The new news 24 thread

[Cavcraft]

Excelsior news on the 306 front: washed and buffed it yesterday which made it look shite loads better and my lad weaved his magic today so boot now opens and closes (even if the lock is typical bloody Peugeot and only works when it wants to) which is mint, oh and the rear wiper also works now too!

 

Best of all though was a check under the bonnet reveals pump says Bosch! Asian supermarket here I come!

[dollywobbler]

RobT - you can have this one if you're at Shitefest. I don't really need a Sat Nav. I've gone back to using Google maps and I'm sure I can convince the Garmin Nuvi to work again if I really need it.

 

The wife is pretty good at navigation as well, which is good as we went to Redditch today and it's a fuggin' nightmare. We went to Arrow Valley Country Park which is handily not sign-posted until you take the junction you need on one of the many dual carriageways. Come off and down to the roundabout and you're actually treated to a sign telling you where the park is! Wife 1, Redditch nil.

 

Left the BX 'Safari' unlocked all day at the park, which was silly. No-one seemed to notice though - perhaps they were too busy laughing at the stripes. Hideous journey over there, with loads of dawdlers and caravans. That at least allowed a rather pleasant 55mpg. Drives beautifully now I've sorted the steering and suspension and disengaged the self-cancelling function on the indicators. Wonderful.

[wuvvum]

This afternoon I have mostly been working on shite. I nipped into Norwich for some hacksaw blades and exhaust clamps, then cut the old exhaust off the Renault 6 and more or less managed to fit the new one. I say more or less because there's a little blob of weld inside the silencer in-pipe which is stopping the centre section sliding fully into the silencer, and I didn't have anything to file it off with. I couldn't be arsed to go into Norwich again for a file (the motor factor's in the village shuts at 1 on a Sunday) and the pipe was far enough in that it would be secure and wouldn't blow, so I just clamped it up where it was.

 

The other advantage to this setup was that the rear silencer mount is hung from the front-most bumper mounting bolt, and said bolt snapped when I tried to loosen it, so with the silencer being further back than it should be I was able to move the mount to the rear-most bolt (which undid fine) and everything lined up. So now the tailpipe sticks out about half an inch beyond the rear bumper, but other than that it all seems secure. It's quietened the old crate down a fair bit too.

 

After that I pulled the Solara onto the drive to change the water pump. It's so nice working on a 27-year-old car which doesn't have any rusted up or seized bits. Everything that needed to come undone did so with little effort, and the whole job took less than an hour. The pump I bought off eBay came without a gasket so I used a liberal amount of Hylomar, which seems to have done the job, and the bearing noise is gone so my guess as to where the noise was coming from appears to have been right. Now all I need to do is get the thing idling properly and it can go in for a test.

 

Next job is the handbrake shoes on the Jeep, but I'm going to have to pay someone to do that I think as there's no way my little Aldi trolley jack will lift a Grand Cherokee off the ground.

[dieselnutjob]

just got back from a very flash wedding in Marbella

 

I thought that the wedding car was a big shite though

 

DSC_1593 by dieselnutjob, on Flickr

[John F]

Discovery's OMG HGF is now fixed!

[RobT]

Montego only failed it's MoT on two split outer CV gaitors, which i knew about. So no welding this year, phew! Will get the garage to fix those as I fancy a weekend off from fixing shite.

[Cavcraft]

TR7 is now heading North as I type this!

[Conrad D. Conelrad]

Miserable day renewing driveshaft universal joint. Worst job ever.

[Shep Shepherd]

Managed to clean and polish the paint on the rest of The Volvo's roof and its bonnet this afternoon. Predictably, it started to rain not long after I finished, but at least the polish is doing what it should:

 

 

 

Weather permitting, I should be able to get the car's wings, doors and rear quarters done tomorrow

[cms206]

Managed to clean and polish the paint on the rest of The Volvo's roof and its bonnet this afternoon. Predictably, it started to rain not long after I finished, but at least the polish is doing what it should:

 

 

 

Weather permitting, I should be able to get the car's wings, doors and rear quarters done tomorrow

 

 

I have not yet bothered to wash the Golden Brick as it looks better when you can't see it properly. I may wash it for Shitefest, but I might not...

