The new news 24 thread

[Supernaut]

The b-Max is a lot better looking isn't it?

No.

 

I like the idea of a Fusion. However, they didn't do them with any interesting (i.e. 100hp+) engines. Would look great sitting just slightly lower.

 

Basically, a Fusion with Fiesta ST running gear and suspension would be my idea of a Fusion.

[egg]

??

 

[Supernaut]

??

 

Ford Fusion4.jpg

Woah!

 

Remove the spoiler and put some nicer wheels on it and that would be HAWT.

[Guest Hooli]

A Fusion b-Max direct comparison. Just going off for its MOT and new oil seal. The b-Max is a lot better looking isn't it? And that sliding door makes it much more suited to its small family brief.

 

WP_20170525_001.jpg

 

WP_20170525_002.jpg

 

 

Same car innit?

[egg]

Woah!

 

Remove the spoiler and put some nicer wheels on it and that would be HAWT.

 

There does seem a bit of a #scene around them on the continent from what I've seen online. It's because all the old VW's are over here

[egg]

Fusion gets the fail/pass treatment to keep the stats down for the month . Wipers weren't that bad (only a year old)

 

[Bobthebeard]

My worthless news..

Had to build a bit of decking to cover up an unsightly bit in the back garden. All went well, despite me being crap at joinery/carpentry.

Found a bumble bee nest just forming, so decking on hold for now.

They need all the help they can get, poor buggers. Nest is safe.

[egg]

More Czech parts arrived today for the Fav, including some scene crap I couldn't resist! Would be useful if I actually got the car out of its lock up and used it...

 

[SiC]

My worthless news..

Had to build a bit of decking to cover up an unsightly bit in the back garden. All went well, despite me being crap at joinery/carpentry.

Found a bumble bee nest just forming, so decking on hold for now.

They need all the help they can get, poor buggers. Nest is safe.

Get a bee keeper in. They often will remove the nest for you for not a lot or no cost and give them a new home elsewhere, as they make their money by renting out beehives to farmers.

[egg]

I think 'chick Hunter' would* be a great Favorit addition!!

 

[Bren]

Having surgery in a few hours. Wish me luck.

Aarrgh! Still in hospital. Surgery was ok but took me a while to come out of anasthetic - I was on oxygen through the night and morning but my SATs are low so they won't discharge me. If I have not improved tomorrow I am getting shipped out to Warrington.

[DeeJay]

Aarrgh! Still in hospital. Surgery was ok but took me a while to come out of anasthetic - I was on oxygen through the night and morning but my SATs are low so they won't discharge me. If I have not improved tomorrow I am getting shipped out to Warrington.

Is that a threat so you discharge yourself.

[hairnet]

DAF has passed its MOT.  It'll now be going up for sale - it owes me 600 quid now and want to see that back for it (shouldn't be too tall of an order I wouldn't've thought for a low mileage tax exempt motor, even an unpopular one with issues).  I'll do a proper for sale thread when I'm less tired. 

 

I actually did 70 in it on the way back from the MOT - some tit in a W124 estate pulled out in front of me and then proceeded to trundle along at 35 in a 50, I eventually got fed up and floored it to get past him, whereupon he did the usual tit thing of taking offence at being overtaken by a(n even) older car and speeding up himself, and sitting up my arse at 70 for the next four miles.  Car seemed happy enough at that speed though, if a bit revvy.

 

Looking at the MOT history it did 143 miles between the last MOT and this one - of which 60 was me driving it back from Kings Lynn after buying it, and the rest is also probably me pottering around locally in it.  So the bloke who bought it from Stondon and spent hundreds getting it back on the road must have then literally never have used it.  Weird.  Given its low mileage, original old biddy owner and lengthy sojourn in Stondon, it is also quite likely that the drive home from KL was the longest single journey it's ever done (under its own power at least) in its 45 years,.

are you in tomorrow morning??

[loserone]

Get a bee keeper in. They often will remove the nest for you for not a lot or no cost and give them a new home elsewhere, as they make their money by renting out beehives to farmers.

 

No one makes money from renting out bumble bee nests.

