Ghosty

It varies, some have half a cubby with a clock.

I tried to change the cambelt today, and failed. Couldn't crack the bottom pulley nut. Eh, cambelt's in alright nick, did manage to snap a bolt in the water pump pulley though. Need to see to that. New alternator belt is on too, but that was a faff- it's an MX5parts belt that was in the boot, and it's a bloody tight fit and a PITA to mount as you have to take the water pump pulley off. The engine is very clean for 140k - this car shows a lot of signs it's been well cared for, not a single bolt was seized, has excellent oil pressure, and every part on the car that's changed has been with proper quality stuff. While I had things off I opened the airbox as I'd found a loose, but very clean Wix air filter in the boot and wondered what it was doing there - I was greeted by a washable K&N filter! I also gave it a wash and polish (not pictured) - it's come up pretty well. New tyres on Saturday - Uniroyal RainExpert 5s as I've had them on an MX5 before and they're really good. Fun fact - a visit from the Kwik Fit mobile fitter costs £5 extra than an appointment at Kwik Fit, and is about £40 cheaper than getting tyres delivered from Camskill, and a lot less fucking about (especially as I WFH). I think that's a pretty good deal. The Camskill way: tyres 53.80 * 4 = 214.40 postage 40 fitting 60 = 314.40 plus finding the time to get the tyres fitted, and storage until then, and trying to take four tyres to the fitter's in an MX-5, and the local fitting guy only takes cash and probably won't replace the valves The Kwik-fit way - £65 a tyre, fitted balanced and new valve, plus £5 callout charge = £265. No brainer really.

It's the Classic. You can't get them with textured leather like mine any more - you can have smooth or perforated. I'm not sure how old this one is but the answer is 'rather' - the serial number format means it's over 10 years, and a mate said the textured leather made it a pretty old one (80s?). It supposedly came out of an Evo 6... It matches the factory gearknob perfectly. Be aware they really aren't cheap, mine was a lucky eBay find at £52 locally collected and the car came fitted with a compatible HKB steering wheel boss too. It's unlikely you'll find one under £100. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/234567093816 This POS is £90 ffs, and is missing the horn button and trim ring.

Today I did a small thing. That took two and a half hours. Got some packages. This should all be fairly obvious. One of the items pictured is tomorrow's job. This blanking plate under the radio is stupid. All that space for a headlamp dip adjuster - on a car that should never even need one. There are identically sized switch blanks on the right of the steering wheel too. Relocation is on the cards (if the MOT man cares) but it's just unplugged for now. Centre console is pish to remove, as is the 'tombstone', something like a total of 8 screws and a pair of pliers to pull the vents out as they're just on spring clips. And then the cubby was screwed into the DIN sized plate after, ISO adapter fitted, radio cage fitted, and the radio plugged in to test before slotting into place. I bought a Kenwood on eBay from a car audio specialist. Bollocks. 'PROTECT' on Kenwoods means either the speaker wiring has shorted, or the unit is faulty, and it won't output to save itself from damage. Sometimes hitting the reset behind the fascia helps, but no dice. I wasn't sure if the speakers worked as the old head unit didn't work properly (extremely distorted sounds from one of two speakers), however I had another Kenwood head unit so plugged that in. It worked, but no sound at all. Could the car's wiring be faulty? I had to make sure the unit wasn't faulty too, so I went and slung it in the Civic: the Civic's Alpine head unit is only loosely fitted as it won't locate properly for some reason, possibly excess wiring. The new unit powered on, but only worked through the front speakers - same applied for the spare Kenwood. Hm. Turns out the ISO-Kenwood adapter had a kink in it, the older unit didn't mind but the new one threw a wobbly - after waggling it about a bit it started working properly on all four speakers. But UK MX5s don't have rear (headrest) speakers, and the fronts were working - so what was up? I took the Alpine over to the MX-5 as it was known working. Plugged it in, there was a bit of a whine from the up-to-now non functional passenger speaker, then silence. As standard, the car had a Sony head unit that had an adapter loom going to the car's proprietary two plugs. I'd unplugged these and removed them to replace them with and adapter loom running to some ISO plugs for whatever radio I might want to add. From the colours on the adapter loom, I realised that the plugs didn't function the same as ISO - one of them only had purple and green wires going through it, the other handled all the other audio wires. Purple and green - rear speakers? UK MX-5s don't have any. They only have door speakers... I unplugged the rear speaker plug and the fronts started working. Well, that's that sorted. Cubby hole is a big improvement and will doubtless come in handy. The Alpine looks right at home too - alas it belongs in the Civic for now as I really don't want an even remotely wanky head unit in there (even the Alpine took some finding, most of their offerings are wank now), so it was exchanged for the Kenwood - now the adapter loom was correctly set up and the Kenwood adapter de-kinked, it worked in the MX-5. However I've decided I want to replace the Civic's radio as the Alpine suits the MX-5 better, sounds better, and is better made than the Kenwood, and I can actually reach those useful big buttons, you have to lean to get to the Civic's radio so the convenience element is lost. I guess I might get a Blaupunkt Bremen for the Civic...

