The new news 24 thread

[trigger]

I wouldn't set fire to a fart after that put it like that!

[derskine]

My Mk1 is exactly the same, that's with a brand new fuel pump of non glass bowl variety.

Next step for me is to fit a motorbike electric pump, I'm fed up of having to fill the float bowl after leaving the car for a couple of days.

The advantage of the motorbike pump is that it switches off when the float bowl is full so no need for pressure regulators and shit.

[cros]

I bought a couple of cheap electric fuel pumps on eBay- 9 quid each including postage from China . So far so good, and less noise than a Facet which chatters away all the time.

 

I'm done with trying to save failing batteries with 'Bat aid'. It might have perked them up for a week or two but unless Quentin Wilson can come up with another one of his miracle cures I'm going to have to bite the bullet and buy a new battery.

[trigger]

Good advice chaps, I might look into one of those Motorbike pumps, especially now that I've been outbid on the glass AC one on ebay.

 

In other news today I had my East coast retros car meet at the local transport museum again, it proper pissed it down most of the day which was rubbish but all things considered we had a pretty turn out, the museum even ran a old bus for rides around town which was pretty cool.

 

Here's some photos that I've took with my phone, they are a bit rubbish as my decent camera had a coke interface incident.

 

Heavy rain and loads of Fords, you could hear the rust forming over rain drops.

 

 

This was the bus doing the rides.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[fordperv]

Great pics trig, do you think you could convince the owner of the blue mk2 fiesta in the 1st pic to put his number plate In the proper place, it would improve the looks no end

[trigger]

That would be this one, I have to agree with you on that, it belongs to a young lad but I don't know who he is.

 

[fordperv]

It looks a lovely little car

[darkfour]

Took a trip down to the Daytona Spring Turkey Run this weekend. It's a much smaller event than the November one but still fun. I took the Dart along and parked up next to a 64 Plymouth Fury sport convertible which had a 350hp V8 installed.

 

Not much shite to spot, although there was an orange Bricklin there for sale, couple of spifires, 2 moggie minors, an anglia estate. All of which I failed to take any pictures of.

 

I did however manage to get some pretty serious sunburn on my neck.

 

 

 

 

[RobT]

I’m on the verge of buying another car, but this one is for Mrs T so I’m being a bit picky for a change.  I’ve sort of talked her around to a medium sized 2 litre beater rather than small sub-1400cc, on the basis that it’ll be more versatile should she want it for the odd long trip (main use will be as an urban runabout).  I viewed something yesterday that fits the bill, and by happy coincidence is also a car I rather like.  This search has been ongoing for the last few months so I need to get off my arse and do it!

 

But to keep fleet costs down I’ll have to sell the 440 on sooner than expected, as I can't justify having four cars (well, actually I can but my bank balance has other ideas).  I only bought it as a response to being stressed at work really, so I need to take up eating chocolate or something rather than buying cars every time work/people get on my tits.

[EssDeeWon]

 

so I need to take up eating chocolate or something rather than buying cars every time work/people get on my tits.

 

Drive all the way to Scotland in the Rover eating Toblerones Alan Partridge style.

[RobT]

^^I have considered doing so many, many times!  With The Return of the Saint playing on loop...

[dollywobbler]

I only bought it as a response to being stressed at work really, so I need to take up eating chocolate or something rather than buying cars every time work/people get on my tits.

 

Funnily enough, I hadn't realised how car purchasing was linked to stress until Mrs DW pointed it out... Comfort shopping. Expensive comfort shopping. I must be pretty chilled at the moment given I've only bought two cars since September. I know Neil Campbell on PC has a soft spot for 440 autos, but he usually has as much spare cash as I do...

[cms206]

The buying cars thing for me has got to the stage that my boss alerted me to a cheap 240 estate for sale not far down the coast from here. He has ten Rovers so is clearly a man of great intelligence, but I then reminded him that I'd need to park said Volvo in the yard with the three broken ones I already have here. His words?

 

"Won't do any harm, besides it's got a towbar and it's manual so we won't have to cook the autobox in your 740 when we do scrap runs when I take the 416 off the road."

[RobT]

Funnily enough, I hadn't realised how car purchasing was linked to stress until Mrs DW pointed it out... Comfort shopping. Expensive comfort shopping. I must be pretty chilled at the moment given I've only bought two cars since September. I know Neil Campbell on PC has a soft spot for 440 autos, but he usually has as much spare cash as I do...

 

Expensive comfort shopping that also takes up a lot of space.  The 440 will be cheap if that helps feed his affliction, and it has a few issues so would give him something to write about!

[JohnK]

 

Got 200 miles under my belt in this little thing today. I really cannot rate this car highly enough. Cheap to buy, cheap to run, nippy and fun - ticks a lot of boxes. Okay, with a 5yr old and a 6 month old it's not going to serve as our 'only' family car (pram just squeezes in the boot and leaves little room for anything else and a large baby seat doesn't fit in the back unless the front seats are right far forward), but as a runaround for me on my own it's ideal. I rate it so much that I moved both the XJ8 and 525i to get this out today!

 

For £500, having just ticked over onto 63k today, with full service history and a fresh MOT it was very cheap looking at the market for these. I do believe the previous keeper had it for sale cheap to make it an attractive sale, due to the overheating/coolant loss issues even after he had changed the expansion bottle, probably thinking it was something much more serious.

 

It's been faultless today and I think I've sorted the problems for pennies really.