 

Whilst I agree about giving bees all the help they can get, check to see if they're tree bees.  https://bumblebeeconservation.org/images/uploads/Tree_bee_article_2015.pdf 

 

Some beekeepers (who keep honey bees) will also rehome bumbles as well, but many will just be pee'd off for being disturbed.

[Supernaut]

It seems I missed the boat with regards to Mazda MX-5s, if my local used car centre is anything to go by.

 

I nearly fell off my bicycle laughing when I saw the price, so I had to take a photo!

 

 

However, it's a proper AS-spec one, on the factory steelies, and it's a 1.6.

 

[bramz7]

I threw a bid on something as a little bet I won't win this thought, and 4 days later I am still the high bidder, and it ends tomorrow morning. And it's not got an MOT, because it just failed one. 

 

The only bonus is that it isn't thaaaat far away.

 

 

Might have an AX with 12 months MOT and no rust for sale soon then....

[SiC]

No one makes money from renting out bumble bee nests.

 

Whilst I agree about giving bees all the help they can get, check to see if they're tree bees. https://bumblebeeconservation.org/images/uploads/Tree_bee_article_2015.pdf

 

Some beekeepers (who keep honey bees) will also rehome bumbles as well, but many will just be pee'd off for being disturbed.

Well that's what the beekeeper told me who I called out to destroyed a wasp nest in my loft!

[Twiggy]

Aarrgh! Still in hospital. Surgery was ok but took me a while to come out of anasthetic - I was on oxygen through the night and morning but my SATs are low so they won't discharge me. If I have not improved tomorrow I am getting shipped out to Warrington.

 

Hope you`re getting better.

[puddlethumper]

Good luck Bren.

[greengartside]

Picked up this little beauty last night...

 

 

Broken Astra SRi CDTi. At the best possible price of £0.

 

Cannot open the fucking bonnet though! I've tried pulling the cable with pliers but its refusing to budge. I've even obliterated the front grille in order to try and get it open. Any ideas, shitepickers?

[wuvvum]

are you in tomorrow morning??

I'm attempting a track rod end replacement on the MGF tomorrow morning, so won't be going too far...

[Timewaster]

Picked up this little beauty last night...

 

 

Broken Astra SRi CDTi. At the best possible price of £0.

 

Cannot open the fucking bonnet though! I've tried pulling the cable with pliers but its refusing to budge. I've even obliterated the front grille in order to try and get it open. Any ideas, shitepickers?

The price was right!

 

Is it worth getting someone to push / pull / sit on the bonnet while you pull the cable?

[SiC]

Or a bfo long screwdriver to poke the mechanism? Is it two catches on these?

[SiC]

Also is the handle inside pulling the cable or the handle mechanism broken? If so, could use a pair of pilers to pull the cable.

[Timewaster]

I've tried pulling the cable with pliers but its refusing to budge.

[greengartside]

Or a bfo long screwdriver to poke the mechanism? Is it two catches on these?

 

I've no idea where I'm meant to be prodding the mechanism. PO has disconnected the cable from the handle inside and I've tried pulling on the cable with a pair of mole grips but no dice. If I look through the space where the grille used to be then I can see (from left to right), the air intake then the main spring and closing spring next to it which I've disconnected.

[ruffgeezer]

This little devil had a bit of a moment outside work today, there is a long, slight gradient into the village that has seen off many a dodgy cooling system...

[wuvvum]

I bought a new daily today.  Hadn't been intending to, it's just one of those things that sorta happened.  The Rover of Doom has been having issues with its tuning box, so I was browsing through eBay trying to see if I could find a replacement.  I did a search for "Rover diesel tuning" and this came up in the related items box:

 

 

At first glance it looks like a boggo giffer spec 15-year-old Rover 45 saloon, although the MG ZS 180 alloys give a hint that all may not be completely standard.  I had a read through the spec, which I was quite impressed with, luzzed on what I thought was a silly low bid and ended up winning it.  It has a couple of issues, the most urgent among which is the NSR trailing arm bush which needs replacing, but it's fully operational and road-legal and it has working aircon, which I'm finding more and more of an essential fitting on a daily as I get older (I took the Moog Mondeo in to work this morning despite it being in limp mode, as it was the only car with a/c in the fleet).

