Car tinkering

Foster

A quick photo of the reassembled engine bay - Can you tell which bits I took out and cleaned?

chillidoggy

Yes. Well done that man!

Corvus

Good work! (Now come and do mine )

boogieman

Foster;243239" said:

A quick photo of the reassembled engine bay - Can you tell which bits I took out and cleaned?

Shiny. We approves.

chillidoggy

Might be flogging mine and getting another classic pile of junk to tinker with.

chillidoggy

Aaaannnnd - half way through the rebuild, I've sold it. this is sad, because I built it and have had it since 1987, but there you go.

NPOSOWD (New Pile Of Shite On Wheels Day) will no doubt be coming up very soon.

Corvus

Really? Sad indeed! I assumed the prev post was a mojo dip like we all get from time to time. Especially in a long project. Good luck with the new POS 

boogieman

That's a shame. So what's the next one gonna be?

ICBM

FX_Munkee said:

Foster said:

From the research I've done the suspension is easier to work on than springs, there might be some orbs that are trickier to get to - but as long as it's treated with TLC then it should work fine.

As the ex owner of a BX (which had suspension "issues") I can quite confidently say, springs and struts are much more straight forward to work on (and I've worked on quite a few).

+1. There is a reason they are so rare now. I can still identify the smell of LHM hydraulic fluid at about fifty yards, and I learned a few interesting tricks for driving a vehicle with no functional suspension or power steering along the way too!

Mine was a BX19TRS estate - not a GTi, but basically the same engine without injection. Not as much acceleration, but it was an absolute flying machine when it got up to speed, the estate body had less drag than the saloon for some reason.

To be fair to it, it was very reliable for several years until the hydraulic piping rotted through, a bit at a time so I didn't give up repairing it soon enough really.

Also, 2CVs are unfortunately a bit of a minefield as well despite their simplicity. Towards the end of production the basic quality of all the metalwork really dropped, and it's now very rare to find one without major body rot issues - a replaced chassis is already pretty much a given for any that's still on the road. They are also very hard to weld because the sheeting is so thin. You will pay a *lot* for one that's been professionally restored too, which reflects this.

I've owned three of them, but I gave up on my last one after having had it in bits for ten years and sold it as a project to someone with more patience than me! But now summer is coming I still miss bowling along country roads with my elbow almost scraping the tarmac on corners, and being able to drive a car to its absolute performance limits without breaking the law - much - although I tuned mine up a bit and they would do 90 on a downhill with the wind behind! God knows what the brakes would have done at that speed...

chillidoggy

boogieman said:

That's a shame. So what's the next one gonna be?

If I do the sensible thing, there won't be another one. But I'm a total clown, so it might be a Lotus. More on that as time goes on.

boogieman

A Lotus? Jeez you really like a challenge don't ya? >:D< A mate's dad has a beautiful restored Élan, an amazing thing.

chillidoggy

Beautiful to look at but a pain in the arse. Which kind of sums up one or two old flames of mine, as it happens.

FX_Munkee

Get a MK1 MX-5 (preferably an imported Eunos Roadster).
Looks like a classic (nicked Elan design), cheap as chips, easy to work on, loads of spares, loads of tuning potential (engine was designed for a turbo*) and the USP..... It stands a very healthy chance of actually working when you want it to.
Oh and they're quite good fun to drive as well (possibly because you're not constantly worrying about it breaking down, although it could be the handling?)

Or you could get an Esprit, and spend your days pulling GRP shards out of your skin and wondering what it will sound like when you actually get it to turn over

*whack a turbo on, instant 180 bhp on something weighing ~900kgs, smiley face.

chillidoggy

The MX5 is a very good car, but it's driven by hairdressers. Apart from one incredible conversion I saw which a couple of very clever guys had fitted an LS 6.2 litre Corvette engine and manual gearbox into. 600bhp - now THAT would be worth looking like a hairdresser for!

Seeing as you mentioned it, I do quite fancy the Esprit. Working with boats, I'm no stranger to GRP, or unreliable equipment, either. I did sit in one years ago, but the headroom was shite. As was the Excel Lotus belonging to a friend of mine, and I did test drive the first Elise when it came out. I thought it was OK, but there wasn't enough power, and the soft top was like doing a Rubik's cube. 

FX_Munkee

Friend of mine used to have an Esprit S4, nippy, but pretty unreliable (electrical gremlins) and I always felt the finishing was a bit poor.
600bhp in an MX-5 is just silly and would ruin the cars natural balance. about 180 is the "sweet spot" for driveability anything over 240ish and you start to lose too much traction and it becomes a fight, which then negates the excellent handling.
And yes, you're right, the MX-5 is a hairdressers car, if they had a Lotus they'd never make it to their appointments (due to being stranded on the roadside) so they'd go out of business. Would a Lotus be an ex-hairdressers car then? 

Monkeybone

People keep calling my car a hairdresser's car, it's not at all, it's butch and manly and the dark blue colour should help people realise this...

FX_Munkee

Monkeybone said:

People keep calling my car a hairdresser's car, it's not at all, it's butch and manly and the dark blue colour should help people realise this...

Mine's black, with a red leather interior and gold wheels.
I'm quite obviously a pimp not a hairdresser...

although I do have one of these that I need to put on the car, just in case.

Monkeybone

FX_Munkee;246185" said:

Monkeybone said:

People keep calling my car a hairdresser's car, it's not at all, it's butch and manly and the dark blue colour should help people realise this...





Mine's black, with a red leather interior and gold wheels.

I'm quite obviously a pimp not a hairdresser...



although I do have one of these that I need to put on the car, just in case.

Might have to get that sticker myself...

Mine's dark blue with gunmetal wheels, occasionally a roof, and a slightly throaty exhaust (although that isn't through choice, I think there's a hole in it...)

chillidoggy

Joking aside, I'll see if I can find the link to the V8 MX5, it's worth a look just for the amount of thought that went into it. Dread to think what it's like to drive, though!

Monkeybone

Thinking about it, someone put a V8 in a Honda S2000 too, looks a bit of a beast. Plus, search YouTube for 701bhp S2000 from hell, madness...