Shirley Knott

So, a further update on my stupidity. The car was returned on Saturday morning, with me being at work, my Granda cracked on with disassembly. So far I've assessed and ordered the FUBAR bits, namely a wishbone, and a shock absorber. The tie rod was also bent, but has been masterfully* corrected with much fire, many hammer, and lots of swearing. It's still as crooked as the average set of teeth in Kilwinning however it'll do so I can farm out the tie rod replacement to the trusted shite friendly bit up the road.

We only set fire to the wet cloth a few times with the blowtorch...


The wishbone took the brunt of it as expected, so all is looking okay at that... (well beyond having to replace a wishbone)


Here it as it stands, a bit sad, but it'll be on the mend soon.

In the meantime, I'm dailying the Duster, and having loads of fun. 100hp turbo engine is a hoot, you don't get bullied as much, and I managed nearly 51mpg average over 184 miles between Largs and Fenwick and some other bits.


So aye, not all is lost then, which is good. Should hopefully have my own car running soon

Here it is from far away. Looks quite good at this distance.

Wow.  A perfect fit. Fuck you science

Plen land
Leg 5 is getting a lift with a mate that I haven't seen in 10yrs

Leg 4: PLEN

First leg: drop easy-to-steal car with no locks at train station 

 
Second leg: get train into town
....nope. Turns out the itinerary I planned last night was using Saturday's train schedule. Bus it is. I have 31 mins to walk a 40 min journey. I ran about 2 miles and I'm a sweaty mess but made it

Commensurate with last week's absolutely retarded 3-day, FTP-packed collection, I have a worse collection tomorrow. This one is considerably more poorly planned.
All the dominos to ruin my life are set in place. Tune in at 7am tomorrow for the first of 6 legs. 

Sounds decent.
Honestly,  the less I have do the more likely I am to do it if that makes sense?
Also, since I've 'made it' and moved to the *outskirts of Durham I've pretty much concluded it's God's country. I will only leave under extreme duress. 

Garage is looking a little tidier...

Couple of updates then.
The express passed it's test as noted above and continues to provide stellar service.

The Duster took us on holiday again


 
And it also took on a key role in a night time ARSE.

The 182 has sat for seven weeks or so during the summer holidays

So it was flat.
Also, the exhaust was blowing like a fucker as the brillo pad gasket in one of the joins had disintegrated.

Up it goes.
Nope, try again.

There we go.   Exhaust unbolted and prised apart, new £6 gasket fitted.
Old gasket mostly here:

Though there was also much in my hair.
Then took the kids for ice cream and spotted @PSAPerv parked at his work.

Now back to school run duty.

The good news in all this is that I've bought something else so there's another collection thread to go this weekend

I think there's a saveable car in there somewhere, it's more about whether it's financially prudent to fix or not. 
Engine seemed fine. @Jimbob McGregorchanged the vee belt and the alternator quietened down. 
It's ULEZ compliant in Glasgow, it's a genuine 70mpg, it's interesting and it's cheap to insure as a classic. 
I enjoy the adventure, the uncertainty and the misery a fair bit as well honestly.

I've been doing a good job of not buying any cars recently. Maintaining my ideal fleet of three vehicles for several months. When @sdkrc offered his veg friendly Rexton 290 for sale though I was powerless to resist. I supressed my feelings of deep dread and anxiety and agreed to take it on. Sam  even delivered it to my door and offered most agreeable payment terms. A+++ seller, would recommend. 


It was very fairly described so I knew there were a couple of issues needing prompt attention and that it is generally pretty baggy. I get the impression this the actual running gear etc are very robust but that everything else is less so and hasn't worn the miles well. It's sub 20 years old, but with it's considerable bulk, old school five pot diesel and separate chassis it feels like a big old truck. Evidence below of said bagginess, yes, that is it in gear. 
 
In truth the main selling point is the license built Mercedes OM662 engine under the bonnet. It's a 2.9 litre, 5 cylinder, turbocharged (not that you'd know it) with I believe a fully mechanical fuel injection setup. This engines prowess in alternative fuel running is legendary and hard to beat for veg oil running. 

The most pressing issue was the PSF leak. It was leaking behind the front bumper in quite an awkward spot. It's a low pressure return line which runs in a big loop along a crossmember at the front to aid cooling,  even in the tropical microclimate of North Ayrshire I didn't feel this was critical so cut it off nearer the pump and looped it off with some 10mm ID rubber hose. 



