Pillock does a collection thread

[Pillock]

[brickwall]

Ha ha!!!!!!

[dugong]

Looks like BTB's MGF!

[HMC]

MGF.

 

I spent a long journey in a knackered one with my eyes glued to that bank of gauges

[Micrashed]

Northbound on the M6 is a bit of a car park, but southbound is OK.

 

Im just setting off to Manc down the 61 in a little while

[Cavcraft]

A busy M6, a long journey and an MG. WCPGW?

[CortinaDave]

Haha! By all accounts this is a good one. Quite fancied it myself!

 

It started off about a mile from my house with tiff... But as it's passed through various shiters it's now about 350 miles away so chances if it at some point coming to me are much slimmer!

 

Looked a proper barg. Nice work!

[Pillock]

Dingdingdingding it's the HFH MGF from BTB! It's now safely in Philibusmo's bedroom cos I'm off out to a barbeque and meat > cars. Full report later.

[Pillock]

[Bobthebeard]

A busy M6, a long journey and an MG. WCPGW?

Haha! Thankfully nothing of course...!

[Bobthebeard]

All gone jolly quiet on here..... Come on Pillock... Spill the beans... Update needed!

[urpert]

I'm on a purple Pacer....

The very definition of trainshite.

[Bobthebeard]

The very definition of trainshite.

Indeed so..... This is my local train service. Not proud of it, it is truly shite.

Welcome to Northern Rail.

[richardmorris]

Is that a train? I thought it was a bus

[eddyramrod]

Aye, but what time do you go to sleep?

Normally between 11 and midnight.  I've tried going earlier, I just can't.  Even 11 is too early some nights, I had one last week where I just couldn't sleep.  Ended up back on the internet for a couple of hours trying to make my eyes tired.  I do, however, usually get 30-60 minutes on the settee most afternoons, which appears to be the top-up I need.

 

Smart-looking MGF, btw, hope it lives up to the pic.  I've driven one and liked it.

[Pillock]

OK, so as correctly guessed by CortinaDave back at the start, it's the MGF. I kinda thought someone would guess since I made all the right noises on that thread, and then the thread bombed because I'd agreed to have it. But I also wanted to do the whole mystery thing, so essentially I ignored the fact it had been guessed.

 

 

So are you lot ready for a tale of woe, heroic rescue, near misses and daring? Try www.amazon.co.uk then sucker, because actually this was fairly straightforward. As predicted there was some swearing at a quarter to five this morning, because I'd booked a train ticket for the good lady too and we just got carried away watching TV last night and didn't get to bed much before midnight. Ooops. Still, there'll be coffee on the station, right? Wrong. Leicester station cafe locked up, cheers East Midlands Trains. Obviously nobody needs caffine at half five in the morning.

 

Boarded a Class 170 which just seems to be an upgraded Sprinter type thing. It wobbled through Leicestershire and into the West Midlands and Mrs_Pillock pointed out gently that it called at Hinkley which was just as far from our house, and it was now 30 minutes later which could have meant 30 minutes more in bed. I nodded and said nothing. Eventually we arrived at Birmingham New Street where a paper cup of warm brown was purchased, and a Pendolino was boarded to Preston. This was like the Ford Scorpio of trains - there's a step that comes out when the door opens and everything. And instead of paper tickets in the top of the seats, they have a little LCD display above each one showing when it's reserved from and to. I don't get out much, as you can see. Especially on trains.

 

There were rainbows. 

 

 

Eventually Preston was called out, we got off the train and hunted out some form of meat-based breakfast and moar coffee. Returning to the station (I'm not paying station platform prices for a bacon buttie, no chance) we found our platform to be entirely occupied by slack-jawed chavs and their five gnerations of offspring. At least this journey was a short one, and as a Pacer hooked up to a Sprinter pulled in, we held our breath and got on. The girl sat opposite (who I had to ask three times to move her feet off the seat so I could sit down) seemed to be chewing her boyfriends ear about who he was looking at, who he'd slept with, and whose numbers were in his phone. And her mate had just got rid of her baby because she didn't know whose it was. Good lord.

 

 

Anyway, we were met at the station by Bobthebeard, who didn't have a beard and wasn't called Bob. That's internet forums for you, reminds me of that "girl" I met online once. We clambered into his half-scale replica Prelude (or maybe I just thought they were bigger than that) and oozed gently down the road and round the corner - that was a really nice end to the outward journey, that Honda was a nice ride. 

 

Rolled the MG out of the garage and BobTB gave me a quick run down of where things are, because actually I'd never really looked over one of these. I'm still wondering a few bits, like how the heck does the engine come out of that little gap? But it was nice to know it was all there, and he kindly made a cuppa whilst I whizzed it around the block to make sure things were basically connected and it had the right number of wheels etc. First impressions were that it drove really nicely but MY GOD was it heavy. However, for a super-budget car with a full MOT and bugger all wrong with it, it was fantastic.

 

 

Money changed hands, cuppa drank, BobTB said goodbye to, first stop petrol station for obligatory photo, and to wazz some air into the spare tyre - 3psi but Bob was kind enough to mention it before I was sat on the hard shoulder cursing. I'll keep an eye on that.

