Now that the car’s safely back home and I’ve had a bit of a break from the garage, I popped out tonight to take a look at the plugs following their first few hundred miles. They were all pretty sooty, more so on the rear ones than the front – I’m sure that means something More importantly though, the oil level was at the top mark on the dipstick when…
Right, catch-up time Started off with some glass fibre compound to fill in the gaps and take out the crease from the old bump, then ran some filler over the top. Unfortunately, I forgot I didn’t have the air sander I’d used at college and probably got a bit carried away and put too much on A little bit of sanding later, I’d worked through 80, 180 and 320 grit…
Doesn’t time fly when you’re out in the garage – one minute I’m happily grinding away thinking what I’m going to have for lunch, then a couple of moments pass and I’m running late for getting to an evening course at college I’ve been poking at stuff with the screwdriver, and the bit that’s annoyed me the most for the longest is the holes on the passenger side of the…
Part of the problem (with being isolated in the garage) is that I can’t bring myself to traipse through my nice new house in grubby overalls (to scour the interwebs for help), and even if I could, I’d never be able to bear the sight of oily fingerprints on the keyboard Logical answer then, I guess, is to rig up a PC in the garage – which would also give me…
The new calipers went on nice and easy, and whilst I was doing the job, I thought I might as well also fit the braided hoses I picked up at the NEC Classic Motorshow a few months ago. The new hoses all went on fairly easily, once I’d worked out which nut of the brake unions I was meant to be undoing It’s obvious once you’ve done it, but up till…
After lots of to-ing and fro-ing the pistons on the passenger side caliper showed no signs of shifting With the memory of a rather unamusing Renault 5 crash in the back of my mind, I decided not to bother with cleaning up the old calipers and getting a service kit, so one call to the local factors and a few quid later I’ve got a pair of reconditioned ones. I…
Well, I finally got the front end re-assembled tonight but the bumper’s going to have to come off again for some “adjustment” – it seems like one of the bumper irons I got is slightly bent, as the whole bumper is slightly skewiff and tight up against the bodywork on one side. Never mind, I think it looks alright for now OK, so the indicators are held in with cable ties, but…
Just a quick little update today. Finally got some time yesterday to see why the engine wasn’t firing, having had both the battery and jumper pack on charge over the weekend. I worked my way down the checklists in the Haynes and Autodata books (told you this was all new to me) and after making sure that everything was plugged in securely, then cleaning the earthing points and the plugs…
The garage is great to work in – it means I don’t have to get absolutely everything done in an evening, I can just close the door and come back to it a few days later Of course, it’ll be even nicer once I’ve stopped the roof leaking and had it rewired by a sparkie who actually understands the word “safe”, but they’re minor things – hats off to the guys…
To get me through the delay, I consoled myself with a trip to Machine Mart on one of their VAT free days and came away with (amongst other things) a new bottom cabinet to hold the ever expanding collection of tools and gadgets. The new bottom radiator hose arrived in the post, so I immediately rushed out to the garage, fixed it up with some new hose clips and started filling the…
Imagine, if you will, that a week has passed… The front end of the engine is in a right state and lurking underneath all that dirt, goo and crystallised rust is undoubtedly the explanation for the seemingly inoperative cooling. It’s all ripe for a tidy up and new belts, particularly as I can’t find anything to tell me when the last cambelt change was. The thermostat housing came off without…
Right, enough of the mucking about with boxes … there’s a car to put back on the road for the summer, before it starts snowing and I wonder where the heck the nice weather went This is a catch-up exercise for the minute, so bear with me – I’ve been doing stuff for the last few weekends, but couldn’t find the interface cable for the camera. My compulsion for buying things…
Erm, well … you see it’s like this, sir … Boxes are now emptied (though I can’t remember where I’ve put half the stuff now), shelves have been put up, lights have been mended, a sink’s been replaced and half a square mile of York stone has been jetwashed – which means I can go out and play in the garage As well as working on the car, I need…
First of all, wow – thanks to anyone who awarded the thread some stars … it’s nice to know that people are actually interested Secondly, sorry, but I couldn’t make the Scotch Corner meet for reasons that will become readily apparent Thirdly, never, ever,ever buy a house without a warranted/certified central heating system If you happen to contract pneumonia and the central heating dies repeatedly leaving you with a f-f-f-freezin’ house it doesn’t…