Schaefft's Bargain Barge Extravaganza - Italian Money Furnace

[hairnet]

https://www.kentekencheck.nl/kenteken?i=GD-LB-94

 

[mk2_craig]

Weird innit. You hear all this talk of authorities clamping down on unregistered foreign vehicles, but somehow the least inconspicuous car possible can be parked on U.K. streets for half a decade and nobody bats an eyelid. 

[Dave_Q]

I sincerely doubt the previous owner will get any aggro from the tax man over not declaring it, they barely have the resources to collect tax from people who are trying to pay.

I don't think there is any register of arrivals for foreign numberplates so it's not like they will get picked up on ANPR after 6 months. It would need an actual copper to pull them over and ask questions which is pretty low risk I'd say.

With this it's almost so blatant it's like a double bluff, who would drive round in such a noticable car not correctly registered?

[D.E]

10 hours ago, Schaefft said:

The usual reg plate site doesn't recognize the plate anymore, apparently that's normal if nothing has happened after a few years time.

Normally a car only becomes untraceable if it has been exported or scrapped. Just being off the road for a couple of years doesn't do that, our version of SORN (schorsen) requires renewal every year, which is enough to keep the plate active and findable. 

What probably caused this, is that the PO moved abroad and stopped paying and responding to everything - Taxes, inspections. insurance. RDW is unable to find owner and car, and removes it from their system.

[mk2_craig]

6 hours ago, Dave_Q said:

it's almost so blatant it's like a double bluff, who would drive round in such a noticable car

Hiding in plain sight eh. 

[Schaefft]

To be fair, he didn't use the car too much, it mostly sat in his drive and didn't go anywhere so chances of getting caught were slim. Hardly a car you'd expect someone to dodge taxes in either. I've sent my Nova docs including a cover letter and receipts off to HMRC now, fingers crossed that I dont have to pay VAT on a car I clearly bought in the UK...

The Corona is now with Powerflow/The Exhaust Doctor here in Newcastle (Tynemouth really) where it'll receive a custom made stainless steel catback exhaust on Tuesday. Hoping that everything is going alright, I made extra clear to them that I wanted to avoid any droning completely while returning to the dual chrome exhaust tips the car originally came with (and has lost a long time ago as the replacement backbox is getting pretty rusty now).

I've also had another look at the crusty audio system amplifier which is incredibly hard to come by. As you can see below its pretty clear that its been submerged halfway for a considerable time (still wondering how that happened, there's no water leaks inside really). It pretty much looks like a goner but I'll see if I can improve things at least a little by cleaning it up. The components themselves mostly look fine at a first glance although Im relatively sure that most capacitors have rotten out at the bottom.

Believe it or not, the radio still turned on with it plugged in (although no audio). One of the tiny capacitors has snapped off while cleaning it unfortunately...

If anyone has any idea how I can keep the original stereo while replacing the amp, one way or another, with an alternative unit, please let me know. Im actually in a similar situation with my Toyota Celsior where finding a replacement amp (which seems to be missing in mine for some reason) proves pretty much impossible as its JDM Celsior exclusive.

With the drive empty I pulled the S-Class in to see if I can isolate my hot starting/bad idling issues that I experience when I haven't driven the car for a while. It was relatively clear to me that it can only be moisture build-up in the distributer caps which I quickly confirmed - it ran perfectly fine after wiping any moisture out of them. I think the old seal rings for the dustcover/dissy cap are just too hard and don't really keep moisture out anymore (thats really my only explanation) so I'll order some new ones.

While in there I wanted to investigate the oil leak coming from the driver side cam adjustment solenoid (believe it or not, Mercedes did have adjustable cam timing in 1991/92 on their M119). Turns out the solenoid housing sits flush against the engine with some kind of silicone sealant proventing oil mists from escaping from the timing chain housing. I didn't even realize there was supposed to be some type of sealant is its brown in color, similar to what you'd expect the oil residue underneath there to look like.

