I'll get round to it at some point - Bratislava and Back: Things not to do in a mk2 Clio

[Rust Collector]

Small Proton update today. Ive been up to the stables and swapped over the radiator switch. I reckon the old one may* have been fucked:

I’m going to chuck some coolant flush in it, swap out the down pipe, replace the rear wheel cylinders and put it in for MOT. Hopefully it will see the road again this month.

In other fleet news, as mentioned in the news 24 thread, I have another car incoming. It’s a Discovery 3 that belonged to a very close friend who passed away recently. It had a lot of sentimental value to him, and by proxy it has a lot of sentimental value to me. It currently needs a little work, at the very least a new air spring and a front wheel bearing. It still has MOT on it, so I’m hoping to get it sorted fairly quickly and run it as my daily. I’ve been doing as much overtime as possible, to prepare myself for the inevitable financial ruin of the green oval 🤣

Im hoping to collect it at some point over the Easter break.

For the last few days I’ve been using the Lada as my daily. It’s not bad on fuel, it’s fun to drive, and I’ve been neglecting it lately. As of lately, I’ve been leaving home at 5:30am for work in it and so far it’s been dependable. I also took it out for a longish jaunt at the weekend - I went to Pevensey for the (cancelled) car show, then came back to newhaven for the car show at the fort. Keeping up with modern traffic was not an issue…

Because barely anyone in Sussex drives at more than 40mph before slamming on their brakes in a panic.

Im back in the Mitsubishi for my commute tomorrow as I need to use it after work, so the Lada will have a break for a couple of days now.

The next thing I really need to look at is the BX Leader that’s dragging on a bit now. It’s developed a misfire, one cylinder is barely firing. I’m hoping it’s a bad ignition component, I just need to pull my finger out and do some diagnostics. Hopefully get that done one evening this week!

[Fumbler]

2 minutes ago, Rust Collector said:

Because barely anyone in Sussex drives at more than 40mph before slamming on their brakes in a panic.

I'm bracing myself for tourist season this year. I think it'll be an extra bad one.

[Rust Collector]

12 hours ago, Fumbler said:

I'm bracing myself for tourist season this year. I think it'll be an extra bad one.

Yeah, I definitely won't be coming out Rye/Camber way this summer 😅

[Fumbler]

47 minutes ago, Rust Collector said:

Yeah, I definitely won't be coming out Rye/Camber way this summer 😅

Those queues into Camber were impressive!

[crad]

21 hours ago, Rust Collector said:

Yeah, I definitely won't be coming out Rye/Camber way this summer 😅

considering it's now 30 quid to park there don't think many others will neither 🤣

[High Jetter]

28 minutes ago, crad said:

considering it's now 30 quid to park there don't think many others will neither 🤣

HFM? Went there very early on with Mrs J, 30+ years ago (!). We didn't pay anything then (though it was like 2am when we got there 🤣)

[crad]

5 hours ago, High Jetter said:

HFM? Went there very early on with Mrs J, 30+ years ago (!). We didn't pay anything then (though it was like 2am when we got there 🤣)

according to radio sussex it will be 30 quid for the day, but only* 15 quid if you arrive after 3pm. i think it's only during 'the season' though, which i'd assume would be summer sort of time

 

anyway back to cars, apologies for the slight drift 🤣

[Rust Collector]

I had time to go up the stables and run the Proton up to temperature just now.

The fan switch is working, and the fan runs when the coolant temp gets to about the halfway mark on the gauge.

The coolant temp then drops a chunk:

Im satisfied that this has most likely solved the overheating problem, road testing next week will hopefully confirm this.

It looks like the thermostat is either missing or jammed open, as there’s a fair old flow of coolant through the rad even at cold. I’ll try and get a thermostat in for the Easter weekend and fit it before the MOT.

I’m 60% sure there’s a 75% chance it’ll have an MOT next week 😁

[Rust Collector]

More explicit Proton content for you, I’ve spent all day working on it.

The thermostat got changed early doors, the old one was present but stuck open which explains to the slow warm up.

Predictably, Euro Car Parts supplied one with the wrong gasket. I only bought it from them as it was the only way I could get one for today - I’ve made it work for now but I’ll order a second one so that I can unpick this cock up later.

It works at least, the car heats up and holds temperature as it should.