Next, in the definition of fiddling while Rome burns, high fidelity bluetooth audio install. No, that isn't a woodscrew through the top of the head unit holding it in place and I do not care for such slanderous accusations.  The hole was approximately 2.347242 DINS so fitting this single DIN head unit in was like flinging a sausage up a close, punching smoke, etc. 


That's better*


 

With all that work done and initial testing complete all that was left was for a wash and some small details. The headlamp cateracts had been pissing me off, so decided to sand and polish them. Hit them with 1000, 1500, 2000 and 3000 grit sandpaper then some polish on the DA polisher. 
Before;

And after;


Was surprised and delighted with how well they came up. Given a right good wash afterwards and that's everything done for now. Have a gratuitous photo dump from yesterday. 






It's the most modern thing I've owned and that does take some of the fun out of the ownership experience, it's also tying up my car monies, so I can't be quite as spontaneous as I would have been in the past with buying stuff but I do love it. It's such a competent thing to drive, really cosseting and relaxing but can't half shift when needed. The active dampers and various modes do make a big difference to the driving experience too and it can be an engaging thing to drive when you want it to be. 

Personally, I think the CVT gearbox is great when combined with this engine. It has plenty grunt to drive it at low revs if that makes sense, it doesn't use the upper end of the rev range unless you mash your foot to the floor. The benefit being it will do 1100 RPM at 80mph. It's far better on fuel than it has any right to be with the performance on offer and considering the battery is 10 years old with 115k on it. 135 miles of mixed driving at the weekend and it done 43mpg. 

We have just returned from a week away.
 
I'll start with this our hire car for the week.A 1.2 VW Polo shit.

 

 
I get a photo of these every time i go.

 
This was over the road.

 
This passed most days any idea what it is?

 
Any love for these?

 


 
Are these hitting shite territory yet?

Aye, that's properly miniscule TBF. Makes you wonder how much filtering can actually be going on really.

My white chariot on the way home. The 205 drives beautifully. The 1.4 feels asthmatic compared to a fettled 1.8. 
The 106 feels a lot tighter, ride is very different. 

Home at 440am. Woke up at 840am. Feel like I've been drinking for 2 days and like someone has shit in my mouth. ROUGH

I'm still 2hrs drive from home now in the courtesy 205. 
Some incredible fog in the Pennines so was crawling at 30mph most of the last 90mins.
Some other pics from today

It has begun.  
Poo count = 2.  Must be the excitement.

Stay away from the light pal. Not your time yet 😄

 

Busy old weekend for this..
On Saturday it had a good 320 mile round trip up north. Claimed 40.2mpg. @Tickman joined me for the jaunt and a most pleasant trip was had.
 
Then on Sunday, I was off to Forrestburn for another shot of slinging it up the hill.
It wasn't super busy so I managed to blag a fair few runs, and get plenty of helpful advice off some veterans.
Smol french cars flock together

That 106 sounded fucking GLORIOUS.
So do birds of a feather

The blue one has a bazillion upgrades, sounds ace and upheld the theory that the more Clios there are the lower the reliability percentage would be.😁
It was driven in, parked up for 30 mins and then wouldn't start sue to a flat battery🤣
My GPS recorder was not working consistently, but I did manage to update the track map to have more checkpoints, so it was a bit more accurate.

Despite not recording properly all the time, I managed a  57.54 second run.
The 1.33 was the sighting lap ( slow, steady and sensible)
The 1.41 was me giving the blue Clio owner a lift to the hairpin marshal station to take his turn.
 
All in all, almost 400miles covered at almost 37.1mpg indicated.
I used just over a full 10gallon tank (I lobbed 10L on the way to the hill to avoid running out)

 
All in all FUGGIN BRILLIANT

Joys***
First up. Driving home on Wednesday evening

Stop light and Oil light illuminated. It did this before on the way back from the hillclimb. 
It went on and off randomly all the way home. I suspect the pressure switch (changed before the MOT in Dec) is faulty.
I continued to use it🤣
I'll get a sensor purchased and combine fitting with an oil change.
 
Then the driver's exterior door handle stopped working. The passenger one has been intermittent.
I took the door card off last night, and fixed the adjustment on the bar that operates the lock.
All back together and working well.
 
Until today.
Then both the drivers and passengers external handles stopped working. 
I had to go in via the boot.
 
Back home...
 
I rigged up a temporary* repair, tested it all as working. Put everything back together, and the outside door handle has started working again.... Hopefully get it up to Stu this week to see if it can be sorted.

Too busy gaun lit fuck Tae bother filtering

They've been flat like that for many decades without getting a reputation for lubrication failure, so it seems to work.