I'll order the sealant and o-rings for the distributer cover tomorrow and take it all apart the next weekend I actually got time. There's still a chance that the solenoid cap itself is leaking, which would mean I have to get new ones as well, but fingers crossed. I was worried that I had to replace the camshaft seals, that would have been much worse of a job and Im glad I managed to avoid that (for now). Gave the engine bay a badly needed clean at the end, looks so much better now:

I also finally got a wet vac! I don't think its magic but certainly helps with cleaning floor mats and carpets although it requires lots of patience, getting the solution out of the carpet really is the trick here and requires time and pressure. Naturally I didnt take any before and afters aside from a test area I did in the Celsior. I ran out of cleaning solution so this isn't the best it could be but gives you a good idea.

Hoping that I can get more stuff done now that the days are getting longer again and I don't have to wait until the weekend to get some time to work on the cars...

[Fabergé Greggs]

Is there a wiring diagram for the amp? I'd imagine you could replace it with any generic amp without too much hassle, but you'd probably have to splice in some new connectors. 

[Schaefft]

8 minutes ago, Fabergé Greggs said:

Is there a wiring diagram for the amp? I'd imagine you could replace it with any generic amp without too much hassle, but you'd probably have to splice in some new connectors. 

That might be a tricky one, those amps were only used in the super live sound system found in Corona EXiVs, Carina EDs and Celica GT4s I believe.

[Tepper]

It shouldn't be impossible to replace it with a generic amp. Working out which wires go to the speakers should be easy enough, you can get telecoms testers that put a tone down a pair of wires which you then pick up with an amplifier. Or apply a short at each speaker, check through the wires at the amplifier end with a multimeter until you find it, then take it off to confirm you're on the right wires.

Then you've got to find a permanent live, a switched live and a ground, which should also be easy enough with a meter. Might be thicker wires than the signal wiring. Finally you'll need to find the audio output from the original stereo to the amp, which if you've identified all the other wires shouldn't be too difficult. A cheap pair of headphones and a bit of trial and error should do the trick.

But if you can find a wiring diagram that'll make your life a fair bit easier! Drop me a message if you want any help with it.

[Schaefft]

On 2/22/2022 at 10:50 PM, Tepper said:

It shouldn't be impossible to replace it with a generic amp. Working out which wires go to the speakers should be easy enough, you can get telecoms testers that put a tone down a pair of wires which you then pick up with an amplifier. Or apply a short at each speaker, check through the wires at the amplifier end with a multimeter until you find it, then take it off to confirm you're on the right wires.

Then you've got to find a permanent live, a switched live and a ground, which should also be easy enough with a meter. Might be thicker wires than the signal wiring. Finally you'll need to find the audio output from the original stereo to the amp, which if you've identified all the other wires shouldn't be too difficult. A cheap pair of headphones and a bit of trial and error should do the trick.

But if you can find a wiring diagram that'll make your life a fair bit easier! Drop me a message if you want any help with it.

Thanks for the info. I will try to go with a similar Toyota amp first but if that doesnt work something more generic might be my only option.

Cleaning the amp unfortunately didn't help much. I can confirm that the radio, CD player and most of the speakers work, aside from scratching noises there isnt much audio output though.

There has been some major progress on the exhaust front though! The car now has a brand new custom made stainless steel catback exhaust which really transformed the driving experience. Which isn't surprising considering the original exhaust was a holey mess. Its nice and quiet now, similar to what you'd expect from a stock Toyota (in fact rather mundate hah) and has it's original twin chrome tipped backbox, just like it came from the factory.

This really was the last big job that needing doing on the car, at least for now only wheels and cosmetics are left on the to do list. I am still intending to order a replacement taillight, reflector panel and rear wiper motor from Russia, as you can imagine things have become quite a bit more complicated recently though, hard to tell what this means for the car dismantler, shipping companies or my mate's wife who is actually living close to the Ukranian border.

The liquid gasket specified for the Merc's cam adjuster solenoids arrived last week though so I used the few hours I had on Sunday to reseal those. Normally not a big job but the power steeting reservoir had to go to get access to all bolts, and as always, there've been those last few bolts that made the whole ordeal harder than you'd think things would need to be.

