The new news 24 thread

[ayd]

after a couple of years of none car ownership due to living so close to work it was cheaper to walk (plus I could use the Wife's car if I had to)...a recent move of house to a destination even further in to the sticks had me on the look out for a cheap motor to ferry me to and from work.

 

Bloke I work with decided for his 65th Birthday he'd treat himself to a Chrysler Crossfire so he offered me his A4 for the sum of £200. Couldn't say no really.

A4 1.8T 138k with FSH and a comprehensive recipt folder for all work ever done, 11 months MOT and a few months Tax starts at the flick of the key and runs really well.

 

Really pleased with it, has a couple of bad points, the boot lock solenoid has gone so the boot doesn't actually lock and the NSR door has a rather large dent in it

 

Looking forward to the weekend valet of my new toy (weather permitting)

 

 

 

P.S. oil on the drive is from me being clumsy when doing an oil change on the Saab.......

 

P.P.S. I really must pressure wash the side of the house to clean all the green moss shite off it

[eddyramrod]

That looks like a handy result!

[trigger]

I'm taking sad geek to a whole new level! You've have to click on the link as you can't embed videos on here it seems.

 

 

 

1974 Ford Cortina 2000 XL Mk3 by Trigger's Retro Road Tests!, on Flickr

[Cavcraft]

That picture is nothing short of fantastic, Mike. Looks like it was taken in 1975 and is very impressive.

 

 

Today my lad and I (mostly him!) replaced the front links on the 80. He'd spotted the n/s was knackered looking and it was confirmed when we took it off as it pretty much just fell to bits. Got two for the price of one on eBay so replaced both, seemed daft not to tbh.

The tyres are just about on the limit so currently weighing up the price of mingebag new ones and part worns. It's no biggie though as the wheels are 4x108 some old Ford wheels/tyress will do to get past the MOT if needed and they're a popular fitment.

Arsed about cleaning and test spraying the front wheels and grille. Grille is a bit shit looking due to £1.00 Shop black spray being utterly hopeless, but it'll be easy enough to sort out.

Sprayed one wheel in primer and another one black, personally I think white ones would look good and offset the red paintwork, my lad things the black looks better though so will do one side white and one side black before deciding for sure.

[worldofceri]

I managed to get down the garage for an afternoon last week to bugger about with my Beetle a bit.

 

The offside front wing is basically beyond repair, so I bought these on Ebay.

 

They're a bit ropier than I'd hoped to be honest, but they're the right colour, grey primer aside, and more solid than the ones I'll be taking off. I can't be arsed/afford to get them painted so I figured I'd slap a load of Hammerite on the underside to hopefully slow the descent into iron oxide flakes, then bolt them on 'as is'.

 

Stupid as it sounds, although Mrs. Ceri and I have owned this car for over ten years now (at least half of which time it's been in daily use) I can't remember ever having taken a wheel off myself until now.

 

The nuts were incredibly tight. When the first bolt finally shifted, it was with such violent force that for a few seconds I was convinced I must have sheared the bolt, snapped the breaker bar, or broken something else in the vicinity, perhaps even my own arm, but luckily, no. Although, cheap sockets won at a charity auction: Not up to the job:

 

Anyhow, removing the offensive old wing, of course, revealed more grot and previous bodges.

 

 

There remains nothing solid to bolt the 'new' wing to along the edge of the front valance. This needs remedying, really, but, as I can't weld myself, for now I think I'll just cover the problem up again and get it sorted 'when I can afford to', i.e. when Nelson gets his eye back, as my Mum would say.

 

Along with copious amounts of rust, this sticker fell off some suspension component or other. Retro.

[autofive]

cortina

 

zephyr

 

 

granada

[cort16]

In the last 2 days I've seen two new MG Magnettes (different ones) having seen none at all ever previously. Have they gone onto a hire car fleet or something as I don't think there's even any dealers in Scotland?

I have to say the one I saw in black looked pretty good.

[catsinthewelder]

One in Stirling apparently http://www.mg.co.uk/dealers/find-a-dealer.aspx

 

It was worth looking as I was wondering where the half dozen or so I'd seen had sprung from. That said we're only 45 miles or so from Longbridge here.

[dollywobbler]

They are indeed on some hire fleets. A mate of mine hired one fairly recently. Said it was quite good overall.

[Conrad D. Conelrad]

In the last 2 days I've seen two new MG Magnettes (different ones) having seen none at all ever previously. Have they gone onto a hire car fleet or something as I don't think there's even any dealers in Scotland?

I have to say the one I saw in black looked pretty good.

 

Avis have bought 500 of them. You can't request one, you just have to get lucky.

[peter9000uk]

We had an Avis one at work last week. I feel the £315/year road tax may make it unpopular with fleet buyers! It was plastered in mg.co.uk stickers. Reminded me of a scaled down Insignia. The interior did not look/feel like it would last very well.

[fiatdaft]

Road tax won't be £315 for the year,maybe the first tax disc was,but it won't be that every year.

[HillmanImp]

Picked up the Volvo of doom yesterday from the very nice Mr Glover and saw his AMAZING collection of tat. The car is actualy really nice to drive and a very pleasant place to be once you are in it. Its just when you get outside it that it goes a bit wrong but I am going to do a little to rectify that this week and will provide a full update.

 

Have just noticed this morning that I forgot the bloody paperwork though. Fucksticks. Thats what happens if you go to the pub on the Sunday night. Brain Confusion.

[Volksy]

Thats what happens if you go to the pub on the Sunday night. Brain Confusion.

 

Did you not have 27hrs on National Depress to come round the next day?

[dollywobbler]

2CV is in for MOT today. Kingpins greased, sidelights almost work. We'll see how she does...

