mat777

This just popped up on the book of face...... pretty cool idea, and every day is a school day!

Very much looking forward to this, it's once again within 90 mins of the parents! Looking at the website, the toilets and shower look reasonably posh too, which is always a good sign for fair weather camping ponces like me Sounds like the entry track is the perfect excuse for me to bring the Land Rover this year, assuming I can put all the electrons back into the wiring loom between now and then 😂 Also very much up for Cosford too. Another suggestion could be Blists Hill living Victorian town which is an absolutely fab experience, though unfortunately the ticket prices are £lol by AS standards

Ahhh I see, that makes sense as to why I kept seeing the "same" cab so often! 😂 I'm going to guess that all the EU6 ones suffer similar DPF/Oil Dilution/Adblue related shite issues of any modern diesel doing stop-start urban journeys. I did notice that even in 2017-18 ish, there were still several Mk2 and Mk3 V8 Lexus LS's floating in Liverpool around as minicabs, all running on LPG. Now there's a clean-air solution I could get behind! Sadly I think they've all finally rusted away or aged out now.

Just come across this, brilliant piece of malaise era chod and looking forward to seeing it all cleaned up and working! I know it's not quite the same model version, but I immediately thought back to this advert - "as quiet as a Rolls Royce" they claimed!

Apologies for the thread bump, just followed a link here from another thread and found it quite interesting* *in my nerdy AS way! @warren t claim you mentioned having a blue TX, that wasnt perchance the one with flouro yellow hubcabs was it? Used to see it every day knocking around the uni and Kensington areas back when I was a student there.! I'm assuming you no longer have a TX, as Horriblemercedes mentioned you have an MG now that he was interested in perving at 😂 (and was subsequently gutted about us going out in a group of 5 in Liverpool this weekend rather than 4 or less!)

This lives near me, the matching house and car always makes me wonder just how good/bad the decor is inside!

Possibly one of the more useless (for anything other than its very specific purpose) things to feature here, but who cares - check out the all the cool retro tech! https://www.thedrive.com/news/live-your-90s-tv-dreams-with-this-jdm-mitsubishi-broadcast-truck-for-sale

Hmmm... Mk1 Galaxy? Or Mk4/5 Escrote?

I know continuity wasn't the strongest suit of older films, but fuck me couldn't they at least get the GB badges on the same side? 😂

This one is, I believe, fully loaded. Cruise as mentioned, the option full coloured interior, sports exhaust, parking sensors (another huge plus for me, coming from camera-equipped SUVs and not being used to non existent rear visibility!) and some "991 Turbo type 2" wheels which are apparently super rare (as merc found out when he had to replace one through pothole damage). The cruise was important to me as the throttle pedal is very heavy, I wouldn't like to have to hold that in place for an extended amount of time! I'm told the 2.5 is somewhat pedestrian, though it does at least have a different engine design that is free of the IMS bearing worries. This 3.2 is unreasonably rapid on the road! And luckily the previous owner from before Merc had a receipt for an IMS bearing replacement too. The 3.2Ss do command a fair premium though it seems, maybe a 2,7 is the financial and performance sweet spot? I guess they are now cheap and old enough that they are beginning to fall into the hands of shiters? Not sure I'd personally stick that particular engine in one though.... a wankel would be an interesting conversion however! Gratuitous interior shot of the full red leather trim. It seems to be splitting opinion amongst my friends of those who love it and those who think it's gash! I quite like it, it's much nicer than plain black and not as though it's, say, pea green like one particular 911 whose pictures often do the rounds.... One thing I did quite quickly realise was that the included car cover had suffered during the car's garage sabbatical over the winter. I can only assume it was slightly damp when put away in the boot, because upon retrieval merc was unpleasantly surprised to discover it had gone quite stiff. It's a multi layer design with an outer corduroy type material and an inner plastic-y waterproof layer. Seems weirdly back to front to me, but that's definitely the right way round. Later on when at home, this translated (when held up to the light) into the inner waterproof layer having quite a few splits in it which was going to lead to trapped moisture ingress when on the car in the rain. As these tailored covers are £lol and I didn't want the hassle of a full cover because they're a colossal pain and a danger to paintwork, I opted for plan D(uct tape) On the topic of swift fixes for damage, the car has a "dink" of creased and split paint on the middle of rear bumper, from the owner prior to merc. It looks as though the car was reveres into a lamp post, which is impressive given it's got the parking sensors.... It's not immediately noticeable, but when you know it's there you always see it. Merc actually had a brand new bumper for the car, but didn't want to fit it until selling the car in case the new one should get damaged. For me, given the temporary nature of my custody, I'm not especially keen on going to the hassle of changing it either especially as it's 99.9% likely to go back to merc. Luckily, a friend suggested an amusing yet simple solution 🤣 The observant amongst you may notice that the "S" is also missing from the bootlid, this is because when merc bought it there was a nasty "RS" badge there instead which was swiftly removed. As replacement badges seem to be about £70, that's also something I'm very "not bothered" about - although the fact the Boxster script is consequently off centre on the bootlid is playing on my CDO tendencies.......