Next up was the exhaust replacement. The new part had arrived yesterday and been inspected:

This would explain the exhaust blow:

The heat shield bolts, manifold nuts and O2 sensor were a piece of piss. The bolts into the cat were not, so the whole exhaust came off and was taken down to the house. Not before I exploded a cutting disc beside my face in the appropriate manner for these types of jobs:

Not the full disc that exploded and I didn’t feel a thing, so I give it a 3 out of 10.

This is probably the most useful thing about learning* to weld:

Snapped bolts and studs used to properly fuck up projects for me, now they just slow things down. I owe my late friend for teaching me how to burn things into submission and I wish he was still here to show these small accomplishments to.

Not pictured, but I also welded on the bracket that fell off in my brother’s hand and I also welded up a couple of brackets that had snapped on one side and were flapping in the breeze. The exhaust was left feeling somewhat sturdier for it.

Here is the finished article:

Refitting it was only difficult due to the weight of the thing. It’s on there now though and I’m pleased to report that it works and the car sounds fine now.

For those of you worried that I didn’t follow proper protocol, whilst the exhaust was completely removed I did turn the car on and give it the beans. All three dogs ran away like the world was ending but the horses remained nonchalant. 7/10.

With both functioning coolant and exhaust systems, the car rewarded me with the loss of the clutch pedal. It had been low for ages, cured by pumping it like you’re 14 again. This time frantic pumping did not result in gears, which meant actually having to do something…

Oh dear.

New washers on then:

Bleeding took forever. It turned out that my instruction to my brother of ‘keep the car running, and try to put it in gear every now and again - if you feel resistance don’t force it and we will bleed it more’ was well intentioned but fundamentally flawed in that he had never felt the gear throw in the car before so had no idea of what resistance was fine and what wasn’t… After something I’m embarrassed to admit to, such as an hour or so, I checked it myself and it was fine 🤣 my bad.

So, we now have a sensible biting point, sensible exhaust, sensible cooling system… all that’s left is to replace the brake cylinders, weld up the sill and go in for the ticket.

Wish me luck!

[Rust Collector]

I didn't get as much done yesterday as I had hoped...

A small job to warm up, one wiper blade was missing and the other was shagged:

New blades, courtesy of the Range - they seem to be getting cheaper each time I go there, these ones were like £1.60 each or something daft.

Aero blades were all they had, so apologies to anyone jarred by aeros on an older vehicle.

Next up was the longest drive I've ever undertaken in the Proton - a staggering 400 metres down to the house! On the way we see (and ignore) reminders of other projects I need to finish.

It's important to strike a pose as you leave the fields;

I had planned to get some welding done yesterday, but a series of interruptions and a lack of motivation meant I only got as far as pulling the sill cover off to check what I was in for.

This reminded me that I want to make a thread of automotive flora and fauna at some point;

I'm always impressed how nature finds a way. I may pot it and see what it turns into, even though it's just a weed.

The sill covers were a bugger to remove by virtue of the fact that all the retaining screws (bar the two at the front behind the mud flap) were completely corroded, to the point that even the impact screw driver couldn't remove them. I drilled them in the end rather than faff around trying to save them.

This is all that I reckon stands between me and having a ticket on the car now:

There's three distinct areas that are crumbly. I'm stopping by after work and I will take all of this back to find good metal, then plan my attack from there. I'm hoping I should get away with only needing to cut out those 3 sections and weld in replacement patches - I'm starting to suspect I may end up going into the rear inner arch though if I can't find anything solid at the rear of that sill.

What is it they say about rust; plan for double what you see and then it will be double that again, or something like that... @Talbot, I knew I should have played dumb and invited you down for a welding session 😅

[mercedade]

Fantastic work. Lovely bus.

[Talbot]

21 minutes ago, Rust Collector said:

What is it they say about rust; plan for double what you see and then it will be double that again, or something like that...

Yup.  All of that.  If you assume it will be an order of magnitude worse, you'll probably be about right.  IE:

This:

Became this:

So be sure you're ready for it to all get worse.

[Rust Collector]

I’m really behind on my thread (as ever), but now is probably time to catch up on current events. As you may have seen on the News 24 thread, my Insight has not had a good day.

I’ve gone and recovered it myself to the stables, so here are some photos for your viewing pleasure:

I’ll pull it apart another day, but at a glance it looks like I went under the other car somewhat and so the bonnet and slam panel took the brunt of the impact rather than the crash bar. The radiator carriage has tilted back and is pushing the engine back on its mounts. The crash bar is bent down, but apart from towards the joint with the crash bar the chassis legs look straight.

