The new news 24 thread

[ShiteRider]

I've been offered an escort for "free", it's in spain but if i pay for the shipping (£600) i can have it. It belongs to the guy who originally owned the garage i work at, he retired in his early forties and emigrated to southern spain buying the escort from the local dealer on arrival.

It's an '86 2 door 1600 with 30,000 kilometres on the clock, and is rust free but fairly sun bleached.  It was his wifes car, but she's too old to go without PAS and air-con now.

I'm not sure what to do about this, i don't really have the money or the space and i need to do more Cortina related shit really. It could be a good little run-around, or i should be able to flop it on and at least break even.....

Thoughts anyone?

[trigger]

Pipped at the post today for an H reg Escort Eclipse, dirty cheap but with no mot. I guess it just wasn't to be.

 

Winners own H reg Eclipses. 

 

 

 

 

This was 1998 mind and i did pay £2000 for it. 

[dugong]

Paul messaged me to say you'd collected them, i really appreciate it!, honestly without your help I would be up shit creek without a paddle at the moment.

You could have asked me......

[Lord Sterling]

I've been offered an escort for "free", it's in spain but if i pay for the shipping (£600) i can have it. It belongs to the guy who originally owned the garage i work at, he retired in his early forties and emigrated to southern spain buying the escort from the local dealer on arrival.

It's an '86 2 door 1600 with 30,000 kilometres on the clock, and is rust free but fairly sun bleached. It was his wifes car, but she's too old to go without PAS and air-con now.

I'm not sure what to do about this, i don't really have the money or the space and i need to do more Cortina related shit really. It could be a good little run-around, or i should be able to flop it on and at least break even.....

Thoughts anyone?

I'm about 40 mins from the Spanish border, if he could bring to the French border or bring here to Languedoc-Roussillon I could keep in our rather large garage until it can be passed on up North, maybe to Bol on one of his France-bound trips?

[ShiteRider]

Thanks for the offer Lord Sterling, but Jimmy (the escort owner) still has business interests in the area,  so still has vans and wagons to-ing and fro-ing from spain to england. The £600 is to cover fuel+ferry of having a trailer hitched up to the back of one of his sprinters, maybe even less if there's space in the back of a wagon.

[derskine]

Tried to change drivers front wheel bearing on 18 today in preparation for trip to Oxford.

Didn't go to plan... managed to get everything off and then tried to remove the inner bearing race for the outer bearing off the hub shaft using the puller I bought specifically for this.

Not having any of it, couldn't grip the lip the manual suggested to so ground some slots in it, legs kept slipping.

Welded the legs to the race, legs came off and took a small fragment of hardened steel away from each.

Tried heating with a propane torch (albeit not a huge amount) and hitting with a hammer.

Bit stumped on this one, someone has suggested cutting a slot lengthways in it and battering a chisel into the slot, not sure thats possible with an angle grinder rather than a dremel though.

Any tips or advice appreciated.

[Lord Sterling]

Thanks for the offer Lord Sterling, but Jimmy (the escort owner) still has business interests in the area,  so still has vans and wagons to-ing and fro-ing from spain to england. The £600 is to cover fuel+ferry of having a trailer hitched up to the back of one of his sprinters, maybe even less if there's space in the back of a wagon.

Cool as. If you don't want it then I do have some French garage space happily waiting.

[messerschmitt owner]

You could have asked me......

ah, I'm getting them to London next week as part two of the autoshite pony express - no trains or horses will be harmed in the making of this delivery.

[Barry Cade]

The golf of dooms replacement has been purchased. It's a renner. It's in engerland . Bought unseen off ebay. If only everything in life was as reliable as a Volkswagen. I hate iPads too,. Like tyskie. A lot. I,m a little drunk and on ebay. I might regret fis

[drum]

The disco's chronic steering fluid leak appears to stem from the bottom of the pump where the feed pipe from the reservoir enters.

There's a 20mm rubber o ring in there which looked ok but must be the problem. It's in a very awkward spot and I'm not looking forward to 'reverse of removal'.

I'll consult a vet's manual on calving a cow and soap my arm up to the elbow before proceeding.