 

Okay it's got a few little niggling issues but the bodywork isn't in bad shape (seen some pretty rotten Ka's in my time) and is simple enough for DIY maintenance. I was intending to buy it and flip a quick profit, but I've decided to keep it for now.

 

Would highly recommend one to somebody looking for a cheap but cheerful runaround with character.

[stuboy]

 

 

i considered one of these before..

[JohnK]

i considered one of these before..

If you can get away with a small car (or have scope to have it as a second car) then do it!

[cobblers]

In 2003 I almost spent my student loan on a normal Ka off a lecturer at uni, I was gonna sport bumpers on and some escort cosworth wheels on like one I saw on the internet once.

 

I went to look at it and it had snotty welding and a tetrosyl tidemark at 5 years old so I didn't bother, and I bought a Saxo VTR instead and drove everywhere at 108mph.

[Lord Sterling]

Took Merc to Mahmoud's today and as always I drove many, many cars. Now, many people look us in our 70s 80s cars and wonder why we bother/laugh, but if you drove thier "new plate" (02/03/04+) cars, you'd be seriously astonished at how crap and poorly maintained they really are. Some cars I drove seriously felt as if they were only held together by gravity, and some of these cars are less than 10 years old.

 

Also met a decent young chap who buy and sells cars for a living, he is only 25 years old and University educated but he left his profession a couple of years ago to buy and sell cars, he now rents a unit that fits up to 20 cars and has a high 5-figure turnover. Now I'm 32 and got fuck all to show for all those years on earth, being pushed about from temp job to temp job is no way forward. I'm sick to bastard of working for other people/companies, getting nowhere and being paid pittance, but for the next year or so it is something I must do due to personal reasons and the time limits relating to those reasons that is being forced on me. I am going start and get the ball rolling on enquiring about opening by own business, I love cars and want to work with them, I'm shit at mechanics and don't want to sell cars for other people, if a 25 year old can make it, why can't I?

[Inspector Morose]

That's the kind of thinking chap! (Now why didn't I take my own advice years ago?)

[wuvvum]

In a somwhat convoluted deal with a mate yesterday, I joined the hallowed ranks of the Autoshite Perodua Owners Club when I became the owner of this beauty.

 

 

It's a Kenari GX which his Mrs has owned for about the last five years - it was owned from new by an old biddy prior to that.  It's done about 110K miles which is probably quite high for one of these, but it seems happy enough.  Mate's boy is a mechanic so it had a cambelt last year and has been well looked after, mechanically at least - the bodywork has a few issues, mainly grot on the rear arches and a dent on the front passenger door.  It's got electric windows and sunroof, and central locking (which closes the roof automatically but not the windows, weirdly).

 

It's an odd little thing to drive.  It's quite nippy, being powered by a copy of the 989cc triple from the Sirion, with a 5-speed manual 'box.  It's surprisingly high geared for a small engine - 60 in 5th is just under 3,000 revs - and I think motorway inclines may need 4th gear, if I'm ever brave enough to take it on the motorway.  Handling is "interesting", and gets rather wallowy if pushed too hard, but then it was never meant as a B-road blaster.  The steering is very low geared for a PAS system but the turning circle is superb.  The sideways-opening tailgate is useful and to my surprise I've managed to shoehorn my pushbike in there - so I'll be driving it to work tomorrow.  Could be interesting in a 50mph crosswind... 

[barmatt]

DSC_0160a.JPG

 

 

I think there's an "LY" missing off the end of the number plate. Top purchase mate.

[dollywobbler]

Fabulous. I think we may upgrade to a Kenari one day.

[andy18s]

Fabulous. I think we may upgrade to a Kenari one day.

I can't possibly imagine any other place where I would read that....

[phil_lihp]

Aren't they a rebadged 90's Daihatsu?  Not the most flattering facelift ever, the original Move definitely looks better.  Therefore a beige Kenari definitely wins Autoshite today.

[EssDeeWon]

With the aerodymanics of Postman Pats van and in JRG it looks a kwality purchase wuvvum.

[cort16]

I've sold the CL (well pending collection tomorrow). I drove it up today so I could get it washed and was thinking "why am I selling it again?". Great car, will probably be bealling about selling it once it's gone.

 

I probably should bank this cash but I really fancy a mk2 Astra GTE however the price of them has went bonkers. £2500 seems to be the going rate for a decent 8v £3000 + for a 16v

 

If anyone see's one on their travels (8v or 16v) let me know. I also quite like that little 16v mk1 Golf on ebay.

[rml2345]

After hearing about the new lease of life a clean fuel filter gave, I decided to do the one on the Carisma.

 

 

Can't say it's been a miraculous transformation but it's definitely an improvement.

[cms206]

The Scotrail franchise changes from First to Abellio in the morning. I've got two coaches out over the next three days, the first one at 5am tomorrow.

 

No paperwork so far. No duty boards. No rail replacement banners. No control room numbers. Fuck all. Currently bastardising First Scotrail boards and banners to make it look like someone cares, all while waiting for catalloy to dry on the back end repairs on one of the Paramounts so I can leather some paint over it with a brush for the morning schools.

[coalnotdole]

I Got my new tyres for the GTE fitted to the Turbines on Monday, so this afternoon I fitted them to the Car... 

 

 

Comparison between new and old:

 

 

I've fitted 5mm spacers front and rear but I'm nor sure if they are really needed so will experiment with them over the next couple of weeks and possibly remove the rears as they bring the tyres right to the limit of the wheel arch!

 

 

 

 

I then went for a drive: