Vorsprung Durch Ticket (MOT) - Ohdearme’s turn of the century emporium

[purplebargeken]

Let's just hope he buys the chicken and doesn't just return it to the hot food cabinet afterwards.

 

That is just fowl.

[NorthernMonkey]

It’s finger warming good

[Ohdearme]

Came up with two solutions to the lock whilst watching James May’s cars of the people in hotel.

 

Outbid on plan A...my bottle caved at potentially explaining to the wife why I’d spent £200+ on a shagged Galaxy in even worse nick than mine...

 

 

Captain Sensible purchase instead

 

[Supernaut]

£8 for an entire door handle and lock assembly?

 

I bet that's really high quality*.

[purplebargeken]

89.54% sure that it work just fine.

[Guest Hooli]

£8 for an entire door handle and lock assembly?

 

I bet that's really high quality*.

 

The original was great* too.

[Ohdearme]

To be fair it’s not a bad thing, I’d been meaning to take the door off to pop out the dent in the drivers door.

 

Silver linings and all that, etc.

[Matty]

I bought one at this price for my MK3 golf. It looked exactly like a golf door handle in all respects except it didn't fit the fucking car! TBF VW heritage sell them at the same price so it would appear all you can get is new shit or second hand. Good thing is you can make one good one out of two bad...

[mrbenn]

Captain Sensible purchase instead

 

That's not like you. Are you unwell?

[Ohdearme]

That's not like you. Are you unwell?

Only a little under the weather...you’ll note I was bidding...I stopped at £160 as I had to factor the £40 MOT fee for booking it into my local garage to make the drive home legit.

 

I’d also worked out that I could fit a wheel of my red Galaxy, a trolley jack and breaker bar in my suitcase to make the one illegal wheel on the silver one ok...

 

Far too sensible a plan. It will also soften the blow this way if I win the Voyager...

 

“Ho, ho darling, imagine if I’d won the Voyager and the silver Galaxy, aren’t you pleased you married such a character...”

[purplebargeken]

Voyager. Interesting.

 

I still miss the Galaxy, but you are doing good by her which is ace.

[Ohdearme]

Voyager. Interesting.

 

I still miss the Galaxy, but you are doing good by her which is ace.

Doing good? Every bastard time I touch the poor girl a bit falls off it, it’s like trying to fondle a leper...

[Ohdearme]

Pointlessly extravagant power nap in the Galaxy, I have the seats so why not spread out?

 

 

Good dry run for shite fest sleeping arrangements.

 

Fuse has also popped again in the heater so more investigation activity needed there :/

[Ohdearme]

As there's not a lot going on with the Galaxy and based on the 2009 <> 2019 thread, I thought I'd go all wibbly screen flashback and talk briefly about a few cars I'd had in the past.

 

Circa 2008-9 I was still living down south in Weybridge (after I accepted a six month* secondment in 2001). I was commuting a short distance to Staines each day so the fact this was being done in this lovely old bus of a 540 and getting 18-20mpg wasn't exactly a big worry. It was a beautiful car to waft along in but floor it and as the revs rose it had a disgustingly Nascar growl to the V8, I never tired of it, ever.

 

It was a standard 540I Sport Auto with an AC Schnitzer kit and alloys so was different to the slightly staid E39 but not as common as the facelift sport kits BMWs.

 

 

 

 

Then things changed at work and I started doing a weekly run back up to Leeds in it. Although fuel economy went as high as 28 mpg, it was too easy to find oneself the wrong side of the big numbers, to the point I found myself in the early hours of the morning having a chat with an officer in Leicester Forest East services. The discussion, after being pulled over was mainly about what appropriate speed was and we both agreed that anything that crept into three figures, no matter how briefly or how quiet a road was, was probably in the realms of inappropriate.

 

Unrelated* I received an SP50.

[Ohdearme]

At the same time as the BMW, I also had this extravagant little beauty. My second fiat Barchetta, the first was a yellow one that was always headed for the knackers yard (I'll dig out a photo and discuss that later) but this one was a minty good nick one.

 

 

 

 

Interior an acquired taste (I don't like it now, but loved it back then).

 

It was a mid date model when they'd introduced the 'cat's arse' third brakelight on the boot but still had the old front bumper I got DTR (where I bought it) to swap the boot for an earlier model.

 

Despite being front wheel drive and LHD, they were fantastic fun. it shared the 1.8 engine from the Punto HGT and with no weight over the rear, the most amusing way of making progress was to enter corners/roundabouts way too fast with a bit too much lock and then power out of the roundabouts as fast as possible, hoping to drag itself straight.

 

I also discovered in a rolling drag race, a Barchetta is marginally* slower than an Enzo - (will try and find the vid).

 

Anyhoo, I'd sold the BMW to free up some funds and opted for a company car due to the mileage and was awaiting the arrival of a boring but efficient Golf GT TDi. As the Golf didn't turn up on time, I found my self fitting the hardtop and starting to drive up and down the motorway in the Barchetta. I wasn't keen on doing that for a number of reasons.

 

It leaked a bit, I was putting miles on a low mileage example, it was noisy, overtaking was an arse, it wasn't exactly comfy on the motorway, junctions were impossible and the exquisitely beautiful door handles iced up all the time in winter.

 

Add to this, some scrote didn't seem to like it as it had been keyed, then the wing mirror and door booted in separately and it was painful to watch a pride and joy getting fecked up by jealous arseholes I had no hope of catching at it. (CCTV wasn't quite so ubiquitous/cheap then).

