Post by josho on Jul 14, 2016 11:13:04 GMT
Hi everyone,
For this first post I am copying over the original start of my progress blog from another forum, as it saves me some time
The blog I am copying from is very neglected and is missing chunks throughout, I shall do my very best not to let that happen over here.
Here is the story of my MK1.
Hi all,
I recently picked up my relatively standard MK1 in silver.
It has a little bit of a back story, so forgive me but i shall tell it now.
My good friend Hal and I had been looking around for mk1s for a while as we were thinking of getting them as our next cars.
We had been to see a somewhat dilapidated mariner blue 1.6, described in its advert as needing a little work, the sills were shot and it was rusty as hell all over! After giving some vague excuse about getting back to the person about it after a think we hightailed it out of there.
Having seen that car we were a little worried about the condition of the cars in my price range and whether it would be worth me waiting a while and saving up for a better condition '5.
It was around this time we discovered a small number of problems (in excess of 30) on my daily at the time, a Peugeot 106 that i had taken from humble 1.0 litre to a fairly nippy high revving 1.6 8v with some pretty special bits.
We began the search for a suitable MX5 in earnest, got beaten to two lovely looking ones literally hours before we had arranged to see them.
I was beginning to lose hope about getting an mx5 and working out the costs of fixing the 106.
I was at work one sunday and hal messaged me a few possible '5s to look at in the evening after work, we quickly ruled out two, one for being rustier than a really rusty thing, and the other for being too much money for the amount of car.
And so we settled on going to see a red mk1, which had all the external features of a UK spec, had a mph speedo, and had been listed as being registered in 2000.
We rang the seller, asked whether he knew why the car was registered so late for a 1991 mk1, he said he didnt know, we asked him to check if the v5 said anything about it being an import, he said no, I said we should go for a viewing right away.
Hal and I set off the 60 miles north to Leighton Buzzard (aka Latent Ballbag) cruising round the M25 for about 20 miles and then off into possibly some of the best country lanes I have been down, smooth enough to go fast, yet twisty enough to keep you on your toes.
When we got there, we had a look around the car and checked the usual rust spots, they were shot through (literally) there were holes big enough to fit your hand in, yet there was no mention of this on the listing. . . We started to become a little worried, and when we checked the v5 I was furious.
It turns out the car was imported, after the guy had told us as far as he knew it was a UK model.
We bade our farewells and left feeling irritated and by this time pretty hungry.
We set the twatnav for the nearest Mcyouknowwhat and started heading there.
On the way there I was going back through the list Hal had sent me, sure that there was one we had missed out of our checks. I was right. There was a (you guessed it) Silver MK1 listed that was ending in one day, with no bids and a starting price in my range. And it was in Leighton Buzzard!
We shot the guy a message asking whether we could pop round to have a look at the car, laying it on real thick about the disappointment of the evenings previous viewing.
As we pulled into the car park of Mcyouknowwhere, we heard my phone bleep, it was the seller of the silver mk1! We grabbed a double cheeseburger each in record time and set off to see the '5.
By the time we got there the sun was just starting to set so we had a quick look around at the bodywork and under the bonnet to see if there were any gremlins hiding, it all checked out fairly well so i went back to Hals AX to grab the superawesome inspection lamp. I crawled under the '5 the best I could and had a good look around and a good prod with a screwdriver. The underside passed the prod test with flying colours(or should that be underseal?)
It was time for the test drive, the car had sounded a little tappy when we first fired it up, so we switched it off after about a minute of running time and checked and topped off all the fluids.
After that Hal and I strapped ourselves in fearing the worst and that the car would be a dog.
The car drove beautifully, and after around 2 mins of slow driving the engine quitened down into a steady purr. It felt very precise and responded well to my inputs. The brakes felt a little off but the car hadn't been used for a couple of months prior to our test drive.
The throttle pedal also felt pretty slack (more on that later).
After our relatively long test drive we dropped the car back and set off on our way home. With Hals favourite phrase being "Buy it" for the entire return journey.
After having a read over of the notes I had made about the car and having a sleep on it, I contacted the seller with an offer, and to my surprise he accepted it and removed the listing that same hour.
Fast forward a week and Hal and I were getting ready to jump on the train to Cheddington to pick up my '5. A 2 hour train journey followed with two uneventful changes, and we were in cheddington waiting to be met at the station.
After popping to the cash point to retrieve some real money, we got to my '5.
The seller had explained to us that after he had fitted the new lowering springs that he had not done the camber/castor bolts up in their original positions. So even before the car was signed in my name Hal and I were working on the suspension!
Happily all the bolts were still very free and moved smoothly when it came to adjust them, we set them to where they had been before the springs were fitted, tightened them up and popped the wheels on and set the car on the ground, straightaway you could see the difference, the wheels sat better with a little bit of negative camber.
The formalities were taken care of and we headed off. The car felt even better than on the test drive and felt a lot more surefooted. After a fuel stop we set the twatnav homeward bound.
About 20mins into the journey we got stuck behind a Z4 3.0l doing 25 in a clearly signed 40 area of road.
I sat back but quickly became bored when I saw the approaching national sign. He too had seen this sign and hoofed it. I dropped a couple of cogs and followed suit. After a couple of very shallow corners I caught up with him, and tried to follow him into a much sharper corner, which turned out to be very off camber, resulting in the backend letting me know it was providing the go and stepping out a little.
Suffice to say the rest of the journey was taken at a much calmer pace, and with somewhat browner underwear.
Anyway, I've waffled enough, they say pictures equal a thousand words, so ive probably waffled a picture out above.
That image is of the car when I first got her home. How long ago that was!
I will update some more with the more interesting parts of the build as detailed in the title.
