Project Beep beep beep - living the P38 dream

[The Moog]

https://youtu.be/dzvrQ2rejr4

 

 

 

https://youtu.be/dzvrQ2rejr4

[hairnet]

Bitch did ya fix the rover

[The Moog]

Bitch did ya fix the rover

 

Shhhhh it is happening soon! 

[Tamworthbay]

What’s the E reg car? Veeeeery nice.......

[The Moog]

What’s the E reg kit car? Veeeeery nice.......

 

its a saab sonnett - beautiful cars 

 

 

[Tamworthbay]

its a saab sonnett - beautiful cars 

 

 

Wow! I have only seen two sonnets in real life, one of them in a museum. I thought it might be one then went, nah can’t be.

[NorthernMonkey]

Functional heated seats in these is somewhat of a rarity on these I hear. So are there any grand plans for the P38?

Actually, only one. Claire’s is working well, nice and toasty. Mine is deader than a dead thing.

 

Grand plans? Well.....

 

As some of you may know, I have a small garage business doing general repairs and also selling one or two cars alongside collecting shite (or genuine bona-fide future classics if Claire is reading)

 

As a result, it’s useful to have some sort of tat shifter. I’ve got a little 3.5t Isuzu beavertail truck which has made the occasional appearance on these pages. It’s a handy little thing but has two issues.

 

Firstly, the carrying capacity means that legally you’re only able to move stuff that weighs less than around 1.2 ton and secondly it was designed for a small Japanese person to fit behind the wheel, not a rather large Northener with type 1 pieabetes.

 

We also have a Volvo XC90 that we acquired a couple of years ago for use as a general family car, spaniel shifter, tip runner etc etc

 

This was bought for not too much from BCA.

 

Lesson one...buy cheap, buy twice guys. XC90s do have a few known issues and trust me, this bugger had the full compliment. Play in the bottom arms, leaking intercooler, transmission fault, leaking oil way core plug inside the bellhousing, the works. You name it, if it has ever failed on a Volvo, then this one was living proof...

 

To be continued

[Broadsword]

Sounds good. From the cold start video it seemed the engine was quite willing, that's a good start. Yeah the towing capacity is why we got ours, when it turned up cheap and luck would have it passed an MOT the next day. I don't know if it will happen but we wanted the option of being able to tow a project car from time to time. Pretty much restricted to hiring a car trailer though, they are dead expensive and secure storage for a trailer is a challenge.

 

If it doesn't work out, do consider selling the go faster chip tune box to me!

[Royale80]

Looks good!!!

 

Waiting for mine to come back after undergoing a “mini restoration “ - new headlining, door lock, air con fixed, security options taken off, new battery, mot and service. Had mine just over 12 years- it’s a 4.6 so tows the caravan “adequately “.

 

I’ve always fancied the L322 like Wacks- but as long as the P38 keeps going I’ll keep it.

 

Keep us posted with going on.

 

Regards

 

Steve

[djimbob]

Wow, you guys have big cahones, if you need a spares motah mine may well be available once I have properly diagnosed the giant smog cloud coming out of it's arse end this week, I have updated the For sale thread which I never bothered to change which has come full circle, probably

 

Shiter's discount will apply

[Cavcraft]

And they say Autoshite isn't the same now.

[Skizzer]

PROPER collection thread. Mucho respecto, yo.

 

Quite fancy a P38. But no.

[NorthernMonkey]

Wow, you guys have big cahones, if you need a spares motah mine may well be available once I have properly diagnosed the giant smog cloud coming out of it's arse end this week, I have updated the For sale thread which I never bothered to change which has come full circle, probably

 

Shiter's discount will apply

Same colour too....hmm. Could do with a better front bumper, a couple of doors, some trim bits etc.

 

Keep me posted, won’t you?

[NorthernMonkey]

Anyway, where were we?

 

Having removed the automatic gearbox from the XC, which incidentally involves dropping the front suspension, subframe, rack, transfer box and god knows what else, I replaced the £2.47 core plug with an improved alloy one from Volvo. Then it was simply* a case of popping on a couple of new suspension arms, a new intercooler and one or two other bits before we were back on the road.

 

Two days later, the transmission fault message popped up and it went into limp mode. Joy.

 

Unable to face swapping the gearbox so soon after putting the damned thing back together, I decided to try flushing the fluid through a couple of times and to be fair, although the message keeps coming up every time you start the engine, it has actually behaved itself pretty much for the last year or so. It occasionally went into limp mode in the early days but switching off and back on again sorted that and it hasn’t actually done that for the last six months or so.

 

Since then though, it’s started to leak a bit of transmission fluid to the point where it needs a litre top up every five or six weeks and it appears to be coming from the torque converter oil seal. It’s also got a distinct droning noise which sounds like a wheel bearing, all four tyres could do with replacing soon and the miles are up to nearly 180k.

 

Although it would pass a test easily enough and actually drives very well I wouldn’t dream of selling it other than for spares or repairs due to the ATF leak.

 

As a result, I’ve been on the lookout for something that could replace both the Volvo and the recovery truck. It needs to be able to tow a 3.5t trailer if needs be and have a full compliment of seats/windows which rules out a van. Also, four wheel drive comes in handy a few times a year as we live in semi-rural Lancashire up on the edge of Pendle hill.

 

Having tried a couple of Discovery 2s, I can’t seem to get enough legroom even with the seat right back. The Disco 3s are fine in that respect but still hold their value pretty well and I’m loath to spend more than 2-3k on something that will mainly get used for dragging a trailer occasionally and carrying a few muddy spaniels in the back.

 

That leaves the RRs. I was really looking out for an early L322 auto like Wacks but when Saabnut offered up a diesel P38 auto for not a lot of dosh just before Xmas, messages were exchanged and plans were made.

