The new news 24 thread

[Mr_Bo11ox]

On 04/06/2024 at 20:37, bramz7 said:

Long time no post.

 

I have been lurking on here for the last 12 months or so but haven't felt it's been appropriate to post until now, and even then I don't really know if it's a good idea. 

Long story short, my (ex, phew) wife hated me being on here, I had to endure a lot in our time together, and it most certainly had a negative impact on how I was with people, how I reacted to things...and I know full well I upset one or two people in that time, so I am very sorry for that. 

 

On the flip side, I am in the middle of a career change in the same industry I was in, live by myself with a needy cat, and have managed to amass a little fleet of Italian cars. 

I won this on eBay in April, and went to Evesham to collect it. Turns out the owner had had it since 2005, and had spent various sums in the 4 figure region yearly on it, for a long time. And it shows. 168k now and it drives like half of that. Alas, it is still a twenty year old 156 so there are some areas of rust which are beginning to bother me, not least a front suspension turret.... Have to see how the MOT goes for the verdict, but easily the best long distance car in the fleet. 

I have long fancied a Panda, and my excuse for bidding on this one was getting itchy about having 'just' a 156 knocking about, so I obviously needed a backup. Conveniently, this was very local (Midgham), and I managed to win it on eBay as well. Registered in December 2003, one of the very earliest Pandas left, with the official press cars having reg dates about 3 days beforehand. It drives like every small Fiat does, but with a better gearchange.  I guess the potential financial ruin Fiat faced at the time really focused their minds when developing it, because they are great cars. 

And lastly, this. I had been owed a car from a friend for a while, and said friend has a vast array of cars. It was meant to be the ex forum Laguna V6, which he still has, but actually I changed my mind and have ended up with this. Now, I guess I could argue it was free (well, no, because technically it was the swap for an XC70 which I had swapped a Rover 75 for)....

It's a proper blast to drive, I really love the 20v engine and you end up surprising everyone (well ok, people in crap moderns, not powerful ones) with the traction and good midrange. 

 

Really though, I should sell one. But I have spent most of my time trying to justify all of them. The Marea probably needs about a grand spending on it to get it up to scratch and in a safe position reliability wise, thankfully it's unbelievably solid (former long term London car), the Panda rear axle should really be replaced, but the sills are solid, and the 156 will definitely need welding, yet everything mechanical, aside from a bit of front suspension and thermostat (because 156) is spot on. Even the DMF was done in the relevant past. 

 

Part of me is tempted to stick them all up for sale and whichever one sells first, decides it. But wouldn't I then just rebound buy something?! 

Great to see you back there Bramz. I'm still driving the Volvo S80 D5 I bought off you years ago. Think it was on 185k when I got it, now its on 248k and I spent £1100 last year having a new genuine Volvo clutch & DMF fitted in it. Great car.

[Cavcraft]

I think this can be recorded as a new personal best.

Upon minesweeping a new* arrival, there was the usual sweets, low denomination coins (three pound coins in boot though),  plus some horrible looking mould, a spoon (why is there always some form of cutlery in shit cars?) biscuit crumbs and stones...

...but with the added bonus* of what I thought was a pair of socks stuffed into the pouch thing behind the driver's seat, but was actually a used bra...

 

[lesapandre]

Lost in France...

[MXShite]

14 hours ago, goosey said:

This is a 2000 TD5 with 150k on it, my Son paid £6000 for it, the chassis is in excellent condition and the bulkhead is good but needs a small repair on the O/S A pillar. It’s 2 owners from new both of which were Country estates. The rear canopy has now been removed and is for sale 

Sounds like a really good deal considering the condition.

[junkyarddog]

Rolled my project Golf GTI out for the first time in 12 months. 

Really need to regain my sadly lacking Mojo.

[Saabnut]

1 hour ago, lesapandre said:

Lost in France...

 

Fridge is stocked with cold beer if you find your way down this way....

[bramz7]

Up in Scotland for a relatives wedding, was intending to get a train but felt super impulsive so drove up! Seemed to genuinely average 50mpg, and aside from a sore bum cheek from lack of cruise, I feel fine for 8 hours of driving. 