So, as some of you may have guessed - the Porsche, the BMW, and indeed the arms driving the BMW, all belong to Horriblemercedes of this parish. Due to trying to get his recently acquired Maserati to do 185, the Boxster was not going to drive (SWIDT?) anytime soon. It's a car that I've had a few goes in, and loved the performance and especially the colour combo. I therefore opined that it would be a shame for it to sit on SORN in his garage for the forseeable, and that I would be glad to purchase it if I could afford to do so. Ever the gentleman, friend and scholar, Merc quoted me an unbelievably generous price for the car on the proviso that he could have first refusal when I needed the money for its intended house-related purpose in a year's time or so (I've never seen a more immediate case of "seller's remorse"!) Seen here after disinterring it, parked next to the new toy: First impressions on driving it back from Nottinghamshire to Liverpool? Unbelievably refined at a cruise, for a 22 year old soft top! Also, wow does it have some poke (Ok, so I'm used to dailying Japanese pickups, but I've driven plenty of fast things in the past). The noise, as you'd imagine, is pretty damn good as well - especially with the "sports" zorst toob currently fitted, which borders on an obnoxious burble at idle but howls like a GT3 racer at the 7.5k redline.... "I paid for the whole rev range, Imma use the whole rev range!" 😂 So, surely there must be a catch, right? Well, Merc was as ever scrupulously honest about the niggles with the car. Firstly, the knackered battery, and secondly, the front tyres are also not long for this world and predictably these aren't exactly a £30 kwik fit budget option. These are all things I'm happy to sort even though I'm not planning to keep the car, as thanks for Merc's ongoing generosity. Another niggle is a knackered window regulator, for which a good genuine spare came with the car but hadn't had time to be fitted. I still haven't had a chance to do this /get it done yet, and until this is sorted there is a water leak from the front corner of the window due to it not going up into the hood enough to seal when the door is shut. To counter this, there's a "shower cap" for the car that fits over the soft top and screens. A slight faff, especially if you want to use the car and put it away when wet, but hardly the end of the world!

First order of business.... A trip to Halfords to get a new battery, the elderly current one having died completely whilst the car has been off the road for 6 months Second order of business... Achievement unlocked: Watch Wanker 🤣

Final destination (although sans any unusual causes of death) Picked up by a very familiar AS regular 😁 Spotted a movie star on the way out of the station too! 😅

So, on with the story! Aaaand @RichardK hits the nail on the head - so very much this! This tale would have had a very, very different but much worse ending had I not had the legal protections of buying from a registered dealer - something that is well worth the mark-up in my opinion.... Well, every day is a schoolday! Strange setup, why does work in series rather than just using both 12vs in parallel? I would have assumed that double the cranking current capacity would be just as good as double the voltage? So, I left proceedings at the point where I'd discovered an empty header tank. Not ideal, then... I was sure there had been coolant in the tank when I checked before the test drive, but I hadn't checked after the test drive. Rookie error! Mind whirling, I was desperately searching for an answer that didnt involve OMFGHGF. Maybe they drained a bit out for some prep work on the car and didnt refill it? Maybe it just had a leak somewhere? I'd have to keep a close eye on the driveway after each journey and see if any puddles appeared. Not being 100% sure which type of coolant it had, and indeed which type it was supposed to have, plain water would have to do until I could investigate further. It was at least the middle of summer, so no worries about frost damage whilst figuring it all out. I bought one of those cheap sniff testing kits from ebay, but the results were very inconclusive. The big issue was the weird design of expansion tank which is deep in the engine bay and below the level of the filler neck on the radiator, and fed by an overflow hose in the rad neck like a much more classic car. Thus, unless the engine was red hot enough to be overflowing coolant, I'd have the use the tester on the radiator filler neck.Unfortunately this was narrower than the bung/cork on the kit, so it was impossible to get it to seal properly. The indicator didnt change colour, but then I only managed to get a couple of pathetic bubbles to pass through it instead of leaking past. Ho hum, back to square one. +10 internets to anyone who can guess an alternative culprit? All will be revealed later today!