For this first post I am copying over the original start of my progress blog from another forum, as it saves me some time
The blog I am copying from is very neglected and is missing chunks throughout, I shall do my very best not to let that happen over here.
Here is the story of my MK1.
Hi all,
I recently picked up my relatively standard MK1 in silver.
It has a little bit of a back story, so forgive me but i shall tell it now.
My good friend Hal and I had been looking around for mk1s for a while as we were thinking of getting them as our next cars.
We had been to see a somewhat dilapidated mariner blue 1.6, described in its advert as needing a little work, the sills were shot and it was rusty as hell all over! After giving some vague excuse about getting back to the person about it after a think we hightailed it out of there.
Having seen that car we were a little worried about the condition of the cars in my price range and whether it would be worth me waiting a while and saving up for a better condition '5.
It was around this time we discovered a small number of problems (in excess of 30) on my daily at the time, a Peugeot 106 that i had taken from humble 1.0 litre to a fairly nippy high revving 1.6 8v with some pretty special bits.
We began the search for a suitable MX5 in earnest, got beaten to two lovely looking ones literally hours before we had arranged to see them.
I was beginning to lose hope about getting an mx5 and working out the costs of fixing the 106.
I was at work one sunday and hal messaged me a few possible '5s to look at in the evening after work, we quickly ruled out two, one for being rustier than a really rusty thing, and the other for being too much money for the amount of car.
And so we settled on going to see a red mk1, which had all the external features of a UK spec, had a mph speedo, and had been listed as being registered in 2000.
We rang the seller, asked whether he knew why the car was registered so late for a 1991 mk1, he said he didnt know, we asked him to check if the v5 said anything about it being an import, he said no, I said we should go for a viewing right away.
Hal and I set off the 60 miles north to Leighton Buzzard (aka Latent Ballbag) cruising round the M25 for about 20 miles and then off into possibly some of the best country lanes I have been down, smooth enough to go fast, yet twisty enough to keep you on your toes.
When we got there, we had a look around the car and checked the usual rust spots, they were shot through (literally) there were holes big enough to fit your hand in, yet there was no mention of this on the listing. . . We started to become a little worried, and when we checked the v5 I was furious.
It turns out the car was imported, after the guy had told us as far as he knew it was a UK model.
We bade our farewells and left feeling irritated and by this time pretty hungry.
We set the twatnav for the nearest Mcyouknowwhat and started heading there.
On the way there I was going back through the list Hal had sent me, sure that there was one we had missed out of our checks. I was right. There was a (you guessed it) Silver MK1 listed that was ending in one day, with no bids and a starting price in my range. And it was in Leighton Buzzard!
We shot the guy a message asking whether we could pop round to have a look at the car, laying it on real thick about the disappointment of the evenings previous viewing.
As we pulled into the car park of Mcyouknowwhere, we heard my phone bleep, it was the seller of the silver mk1! We grabbed a double cheeseburger each in record time and set off to see the '5.
By the time we got there the sun was just starting to set so we had a quick look around at the bodywork and under the bonnet to see if there were any gremlins hiding, it all checked out fairly well so i went back to Hals AX to grab the superawesome inspection lamp. I crawled under the '5 the best I could and had a good look around and a good prod with a screwdriver. The underside passed the prod test with flying colours(or should that be underseal?)
It was time for the test drive, the car had sounded a little tappy when we first fired it up, so we switched it off after about a minute of running time and checked and topped off all the fluids.
After that Hal and I strapped ourselves in fearing the worst and that the car would be a dog.
The car drove beautifully, and after around 2 mins of slow driving the engine quitened down into a steady purr. It felt very precise and responded well to my inputs. The brakes felt a little off but the car hadn't been used for a couple of months prior to our test drive.
The throttle pedal also felt pretty slack (more on that later).
After our relatively long test drive we dropped the car back and set off on our way home. With Hals favourite phrase being "Buy it" for the entire return journey.
After having a read over of the notes I had made about the car and having a sleep on it, I contacted the seller with an offer, and to my surprise he accepted it and removed the listing that same hour.
Fast forward a week and Hal and I were getting ready to jump on the train to Cheddington to pick up my '5. A 2 hour train journey followed with two uneventful changes, and we were in cheddington waiting to be met at the station.
After popping to the cash point to retrieve some real money, we got to my '5.
The seller had explained to us that after he had fitted the new lowering springs that he had not done the camber/castor bolts up in their original positions. So even before the car was signed in my name Hal and I were working on the suspension!
Happily all the bolts were still very free and moved smoothly when it came to adjust them, we set them to where they had been before the springs were fitted, tightened them up and popped the wheels on and set the car on the ground, straightaway you could see the difference, the wheels sat better with a little bit of negative camber.
The formalities were taken care of and we headed off. The car felt even better than on the test drive and felt a lot more surefooted. After a fuel stop we set the twatnav homeward bound.
About 20mins into the journey we got stuck behind a Z4 3.0l doing 25 in a clearly signed 40 area of road.
I sat back but quickly became bored when I saw the approaching national sign. He too had seen this sign and hoofed it. I dropped a couple of cogs and followed suit. After a couple of very shallow corners I caught up with him, and tried to follow him into a much sharper corner, which turned out to be very off camber, resulting in the backend letting me know it was providing the go and stepping out a little.
Suffice to say the rest of the journey was taken at a much calmer pace, and with somewhat browner underwear.
Anyway, I've waffled enough, they say pictures equal a thousand words, so ive probably waffled a picture out above.
That image is of the car when I first got her home. How long ago that was!
I will update some more with the more interesting parts of the build as detailed in the title.
because idle is overrated. 
le sigh