Andyrew

Day 8 And early ish start for a day off, i head over to my friends to see what the noise was on the freelander. The oddly mis shapen arch liner had moved and was touching the bottom pulley. A bit of a relocate and all is well. From there i went out with mother rew for the day. Later i return to the workshop to meet my friend Gary who wants to do a service on his partners weekend toy. I really like these, and this one being black with the red and black interior is defo up my alley. Its been serviced by her usual mechanic although the cabin and plugs seen to have missed the list a few times. Its an 80k mile car so Maybe original? Either way changed now and id guess we will be doing most of the work on the car from now on. Cabin was aftermarket but definately not been done any time recently. Air and oil filters looked pretty good so id say the services have just been the very basics. Thankfully having the sprinter, i had the correct oil filter housing tool to hand! Some fresh oil in and fired up sounding sweet and off it goes.

Freelander fondle. The freelander stopped charging, chucked all the warning light on and ran on the battery. After switching the battery we decided to limp it to the workshop. On the trip over it worked perfectly. Suspected the alt so a replacement was collected and shoved in, still didnt charge. Really should have spent more time doing diag. Checked and the alt was charging but it wasnt making it to the battery. The live goes from the alt and picks up on the stud of the starter and off to the battery. Upon removing the boot we found a heavily corroded connection. You can see the starter has been removed and what a bastard that was. With it off, it was time to bust out the grinder. The nut was stuck solid so i carefully ground a side down and cracked it off, really dont want to replace a starter just for this. The cables were cleaned up and everything re installed. The starter now spins over faster than it ever has and we had volts at the battery. All sorted. Friend leaves and later i recieve a call that theres an concerning claking noise from the alt area that started a few miles into the trip. So have we just swapped out a good alt for a new but faulty alt? Or just a rattly bit of arch liner. Guess ill find out tomorrow.

A swanky old girl, power windows, aux heater, abs, multi adjust seats. No air bag tho!

The pump then, i strip it appart and its pretty grim inside but i was expecting a split or tear internally but nothing. Just alot of crud. I clean this out with a filthy rag that was in the engine bay. Re assembled and with my mate now at the scene he cranked it over while i blocked the pump untill it fired fuel out. We then done this a couple of time untill it was at the carbs. A few cranks and the old turd fired into life. We left for the steady trundle to the workshop. Well thats not true, i trundled a few hundred yard got bored and then just went full onions as it was running alright. Got home with out a hitch. Theres two inline fuel filters one in the boot and one in the bay. The boot one is very clean. The engine bay one however grim. Id say the hard line is rotten internally and this crud giving these issues. Time for a new hardline and a good clean throughout.

Day 7, Been a more interesting one this one. I had the day off and with a dead freelander on the plan with some time inbetween the new alt turning up with the owner in my astra and some spannering i figured id have a tinker as the shitfire had coughed and spluttered on the way home last night. Id changed the very grim fuel filter up front. Id popped the floats open and sure enough some crud swilling about at the bottom. This was given a quick clean out aswell. Time for a test drive. id pop out to get some new nuts and bolts from browns and a few bits from the shop which would only kill a few mins . . As we can see above above this didnt go as planned. As i pushed the little shite up the rather busy road A helpful passer by (who he and his wife were both mechanics) dived out to lend a hand. With a random old plug that was in the boot he could see spark for me and after i popped open the carbs to find 2 very empty floats he was looking at the pump and with some cranking the pump pushed nothing out and didnt seem to have any suction .With this the helpers left me too it. I sucked on the fuel filter and while fuel came up it soon started to bubble. I check the dial and sure enough its showing about 3rd of a tank. Using a quarter inch extension and an old spark plug i beater the sender retainer out and had a peak inside. it was what appears exceptionally low. I buy some juice and a can and wander back lob it in and suck on the filter to help the pump out just incase the pump is a bit weak. A gob full of fuel later im happy we have a good supply.

Many, they are like bags for life. Never in the car im in at the time of need. Yet ive always got one when someone else needs one.

land rovers. Such a joy to work on.

Walk of shame5

Hello? Fuel? Anybody in there?

Coming at you live from the streets of leighton buzzard

Day 6. Today see me over the FOD to grab the Shitfire for a bit of a sunny sunday thrash. Not much tinkering occurred. Pop the plugs out of mrs6 herald and brimmed the cylinders with some oil to let it soak in the hope it will free up. Shitfire seems to have swilled up some shite from the tank as there was a few coughs and splutters and the inline filter thats probably 200miles old looks pretty clagged up. Maybe a good clean out required. Tomorrow, freelander alternator removal.

Day 5 Been an interesting day and not in a good way but thats another story. After work i collected my friend from his work and we proceed to get the freeland shifted with its duff altetnator. Battery swapped for the charged battery from the astra and flat battery put into the astra ( then jump started using the charged battery) It was decided to limp the freelander up to the workshop guessing the battery had enough charge to make it. And make it it did helped by the fact the alt had dedicided to work perfectly fine. New unit under warranty being ordered into my work and we shall go from there.