 

 

And that, folks, is pretty much the exciting bit. There was a mild panic when I realised that once hot, the car stank of that oh-shit-it's-overheating smell but I did was any shitist would do, and ignored it. It only seemed to happen when stationary so I just didn't stop much for the first bit. I probably had a bit of paranoia going off regarding anything to do with water, heat, the K-Series so perhaps I was jumping to conclusions but my bum started twitching when I realised that no matter what the heater control was set to, hot air came from the vents. This immediately meant in my head that the head gasket had chosen the two miles since buying a perfectly fine car to detonate, and shortly there would be a Hiroshima-style incident on the outskirts of Blackpool.

 

Ignoring it seemed to be the best plan in this case (and I'm not condoning driving cars until they die - the water temp was absolutely perfect on the gauge, the oil temp was if anything a bit low, and it was running fine with no steam) because a few miles later the smell was pretty much gone. It was then a 60mph cruise down the M6 - both for reasons of caution with a long journey on a little-used car, and also because I was just getting used to roof-down motoring and acquainting myself with truck wheelnuts. 

 

I was also getting used to the gearchange - it's really frickin' heavy. I don't know if this is because I'm used to girly cars with purposefully light actions, but it really feels like something is overtight or jammed. All gears are available though, no crunching. The clutch feels really high but BTB jumped in before we left, tried it, said it had always been like that so I'm happy. I'd already sussed that it didn't slip in 4th, again perhaps it's just the comparison to my Peugeot that's only done 5000 miles and is light as anything.

 

The M6 started getting a bit stop-start around J19, and we made the decision to head cross-country to Stoke which I knew was on the way home so a signpost for the A50 was located and we came off the M6 early and headed through some nice little towns. Again, in traffic on the motorway I was just a bit concerned about the heat but BTB was quite reassuring that it was a good car, no faults, and it would handle it. Didn't stop me keep checking the temperature gauge every 30 seconds though.

 

It rained for approx. 20 seconds but otherwise it was a lovely drive, cruised through the Stoke ring road and out towards Uttoxeter and the M1, into Leicester to pick my car up from the station and I handed the MG keys to Mrs_Pillock who took it home for me and started showing it off to the neighbours by the time I got home. I cast a more critical eye over it at this point, there's a couple of rust blebs and some poor rattlecan work been done in the past but that's because I'm stood right next to it. I'll start a proper thread to document the work I do on it.

 

I presented it to the boy, who will be helping me with the work on it (and technically part-owns it). I'm going to moderate his "I'm going to do it up like in Forza" attitude but shouldn't be too hard, there's not much in the way of garish bolt-ons for this car. He loves Wheeler Dealers so it should be simple to get him to think along the lines of a rolling tidy and part resto. He loves it which is a relief since he was a bit "meh" after I showed him pics, he was after me buying a frickin' Impreza or Skyline or something. Bloody Xbox.

 

Things I have found:

1. You shouldn't drive petrol cars like a diesel. They feel rubbish if you change at 3000rpm all the time. This goes like a scalded squirrel if you hold on to the gears.

2. No PAS makes you drive properly, wit htwo hands, moving when steering.

3. Bobthebeard is a very very nice man indeed.

4. IF you drive around with the roof down, you'll get a suntanned forehead.

 

I'll start a proper thread with some plans for it - tidying, cleaning, sorting out a few niggles. But for now, it's in my garage and it all went wonderfully

 

Thanks again Mr Thebeard!

 

 

[holbeck]

 

 

2. No PAS makes you drive properly, wit htwo hands, moving when steering.

 

 

Really no PAS?

 

99.9% of these had Electric power steering with a large motor on the column under the dash

[Pillock]

Standard from 1998 on all cars, only the VVC had it standard from launch - someone was feeling a little stingy with the options it seems as this is a 1997.

[holbeck]

Standard from 1998 on all cars, only the VVC had it standard from launch - someone was feeling a little stingy with the options it seems as this is a 1997.

 

That's a rare beast then. My employers supplied the power steering kit to Rover and option or not, virtually every car had it.

[Pillock]

I feel hard done to now. I've briefly looked into whether it can be retro fitted but given that Mrs_Pillock can drive it fine I just told myself to man up.

[CortinaDave]

I only guessed as I happened to look for that thread this week as I was kinda toying with the car myself... Looked it up and saw you making interested noises on it then the collection thread and thought - ahhhhhhhhh....

 

Looks a great buy at that money. You can't really argue with anything halfway decent and tested for that sort of cash,let alone a wee hottie like that

[Barry Cade]

I feel hard done to now. I've briefly looked into whether it can be retro fitted but given that Mrs_Pillock can drive it fine I just told myself to man up.

You need the colummn, some wire and a fuse and it's good to go. Electric power steering is gash though. It does have ABS and leather though, so some boxes were ticked! I fitted the wind stop, the stereo,TF speakers when I had it, as well as a wiper motor that you could hear the stereo over!

[Noel Tidybeard]

+2 psi in front tyres= autoshite powa steering

[Pillock]

TF door speakers? I was looking at putting in the rear T-Bar speakers but I don't know if they can co-exist with the wind stop?

[purplebargeken]

They can indeed co-exist. Oh yes.