A tale of two MPV's - bangernomics and veg oil
Discussion
I have run several AFN engined TDi's over the last few years as they run well on vegetable oil and are uncomplicated if a bit/very rough. A couple of years ago I got my hands on an Alhambra for £1,500, over the 35k miles I have put on it I think I have saved over £3k in fuel costs. On the flipside I have paid about £1k in repairs to the clutch and radiator. The first clutch I put in it broke up after 1k miles, it was a cheap Eurocarparts single mass clutch conversion, but to their credit Euro refunded me for the parts. I then put a Luks DMF and clutch in it.
In November last year my Alhambra ate its turbo, taking some of the turbine blade into the engine and massive oil usage. Replacing the turbo resulted in a running car, but just as I got it going the MOT and tax expired. The car now smoked badly, which may have been due to simply an oily exhaust. I pulled the exhaust off but it still smoked, and the exhaust manifold wouldn't shift. As I couldn't use the car on the road at this point I gave up and started to strip the car for bits, just as well as it was going mouldy inside.
I can't seem to manage without 7 seats, something the size of a van without the seats and the equivalent of 130mpg so started to look for another one. Oh and the equivalent of over a grand's worth of diesel in the form of veg oil also suggested another AFN engined car was on the cards. My search led to nearly buying a £500 Alhambra that had a blown turbo but was described as being good. A 120 mile drive with a hired trailer behind the 110 was a complete waste of time, the car was fit for the scrapper. Lesson learnt, buy local, don't give a deposit!
The next day I spotted a 98 Galaxy TDi Ghia X at a garage, 6 months tax and 10 months MOT with 138k miles, £1150. Going against what I had learnt the day before I put a deposit down and drove 100 miles to see it. This time I got lucky, it had every option on it and was very clean with a few dents but not bad at all. The sills are usually crushed by the arms of a post lift but these were good, and the underneath was nearly mint. Its been well looked after, but there is no history from 2005 and I have to change the cam belt as I have no idea when it was done if at all.
So far I have discovered the auxillary heater was not working and dripping diesel on the ground, fixed by fitting my old heater. The key plipper didn't work, swapped my old one over and programmed it to the car.
The glow plugs are not working at all, the light goes straight out I have a couple of relays to swap out from the old car that might sort this and a spare set of glowplugs if it doesn't. The abs light is on and I have the old front driveshafts to fit which might get rid of this, I need to put VAGCOM on the car and have a look. Strangely for a car with a newish MOT the inner cv boot is very torn, which should have been a fail hmmm. On the plus side I have captain chairs, climate control, heated seats and front screen, electric everything and the display read 50mpg on a steady run on the M25.
The next step is to twin tank for vegatable oil and stick my winter tyres on, then hand over to my wife so I can get my Defender back from her clutches.
In November last year my Alhambra ate its turbo, taking some of the turbine blade into the engine and massive oil usage. Replacing the turbo resulted in a running car, but just as I got it going the MOT and tax expired. The car now smoked badly, which may have been due to simply an oily exhaust. I pulled the exhaust off but it still smoked, and the exhaust manifold wouldn't shift. As I couldn't use the car on the road at this point I gave up and started to strip the car for bits, just as well as it was going mouldy inside.
I can't seem to manage without 7 seats, something the size of a van without the seats and the equivalent of 130mpg so started to look for another one. Oh and the equivalent of over a grand's worth of diesel in the form of veg oil also suggested another AFN engined car was on the cards. My search led to nearly buying a £500 Alhambra that had a blown turbo but was described as being good. A 120 mile drive with a hired trailer behind the 110 was a complete waste of time, the car was fit for the scrapper. Lesson learnt, buy local, don't give a deposit!
The next day I spotted a 98 Galaxy TDi Ghia X at a garage, 6 months tax and 10 months MOT with 138k miles, £1150. Going against what I had learnt the day before I put a deposit down and drove 100 miles to see it. This time I got lucky, it had every option on it and was very clean with a few dents but not bad at all. The sills are usually crushed by the arms of a post lift but these were good, and the underneath was nearly mint. Its been well looked after, but there is no history from 2005 and I have to change the cam belt as I have no idea when it was done if at all.
So far I have discovered the auxillary heater was not working and dripping diesel on the ground, fixed by fitting my old heater. The key plipper didn't work, swapped my old one over and programmed it to the car.
The glow plugs are not working at all, the light goes straight out I have a couple of relays to swap out from the old car that might sort this and a spare set of glowplugs if it doesn't. The abs light is on and I have the old front driveshafts to fit which might get rid of this, I need to put VAGCOM on the car and have a look. Strangely for a car with a newish MOT the inner cv boot is very torn, which should have been a fail hmmm. On the plus side I have captain chairs, climate control, heated seats and front screen, electric everything and the display read 50mpg on a steady run on the M25.
The next step is to twin tank for vegatable oil and stick my winter tyres on, then hand over to my wife so I can get my Defender back from her clutches.
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