I'll save that for when the Kwik-Fit man's been. It's currently wearing the tyres that killed my mate's Civic. They need replacing.

If anyone is thinking 'but the sedan is a 1.4 too!', the gearing is way better on that than it is on the silver hatch, supposedly the sedan gets the same gearbox as the 1.6i-16 Civics and CRXs. Gearing's way way better on that, and I think the carbs are more responsive than the basic top-down manifold. By my calculations the MX5 appears to be doing 41mpg

That's because that wasn't metal.

Not posted in here for a bit, mainly as the silver Civic just worked. It handled well and was a lol to drive. Only issue is that one of the spigot rings got damaged, leading to some wheel wobble. Spring arrived and I've just been knocking about in the sedan, as the weather permitted, and it just works. Isn't it nice when things just... work? However I found that the little 1.4 in that car just isn't well suited to anything other than town driving, they're nippy but the power really fizzles out at the top end and overtakes are protracted, especially on the motorway. MPG is ok, but as you have to work them quite hard it could be better. I was thinking of replacing it, and my dad had suggested that I take on the blue coupe. I'd been to Mimms Honda Day at Santa Pod with some friends, and my mate from Bristol with another guy we sort of know. I mentioned in passing that I was thinking of selling the silver Civic, he asks what I want for it and agreed to buy it without thinking about it. I put it back to standard, he's really pleased with it and has had it undersealed! I got £300 more than I paid for it too. So that left me with the coupe, which my dad was working on and got through an MOT while I gathered parts for it. I drove it a bit but found the seats, which are specific to the coupe, played havoc with my back. I pondered getting another MX5 as I wanted something a bit more fun too. Enter a suggestion from a third party that I swap it with my mate in south London that is often involved in my capers - with his MX-5 that I'd pointed him to, with a local seller. He was in a similar position to me- he got the MX-5 to replace a Civic that came to an untimely demise, but wasn't getting on with it. He also, cannily, had a set of Prelude seats to put in it. Given the coupe has quite a few brand new upgraded parts on it and had just had some welding, we agreed to swap the Civic, £100 and a spare set of wheels I needed shot of for the MX-5. He was also keen to get something else as he felt liable to drive the MX-5 too fast - no idea how as it's a 90hp model! I could understand if it was a Eunos though, as they can be dangerously fast. Then again, an MX-5 is probably fast compared to his other cars, a Spitfire and a Triumph 2000. So we met up at a mutual mate's place in Warwick as we both also had PC parts to give to him, went to 'spoons (where it took an hour to get anything to eat as all the fryers were broken), hooned around a bit before parting ways again. It was also an important occasion for a mate of mine that I had in tow - he's a Mopar enthusiast with no driving licence yet, and he somehow ended up with a rotten MX-5 he's never driven. That was the first time he'd been taken out in one, and loved it. His MX-5 has just been sent away for restoration, as it happens: it only has about 25% of its sills left. Worth doing though as it's one of the JDM special edition ones and it's going back to standard. The MX5 proved to be faultless on the drive home and did 350 miles to a tank, which is more than my Civic can muster - and the Civic does 40mpg, so the MX5 can't be far off that. The car came with a big history folder that my mate hadn't even bothered to read through - it's done 140k but has all its old MOTs, and has had a lot of important things replaced in recent years like the alternator, gearbox thrust bearing, a Panasonic gel battery, it'd been properly cared for, and there's very little rot to speak of. Cat's been replaced in the past so no theft risk either. It got bought by a y00f some time a couple of years ago, and it received a stainless backbox, VLSD, and HSD coilovers - so it handles rather well. It also had some JBW Minilites on it but they didn't come with the car. The wheels on it, Asso Logic A701, a pretty uncommon Japanese wheel, came from my mate as despite being $$$ he had no other use for them. They need new tyres, mind: that's happening on Saturday. I've added a couple of personal touches already as the steering wheel it came with, a knackered 370mm Momo Montecarlo, was something of a placeholder (though I am trying to clean it up). Genuine Eunos Roadster floor mats and a Nardi wheel. I'd bought white Lockwood gauge faces too but a listing error on their website means I got blue ones which will be going back. I'm going to leave the black ones in. I might try and get some kick plates for the sills. I've also pulled the radio out as it didn't work properly, unfortunately the car isn't fucking ISO so an adapter is on the way so I can put a Bluetooth head unit in. Need to put the dashcam hardwire kit in at some point too - as the 12v socket is in the middle of the dash it's a bit awkward to have a big plug with a wire coming out of it there permanently. I'm also going to relocate the headlamp dip switch to one of the switch blanks right of the steering wheel - it's the right size, so I've no idea why they didn't put it there anyway. That's the only thing in that DIN sized blanking plate, which I'm going to replace with a much more sensible cubby hole. However, that plate is somewhat overengineered. To remove it, the dash vents have to come out, and the centre console, because the blanking plate is screwed to the inside of the tombstone console.

