Dippy

Guilty, I took a 4000 mile car in almost perfect condition sold my Audi A6 and went back to driving old cars everyday. I used it for everything I would have used the Audi for  over nearly 2 years and it never broke down.
I did have to hit the starter  motor a couple of times and a couple of small jobs, rear brake cylinders and new exhaust and that was it. Took it to 16000 miles and strangely it wasn't  the winter that caused any damage but the summer sun on the velour and dash trims which started to fade.
I used it to go quoting jobs for my business and Im sure I got more jobs as it proved a good ice breaker when turning up somewhere new.

STV is an app based channel free once you sign in.
I watched episode 2 tonight where Bobby Grants Princess failed to proceed.

February update time, I am clearly not rushing this....  The sill has now been cleaned back and is re primer'ed and appears much happier, this took a couple of attempts as the low temps in the garage caused one painting session to go wrong possibly not helped by switching to a different brand of primer half way through.  So I changed back to the original brand and cracked out the hair drier to pre warm the can and sill panel. Success I think.

With that starting to look half decent I moved on to the inner wheel arch as it was  crusty. I cannot get hold of a replacement wheel arch let alone and inner part so had to get creative.

And the inner...

Choppy choppy time...

New inner section, made up folded cut and formed, not the sexiest looking thing but it fits. 

Then the outer which I had to do in sections. Not helped by blowing a hole in part of it..... I had some how flicked the welder onto its 2nd power level which is a bit too much for thin body work. 

Hole filled and cleaned up...

And inner lip welded in place, followed by some primer just to keep things protected...


Its definitely going to need a bit of filler to look okay, I hate filler! I am getting dangerously close to having a car with MOT safe metal work, its just everything else that may let it down.......  Oh and I tried Motowns suggestion of Ford wheelnuts, it works they even look the part, cheers!
 
 

I never noticed that before; why the hell did BL do that? Very nearly the same, but different enough to infuriate shiters 40 years afterwards.

STV is an app based channel free once you sign in.
I watched episode 2 tonight where Bobby Grants Princess failed to proceed.

Cant see that this has been mentioned elsewhere but STV started a rerun of Brookside yesterday from the very first episode and its worth watching just for the cars.
 

Ironically , people with old ICE cars who often get the most blame , probably do the lowest mileage.
My car mileage last year was about 6000, (2:1 petrol:diesel) ,walked maybe 1000, (3 miles a day), cycled about 10, public transport( London Underground), about 50. Last long haul flight was in 2016, last flight of any kind , 2020.
I bet many people who preach to the world about being green, run up huge air miles “supporting sustainable tourism “ in places like India , far east or various parts of Africa.

Is that your cock hanging out ?  The black bit on the end  looks a bit nasty mate 

The Granada’s been dormant for about a year. In anticipation of starting to do something with it I decided to start it up. 
There was oil was still in it, so I took the king lead off to spin it up on the starter to get some pressure and spread it about a bit. Then once all reconnected, I gave it a go.
It’s willing! It won’t idle properly yet, presumably a blocked idle jet. Brakes are first on the agenda though. 

This is a great channel,some serious bodged and neglected stuff!!

Heres my youtube stuff , all Jensen content though as not made video of the Princess.
 

satin lacquer the body?

I think there's narrow windows on both sides of the argument that are sweet spots to motoring.
I can see the appeal of having something on monthly payment that you devote zero head space to other than putting fuel in.  However a warranty doesn't stop you from breaking down, and reading of and experiencing issues with brand new cars that dealers take months to sort (or refuse to sort) puts you right back in that shite-owning stressful motoring hell, except you're still flinging money at it whether you want to or not.  A new white goods petrol car with a straightforward N/A engine and as few electronics as possible is likely to be a good bet.
At the same time for the cost of a couple of monthly payments you could own a heap of shite outright. In my head running it into the tarmac with zero outlay is appealing but it ends up worse than spending the money to get it running well and keep it that way.  Also, to have peace of mind shite motoring it's best to have at least two cars so that you have a backup.
For what it's worth most of the breakdowns I've had have been in moderns, where the computer has said NO and refused to go any further.  Any issues I've had with old cars tend to develop slowly with a bit of warning, and I've always been able to limp home, or jerry rig a roadside fix because they are simpler to work on.
There's an environmental argument for owning more than one car. You can only drive one of them at a time, whereas if they had individual owners they might all be on the road. A good argument for hoarding ALL THE CARS.
We own 7 cars and still probably have less motoring costs and higher reliability than our neighbour with their single lease car. Not to mention every one is an asset that has long since passed the bottom of the depreciation curve so we can expect to get our money back or make a profit.

A video of my most recent restoration  with some time lapse footage of assembly and 70’s music if you want to waste 10 minutes when you should be working.
 
 

A video of my most recent restoration  with some time lapse footage of assembly and 70’s music if you want to waste 10 minutes when you should be working.
 
 

I'd gladly waste 10 hours watching how that was done if I'm honest.

A video of my most recent restoration  with some time lapse footage of assembly and 70’s music if you want to waste 10 minutes when you should be working.
 
 

Im amazed at the amount of people that dont know you can check mot history.
Its always the first thing I do when looking at a car ad.

Im amazed at the amount of people that dont know you can check mot history.
Its always the first thing I do when looking at a car ad.

Im amazed at the amount of people that dont know you can check mot history.
Its always the first thing I do when looking at a car ad.

Ten points to Mr Skizzer for "Princesla" which needs to be trademarked immediately. 

I met up with a friend during my lunch break the other day, we've been wanting to get this photo for a while.