The car has a lot of sentimental value, so I’ll do my best to save it. For now though it can sit here for a bit.

The main thing is I’m fine, and so I’ve taken the day off work. Coming home to this is what’s what’s important after all, everything else is just stuff:

We will go out a little later and have a nice day out. What a beautiful day to crash a car 😅

[TheOtherStu]

On 4/3/2023 at 10:58 PM, Fumbler said:

I'm bracing myself for tourist season this year. I think it'll be an extra bad one.

Come live in the New Forest. All the roads are 40mph and you have moving obstructions, so you wouldn't want to go any faster.

[TheOtherStu]

1 hour ago, Rust Collector said:

I’m really behind on my thread (as ever), but now is probably time to catch up on current events. As you may have seen on the News 24 thread, my Insight has not had a good day.

I’ve gone and recovered it myself to the stables, so here are some photos for your viewing pleasure:

I’ll pull it apart another day, but at a glance it looks like I went under the other car somewhat and so the bonnet and slam panel took the brunt of the impact rather than the crash bar. The radiator carriage has tilted back and is pushing the engine back on its mounts. The crash bar is bent down, but apart from towards the joint with the crash bar the chassis legs look straight.

The car has a lot of sentimental value, so I’ll do my best to save it. For now though it can sit here for a bit.

The main thing is I’m fine, and so I’ve taken the day off work. Coming home to this is what’s what’s important after all, everything else is just stuff:

We will go out a little later and have a nice day out. What a beautiful day to crash a car 😅

As you say, the main thing is that you're safe and unhurt. The Insight might live to see another day. Otherwise,  I can imagine the spares are fairly limited, so parting it might not be the worst idea.

[mk2_craig]

Mate sent me these the other day. 
 

Don’t know when it was last on the road!

[High Jetter]

£50 bonnet on ebay: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/166146075906?hash=item26af13ed02:g:j7UAAOSwxF5kewrg

Might* need a respray

[Rust Collector]

15 minutes ago, mk2_craig said:

Mate sent me these the other day. 
 

Don’t know when it was last on the road!

Is that in the UK?

11 minutes ago, High Jetter said:

£50 bonnet on ebay: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/166146075906?hash=item26af13ed02:g:j7UAAOSwxF5kewrg

Might* need a respray

Mk2 sadly, but does remind me that there was a lad breaking one on eBay a while back and I messaged him about some other bits. Might be worth me revisiting that seller!

[somewhatfoolish]

Sadface; not many Insights to begin with, each one gone is a loss.

[sdkrc]

There was a HGF failure insight for parts on Insightcentral about 10 days ago.

 

[Weird Car]

Similar thing happened to my beloved Fiat 500 by Gucci last month, guy did an emergency stop on the A34 for no reason and 3 cars hit each other like dominoes, mine being the last in the line, Cat C write off, luckily I had my Hyundai Getz as a back up car, ironically I’ve actually fallen for the little Getz this last week, it’s covered close to 1000 miles in the last week flawlessly, I’m starting to prefer it over the Fiat, blessing in disguise I guess.. 

[mk2_craig]

1 hour ago, Rust Collector said:

Is that in the UK?

Somewhere in Jersey, so within about a 6mile radius of where I am. 

[Rust Collector]

47 minutes ago, sdkrc said:

There was a HGF failure insight for parts on Insightcentral about 10 days ago.

 

I had a quick look as I’m signed up there, thanks for sending the link but looks like it sold for over a grand in the end after a bit of a Dutch auction. Would’ve been been mega to get a spares car for that sort of money. Possibly wrong to cut it up though.

21 minutes ago, mk2_craig said:

Somewhere in Jersey, so within about a 6mile radius of where I am. 

Ah ok, maybe not practical for me to track down and go knocking doors then 😅

[Rust Collector]

27 minutes ago, Weird Car said:

Similar thing happened to my beloved Fiat 500 by Gucci last month, guy did an emergency stop on the A34 for no reason and 3 cars hit each other like dominoes, mine being the last in the line, Cat C write off, luckily I had my Hyundai Getz as a back up car, ironically I’ve actually fallen for the little Getz this last week, it’s covered close to 1000 miles in the last week flawlessly, I’m starting to prefer it over the Fiat, blessing in disguise I guess.. 