Reservoir and dissy cap gone, since I didnt wanna fork out 35 quid for an OEM reservoir gasket the last time I made my own which worked perfectly over the last 2 years or so. I replaced it with a fresh one (once again cut myself) just to be on the safe side.

You can see how oil is seeping through the solenoids, I'm still hoping its mostly coming from the sealing surfaces, not through the connector. The driver side one was much worse.

Definitely signs for at least some seepage there.

Used some steel wool to clean it all up, same on the mating surfaces of the reservoir. The O-rings were a bit of a pain to get off the distributer cover, they were still the original ones and hopefully the main reason for moisture building up in there, ultimately causing the misfire when hot. I'll hopefully get them picked up from the dealer on Wednesday.

And the backsides of the solenoids. Loctite 574 is the sealant specified for this job and a bit cheaper than the OEM sealant which isn't even available from the dealer anymore.

Hopefully I won't need to do this anytime soon again, although really this is a 2 hour job at most without cleaning, if none of the bolts cause issues.

[Schaefft]

The S-Classes ignition system is back in one piece, the car really struggled to start at first, Im not quite sure what was even the problem. I cleaned the dizzy caps again and the car managed to come back to life eventually. It now seems to run better than ever before though, it feels like an absolute rocketship, amazing considering its curbweight is over two tons, and the car is now 30 years old! Gave it the first wash in 6 months as well:

In other news, the Toyota got more attention today. The exhaust shop mentioned a bad engine mount. Having had a look underneath I can't see anything wrong with them though, they are soft but there are no rips, neither does the engine move unusually heavily when giving it some throttle. I did notice that my powersteering pump is leaking from the back though, and I will probably need to do a valve cover gasket relatively soon. From what I can tell it'll be a straigh forward job fortunately.

I've also investigated a noise still coming from the back. Turns out one of the new brakehoses rubbed against the wheel... It rubbed through the rubber, the flexihose inside was perfectly fine though. Hopefully some silicon grease and lots of electrical tape will keep it in decent shape for the foreseeable future...

I've also removed the alternator to investigate a high pitched noise coming from somewhere around it. I'm not sure if its the rear shaft bearing thats causing the problem. Considering that bearing is the one thing that is not easily replaceable on that alternator I just put it back on the car, with a replacement in mind for the future. After its first trip to Asda its now perfectly quiet again. Toyota self healing magic.

Mandatory "Cars really grew in size" comment. The Corona EXiV never was a big car being based on the Celica. But how the hell is that Yaris still seen as a Sub-Compact?

In general I really think the car feels nippier than ever before. Maybe it was the lack of exhaust back pressure but the 125 or so hp really feel perfectly sufficient for it, even with the 4-speed automatic.

I've also finally polished the headlights. I wasn't sure if there was a major difference afterwards but the photos tell a different story.

Before and after:

I can still recommend Turtle Wax's Headlight restoration kit, dirt cheap, easy and quick to use, lasts for several cars.

Not sure whats next. I'll probably knock out the valve cover gasket and then hope to get a message from @GingerNuttz soon.😄

[GingerNuttz]

30 minutes ago, Schaefft said:

The S-Classes ignition system is back in one piece, the car really struggled to start at first, Im not quite sure what was even the problem. I cleaned the dizzy caps again and the car managed to come back to life eventually. It now seems to run better than ever before though, it feels like an absolute rocketship, amazing considering its curbweight is over two tons, and the car is now 30 years old! Gave it the first wash in 6 months as well:

In other news, the Toyota got more attention today. The exhaust shop mentioned a bad engine mount. Having had a look underneath I can't see anything wrong with them though, they are soft but there are no rips, neither does the engine move unusually heavily when giving it some throttle. I did notice that my powersteering pump is leaking from the back though, and I will probably need to do a valve cover gasket relatively soon. From what I can tell it'll be a straigh forward job fortunately.

I've also investigated a noise still coming from the back. Turns out one of the new brakehoses rubbed against the wheel... It rubbed through the rubber, the flexihose inside was perfectly fine though. Hopefully some silicon grease and lots of electrical tape will keep it in decent shape for the foreseeable future...