[NorthernMonkey]

Those plans were initially to hitch a lift up to Scotland with Mr&Mrs Moog when they were heading up to see family. However, at the last minute this all went to pot as I went down with man flu the day before. As it turns out, it was probably for the best as the Moogs 406 gave up the ghost on the morning of the planned trip so they went up in the Getz instead which would have been a bit of a squeeze to say the least.

 

As Saabnut was travelling down to France that week, things were postponed until he returned at the end of January...plans were then formulated to collect it on the 17th of February.

 

Will very kindly offered to take me up to and until last Friday, the plan was to set off early on Sunday morning. There were a few things to be done to the Rangie upon our arrival though...it needed a couple of rear shocks replacing which I was taking up with me...and we decided that it may be a bit of a task to do it all in one day so thanks to the kindness of Wills mother in law who lives 70 miles south of Aberdeen, the decision was made to travel up on Saturday, stop overnight then get up to Saabnuts early on Sunday to enable fixings to be undertaken with time to spare.

 

This then evolved into being a Valentines break for our respective others thus mitigating the entire thing and earning (or rather avoid losing) brownie points on both sides!

 

Anyway, that brings us to the current time. The Moog has done an excellent job of covering the collection itself so next up from me will be an evaluation of the car itself along with the plans for its future and hopefully in due course, a detailed documentation of its refurbishment.

 

Keep tuned

[hairnet]

respec

 

not for the trip to the arse of ecosse (which is beautiful)

 

but for the words the p38 is heading home south with us

 

granite - och aye

[Cavcraft]

Ha, thought Will had bought this from the way I read the thread. You're a brave man, Neil.

[Ohdearme]

We saw a sacred Scottish monument yesterday

 

Uddingston!

 

Worked there (sadly not at Tunnocks) for 9 months of my life once

[NorthernMonkey]

Ha, thought Will had bought this from the way I read the thread. You're a brave man, Neil.

There is but a very fine line between bravery and all out bloody recklessness...

[The Moog]

Ha, thought Will had bought this from the way I read the thread. You're a brave man, Neil.

I dont own underpants strong enough! 

[anonymous user]

PROPER collection thread. Mucho respecto, yo.

 

Quite fancy a P38. But no.

Same here, but I've always thought that it would be a bit like having an outdoor swimming pool in this country, cost a fortune to run and only be useful a few days in the year (probably be full of water as well)

[djimbob]

Lucky for you good people there is a once in a shiter's lifetime opportunity to purchase a *fine example of the P38 model of your very own at an initially very affordable price from my good self

 

(will require trailering and the sort of big bollocks ably demonstrated by the interpid adventurers on this thread)

 

Please form an orderly cyber queue

[djimbob]

Please disperse back to your keyboards people, the P38 of global warming enhancement has been claimed, i will let the new owner tell the tale of collectioning when it occurs, will he brave the drive, or bang it on a trailer, tune in laterz to find out

[Exiled_Tat_Gatherer]

I have 2 top cars of all time I got for £500 - the Celsior from our beloved Wuvv's on here that was a bloody miracle on wheels - just immense.

2nd is the P38 I ignored all sense and advice and bought ebay blind with 'possible leaking airbag at the rear and unknown battery drain'...…. WGPGW - took munchkin - who was the grand old age of 5 - with me and we did London zoo before collecting and driving back to Brussels. Only time we stopped on the motorway was because he couldn't wait until the next services!

It was fantastic…….

 

I went for the 4.0 - it sank every time I switched off and if it was more than 3days I was left with an 'alternative' bonnet opener and battery charge - then the key turn tango. Apart from that it was fucking brilliant and towed anything and everything I loaded up between here and Germany regularly. truly loved it.

I know I got lucky - but £500 - what can you expect? It blew the bags on one tow - so they were replaced - not actually too bad and can be done relatively quickly too. Ex had it towed as part of her revenge when we split (long story).

 

Looking forward to you getting through this and having it in use. they really are a proper nice place to be when botching up the miles.

I'm fine for now - but a supercharged version is on the wish list - hopefully in time for next winter...…..

Top buying, fixing and fetching…….. keep the updates coming.

[NorthernMonkey]

I really want to see the ex-Saabnut p38 go on its first recovery mission.

It is a possibility but I think a few gallons of water and a recovery club card will be the order of the day here, especially as it’s only about 10 miles away

[The Moog]

One thing we forgot to mention was that Saabnut had said that the RR kept locking itself no matter what.

 

Cue moving it into the garage for work to start and the car kept locking and unlocking.

 

Many eyes were rolled until we worked out njgleeds had the keys in his pocket and kept rolling on them

[mat_the_cat]

As a result, I’ve been on the lookout for something that could replace both the Volvo and the recovery truck. It needs to be able to tow a 3.5t trailer if needs be and have a full compliment of seats/windows which rules out a van. Also, four wheel drive comes in handy a few times a year as we live in semi-rural Lancashire up on the edge of Pendle hill.

 

This P38 seems like a fairly decent tow car:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQ1SCNGO34c

[NorthernMonkey]

FFS. Just checked the service specs as I’ve no idea when it was last done......

 

 

 

.....nine and a half bloody litres!!!

 

And Junkman thought he was hard done by.

[Junkman]

Yeah, but it's not a lousy four banger that can't pull the sausage off a plate.

[Saabnut]

FFS. Just checked the service specs as I’ve no idea when it was last done......

 

 

 

.....nine and a half bloody litres!!!

 

And Junkman thought he was hard done by.

 

Last oil change was 2 years and about 3k miles ago, when the oil cooler split and had a secondhand one fitted. That, new water pump, belts etc cost oooh, that will be 600 quid Sir!