Primarily

[jonathan_dyane]

I am rather surprised to find that I seem to have become a massive Primera fan and I still can't believe what a well kept secret they are. I've driven a lot of cars and the balance of performance, handling economy and space that the Primera gives is nothing short of remarkable. With uncharacteristic enthusiasm I have found myself embarking on an improvement programme which I will do my best to detail below. 

 

Today's work:

 

1) The doors. I'm glad to say that being a London car seems to have preserved the underbody relatively well, it has unfortunately resulted in loads of dents. I managed to get a decent back door and tailgate and I have got the side door on. See photo 1. Unfortunately it isn't quite the right colour but it's close enough for me.

 

2) Wipers. Two main faults; inoperative self parking/intermittent wipe and what is apparently the scourge of Primera P11 wipers knackered spindles. One isn't two bad but the other was well fucked. Basically mild steel axles run in a nylon block and gradually chew through it. Happily I managed to find a piece of copper pipe on the road which as luck would have it was a good fit on the axle and I was able to drill out the nylon a bit more and tap the copper sleeve in. It's not 100% but it's a great improvement.

 

In terms of the lack of parking I had read on the Primera owners club that this can be cured by drilling out some rivets to remove the endplate of the wiper motor and cleaning up the contact plate, bending out the contacts a tad and lightly regreasing. It only flipping worked!

 

3) ABS light on. I traced this to an open circuit drivers side front abs sensor. Curiously the last MOT had an advisory for frayed ABS wiring however this was not present; in fact the wiring is very neatly routed. I suspect that they put the advisory on to try to cover themselves for passing it with the ABS light on. Remarkably I found new pattern sensors on ebay for ITRO £20 and set about removing the old one. Of course it was seized solid and after some 'persuasion' the end snapped off flush. In the end I drilled a load of holes around the edge of it and managed to prise it out. New sensor in place (with copperslip) and no ABS light

 

 

[jonathan_dyane]

Sorry for shit photos; will try better next time.

 

Below see photos of new radio which was about £50 off Amazon which is deckless and runs Ipod/Iphone and I would recommend and also plip. The car didn't have one but I was glad to find that you can work out what frequency your receiver is and programme in a suitable secondhand fob. Works great so far

[r.welfare]

Great to see this being fettled. They are truly great cars to drive.

[Noel Tidybeard]

if you can find some you want p10 wiper spindles which are metel instead of cheese plastic

 

these also have a learning ecu so if its a little "sluggish" just give it a regular damned good spanking

[fatharris]

In terms of owners clubs, I always found the NPOC guys to be excellent.

[wuvvum]

these also have a learning ecu so if its a little "sluggish" just give it a regular damned good spanking

Both I and its previous two owners drove it quite enthusiastically, so it shouldn't be too bad...

[Noel Tidybeard]

if you want to see obsessive with a p11 look up my buddy naughty norm and his car the wannabe

[Faker]

I once owned an si and an sri. Many many moons ago. Simply awesome underrated and unappreciated vehicles. Very thirsty beasts, but as you state, very very capable machines.

[dieselassist]

My Old man had one of these in 1.6 estate form years back, a work'horse n miles muncher; it never failed to proceed, but it had the problem of the wiper jumping about - the spindle mount fault, and he found it desperately uncomfortable - due to very worn drivers seat; foam completely dead - I had a similar era mega miles Almera - on that I swopped over the padding n cloth from an identical pattern passenger seat, found in the scrapyard for €10...

 

...anyways, the old man left his old Primera estate down to me to fix up n sell; which I did tho I bombed about locally in it for a week, n my 6'4 16stone frame managed to bust the metal base of the seat, completely away from the frame! I took the seat out n welded back up the seat base to frame mounting points; the seats bases seem to be made of rizzla thin metal....

 

...as said above they do like a drink, but are very hard to kill, and the seating comfort is minimal /very uncomfortable; especially on long drives...

[fordperv]

if you want to see obsessive with a p11 look up my buddy naughty norm and his car the wannabe

how do you know norm? i know him actually in person used to go to the same car meet

[wuvvum]

I once owned an si and an sri. Many many moons ago. Simply awesome underrated and unappreciated vehicles. Very thirsty beasts, but as you state, very very capable machines.

I didn't think it was too bad on petrol.  I was averaging nearly 40mpg when driving sensibly.

[Mr_Bo11ox]

I had a 2.0 GT LE for a year not long back. It was absolutely great, one of the best-driving cars I've had. 38mpg average too.

[Faker]

Well blow me! I never ever got anywhere near that mpg! I'd a 2.5di smiley tannyshite which was easier run!