I've also removed the alternator to investigate a high pitched noise coming from somewhere around it. I'm not sure if its the rear shaft bearing thats causing the problem. Considering that bearing is the one thing that is not easily replaceable on that alternator I just put it back on the car, with a replacement in mind for the future. After its first trip to Asda its now perfectly quiet again. Toyota self healing magic.

Mandatory "Cars really grew in size" comment. The Corona EXiV never was a big car being based on the Celica. But how the hell is that Yaris still seen as a Sub-Compact?

In general I really think the car feels nippier than ever before. Maybe it was the lack of exhaust back pressure but the 125 or so hp really feel perfectly sufficient for it, even with the 4-speed automatic.

I've also finally polished the headlights. I wasn't sure if there was a major difference afterwards but the photos tell a different story.

Before and after:

I can still recommend Turtle Wax's Headlight restoration kit, dirt cheap, easy and quick to use, lasts for several cars.

Not sure whats next. I'll probably knock out the valve cover gasket and then hope to get a message from @GingerNuttz soon.😄

I haven't forgotten about you fella 👍 

Been snowed under with Corts Mustang that came into get painted but turned out to be rotten. Having to split my time between work-Mustang-Manta and my new son, life is bonkers atm 😂

[Schaefft]

5 minutes ago, GingerNuttz said:

I haven't forgotten about you fella 👍 

Been snowed under with Corts Mustang that came into get painted but turned out to be rotten. Having to split my time between work-Mustang-Manta and my new son, life is bonkers atm 😂

No worries, theres no rush for now although I might have to send another car if the Mustang takes a little longer, the E39 with the rotten jacking points needs an MOT fairly soon😂

[Schaefft]

A few minor updates.

The E38 728i ULEZ refugee I picked up last October is starting to receive a little more attention now that winter is over. It needs a few cosmetic things sorted out to look like the 60k miles it has done in the last 25 years so I contacted multiple people breaking these cars with a list of bits I need.

The result was that I went straight to BMW and bought some of them new as almost every single one of these people turned out to be an incompetent tw*t who didn't understand the basics of communicating with a customer and then selling an item to said customer. It is honestly mind boggling how many conversations, even when parts have already been confirmed to be available, end up going nowhere. Really makes me lose my hope in society (or at least the people I need to interact with owning many of these older cars).

I'll probably end up buying the rest in Germany when I'm there again in June.

However, some progress has been made:

140 quid worth of BMW rubber:

I didn't even realize that these lower door edge trim pieces were supposed to be made from rubber, mine were rock hard and probably the reason why half of them were missing already (one was in boot that I stuck back on again earlier). Very common issue on E38s:

And new. It needed the force of a thousand suns getting these new ones on. Silicon lube is a must.

The car needs a wash badly. It's still a glorious looking machine though, the orient blue paint and sandbeige interior are a great match:

Bought a set of used floormats on Ebay as well. The driver one has a bit of wear that won't polish out but it'll do for now. Drill brush and wet vac used.

I'll order a few clips for the missing/lose c-pillar chrome trim next, doubt I'll get someone to sell me one anytime soon but we'll see. I've also asked the local BMW specialist for an appointment to have the ATF changed, naturally the conversation just stopped in the middle as well after him giving me two options. Guess you have to kick people in the ass whenever you want something to move forward nowadays... MOT is expiring soon, too.

In other news, the Corona now has a key ring. Wow.

[Schaefft]

The A6 Avant continues to be excellent as well. It's recently done a few hundred hassle free miles in the lake district. It needs a clean inside and out badly but its worth every euro I paid for it and is easily the most practical car I own.

I'll be at the NEC this Sunday. The plan is to take the S-Class on its first longer trip in what must be 2 or 3 years. Lets hope it'll do the journey without too much trouble after all the work that went into it then!🤞

[Schaefft]

Tiny update. The Mercedes has done well and did the Newcastle - NEC Birmingham 450 mile roundtrip without any issues. The trip did highlight the remaining issues of the car though, mainly the (literally) desolved front bush of the passenger side lower control arm that has been melted by the original power steering fluid leak (from 3 years ago) and the sticky brake caliper on the driver side front which probably hasn't particularly helped with the abysmal fuel economy which should lie somewhere in the mid to high teens...

