Ben99Felicia

I used the autoglym magma yesterday The car was absolutely covered it big iron particles like someone has been grinding metal next to it so I ended up using the entire bottle just to get the bonnet done, this is probably due to me not using it effectively and wasting it but I did follow the instructions on the bottle. I started off giving the entire car a spray with it, that was probably a third of a bottle. I left that for 5 minutes then jet washed it off, it did remove loads a stuff but not all of it. I decided to concentrate on the bonnet which was the worst panel. After a lot of hard work and picking at it with my nails (I really didn't want to do that) I've managed to get it looking clean at last It's hard to get the camera to focus but trust me it's clean and ready to polish. I finished by washing the car and spray waxing it as I didn't have time to do anymore. It don't look too bad though does it? I've just popped a new air filter in today too. I'm going to get a big bottle of autosmart red 7 to get the rest of the iron off the car it works out to be half the price of magma and the way I went through it I need loads more to finish the car

Just stopped to get my truck washed and bought some of this from inside the shop at the truck wash. I'll let you see the results..

Thank you. Your car is looking really nice, I need to do quite a bit more to get it to the same standard as yours. I've done some more this week, I've had a weeks holiday off work but had a bad cold so didn't get anywhere near as much done as I'd have liked to. I finally got round to taking the stickers off and giving it a quick clean. I got carried away and forgot the before photo of the sides of the car before I started taking the stickers off. The back one came off easily with the heat gun warming the adhesive and wd40 to remove the residue. You can't tell it was ever there. The sides also came off easy enough but the paint is a slightly different colour underneath if you look carefully. I realised I had run out of car shampoo/snowfoam so took it to the local car wash, they don't do a bad job and I just wanted it "cleaner" to see what the paint is like The paint is faded but if I compound and polish it it'll be loads better, before that though it needs decontaminating It's very hard to get the camera to focus on it but the whole car is covered it tiny orange dots of rusty iron particles embedded into the paint. I did a test with some clay bar and it took a ridiculous amount of effort to clean a tiny patch, it's obviously not the way to go about it. Then I realised the wheel cleaner that turns red on contact with iron would be the stuff to use. I've been meaning to get hold of some autosmart red 7 for a while so that's the plan...

This week the windscreen wipers seized, I read all about refurbishing them but decided to by a new one for £25 on eBay...that was my first mistake. It turns out all the new wiper linkages on eBay are the left hand drive models. After fitting the new part I realised something was wrong because the wiper travel on the driver's side was to far. Even with the wiper parked at the very bottom of the screen it would travel way past the side of the screen and across the a pillar. You can see the difference in the picture, they main bar is bent on the left of the original and the right of the new part, the linkage is 10mm longer too. I tried swapping the linkage but that had the same result. I'll refurb the old one then...yeah that didn't go well with me snapping the end off trying to get the spline out, it was very seized. I've ordered a used one off eBay for £30 which i will refurb before fitting to make it last. I've also broken the scuttle panel, it tore when I pulled it off. I've had no luck finding one on eBay so I'll need to find someone breaking one. Not the usual productive weekend 🤔

I had the sai pump pipe arrive from China, it only took 10 days, not bad for £13.10. I also bought a dipstick from gsf to replace the one that's falling to pieces. I replaced the broken air vent in the middle of the dashboard with one from eBay. Whilst I was running the car up to temperature I noticed a vacuum leak from the brake servo hose. I've wrapped some electrical tape around it 🤫 I know that's not gonna be any good. I've seen I can replace it for about £40 with the fittings but I'm thinking if the fittings are ok then I could just replace the hose. I'll have a think about it 🤔

Yeah man, still got loads to do but I'm enjoying working on it.

I thought it would be sold by now, I was waiting to see how much money the rest of the car was going to cost me to repair before I started looking for a replacement seat. I'm getting there now so I'll keep an eye out for some, I think I want standard seats to keep an original look to the car.

Hi Skinnyman I use 5w40 nanodrive nt+ CFS in my mini cooper s, it uses at lot less oil than when I used to put 5w30 in it. Next time I change the oil in the mini I'll put the same stuff as ive just put in the vrs because it's £42 instead of £58 and is made for road/track use rather than Motorsport. Anyway yeah getting jobs ticked off and enjoying working on it. By the way do you still have an interior for sale? My driver's seat has a hole in the bolster and I want to replace it.

