I enquired as to the whereabouts of the half litre of Zetec top up oil he had no fucking idea what I was talking about!

Sitrep: Good Even compression across the board, 120-125psi. That was before it had ran, so everything was 'dry'. Ran and idled well No exhaust blow Bad Coolant seeping out from between block and head White stuff appearing in coolant Next steps K-Seal. Then, new (used) engine. @High Jetter the Shitely is a good suggestion but an engine is a bastard thing to transport. Pompey is about 2 hours from here on a good run so it's not the worst collection.

The DINO 246 GT California Spyder, built for Conrad Twitty

1961 dodge viper. Entered in that years le mans, retired in the 16th hour after gearbox failure. Entrant- Briggs cunningham / drivers Guichet/ Gendebien

😊

1995 iso grifo launch in venice

Blimey! I can't even leave out a barrel of cement mix water, without someone wanting to float a Mini wheel in it...

1971 de tomaso 2+2 proposal

Yes could just be not enough gas. Still getting use to the box. Sometimes it will creep with no throttle - which I'm used to and expect. Sometimes it won't. Also when in Comfort mode, its reluctant to get going. It does start in 2nd in Comfort. Maybe I'm not giving it enough beans. Switched it to Sport mode, that gets off the line quite nicely.

IIRC @Mrs6C bought some 10 inch inner tubes, as an attempt to get some rolling tyres for the Model 70 at the time our attempt to fit one was not successful (turns out 20+ year old cross ply's are not very stretchy who knew! LOL) but if the tubes are still floating perhaps you might have some better luck? (we did actually get a tube in there and the tyre mounted, but sadly it seems the tube got pinched as it would not hold air)

The 1986 Fiat Dino Coupe and Spider. The Coupe was the first Fiat to be offered with a detachable Targa roof, since the X1/9. In a publicist's nightmare, they were both booked to be shown on the same afternoon to an excited press at Positano. But the buffoon hadn't realised it was a Bank Holiday, so none showed. Not only that, the ideal chance to take some publicity photographs faltered as well: the Spider was fitted with its Hard Top for transportation, which latched itself home and couldn't be removed until Giuseppe returned to collect the following Friday.