 

I wish it was a bit less rusty. 

 

[lesapandre]

24 minutes ago, Saabnut said:

Fridge is stocked with cold beer if you find your way down this way....

Ta! When are you there 'till? 

Currently awaiting a new knob at the local café...

[Saabnut]

Here until about the 23rd ish June as things stand

[worldofceri]

 

A few weeks ago Mrs WO’C abandoned her Accord at an inconveniently jaunty angle on the drive. Her excuse was that the clutch had gone and she had only just managed to limp it home.

This was alarming as we had only had the clutch replaced last year, at vast expense. However, on closer inspection, the problem was that the pedal mounting bracket was twisted and broken. This was not entirely a surprise, as I had had a grovel in the footwell a couple of months ago, investigating an irritating squeak from the pedal, and noticed that the one of the welds seemed to be coming apart.  These days I’m inclined to entrust these problems straight to a garage, but the car was immobile and would have to be towed, so I thought I’d investigate further. It was only three bolts to remove. Look at the state of it!!

Clutch pedal shopping, I discovered the assembly is discontinued by Honda UK and none of the Honda parts places I enquired with would source me one. Ebay turned up a seller who would send one from Japan, and a Google deep dive turned up a tuning company in Dublin who would had them in stock. £148 delivered across the Irish Sea. I discounted the idea of sourcing secondhand as it seemed to me that the failure was an inherent design weakness and any used part I could acquire would be knocking on for twenty years old at least and probably similarly afflicted.

Reassembly day soon came round and was it was, as the mantra goes, the reverse of removal. Save for I couldn’t bend and twist the new pedal in the same way I had the broken one, in order to get to the inaccessible top bolt. Dismantling the entire dash and removing the heater for access was not an appealing prospect. I abandoned the task at the first attempt and had Mrs WO’C lined up to have a go, what with her having surprisingly small hands. However last Saturday, having had a good night’s sleep and an additional breakfast Weetabix, I got the job jobbed at the second attempt.

*Driver’s footwell contortions selfie*

How you pro guys deal with these sort of shenanigans on a daily basis I don’t know.

Anyway, bolts nipped up and we’re back in business. Can’t really believe this car is almost two decades old.

[grogee]

14 hours ago, worldofceri said:

 

A few weeks ago Mrs WO’C abandoned her Accord at an inconveniently jaunty angle on the drive. Her excuse was that the clutch had gone and she had only just managed to limp it home.

This was alarming as we had only had the clutch replaced last year, at vast expense. However, on closer inspection, the problem was that the pedal mounting bracket was twisted and broken. This was not entirely a surprise, as I had had a grovel in the footwell a couple of months ago, investigating an irritating squeak from the pedal, and noticed that the one of the welds seemed to be coming apart.  These days I’m inclined to entrust these problems straight to a garage, but the car was immobile and would have to be towed, so I thought I’d investigate further. It was only three bolts to remove. Look at the state of it!!

Clutch pedal shopping, I discovered the assembly is discontinued by Honda UK and none of the Honda parts places I enquired with would source me one. Ebay turned up a seller who would send one from Japan, and a Google deep dive turned up a tuning company in Dublin who would had them in stock. £148 delivered across the Irish Sea. I discounted the idea of sourcing secondhand as it seemed to me that the failure was an inherent design weakness and any used part I could acquire would be knocking on for twenty years old at least and probably similarly afflicted.

Reassembly day soon came round and was it was, as the mantra goes, the reverse of removal. Save for I couldn’t bend and twist the new pedal in the same way I had the broken one, in order to get to the inaccessible top bolt. Dismantling the entire dash and removing the heater for access was not an appealing prospect. I abandoned the task at the first attempt and had Mrs WO’C lined up to have a go, what with her having surprisingly small hands. However last Saturday, having had a good night’s sleep and an additional breakfast Weetabix, I got the job jobbed at the second attempt.