Successful weekend, I've replaced the oil pickup, cleaned the sump out and fitted some new parts. Lots of bits of dipstick tube/dipstick in the oil pan. I cleaned it out with brake cleaner and scotch brite. I got my new oil pickup kit and crankcase breather kit. I cleaned the windage tray and fitted the new pickup. The old oil pickup had plastic in it, but it wasn't clogged and not looking too bad. I fitted the new crankcase breather using some 19mm hose and a straight 19mm connection, I'll replaced the entire system with a catch can at some point. Some broken plastic fell inside when I removed the old one so I vacuumed it out with a modification of the vacuum hose. I bought a Mann filter and some millers oil, I went for 5w40 as it has a few miles on it now.

Loads of fun and games today. I've replaced the thermostat because the car would only get up to 60 degrees whilst driving, that's all sorted. of course the sai pump hose snapped straight away shortly followed by the dipstick tube dropping plastic shards down the tube into the sump, a great design. I've put new rubber mounts on the sai pump I've ordered a new dipstick tube which was cheap and in the uk and I've ordered new hoses for the sai pump from China because they're £13.10 instead of £60. I'll delete the sai at some point but not yet. Next weekend I'll be taking the sump off to clean the bits of dipstick out, I suppose I should price up a new oil pickup too...

Sorted, it wasn't too hard either, the engine bracket is the worst part. Fingers crossed now there's no more EML and hopefully it runs a little better

Well it looks like I'm going to be busy tomorrow, the timing is one tooth out!.. So after looking at the spark plugs and coils earlier I thought I'd contact my mate with vcds, he said yeah no worries I'll be home from 630, come over and we'll scan it. I started to do a little research into what we would need to scan and how to run the diagnostics properly. I found the fault code p0340 on the ross-tech wiki page which said check the wiring, replace the sensor or check the timing. I checked the timing, it's really hard to get the camera to focus because I didn't take it all apart but as the can see with the cam pulley timed up the crank pulley is miles out So I lined up the timing marks on the crank pulley and re checked the cam pulley, it was one tooth out. I couldn't get a clear photo of it but I'll post some better pictures tomorrow when it's fixed

Thought I'd investigate the spark plugs and coils this morning, the plugs are standard ngk pfr6q, the gaps seem fine at 0.8mm I've got three different model of coil pack, all of which look like aftermarket ones. I'm going to put a new set of plugs in and change all the coil packs. Does anyone know if the red r8 coils are worth buying, they seem to be available for a good price. Otherwise what coil packs have you peeps got in yours? Carparts4less have 5 different brands, awesomeGTi sell the red r8.

I changed the knocking ARB bushes today, easy enough job. The hardest part is getting the drop link out of the ARB which requires the weight of the car so the thread isn't binding up in the hole of the ARB. Actually the hardest part is getting the bolt back in the bush bracket, the new bush is bigger than the old bush as it's not been squashed yet and it's a pain to start the thread, if the bolt was just a little long it wouldn't be an issue. Anyway it didn't need to be swore at too much before it gave up and behaved itself. I coated the inside and outside in grease but I feel like the rough rusty ARB is going to chew the new bush up 🤔

Thanks, I could clean it out better now, when I tried washing it out the other day the water was flooding in both ends of the dashboard. It can stay like that for now though I've got other more pressing issues to sort out like the sai pump mounts, ARB bushes and thus afternoon the EML came back on. It had a camshaft position sensor fault when I bought it and I reset the light to see if it came back. It looks to be a new sensor but I can't see it well enough to say what make it is. All I know so far is it has power and ground. I need to get hold of vcds to do a better diagnosis, I'm tempted to invest but I haven't got a laptop and it all ads up. I do know someone with vcds but not sure when/if I can borrow it.

I can confirm that the 20mm grommets from Screwfix fit well in the whole next to the cabin filter, if anybody wants one I've got 99 left over😂. I used gasket maker to help seal it up and did the same for the filter box. Then I chucked in a new filter and jobs a good un. I took the wiper mechanism out (not as easy as I'd like but I worked it out) and removed the cover on the driver's side to out gasket maker around the the edge of that cover too. Final I put some gasket maker around the bonnet release cable grommet Now it's all sealed up I can think about washing the outside and see if the paint will polish up.

