Ghostly Goings On - a while on

[Ghosty]

Just passing through on my way to my mates place in Whyteleafe where I'm grabbing a lift for the last part of the journey. 

Been up and down this line a lot, my aunt used to live in Sydenham until around ten years ago. 

The first time I made this journey was in about 2005, when the line still had slamdoors, A Stock trains on the East London, and Routemasters everywhere. How things change.  

[Ghosty]

Right, viewing occurred, and I've walked away. I'd been looking at a Triumph 2000, alas the sills were fucked on it (and potentially the bulkhead) so I've walked away. 

Keeping an open mind and seeing what else comes up. I'd really like something exempt. 

[Ghosty]

The car in question:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/374186768369

 

 

[Ghosty]

For a multitude of reasons I ended up neglecting this thread, shit well and truly hit the fan unjustifiably and the latter third of last year ended up being a very interesting time for me.. I'd just started a new job, and my 'friends' threw me out of a group I formed, for reasons that weren't true - the right people stood by me though, and as they say in the big country, I came up screaming. Well that's all passed now and normality, to a degree, resumed.

I dailied the green MX5 til its MOT ran out, and for some reason I bought a Civic Type R instead of putting it in for MOT.

Around this time I met my now ex.

My contract ended early, but I was well off.  Money burning a hole in my pocket, I looked for something else to smoke about, and possibly invest in... after a couple of false starts I stumbled across a W124 on C&C, freshly listed , but with a running fault. 61k miles. £2k. Read the description, and knew exactly what was going on from the symptoms: dizzy. Extensive discussion with the seller revealed the dizzy cap was one of the few things he'd not touched.



The fault was nothing more than slightly corroded distributor cap contacts: after travelling down in his Renault 4, Junkman and I cleaned them on the seller's drive, and I drove home from Llandrinod Wells without fault - the key wears a pewter R4 keyring that I was gifted when I was planning to import one from France pre-Covid to attest to that day. The car is almost perfect, and I'd be a fool to sell. A 61k 300E ffs. It's sublime. I use it for long distance leisure trips.  There's a fair chunk of history with it.

The next week, I found my mum's ideal Civic on eBay, a Polar White automatic EF on 53k. I bid on my mum's insistence but don't win, a few days later the seller messages me offering the car as the sale has fallen through. I negotiate and secure the car, and it's off to Saffron Walden to collect:

it promptly shits its battery, but the seller is stand up, comes out with a jump pack and follows me to the nearest Halfords where we go halves on a Yuasa Silver, which I then fit in the car park, and the car gets home without fault. It's not perfect but it's a well maintained gem and is the best EF I've driven. Previous owner bought it on fuck all miles for his Japanese wife to run about in, and had it for 14 years or so. No expense spared in that time. It's my mum's winter car as her EK is actually tidier and lower owners, but it's still flippin class. It's currently off the road having its brake master and servo overhauled.
 

As a result of the white EF arriving, I sold the type R and bought my mum's F reg Civic auto as a runabout.

I also bought another MX5, seeeking to upgrade from my Monza which was undesirable in general by Mx5 standards - late 1.6 meant less chassis bracing, and 90bhp. Also the coilovers had seized.



Low miles and unmodified, but turned out to be a bit of a pig in a frock.

At the end of January my runabout Civic takes me and my mate to Bridgwater to buy his first car, a similar Civic:

 

A couple of days later, I started a new job.

On day two, my Civic got written off.



I got an extortionate payout.

Around the same time, I found out my new* MX5 wasn't worth keeping.

I sold the green one, having sat on it over winter.  On the same day, in the same collection mission, I bought another Civic, a manual, to replace the dead one. It's way better. It ended up with many parts from the dead one before it met its fate, and the green MX5s wheels, as I wasn't letting them go. Here it is last week:



shortly afterwards I sold the blue MX-5 too, and replaced it with a well cared for red UK model, which is now sporting several improvements over how I bought it:






My mum's other Civic is wearing the spare set of alloys from the blue coupe from last year, and now has fully working retrofitted air conditioning to OE spec:

Things are pretty alright here.

 

[Rod/b]

None of the pictures are showing here.

[DVee8]

Same here.

[mercedade]

Yep same here @Ghosty- and I want to see the new whips

[AnnoyingPentium]

Echoing the rest, canny see the photos unfortunately.

10 hours ago, Ghosty said:

in the big country, I came up screaming

Also, liking this reference.

[Ghosty]

14 hours ago, Rod/b said:

None of the pictures are showing here.

 

14 hours ago, DVee8 said:

Same here.

 

7 hours ago, mercedade said:

Yep same here @Ghosty- and I want to see the new whips

 

7 hours ago, AnnoyingPentium said:

Echoing the rest, canny see the photos unfortunately.

Also, liking this reference.

Whoops, think it's because I copied them from Google Photos. Should be there now.

[tom13]

New Civic is looking ace. Your Moms EK/EJ looks mint as well.

[Ghosty]

2 hours ago, tom13 said:

Your Moms EK/EJ looks mint as well.

EK3 65k, one previous owner. Never welded.

[yes oui si]

I was about to post that I've never owned a civic but really fancy one, but I remembered that I'm actually dailying a diesel mk8 one. 

There's a local lad with a really clean red 5th gen one with the usual modifications and I want it. He seems to be dailying it as well. 

[Nyphur]

Both of these look seriously cool to my eye. What's the going rate for a half decent example of each model?

[Ghosty]

1 hour ago, Nyphur said:

What's the going rate for a half decent example of each model?

For an EF/fourth gen GL, you'll pay £3k for a tidy one now, as my mate did needing a couple hundred spending on TLC. Mine was £3500 on 87k, BC Racing coilovers with no other mods but no rot, fresh cambelt and service. My mum's auto was £3300 on 53k, but that's an auto. Both mine and my mum's had previously had the rear arches seen to, and previous paintwork.

For the EK/sixth gen, values vary. The grey one was a lucky find at 1250 px to clear in an LHD specialist who kept it for us when they heard how far we'd travel for it (one of the staff owned an Integra Type R so they got the appeal) , especially as a 1.5LS and not the much more common 1.4. A reasonable one is probably around the 2k mark these days but there are very few that don't need welding to some degree. Ours only doesn't as it was owned by expats and never sees salt.