I could try and get my Civic into conkers, but I think it needs a bit more work first.

The car in front is a Toyota. Thanks for reminding me, I'd already read the badge.

Snap, yes 90hp Monza. Well aware it's on different wheels, it was on 15" JBW minilites before my mate had it, he fitted the 14" Asso wheels because he didn't want to take the JBWs with the car. It did look daft. The 90hp definitely isn't as quick as my previous Eunos Roadsters, but it seems more lively and responsive somehow. The sound from the exhaust is just fantastic, sporty in all the right ways without being asbo.

This says it all. No PAS, no electric windows, stainless exhaust, hardtop. Many many grins.

Off collecting this tomorrow: It's replacing my Civic Coupe. Trading it with a mate, his Civic sedan met an untimely end, and this replaced it after I sent him a link to it. He didn't gel with it and missed having a Honda - I've been looking for something with a bit more of an involved driving experience and started looking at MX5s again, we've managed to arrange a swap so I get this to run about in and keep miles off my sedan while having many grins and lols. It's a UK spec 1.6 with amongst other things, an LSD, HSD coilovers, a fibreglass hardtop and an MX5parts exhaust. I've already ordered/started gathering a few bits for it including Japanese spec deep pile checkerboard floormats, that Nardi steering wheel, a Bluetooth radio, white gauge faces to brighten the interior... Thought I'd missed the boat on usable MX5s and fancied another so I'm feeling pretty lucky.

Mate sent me a pic of a Capri he spotted. Apparently the odometer is broken. 420 on 4/20. 🤣

Been spotted!

Genuine! Get the fuck in, that's £150-200 sitting there. Going to put it in the incoming MX5.

Contact made with the Nardi seller - collecting after work. Noticed he also has some WedsSport wheels for sale for £800 start bid, and an HKS mushroom filter, so there's a very good chance it's a real Nardi.

This will be fun - I've won a rather legitimate looking, poorly listed Nardi Classic on ebay - collection only in Bolton. It's worth a lot more than £52 if legit. The seller has a load of Evo parts for sale, seems they've cut one up. Part of me is expecting a fake wheel or something.

Went to Ipswich to look at a S3 Daimler Sovereign. Seller picks me up from the station in a Jeep, the first thing he does is knock £250 off the price before I've even seen the car, tells me that his driveway didn't have a drop kerb, and that the windscreen had cracked driving down it. But it was fine, you can get windscreens on insurance etc. Riiiight. In reality this is a red flag that the bulkhead is rotten. Car's fucked. When we get to the car, it won't start. Shoves some easy start (or was it WD40?) in the intake and thrashes the bollocks off it from cold (bearing in mind 4.2s are no stranger to HGF) and gets it to run on the high pressure fuel pump, and it won't idle, only runs on throttle. Seller is baffled and his mate what knows stuff innit wasn't answering the phone to help him. I didn't bother to tell him that the fuel pump isolator at the base of the passenger A pillar had probably tripped. The guy refused to sell me the car on the basis it wasn't running, on the train back I said I'd been advised the bulkhead might be rotten. He didn't reply again after that. Went and got pissed in a Wetherspoons in Peterborough before heading home. ~~ Last year my dad did the timing chain on my mum's Cooper S as it'd eaten the guides and running a bit funny with some shite in the sump (Prince, TADTS). When he put it back together it ran but was rattling like fuck - chain achieved fuck all - there were things in the sump that shouldn't be yet again, and it sounded like it was piston slapping (again TADTS). Decided to fuck it off as it was terminal at this point - 35k, high spec, auto - we reckoned we'd get 5/6k for it if we sold it having warmed it up to hide the slap. I looked on WBAC and their initial offer was £5650 or something, so we warmed it up, took it to them - they looked around the outside, didn't bother starting it, and gave us £4950 for it. We lol'd our heads off, it went off to BCA, then showed up in a dealer in Hounslow for £8000. Was there for ages, then vanished, no clue where - it then had a V5 issued in April so some poor sod has bought it.

I'm pretty pleased with how the Civic sedan came out after its recent partial respray. Mimms Honda Day Three Sisters is coming up (the UK Honda show - and they bother to hold north and south events unlike most), and it's only in Wigan, so I thought to myself, I'll apply for show and shine, why the fuck not, it's not like I have a club stand to be on, and the general Honda parking will be right at the back if it's anything like Santa Pod was. Checked my junk mail - I've only bloody been accepted. Get the fuck in.

Civic on E5 does 40mpg. (1.4 with twin carbs). Hardly hanging about either.

Just seen in my FB feed, some dick has painted the A-series Montego.

At the summit of the M62 - all the letters have fallen off.

Remove horn pad for added win.

Oh, forgot this one too - happened just off the M6 south of Carlisle: