THE GUBBERMINT ALWAYS KNOWS BEST

[Tayne]

  Pete-M said:

  dollywobbler said:

  John F said:

Alternatively, hold on to the Rangie until the first snow arrives and then sell it for upwards of 1500 quid...

 

Yeah, the non-working heater may affect that possibility! Whereas if I've got a fully kitted Jeep...

 

Rover is appealing as well though. Will see how that pair affect my insurance...

 

Jeeps aren't bad. If it's a 4.0 you'll be getting bugger all to the gallon though. 14-15 in town, 18-22 on a run. The diesel is a rough old dog.

 

Courtesy of VM Motori S.p.A of Italy, the same people who made the engine in Ian's Range Rover.

[dollywobbler]

Aye. That VM engine got bloody everywhere - even in the Alfa 164. Now there's uber-shite for you. At tickover, it has the NVH qualities of one of those things you use for tamping down tarmac, but I still reckon its an engine with a somewhat misguided reputation. Very much like the Iveco truck we used to move house. Quieter at speed than when stationary.

[Rusty Pelican]

Not really car related but in the autoshite fix it and not chuck it philosophy , ive just repaired my knackered 80s Heybrook speakers with this kit , they do loads for different makes as well.

Recommend doing this if your not a throwaway person

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Repair-kit-He ... _579wt_952

[wuvvum]

  DSdriver said:

  wuvvum said:

Am currently sat on a train on my way back to Norwich, having failed once again in my quest to own a roadworthy DS. Appears the fuel pump has died & it wouldnt go. Seller is going to try & get it sorted next week so may still end up buying it. Or I could in back down with the Facet pump off the Volvo, but its a bloody long way to go just to try it. Is it worth trying to get a Shiply quote or is having it transported likely to prove uneconomical?

Bummer! why didn't he let you know it wouldn't start before you set out? The fuel pump is mechanical but you could rig up a leccy one, my Safari has one because it also runs LPG but the manual pump is still there for emergencies. Having said that, check the cause of the fail cos it might be a tank full of jellified four star and/or rust in which case a leccy pump and a line filter would be a useful upgrade.

He didn't know. The car apparently started fine the last time he used it (2-3 weeks ago) and he didn't go out to try and start it today until lunchtime, by which time I was over halfway there. Don't think there's any blockages in the fuel line as when I took the pipe off the carb and sucked I got a gobful of unleaded in very short order. Reckon it's probably the diaphragm that's given up - the fuel pump on the Skoda did the same after sitting idle for a long time and then suddenly being pressed back into service - worked fine for a short while and then suddenly died.

 

It's actually not a bad old thing other than that though - n/s doorskins have seen better days but other than that it's fairly straight. I might just end up hiring a trailer and dragging it home behind the Rover 75 (which should be fun...) - he's said he'll knock a couple of hundred quid off the price, which should cover the trailer hire and petrol. He was actually quite a decent bloke - apparently his threat to scrap it if it didn't sell at that price was to put off some bloke who kept ringing him making ridiculous offers - and he had a gorgeous 1961 ID19 in his garage.

[KruJoe]

Indeed a bit of a bummer, but hope is not lost, fingers crossed for a happy ending to this story!

[Cavcraft]

  Father Ted said:

Mk1 Zaffy or Sintra?

 

Bang on the money old lad.

[Pete-M]

  dollywobbler said:

Aye. That VM engine got bloody everywhere - even in the Alfa 164. Now there's uber-shite for you. At tickover, it has the NVH qualities of one of those things you use for tamping down tarmac, but I still reckon its an engine with a somewhat misguided reputation. Very much like the Iveco truck we used to move house. Quieter at speed than when stationary.

 

Three or four years ago I did a lot of miles in a couple of months in an old Heep Cherokee diesel. To give it some due it always worked, didn't pop its headgasket and would happily bimble along the motorways at 70ish never missing a beat. It wasn't brilliant on fuel but on a good day it would do 30 mpg with no worries - even when doin' a bit of framin'. At idle the thing shook a fair bit in the style of a faithful old tractor. Above idle it merely vibrated quite a bit, on boost it did smooth out a bit and the noise was mainly drowned out in the first three gears by an incredible amount of gearbox whine that particular example had. It's unlikely to be a coincidence that the thing went ok in second and third provided the turbo was kept spinning merrily.

 

The Grand Cherokee is a much better beast. Coils all round make a big difference. Nowhere near as good off road as your Rangie.

[tonedepear]

  Team Blitz said:

  Cavette said:

  Father Ted said:

Mk1 Zaffy or Sintra?

 

Bang on the money old lad.

 

Shite. When you said Griffin, I was thinking TVR. I'm bored now.

 

I was thinking SAAB!

[wuvvum]

Hmm. Best Shiply quote received so far = £174 [plus Shiply's fugging fees which make eBay look like a bargain ], and it's only been on there 12 hours. Looks like the DS might be coming home yet.

[dollywobbler]

Balls. Rover 75 bloke has changed his mind. I'm pretty set on getting one though, so will just have to hope that the Rangie sells and that I can find a decent 75...

[Cavcraft]

*Horrible content warning:

 

Had a better look at it today and need to order the MOT failure items, namely a backbox (£44 new) CV gaiter 'thing' (£5.00?) and road spring (about £25 new) plus the door lock is different so hopefully my neighbour can use his key coding machine and re-programme they key that came with the car. Oh, the radio display thing has 'done a Vauxhall' too so might get another from a scrappy.

One tyre a bit low and gained an advisory but I have a very good one in the garage and because it has steel wheels I can fit it myself easily enough. Gave the interior a quick going over today but my valeting machine is playing daft arse at the moment and needs a good service.

