Exactly, make do and mend, the hose itself is fine, so why pay to replace it when i can fix it on the cheap

magnumpi wrote:Overall, the car is fairly clean and tidy except the front valance, ...

Check this one out, magnumpi!
http://cgi.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vie ... 0409399493

Cheers

Tom

^^ Oh interesting ^^

So is that a buy it now price or still an auction?

It's looking worse than that pic now aswell with a hole begining to form

Just noticed he has a rear number plate panel aswell

Yes, but those are inside panels, one for a MkII saloon and one for a MkII hatch ...

Tom

Ah dammit, i couldn't tell from the pic, i could see they were different so just pressumed one was an inner and one was an outer.

Well i was working away from home all of last week, so today was the 1st chance i've had to have a look under my car to see whats going on. If you don't know i got a lift home from my local AA Patrolman last Saturday due to loss of drive. We had a quick look at the side of the road and came to the conclusion the prop had gone,but lowered cars and bigger exhaust make investigation quite difficult.

Anyway, today i dropped the exhaust at the downpipe then with the aid of my new gift from Father Christmas, i jacked the old girl up and had a look. Makes a nice change not having to roll it onto blocks of wood 1st to get the jack in place

Shiny, shiny







Obviously safety first kids, i placed my axle stands and crawled under. The front of the prop was fine, so i crawled to the back and all looked ok, apart from the molten rubber stuck to the floorpan, which can just about be seen here:





So off came the prop clamps, out came the rubber mallet and banging ensued until it came off the nose cone, it was then easy to pull the knackered end off of the gearbox. As suspected the rubber has gone in the prop. I take it these are glued in at the factory, but it's hard to tell, has the glue simply gone, or has the rubber fatigued over time and simple twisted and split?





Melted rubber/glue







While under there, i've noticed the engine rubber is now like jelly, so that needs doing ASAP.
By now i was loosing light, but got my spare prop halfway on, there it decided to stay and i can't get it on the splines any futher.

Whats the knack to easy prop refitment? The Haynes manual suggests undoing the gearbox mounts asfar as possible without removing them, is this 100% necesary, i take it you need it to drop the splines at a better angle to line up with the prop. Should i grease the splines to make it easier, i guessed not as both ends were bone dry?


If only they could go this low





Thanks for looking

Easiest way I've found is use the space around the gearbox to position the prop and bang it on the front splines first. once it's on nicely bang it the other way onto the gearbox splines.

Don't use grease. I did. I'm an idiot for doing so

Maybe thats where i'm going wrong, i thought the manual said gearbox end 1st then bellhousing

It does. I'm overriding the manual

Fair enough I'm working away again from tomo so won't be bothering myself with it until atl east Saturday .

I think the easiest way I found to do it was to slide it on the engine end first, jack the engine under the front of the sump (use a bit of wood to spread the load). I also use a bit of WD40 on the splines to make it easier to get on and off, don't use grease though.

ALWAYS FRONT FIRST!!!!
And lift the front of the engine with a jack, the tilt will help you slide it back to the shoulder on the gearbox input shaft.

I never had a problem with the 1.4...just a bit of gentle "assistance" from a copper mallet...

cheers

James

foggyjames wrote:I never had a problem with the 1.4...just a bit of gentle "assistance" from a copper mallet...

cheers

James

remind me never to ask you for assistance accros the road.