My £100 Skoda Felicia (estate).. it's all so tyresome..

[Scotball]

I found this on gumtree just before christmas (I think) in the Aberdour area of fife. Sold on behalf of an old lady who has had to very reluctantly gave up her driving. I believe she was the original owner of the car and she was still on the V5C.  I was the first one to look at it and I checked the previous night before I went to view and had found out on CarTakeBack that car had already been valued for scrap by the seller... the site gave me a warning the car had already been valued at a certain postcode - so I put the sellers postcode in and there it was. Part of the sellers email was visible for me to see with the price he was quoted. (A good tip to anyone looking at a car btw) He was asking for a lot more than £81.  Judging by the posts on here the car is only worth about £300 in good condition at most. He was asking more than that. I thought fair enough. I'll have a look anyway as it's not far away from me and I'll have all my expectations dropped to the floor. 

Seller picked me up from Aberdour train station.  Very friendly and gave me a tour of the local train station  as it was an award winning station... I have to say it looks very nice a little kept garden and stuff. So that was all good... but then wondering if he doesn't want me to see this car haha. After the tour he took me to the owners garage where the car looks like it's spent all of it's 21 years in.  First impressions seems good other than the tape. I'll need to have a look under that tape asap. 

By the looks of the paperwork it hinted about this and the seller seemed to think the tape was so it could pass the MOT without the sharp edges fail. I did agree that was probably that might be why the tape was on it but wasn't sure. Car itself has done about 37,300 miles. Registered in March 1999. One of the first T plates.  So I eventually told the seller is this why you got valued it for scrap because of the rust? and he gave me a brief poker face look then telling me he wanted to check the lowest price he could get for it so he could work out what to put it on gumtree or something incase someone discovered a major fault he hadn't seen and had to lower the price.   Which after he seen all the rust under the tape we agreed on £100 and I would probably drive it around a bit and scrap it myself when the MOT ran out in February.  Done about 200 miles or so driving in it and lots of recent paperwork showing it has been serviced with some big bills to show and it did seem to drive quite good (with a very high clutch mind) So I decided to put it in for an early MOT to see what comes up (with the arches taped back up again) 

 

So I'm about £150 into this so far and the Skoda now has a fresh MOT until January next year but there is work that needs to be done.. but i'm not sure how much I would need to spend to get it all fixed up and more importantly is it worth it? I'll run down all the issues from most important and I'll see what you guys think.

Worn old lady driver clutch? - it's very high and sometimes something makes a squealing sound when you take off from 2nd gear. I suspect its on the way out, Rear aches need replacement I don't think they can be saved. Advice on where to find any cheap panels to put on it? The garage that did the MOT can't find the parts for it and advised that it might be able to be bodged up but I would rather do a proper job of it if possible.  It also is stinking of what is gearbox oil. (I thought it was a fuel leak or something) the garage that has had it for years and years says its "always been like that" so I suppose its leaked somewhere at some point in its life and now its just stinking the car up.  

Let me know what you think and I'll take any advice. thanks.

Some more pics :

You need this stone to turn the radio on.. and guess what dash lights that are out and may or may not have been working correctly at the time of the MOT test*

*something else to add to my list of stuff to fix

[Stinkwheel]

Think you've got a bit of a bargain there, well saved. these felicias are pretty bomb proof. 

[DoctorRetro]

Even if it only gets one last year on the road, there's something satisfying about extending the life of a car at the end of its time. 

Well done ?

[500tops]

I can't remember the last time I saw a Felly wagon! Nice colour, too ?

[Craig the Princess]

Good buy, if you get bored of it I can see @Kiltox making a YouTube star at some point in the year.

[Kiltox]

I absolutely adore the Felicia, you’ve done well there for a ton I reckon!

[strangeangel]

1 hour ago, Stinkwheel said:

Think you've got a bit of a bargain there, well saved. these felicias are pretty bomb proof. 

 

The old 1300 ones are, I had one with the 1.6 Golf engine and it ended very badly indeed.

 

Well done on rescuing it anyway, OP, and hope you have better luck than I did!

[Stinkwheel]

 
The old 1300 ones are, I had one with the 1.6 Golf engine and it ended very badly indeed.

Ah, I’ve only ever had experience of the 1.3 Early type.


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[Scotball]

40 minutes ago, strangeangel said:

 

The old 1300 ones are, I had one with the 1.6 Golf engine and it ended very badly indeed.

 

Well done on rescuing it anyway, OP, and hope you have better luck than I did!