 

[ashmicro]

^^ The only current Vauxhall I'd have.

[Lankytim]

Those Zafiras make GR9 family haulers. There just like an inflated Mk4 Astra, and as we all know, Astras are GR99. I'd drive round in one, bet you can get lots of shite in the boot, too.

 

Actually Mrs Lankytim said our Mk4 Astra made a loud "bang" noise the other day. so maybere theyre not that great. Its still going though!

 

In other news Mrs Lankytim and I drove to Ikea Warrington today in our Volvo 240 estate and bought a Billy bookcase. If there is any experience more Swedish than that, i'd like to see it.

[RoadworkUK]

  ashmicro said:

^^ The only current Vauxhall I'd have.

 

We've got a 75k Y-Reg 1.6 Club coming in as a p/x, £500! Sending it straight to the block as we're pretty sure it'll make a bit.

 

I'm going to have a play with it first, though. Flex 7 and all that...

[DSdriver]

  wuvvum said:

He had a gorgeous 1961 ID19 in his garage.

I hope it all comes together for you with the camera car. I am looking forward to "Autoshite, the movie" (straight to DVD release).

[andrew e]

Obsucure facts: Those Zafira's have excellent headlamps too, (far better than the Vectra C even though there same bloody shape near enough) and even if you don't have a tribe the fact you can roll the rear seat back to stop the kids kicking your seat is very welcome. The half of one I own with the old main is an auto 1.8 and its supisingly nippy really, just horrible flat seats. GR8 4 TEH TIPZ.

 

[bobble hat]Zafira A&B's have the same floorpan too.[/bobble hat off]

[Cavcraft]

The whole seating arrangement thing is very clever, had a play with it before, though struggling to get one of the rear seats out. One thing that bugs me about the mingebag/lukewarm spec Vauxhalls is the dashboard.

Had a Mk4 Astra Sport which had white dials (standard) and every 'lesser' model I've had since look shit in comparison.

[wuvvum]

Fired up the Estelle today for the first time in ages, and actually drove it 15 feet (up the side of the house so I could get the towing dolly into the driveway). I was originally planning to move it on the starter as I normally do, but one of the rear brakes had partially stuck on so the starter couldn't quite cope. I had to run it from a can balanced on the engine lid as the fuel pump is still kaput, so I got my second gobful of unleaded of the weekend, but once the pez was flowing the old crate fired up straight away and sounded surprisingly healthy given that a) it hadn't been run for months and the oil in the sump is about 50% coolant now. Old commie technology FTW. I really must do something with the car though - it's just sat there wasting MoT at the moment.

[George-Roper]

  trigger said:

I've got someone coming from Norwich tomorrow morning to view the Kadett..

 

Did it go?

[Shep Shepherd]

The Volvo now has a working offside taillight

 

On Saturday a friend (who currently drives a 1994 Nissan Micra Super S, the S standing for 'Shite') and I traced the fault to the bulb failure warning module on the car's relay board, which had overheated and was in a bit of a state inside. Some judicious soldering got it working again. Hopefully it will carry on working long enough for me to source a replacement

[Shep Shepherd]

To be fair, it's a very good and useful system when it's in working order, which it invariably is 99% of the time. Pity that it causes so much grief when it isn't, though.

[barefoot]

A couple of items from me this morning;

First, I've had that darn Scirocco for a year today & I still love it - Thanks Scotty.

& Second, we've been taking the mick out of a bloke down the pub who has a Vauxhall VXR thing...

"well it might be a V8 but it doesn't sound like one/very impressive etc."

for so long that he's gone & spent £1400 on a new rowdy exhaust system!

Pillock - I can think of many better ways to spend £1400 - Rover 75, Jaguar X300 etc etc

[Cavcraft]

My ace neighbour has some sort of clever laptop 'thing' that can code car keys. He's just very kindly programmed the Zafira key so it locks/unlocks the doors with the plipper thing so now I can lock it up.

[retrogeezer]

  Cavette said:

*Horrible content warning:

 

Had a better look at it today and need to order the MOT failure items, namely a backbox (£44 new) CV gaiter 'thing' (£5.00?) and road spring (about £25 new) plus the door lock is different so hopefully my neighbour can use his key coding machine and re-programme they key that came with the car. Oh, the radio display thing has 'done a Vauxhall' too so might get another from a scrappy.

One tyre a bit low and gained an advisory but I have a very good one in the garage and because it has steel wheels I can fit it myself easily enough. Gave the interior a quick going over today but my valeting machine is playing daft arse at the moment and needs a good service.

 

 

I'll be on the lookout for one of these sometime too, think they look pretty nice for an 'mpv' and are a useful tool..

[Shep Shepherd]

Found a good spare bulb failure warning module in my box of Volvoishness, which I liberated from a scrapped 940 years ago and promptly forgot about until today. It will save me buying a new one should The Volvo's repaired one fail in the future

[dollywobbler]

I've de-flowered my Rover. No, the stickers, nothing suspicious! I feel more macho already.

[theorganist]

It did seem an odd car to be adorned with pink flowers!!

[theorganist]

It did seem an odd car to be adorned with pink flowers!!

[Cavcraft]

They did look a bit suspiciously placed Ian, was there signs of scuffs or rough paint underneath?

[dollywobbler]

Yeah, it was obvious in the first pictures I saw that the flowers were a rather feeble attempt to cover up some damage. It's had a minor thump which has made a mess of the paint and slightly creased the top edge of the bumper cover. Looks far better without the flowers...