 

This was back in a time when the police had resources and Surrey plod actually sent a forensics van out to the car to try and dust the mirror for prints (as the scrote had left prints trying to pull it off?!?) sadly, nothing complete was obtained and I had to cough up for the damage myself.

 

The final straw was when I went to the car one day to find the rear bumper caved in at the exact same height the neighbour's Frontera would have bashed it executing a three point turn to reverse in to their space. I raised this in passing. Not directly blaming them but giving opportunity for confession, as in "Looks like my car's had a knock while parked round the back and its quite high up for it be a car, any ideas?" (only three of us parked round there). They said perhaps the gardener did it with his trailer so to this day it was clearly* nothing to do with them.

 

I then decided to sell the Barchetta before it was totally devalued and got myself a cheap piece of Chod to rattle off the miles till the Golf arrived.

 

This was done by driving to the nearest dealer with a grand in cash and asking what he had with around 12 months tax, automatic and bargey. My choices were a battered new shape (the ugly one) Laguna, or a much older 2.0lpt 9-5 saloon...

[purplebargeken]

^^ Oh very nice indeed!!!!!!

[Ohdearme]

...given I had a need to reliably get to and form Leeds/London, I opted for the Saab.

 

£900 got me this thing with a FSH, auto box, cloth heated seats and (because I knew nothing of the potential of these engines with a remap back then) a rather lazy 0-60 of 11 seconds. It didn't even have wonky headlight wipers.

 

With cruise and badermatic it was a most relaxing ride up and down the motorway. Can't remember the mpg but it was a significant improvement on the BMW or Fiat. Absolutely nothing of consequence happened in my ownership of it, which fitted my requirements exactly.

 

After three months and 6000 miles in the Saab, the Golf arrived (it's hiding in one pic) so the 9-5 was ebayed off.

 

As usual highest bidder was a no show moron so second bidder got it for £700, fine bangernomics.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Ohdearme]

One of these things will fix the Galaxy door access problem.

 

 

What’s it gonna be? In through the handle or in through the window?

[Guest Hooli]

The green one looks like a scale model of a typical* Galaxy owner.

[purplebargeken]

Oi, I resemble that remark!

[Ohdearme]

Have been a bit quiet on here as busy with work work and building work.

 

Still got the handle for the Galaxy to fit and then of all things this morning, this happened...

 

 

All that careful preparation ruined, life in tatters, etc.

 

After a smoll cry at not being able to capture the 159,159,159 I have redoubled my efforts and will aim for a palindrome mileage shot of 159951 very soon.

 

It's important to have goals.

 

 

 

[Ohdearme]

In appreciation/consoles for mon birthday I have been granted free pass to the U-Pull-It emporium in York tomorrow to attempt to rape the remaining Galaxy in their fleet of its earthly (and unearthed) possessions.

 

All shiters welcome to help (or be helped home with bits - I’m in t’galaxy ffs) I will be there most of the day trying to prise out a fecking headliner plus all non nailed down bits I don’t need!

 

Good too see any shiters there as I’m always short of the wrong tool.

 

Pm me if stalking the premises, I’m not mental, honest, says the guy with a parts shopping list for a 20 year old mpv he bought in lieu of 10 skips....

 

Run away.

[Guest Hooli]

I'd love* to join you but I'm scared of nutters washing my hair.

[rantingYoof]

Oooof, a Linear spec. base engine Saab 9-5.

 

 

 

*salutes*

[purplebargeken]

I read that as it is important to have goats.

 

I guess either is important enough. Good luck with the parts grabbage. If I weren't so far away I would help.

[mrbenn]

Bummer. York is about 90 miles for me but I'd be well up for a future parts run with a bit more notice.

 

Good luck!

[loserone]

Sadly not in the right place to come down (it would be up from here), would have tried to otherwise

[Aston Martin]

12 and a half seconds after a car arrives at upullmeoff.... The Polskis have stripped it to bare metal.

[Ohdearme]

I never did go to the scrappers on Sat, I popped outside in the morning to brick acid my garden wall and my hands were so comprehensively and painfully frozen after 15 minutes outside, I decided driving to York to roll around in the cold trying to rag bits off a probably already empty shell wasn’t going to be that much fun.

 

I did summon the strength to fit the new door handle on Sunday though.

 

It’s as simple* as a single torx screw and some yanking but as I’d disconnected the electrics, the door card needed to come off.

 

 

Lock had fallen to bits and the paddle had left it in auto open mode, hence needing to cut the window power.

 

 

 

The pattern part wasn’t quite a perfect fit but is doing the job. It also doesn’t spring back so you have to turn it to centre manually or it goes into auto windows down mode.

 

I know this because I did the handle first to get the lock working and then with the card off proceeded to connect the window plug and immediately crush my arm inside the door as the window descended on me.

 

Once again and true to form, any attempt to keep a car going results in at least two of blood, sweat and tears...

 

 

In other news, the ‘90’s May have been the peak of flowing dashboard design because the designers never had to experience the joys* of mobile phones flying around the top of the dashboard.

 

I’ve therefore invested in a super-premium* non-slip mat. Instructions are very clear.

 

 

Kids have duly been instructed not to ‘eat bite’ the mat, whatever that means.

[purplebargeken]

Yes, eat biting the mat is never a good thing.