Day 4 A poor effort tonight, a chat with my friend / landlord and a phonecall with a mate having a bit of a rough time see very little time for tinkering but a task had to be done. Anyway the tyre was popped off and cleaned up again. This time it popped on first time. Chucked back on the disco and thats one job off the list. After my chat with my mate it seems Tomorrow will be freelander recovery as the reman bosch alt i fitted a few months back has crapped out, Sister rews zafira will also be limped up as it seems its also decided to slowly die. Ive no idea whats the problem so a bit of investigation is needed. Its down on power hunting at idle and seems to be pinking from the exhaust under load. Ill start with all the basics before any parts darts starts. Sorry no pics so have a pic of the awesome scale model of the allegro @quicksilver made.

Day 3 A bit of a fail this one. However the mindset of having to write a brief day to day update is good as it make me want to pick all the little jobs that i can complete in a short amount of time. Which are usually the kind of little jobs we put off. Tonight was a bit of a later start so i wanted a quick simple task. Never seem to turn out like that do they? Tonight was a leaking bead on one of the Discoverys back wheels something that this car suffered with for ages. I popped the wheel off, whipped the tyre off to reveal a very crusty bead and this took long time to clean up. Cleaned up i chucked the tyre back on and smeared in some bead sealer. Could i get the bloody bead to pop? Nope. Not having it, it was very warm in there tonight and i feel the old tyre and bear sealer drying quickly combo is the issue. The workshops next to the farm house so the compressor chugging away late at night is something i avoid. I was sweaty and getting grumpy so i called it a night. Short and unsucessful but at least some progess was made. Even if it wasnt finished. Ill pull it off and try again tomorrow and it will probably slip straight on. Untill tomorrow, that is all..

Day 2 Squeaky Accent. The last time this wee wagon was here id done some balljoints and links upfront. I also changed the belts as the powersteering had been squealing its arse off. I changed the belt, the power steering belt is an industrial sized belt and i set the tension maybe a smidge less than id nomally go but the belts driven off the water pump pulley an the possibly original 135k waterpumps got a tickle of play in it and i wasnt looking to over do it. All was well but a week or so later once the belt had settled in the noise returned on full lock. I gave it a little tighten first but it seemed to make it worse. With the owner on holiday i said id have another look. This time i popped it all apart and gave the pulleys a bit more of a clean up. Id wire brushed them before to remove all the belt slip burnt on crud. but this time i nipped over the channel with some abrasive paper and chucked a new belt on again. Fires up and lock to lock it seems to have cured it but it did last time! We will see. With that done i rummaged around the workshop and put some spares id had kicking around for the jimny inside it ready for it to go to its new owner. And thats as exciting as it got. See you tomorrow.

Day 1 A quick visit from my friend in the "chuggy buggy" that belongs to his now partner. Still running like a champ however a knocking from the steering rack area was apparent. Some wiggling and shaking later and i clock that the bolt holding the rack to the subframe was loose. A quick nip up and all is well. The low hanging rear exhaust was also messed around with and now sits slighty higher, a new more shallow exhaust may need to be made. With that done he left and i lobbed the Black Astra on the lift. Many moons ago id picked up some cheapo rear shocks and a supplier at work had at the time a load of springs on clearance so a rear pair were purchased at 1 pound plus vat each! Crusty! Shocking In and done. See you tomorrow!

Autoshite August. Daily updates every day of this month, all working on a shite car in some form or another. Doing jobs on a different vehicle each night and rotate between my own and other guest cars. Why? Since the ex pissed off earlier this year, i moved closer to the workshop rather than my work so id have something to do in the evening and maybe id keep myself motivated. The reality is ive done a few car repairs for friends and done the odd job or two here and there on mine when essential. Most days i just have my dinner and veg out watching people on youtube fixing cars after a long day , my mojo is on its arse, im unhappy and im getting fat. First step, Why am i spending this much time watching people on youtube doing something i should be? TV removed from the living room and packed away behind the bed. Right then. Lets crack on shall we?

Left work and walk over to the harpenden classics on the common. Meet up with my work friends who are running a stall there. I leave them to go hunting for interesting cars, hard in this show as alot of willy wavers pay extra to put a mondern high performance car on display. I find One stall there selling used parts, i spy a chrome bumper a black bumper and a steering rack. Bumper looked allegro ish, so did the rack. Asked the chap and he confirmed its aggy parts. 20 quid if you want all three parts mate I decline the black bumper and leave with the rack and chrome bumper for 15 quid. Absolute bargain and he seemed glad they were going.

I have booked the 12th off so count me in

Back, crack, cack, smack This is back! Black eco4 returned home from its time with @Six-cylinder The blue corsa of high oil consumption returned for a weld up of this crack Picked up a tin top for the shitfire locally for a mere £85, its in good shape but the blue and white combos a bit cack, i have zero interest in painting it so ill let it grow on me. And finally the 1 series mentioned here before having a starter fitted and i may have mentioned an oil change that was its first in something like 5 years and about 50k, Well a distracted mother and a parked pick up lead to a smack. no one was injured and thats one more 1 series off the road. So a good outcome really, shitheaps.

I really want it to be a Tata loadbeta on air ride.

Not sure where your at stage wise with the busted gearbox but im local to ashcrofts ( used to work there! And mate still does) so if you want the parts collecting and bring to the FOD i can arrange that if its saves postage/collection.