Grogee's spannering (Maestro , Corsa & Avensis). PIMP MY PARTNER

[djoptix]

8 hours ago, grogee said:

I imagine Initiale trim would be spectacular, and the 3.5 would go well too. Also a Nissan donk I think, with automagic? 

How long did it take to spontaneously combust?

The Initiale trim was neither here nor there to be honest. Auto wipers and lights was nice. The sat nav was way out of date and I never bothered updating it. It did have the panoramic roof which was lovely.

Nissan engine (it's a 350z tourer m8), Aisin-Warner box - same as in the Saab I believe! - and it was mostly very reliable and never FTPd. The electronic parking brake was knackered but I always left it in park anyway.

It was hilariously fast. Would have another if the MPG wasn't so awful.

[grogee]

Mrs Grogee's Alfa is now the property of Mannheim Ltd. Started by going to advertise on Autotrader, then there's a 'we'll buy your car' option. Put in the details, declare the marks and scrapes, then it spits out a valuation.

If you accept, call centre phones to arrange A Man to come round and inspect. His visit is dual purpose:

1) He's checking you declared marks and scrapes honestly. Then, he checks you are who you say you are via various proof of ID and the V5 address.

2) He's taking pictures because these form part of Mannheim's sales portfolio. It may go to auction, or it may go to 'select' traders who have access to this stock. So it's photos of outside, inside, underbonnet, locking wheel nut key, keys, service history etc. Presumably, traders then bid against each other for that car. 

Interestingly, mechanical condition doesn't seem to come into it. He asked to go for a short 2 mile drive just to make sure it started and stopped. That was it really. I was able to actually drive it thereby masking the injector fault/lumpy running, and also the clonky front suspension.

Once he's satisfied it checks out, Mannheim emails a purchase agreement showing price. No admin fee bollocks. You either accept or reject. Once accepted, another email asks for bank details. You bang in your account details, then 10 mins later the money lands in your account. He takes the keys, then car gets collected in next few days. Job done.

£1928 after all said and done. IMO if I'd really polished the shit out of it and found a route that didn't highlight the mechanical issues, I might have got £2,300 for it in private sale. But our current circumstances mean I don't have a drive or hosepipe, and selling a car from a different address to that shown on V5 is fraught.

WBAC offered £1300ish, Motorway eventually upped to £1700. So Mannheim wins from that point of view, and it was fairly painless apart from the vague 'between 1pm and 6pm' appointment. Didn't even have to clean it and it was dirty as hell as you can see.

[Sunny Jim]

Result! Hope sorting the Renault is equally painless. 

[grogee]

11 minutes ago, Sunny Jim said:

Result! Hope sorting the Renault is equally painless. 

Thanks man. It seems to be a battery and this 300A fuse, which in the scheme of things is painless. Time will tell though.

300A is a big old unit. Why didn't they just use a nail like everyone else?

[Matty]

On 1/20/2023 at 5:13 PM, grogee said:

I do have some residual guilt about not throwing a battery on myself, but it's cold and dark plus the car is half an hour away from me. And no access to tools etc etc... I know it's only a 10mm spanner but honestly, getting someone else to sort this is blessed relief.

 

Really wouldn't feel bad. I'm beginning to fucking hate working on cars. Probably doesn't help being a mechanic on machinery for work. As I'm getting older the idea of going to work and doing your thing whilst paying someone else to do these bits of jobs for you is getting increasingly appealing. Cars are for driving and looking at adoringly,  not lying under 😄

[grogee]

2 minutes ago, Matty said:

Really wouldn't feel bad. I'm beginning to fucking hate working on cars. Probably doesn't help being a mechanic on machinery for work. As I'm getting older the idea of going to work and doing your thing whilst paying someone else to do these bits of jobs for you is getting increasingly appealing. Cars are for driving and looking at adoringly,  not lying under 😄

This time of year, I agree. I get a huge amount of satisfaction from working on old shite and fixing it, but that relies on the proper tools being available.

One of the most important 'tools' is space to work. Another one is time - time to make a mistake and not sabotage your only means of getting to work.

And yet another is light - for many of us that means daylight. 

In other words it can be enjoyable in the summer, but it's a feckin chore this time of year. 

[grogee]

The MumBus ® is back in action. Mrs Grogee reports it is running well but the heater is a bit sub-par.

