Eunos Chump

Vel Satis is now fixed, after bleeding the clutch slave cylinder.  It's fed off the brake reservoir, and the level had got a bit low in there - didn't ping up an alert though, perhaps it's not working.  Need to watch the fluid level for a bit, maybe there's a leak somewhere.

BETRAYAL! The Vel Satis broke down the other day on the way home from work, with clutch hydraulic failure.  Spent about 3 hours waiting for the RAC, only for them to call me to say it would be another 2 hours at least.  It appears the fluid is shared with the brake reservoir and that did seem a bit low, so bought some fluid and topped it up but no change. Once the roads were quiet I drove the 20 miles home without a clutch, which was an interesting challenge with the added burden of an electronic handbrake.  Will have a look at fixing it over the weekend, with any luck it just needs bleeding.

 I'm still enjoying the Vel Satis, still unsure why.  The Mercedes rides better, handles better, sounds far nicer, is considerably faster and uses the same amount of fuel as this, yet the Renault is great.   Doh!  This error is pretty normal for this car though, it still works fine.  Apart from when it failed to disengage when I drove away once - I think it was because the car didn't full stop though, and it became confused.  Went down the road like a dog dragging it's arse along the ground until I manually released it.  Then there was a cow in the road, having a massive piss.  This was in Guildford, btw.  That was a very odd day.  I used a soft upholstery brush to clean all the surfaces, they've come up well.  The plastics have a thin layer of latex (presumably to improve the feel of them), but it scratches and muck gets encrusted within, which you can't shift easily.  Little clock tells time and lets you ...

It's here, it's vast, and I love it.  Definitely a wafting car - trying to go quickly results in engine noise and little of the promised Velocity, and in fast corners the only thing stopping it falling off the road is the fact you'll fall out of the seat first.  But those seats!  Wide and comfortable, it's nicer than my house (but that's not saying much, perhaps). Heated too. It's a big, soft cocoon of peace so it's definitely delivering on the Satisfaction front.   Took it to work today, bad traffic on the way home and had to make much use of the electronic handbrake.  Don't trust it, but at least I know where the emergency release is now.

Despite the sterling work of the GTV, I don't feel I have enough rammel in my life so I've taken steps: 5 more sleeps to go, during which I need to stick some new pads on the GTV and put the dash back together (the heater flap motors have started working again, I believe this is known as 'character'). UPDATE : this car is famous. For not being very good.

GTV is back on the road, and has covered 20 miles without the wheels falling off.  Getting the driveshaft back on was difficult, and then the bolts didn't screw into the flange as I'd expected, which was very puzzling.  Turns out there were nuts behind the flange - all 6 had fallen off and into an expansion gap in my concrete drive without me noticing.  What a donkey!  Had to use a spring compressor to get the strut back in place too, deffo the wrong procedure there.  Oil and filter changed, tightened up leaking coolant hoses, and it was ready to go. It does drive well and the engine is very eager, but I need to replace the cambelt ASAP; would be very annoyed if it went pop after all the time I've spent on it. Noticed some new problems while I was test driving it - drivers window rattly, but most annoyingly the air direction on the HVAC doesn't work (it's electronic and it seems there's a little motor module at fault). That prevents it being usabl...

Woke up early and set to work while the car was still frosted up. This machine is never far from my thoughts, it's become a puzzle I must solve. Perhaps I'm going a bit mental. Driveshaft finally off, though ended up taking off the strut to get clearance. I've got a PDF of the factory Alfa workshop manual (complete with dodgy translations), it reckons you can take the shaft off by only removing 1 bolt from the strut but nope. Should have just undone the bottom balljoint. New thermostat on, with £15 of new hoseclips from Halfords. Exhaust back on, but unable to test as in middle of oil change. Didn't take long for rain to stop my obsessive fun.

Have spent all day drilling out the broken studs on the cat on the GTV.  OK, I didn't start until mid-morning and then there was lunch, and 2 trips to Screwfix, and the light was going by 4pm, but still... am totally knackered now.  Last 1.5mm took 2 bloody hours! Chris welded up the broken exhaust mount for me, it's now seriously over-engineered. Exhaust was fixed at local place, have not been able to refit though because... .. this oil-cooler pipe is weeping, and there'd be no access with the manifold on.  Got the thermostat off and have flushed the cooling system, so making slow progress.  Next step - driveshaft.

Continuing to work on the GTV, slowly, and still not entirely sure why; perhaps it's like a sick animal I want to nurse back to health? Thermostat has failed open, this is the replacement.  About £30 and ECP had it in stock, currently fighting to remove the single-use hoseclips from the old one.  Discovered it's had a radiator quite recently, yet the coolant is mostly brown water.  Who does that? Engine is covered in oil, appears to be cam cover gasket but also suspect something is leaking under the cambelt cover.  Need to replace cambelt and balancer shaft belt as there's no history of either being done. Split intake hose not helping. I've given the frontpipe to a local exhaust fabricator to sort out.  Broken studs on cat now need sorting.  Awkward hub nut requires a thin-walled socket to remove it, which I've only been able to get from Amazon.  Everything is awkward on this car.

