OMG BROKKEN DOWN!!! (Now with added social snobbery)

[Guest Breadvan72]

I am waiting for the RAC at Cherwell Valley Services on the M40 as the belt on the Beta has gone SNAFU and I am temporarily without alternator or water pump action.    RAC ETA many hours from now, so they say.  Arse.

 

Sign at the restaurant bit: "No access to Greggs through the external seating area".  Plainly designed to segregate the povs and Northerners from the nice middle class people lunching al fresco on up-market Burger King.   Naturally I approve.

 

 "Mummy, Mummy, the people on the next table are eating Greggs!"

 

"Hush, Sofia, it's rude to point. Simon, darling, can we move tables? We might catch rickets."

[eddyramrod]

Good luck (as the Gestapo said to Gordon Jackson   )

[Guest Breadvan72]

Thank you!  (cue running through streets like a nutter only to be gunned down by merciless Boche fiends).

 

I am back home now, The helpful RAC bloke arrived not five minutes after I posted the whinge above, and came up with the goodies.   Now once more the astonishing Italian electrics are powered up to work their magic, and the mighty water pump can propel the mayonnaise through the head gasket, and thus are order, peace, and justice restored to the world of shitbag Italian motors. 

[tooSavvy]

I get to fix all sorts of tat in BK, on the Mway services, and I always politely decline the offer of a bite.... well, I get to go round the black back! 

 

TS

[Guest Breadvan72]

Cuz I is well classy innit I had the steaky pie and cold chips at FOOD R US or whatever the other place along from BK is called.   Noms.

[michael1703]

That's not a breakdown,that's a pit stop. If you get back within the same day/decade it doesn't even count

[Guest Breadvan72]

FPWM.

 

Only one chod spottage at the services by the way.  A K reg Rover driven by a foxy chick in big shades.  

[wackywacerwill]

/\ /\ Pics or it never happened.

[Guest Breadvan72]

Ever since the episode above, the temperature gauge needle has been up and down like a whore's drawers, even thought the car is showing no sign of actual overheating, the coolant level is fine, the heater is working (insofar as it ever does), etc. The overheat light is coming on even when the car is cold, and when the needle is bang in the middle where it should be.  

 

Instrument broken, or air in the system, or what?  I did a bit of top hose squeezage with the engine running and the cap off the expansion tank, but remain unsure, as usual, of what the car is up to.    

 

Which fuckwit invented these ludicrous machines, and why do we like them so much?    

[skattrd]

My Spyder over-reads on the temp gauge quite a bit. It was only after flushing the system, fitting new thermostat, huge radiator & fan that I discovered it was a faulty gauge ... It's Italian don't put too much faith in the gauges.

The sender for the gauge is in the top of the cylinder head. There are two there & I think the one you want is the one nearest the drivers side, check the wiring to that, remove it (if you can, mine won't move) and give the sender a clean

[Guest Breadvan72]

Cheers.  I was indeed distrusting the gauge, accustomed as I am to Italian motaz.  

 

The petrol gauge on the Beta is also a bit dodge, but as I used to fly light aeroplanes back before I was skint (query causal relationship between flying and skintage, but don't go there), and because in flying fuel level really, really matters, I have learned to treat all petrol gauges as bloody liars, one way or the other.

[skattrd]

I have only ever run out of petrol in a car twice .... Both times were in a Lancia, and it was because I believed the fuel gauge.

I now have a rule that I travel with a full can of petrol in the boot of any Lancia.

[Guest Breadvan72]

I carry two cans of Polar Bear juice in my old Jensen.  I ran out in that once, but that was because I started the engine. 

 

When I had a goppingly crap POS Hyundai I believed the gauge and refused to believe the onboard computer, thinking all computers are wank. This bit of idiocy meant that I ran out of electric soup on a French autoroute and had to pay a hefty bung to the tow dude.  

[Guest Breadvan72]

My Spyder...

 

 

Spyder or Spider?  Lancia used both, the idiots.  Alfa said Spider, but Lancia appear to be all over the place.  I had someone call mine a Zagato, which I think was what they called the heaps in the USA, or was that a  Scorpion, or was that a Montecarlo, or WTF?   I'm Fulvia'd if I know.  