I kind of noticed this too but put it down to Big Interior Volume. However once I do get into our new [used] house I will give it a reverse flush of the matrix and change le coolant. From memory the crappy plastic thermostat housing will start to leak too so that'll be the time to change it. (It warms up just fine if the digital temp gauge can be trusted).

In other news I 'won' a starter motor for the Maestro, £50. I do tend to keep an eye on bits for sale in case anything crops up, as spares are thin on the ground. I've got shedloads to go on it now after the Works are done early March, inc clutch kit.

'Sovereign Rotating Electrics', now there's a name you can trust*. How Brexity.

[grogee]

Some post arrived today, some eBay tat I'd kind of forgotten about. Because we don't have a postal address at the moment, stuff is going to BiL's house but he's normally at work so then it ends up at delivery office. Therefore it's usually weeks before I get to see what I've ordered.

Not pictured is a pair of knobs for the Maestro seat recline. 

The Fast Check should help in the event of an FTP, at least if it's an ignition fault. I think it plugs into the EFI harness under the bonnet then checks for proper operation of the sensors. Thankfully it came with instructions.

All shiters welcome to borrow with the usual T's & C's: you break my stuff, I break your kneecaps.

[AnnoyingPentium]

2 hours ago, grogee said:

All shiters welcome to borrow with the usual T's & C's: you break my stuff, I break your kneecaps.

I like those odds. They're a little fucked anyway, the kneecaps, that is.

[grogee]

Mrs Grogee came home and declared disgust that £120 worth of diseasal didn't fill the MumBus ®.

It's only ever wimmin that say things like this.

Men: Fully cognisant that a fixed volume of fuel will have a cost dependent on the price of said fuel. Therefore, simply release the filler handle when your shoes become covered in flammable liquid. 

Women: "I always put in £30 because that gets me to work and back for the week, even if I stop at Maria's on the way home. But this week/month/year the light came on and I had to put £30 in again!"

[grogee]

Just been to pick up a couple of front wings for the Maestro. I don't necessarily need them as such, but I thought they'd make useful spares, and they were local. Having cogitated a bit on it, I think I've now got a full set of RH and LH inner & outer rear arches by using 'opposite corner' front wing donor panels - so 'Kevin' the fixing man may be grateful of that next month.

Anyway the chap selling them had not one but two Talbot Avengers - a red saloon and a silvery-blue estate that had just come back from the paint shop. Full marks for keeping that rammel on the road. He's selling his Maestro (for which he's accumulated many spares) because he can't drive three classics and they don't like just sitting about.

The estate one was on a two-post lift and was being reconstructed after the paintwork, so there was no tailgate, wheels etc. However - what a satisfying project to be doing, a shiny body fresh from the body shop and you just need to bolt the bits back on. Lovely.

 

[grogee]

Last night I went over to semi-employer's garage to continue battle with the Land Rover Series III heater. It's finally all bolted back together but I pocketed the spare screws. Most of the possibly original fixings are flat head which makes the job twice as hard as it needs to be.

It's quite a simple setup but just bound to fail, as the cables will just rust in place if not used. 

Anyway he's selling it, probably privately. Not sure when he bought it, couple of years ago maybe. 110 pick up with a four-cylinder petrol donk. Pretty immaculate as they go. He reckons he'll double his money, and he's probably right - there's no shortage of idiots queuing to get into these shonky BL tractors.

Hoping that I don't have to touch it ever again. I don't know why I hate it so much, I think it's just the slapdash way it's thrown together. I mean it's easy to work on I suppose but it can be awkward sometimes. And it's horrible to drive.

[grogee]

Just popped into the MumBus ® to see if my Chinese Bluetooth adaptor would successfully work on the standard head unit.

The short answer is 'no', but the longer answer is 'maybe, with some fiddling'.

The blue mini ISO does fit into the unit, and when I power the radio, a new Bluetooth device appears if I search for it. So that's 50% there.

Unfortunately my colour blindness (incompetence) didn't spot that the standard unit is looking for a yellow mini ISO, not the green one supplied with the Chinese thing (third pic).

However, I think it's possible to splice the audio output onto a different adaptor that uses the yellow plug. Which is what my head unit is prepared for (second pic, see the dab of yellow paint).

The pin-out could well be completely wrong, but equally there may be a standard that defines L+, R+ and common/ground.

That's why I've spent a fiver on the yellow adaptor (last pic) which is for an Alfa, buuuuuut... European, probably similar suppliers to Rennow, maybe ISO standard.

The whole experimentation isn't an expensive affair - if I've failed, I've lost about £13 in total. So it's worth a try.