Given that my last 2 collection threads have been a moped and a bare chassis, you could be forgiven for being merely whelmed by my proclivity. But today is different, for I am off to collect and actual running, driving car! *gasp* Bus wankered my way to the local station and froze ma tits off waiting All change for another line. Also, FLOL, not in my lifetime.....

Morning all, Sorry for leaving everyone hanging! It's been a very busy 2 or 3 weeks in my work and personal life, so I haven't had the chance to get on here and write until now. But, all will be rectified fortwith! As I'm currently on a long train ride, what better way to kill some time I can also report that no baked potatoes or thread authors were harmed during this interim period....

Oooft, that's a project for the brave! It's great to see another 200tdi Disco being saved, there really can't be many of them left now! I'd be very worried though, given that on these the body rusts worse than the chassis, exactly how bed the shell is 👀

This is all very true, however there is one big advantage to buying from a dealer, even if they are economical with the truth - as will become very apparent later in this saga. As I say, I had had a brilliant experience with them 2 years prior, which just goes to show the variability.... Anyhow, 'twas the day after the purchase, so no time like the present for a bit of fettling. One thing that was obvious when buying was that the one replaced headlight was lovely and shiny and clear, but the original unit on the other side was badly yellowed, and had a comedy circle in the middle where a beam deflector had clearly been fitted for a while in the past. This was clearly not going to work with my "CDO" tendencies. Luckily, I had an unused headlight restoration kit in the parents garage, so this was the first thing to rectify. Having never actually used one before, after the first stage of heavy sanding I was beginning to wonder if I'd just fucked it up entirely, but "patience, youngling!" Nearly an hour of wetting, sanding, polishing and drying later, it was finished with a ceramic clearcoat and looked infinitely better. The annoying circle imprint had gone, too. can highly recommend the Turtle Wax DIY headlight kit - one of the key USPs is that this doesn't require a drill or buffer to use, it's all done by hand and it's relatively cheap to buy compared to most of them. Second of the immediately address-able irritations was this horror story of a towbar setup. Presumably a part of some long-lost bike rack accessory, it meant that the towbar was spaced a good 4-5" out from the mounting. "Can you say 'shear loading'?" Luckily, again I had a spare set of new, shorter towbar bolts as well as a heavy duty flange (ooh, matron) that I could throw on. Time to break out the big boy tools Ah, much better! Unfortunately, this is where the good news ends, as I then delved under the bonnet. Immediately, alarm bells started to ring, as I recognised the same mismatched pair of batteries (2 batteries on a J100 Land Cruiser, because why the fuck not for extra oomph!) that had been on it when it was jump started. Obviously, they still worked for the trip home which had multiple stops for fuel and food, but for how much longer? Delving further with a torch, it was also evident that the oil filter hadn't been replaced, which tallied with the oil condition (although it's always hard to tell on a diesel after even just 100 miles, of course). So, evidently not serviced as promised then. Luckily, as a "premium dealer", this dealer includes a comprehensive 3 month warranty with all purchases, so there wasn't much wriggle room for them here. Cue a telephone call to the dealership. It was obvious they'd just skimped and expected me not to notice, but I decided to play nice and take the "missed in error" line rather than getting anyone's backs up. The dealership is run by 2 people, supposedly with one overseeing sales and one overseeing servicing on the very large amount of stock they keep. Surprise surprise then, that there had been a "miscommunication": Rather than schlep all the way down to MK, they agreed to pay £300 towards the cost of a service up here (the local Toyota main dealer that looked after my Hilux - Oakmere of Northwich - being a unicorn of excellent customer service, competent work, all work actually being carried out, and reasonable pricing too). They also agreed to pay back the cost of me buying whatever reasonably priced batteries I could source and fit myself. One other thing I did notice, however, was the header tank being suspiciously empty, when it was conspicuously full during my test drive the week before. Hmmmmmmm. Just wait for the next couple of parts.....

Not in the slightest. ULEZ is Eu6 diesels from circa 2015. Even if it somehow was 2008, the van is from 2002 despite the later reg. I'll have some of what the seller is smoking....

I'm still trying to work out how a 2002 van is remotely approaching compliant in the first place?!

