My 86 "Breadvan" aka The Breadmobile

Model: POLO 86C

Engine: 1043 CC

Suspension: Standard (though considering cutting the springs)

Brakes: Standard (looking to upgrade when I find what fits)

Wheels/Tyres: Standard 13" Steelies not sure on tyres (looking for 13" black banded steelies)

Exterior/styling: Standard

ICE & Security: Standard

Bought for £300 with a whole years MOT from a friends garage. She's not in bad condition bot nothing special, no major rust that I'm aware of at present though she needs a new drivers door as it's bent. Surface rust here and there mainly paint chips and a few small bits round the window seals.

Came with 77,000 on the clock.

I intend to make a full project of her, full repaint, new interior, upgraded brakes suspension wheels and eventually a 5 speed engine.

Not much mechanical experience but I intend on doing as much of the work myself as possible while keeping her on the road.

I'll keep this thread updated with each step I take.

Edited 14 November, 201411 yr by kraiig

Sounds like a bargain. Did the coffin come free?

I eventually want to get mine sprayed, you thinking of a rattle can job, or go full out on it?

Yeah the roof rack came with it and it's here to stay haha. I dismantled it today, sanded down the wood then stained and varnished it a dark Rosewood colour. The metal frame is currently primed and ready to be sprayed satin black tomorrow, depending on the weather.

As much as I'd love to have it sprayed proffesionally, that's beyond my budget. I plan to take as much care and time as possible and spray it myself, panel at a time, from spray cans. Can't be that hard can it? Haha

Well atleast its different. I think I'm gonna take mine off and give it a proper clean, and put some wood slats on.

I'm unsure about a professional jobby yet. But you should try telling that to whoever rattle canned my car before me. Dreadful

Sanding down the rear bumper and primering ready for black tomorrow (dependant on weather, been waiting days just to do this)

The faded bumpers look so shit hopefully the black will give it a new lease of life.

I'm really not keen on the plastic trim around the rear window either, but until I can afford to get the body painted and get the holes filled that removing the trim will leave, I'll probably spray that black too for the time being.

As I can't afford a decent set of alloys atm, I might replace the wheels one by one with the spare in the boot and spray the steelies gloss black for now, atleast doing them one at a time I can still drive the car around.

Not great progress but progress none the less :)

So today I sprayed the bumper black, and if I'm honest, I don't like it. It looks better, but, now that it looks nice and new I think it just clashes with the worn down car and stands out. I also cleaned up the plastic trim around the rear window. I was going to spray it the same black as the bumper but a mate told me I could just rub it down with smooth peanut butter, and hey ho, it worked! Much darker if you compare it to previous pictures.

I also brought the rest of the black plastic trims to life, again, with peanut butter! No need for pay for Back To Black, supposedly this works better and lasts longer. check out the faded plastic on the left and the nice new looking peanut plastic on the right haha

Who'd have known aye?

But in all seriousness I'm still not liking the black trim round the rear window. I might just remove it and fill the plug holes that it'll leave. Won't look great, but surely look better than the trim. Opinions?

I agree that the rear window trim looks awful, but personally having ugly, improperly filled holes would irritate me more.

If that wouldn't bother you, go for it.

Yeah I might just fill them and get one of those little Halfords color match pens that are used for scratches and try hide them best I can.

New problem, went to remove my wheels to paint them and realised the car didn't come with the lock nut tool for those specific steelies, each wheel has a round nut with three little holes in. Suggestions anyone?

Started to paint the steelies but it's taken me 5 days just to do one due to the weather. I've been dashing out to lay down another layer as soon as it stops raining for 5 fucking minutes. As I need to keep the car on road, I've only painted the spare wheel so far as I'm going to swap them over and paint them one at a time. It'll look a bit gimp with 3 shitty steels and one nice shiny one, then 2/2 3/1 again then eventually 4 nice glossy black wheels :) Dug out some pokemon cards from the attic to protect the tyres, I knew they would come in handy one day!! Haha

*update: Is it just me, or does this website severely degrade picture quality?? The black steely looks lovely, shiny and glossed on my phone but grainy and dull on the thread picture :/

Edited 14 November, 201411 yr by kraiig

I agree that the rear window trim looks awful, but personally having ugly, improperly filled holes would irritate me more.

If that wouldn't bother you, go for it.

yeah id wait for a second hand tailgate to come up , bodged over holes will look worse than the spolier

I agree that the rear window trim looks awful, but personally having ugly, improperly filled holes would irritate me more.

If that wouldn't bother you, go for it.

yeah id wait for a second hand tailgate to come up , bodged over holes will look worse than the spolier

Seconded, i've always liked the spoiler too.

As for the rattle can paint job, unless the paintwork on this is really terrible, don't do it. Been there done that and the finish is never right. The pokemon cards trick is good, i've always used the washing up liquid method.

It looks like a good example, thats one of my favorite interior/color combos for breadys.

I've ordered some 10mm blanking grommets to cover the holes under the rear window trim but they don't quite fit so I'll order some 8mm instead. Don't suppose anybody knows the exact diameter of the rear window wiper motor hole? I need to get a grommet for that also.

I'm not too bothered about having a perfect finish on the paint job, it's only a £300 car and I plan on rusting the bonnet anyway so it's a wee bit ratty.

The interior is in pretty bad condition, a lot of fag burns from the previous owners so I plan on getting them recovered with a classic vintagey Tweed material, like an old country hunting jacket Not much progress lately due to bad weather hope to get back to work on it asap!

Well I've had a step back in the project due to a stupid fucking coach driver side swiping me at a roundabout. I'm hoping the insurance will pay for the repairs rather than write off the car due to Low value vs. Repair cost. Such a piss take considering I only painted the bumper a few weeks ago :@ aggyyyy is not the word. :angry:

Dam... :( if I had to guess, that a insurance garage repair would be far more than the cars worth. I would see if you can get some cash estimates and then use that as a guide to perhaps get cash in lieu of repair.

That's not good about the crash :( although the Polo seems to have stood up well considering you say a coach hit it.

I dare say if you go through insurance to get it repaired they will write it off as for a start they probably won't be able to find a brand new genuine tail light unit.

See if you can agree on a cash settlement to save any hassle.