 

It's had a lot of work done and a lot of money spent - as it's late and I'm tired I'm just going to copy and paste from the eBay ad:

 

 

 

It has all the Dark Ice Designs mods. decat pipe and custom cat back stainless performance exhaust from longlife bought off the MG Rover.org forum group buys as well as Roose boost hoses, SDI injectors, free flow turbo outlet pipe with roose silicone reducer pipe, cone air filter, MG ZS straights (17" alloy wheels) boost guage,
It has the ceramic fan speed regulator upgrade, ice cold air con as well!

Braking.
MG ZS 180 front brakes and master cylinder and servo and braided brake hoses all round. car has a nice firm pedal and stops very well. needs pads replacing but have brembo ones included in sale.

Chassis stiffening.
Front Dark ice designs strut brace, rear upper Dark ice strut/tower brace, rear motobuild middle strut brace and motobuild rear lower brace between lower arms under car, this car has almost no lift off over-steer and corners really well.

Suspension.
MG ZS180 shocks and springs all round new old stock from Brown and Gammons a few years ago.
The front suspension has every poly-bush available as well as the one for the steering rack as used on some track cars.
Needs 2 rear trailing arm bushes one is included.
 
Transmission.
Rebuilt PG1 Gearbox with Rover LSD, (remember this is geared for the L series Diesel engine)
The car has the Dark Ice Designs short shift kit as well as all the poly bushes for the gear leaver including the one at the gearbox end on the stabilizer bar.
The gearbox has a new Rover LSD fitted a year or so ago and the gearbox was rebuilt a few years before that but this time when the new LSD was fitted we had std plastic caged bearings fitted rather than the metal ones (after a lot of discussion).  Also the rest of the gearbox was checked while it was out and was in good condition needing no parts except a drive shaft oil seal.
New recon driveshafts a couple of years ago.
A new N/S/F wheel bearing was fitted a month ago.

Engine.
Standard Rover L series, no head work or port matching but the inlet manifold was cleaned out a few times.
The Engine is new old stock short engine with the head and timing belt fitted from Rover garage crow lane romford about 40k miles ago at the time of fitting everything was checked new hoses fitted as well as water pump, new oil hoses were also fitted.
The timing belt was changed a couple of years ago but not the pump belt.
It has what are known as SDI injectors from the older Rover diesels which gives an extra 30bhp above the standard injectors on later cars.
The roose boost hoses, decat pipe and stainless custom exhaust and the uprated turbo outlet pipe help to reduce restrictions in the system which allows the turbo to spool much faster which enables the turbo to give full boost very quickly, which means more instant feel to the turbo, also the boost is set at  the optimum 19psi.
In the last few years it has had a new maf sensor. The EGR Is blanked. l changed 3 of the glow plugs a few months ago.

 

 

There is a proper impressive folder of receipts with it.  The only thing it hasn't had done is a remap, which I might eventually get done if I decide to keep it.  It's plenty quick enough as it is though, probably similar in outright performance to the Rover of Doom but (even) more responsive due to a more sophisticated injector pump setup and less restrictive turbo piping.  It also handles and stops far, far better.  Only annoying thing is the gear lever is even buzzier than on the RoD, which I'll have a look at at some point.  I might fit smaller wheels to it, both to keep it understated and to reduce the cost of replacement tyres, but otherwise it's pretty much perfect spec-wise.  So it's going to take over daily duties from the RoD for a while, then I'll decide which one to keep...

[Ghosty]

Looks brilliant on those wheels, bet it goes OK too.

[Brodders]

Although I am not a huge fan of those alloy wheels, I have to say that looks very nice, especially with the pre-project drive, 75 style, seats. I reckon that is a pretty high spec one if its got leather seats and air conditioning, as the bottom of the range ones didn't get goodies like that at all.

 

I agree with fitting the smaller standard wheels though, it will make it more shocking for those you fly past when you overtake them and be slightly more comfortable than the ones fitted at the moment.

 

Well bought and good luck with it. I for one am looking forward to seeing more of this.