No worries, I love how everyone chips in to help on here👍

Hi Mike, thanks I think I've sorted the grommet, I picked up a bag of 100 from Screwfix for £2.69. I'll report back after I've fitted it. The link you posted leads me to a page with a diagram but the grommet isn't one in the picture.

I have read about all the engine bay deletes and I can see me doing that in the future but it looks easy enough to replace the mounts on the pump for now. It seems like if if don't get the car remapped after the deletes it will probably throw a code even with the resistors in place. What I'm saying is I'll get rid of all that extra gubbings when I'm more comfortable with the idea and I've got a plan. The engine bay does look a lot tidier when it's all gone that's for sure. I think I've found the correct mounts for the sai online, they're cheap so I'll order some and see how I get on.

Back at it today. Got the driver's side arch cleaned out. I've measured the anti roll bar, it's 20mm. the missing grommet seems to be 20mm too, they sell a box of 100 for £2.69 at Screwfix, I only want one😂. Also noticed that the sai pump mounts are broken, not sure what to do about that yet, I'll search the forum later.

Yeah I was thinking that maybe it means aircon off. The blowers stay on when you have Econ on so...aircon off/economy mode?

Yeah there was a lot, still got the driver's side arch liner to clean out too. Just got back from a family trip to IKEA for dinner, it's the first time properly driving it. The front anti roll bar bushes need changing, I can here them banging at slow speeds. I'll measure the ARB size and the size of the grommet tomorrow and get some ordered. What temperature should it run at, I thought it would be 90 but it's more like 70 I think. I presume the car has aircon but there isn't an aircon button as such. There's a button that says Econ!?

So it failed the mot on the drives side CV boot, not a suprise as it was advised last mot. Got the new one fitted today and just got it back for a retest. I also spent a bit more time on the scuttle leak. I need to replace the grommet that's missing near the heater filter. It was full of silicone but not water tight. I've stuck gorilla tape over it for now as it's the best I could do. Anyone know what grommet is supposed to be there and where to get one from?

Thanks for all the comments guys, I appreciate you all looking out for me and giving me advice. I've been at it again today, Mot on Monday so I thought I'd better take a look at the lights. All the lights apart from one number plate light worked, not a problem I thought, I've got spare push fit bulbs. Ah that's not what I wanted to see. Hmm the bulbs replaced but how am I supposed to get the rest of the screws out?! Anyway tested the new bulb and guess what...the other one blew. Never mind, drilled the heads of the other side and replaced the bulb. So both lights working but 4 screw "ends" to remove. I know I thought I'll pull the cover off the inside of the boot lid and see if I can remove the handle/trim panel and get a better look at it off the car...well blow me I could have changed the bulbs from inside the boot lid cover and left the screws alone, what a ******. At this point the weather is taking another turn for the worst so I did something I hate doing, I bodged it by sticking the lenses back on with silicone, not my best work and something I will be fixing properly at some point in the future but at least I'm heading towards an MOT with some optimism. What ever happens on Mondays mot test I'll be doing something to the car next week as I'm off work for the week so if it passes it'll be a service an a clean if it fails then I'll be fixing what ever that issue is.

Got a little bit more done this weekend, the weather has been crap though so not as much as I'd of liked. Interior back in, I've got water in the front passenger footwell though. Not a suprise to find this mess. I've vacuumed it out but the rain was too much to do a proper job so I've just made sure the drains are unblocked and put it back together without the filter in. I haven't checked the door membrane yet so it could be leaking through there. The central locking doesn't work on that door and I wouldn't be surprised if someone has been in there to look at it and not stuck the membrane back down. I had a mk1 Leon cupra about 10years ago and I remember that leaked and I fixed it with some really sticky stuff that comes in a roll, anyway I guess it's the same deal to fix Octavias too. Edit. One last thing, I'd like some new Mat's, the driver's one is knackered and the nearside rear mat is missing. Can you still get genuine mats or shall I get some aftermarket ones from eBay?