*Driver’s footwell contortions selfie*

How you pro guys deal with these sort of shenanigans on a daily basis I don’t know.

Anyway, bolts nipped up and we’re back in business. Can’t really believe this car is almost two decades old.

I *hate* footwell jobs. On older stuff I normally take out the seat if it looks like it's going to be a longer job. On newer stuff I still will but there's the added jeopardy of airbag light roulette. 

Would that bracket have welded up if you'd not been able to source a new part, or is it an unholy mess of plastic and metal? 

[Stinkwheel]

Ah thats takes me back, BX's and AX's used to do this with surprising regularity, never fit a new bracket, it would just happen again, so weld it up was the way for those.

Well done to you for fixing it properly with a new part, you dont expect this sort of shennanigan from a Honda 

[JMotor]

20 hours ago, Split_Pin said:

Looks to be a 2.0 SRi model, hopefully it's a pre Ecotec 8v!

After a quick total car check search.

It might be an even rarer C20XE powered SRi. Says it's got 147bhp. 

[worldofceri]

2 hours ago, grogee said:

Would that bracket have welded up if you'd not been able to source a new part, or is it an unholy mess of plastic and metal? 

Maybe if I’d done something about it when I first suspected it was on the way out. By the time I’d liberated it from the car it was totally fecking fecked m9. You would probably be as well to reverse engineer it and fabricate a new one.

2 hours ago, Stinkwheel said:

Well done to you for fixing it properly with a new part, you dont expect this sort of shennanigan from a Honda 

Thanks. And I agree; the car in general seems properly engineered and very well screwed together. There’s not even any of those sundry bits of broken minor trim that afflict most models before they even get to their first mot. Having installed the new pedal though, I can observe the new one twist slightly with every application. Could explain why the old one suffered fatigue in the welds and cracking of the metal.  I reckon someone didn’t quite do their sums right.  But I reckon we can forgive the Honda engineers the one ‘fuck it, it’s Friday, it’ll do’ moment.

[Matty]

On 01/06/2024 at 23:27, morrisoxide said:

Aye they could and that's the half of it. I saved the car from the track years ago. It was owned by Rea's Creamy Ices (Chris Rea's Dad) and used to move fridges about with Ice cream in them hence no back door handles and odd floor strengtheners.

I'm well aware it is a dog of car. Everyone seems to go out of one's way to tell me, even on this forum. This is the main reason I don't have my own car threads on here or anywhere.

I very nearly met this in the flesh a few years ago. Looked good driving through the motorist anyhow. Cool car 👍

[lesapandre]

Waiting for spare parts in France - I have ordered some stuff off LeBonCoin which are cheap here or unobtanium in UK - seller turning up in a few minutes. Beats the queue in Euro Carparts.

No sign of Ricky Sunak here either...

[IronStar]

I was wondering who the hell specced a Fiat Bravo this high since I first saved it from being broken for parts or scrapped, but didn’t really have time to look at it since then. I needed the registration certificate to get some paperwork done and looked at it properly for the first time today and - turns out it’s a special “Suite” edition, which is essentially everything ticked trim! It’s “a car with great attention to detail in elegance and comfort” according to Fiat press release. 😄

Whilst not really significant in any shape or form, this makes me even more happy it was saved from its untimely demise in a junkyard. 

[Noel Tidybeard]

On 26/05/2024 at 14:35, MJK 24 said:

Came across a couple of old Suzuki’s the other day that seemed to have survived remarkably well for their 20 plus years…

 

i'm sad enough to recognise those reg numbers!

[Noel Tidybeard]

On 03/06/2024 at 12:44, JJ0063 said:

Lovely job, total cost £10.99 for the socket and the sparky charged £30 to fit 

might be worth swapping the sockets for an rcd set

[wesacosa]

throwing out some 90s vibes to the neighbours 

 

[Noel Tidybeard]

1 hour ago, Noel Tidybeard said:

might be worth swapping the sockets for an rcd set

exhibit A

and exhibit B

for other shenanigans

[tooSavvy]

Any $hiteist out on a Motosiccle 2day🤔

.... saw the Grand Departure, Ace café, on BBC.

