The new news 24 thread

[High Jetter]

1 hour ago, trigger said:

If she is then she never got the brains! 

She looks smart enough to me!

[wuvvum]

Not got a huge amount done this weekend.  I reassembled the Spacy and tried to start it but it wasn't having any of it - it had a spark and petrol was getting to the carb but it wouldn't go.  It fired straight up on Easy Start so I think the carb has got gunged up again - I've taken it off and I'm going to have to pick up a can of carb cleaner and take it to bits for the umpteenth time.

The underseal I'd ordered to do the sills on the Maxus hasn't shown up, but that turned out not to be too much of an issue - the white Aldi metal paint I used to paint the welded patch took absolutely ages to dry and needed two coats so I wouldn't have been able to complete the undersealing anyway.  I've fitted a new rear number plate and a replacement nearside mirror glass and secured the battery in place, so it's getting closer to being ready to run in for a test.

I spent a happy* hour or so on Saturday clearing out the back of the Mazda, which had been used as a repository for junk for the last few months.  There's still a fair bit of crap in the boot but at least the back seats are now back up and the cabin is fairly clear, although in dire need of a valet.  I ran it in to Norwich today to do a couple of bits and pick HillmanImp up from the station and it behaved fine, although it was slightly fumey in traffic due to the blowing exhaust - I've re-Gun Gummed the front pipe which has quietened things down a bit, but the back box is still blowing.  Fortunately these are the same as a Kia Pride so fairly readily available.  I might stick the car up for sale soon though, I've really not been using it enough to justify keeping it.

I stuck the Caliber up on the ramps to have another look at the turbo and see how easy it would be to dismantle enough of it to be able to get some turbo cleaner / Mr Muscle or similar in there.  It looks like it'd be a bit of a twat to be honest - the exhaust is held on to the turbo with a sort of massive heavy duty Jubilee clip, and I can't even see the screw without poking around with the mirror-on-a-stick.  I've stuck a bottle of DPF cleaner in the tank for now - I'm not entirely convinced that such things actually work, but if they do it's got to pass through the turbo before reaching the DPF so logically it should clean some of the soot out of the turbo as well.  We shall see.  It's only really an issue on dual carriageways and motorways anyway - on the 60mph single-carriageway A and B roads which make up the vast majority of my driving it behaves fine.

[reb]

I was scheduled for 7am for two weeks.

I was sure this was the second of two weeks.

Woke up at 6:55, bugger.

Fed the cats, made coffee, pissed, logged in to the system. 7:14, not too bad.

Take a few calls. Feeling alright really.

7:40, check my schedule for when my break is.

Says "Not Scheduled" in the "Now" section, wtf?

View full schedule. Start time 8:45.

What a prick I am. Could have still been asleep.

Can't even have a quick nap because I've had a cup of rocket fuel coffee and my ritalin so any chance of sleeping in the next 12 hours is out the window.

I guess I could do something useful, but actually I'll just sit and drink more coffee.

 

[Dick Cheeseburger]

12 hours ago, Lankytim said:

Visited my Dad in Brum today and finally got a pic of this. It's been parked up for a few weeks. Fridge fire or turf war?

The van looks as though it's come straight from a film set - it needs recommissioning with the externals left as is. For full effect, the driver needs to don a zombie outfit for the ultimate zombie apocalypse I-scream experience.

[dozeydustman]

I made the extensive* journey between Chichester and Emsworth to look at the flower-plastered Beetle.

Here it in in my cul de sac. £1000 down from £1200, it’s an honest little thing under the silly stickers, not been pranged, not been pissed around with underneath and drives really nicely. Needs a couple of tyres and the advisories at last MoT were track rods, minor bit of corrosion which sis-in-law’s neighbour can sort if it gets too bad - I had a look where the test said it was starting to corrode but it was solid and not crispy so hopefully a wire brush and some vactan and a bit of schutz will see it fine.

Now to sort out taxation class to disabled and sort out insurance

[Tony McVeigh]

On 8/8/2022 at 7:50 PM, wuvvum said:

That belongs to @Tony McVeigh of this parish.

Yep, that's mine, love it !!

The amount of people that pass and comment is, well, expected!!

My wife still hates it, but hey, relationships come and go, love of cars, never falters!!

 

[Cavcraft]

What a little beauty* this is...

Invisible body repairs are invisible

 

The n/s/r door doesn't open, there's a clonk from o/s/f and n/s/r suspension and the driver's seat belt doesn't return all the way, which is fucking really annoying.

Anyhow, it's now sporting some Vauxhall wheel trims, and the inside and outside have had a bath/good clean. To be fair, it doesn't half pull well (speed, not birds) and might even be ok on fuel.

[AnnoyingPentium]

2 hours ago, Cavcraft said:

there's a clonk from o/s/f and n/s/r suspension

ARB bushes tend to shit themselves on these. See also CV related things.

Edit - I may have some ARB bushes sitting about, I'll be in touch if I can find them.