Really sorry to see that - exactly the same thing happened to me recently on the M1 albeit I was ok but someone about 3 cars back went into the Armco and then several others followed. Somebody up ahead had done an emergency stop in lane 3 and it caused a ripple effect, each car having less time/space to react than the last.

[Rust Collector]

I think it's time for some more car content. I'm late as always, so I think we're going to do this on a car by car basis over a few posts.

First off then, against all good judgement I got myself a Discovery 3. I've mentioned it elsewhere so I won't bore you all again, but this one belonged to my mate who passed away. I'm not a huge Land Rover fan, but it's important to me that this one is kept.

Collection attempt number one did not go well.

We jump started it for loading, and the dash lit up like a christmas tree and the Disco assumed the 'face down, arse up' position. This was followed by discovering that it's too wide to fit on the trailer. Fucker.

Attempt two, I came armed with a battery and mentally prepared for a bandit run.

No expense wasn't spared and the Yuasa was ejected in favour of the cheapest replacement I could find - Powerline, come on down!

It ran, albeit with the dashboard doing these things, the gearbox in limp mode, the doors randomly locking and unlocking, the hazards occasionally flashing, and the suspension locked in drag race position:

Luckily I only had to cover a few miles, and I made it home without the thing dying completely.

I made my peace with the fact that I'd need to spend some money on diagnostics, and ordered this:

It's cheap* chinese stuff, but it works and I'm pleased with it. The fault codes on the Disco were endless, but one common theme was units complaining about a lack of comms with the transfer case module. Trying to speak to the transfer case module resulted in an error.

Internet research revealed that the transfer case control module is located perfectly for the encouragement of water ingress.

Oh dear:

Contact cleaner and a toothbrush to the rescue then.

Some time later, and with a total lack of belief that it would actually sort the problem, I refitted the control module. I had some help:

Fuck me, it actually worked!!

Unable to quit whilst I'm ahead, I pulled the nav unit apart to do the modification that gives me Range Rover menu screens (and also makes the screen permanently fucking dim).

Happy days!

We then did some lifestyle activities:

This is one of the rare 'Partner Approved' vehicles:

It came in with a month of MOT and a noisy wheel bearing, so best to fix that one evening in the dark:

I fitted a tow ball for car park protection and shite recovery:

It needed lowering in the end as the trailer was looking like it was going to take off with the tow ball at that height.

I let the MOT lapse as I had no real time to do any more work, but then one night shortly before a collection I decided to book a ticket for the next morning. I emptied it out, took it in and happily it passed. A couple of days later I took it out for a 300 mile round trip with the trailer, and I'm pleased to say it performed admirably:

 

So, I say I'm not a Land Rover person, but truth be told I really like the thing. It's lovely to drive, if not thirsty and slow, and it's brilliant for towing. I'm really pleased to have it as part of the fleet.

[somewhatfoolish]

Impressive rescue of that control module; it really looks like a frisbee into the bin job.

[Rust Collector]

Next up is some fuckery with the Mercedes.

It became apparent after we started running it that there was some sort of injector seal leak. Parts were ordered and eventually fitted:

The internet had promised me a traumatic experience, but this one wasn't too awful. The worst part was cleaning as much of the carbon off as I could be bothered to do needed to do the repair. I did have a suitable slide hammer and I'd bought an adapter for these injectors which I think you'd struggle without. Plus I had a seat cutting tool already. I did have to buy a tiny torque wrench for the job as well, as I snapped my last one in a bout of fucking idiotery.

The boost hoses were held into the intercooler by cable ties, so I put some new clips on. The Gates ones have a square profile which looks more secure.

I then found out my radiator carriage was pushed so far back it was pinching the boost hose.

I pulled it back in to place, which broke it free from the chassis leg. I then welded it on badly.

I then used the car for some trade shows up North.

All was good, and I was pleased with the fuel economy:

I was not pleased with the fact that I ripped the radiator carriage off again whilst leaving the car park of the Hilton Hotel Leicester.

Who the fuck loaded this in?! Oh, never mind. Lucky there isn't a big sticker telling you what to do, that would be embarrassing:

I welded it back on again, this time losing my patience and occasionally setting things on fire. Once cooled down, the work was then checked and signed off by a competent person.