Roads to avoid/traffic jams @Barrow....

🚙💨

[JJ0063]

On 26/05/2024 at 16:42, JJ0063 said:

Trailer project complete bar I need to order a new cover. 
 

Went to the jet wash at the petrol station and gave the whole trailer a really good clean down, undid the tipping mechanism so I could clean all the underside up too.

The OS light was being temperamental, took it apart and it was rusted to shit, other side looked virtually new inside so assume the OS just hadn’t sealed right when fitted. £5.something in Halfords for a replacement unit, wired in and tested.

Finally the world’s shittest, quickest paint job of the wheels. Literally took them off, blast over with the wire wheel, primer and Poundland alloy wheel silver,  back on before they were barely dry. 
 

Definitely looks better than when I picked it up yesterday, and must be worth more than £60! 

Neighbour opposite has just agreed to buy this for £200, that was worth doing!

[wuvvum]

Oop on t'moors wi' t'Maxus.

[egg]

Reading about this 1.1 pez C15 from 1996 with 36,000KM's over on the LNA/Visa forum is cheering.

https://ln-lnaclubdefrance.1fr1.net/t4434-c15-e-1-1i-de-1996

[grogee]

9 minutes ago, egg said:

Reading about this 1.1 pez C15 from 1996 with 36,000KM's over on the LNA/Visa forum is cheering.

https://ln-lnaclubdefrance.1fr1.net/t4434-c15-e-1-1i-de-1996

Bicycle tyres! Bet that is proper struggling with a few crates of van rouge in the back. 

Still would though. 

[wesacosa]

I'm sad to report I think it might be the end of the road for the Favorit 

after the coolant dumping a few weeks ago I replaced the offending pipe and the leak seems to have stopped, so I filled up with antifreeze and was running it with the cap off to bleed the system.  I noticed after a few minutes some smoke/steam coming from the back of the engine. I figured it might just be some of the coolant that leaked burning off the exhaust manifold so I gave it a few revs to try and speed up the process, but when I did the coolant started erupting out of the coolant bottle like Old Faithful. Given the coolant was cold as the stat hadn't even opened I suspect its OMGHGF

Assuming worst case its warped the  head, this head has already had a skim and I don't think they can take two skims, so could be looking at sourcing a new head.. Given the car is 100k+ and tatty, and it costs me 12.50 every time I drive it I am not sure its viable. I think its also still qualifying for Khan's £2000 scrappage scheme bribe.  I will be utterly heartbroken to do that but at some point common sense has to take over, surely 

[JJ0063]

Came out the butchers this morning to be greeted by Liz Truss and her entourage going into a little cafe next door.

Not to worry. 

[grogee]

10 minutes ago, JJ0063 said:

Came out the butchers this morning to be greeted by Liz Truss and her entourage going into a little cafe next door.

Not to worry. 

Did she park the RR? 

[grogee]

53 minutes ago, wesacosa said:

I'm sad to report I think it might be the end of the road for the Favorit 

after the coolant dumping a few weeks ago I replaced the offending pipe and the leak seems to have stopped, so I filled up with antifreeze and was running it with the cap off to bleed the system.  I noticed after a few minutes some smoke/steam coming from the back of the engine. I figured it might just be some of the coolant that leaked burning off the exhaust manifold so I gave it a few revs to try and speed up the process, but when I did the coolant started erupting out of the coolant bottle like Old Faithful. Given the coolant was cold as the stat hadn't even opened I suspect its OMGHGF

Assuming worst case its warped the  head, this head has already had a skim and I don't think they can take two skims, so could be looking at sourcing a new head.. Given the car is 100k+ and tatty, and it costs me 12.50 every time I drive it I am not sure its viable. I think its also still qualifying for Khan's £2000 scrappage scheme bribe.  I will be utterly heartbroken to do that but at some point common sense has to take over, surely 

Aw BAWS. How difficult are s/h engines to find? Or is there too much other stuff needs fixing to make it worthwhile...?