[cort16]

I've been in negotiation with cavcraft to get the infamous brown bike up to Scotchland. Billy kindly offered to come up and meet me at Carlisle so I could pick it up half way but a chat with a mate put me onto a delivery company who arranged to bring it up at a very reasonable cost.

 

It all happened last night with the driver turning up to get it.

 

Here it is being loaded up in the cavcraft PDI and handover section.

 

IMG_0390 by cort16, on Flickr

 

Several hours later it turned up and burst into life first turn of the key.

IMG_2069 by cort16, on Flickr

 

On the drive awaiting transfer to my lockup once I get my insurance sorted.

IMG_2071 by cort16, on Flickr

 

Thank you CavCraft, another happy customer. As you can see by the reflection I'm about to be attacked by a giant crab but that didn't detract from my happyness at getting a shot on the autoshite bike.

IMG_2070 by cort16, on Flickr

 

From what I can see it needs an exhaust, window regulator and passengerside door. I know there's a TR7 at a local breakers so I might go and see what I can plunder off of that. TBH I think the plans going to be to do it up over the winter as I want to drive the SD1 now it's finally finished.

[Cavcraft]

Nice one Glenn. Your mate with the recovery truck is an ace fella by the way and doesn't half do some miles, I think between either Sunday night or Monday morning and today he's done Scotland-Midlands-Portsmouth-Oxford-Oldham-Chester-Scotland!

[Shep Shepherd]

I have not yet bothered to wash the Golden Brick as it looks better when you can't see it properly. I may wash it for Shitefest, but I might not...

 

I think that the car lends itself well to the raffish rural vet/lord of the manor look, especially with the blue tailgate

[cort16]

Nice one Glenn. Your mate with the recovery truck is an ace fella by the way and doesn't half do some miles, I think between either Sunday night or Monday morning and today he's done Scotland-Midlands-Portsmouth-Oxford-Oldham-Chester-Scotland!

 

He was off to Aberdeen after dropping off the TR7. I'd use him again as he was always in touch, which means you're not worrying about when and if he's going to turn up.

[Pete-M]

Bought another set of cheapo JVC speakers for the Subaru. The rears I'd borrowed from Jon Wat and they were 1/2" too small.

 

To give 'em their due, considering it's got cheap speakers all round, it actually sounds rather decent. Big grinz.

 

Oh, and to the previous owner, ok, you took the stereo and CD changer out. I can sort of understand that, but the speakers??? Bloody annoying that.

[eddyramrod]

News! There have been developments (aside from the arrival on a transporter of a lowriding Metro). I had a phone call on Monday from a chap interested in my pickup. He came to see it more or less immediately and we agreed a sale. Less money than I wanted, but hey, I'm waaaaaaaaay past that point anyway. Yesterday morning he turned up at least half an hour early with a deposit, and today gave me the balance. Then we set about changing it over... It never occurred to me that he wouldn't know this: in Cyprus, before the authorities will issue you with their equivalent of a V5, you have to produce insurancein your name, for that vehicle. We then spent a couple of hours dashing around getting him insured, because mine was cancelled from 12 noon. Anyway we got it and he now has the truck. He was over the moon when he left me. Wonder how long that'll last? He's a plumber and wants it as a work van. Ideal.

So, with his deposit in my pocket I went out and got insurance on my Granada, and then tax on it too so I can legally drive it for the first time in about 3 months! I treated it to a new battery too, it's a big old lump for the old one to keep churning over. Need to wash it now but I was too busy today.

[dollywobbler]

Today I fitted a new wiper relay to the BX 'Safari.' Doesn't sound very exciting does it? However, I've replaced the standard relay with one from a mid-1990s Volkswagen (Relay 99) after a tip-off on the BX Club website. The result? Programmable variable intermittent wipers!

