captain_70s
Forum Addict
- Joined
- Aug 6, 2008
- Messages
- 6,525
- Location
- Glasgow, Scotland
- Car(s)
- Three Triumphs and a Volvo estate
This car continues to be a bit of a nightmare. Although a bargain at ?850 for a Dolomite with a years MOT it's has started to show it's true colours. Eventually the problems with the steering improved with repeated trips to the garage but it never got to the same level as it had been before., I resigned myself to buying a new steering rack which is waiting to be fitted.
The car went back into regular use alongside my Corsa and generally improved over time, I bought some NOS wheel trims from an earlier Dolomite to replace the plastic ones it should have had.
At the tail end of last year it went wrong in several lengthy, irritating and expensive ways, firstly the thermostat jammed shut and the car overheated on Aberdeen beach front. This blew out some rather irritating O-ring seals between the thermostat housing and the water pump, the thermostat housing is built into the intake manifold so the whole lot has to come off to replace them.
At the time the 1300 was occupying the garage so fixing the 1850 became weather dependant, it took weeks. It's an utter ball ache of a job and I was blessed with an unseasonally warm Autumn night with which to get it sorted. While I did that I replaced all the rubber fuel and water pipes in the engine bay.
With winter closing in I decided to use the 1850 as a winter hack as to fit winter tyres/wheels to the Corsa would be stupid money and I didn't want to risk damaging it. So I bought a set of winter tyres and painted my steel wheels black. This was around one year after buying the car. At this point it looked mostly the same as when I bought it.
After Christmas things took a turn for the worse, the numerous layers of poor quality respray started to flake away, leaving the old factory paint in some places and rust in others. My attempts at fixing showed that the car was no longer quite the same shade of Inca Yellow as my spray cans.
Then the starter motor died so the car ended up sitting for a few weeks until that was replaced. At the same time I moved house and sold the Corsa.
Then the driveshaft rubbers failed and rendered the car undrivable, this cost a fair amount to fix and the car was laid up at my parent's place for a good few weeks again and the 1300 took over daily drive duties. When this was repaired the brakes stopped working properly and the leak from the thermostat re-appeared causing the car to run hot. A knocking sound had also appeared from the engine which suggested big end bearing wear. I put the car in for it's MOT to see what needed fixing.
Condensed that reads:
Every brake pipe and hose needs replacing, as the do the front discs and pads. Rear drums are seized + handbrake doesn't work.
The fuel line under the car needs replacing.
Most of the exhaust rubber mounts need replacing.
The exhaust emissions are too high and the car is blowing smoke when revved.
The exhaust is also leaking where the manifold meets the downpipe.
Steering rack bushes are perished.
Oil leak at the rear of the engine.
Right hand indicator not flashing and one of the full beam headlights was blown.
Driver's side chassis leg holed in two places.
Various other misc bits and pieces.
I limped the car back to my house as I couldn't keep it on the street with no MOT. Over the next few months many hundreds of pounds left my bank account and reappeared in the form of stuff, namely a spare 1850cc engine, new brake pipes, discs and pads etc, etc. At this point I began Operation Sod Cosmetics. It became clear I didn't have the cash to both fix the car mechanically and structurally AND repaint it to a decent standard. So I sanded back all the surface rust, treated the metal work and painted over it with industrial grade paint, in red. At the same time my hours at work increased and I started working 6 days a week to make ends meet leaving me even less time to work on the car which was already weather dependent to start with.
I started stripping out the old brake pipes and replacing them which was a nightmare as everything was COATED in layers and layers of underseal and was siezed to all hell. I ended up taking a junior hacksaw to several sections.
Then I poked the chassis leg holes.
At this point I was quite disheartened, under the billion layers of underseal lay some questionable sections of metalwork that hadn't been improved by every single drain point being blocked. I also tried to re-hang the exhaust but got nowhere in 4+ hours of lying under the car wrestling with the things. Then work announced we were switching from being paid weekly to being paid monthly leaving me flat broke. Around the same time I was featured in the UK's best selling classic car magazine, the content was slightly outdated.
The 1300 then suffered a series of failures including the exhaust and the alternator which bit in to my car repair funds quite badly.
So that brings us pretty much up to date. There is still a mountain of work left to do and my finances have hit an all time low and the weather has taken a turn for the worse as summer is very much over. Trying to finish the rear brake pipes today I looked at the rear suspension rubbers and they are all pretty fucked, the subfame mounts have also seen better days. Currently hunting for a second job with the aim of getting enough money to send the car to a garage to have some of the work done as I don't have the time or energy I used to have a year or two ago.