Yup. It's the crappy 1.6. I'm not sure what the deal is other than they leak oil a bit... which this is doing slightly... are they prone to HGF?  I thought it was a chain for some reason as well but no, its just a belt? I can't see any timing belt change done in its life from the paperwork but I suppose I can phone the garage tomorrow and ask if they've ever done it.. 

[strangeangel]

Just now, Scotball said:

Yup. It's the crappy 1.6. I'm not sure what the deal is other than they leak oil a bit... which this is doing slightly and maybe prone to HGF?  I thought it was a chain for some reason as well but no, its just a belt? I can't see any timing belt change done in its life from the paperwork but I suppose I can phone the garage tomorrow and ask if they've ever done it.. 

 

Yeah, mine leaked oil nearly as bad as my old SIII Land Rover, this was at 7YO with barely 40000 on the clock. Amongst its other foibles, the plastic thermostat housing shed one of it's 'legs' and jammed in the top hose, causing the thing to overheat. Mine was bridged at eight years old,  the age yours has survived to means it'll probably be fine. I wouldn't waste your money on changing to timing belt though.

 

[Scotball]

30 minutes ago, strangeangel said:

 

Yeah, mine leaked oil nearly as bad as my old SIII Land Rover, this was at 7YO with barely 40000 on the clock. Amongst its other foibles, the plastic thermostat housing shed one of it's 'legs' and jammed in the top hose, causing the thing to overheat. Mine was bridged at eight years old,  the age yours has survived to means it'll probably be fine. I wouldn't waste your money on changing to timing belt though.

 

From the paperwork they keep putting 10/40 Semi in it, while I only have 10/40 full. I guess I should use semi when doing an oil change to avoid more oil leaks.. On the same sheet it just says "CHECK TIMING BELT HISTORY" and the battery and pads have been done after that date, 2015. Just not sure if the belt was as well.

[egg]

Nice old Felly. Yoss will be along in a mo to defend the 1.6

1.3 is the chain engine.

[DodgyBastard]

Aberdour is only just along the road from me, I usually buy all of the cheap shite around here, can't believe I missed it. If you want rid of it I'll probably buy it at some point.

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[Scotball]

8 minutes ago, DodgyBastard said:

Aberdour is only just along the road from me, I usually buy all of the cheap shite around here, can't believe I missed it. If you want rid of it I'll probably buy it at some point.

Sent from my G3121 using Tapatalk
 

Just have to be quick. missed out on a very cheap berlingo van with a years mot that went within about an hour of advertised  I have a script setup that will refresh gumtree for cheap shit in a 50mile+ radius on my second monitor and glance it at from time to time, seen this thing pop up at some daft hour.  When I do sell it i'll give you first look at it. 

[DodgyBastard]

36 minutes ago, Scotball said:

Just have to be quick. missed out on a very cheap berlingo van with a years mot that went within about an hour of advertised  I have a script setup that will refresh gumtree for cheap shit in a 50mile+ radius on my second monitor and glance it at from time to time, seen this thing pop up at some daft hour.  When I do sell it i'll give you first look at it. 

I'm usually quick on going out getting stuff, I didn't even see the Felicia for sale. I have a Felicia hatchback with the 1.3 mpi engine at the moment, I had considered selling it recently but can't seem to part with it due to it being such a decent wee car, I'd love the estate version though.

Mine will need the arches welded and the mot is up quite soon so I'll look into getting panels shortly.

https://georgebarberpanels.co.uk/product-category/skoda/felicia/felicia-1998-2001/

 

£53 shipped for a pair of them seem pretty good, the only ones I could find on ebay were over £100.

 

[320touring]

Nicely bought, I like these Fellys a lot. Good cars, and the estate will be Uber practical too:)

[LabRat]

Re the gearbox oil smell: check the gearbox breather. On the 1.3s there's a nylon style breater that has a tendency to get stuck (it looks a bit like a white bung) and block up. This causes gearbox oil to be drawn up the speedo cable and drip down the back of the clocks and onto the carpet/your shoes! (Ask me how I know...)

 

Don't know if the 1.6 shares this trait, but its worth a look for nothing! Good buy btw, these are bloody decent little cars.

[bunglebus]

Hubs/suspension look a bit crusty, is it near the sea?

Time to learn to MiG, get those arches done

[Scotball]

3 hours ago, bunglebus said:

Hubs/suspension look a bit crusty, is it near the sea?

Time to learn to MiG, get those arches done

Is it near the sea haha you could look over the garage and 100m down the road all you see is the sea.