[scooters]

I fuggin hate Cherwell Valley services, the busiest services by a mile. I spent 3 hours there once waiting for an AA lorry to ship my old early Volvo240 back to Edinburgh. Started having running issues. On getting home we couldn;t work out what was wrong with it until I took the newly professionally reconditioned carb to bits and low and behold there was a 2 inch long off cut of white perspex in the bowl!!??! Lesson - just because the ad says they are professional doesn't preclude them from being numpties....sometimes you are better off tackling it yourself. These days I wouldn't think twice

[Guest Breadvan72]

The RAC used to be pretty good, and the mechs still are, but the call centre has got worse and worse, and the waiting times keep going up.  It wasn't too bad the other day - about an hour and a half.  

[skattrd]

Spyder or Spider?  Lancia used both, the idiots.  Alfa said Spider, but Lancia appear to be all over the place.  I had someone call mine a Zagato, which I think was what they called the heaps in the USA, or was that a  Scorpion, or was that a Montecarlo, or WTF?   I'm Fulvia'd if I know.  

 

I say Spyder, as said Alfa's were Spiders, Lancia Spyder.

 

Zagato is the US name for them, which reminds me .... I don't suppose you know anywhere to get replacement hoods for Spyders? Shockingly it seems getting one shipped from the states is the easiest option: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/251074037375?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649

[Guest Breadvan72]

I bought one from a place in the UK two years ago.  I will check my stuff and find out who it was.   Mine came with a very tatty mohair hood so I went back to black vinyl.    Quite pricy.

[Guest Breadvan72]

Look at that horrid Federal bumper!  

 

I don't know if you ever use Midwest Bayless.  They are a pretty good US spares source for non handed stuff. 

 

http://www.midwest-bayless.com/storefrontprofiles/default.aspx?sfid=208227

[skattrd]

Cheers for the link. I'd be grateful if you could see where you got your hood from. I haven't been able to find one in the UK for less than £400, and even with expensive shipping that one from the states comes in well under £300.

[Guest Breadvan72]

My vinyl  hood from the UK cost me more than £300.  I have ruffled through old emails but not found the company name.   I will look at the papers in a drawer this evening.   The hood that I bought is good quality, but a tight fit that was difficult to put on, and I can't get the old hood cover to fasten over it when the hood is down.    I have still got the old mohair hood in case Barry the Chav happens by with his Stanley knife (as happened twice when I had a 1977 Alfa Spider that lived in a posh London Square).

[skattrd]

Don't worry about digging the paperwork out. My brother was supposed to be getting details of someone in Kings Lynn who may able to make me a new hood, otherwise I'll be getting one of those from the US.

 

It just annoys me that I can find a hood for an MX5 for considerably less than one for a Beta, when the Beta's hood is a fraction of the size.

[Guest Breadvan72]

Economies of scale, innit.

[Guest Breadvan72]

I can never decide whether a Beta Spider/Spyder with the top down looks cool, or looks like a spavined pick up truck, or both.    It was the same when I had a Lotus Europa Special. Some times I looked at it and saw only beauty; other times I looked at it and saw only a daft looking squished van.  

[skattrd]

I don't care how the car looks with the roof up/down. I just like the drive and the handling of mine.

That said, as a rather pale ginger with receding hairline (bald) the targa/soft top set up is probably better than a normal convertible for me ... I can hide from people/the sun.

[Guest Breadvan72]

U B DA JUREE

[320touring]

U B DA JUREE

Incase you hadn't noticed,some 3.14 lock opening device has pitched a tent on the back of your motah!

[Guest Breadvan72]

No self respecting member of the travelling community would be seen dead in my yard, as it is too full of skanky motors, mangy dogs, and assorted rubble and wreckage. 

[skattrd]

I'm sorry Mr Breadvan, but your Beta is far too shiny for me:

 

 

The main reason I haven't removed the chequered stickers is that I think they may be structural.

[Guest Breadvan72]

OMG BOOT SPOLIER  - must add at least 10 BHP, I reckon.