 

Hopefully the pump hasn't been buggered by being run dry.

[Ratdat]

Sad to say, I no longer have a Renault 16.  It's been fun and I shall miss the old girl 

 

[nacho man]

Spent the morning changing the coolant on the 306 as it was proper manky.

 

 

[richardmorris]

I think the head gasket's gone on the merc. Water level's dropped and tank is quite pressurised and only started on 4 cylinders. Also looked like a lot of smoke has escaped from somewhere! I think it was water (white) but could have been blueish - not since my CX Turbo Diesel have I had a car with a cloaking smoke cloud

 

Anyone any experience of the six cylinder 3.2 engines?

 

Richard

 

PS in other news, had the roof off the 2CV this morning too. Summer's come !

[dollywobbler]

Yup. I've had a roof-off hoon in my 2CV this morning as well. Not actually sunny, but not raining - that's the main thing! Surprised a few tourists going into town. Gravity and momentum were my allies.

[richardmorris]

8am this morning, before car started misbehaving.

 

 

 

 

Edit - actually that's not true. I had the door panel off yesterday to find the source of a rattle, only to discover it was a missing a screw to hold the outer plastic cladding that was the problem. And then later when I was giving it a wash noticed that one of the front indicator lenses had a 10p hole in it.  Good news from that is that eurocarparts only wanted £6.50 for a new one.

[gordonbennet]

I think the head gasket's gone on the merc. Water level's dropped and tank is quite pressurised and only started on six cylinders. Also looked like a lot of smoke has escaped from somewhere! I think it was water (white) but could have been blueish - not since my CX Turbo Diesel have I had a car with a cloaking smoke cloud

 

 

How many cylinders has yours got?    

 

Thats a bugger, no signs of oil in the header tank? water pump..he hopes.

 

Mine was starting to oil the water last year 90ish K miles so got my MB indy to do the job bfore it got serious, i'm not up to jobs as involved any more.

 

Whilst down the water pump, oil cooler and timing chain were replaced...timing chain wasn't my idea but i trust my indy implicitly, so if he recommends its done.

 

If you haven't already done so carefully inspect the engine wiring loom especially nearest the coils, you probably already know they decompose and short out the coils which in turn spikes the ECU, disturbing the bloody thing during head off work will finish the bugger off if its getting past it...not as i'd know anything about this, much, T shirt etc   .

[theorganist]

Went to pick the Princess up on Friday from mot unfortunately one of the wheel cylinders failed so a minor setback so hopefully this time next week it will be on the road.

 

And Erm I appear to have just bought a Talbot Horizon!

[richardmorris]

I've corrected the typo now- meant 4

 

There's no sign of oil in the tank - plenty down the back of the block but that's usual. The tank seemed to be quite pressurised though - is that usual with OMGHGF?

I'm a point and pay garage customer myself, so having spoken to my mechanic at home (I'm that good a customer haha) they're having it in for a compression check in the morning. It's on 89,600miles so snap! I'll see what they say. They're my citroen specialist but trust them with it.

 

I think the wiring loom's ok - touch wood, fake wood and walnut veneer There's evidence of it being done anyway. Apart from a relay or two, this is it's first issue in 2years and 17,000miles.

 

My mechanic did mention about needing a second Citroen SM though with the proceeds of a likely bill for this

[gordonbennet]

Mine wasn't pressurised, so maybe if yours has gone its between cylinder and water jacket only, seems to be normal on our engines at this mileage, mine had been leaking outside for ages but when oil showed in the water it was time.

 

I'm afraid it is a dear job, very labour intensive, hence why the other jobs were done at the time.

 

I hope the loom was replaced before, its a £600 part, but a repair section is available cheaply from MB for the most affected part if the rest isn't bad.

 

Cracking car the 320's but not a good cheap to run bet like the smaller engined models.

 

By the way if you get the worlds noisiest drive belt syndrome, get a Continental brand belt on it, i must have gone through 4 off genuine and other pattern parts and not one lasted 6 months before it squealed stuck pig like loud enough to to wake the bloody street.