I don't give a shit about how it looks I just want it to be back on the road at this point but it's a case of one step forwards, two steps back... and when I step back it's into a bear trap... Which already has a bear in it... And the bear is on fire. Also while I fight off the flaming bear my parents are standing to one side asking if I have a girlfriend yet and if I've considered selling the cars and taking up a cheaper, more socially acceptable hobby like collecting anime figurines or crack cocaine.
The car went back into regular use alongside my Corsa and generally improved over time, I bought some NOS wheel trims from an earlier Dolomite to replace the plastic ones it should have had.
At the tail end of last year it went wrong in several lengthy, irritating and expensive ways, firstly the thermostat jammed shut and the car overheated on Aberdeen beach front. This blew out some rather irritating O-ring seals between the thermostat housing and the water pump, the thermostat housing is built into the intake manifold so the whole lot has to come off to replace them.
At the time the 1300 was occupying the garage so fixing the 1850 became weather dependant, it took weeks. It's an utter ball ache of a job and I was blessed with an unseasonally warm Autumn night with which to get it sorted. While I did that I replaced all the rubber fuel and water pipes in the engine bay.
With winter closing in I decided to use the 1850 as a winter hack as to fit winter tyres/wheels to the Corsa would be stupid money and I didn't want to risk damaging it. So I bought a set of winter tyres and painted my steel wheels black. This was around one year after buying the car. At this point it looked mostly the same as when I bought it.
After Christmas things took a turn for the worse, the numerous layers of poor quality respray started to flake away, leaving the old factory paint in some places and rust in others. My attempts at fixing showed that the car was no longer quite the same shade of Inca Yellow as my spray cans.
Then the starter motor died so the car ended up sitting for a few weeks until that was replaced. At the same time I moved house and sold the Corsa.
Then the driveshaft rubbers failed and rendered the car undrivable, this cost a fair amount to fix and the car was laid up at my parent's place for a good few weeks again and the 1300 took over daily drive duties. When this was repaired the brakes stopped working properly and the leak from the thermostat re-appeared causing the car to run hot. A knocking sound had also appeared from the engine which suggested big end bearing wear. I put the car in for it's MOT to see what needed fixing.
Condensed that reads:
Every brake pipe and hose needs replacing, as the do the front discs and pads. Rear drums are seized + handbrake doesn't work.
The fuel line under the car needs replacing.
Most of the exhaust rubber mounts need replacing.
The exhaust emissions are too high and the car is blowing smoke when revved.
The exhaust is also leaking where the manifold meets the downpipe.
Steering rack bushes are perished.
Oil leak at the rear of the engine.
Right hand indicator not flashing and one of the full beam headlights was blown.
Driver's side chassis leg holed in two places.
Various other misc bits and pieces.
I limped the car back to my house as I couldn't keep it on the street with no MOT. Over the next few months many hundreds of pounds left my bank account and reappeared in the form of stuff, namely a spare 1850cc engine, new brake pipes, discs and pads etc, etc. At this point I began Operation Sod Cosmetics. It became clear I didn't have the cash to both fix the car mechanically and structurally AND repaint it to a decent standard. So I sanded back all the surface rust, treated the metal work and painted over it with industrial grade paint, in red. At the same time my hours at work increased and I started working 6 days a week to make ends meet leaving me even less time to work on the car which was already weather dependent to start with.
I started stripping out the old brake pipes and replacing them which was a nightmare as everything was COATED in layers and layers of underseal and was siezed to all hell. I ended up taking a junior hacksaw to several sections.
Then I poked the chassis leg holes.
At this point I was quite disheartened, under the billion layers of underseal lay some questionable sections of metalwork that hadn't been improved by every single drain point being blocked. I also tried to re-hang the exhaust but got nowhere in 4+ hours of lying under the car wrestling with the things. Then work announced we were switching from being paid weekly to being paid monthly leaving me flat broke. Around the same time I was featured in the UK's best selling classic car magazine, the content was slightly outdated.
The 1300 then suffered a series of failures including the exhaust and the alternator which bit in to my car repair funds quite badly.
So that brings us pretty much up to date. There is still a mountain of work left to do and my finances have hit an all time low and the weather has taken a turn for the worse as summer is very much over. Trying to finish the rear brake pipes today I looked at the rear suspension rubbers and they are all pretty fucked, the subfame mounts have also seen better days. Currently hunting for a second job with the aim of getting enough money to send the car to a garage to have some of the work done as I don't have the time or energy I used to have a year or two ago.
I don't give a shit about how it looks I just want it to be back on the road at this point but it's a case of one step forwards, two steps back... and when I step back it's into a bear trap... Which already has a bear in it... And the bear is on fire. Also while I fight off the flaming bear my parents are standing to one side asking if I have a girlfriend yet and if I've considered selling the cars and taking up a cheaper, more socially acceptable hobby like collecting anime figurines or crack cocaine.