 

I first encountered this set-up on a 1996 VW T4 Transporter when I was a van driver, noticing that you could adjust the delay by switching to intermittent, switching to off and then switching back to intermittent after your desired delay. It maintains that selected gap until you either change it or turn the ignition off. Standard delay is 6 seconds but you can adjust it from naff-all to about 30 seconds. This is a major boon given British summertime...

 

Another bonus is that the amount of times the wiper wipes after washing is also variable, depending on how long you hold the washer on. I actually get a 'flick' wipe by flicking the wiper stalk to the wash position (something I really missed) and no longer have the frustration of the wiper going for too long after washing. In winter, this often starts smearing again after washing whereas it wouldn't if it stopped sooner. A small change, but also a massive one in terms of driver pleasure.

 

As an aside, the 2CV's wiper switch has a 'flick' function. I've never encountered another car with such a feature (ok, also fitted to the H van I owned) on a button rather than a stalk. It's great. Just a single move gets you one wipe of the wipers. As I discovered when I had my P6, having to switch the wipers on and off again for that single wipe can become a surprisingly annoying thing after a while. The Mini has a stalk with the 'flick' function too. Yet so many cars (I'm looking at you Vauxhall, Ford and mid-1980s Citroen/PSA) don't have it.

[vulgalour]

Ah, intermittent wipers, how I'd love a set of those.

[cobblers]

Those #99 wiper relays are ace. My T25 didn't even come with intermittent wipers at all, so I bought the relay, pulled a bridging link out of the fuse box and stuck the #99 relay in it's place, then pulled the plastic tab out of the wiper stalk base and it now allows you to select intermittent wipe.

 

Poor sods have been driving these vans round for the last 24 years without intermittent at all for the sake of £2 and 5 minutes work.

 

Same goes for the lights on warning beeper - I just get relay out of a 90s VW that has it and plugged it in the fuse box, Shazam!

[John F]

.

 

As an aside, the 2CV's wiper switch has a 'flick' function. I've never encountered another car with such a feature (ok, also fitted to the H van I owned) on a button rather than a stalk. It's great. Just a single move gets you one wipe of the wipers. As I discovered when I had my P6, having to switch the wipers on and off again for that single wipe can become a surprisingly annoying thing after a while. The Mini has a stalk with the 'flick' function too. Yet so many cars (I'm looking at you Vauxhall, Ford and mid-1980s Citroen/PSA) don't have it.

 

My Calibra has that function (on the indicator stalk), and so did my old Cav SRi.

[dollywobbler]

Ah, thanks John. Clearly my time spent only with lowly povo-spec Cavaliers has led me astra-y!

 

VolksAngyl - does the Princess have a 'flick' function? Very similar stalks to the Mini I would have thought. Not sure when that feature was introduced. I'd take that over intermittent wipers any day if forced to only have one of the two.

[philibusmo]

My Austin maxi 2 had that function. It also had a very worn linkage so the wipers stopped about 2 inches from the bottom of the screen until pushed back into the correct place and if set at their fastest speed they used to hit the screen surround on every swipe with an amusing 'thunk'.

[Spiny Norman]

My Merc has that feature as well, you just give the end of the huge single column stalk a thump and the wiper sweeps across the screen once, hold it in for screenwash.

[skattrd]

It's been a bit busy for me today, I'm off work this week trying to sort various things around the house, but had today pencilled in for car stuff:

Bora passed its MOT this morning, only advisory was wear to one tyre.

Then we changed the clutch on the bora, not too bad a job, but we did break the speedo sensor whilst doing it (getting/fitting new one tomorrow). The clutch is now incredibly light and easy to use.

 

This eve myself and a mate decided to go to Newark car auction as his girlfriends after a new motor (she wasn't invited). Long story short, his girlfriend doesn't have a new motor, but ..... I now have a Volvo S80 in the 2.5 diesel automatic flavour. My only excuse is that it was cheap, and I've been after a diesel auto for occasional work use.