2 hours ago, Cavcraft said:

driver's seat belt doesn't return all the way, which is fucking really annoying.

Wee drop of furniture polish as both my front ones were like this.

Good buy though.

[mitsisigma01]

On 9/3/2022 at 12:25 AM, mitsisigma01 said:

Are there any Bongo or Freda owners on here .....

I am trying to bump up interest in a set of 4 alloys with winter tyres fitted . I am going to see them tomorrow so will try and get some pictures and tyre details. 

Watch this space ....

I've bought them myself.... Just need the rest of the Bongo now 🙄

[mitsisigma01]

 

"Suits you Sir"

[stuboy]

2 minutes ago, mitsisigma01 said:

 

"Suits you Sir"

 

[brownnova]

Phone call from the Saab people: 

“Your car’s ready, I gave it a good checkover like you asked… nothing else wrong with it, only thing I noticed was someone has bodged the exhaust mount…”

”Yeah, that was me. It works for now” 

“Yeah, looks solid so if it works keep it like that”

That’ll be my garden wire exhaust mount. I think that’s specialist approved bodgery now?

Can’t wait to get the 9000 back! 

[Lankytim]

Spent a pleasurable hour or so this afternoon fixing the Lagunas sticky OSF brake caliper. It looked pretty scaly so a wire cup brush on an angle grinder was used to remove all the flakes and tidy things up. The pads were copper greased where needed and the caliper reassembled. It seems to have done the trick, I’ll do the NS at some point too as presumably it’s nearly as corroded as the OS. 

[Bear]

How it started:

How it was going (thanks M5):

Made it to Nottingham turnoff and:

[Bear]

(I did check the inflation on the spare - that was the "out of hardshoulderless hell let's check things - was happily bimbling home at 40 and then the other front tyre went. Lilith is definitely one for drama as I changed the spare in an actual lightning storm. Also worried that looking for a place to check tyre I got snapped by a lane closure camera on the M42 so today really has gone to shit - as the whole plan was driving to my friend's house near Chelt to sort her car MoT - booked with Halfords ages ago, they told her at 10am they don't do tests on Monday at that garage - like, they had weeks to tell her this. Absolute fucking waste).

[Bear]

Fucking hell the AA are absolute shite. Good thing I'm not a motoring writer.

[SiC]

5 hours ago, RichardK said:

Fucking hell the AA are absolute shite. Good thing I'm not a motoring writer.

Are they trying to avoid covering you?

I know I've read in T&C's that they don't necessarily cover someone who has a flat in their spare tyre. Whether they enforce that is another matter. 

[egg]

For the fifth or sixth time since we've lived here someone has scraped my parked car. Thank fck it wasn't the Mondeo this time as the i10 was parked in the Mondy's spot. They left a note. People just cannot drive.

[JJ0063]

It’s what he would have wanted x

[wuvvum]

3 hours ago, SiC said:

I know I've read in T&C's that they don't necessarily cover someone who has a flat in their spare tyre. Whether they enforce that is another matter. 

I had to argue with the call handler to get them to come out when I had two blowouts on a trailer in the same journey (the fact that I had 3+ tonnes of Saviem tipper truck on the trailer was of course completely unrelated).

[Tony McVeigh]

Reply to egg:

Yep, people can't drive, as experienced when my Twingo got totalled when parked at 01:00 - plus side, got my 205 with the payout 😁

[HillmanImp]

Yeah, you never know whats going to happen. Look at the damage done to this guys car that was caught on his ring doorbell. The person who did it was obviously drunk. 

 

[Tony McVeigh]

Hilarious!!

 

[Datsuncog]

You told me you'd deleted that.

[egg]

One of those days, daughter's school taxi (Touran) 'smouldering' at side of road on way to pick her up....luckily another taxi that comes our way can bring her home. 

It's done 250,000+ miles though.

[stuboy]

Plugs arrived... just gotta find time to fit them whilst looming after mini stuboy 

[Low Horatio gearbox]

Inching closer to having the XJ back .. this week.

[Low Horatio gearbox]

4 hours ago, wuvvum said:

I had to argue with the call handler to get them to come out when I had two blowouts on a trailer in the same journey (the fact that I had 3+ tonnes of Saviem tipper truck on the trailer was of course completely unrelated).

Same experience with the AA after running over road debris thet holed the fuel tank  - fun fact plasterboard at 65 mph will hole a plastic Volvo petrol tank.  "We dont recover acccident damaged"  vehicles. It took 3 phone calls and a 4 hour wait and the patrolman was half a second from striking up and lighting a fag next to the car..

[Split_Pin]

I just came here to say I think these are such handsome buggers:

 

[Crackers]

I hate car hunting. I've got my sights set on buying a cheap barge for the winter, but as usual, I've got a fairly specific set of criteria. Bring on weeks upon weeks of frustration... if anyone's got a decent 530d/E320cdi/Saab turbo/Volvo T5 they want to part with, I'm interested...