My cars...

[5potTurbo]

Lovely S55... wheelnuts look like they could do with changing

[DannyScene]

Love readers cars threads like this one, however, that merc has not aged at all well has it

[willisit]

A great read! Thanks for that

[djgritt]

Love the AMG.

Saw it on CS, want one now. Ha.

[Chris x]

Audi:
Bought it exactly two years ago today! Gave it a wash a few weeks back but it's now rotten again due to the Mrs going back and forth from Uni.

Passed its MOT last month, went straight through! Also taxed it on the 31st





/////AMG:
Taxed this also last month, rotten ATM due to it now being the family car! I want to give it a decent clean in and out ASAP, hopefully have a weekend free soon!







Scooter:
Replaced the air filter and fuel filter last week as its now done 10000 kilometers (all done by moi!), so thought I would treat it!




Replaced the front and rear pads today and took it for it's MOT straight after which it passed! Taxed for £17 which covers me for a year!




Thanks for the comments so far! Hopefully the next update will be a nice clean /////AMG!

Edited by Chris x on Saturday 14th February 22:29

Edited by Chris x on Saturday 14th February 22:31

[Chris x]

Timbola said:

Good read! Thanks for posting.

Just one question about the S55; Electric seats in the rear??

Yup, LWB has electric seats in the rear. Also heated and cooled on mine!

[Chris x]

/////AMG
Gave it a good polish last weekend, very overdue...



Took some photos with my Canon EOS M when I got home...















Few interior pictures...







and the all important S Class W220 rust...







It's really fked me off, but I have been waiting for it given their reputation. That's rust on both rear quarter panels where the bumper joins the panel, two spots of rust around the sunroof and rust starting underneath the bonnet emblem. I think i'm going to take it off the road in a few months to strip it back to bare metal to see what's what then to get a body shop to paint it.

It continues to do its Dad duties well and I thought i'd start teaching my 3 month old daughter to wash it the other day




Parent & Child parking



Treated it to some new windscreen wipers:




Genuine delivered for £30 off eBay, not bad and a great improvement!

Bit of beading!:




TT
Gave that a quick once over and got a few shots with the Canon. Need to refurb the wheels again when it warms up!









Not bad for and old car with 130k miles on.

Also have some new genuine wipers from my local Audi main dealer, £40. Bit more than the Merc but I couldn't find any genuine ones on eBay. That's the mothers day present sorted!


S320 CDI
I'll be running in this whilst the /////AMG gets renovated. My Grandad had two of these, this one he's had for a few years and the other one we picked up from a BCA auction about 6 months ago. It was a facelift with heated front and rear seats, xenons, satnav and parking sensors so the luxury of the /////AMG that I bought off him but with the engine he wanted. This one however is poverty spec hence the upgrade last year. Unfortunately he lost his battle with cancer a few weeks ago , so i'm reluctant to get rid of it, plus the fact he spent £2k+ on suspension wishbones, track rod ends etc on this in 2013. This is rusty rusty and needs a good clean up! Think i'll start with this one first for a bit of practicing!












Thanks for making it this far! Hopefully some updates soon other than washing cars!

Edited by Chris x on Saturday 14th March 23:25

Edited by Chris x on Saturday 14th March 23:29

Edited by Chris x on Saturday 14th March 23:30

[mattman]

How did you repair the kerb marks on the wheels before painting? I have some black wheels that i fancy changing to gunmetal but not sure best way of tidying up the edges.

[Remagel2507]

Sorry to hear about your Grandad, seems like he was a real fan of the S Class though. Not seen an S Class with that low spec in a long time don't know what Merc were thinking having such a basic looking radio in their flagship car.

Oh and your S55 still looks

[Chris x]

Decided the other week that the /////AMG isn't really big enough as the family wagon so have decided to buy one (a family wagon)!

Had a think and kept coming back to a Discovery 2, 7 seats, great towing capacity and old school enough to fix yourself!

So last week I picked this up, with a V8 engine of course! It's extremely clean!




















It's the 1st release of the Discovery 2 being on an S (98) plate, but it doesn't have the hideous (IMO) face-lift headlights and has the cheaper tax. It's an ES model so has heated leather, dual digital climate control, ACE, SLS, heated front windscreen etc so has a few toys. Still drives like an old Land Rover however which I was a bit disappointing and really is night and day compared to the /////AMG! But I've learnt to love it already!

I paid £2451 for it. It's had the rear air bags replaced, head gaskets, brake lines, hoses, disks e.t.c over the years. The previous owner bought it in 2001 so I don't think I'm going to loose much on it if I maintain it. It's also only on 75k miles!