As you can tell, one of the pistons doesn't retract like the others, despite my best efforts to free it up. I could buy a refurb kit. Considering the general state of the caliper and the risk of snapping the bleeding screw I'll probably just get a remanufactured one though, it wouldn't be much more expensive.

I also did notice some pretty odd brake shudder that gets worse the longer the car is driven. I honestly can't explain it as its simply not there under any kind of braking, and whats worse, I cant even figure out which corner its coming from as the steering wheel doesn't shake as much as the car (but sometimes does when things are getting worse). I'm praying that my 10 month old rear discs aren't warped already, that would really piss me off.

Especially after seeing the below:

Both of these (allegedly) genuine Lemforder front balljoints were only replaced 10 months ago. They didn't even have 500 miles on them yet. Both rubber boots have torn all the way around. I cannot even comprehend how that is possible on brand new quality parts. I've bought them on ebay and try to claim for warranty, I am not sure how successful I will be though now that more than 6 months have passed. If anyone can share their experiences on ebay when it comes to claiming warranty on car parts this late, please let me know. It's not like these can be installed incorrectly?!

In other news, I've finally installed the 8-hole wheels I bought from a Polish chap a few years ago. I'm still torn which set I prefer. I honestly thought it would be an easy decision, they do appear smaller than the original wheels somehow.

[hairnet]

orig wheels ftw

[Wibble]

Conversely, I prefer the eight holes 🙂

[brownnova]

I’m in agreement with Squire Hairnet… original wheels, they just look right. 

[TrabbieRonnie]

I think I just about prefer the originals too, but both sets really suit it.

Winters on one set, mebbe?

[Schaefft]

On 3/21/2022 at 10:34 PM, TrabbieRonnie said:

I think I just about prefer the originals too, but both sets really suit it.

Winters on one set, mebbe?

The car will probably never see a winter again so it would only make sense to keep one set around. Decisions!

Anyway, as you might have seen in the last Sunday Collection Action thread another pre-fl E38 728i has joined the fleet. The intend was to not turn the 60k ULEZ survivor into a daily that would be driven in winter as it really is too nice for that. I will probably go into more detail for what exactly I bought later this week, the lack of cats will certainly be a challenge as old ones go straight to the scrappy and new ones are impossible to find in the UK. Woohoo...

However, there is progress to report in other areas. I thought I should use the change to Summer time and replace the valve cover gasket on the Corona. Its a very easy job really, the cover is held on by just four 30mm nuts right on the spark plug tubes. Turns out 3 out of 4 weren't even what I'd call finger tight. I further loosened them with just my fingers in the pic below.

I think the only thing holding that cover on was what I found underneath it...

Welcome to sludge city. I feel like this car hasn't had an oil change in a very long time before I got it... Which does make sense considering the car has been off the road for 10 years, yet was still moved about somewhat regularly.

Nothing that can't be fixed with the right products, its a good thing the next oil change is coming up soon...

Fortunatelty the cam lobes don't appear to show any wear as far as I can tell. Which is further proof that this could possibly really be an 80k mile car.

The inside of the valve cover doesn't look much better either. There's a thick layer of caked on oil covering literally everything. That's probably also the reason why it didn't leak more, how could it possibly with this much sludge inside of it?!

2 cans of brake cleaner improved things slightly. I think I will dump in some engine cleaner before the next oil change and hope for the best. Things should further improve with every succeeding oil change you'd think.

I've wiped some of the sludge out of the valve train and started replacing the old gasket. Considering how brittle it was there's a good chance this was the original one from '89, literally as old as I am. The gasket set used includes the spark plug hole seals and these halfmoon shaped aluminium blanking plugs:

Not sure why Toyota decided to have these for their cylinder head. As you can tell this is a DOHC engine, both camshafts are connected by gears though, I'm not sure whether this wasn't the case for their higher performance 3S 4 cylinder engine heads, I guess not?