Ugh.  That flexi is causing me some right headaches, but it's one of 2 serious problems that'll prevent an MOT pass next month.  Other is a split CV gaiter, have got a replacement but weather has stopped play. 

 Getting up 5am on a Saturday?  Is any car worth this? Italian car will not start, of course.  A new battery from ECP sorts it.  £24 car now £93 (excluding flight and train fare @ £77)  240 miles later and I'm home.  It looks a bit tired but it drives really well. Tired now, going to bed.

Have finally won an Autoshite roffle!  6 weeks MOT, exhaust leak and it doesn't start when hot ('cos crank sensor), superb.  Going to collect it at weekend (it's UP NORTH).

Spent yesterday at Alton Towers, with Mrs Maimboy. Nemesis looks genuinely old and tatty now, I remember when it was shiny and new in 1994.  Was easily the oldest person on it, in fact I reckon none of the other riders or staff were even born back then. Wicker Man good, most extreme woody I've ever ridden.  It's replaced the Log Flume though, boo!  Lots of good memories of riding the Log Flume with Mrs Maimboy, stop erasing our youth! Hex still ace, not changed in the slightest since 2000 either.  I remember when this building was a gift shop back in the late '80s.  So old...

Mazda has just left the premises.  It's in safe* hands with another Autoshiter so it won't disappear, I'm a bit sad though. Still, I might win a Cavalier later in a roffle :) *he's going to use it as a track weapon

Have been back to McLean in the USA to remove all the kit from the office I installed 8 years ago, as the company continues to shrink. 2011 2019 It's all gone into a datacentre but we had to work ridiculous hours to get the systems live again for Monday; we arrived at 11am on Saturday to start installation in the DC, but it was 11 pm before the data cablers finished so we had to work non-stop until 7pm on Sunday to hit the deadline. Unfortunately this created a problem in Toronto which couldn't be fixed remotely, so I had to have a day trip there, as you do.  It was raining, I had a nice croissant for lunch but that was all I saw of Canada. Back to Washington, and had another look around the Air & Space museum before getting the bus to Dulles. Getting home was a faff, had to go via Detroit due to delays and ended up on an ancient Delta Boeing 767 instead of a Virgin A330.  It was alright though.  Final indignity was a £223 car parking surch...

My holiday this year is 2 weeks of messing about with cars and bikes, I'm bloody loving it.  This CLK is 3 years older than Mrs B's, has quite a lot less equipment, more rattles, more rust, but the familiar vague steering feel.  Blimey is is SMOOTH though, the V6 just whirrs and perfectly suits the car.  It's a little bit quicker than the 230K and uses a little bit more fuel, as expected. It's been raining since I bought it so haven't had much chance to tinker with it - a number of small fixes are required, the biggest being the weak OEM CD player but I'm already working on that. Didn't actually spend much time in Torquay, it's reminds me of Reading but with a marina. High street is vape shops, Sports Direct, Wetherspoons and tattoo parlours.

I decided to get another track bike the other day - maybe a GSX-R or possibly a Fireblade.  Yet somehow I've ended up buying this instead: It came up on Autoshite and was a golden opportunity, it has the silky V6 motor so I had to have it.  Collecting from Torquay tomorrow, excitement! Also fixed the Mini, bought another AC compressor from Silverlake car breakers for £25 and stuck it on this evening.  I'm pretty adept at ripping the face off Minis now, can do it in 10 mins.

New tyres on the H2 today, old ones shot after just 4200 miles.  Went for Bridgestone S21 again though, they do effectively glue the bike to the road. Fixed the Superduke too.  The chain tension nuts had seized in the swingarm (galvanic corrosion), it took several sessions to get them out (eventually a blowtorch on the swingarm with a rattlegun on the the bolt did the job).  Recovered the threads so total cost to fix was just £6.70 for new nuts/bolts. This means for the first time, every vehicle is operational and road legal!

Have been replacing the clutch on the aircon compressor on t'Mini today, my diagnostics indicated it was blown.  Got a replacement from Germany delivered for about £36. Access was impossible so I had to take the bumper off and put the front end into the service position, where it basically slides forward a few inches - there's a lot of screws and some big 16mm bolts that required a rattle gun to remove, but it's not bad. Eventually I get the pulley and clutch off the compressor (much circlip grief), and go into the garage to get the new one... suddenly POP then HISSSS.  The seal has blown off the shaft.  I eventually find the seal some distance away, it must have ricocheted off the house - good job I wasn't in front of it at the time.  Compresser is now toast so will have to get one off eBay. After all that, it seems the clutch is OK anyway - certainly there's circuit continuity (but was impossible to test this without taking it all apart anyway).  Per...