I have a few plans for it:
Face-lift rear lights and guards
Modular wheels with big tyres or bigger face-lift alloys
Re seal the twin electric sunroofs as they leak
Passenger central locking doesn't work
Wet vac carpet and condition the leather
Replace the bonnet as that's been very badly repainted before (where the previous owner removed the Land Rover decal )
Drivers side headlight is stone chipped which has left water inside it
Air-con doesn't work - just a re gas?
Auto dimming mirror has leaked
Fit an exhaust (it fell off on Monday )

Probably more but that's all I can think of for now. The insurance finishes on the /////AMG in May so that will be coming off the road for some rust treatment!


Thanks


Edit:
Just remembered, I fitted a new Land Rover decal to the bonnet this morning, that the previous owner removed

Edited by Chris x on Friday 10th April 22:43

Edited by Chris x on Friday 10th April 22:52

[Chris x]

mattman said:

How did you repair the kerb marks on the wheels before painting? I have some black wheels that i fancy changing to gunmetal but not sure best way of tidying up the edges.

Just some liquid metal that I bought from Halfords. Your suppose to be able to tap threads in it once set! I think any filler will do though!

[Chris x]

Remagel2507 said:

Sorry to hear about your Grandad, seems like he was a real fan of the S Class though. Not seen an S Class with that low spec in a long time don't know what Merc were thinking having such a basic looking radio in their flagship car.

Oh and your S55 still looks

Thanks mate!

Yeh, shocking spec for an S Class! However I wont be using it now due to my recent purchase! It can live on the drive as a spare!

[Chris x]

Managed to pick up a very clean second hand exhaust for £30 delivered on eBay.

The old one was very rusted on (to be explected), so the angle grinder was out.

I had to drill the old studs out as this exhaust had studs also. Run an M10 die down to clean it up.

Bit of a bodge but for £30 i'm happy! Exspecially as they seem so hard to source?!

Some pictures...

Jacked up:





Arghh...


Old exhaust vs new:


Studs ground down and drilled out on the centre box:



Bolted back on and complete!

[Chris x]

Took the rear bumper off the /////AMG today to start fixing the rust.

Does anyone have an tips or advice, ideally on what products to use to stop the rust coming back?

Going to pick up some paint from Mercedes and give blowing it over ago myself. If it looks st i'll chuck it in a body shop.

100% want to do the rust treating/priming myself. It's been in for warranty before in 2008 and 2010 for the rear arches, so you can see why i'd rather do the prep my self. It's done 15000 miles since 2007/ 2000 miles since 2010 so it's not exactly lasted long, especially as it was garaged all it's life.


Thanks.


Edit:
I will polish the exhausts up whilst the bumpers off!

[JonoG81]

Very nice collection you have there

[Chris x]

Long overdue update!

I'll start with the /////AMG and will try and catch up with the other cars...

Ground all the rust back to bare metal:



















Every bare bit of metal was coated in Kurust, wiped off, ground back again and then covered in Bilt Hamber deox gel and covered in cling film for a day. Once wiped down it was then decreased and coated in Bilt Hamber electrox high zinc primer:




















Flatted back and ready for some colour:












and lacquered:





I then coated the rear in underseal






Rear TPMS brackets blasted, painted in zinc primer and re attached:







Inner wheel arch rust prevention...(same methods as before but I used brush on Zinc 180 primer)








and then undersealed the same as the rear end:













Inner plastic arches back in. I masked the plastic and gave the inner arches a light dusting of underseal:





Back down on all fours after months in the air...low!!!


All the boot carpet came out so this was re fitted:


Bought a car cover as it gets quite dusty even when sitting in the garage:



Completed the paint work mid November, but didn't want to really use it over the Winter, so got the calipers refurbished and painted:



New disks and pads for the rear (fronts were new at Merc only a few thousand miles ago):


Off:


Decided to paint the disks to stop the outer edge and hub area from going rusty:








Baked in my Grans oven :



Old vs New rears:


Going black so same as fronts...:




After some oven treatment:


Bit of copper grease and back on the car:




New genuine hoses, retaining clips and screws:



Callipers back, decided on going Renault liquid yellow:
















So a summary...

