Austin-Rover

Press and hold in until the little marker light on the switch comes on.

Mine catches and crunches the gears changing down from 4th to 3rd. Remedied by pausing in neutral before engaging 3rd, or doubling the clutch. You'll be putting a new clutch in it to cure that problem, and even then it still won't be great. Do your gear linkages make a squeaky rattle when driving too?

Monogram on one of these would have been interesting. One to never leave the pages of the brochure perhaps? They were all painted in the factory in Pune, so the colours they did come in had no direct Rover equivalents anyway. They were all Tata colours. Not that they did a bad job, they chose some very nice colours and the paint finish on them when new was impeccable.

Naturally, I think there are great; I'm on my second. Charging new car prices for something that was out of date when launched was where they fell down, it was already the best part of six years old when it arrived in the UK with Rover. Other than that, there's nothing fundamentally wrong with it as a car. It's been saddled with carrying the baggage of the whole MGRover collapse, and there'll never be any getting away from that now for the CityRover. Its card is marked, and many people can't see beyond that.

Spanish Rose is the interior trim colour, second only to Ochre for fabulous interior colour schemes, as far as Allegros go!

More jobs ticked off in the last couple of months; new drop links means less clunking and banging on the high quality highways of West Yorkshire. The expansion tank was on its way out - I noticed a tiny pinhole that would leak fine bubbles of coolant, and on closer inspection, the old tank was degraded and full of hairline fractures. A new one was thirty quid from the main dealer.

This was in the car mart at Tatton Park last weekend. Absolute shite. Overspray on the door rubbers, a painted radio aerial, badly sprayed wing mirrors. Fit only for the most low-rest weddings and prom nights.

I have one and enjoy it as an interesting curio. I occasionally use it as my daily every few weeks or so. Mk2 versions are the way to go, still shit but improved greatly over the Mk1. Parts are cheap at Rimmer Brothers, including the strut top cups that rot away and allow the strut in to the boot (someone mentioned this earlier in the thread) They're easy to keep serviced (the oil filter is the same as the Peugeot 106). Mine needs a clutch at the moment (Interesting to read they don't last long anyway!), They're well screwed together and are very nippy, thanks to the huge engine. They're crap on fuel around town, but will give you near 40mpg on the motorway (so much for CITY Rover!) Keep the arches cleaned out and they don't rot - mine is fine underneath, however some of the worst examples will have been welded at the backs of the sills a few times by now. Anyone thinking of buying one needs to make sure that for the alarm/central locking that the 'learn' fob is still present. This is a key fob with a lead and plug attached. It plugs in to the alarm/immobiliser ECU under the drivers seat and you will need the 'learn' fob to reprogramme your normal key fobs each time you change the battery! In summary; Thirsty. Can be rusty, but well screwed together. Cheap stuff from Rimmer Bros. Mk2 is best.

This post is an unexpected one, and a bit of a sad end for the Crap Corsa (it was anything but, to be honest - a brilliant little car) as it was written off on Monday 13th May. It was back in service with my Mum who was heading out with my Gran. They came across a queue of traffic at some failed temporary traffic lights. Deciding not to wait, and to take another route, she pulls out of the line of cars to do a u-turn when a minibus comes down the outside of the line of cars to enter a right turn box. It hits the driver's door, pushing the car round straight. We think Mum hit hear head as she doesn't remember anything after this. The Corsa ran down the offside of the car in front and finished up in the back of an Audi. Perhaps her foot went on the gas, considering the damage. It is the end of the road for it, anyway. After a check up by ambulance staff, they both escaped with just bruises thankfully.

Just the 25GTi for this now, the poor little CityRover is staying at home.

Thank you everyone for your encouraging words. Still plenty to do on this car (they joys of getting stuff cheap from friends!) but it is getting there. There's been temptation to sort out the obvious stuff first, like the scuffed bumpers but I'm glad that I've not. It's lovely to just get in and go for a waft and have confidence in the old thing. Various clunks from the front suspension mean that drop links, track rod ends and a couple of bushes are the next things to tackle. Getting both bumpers resprayed would be nice, but we'll have to see...

Yes in 2.5 or 3.0 flavours.

Bringing the Volvo story up to date; plenty of mechanical work since last summer. My local main dealer, Clive Brook, Huddersfield began a 'heritage' club on the first Saturday of each month. Essentially a lot of standing around looking at old and new Volvos, drinking tea and (if you ask in advance) getting your car up on the ramps and taking it apart. It's all brilliant fun and it is really nice of Clive Brook to make time and space for stuff like this. This was wonderful timing, as it means that I've been able to speed up progress through some of the mechanical works I had planned... and not even had to get my hands dirty as it's all been done at Clive Brook. The prices charged for parts and labour through the 'heritage club' have been VERY good, so much so that weighing up the cost of my own time it has been a no-brainer. Over a couple of visits, I've had the cambelt and water pump changed, the camshaft oil seals (special tools required as the back of the head is about two inch from the bulkhead!) and the gear selector switch (which was a welcome repair as more and more often the gearbox would go into a limp mode - which gave you only one forward gear - 3rd!) The reassurance of a new cambelt, and the new selector switch has seen the Volvo get a bit more use (in nicer weather, anyway) I've been keeping tabs on fuel consumption and over about 5,000 miles it has averaged 21mpg. My best ever tank was 27mpg and round town use returns between 16 and 18mpg. It isn't particularly ruinous, especially as it doesn't get used for work. For days out or something to potter about in on my days off it is the only way to travel! A few posts previous, I mentioned that replacing most of the engine's breather system did wonders for its oil incontinence problem. In normal driving it was now oil tight, but when under the load of towing the caravan it made a right mess. Since then I've had the camshaft oil seals replaced (above), and I'd been waiting for another caravanning weekend to test the Volvo out again. Well, this weekend gone was the one; Forty miles to Bolton Abbey on Saturday and forty miles back this morning and the boot lid and front of the caravan are oil free! Hurrah!

I find mine runs pretty well on the 'default' ECU setting, yet I know of another that overfuels and runs like crap on the default ECU setting. Odd! The Fastcheck needs a good quality exhaust gas analyser present to really make the most of tweaking the settings and getting everything tuned spot-on.

That's good - as you can't get older than this one.