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Dollywobbler's Consolidated Tat Thread


dollywobbler

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5 minutes ago, dollywobbler said:

It's my birthday. Its been lovely.

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A closer look at the cake in the backround. Yes, my girlfriend made a cake that features the seat stitching of the Citroen GSA. Wow.

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She also made a Daewoo logo, out of sight, but she said the Reliant one could piss off.

Happy birthday :) 

that cake really is amazing! is there an AC or Invacar badge on there anywhere? (Sorry have to ask!)

will admit im a bit surprised to see a ford badge on there! :mrgreen:

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5 hours ago, dollywobbler said:

It's my birthday. Its been lovely.

EYm8k_nWkAAlTrr?format=jpg&name=small

 

A closer look at the cake in the backround. Yes, my girlfriend made a cake that features the seat stitching of the Citroen GSA. Wow.

EYnBlvPWoAAzwWZ?format=jpg&name=small

She also made a Daewoo logo, out of sight, but she said the Reliant one could piss off.

Happy birthday Ian. Hope you got a large mug of tea to go with your birthday cake. ?

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  • 2 weeks later...

So, having failed to get any of my cars MOTd, the only option was to give up and buy something.

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Oh yes! A Mitsubishi Delica L400 Space Gear 2800 Turbo Intercooler! That isn't an oil puddle. That's LHM from the GSA... (now fixed).

It's big, ugly, noisy, slow but practical and comfortable. It has already suffered a puncture as it sits. But I'm replacing the tyres this afternoon as they are all cracked and a bit rubbish.

I've known this car and the owner for almost a decade. It dragged the striped BX out of a snow drift in December 2010, I once used it to ferry some friends for a day out in Merseyside and have had the occasional drive since then, during which I thought it would  be nice to own one. My mate has two of them and decided it was time to sell. 

He used it for hauling logs around, as a gig wagon all over Europe and for towing heavy things, so I know it's had a pretty hard life. It seems to have survived though. He nabbed the tow bar, so I'm on the hunt for another but it could definitely be useful for hauling my motors around - some of things are far from road ready at the moment (like the 2CV, which I'm going to take to a specialist for rear brakes etc).

I tried to reveal it live on YouTube yesterday, but my phone (a new Huawei P30 Lite) just isn't up to live streaming, so the footage was awful. Then the live stream got interrupted by a bloke looking for his dog...

Here's a video I then recorded. 

 

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I like these.  Mine was very similar but had a manual gearbox - quite uncommon with these, they do suit an auto but the manual helps the fuel consumption, which can use all the help it can get.  Pretty hopeless turning circle (although better than an L300) and a pathetic horn (soon replaced with an air horn on mine) were about the only things I didn't like about it - I enjoyed driving it a lot more than I'd expected to.

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Yes, they're surprisingly jolly even though they're slow and handle like a wardrobe in a wheelbarrow. You can chuck them around a fair bit once you get your confidence up. Not sure I'd like to try and Elk Test mind you...

Just had two new tyres put on it. It was meant to be four but I managed to only order two... Another two tomorrow and alignment. That should make it feel better to drive too.

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I've seen a few of these around. Not my cup of tea, but clearly a useful vehicle and an interesting video.  As is often the case, I went on to catch up with some of your other videos, namely the rather charming Rover P3 and the surprisingly pleasant Pug 404.  I had a ride in our next door neighbours 404 back in 1966 when dad was based in Germany. It was almost new then and impressively refined. It was also beige.  Good luck with coaxing some of your other vehicles in to service and through MOTs.  Elly sounds healthy enough so should sail through once the unusual back brake cylinder disintegration has been seen to.

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Always been intrigued by these. Now I'm normally an estate and saloon kind of guy, so raised SUV 4x4 kind of vehicles have never really caught my attention (except for Land Rovers and other very basic utilitarian Land Rover-type things). This, however, has a sort of off-road people carrier sort of charm to it, which I rather like. It's also got the best sounding diesel I've ever heard, and I don't normally like diesels. 

Do they come in petrol flavour?

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Weirdly not long after you revealed it once which looked almost identical drove past my house, I thought Dollywobbler’s gone a bit further than 5 miles ?

 I’m intrigued by these, never even sat in one.  

Unsurprisingly it’s the return of Elly I’m most excited about! 

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17 hours ago, barefoot said:

Aren't these things designed for use in Japanese cities? About twice as tall as they are wide & topple over at the least provocation?

If so, looks like a sound buy.

 

Haven't fallen over yet. The previous generation, which was proper forward control, could be a little, um, tippy.

17 hours ago, MondeoBlues said:

Do they come in petrol flavour?

Yes, a 3.5-litre V6. Bear in mind the diesels struggle to top 22mpg in general driving...

2 hours ago, brownnova said:

Weirdly not long after you revealed it once which looked almost identical drove past my house, I thought Dollywobbler’s gone a bit further than 5 miles ?

 I’m intrigued by these, never even sat in one.  

Unsurprisingly it’s the return of Elly I’m most excited about! 

Yeah, I'm a bit miffed that we've had a huge stretch of sunshine and I've not had the 2CV. I must apologise to WorldofCeri because instead of booking his excellent transport facilities, I went and bought a tow vehicle instead. Plan is to ship the 2CV to Peak 2CV in Derbyshire so we can tackle the rear brakes and wheel bearing.