The paintwork: You can tell I've done it (when up close), wouldn't surprise me though if the majority of people would miss it. I should of painted more of an area to give it a blend, but as I hadn't done any DIY paintwork before, I was worried about fking it up, and more of an area would have meant a more noticeable fk up! Turns out I didn't do too bad a job, so ended up wishing I had done more of an area. I could of got a body shop to do it, but it's had that route twice before under warranty as I've explained in a previous post and you can quite clearly see they've not done a very good job with the rust prevention. I'm going to leave it as is and use the car this year, then inspect it next year and see if any rust has come back. If it's still OK, i'll get a body shop to do the rear quarters and if it's come back i'll probably cut it out and weld new stuff in. I would be tempted to spray it again as I think I can do a better job than this time round, although I know a body shop is the right route to go (for the painting).

The brakes: It was sitting in the garage waiting for spring and the calipers were in shocking condition, so thought I'd have them refurbished. Went for Renault liquid yellow, although they only look yellow when the sun is on them, and more green when in shade which I'm not fond on. Unfortunately the fronts need doing again as I got some brake fluid on them when bleeding, so may just have all four done again in a normal yellow. I know the colour wont be to everyone's taste, but it livens the car up a bit and really shows off the 8/4pots well!

I went for Pagid rear disks and pads which I got for around £170 from memory at ECP. Calipers were an eye watering £860, but that included spark eroding the 4 bleed nipples at the front as they were seized and heli coiling, two stage paint, new dust covers and seals in every piston and ceramic coating which is supposed to make them easier to clean.


Took it two North Wales with me a few weeks ago for a little family holiday which was great.

Cleaned up before I left:







Wales:








Planned on doing the EVO triangle and exploring a few roads, but Dad duties meant none of that happened. In fact the required Dad driving style meant this happened!




Did 1000 miles in it without a single issue.


It will probably come off the road again in a few weeks to get the calipers re done.



That's the AMG pretty much up to date!... more updates to come!

Well done if you made it this far! I need to get into the habit of updating this real time!

[anonymous-user]

Awesome.

[alec.e]

Very nice! Great job!

[5potTurbo]

OP: very nice, and good job on the rust repairs.

I'll reiterate my comment now from early 2015 ...

5potTurbo said:

Lovely S55... wheelnuts look like they could do with changing

....they're letting the car down when the rest looks soooo clean.

[Chris x]

Updates...

AMG:

Calipers redone in Porsche Speed yellow:






Used now and again, bit of snow foam action:











V8 Discovery went around a year ago. As I've mentioned in a previous post, it was purchased to save using the AMG. When I was at work, the other half used her Audi TT with my youngest in the front, so it worked well. However when my youngest (now eldest) was 3 months old, we found out we were having another. So the V8 was sold and made space for an Espace (head over heart!!!), as the TT wouldnt work with 2!


Espace:

The espace was a pile of st. It was battered and needed front lower arm wishbone joints, inner rack joints and 4 new tyres. It was rank inside, but it was only £580. It was the biggest, safest car I could find for the money. However after just a few months, coming to a junction, with 6 people in my car I look to the right seeing a car already on its side flying towards me. I pulled forwards as much as I could without approaching the main road to much, but she still hit me. Car owed me £900 all in, insurance paid out £3100, which just about made driving around in an Espace worth while! Eldest was 9 months old at the time (wouldn't stop screaming) and the other half was 6 months pregnant - not fun at all!

Doing it up:



Never to be seen again!:






Vectra C:

I then bought a Vectra C nav for £1600. Needed a gear linkage repair (common fault), but other than that it was perfect. Had that from September 2015 til February 2016. Someone from work wanted it, so a deal was done which made it worth while to sell and move on. It had the Z19DTH engine (1.9 CDTI), I put a DTUK box on it, should of been around 200BHP. It certainly went well!






Zafira B:

Purchased this to replace the Vectra. Same engine, but with 7 seats, auto lights/wipers, satnav, half leather, bluetooth, front & rear sensors e.t.c. It also has the XP kit which I think finishes it off. Bought for £1600 with 107k miles on the clock. Cambelt/water pump done, clutch replaced, FSH e.t.c It did however have a DPF fault (hence the price). This was mapped out and removed along with the cat and pre cat.







May 2016:

Aircon never worked, new Delphi condenser fitted. Fan had rubbed holes though the read. Luckily the replacement had additional brackets. Fitted, gassed and working!:




August 2016:

Turbo started whistling when accelerating. Used it for a few months/ few K miles, decided to bite the bullet and get it refurbished as I didn't want it going and doing more damage:

Stripping down:





Turbo re furbished, new gaskets, studs, nuts, genuine oil feed pipe e.t.c....:





The existing coolant rad was fked. Didn't leak, but it was battered where the turbo had obviously been off before my time. I also replaced that as it made sense whilst everything was off:



Ready to put back together:









4 new tyres whilst we're at it:






Have given it 3 oil changes in the past year/5000 miles using the Genuine Dexos 2 oil. The car dumped diesel into the sump when it had the DPF fault. I think this is what killed the turbo. Runs OK now. Always paranoid about the M32 gearbox going tits up, but for the money I paid, I cant complain. Used and abused, rarely cleaned. But to me, that's the idea of a family wagon.