[grogee]

There's one downside to this which I hadn't considered.

The car already has a Bluetooth phone capability and this seems to work fine for calls. But being 2009 it's not suitable for audio/music.

When Mrs Grogee gets in the car, her phone will automatically connect to the car - which means it's not able to connect to a second Bluetooth 'handle'.

However, the main use for Bluetooth tunes will be long journeys when we're both in the car. That means one of our phones would be able to connect to the aftermarket thing for tunes.

[N19]

On 1/26/2023 at 8:54 PM, grogee said:

Mrs Grogee came home and declared disgust that £120 worth of diseasal didn't fill the MumBus ®.

It's only ever wimmin that say things like this.

Men: Fully cognisant that a fixed volume of fuel will have a cost dependent on the price of said fuel. Therefore, simply release the filler handle when your shoes become covered in flammable liquid. 

Women: "I always put in £30 because that gets me to work and back for the week, even if I stop at Maria's on the way home. But this week/month/year the light came on and I had to put £30 in again!"

Said often as a complaint to petrol station cashier - "I put £5 in, but the fuel gauge hasn't moved, your pumps aren't delivering fuel!"

 (yes, the highly sensitive, trading-standards checked meters are clearly usurped by the float gauge in a tank that gives a rough estimation)

[grogee]

Maestro time. Given that the mercury has climbed above freezing, it was time to get the Maestro headliner out ahead of roof repairs and bodywork next month. 

Fortunately it fired straight up, partly because I'd previously taken the battery home for some electron action with the charger. Apart from the suspected exhaust blow(s) it seems fairly healthy, as it should with new plugs and filters etc. Clutch is a bit sticky though, suspect cable, but the whole shebang is getting changed in the Spring. Manoeuvring was a little fraught without a handbrake.

@Cluffy was my wingman and helped by moving the piles of spares aside so I could reverse out into the daylight. Once parked outside we attacked the trim bits and bobs, fortunately nothing particularly difficult and it seems the headliner isn't fitted behind the A- and B-pillar trims.

The whole operation did result in an avalanche of orange dessicated foam, and the material has finally parted company with the biscuit. I was a bit surprised to find it's not that hardboard type material, instead it's kind of like expanded polystyrene. Very delicate but luckily we seem to have extracted it without damage.

Having moved all the spares out of the (extended) boot, this was the first time I've sat in the back of an MG Maestro for 28 years. It was smaller than I remembered...

[grogee]

Unfortunately in returning the favour to @Cluffy by being 'brake man' while he did up the driveshaft bolts... then this happened.

I/we are hopeful that, given the bolts haven't been corroding in there for ages, the broken off bit might be persuaded to come out with a left-handed drill bit. Access isn't the best, but I do have a right-angled drill thingy which might help.

[Cluffy]

A lot was done today, but alas the swear jar is full. I need to update my Corrado thread but will do so when the foul language has stopped. 

Prey to whatever you prey to that the gearbox isn’t coming out again...

[grogee]

So much for getting the Maestro headliner out in one piece. I've ripped a small piece off the front corner.

It's sort of expanded polystyrene type material so I don't want to use any old glue in case it shrivels it up.

Anyone got any suggestions for an adhesive?

[Surface Rust]

21 hours ago, grogee said:

So much for getting the Maestro headliner out in one piece. I've ripped a small piece off the front corner.

It's sort of expanded polystyrene type material so I don't want to use any old glue in case it shrivels it up.

Anyone got any suggestions for an adhesive?

Judging by some of the creations my 5 yr old comes home with from school, PVA should be safe on polystyrene, however, maybe best to test a bit first.

[bigfella2]

I would let the guy recovering the headlining fix it.

[RoverFolkUs]

Water based rather than solvent based for sure.

PVA should* do it with a paper machet type affair on the reverse side

(*Not responsible for the destruction of unobtainium parts )

 

[CreepingJesus]

I only learned recently that polystyrene primer is a thing, and it appears to do a sterling job of being a barrier against whatever you use next. It might even stick the bits back together, but it would certainly expand your adhesive options I'd think.

[grogee]

Fuck this. Someone will be along shortly to tell me this is good valu - but seriously, £30 parts and £220 labour? Really?

Definitely didn't take me five hours to replace the material on the Saab. I was using a garden table, scissors and a craft knife.

I'd be alright if this included removing and refitting the headliner, but it doesn't, and I have to deliver and collect the bastard thing as well. No thanks.

