Hi from Nottingham

Hello , just signed up.
I'm picking up L4 FRP (#0008) next week. Haven't been this excited about buying a car for a long time, I'm really looking forward to the 'FRP experience'.
Paul

[V4FRP]

Welcome along FRP ownership is certainly something to look forward too. You are in the right place to find plenty of help and advice. Happy ownership.

Thanks for the welcome, as it happens I've just been in your neck of the woods...been working in Carmarthen all week.

Hi Paul..

[V4FRP]

Paul0008 wrote:

Thanks for the welcome, as it happens I've just been in your neck of the woods...been working in Carmarthen all week.

18 miles down the road. Let me know if your down this way again there were 3 FRP's within 18 miles of you.

El dude wrote:

Hi Paul..

Eyup Chris, I hope you and my lad's 1.7 are getting well aquainted

Yes, it's been a friggin hard work!.. i'm so knackered today, tried to put it to bed and get finished but still a bit more to do... :-/

El dude wrote:

Yes, it's been a friggin hard work!.. i'm so knackered today, tried to put it to bed and get finished but still a bit more to do... :-/

All your hard work is well appreciated mate. L4 FRP comin up next

fingers crossed all done tomorrow morning... had a right faff cutting out the nearside wishbone after the front bolt sheared off...

has been character building

Doing the actual belts and timing was by far the easiest part

That's a turn up for the books then an straight forward timing job

OK, so I thought I would turn this into a bit of a thread for FRP#8 gradual resto and tidy up. If it's in the wrong area can someone please advise.
Here he is shortly after his move from Bolton


During the past few weeks I've been doing a bit of engine bay cleaning as I thought it could look a bit better.
A couple of before pics




This is how it looks now










It's a pleasure to lift up the bonnet now

[V4FRP]

That looks great Paul if you were closer I'd bring V4 and L8 over for you to magic sponge them!!

If I had enough time I'd love to.
You would have to do without them for a while though...it's taken me a few weeks to do that in little bits at a time

So this weekend I decided to replace my rear top mounts, I've been getting some annoying squeaking and occasional clonking from the back end.
The rear beam bushes are ok as they have been done in the past few years so I ruled them out.
To be honest the top mounts I took out were in pretty good shape, no different from the new ones. But I found a problem with the nearside one...the top mount seemed to be below the lowest spring clip and was a bit of a pig to remove.
The correct position is between the spring clips ????? I am thinking that they have been replaced before and someone didn't do this one right
Suspiciously this is where the noise seemed to be coming from. It went back together OK, hopefully it should make a difference.
I didn't take many pics as I was shower dodging most of yesterday, but now they're all cleaned and freshened up and ready to go back in tomorrow

[V4FRP]

Looking great let us know if that cures the problems. Me with L8 I just use earplugs!!!

OK, I got the struts re-installed this morning before the rain started. This was a fairly easy operation.
I found that you can lower the beam just far enough to manouvre the struts in and out without removing the brake calipers (the danger being that you could overstress the flexible brake lines).

Passenger side....



And the top nuts tightened down....






In my opinion the most difficult part of this is re-fitting the rear seat belt mount brackets and the trim panels. I don't think there's any way you could manage to remove the strut top nuts without removing the brackets (as I think I have read on other forums).
This is how tight they are....






In the first photo you can see the three 8mm bolts (13mm socket) which hold the bracket in position. The fact that there is no slot in the rear end of the rear quarter trim panel for the seat belt makes this a very awkward job. As well as fighting with the bracket, you have to contend with the retraction of the belt.
I made the mistake of not pulling out the seat belt before I removed the bracket so when I came to refit it was very tight.
On the drivers side I had to remove the belt from its floor mounting to get some slack

A quick test drive and all quiet now It used to squawk and click when I pulled on and off my driveway.

All done and back together now, another job off the list