 

So far issues with the S80 are: ABS/Traction control fault and cruise control n/a. Alarm & ABS service indicators showing on dash

On the plus side, full leather, ice cold aircon, tax/mot November (1500 miles since last MOT) engine pulls ok, gearbox appears to work as it should. I'll take it to the garage tomorrow and plug it in to see what the faults are. So far I'm thinking 1x abs sensor or module (£50) +?

[dollywobbler]

About to chuck our camping gear into the 2CV (in the rain) ready to drive four hours to Cambridgeshire (in the rain) where it's currently described as hideously wet (in the rain) so we can pitch our tent (in the rain) and spend a weekend with other 2CVers (in the rain). I'm trying to convince myself that it will be more fun than it sounds...

 

To be fair, it probably will be. The tent is more waterproof than the 2CV (so I'm bound to get wet feet on the drive over there) and the field we're in has two huge barns, complete with a bar.

 

Bloody British Summer.

[cheguava]

About to chuck our camping gear into the 2CV (in the rain) ready to drive four hours to Cambridgeshire (in the rain) where it's currently described as hideously wet (in the rain) so we can pitch our tent (in the rain) and spend a weekend with other 2CVers (in the rain). I'm trying to convince myself that it will be more fun than it sounds...

 

To be fair, it probably will be. The tent is more waterproof than the 2CV (so I'm bound to get wet feet on the drive over there) and the field we're in has two huge barns, complete with a bar.

 

Bloody British Summer.

 

That's a pity - Register's w/e is usually (at least in part) scorchio! Oop North it's been lashing down for the last 3 hours with no end in sight. Depressing hardly describes it.

[dollywobbler]

Aye. I can recall two evenings at Registers Weekend where it rained a bit but since I've been going to the events (my first was 1997 I think) there's never been serious amounts of rain. That's a pretty good record!

[Rocket88]

About to chuck our camping gear into the 2CV (in the rain) ready to drive four hours to Cambridgeshire (in the rain) where it's currently described as hideously wet (in the rain) so we can pitch our tent (in the rain) and spend a weekend with other 2CVers (in the rain). I'm trying to convince myself that it will be more fun than it sounds...

 

To be fair, it probably will be. The tent is more waterproof than the 2CV (so I'm bound to get wet feet on the drive over there) and the field we're in has two huge barns, complete with a bar.

 

Bloody British Summer.

 

Could you not put the tent up before you leave, and drive there under it?

[Cavcraft]

'A months worth of rain in a day' according to local weather forecast. Just been to Delamere Forest for a quick blast and it was tipping it down big time. Even worse now I'm home, haven't seen it this bad in a long while.

[Pete-M]

A cabbie just came flying through traffic behind me, when we stopped at the lights he was kind enough to point out that my brake lights weren't working. I thanked him and drove home (1/2 mile or so) flicking the side lights on whenever I touched the brake pedal. Not ideal, but better than nothing. Couldn't do the old trick of flicking the fog light switch as the foglamp is stuck under the rear bumper and just likely to confuse / irritate folk.

 

Get home, dig out my Kiwi spec translated Impreza handbook and flick to the section marked fuses. All it has to say on the matter is fusebox locations and to replace whichever fuse has blown with the same amperage replacement.

 

So, I find the fusebox...

 

 

Heh. Luckily after a quick google I found someone who has managed to translate it. Replace fuse and have brake lights and a working horn again. Copied the translated fusebox diagram into the handbook to save further issues if another one blows. I'll have to track down a UK spec fusebox cover, but this will do for now.

 

I didn't think about things like this when I bought the car, it just didn't occur that I'd have no hope of reading the bloody fuse box diagram. I've had Italian cars in the past and managed to work out what things do, but I just assumed with the Impreza there's be Ford type symbols to indicate what stuff does.

 

Ah well, learn something new, etc..