A few dots of silicon gasket in the right areas and I slapped it all together. The nuts are torqued to just 25nm, really not a lot at all. I've let it all settle over night and torqued them again today, there was defintely quite a bit of compression happening over night as I had to further torque them to get it all in spec.

And that's it. The whole job took a bit longer as there was quite a bit of cleaning to do. Realistically this could be a sub-1h job though. Drove the car to Asda and back revving the hell out of the engine (after warming it up properly), turns out the PWR button for this 4-speed auto doesn't care if shifting down 2 gears resulting in 6k rpm in 1st😂

[Conan]

The non-performance Toyota F engine of the time have "slave cam" design. One cam sprocket, camshaft geared together. Appears to be the same design as 4A-F in the Corolla. The performance oriented G engine indeed have normal DOHC two sprocket design. Makes cambelt change that bit easier I guess.

[Schaefft]

Yeah, the cambelt was a breeze. Thanks for the clarification!

[Zelandeth]

Given the amount of gunk in there I would absolutely not use any flushing agents.  Too much risk of chunks of crud escaping from relatively harmless locations and finding their way into critical oil passages.

I'd go to town cleaning what you can of the top end with the sump plug out to flush everything straight out there, then just run it on a high detergent (i.e. diesel engine spec) oil.  Change it as soon as it starts to look dark for a while.

Way safer than aggressive flushing products.  Great if you've got one sticky hydraulic tappet or something, but risky in a case like this.

[Bren]

Spray the cams etc with maintainence spray to soften gunk then carefully remove with non lint cloths etc. Then blast it with compressed air.

A couple of oil changes 500 miles apart will help. No flushes though. 

When we got the vectra the oil was dirty so I used a flush before dropping the oil. The new oil stayed clean for a very long time - this time I just changed the oil - it is already going black.

 

[Schaefft]

I couldn't wait and started to inspect the 7-Series more closely. A bit more info on how the sale actually went first though (sorry for the wall of text):

The car has been advertised in the E38 owners group on FB for a little while, it actually looked remarkably clean inside and out but as always, photos hide a lot of things. After not too much time the seller lowered the price to 2500 quid (originally 3000) which seemed like a fair price for a one owner clean 728i with 101k miles. I've agreed to view the car in London and the seller was keen to keep the car around until I arrive.

Fast forward to Sunday and I arrived in London. The seller told me "he's busy" and wouldn't be around but his dad would be there to do the sale. First impression of the car was mixed, dodgy housing estate, the car looked a bit tatty and it was clear that it was hardly a well loved example. After waiting for like 15mins a guy (maybe the dad?) showed up and showed me around the car. First impression was good, I was able to drive it around the estate, the engine sounded healthy, no knocks from the suspension, the car shifted well, brakes were good etc, no overheating. While doing the test drive the dad told me about all kinds of completely irrelevant features of the car and how he thought its the best thing in the world, all of which I completely ignored while going through my mental check list.

I did notice that the exhaust sounding slightly unusual, it sounded a bit like a minor exhaust leak but didnt think much of it, only the basics really mattered considering I already made my way down there and could sort minor problems easily myself. I parked the car and had a look underneath, and where you'd expect two cats to sit, the only thing I could see were two shiny new metal pipes. It dawned on me pretty quickly what was going on.

I mentioned it to the dad and his son on the phone, naturally both of them acted like they had no clue what was going on. I didn't want to walk straight away so I checked prices for cats to see what it would cost to get replacements, while doing that it became more and more clear that the guy seemed to know pretty well what someone could do in a situation like this if you know the right MOT person.

I told them what it would cost (4-700 quid) and that I'd not be interested anymore. Here's where some pretty odd things happened. It seemed like they were pretty desperate for me to buy the car, despite lowering the price to 2 grand first, and then further going down to 1750. Keep in mind it was originally advertised for 3 grand.

Thats pretty much the moment where I felt that it would be hard to lose if I was taking the car right now (keep in mind I would have wasted a day and 150 quid guaranteed otherwise). I offered 1800, the guy accepted in the end, and off I went with the car, a bill of sale and my part of the V5. But not before the battery died, which means a neighbor had to help jumpstart the car, which hasn't been turned off until I made my way back to Newcastle.