[richardmorris]

It's got a contitech belt  - first thing I had replaced when I bought the car -it looked original. The mechanic commented on it being noisy too. It's not squeeling so much as just rather loud spinning.

 

So far it's been the cheapest car to run I've ever had - the biggest bill I had was for my last CX which was £1600 !! Fuel pump,belts,£500 worth of welding. I'm expecting £1000 for the gasket job so I won't be shocked

 

Loom doesn't look original - there's too much insulation tape around the place.

 

I tend to think that if you want to run a car everyday you're either looking at paying for depreciation or maintenance. As I don't do big (or even many small) garage jobs myself, I expect to pay out on cars (although it's nice when you don't have to). It is what puts me off anything more exotic like a 500SL though- I know my wallet's limit!

[gordonbennet]

Loom shouldn't have any insulation tape on show, unless its had the repair section put in, the complete loom plugs straight in to everything, not a tape end to be seen.

 

Gasket replacement will be in the region of £6/800, but if you want the other jobs doing, then a bag o' sand it will be.

 

Agree with you about the costs of running, and i'd much rather spend out on maintaining something interesting and worth having than to watch a modern cloned electronic nightmare depreciate on the driveway.

 

About the only car i would replace mine with is this, i want this so badly it hurts, but we don't do borrowing, so a pipe dream it must remain.

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/301094353356?ru=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.co.uk%2Fsch%2Fi.html%3F_sacat%3D0%26_from%3DR40%26_nkw%3D301094353356%26_rdc%3D1

[richardmorris]

It's not so much tape on show, but tape underneath the battery tray etc. Anyway, it's running ok when it does start.

 

Head gasket is just one of those things. Personally I'm not sure what to replace it with (hopefully in a couple of years time). I like the shape of the alfa 166, but the only person I know with one has just spent £600 on a handbrake cable (apparently the inside of the car needs to come out).

 

I thought about a Citroen C6 but my (citroen specialist) garage told me it would save me a lot of money and them a lot of stress if I just chucked £20 notes down their toilet.

[derskine]

Got the bearing race off, ground a deep, diagonal slot with a 4" grinder and battered a chisel into it.

Cracked fairly quick and came off easy.

 

[dollywobbler]

Nice work Derskine. I was tempted to suggest that method myself, as a friend had to employ it when replacing a wheel bearing on the Discovery. But, you have to be bloody careful or you can grind into the stub axle, which is why I was a bit wary of recommending it.

 

LOL at the earlier C6/toilet discussion.

[derskine]

Nice work Derskine. I was tempted to suggest that method myself, as a friend had to employ it when replacing a wheel bearing on the Discovery. But, you have to be bloody careful or you can grind into the stub axle, which is why I was a bit wary of recommending it.

 

LOL at the earlier C6/toilet discussion.

 

I was very worried about that, the only replacement hub I could find was £300 odd.

Luck must've been on my side though as I didn't grind into the stub or chisel into it!

[derskine]

Also something I forgot, an axle stand managed to recede about an inch into one of the jacking points yesterday.

Will need to weld that up before the mot but it's not really an issue just a hassle.

[twosmoke300]

Getting those bearing races off with out a knife edge can be a mare . A method that I use is to cut a good slit through the race at 45 degrees with a thin disc as far as you dare. Then run a bead of weld around it . As it cools 9 times out of 10 you will hear it crack. Almost drop off then.

[Inspector Morose]

Went to pick the Princess up on Friday from mot unfortunately one of the wheel cylinders failed so a minor setback so hopefully this time next week it will be on the road.

And Erm I appear to have just bought a Talbot Horizon!

Ah, bugger that with the wheel cylinder.

 

HANG ON. You've bought a Horizon?!

[derskine]

Getting those bearing races off with out a knife edge can be a mare . A method that I use is to cut a good slit through the race at 45 degrees with a thin disc as far as you dare. Then run a bead of weld around it . As it cools 9 times out of 10 you will hear it crack. Almost drop off then.

 

That seems a little less risky than using a chisel so will try that in future!

[twosmoke300]

Chisel is fine but fucks the chisel . And wear goggles obviously