Lude Generation

Been busy this week - todays tasks, removing the left "Honda" boot badge and the right "2.2 VTI" badge, took a bit of elbow grease once the badges were off, 19 years of dirt and glue residue left behind

Tried to sell the wifes old Peugeot 207 for 300quid. Punter comes for a test drive, starts it up, warnings galore on the dash, very unusual...

Convinced myself its been standing 2 weeks (been on holiday), battery was probably a bit flat. Car drives like a dog. Restart and all is well, car behaves, test drive fine, money changes hands.

Bloke gets home, says its playing up again - I said that's so unusual and i'm frankly embarrassed at trying to pass off an honest car that is knackered. Drive over to take a look. Display is saying 'engine management fault' so I whip off the battery cover to check the ECU in case some rodent has been nibbling. Released the 3 loom/harness connectors and one of them is visibly wet! WTF?! these are sealed connectors, underneath a plastic cover, no way water can get to them.

Suspicion is the 'new' last year thermostat housing (with coolant temp sensor) is leaking coolant through the sensor into the loom - a fault i've only read about but never seen until now. some electrical cleaner spray later its working fine - but warn him I don't have time to help him fix it (told him what to do, said there is spare sensor from old thermo housing in the boot), told him it may be un fixable (loom might corrode internally from now on) and give him all his money back and tell him to keep the car.

So it just goes to show - sods law. You think you know a car (own for 12 years) , try to sell it as an honest car , then get totally shafted on the test drive lol. Told him if it keeps playing up , dont bother fixing it, take it straight to the scrap yard...

In other news - its replacement, the 10th gen civic is lovely to drive if slightly unrefined 1litre / 3cyl turbo CVT.

That's decent after-sales service indeed!

wife and i rented this for her 30th last weekend for 4 days and thanks again to Wurly's travel advice (as he lived in the area we rented it from) we had a great weekend exploring!

What did I do today?
Came here to say hello!
It's been a while...

Took photos of all the bodywork I need doing. I was hoping to just get The small niggley things sorted out but now it’s now totally depressing because it seems the lude’s been invisible for 3 months during which time someone reversed into the side, someone else reversed into the front, someone tried to merge with me and a pheasant head butted the front bumper!. Other unexplained damage to the rear just appeared today I’d post them but they’re not happy pictures

Good news is that I sold an intravee II from my BMW for a great price.

Hate it when you find damage and you know it wasn't you

Busy today - went to help a friend with a golf tdi (1.9 old engine, 57plate newer shape mk5), showing codes for fuel pump (recent alternator failure and flat battery - now replaced). pulling and checking and replacing fuses, along with wiggling all the relays seems to have solved it (after clearing codes). Power steering and ABS lights came on though which was worrying. Suspect pulling the fuses whilst it was running confused the ECUs. Short journey later they disappeared, assume that the ECU needs to see real world data to confirm its all working. Oddly, the diesel lift pump (in the usual pace under rear seats) wouldn't prime if the drivers door was open. Glad i read that somewhere otherwise id probably still be there now messing around.

Onto the prelude, battery hasn't shown green in its inspection window for a while despite healthy alternator output, and a little on the small side capacity wise (think it was 55ah). After checking the physical size, got myself a yuasa '030' size battery in 75ah capacity from halfords (£98). Not that the old battery had trouble starting, but this is much happier, one potential problem headed off. Had planned to replace the headlight connectors today but space is tight down there so will leave that until another day. New bulbs and sidelights also fitted. Had ordered some Sealey bulb holders, but there were of inferior quality/fake. The old ones were a little charred, but cleaned them up, and pinched up the terminals to the bulb, and on the loom side, to help with conductivity (heat away more than electric in). Hopefully try and find some original (not fake) ones on ebay...

Also took the opportunity to fix the DAB aerial connection (must have rattled loose), re tune my stations and set the RGB to match the OE colours. Set the suspension down to soft (3 or 4 clicks up from lowest setting) as the wife is driving the car all next week as she is carless, and let a tiny bit of air out of the tyres to improve the comfort. Also tightened up the passenger wing mirror, seemed to have come slightly loose since i fitted the folding mirrors, wobble now gone.

Still a million jobs to do - but that's enough for today.

We finally got rid of the Volvo shell.

Hooray, some free space on relatively flat ground!

Sailor wrote: ↑

Mon Mar 25, 2019 10:34 pm

We finally got rid of the Volvo shell.

Am I the only one who doesn't know about the Volvo?


Was this a 740 estate that your son used to have?