Turns out the guy was a trader (of the dodgy kind), therefore knowing very well that these cats had serious value, and I genuine hope that they didn't manage to get even a single cent of profit out of this deal. They didn't seem particularly happy in the end.

[Schaefft]

Now what did I actually buy?

The car is a late pre-facelift 728i, which means it has the single vanos M52b28, the same engine I have in my 528i and the blue 728i. Excellent engine, really can't fault it at all.

This one is Oxford green with sand beige leather, a fantastic combination I think. No special options really, aside from the fact that it has shadowline and body colored chrome accents which I assume is some kind of mild sport package. It also has the BBS style wheels which I think are one of the best wheel options for the E38.

Inside it has the standard electric memory seats which are the base level seat you can get in the UK I believe. It has the M-Sport steering wheel as well, aside from that its all typical E38. The above photo was from the ad.

A couple of bits that need replacing here and there, overall the interior does look like that of a 101k mile car. The seats need a bit of love, the biggest issue is the sagging headliner which seems to be very common on E38s. The sliding cover for the glass sunroof is missing its fabric. The detailing job they did wasn't great, any harder to reach areas still showed how filthy its been before.

I did find some loot underneath the arm rests in the front and back though!

As you can tell the seller did use it to shuttle the kids around in it, which probably explains some of the smashed bits and pieces inside the car.

The typical pixel issues on the radio (and cluster), the seller was nice enough to keep that quid in the coin holder. No tape in the deck unfortunately, surprisingly enough the car also didn't appear to ever have a CD player in the back!

The car comes with an almost complete toolkit, too. The trunk is filthy and I only noticed today that I actually drove home on the original spare. The tire in the back was completely ruined from really bad camber, wouldn't be surprised if thats still the case. Needs more investigating. The other 3 were recent, but budget.

I actually do believe that these could be the original reg plates front and back! Their condition at least would indicate that.

The paint looks a bit rough in places, most of it should come out with a polish though. Haven't found any clear indications of a respray yet which would be fantastic, plenty of door dings though! Amazingly even the windshield appears to be original, it does have a chip right in the driver's field of view unfortunately though so insurance will have to sort that.

The engine sounds good but could idle much more smoothly. I've read all the codes, a code for a cam sensor keeps reappearing so I might need to replace that. Fingers crossed its all that is needed, I have no doubt that there are the typical leaks that need sorting though. I've also confirmed that the car indeed has the advertised 101k miles, the odometer is unreadable.

Overall I think this was a decent purchase, but with the lack of cats not an amazing deal. It is however absolutely worth saving, now I only need to figure out what the best approach for replacing the cats is. Used ones will be hard to find, new ones are available from Autodoc, but only if you purchase in Germany. I'm happy about any suggestions.

Forgot to add, the car actually came with some somewhat recent receipts for shocks, abs sensors and control arms (although hand written) which might have been the reason the previous owner decided to let it go and sell it to this dodgy dealer. The latter also appears to have tried to make service dates from 2010 and 2011 to look like they are from 2020 and 2021. Idiots...

[High Jetter]

So, for what you actually paid, you feel ok? Or at least not shafted?

[cobblers]

Aftermarket cats will last one or two MOTs and cost hundreds.

finding a kind MOT tester is a better strategy. 

[TrabbieRonnie]

It's a beautiful car, and I think you've done well.  I've bought cars in the past with dodgy history/sellers, we probably all have, now I just think nothing really matters except rust and engine.  Surely generic cats are available to suit the diameter of the exhaust?

I wouldn't buy a car on the strength of a service history now, most of it will be made up or carried out by incompetents anyway.  There's always sorting out to do, at least the older German and Japanese lumps can take some mechanical abuse and be brought back around.

Must admit though, I've not had the missing cats thing yet...  People willing to knowingly sell you a car thus mutilated can be filed along with those who throw McDonalds wrappers out of car windows, scumbags.

Anyway, it's definitely the type of car to make you turn around as you walk away from it, and that counts above all else!  Well done, a great addition to your fleet.