You would be correct..... I arrived bright and early at the dealership after a 2.5 hour drive (them being in MK, me being in Cheshire/Liverpool - but I've always been willing to travel for the "right" car). Dropped off the Hilux, and walked around to do the paperwork for both cars. The dealer talked about how they'd done all the work for me, however they hadn't been able to find the source of the squeak despite extensive road testing. It was at this point that I noted from the V5 that the previous "doctor" owner was from the Leeds area and had a rather foreign sounding name, however I'd say that due to my previous experience, my guard was probably much further down that usual, and so I also didn't think it odd when I came out to find the LC running and waiting for me, and didn't perform any cursory checks before climbing aboard. Anyhow, within 5 minutes down the road the squeaking was driving me mad, a minor "budgie chirping" over every minor surface imperfection. Luckily, I had my mum riding with me for the trip back, and she lifted the centre cubby lid whereupon the squeaking suddenly became louder. Inside was the head unit for the rear seat DVD player, and a brief steadying hand revealed this was loose in its cradle with metal-on-metal contact. Score one for mum! A pack of tissues was wedged down to the side of it and silence reigned. Unfortunately, after another 5 minutes it became apparent that whilst the wheel wobble was definitely better, it was by no means cured. "Hmm, if its not the wheels, is it a ball joint? The last MOT did advise play...." Whilst irritating, none of this was a showstopper on an 17 year old car, but in hindsight it should have been a red flag for what was to come..... However, time to focus on the positives. I'd never driven such a comfy car, and that includes my old Jeep Commander which was like a sofa on wheels! This LC had ridiculously wide, plush seats like a La-Z-Boy settee, and it had the benefit of a fully working example of the AHC (Active Height Control) suspension. This is a hydraulic system with adjustable ride height and firmness, that rivals Citroen for comfort (and complexity, and repair bills). It also had a wonderfully mid-00s infotainment system, with a million and one options to delve into. Sold until 2007, was this one of the last vehicles that came with a tape deck, too? Certainly, it must be the last vehicle to come with a fucking EXTENDY ARIEL?! 😁

Well, now that this appears to have finally sold again (to some other poor unsuspecting sap), I can begin to tell the tale of my brief but traumatic experience with the world's only unreliable Land Cruiser Amazon! I bloody loved my Hilux, and it had been utterly faultless for 2 years and 35k miles - but unfortunately my hand was forced into changing it due to increasing difficulty in getting insurance for it. As a commercial vehicle privately owned for hobby purposes, but used for commuting to my day job, InsCos were naturally assuming I was a self-employed tradie taking the piss by using it for undeclared business use. It had got to the point where any online quote/comparison sites had removed the "social and commuting" option from their forms, with "social only" or "business inc commuting" suddenly now (in Jul 23 when my cover lapsed) being the only options. This was, well, inconvenient, unless I wanted to pay £3k for business cover.... And thus, I needed to get back into an SUV, and fast. But the choice of modern-ish SUVs that aren't just a tall car and are able to tow 3+ tons (essential for me), that weren't going to immediately shit themselves (ruling out anything with a green oval), was rather thin. @horriblemercedes had hit on the solution though, he had a Land Cruiser Amazon. Perfect! However, unlike his bargain priced, rot free manual, all I could find for sale was autos, either kwispy with moon mileage for a reasonable price, or a reasonable condition for "HFM?!" Eventually, I stumbled across this one. Only 85k miles, and under £20k! Why? A previous Cat D, according to the dealer. I was shown photos, it had had a new wing, bonnet, headlight and bumper after a front corner knock. And, for bonus points - it was for sale with the very reputable "prestige, SUV and supercar" dealer that my Hilux had come from, so I'd be in good hands. Nope, twas a 4.2D, a facelift with the 5 speed auto. And so, the week before my collection post, I went down for a look. Not visible in the photos was a huge "key" scratch down one side. Hmm.... Well luckily I had a tame bodyshop guy who could sort that. More of a problem on the test drive were flat batteries requiring a jump start, a wheel wobble right around motorway cruising speeds, and an incessant squeak coming from somewhere. Oh, and it was due a service. No problem, shirley, for a reputable large dealer to sort out? Importantly, that fabulous big old engine pulled strongly, and the gearbox changed up and down nicely. Plus, the chassis was absolutely spotless! Thus, a deal was struck which involved a very good price for my Hilux, and I collected the following week.

A friend of a friend on FB appears to be selling a remarkably un fucked BX https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/1333210761408281/

Now, I've seen my fair share of outrageous lies in used car ads, but this takes the biscuit...

A fresh spot tonight whilst dining on cheesy chips and waiting for a taxi 😁