And now for the most important part of this built thread...

Today I passed my driving test! So now she's road going. Its a fantastic feeling.

:)

Well done on passin your test mate :)

Congratulations Now you can learn to drive & not how to drive to pass the test

Congratulations Now you can learn to drive & not how to drive to pass the test

That's the plan!

Thanks guys :)

First time, 5 minors. Not too bad.

Congratulations on passing your test. Now you can really enjoy your car :)

Thanks man, on my way home this evening though my engine was making a weird rattly sort of noise at low revs, so I think the 'enjoyment' has only just begun. ><

haha "Enjoyment"

Congrats on passing your test

Racked up about 200 miles today. Driving's going to be a novelty for a while. I feel!

I think I did like 1,500 miles in my first month of driving. I then did 1,500 miles for the rest of the year

Changed my wiper blades yesterday. The new back wiper however, had a slightly bigger bar that clips in to the wiper arm, I thought it was just stiff and ended up breaking the part that it clips in to.

Can't decide whether to source a new wiper arm, or de-wiper. After seeing how dirty my car got after two days I think de-wiper would be a pain in the arse.

Got a couple of pictures while I was out and about in the last few days...

The last one shows how desperately it needs lowering. I think it looks silly from that angle. That's a job for next weekend I think, when I've got a day off to do it.

I've also got my BBS RXII's going on tomorrow, so that will look much better as well.

I have mixed feelings about my day.

It started off well, I had my booking for my tyres to be fitted to my new alloys and I'm so chuffed with how they look on the car.

I also got my coilovers cleaned up ready for fitting...

Now for the not so fun bit... Went out with a mate this evening though, and while driving along the previously mentioned engine noise suddenly became a bit more noticeable, so i wound the windows down to listen out and then it got even more prominent still and I could feel something knocking so I pulled over and popped the bonnet and could instantly see that the auxiliary belt tensioner had snapped off and that was the problem. The belt hadn't snapped but the damage was done. Called the AA (Thank f*ck I had the sense to get breakdown cover) and somebody came out, waited about an hour in total. Got the tow eye hook out and got it towed back to my girlfriend's parents and now it's sat there waiting for the repair. I'm gonna do it myself, but it's annoying to have just passed and then have this. Still, I'm glad it happened when I had company and not on the way to work, or when I was on my own.

So overall, happy with the wheels, not so happy with the car.

The fun begins!

unlucky though mate!, at least it was the AUX belt!

Yeah, the tensioners are about £50. Could be a lot worse and I reckon I can probably refit it myself... Sounds pretty easy. Its just a pain in the arse really, little things like this keep happening and that car owes me more money than I paid for it...

My car owes me easily 10x what I paid for it :P it's easy and no fun to go buy a perfect car!

Shame it happened not long after your test least the cam belt didn't go. But should check when that was last done.

Yeah, I've got no service history at all, so I'm going to do the cambelt within the next month probably. I don't trust it as far as I can throw it at the moment. Thinking of doing the water pump too...

The positive side is that I've learnt so much and I feel comfortable doing all of this myself. Its good practice for when I've got a car I've spent considerably more money on and want to maintain it better than this has been. To its credit when it's running well Its a fun little car to drive and I do love it!

Edited 26 January, 201511 yr by mbusby993

Don't bother keeping a track of how much you spend on your car. It does nothing but depress you, that's what I've found anyway.

Just do your best to learn new things and maintain the car as best you can. Eventually you will have a car that is reliable and if anything does go wrong you will have the knowledge and the skills to find the fault and fix it easily and cheaply.

I'd rather have a £500 car that I've spent another £500 on to make it reliable rather than buying a car for £1000 just to end up with someone elses problems.

I'm taking it on the chin and learning from it, but you can't keep the frustration at bay when your first car keeps going wrong. Even in small ways. Admittedly, doing 90 on the dual carriageway probably finished it off. As always the break was preceded by "I wonder how fast it can go". Apparently the answer is 90!

Still, hopefully she'll be beating again tomorrow. Its an extra shame, because I think it looks so good on those alloys now.

I forgot to mention on this thread that I discovered wheel spacers already on the car, from the looks of it somewhere between 7 mm and 10mm. So that's a nice little freebie!

Thats probably down to the wheels that came on it when you got it, my mate got a set of halfrauds specials that were told would fit his car, the offset was that high that it was just rubbing his shocks when bolted up, so he had to get some small spacers.

Thats probably down to the wheels that came on it when you got it, my mate got a set of halfrauds specials that were told would fit his car, the offset was that high that it was just rubbing his shocks when bolted up, so he had to get some small spacers.

I think they were et36 or 38. The BBS' that I have on there now are 45 I think.

They look so much better!

So after one week of horrible weather, I'm starting to think I've made the worst colour choices. White car and black alloys?

Doesn't really do how dirty it is justice...

However my friend kindly depicted a phallus on my tailgate for me which I promptly rubbed off.

And again, the drivers side front wheel is worse, but I'm parked on a main road...

Not an ideal place to give her a clean either, so she's gonna be filthy a lot I think!

Desperate to give her a clean, but I've washed it about 5 times in the last 3 weeks.

Edited 3 February, 201511 yr by mbusby993

Gave her a half hearted clean today, and even that made it look 10x better!

Rust badly needs treating on the outer sill though. If you zoom in you can see how much there is...

Tried my out the central locking pump from my mates 6n2 recently and it seemed to work, so I ordered one from eBay. Didn't really want to give any money to a scrapyard for one because it would have been sat in damp, soggy conditions and it wouldn't have worked anyway. I'm sure the reason the pump I had stopped working was because some idiot had taken out the styrofoam insert and the first aid kit so the pump must have gotten a soaking at some point. So I did go to the scrapyard to look for the styrofoam part. i could have made something, but I figured if I got the genuine part then it would be the right shape and it would sit more snug. Because there's no first aid kit I mounted the pump where that would normally go as it's slightly more elevated and out of the way from the rear lights, so there'll be less chance of water getting to it if there's ever a leak. Hopefully.

All fitted up and working for the moment though. It's a nice novelty, unlocking all the doors was getting old quite quickly.

Edited 4 February, 201511 yr by mbusby993

Got a couple of bits done today.

I fixed my sidelight connector that had burnt out by stripping the wire back and using spade connectors to connect the old wire to the 'new' connector. Don't think it will last very long.

Got an oil change done once I finally got my sump plug free - thanks to Kwijibo for suggesting use of a wheel wrench. Now running some Shell Helix which was an in-store special at ECP for only £17.99. Bargain! Not driven it yet, picking up my girlfriend from work in about an hour.

And finally I had to tackle the door lock which bit the bullet yesterday. This one took me about an hour and a half, ruined my fingers and drew out a lot of cursing. It just wouldn't work for me, but I got there in the end.

Next job is most likely Coilovers on Saturday.

EDIT; As much as I think white cars look cool as f*ck, I don't think I'll ever own another one. I'm having to clean this about once every 3 days at the moment.

Edited 12 February, 201511 yr by mbusby993

I'll do a picture update tomorrow, but today I got the Coilovers on and (temporarily, until I decide if I want it) a cone filter. My shift at work starts at 5am, so I'll do a proper update tomorrow as I'm aalready getting less than 6 hours sleep !