[Tenmil Socket]

4 minutes ago, grogee said:

Fuck this. Someone will be along shortly to tell me this is good valu - but seriously, £30 parts and £220 labour? Really?

Definitely didn't take me five hours to replace the material on the Saab. I was using a garden table, scissors and a craft knife.

I'd be alright if this included removing and refitting the headliner, but it doesn't, and I have to deliver and collect the bastard thing as well. No thanks.

Crikey! At that price I would certainly be attempting it myself.

[Forty45]

Maybe he is including his time to fit it back in the car........😉

[grogee]

1 hour ago, Forty45 said:

Maybe he is including his time to fit it back in the car........😉

If he is then he didn't read my email properly.

[grogee]

Got a better look at semi-employer's 914 yesterday, it's just come back from the welder's with some repairs to inner rear arches.

It's nice from 10 ft away but close up there are a few signs that all is not what it seems. It does have a nice paint job, but there are a few small patches of rust bleeding through, and when I looked at the front arches they seemed a bit wob-ish to me.

We investigated the gear linkage, because it's like stirring porridge to select a gear. Looks like there's a bush missing where the selector rod comes out of the floor/body, making gear selection a bit of a lottery. It looks like a very shit design to me, a bent bit of tube flapping in the breeze under the exhaust, going all the way to the back of the car where an exposed mechanism does the fore/aft and left/right "conversion".

Maybe all Beetles are like this but it looks pretty shoddy to me. Also his 914 is a dog-leg gearbox which makes me think it might not be standard Beetle parts.

It also needs a new starter motor. One of the fixings is nice and easy to access, and the other is in no-man's land above the engine but below the 'shield' between exhaust and engine bay.

 

Master Grogee came with me and played with semi-employer's son. It's a hard lesson to learn that Some People Have Nicer Things Than You, but the lad has an electric buggy thing that just looks amazing and I'd have killed for that aged 8. Anyway after having sampled it Master Grogee predictably asked for one for his birthday, whereupon I had to explain it cost thousands of pounds and we couldn't afford it, plus there was nowhere to drive it anyway etc etc. Boring old poor people talk.

 

In other news, Mrs Grogee is complaining profusely about fuel consumption in the Espace. Meter says 36ish mpg which is about what I'd expect for a big old bus, and not significantly worse than the ailing Alfa which by the end was struggling to beat 40mpg. However she's convinced it's drinking fuel so the only other explanation could be a fuel leak. I would have thought that any leak would be fairly obvious by a) smell, and b) puddle after parking - neither of which are apparent.

We've decided to track it with mileage to confirm the trip meter is correct. My suspicion is that she's just been doing a lot of miles and hasn't really realised.

[grogee]

This is bugging the shit out of me. Because:

I'm a child of the 80s, and it's DIGITAL INSTRUMENTS.

I think I could get the talking bit to work, at least in part.

But it's £250 starting price. That feels a bit rich for me. Judging by the eBay handle this is just a guy who breaks cars, not a bonafide BL licker.

He's the same guy breaking that white 1.3L Maestro and I could do with the bonnet, so if I was to go and collect I could get that at the same time. It's in Newcastle but the Staffs one, not the Tyne one so it's do-able although a bit of a trek.

I'm thinking that the £250 is a punt, much as the white 1.3L was - it was £500 but is now being broken. I think I'll wait this auction out and if it gets no bids (as I suspect) I'll put in a cheeky offer.

I mean, how many Maestro owners are out there contemplating an instrument swap? It can't be a huge market.

Meanwhile I'm getting nowhere fast refurbing the crusty alloy wheel, and a nicely restored one has appeared on eBay for £100. My tame powder coat guy only does wheels in sets apparently, and no-one else will touch it. By the time I've had it sand blasted then bought the paint etc I'd be looking at £70 ish I reckon, then I'd actually have to paint it which would be a pain. 

[grogee]

Oh, and I tried to update the Espace sat nav with this. I carefully followed a trail of companies that swallowed Navteq, the original supplier of the 2009 map CD that is still with the car. 

Discovered they were hoovered up by Nokia, whose 'Here' map concern I worked with while at JLR. So, based on this tenuous link, I bought this map update CD.

It didn't work.

What's more, I discovered a new fun* fault with the CD player, which is really struggling to load and eject CDs. Probably an easy fix m9 but I don't want to disconnect as I don't have the code.

If anyone wants to buy this CD for their heap, just let me know.