I adjusted the damaged sections of the leading edge of the carriage using Big Bastard(tm) set of mole grips, with the occasional encouragement from a hammer. It's as good as new*

Other remedial work included plastic welding the broken headlamp and headlamp washer back together:

The headlamp is now flush with the surrounding panels and the car no longer looks like it's having a stroke.

Then I found these fuckers:

I put a temporary plug in the first one, and the second one hadn't gone all the way through luckily. It needs tyres though.

MOT time next! It failed on the bonnet latch not working properly, and the front brake pads being worn to the sensor (my bad).

Luckily there was a heatwave and I was sunburnt like a bastard, so I made myself a suitable work area:

Old bonnet cable:

The replacement process is very technical:

The grommet was a bit tight for the hole but luckily we had help at hand:

That stuff is so useful for stuffing rubber things where they don't want to go that I think it's actually a waste to put it on your cock.

brake pads next, looks like they were just about* due:

It passed the MOT, but I fucked myself over by not putting new discs on as they fairly quickly started making all sorts of unpleasant noises. New discs have arrived, but the front suspension on the car is getting very noisy and we are meant to be using the car on Friday to drive to Italy, and then onwards to Slovakia. Obviously I have not fitted them, and started thinking about a different car...

That's this Mercedes up to date though. In summary, the engine runs nicely but the suspension is clonking away, it needs 2 front tyres, the brakes are noisy. Plus I still can't find a front bumper for reasonable money which is pissing me off, as it looks like shit with the sides cut off. Once I'm back from holidays I'm going to replace all the front suspension, replace the front tyres, and try to find a bumper that isn't £200 and scratched to fuck.

[Rust Collector]

And now, for a brief intermission with some non-project but vaguely related content.

The healing trailer mk2 has had some minor servicing picked away at whenever I had a moment. I greased the greasey bits, adjusted the brakes and re-greased and torqued the bearings. I lost a bearing cap at one point due to overheating the brakes (my pompt to adjust them) and seeing as the Peak style ones were some £15 a pop I instead bought the finest* examples that amazon had to offer for about a tenner.

The little inspection bung/window is handy:

I've since used it to drag a couple of stalled out projects away from my house, and also to recover the Insight...

I'm trying to focus on a single project at a time, so dragging a load of shite off my driveway helped clear my head a little.

I then got offered this for £2,400

It had no ramps though, and I felt it was on the expensive end of the scale for something I couldn't use straight away. I will replace the trailer with one like this at some point though, as I would prefer a flat bed with no sides.

The baby trailer was used to clear a load of my shite out of a mate's unit:

Can't remember what half of it is, so I just dumped the whole trailer in the barn and filed it under 'sort later'. The Mitsubishi was packed out with crap as well...

I did find some useful* bits though:

I definitely need a Nato hitch stashed away. I found a nice Dixon Bates drop pin hitch too, attached to a substantial drop plate. That will go on the Disco nicely I reckon - No pic sadly.

[Rust Collector]

Let's get back to what we came her for: irresponsible car purchases.

The mission at hand was to sell a car and reduce the size of the fleet.

The mission was about 30% successful.

The success was that I did sell* a car, and it has gone to a good home where it will be enjoyed. The BX Leader is now with @rob88h  which means I have kept my commitment to my partner that it would leave the fleet as promised.

So what went wrong then?

Well, firstly @Stinkwheel offered this up for free recently and I was unable to stop myself:

So at the start of this month I had a day out to collect that, which went mostly to plan and was a pleasant day out.

It was great to meet stinkwheel and I'm incredibly grateful for his generosity, and I'm really looking forward to working on the car later this year. For now, it's in the spot where the Proton should be sat for the sill to be welded. As I said before, I'm much more focused* now.

The second snag to my fleet reduction plan was that Rob88h was selling his LS430 and it looked like a really lovely thing to drive around in. I've been driving around in a 3rd gen Clio with no aircon since crashing the Insight, so again I wasn't able to help myself here and this happened:

There's a bit of an early noughties executive car vibe going on outside my house now:

One of the main things that swayed me on the Lexus was the Merc playing up right before we needed it for our holiday. I'm done rushing to get a broken car diagnosed and fixed for a deadline, and so I've decided that we are going to do our Italy/Slovakia trip in the Lexus. Wish me luck 😅

[rob88h]

Good luck. In about 1 day you’ll have done more miles in it than I did in total 🤣

I did tell you I was getting 19mpg right?