Discovery TD5 ES:

This came up for sale locally. £1700 all in (by the time I had collected it, the auction was up to £2100). It had just had the front bearings done (expensive on these). I love these. I miss my Defender/Off roading days and my old V8. I have no need for this, but I like the idea that its there to do whatever job you want. It has 1 previous owner. Every receipt from new, the original bill of sale, EGR delete, e.t.c. I have had to replace the X,Y,Z gearbox switch. Its done 150k miles, but with the history, it means nothing. It does need a few jobs (rust removing from the rear chassis, zinc priming and under sealing, lots of play in the power steering box, air-con doesn't work & the front driver side suspension has dropped), but nothing that it wont pass an MOT for. This will all be done in the spring/summer as a mini project. It has the rear optional climate and DVD too. Which sold it to me as I'm a sucker for a decent spec!













Eldest loves it, although they don't go in it much as they aren't particularly safe in a crash!





ST Mondeo (TDCI )

Browsing on eBay as you do. This was for sale for £450. 99k miles and pretty much every optional extra - Satnav, Xenons, and rear entertainment system, but the engine knackered. As with the Discovery, I have no need for this, but I like a project and a good spec, so it was delivered all in for £600. This was in March 2016. It sat untouched whilst I completely re did my Garden until September 2016. I purchased a 2nd car from Copart (rear ended) for £500 all in delivered. Most bits sold which made the engine virtually free.









All back in and running. Injectors reprogrammed using F Super:




Failed its MOT on front springs snapped, so eibachs fitted:






ST wheels, facelift chrome grill, facelift chrome window trims, facelift chrome fog surrounds, rear lights, chrome boot trim e.t.c fitted to make it look like the final face lift. I do miss old ST220, so this sort of fills that empty gap. Optional extras make up for the 'TDCI'. I don't like diesel clatter, but I must admit the torque, MPG is good.











Clio 182:

I've read about these little things for years on here. November 2016, one turns up on eBay as spares or repairs. Aux belt had split, kindly entering the cam belt housing causing the timing to jump. The week before, the previous owner had replaced various suspension components, new discs and pads all round, 4X Dunlop tyres + a scorpion exhaust. A deal @ £650 was done. I have just sourced a smashed up donor car for £300, so I thought it would be a good time to update this thread so I can update it real time. Towed this back with the Discovery.










Cleaned and in the garage ready to take the engine out. I plan on collecting the donor car next Wednesday. It has the cup pack for the spoiler, but not the cup pack for the suspension, however I will drop it on coil overs and the wheels will get refurbed in anthracite. Other half got me a £100 voucher for fathers day last year for a track day. Think it expires in May/June this year, so I plan on getting this running for April. Watch this space.









Eunos:

This is another car I've read about and wanted to own. January 2017, a family member rang up (knows I love cars) asking if I wanted their Eunos as they were going to scrap it, they had owned since 2007. They said it would require welding, but had MOT til April. I said yes, as I could run around in it until April, where I could scrap/sell/fix it. It has a stainless exhaust and drives brilliantly - i'm hooked. It has new brake hoses, discs and pads all round and the radiator was replaced last year. I took it to my mates MOT centre, and it is solid clean underneath. He checked the brakes, lights, e.t.c. and other than the emissions (weren't checked), he sees no reason why it wouldn't go through. This will be staying. I have the original Eunos wheels on the way (purchased off ebay). It needs a full respray, which I may get done this year, a new roof (will do ASAP) and a good clean up. Ill zinc prime and underseal the underneath. I have already unblocked the sill drain holes so no more sloshing. It's not really moved for 2 years and other than buying a new battery - I've been using it all last month!









So 'My Cars':

S55 AMG - My baby/special/GT car
Audi TT 225 - Her car
TD5 Disco - Off road/towing/go anywhere car
Zafira - Family whip
ST - Backup to the family whip and what I use if shes got the Zafira
182 - Track car
Eunos - RWD/drift/soft top/back up track car.

Lots of man maths required here.

Thanks if you've mad it this far!

Edited by Chris x on Thursday 2nd March 15:00