I-Spy Classic Cars/Bikes-What have you spotted?

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CitroJim
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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by CitroJim »

Same here Neil, it's been years since I've seen one.. Almost as long as the last time I laid spanners on one and that was about 11 years ago now...
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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by NewcastleFalcon »

Much of my car owning activity has consisted of buying a car, running it for about 100,000 miles then phoning Elvis to take it away.

One of those was a metro bog standard 1.0 otherwise known as "Stan". Doing a regular commute from the sticks, there was always tremendous pressure to fix the car, to avoid the almost impossible public transport nightmare. This and the "outdoor workshop" and the inevitable sods law of rain, cold, snow when the car chose to breakdown, was the embryo of quite a decent vocabulary of "frustration releasers" over the years :!: :)

As a matter of idle curiosity I put "Stan's" reg into Autotrader Vehicle Check.....and it appears its still on the "database". Put another couple of former vehicles in, including a Xantia Beta Coupe (edit-that would have been a novelty-yes I meant Lancia Beta Coupe) which unfortunately I demolished the back end right up to just behind the driver's seat in, and thats still there as well! Correct descriptions as well. Probably says more about "the Database" than any evidence that my former cars have been carefully restored from the brink by new owners.

Just to put the "Metro Points" offer up on the new page here it is again. It will be a totally random "what are the chances of that happening?" if we spot a metro when out and about today.

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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by Zelandeth »

The wheels came off my first Metro, which was plainly a Friday afternoon special. It had an eclectic mix of bits from different models, and such joys as metric brakes on the left, and imperial on the right...trying to buy parts for that thing was a definite case of part number bingo. It also had the most useless headlights of any car I have ever owned.

Yellow one at least seemed to have been made as one unit, and showed me that BL could actually put a car together properly. ...sadly that was obviously the one out of every few thousand that was done right.

Don't remember them being bad cars to work on really, only job I remember being a real faff was trying to get the manifold to downpipe joint to seal on the first one as it was buried behind the engine. Never did get it quite 100%. Changing the distributor cap required care too or you would abruptly learn that the radiator fins were basically razor sharp - as they shredded your knuckles while you were getting the cap off.

Think they have probably been one of the least sworn at cars during normal maintenance that I've owned really. Niva probably was at the top of the list simply by virtue of having a heck of a lot of hardware crammed into a pretty compact vehicle and a stupidly complex steering system with entirely too many ball joints. The entire car also appeared to have been built around the steering box, which made topping the oil in it up "interesting."

Now, car I've worked on that has been sworn at the most is an L plate Jag XJ6 3.2 Sport, by a country mile. Lovely car to drive (and I nearly bought it at one point) but my word what a pig of a thing to work on! Everything is ten times more complicated than it needs to be, and everything is in the way of something else. The basic mantra when doing anything is "take the entire car apart first." The XJ8 which followed it was even worse to work on, but thankfully it went wrong slightly less often, and I managed to dodge more of the repair work...
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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by CitroJim »

No, most jobs were easy enough on the Metro Zel, barring the exhaust joint but that was a common problem on all A series'd engined cars of the era...

Fitting a LCB manifold (as the MGs had) helped...

I always used to remove the distributor complete when the points (remember those!!!) needed replacement or adjustment, much easier and saved knuckles and profanities.

Then I set the timing by strobe and always noted a big difference in performance! I found the old points ignition on all Metros never stayed in adjustment for long, ditto tappets and again tappet clearances could make or break performance too...

It was the last car I recall that had grease nipples...
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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by NewcastleFalcon »

One job I remember on my Metro was having to drill/ream a larger hole in the subframe to accomodate the replacement radius arm "through bolt"/ rod as the replacements were a meatier diameter than the originals.

A couple of spots so far, but not much pictoral evidence. A sort of pale lemon and white two-tone Triumph Herald convertible, and a Morris Minor promotional vehicle, and the odd MG Midget/MGB on the road. Not a sign of a metro though to claim the big points :!:

Can't find a lemon and white Herald as an example just yet, so in the meantime here is a gratuitous yellow Vitesse.

Image

regards Neil

PS Sort of like this only nicer.

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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by daviemck2006 »

I have a few spots. I'm cheating though, a classic car gathering was held yesterday.
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Just for Jim, a couple of yellows
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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by CitroJim »

That's a lovely collection Davie :-D

I especially like the 205 :wink:
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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by daviemck2006 »

I didn't have the 205 entered, it's looking a bit rough just now, the wheel trims all broke when I removed them and it's on rusty black steels. My mate, who has 7 classic cars says leave it like that with the scrape in the door and rusty wheels it's typically french!
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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by CitroJim »

I agree, I love a car that wears a patina and scars of many years of valuable and faithful service :-D I'm no fan of clinical concours jobs at all unless they have been done entirely by the owner as a labour of love and devotion. I'm sure many of those shown above have...

Hence my love of the rat look...

I mean, to restore a Maxi takes a lot of both doesn't it? Still, good to see one of the (sadly) many Great British 'so near but so far from being a world beater' lovingly preserved :-D
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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by NewcastleFalcon »

Plenty of points there Davie......but not a Mini Metro in sight for the 500 point bank holiday bonus!

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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by daviemck2006 »

That maxi was a total restoration, and I did like it. The red dolly had some battle and rust scars and I must say I could have taken it home. My 205 is so original I'm not going to fix the scar on the door, it could be worse with the paint not matching. If it gets alloys it will be the 14" 1.6gti alloys that shaun is replacing with 15's, or the 14's that were standard on the gtx and stdt, or just a set of period wheel trims if I can ever find some!!!!!!
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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by NewcastleFalcon »

the yellow convertible is one of these isn't it?

Image

Surprisingly affordable convertible, like the SAAB 900 posted up earlier in the thread

Regards Neil
Last edited by NewcastleFalcon on 31 Aug 2015, 23:21, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by daviemck2006 »

NewcastleFalcon wrote:Plenty of points there Davie......but not a Mini Metro in sight for the 500 point bank holiday bonus!

Regards Neil
I can't remember the last time I saw a metro. I have owned two of them, they were ok little cars. The first one was an original Austin, the 1st Mrs destroyed it in the snow, the second one was a Rover 114SLi which was nicely finished, but went with the first Mrs at divorce time.
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Post by addo »

Aren't car show "spots" cheating? :P
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Re: Classic car summer season-what have you spotted?

Post by daviemck2006 »

I did own up to cheating. I shall go stand in a corner and hang my head in shame
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