I've been recommended a welder so I'll look into that as I don't even have the garage, space or equipment to even if I wanted to start learning.

 

[Scotball]

11 hours ago, LabRat said:

Re the gearbox oil smell: check the gearbox breather. On the 1.3s there's a nylon style breater that has a tendency to get stuck (it looks a bit like a white bung) and block up. This causes gearbox oil to be drawn up the speedo cable and drip down the back of the clocks and onto the carpet/your shoes! (Ask me how I know...)

 

Don't know if the 1.6 shares this trait, but its worth a look for nothing! Good buy btw, these are bloody decent little cars.

This sounds like it could be the problem. Speedo seems to bounce around at 20mph as well.. So either its been "fixed" at some point and theres still the smell hanging around from when it leaked.. or it's still leaking.. hmm. Weather has been terrible I'll try getting a better look at things when I can get out and have a look around the car properly. 

[LabRat]

Look under the clutch arm- it's a white plastic effort- should come out with grips if you're gentle, maybe get someone to stand on the clutch pedal to shift the arm out of the way.

Like I said, not sure if the bigger engine has the same set up, but it's worth a look for nothing.

[Scotball]

Update : Someone took a picture of my car while I was parking it in the Henderson Sreet area of leith today. 

in other news the gearbox oil leak is slightly worse than I thought.. slightly concerned it's all going through the speedo cable and I won't have any gearbox oil left lol but for now its still driving. Going to take labrats advice when I can get a proper look at the car which i just haven't had time yet. In the meantime I ordered a copy of the haynes book of dreams which I hope will arrive in the next few days.

[Cheezey]

Well over ten years ago a boy I worked with had an identical one of these that he got from his in-laws that lived in Aberdour. Could it be that be returned it to them?!?!?

For about a week he didn’t realise it was boiling it’s battery every day driving in and wore a mask to drive it. 

[DodgyBastard]

1 hour ago, Scotball said:

Update : Someone took a picture of my car while I was parking it in the Henderson Sreet area of leith today. 

in other news the gearbox oil leak is slightly worse than I thought.. slightly concerned it's all going through the speedo cable and I won't have any gearbox oil left lol but for now its still driving. Going to take labrats advice when I can get a proper look at the car which i just haven't had time yet. In the meantime I ordered a copy of the haynes book of dreams which I hope will arrive in the next few days.

It'll probably be Alan Gold...

 

You're welcome to have a shot of my ramp sometime to have a better look underneath or whatever.

[Scotball]

21 hours ago, DodgyBastard said:

It'll probably be Alan Gold...

 

You're welcome to have a shot of my ramp sometime to have a better look underneath or whatever.

Does alan gold browse autoshite? I look at his flickr page from time to time. I'll send you a PM about the ramp as I do want to have a look at this rust  

[Scotball]

21 hours ago, Cheezey said:

Well over ten years ago a boy I worked with had an identical one of these that he got from his in-laws that lived in Aberdour. Could it be that be returned it to them?!?!?

For about a week he didn’t realise it was boiling it’s battery every day driving in and wore a mask to drive it. 

Could have been. I get the feeling the car was driven around by family members other than the person on the V5

[leanycan]

Well bought. Looks like a good wee car. I hope you can sort the rust out and keep it running for another few years.

[Scotball]

emergency post MOT inspection ?

Spoiler

 

[Scotball]

Sorry for the lack of updates. Just been busy with personal life. A super big thanks goes out to DodgyBastard for letting me have a look at the car on the ramp the other week. 

This gearbox breather thing is being a pain, it was stuck when I had a look at it today and I've put some WD40 on it and managed to lift it up and down slightly.. but i can't seem to get it out. also there's a crack on it which is putting me off pulling it out or using any force in case I end up breaking the thing off so I just cleaned it up a bit from what I could and left it stuck open as the pictures show.

finally found a use for my bike pump ?

crack down the middle.. hmm. 

cleaned up a bit. not really a great success overall. but i'll see if that does anything..

[Scotball]

Small update. It seems to be fixed as it's smelling a lot less of oil inside and no leaks spotted so far

Going to put two new budget tyres on the back if I can find some cheap on ebay with the 20% code that's going about. 

Dashboard needs removed at some point to fix a blub and try to sort out the dodgy speedometer cable.  Still wondering what to do with the arches but I should focus on the above issues first.. . Hmm what else.. Temp reading is also bit all over the place and is running a bit crap (sometimes) either too cool or it hits the middle depending on what day it is. Strange. Heater is always warm tho.. 

That's my news update today