I'm still trying to settle into life elsewhere in Wales at the moment, so it isn't good news for the 'projects' within the fleet at the moment. I may get the Matiz out, but the Fox, Tercel and Invacar need fairly substantial amounts of work each, so the chances of any of them seeing much action this summer are negligable. The Invacar is road legal, so may get the occasional blat, but it's pissing oil out at a slightly terrifying rate these days, and only has half a door on one side.

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Yes, did rear brakes three years ago I think. They were a seized mess. But I did that job at Sparrow Automotive, under his guidance (and with his breaker bar). I also don't have tools for doing rear wheel bearings. 

My last tinkering slot with the 2CV revealed that there is a LOT of catch-up work I need to do after the Croatia trip. Last year got a bit chaotic, so it just kept getting put on the back burner.

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Oooh I love a Delica.  I did think about getting one when I inevitably bought the Granvia.  We used to use them at running events as they were absolutely brilliant for bombing around fields with the side door jammed open with a bungee cord.  Good purchase.

PS- do you find this sort of stuff on your Facebook utterly terrifying?

image.thumb.png.9db6a3db229bbe86fb6e5c9e5abad722.png

 


It'd frighten the life out of me!

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6 hours ago, BorniteIdentity said:

Oooh I love a Delica.  I did think about getting one when I inevitably bought the Granvia.  We used to use them at running events as they were absolutely brilliant for bombing around fields with the side door jammed open with a bungee cord.  Good purchase.

PS- do you find this sort of stuff on your Facebook utterly terrifying?

image.thumb.png.9db6a3db229bbe86fb6e5c9e5abad722.png

 


It'd frighten the life out of me!

I think Ian has a stalker

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Part of the territory!

More expenditure today. Four new Cooper Discoverer AT3s at £83 plus VAT, plus tracking. Drives MUCH better now.

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Then yet more expense.

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I was expecting worse than that to be honest. Note rural Wales prices... Hope is to get 300 miles out of that. That'd equate to 24mpg.

I also tried getting the washers working better, but haven't had much joy. I'll have to remove the pipework (buried under a sound insulation pad) and blow it through, maybe the nozzles themselves. Getting the wheels off also revealed that I'll need front brakes before too long, and the rears aren't superb. Oh and there are some crusty bits that will need attention before the next MOT I suspect. But the main priority for now is to service the thing, which I hope to do tomorrow.

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@dollywobbler if it’s just blocked jets for the wiper washers as a quick fix in the past I’ve put a drop of vinegar on each washer jet to remive crud where poking a pin in the hole to unblock it hasn’t succeeded. 9/10 it’s made a good improvement. I’ve previously soaked really clogged jets in vinegar for a few hours if a little drop hasn’t done much.

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I like the tip. Thank you. The water doesn't come out with much force, which makes me wonder if someone has tried clearing them with pins before now, and accidentally opened the diameter of the jets up too much. I'll try vinegar though.

Yesterday was service time.

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Not too bad to work on, though the engine contains 7 litres of oil, a good litre of which is just the oil filter. Thankfully my catch can is 7 litres. Just! Air filter is very accessible and easy.

Fuel filter needs you to remove the battery and intercooler, though neither job is onerous other than the battery being a hefty old beast to lift out.

Engine sounds a little smoother, possibly because I only had 15w40 oil, but it's still sluggish. Not helped by brakes that bind occasionally - both fronts were at one stage, though they later sorted themselves out, but the nearside rear often seems to get quite warm. May need a strip and grease. To be honest, a complete brake overhaul with new discs and pads wouldn't go amiss at some stage.

I am a little worried that the gearbox is not healthy though. It feels seriously sluggish in gear, and notably picks up when the torque converter locks up. It had fresh fluid a couple of years ago, and hasn't done much since. I should probably check the level but somehow entirely forgot to do that yesterday. I can give it a sniff then too.

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36 minutes ago, dollywobbler said:

. Not helped by brakes that bind occasionally - both fronts were at one stage, though they later sorted themselves out, but the nearside rear often seems to get quite warm. May need a strip and grease. To be honest, a complete brake overhaul with new discs and pads wouldn't go amiss at some stage.

.

We had an import Pajero (Shogun in the UK, Pajero in domestic market Ireland, never got that)  years back, it wouldn't surprise me if the calipers aren't the same on the Delica. Front calipers were a mess, someone had used moly grease on the boots of the floating caliper, the rubber reacted with the boots swelling and splitting the boot. Water had got in and seized the pins in place causing the brakes to bind. Rebuild kit sorted that out right at the time. 

I've seen it happen on both my Jimnys (where it's a common issue) and my Audi too too (with copper slip this time) Why is it so hard to use the right grease, red rubber grease isn't that expensive from the usual places.... 

 

 

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Yeah, I may need to invest in a seal kit, or new pins, but I'll strip it down when the weather is being a bit more kind and have a look. 

One worrying thing about acquiring the Delica is that it takes me to eight cars. Of the eight, only three are currently road legal, and one of those (the Invacar) is leaking so much engine oil that I really need to sort that out. And the that the offside window glass fell out. Am I a hoarder now?

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