[barefoot]

Removed snow tyres this morning - good

replaced with summery things - good

found cause of odd squeak / grumble - good

it's a broken spring - bad

it's rusty at both ends, its been like it a while - arse

[nigel bickle]

MOT''d my BMW boxer (R60) today. Its the first time I've ridden a m/bikey in nearly 2 years- felt kinda weird. Nice run out though & a shiny new ticket

[dollywobbler]

STOP PRESS. Anyone got a vehicle that needs taxing by the end of the month? Probably best to do it today as I imagine the rates will change in the Budget tomorrow. I've just scored a year's rent for the 2CV. Off to the MOT station soon...

[HMC]

Just agreed to buy a 2 door morris oxford fastback (MGB GT). never had one before, looks fairly original. due to collect saturday. I always thought an mgb should be sampled in v8 flavour. This one isnt but was at a tempting price, and my limited willpower and ability to pass such things over got the better of me!

[barefoot]

STOP PRESS. Anyone got a vehicle that needs taxing by the end of the month?

Probably best to do it today as I imagine the rates will change in the Budget tomorrow.

 

I was just about to post the very same thing - Scirocco taxed today.

 

It actually causes me pain to hand my money over a whole 11 days earlier than normal.

But I suspect I'd be handing over an extra tenner at the end of the month & it comes out of the same pay packet,

I'm going to have to have a lie down.

[dollywobbler]

2CV passed. Phew. Indicators packed up at the end of our driveway, but it turned out I'd disturbed the bulbs when cleaning the filthy (as in full of green gunk) lenses earlier. I didn't think to test the indicators after I'd done that...

 

Was a bit high on emissions, but after the test, on a second attempt with a view to tweaking the mixture a bit, she was well within limits.

[ruffgeezer]

Well the Xantia has a new ticket as does the Ax vts, I'll detax the Delica for the end of the month and pop them both back on the road, the Xantia was a disappointing drive, I hope the ax is still the hoodlum I remember it to be.

[michiel]

Just agreed to buy a 2 door morris oxford fastback (MGB GT). never had one before, looks fairly original. due to collect saturday. I always thought an mgb should be sampled in v8 flavour. This one isnt but was at a tempting price, and my limited willpower and ability to pass such things over got the better of me!

 

Hope it's a rubbabumpa! I secretly like them a bit... if I had the money I'd have one of them modernised Bs with an MX-5 enigne. But with rubbabubbabumpas.

 

And congrats to all MOT winnahs!

[meggersdog]

So this was the smoke stack

 

that I mentioned in the grumpy thread.It was blown across number one like this

Been running like this for about a month but because it didn't really affect the starting and driving I assumed the exhaust manifold gasket was causing the chuffing sound.I'd bought a new gasket and was about to fit it when I saw the smoke.Because the car doesn't use any water and hardly any oil I only check under the bonnet once a month

[Father Ted]

Not really my news, but in the news:

Dog Finds Ceat tyre

[dollywobbler]

Replaced a handbrake cable on the BX today, to cure one of the brake binding issues. You'll be pleased to hear that it was a mild-pikey fix as rather than spend £5 on a new one, someone in the BX Club sent me one for sod all. Lots of people have contributed bits to the BX on that forum. I owe a lot of pints. Still needs a caliper on the other side. Roll on pay day.

 

The best thing is that I can close the garage door again. I'd put the BX on stands and whipped the wheels off while I investigated both issues, but had managed to leave the towbar sticking out too far, preventing door closure. Oops. Couldn't be bothered to put the wheels back on just to move it 3cm further forward.

 

Went for a test drive. Thought the ride was a bit crap. When I got back, I noticed I'd left it on intermediate suspension height. Idiot. That shoves more fluid pressure into the spheres which means the floaty-ness diminishes. On full height, there's nowt but Mini-esque bounce! I am planning to replace all of the suspension spheres, as the ride could be better even when an idiot hasn't left it on the wrong setting.

[Pete-M]

Changed the rest of the locks on the Senator today. What a fiddly bugger of a job that is. The little pingfukkit clip on the back of the door barrel couldn't be more awkward to get to if they'd screwed it to the Titanic.

 

Also, the lock set I bought had a different boot lock barrel from the correct one, so I spent a couple of minutes swapping the lock pins from the new barrel into the old one. That bit is easy enough.

 

Just the glovebox lock left to do and job jobbed.

 

One pisser is the indicator stalk. The main beam hasn't worked properly since the knobhead scally did his thing, I thought I may have disturbed something refitting the shroud, but no, the indicator switch needs replacing - and it has the cruise control switches as part of it so I need to find a Senator or posh Carlton in a scrappy.

[Mike D]

Pete my mate has a Senator 24v in his field, i'm pretty sure it's a digi dash one, would the stalk be the same?

 

In other news, I bought this crock o shite yesterday,

 

 

Its bumpers are miraculously gaffer tape free! other than that, it's a scruffy old thing but seems to run well, and will do a sterling job of carting my ass to work while I fit the Colt GTi engine into my truck, and swap the front suspension on the 840

[cms206]

Pete my mate has a Senator 24v in his field, i'm pretty sure it's a digi dash one, would the stalk be the same?

 

In other news, I bought this crock o shite yesterday,

 

 

Its bumpers are miraculously gaffer tape free! other than that, it's a scruffy old thing but seems to run well, and will do a sterling job of carting my ass to work while I fit the Colt GTi engine into my truck, and swap the front suspension on the 840

 

 

This must be a lie, I thought I had the only Mondeo this shape without gaffa tape bumpers!

 

Need any bits? Cash is rediculously tight so I fear mine is going over the bridge...

[Mike D]

Does it have the same style wheels? I have a couple of low treaded tyres and no spare! Other than that, i don't really want to spend owt on it so it should be ok!