A quick blow over with satin black on the metal grills to improve the finish: Image Unavailable, Please Login And then they fitted right back in place: Image Unavailable, Please Login The silver trims had a few screws missing and a few with rounded off heads so I sourced replacements. Image Unavailable, Please Login And all back together looking good Image Unavailable, Please Login
thanks. just for final confirmation, they did not use the PIN to clone your existing fob right? in that case I'm going to buy a new fob and see if i can get one of the electronic gurus over here to clone mine! thanks again~
I spent a day centred around trying to determine the cause of the headlight aim that was very low. Raising the car up at the front had helped but I was worried that as the headlights had been split to be painted that they had been damaged. I stripped down both headlights and, apart from one small plastic clip that I had to repair with Araldite, all was well. The headlight adjusters were even in good order. I've got them back on the car and I'll take it down to my local MOT centre tomorrow to get the aim spot on. This thing really annoyed me. On one of the wheel well splash guards two bolts had been hacked up. Fair enough if you need to get the dremel out to get a bolt off but why not put a new one in? They're only M6 bolts! They look like they were cut a long time ago and I bet plenty of mechanics have seen them and taken no action. Image Unavailable, Please Login Here's the inside of the front bumper - an interesting use of wood on the inside and note one set of spacers is the wrong way around! One of the brackets is bent out of shape but I'll leave fixing that for another day. Image Unavailable, Please Login The splash guards were in good order, they just needed a good clean. Image Unavailable, Please Login
First thing to be done the day following the headlight investigation was to get down my local MOT place with the front bumper and wheel guards off so the headlight alignment could be sorted. The guy was good enough to get me straight on the machine and it turned out that only the drivers side needed adjustment - somehow my fiddling around the day before had left the passenger side in the correct position. I thought the guy said the light needed to go up a lot so got busy winding the adjuster. It is supposed to be possible to adjust the headlights from inside the front compartment but the little plastic cog jumps off so I had to put my hand in from the side of the wheel. After a few minutes of adjustment the guy comes back and ask me why I've wound it further out of line - I had misheard him and it was supposed to go down!! After much faffing around, I managed to undo my balls up and get the aim in the right place. Once the car was back in the garage it was off with the rear grill. Image Unavailable, Please Login This was going to the powder coaters as there was a small patch of rust in the corner. I could sort this myself but a local place will shot blast it and powder coat it satin black for £30. Image Unavailable, Please Login I also got another expansion tank as the one fitted had peeling paint but the finish on the one I bought isn't great so that's going to the powder coaters too. Image Unavailable, Please Login Next job was to reattach the front end - along the way I was able to fit a set of clear indicators. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Looks like you are doing a great job with items that are overlooked, best of luck. Do consider that while it is minimal, powder coating adds a few mills to the part. It looks like the rear grill is already a tight fit, so you may consider a re-spray with a good quality epoxy based paint in lieu of powder coat as the rust does not look that bad.
Thanks. I thought the OEM finish was a powder coat on these? In any case, the guy shot blasted it back to the bare metal and then powder coated it - it fitted without any drama (I'm just behind in posting the updates).
Nice thread . . . What did you do about the odd wooden supports in your rear bumper and the wrong spacers? Greetz, Joseph
Thanks Joseph! I'm not sure what to do about the wooden spacers. I've got to do some minor refurbishment on the front bumper in the next couple of weeks so will decide then. I suspect they are there to space out so it fits better - I doubt they weigh much and the bumper is OEM so I may end up leaving them. The spacers were just fitted back to front - an easy fix!
As long as they are sitting tight and wouldn't vibrate off then WHY NOT? Keep us posted . . . Greetz, Joseph
I spent half a day tackling a problem with the wipers - when in use they were clonking quite badly. The solution was diagnosed back in August last year as it is noted on one of the service invoices I have. Perhaps the price of the linkage from Ferrari meant the job was postponed - they list at something stupid like £350 + TAX! I bought a second hand one off a late model low mileage car for £20. Firstly it was off with the bonnet to give access to the scuttle panel. Image Unavailable, Please Login This is the replacement linkage. Image Unavailable, Please Login And here's how I left it that day with the new linkage installed and wipers in place for testing. Fitting was fairly straight forward, I just needed to be careful to note the orientation of the old linkage on the splines and ensure the replacement went into the same position. Image Unavailable, Please Login
The next morning started with refitting the scuttle and bonnet - note to self: the pollen filter goes back on before the scuttle is bolted down! The bonnet went back on without any drama although I had marked the position of every nut and bolt. I did a few test closes before putting the wipers back on and noticed that the car looked a lot cleaner without them on.. Image Unavailable, Please Login Wipers back on and all working clonk free! Image Unavailable, Please Login
Next job was to whip the rear bumper off Image Unavailable, Please Login And this is the reason why - whoever had fitted the Novulari exhuast that was on the car before had put one of the exhaust clamps in the wrong place. As the engine moved about the clamp fouled on the diffuser and cracked the fibreglass. Image Unavailable, Please Login After cleaning up the damage with a grinder it wasn't as bad as I first thought. No fibreglassing to do just a skim with filler and paint - a job for later. Image Unavailable, Please Login
I wasn't happy with the exhuast clamps that we used when fitting the Timate but they were all we had to hand. Today I chopped down the excess thread and fitted some funky copper lock nuts that I had left over from a Capristo fitting kit. From this: Image Unavailable, Please Login to this: Image Unavailable, Please Login And a couple pictures of the Timate now it's had a chance to colour a little... Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
I noticed that one of the oil lines into the gearbox was too close to the cat for my liking. Image Unavailable, Please Login All that was needed was to crack off the union, re-position the line and re-tighten up. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
The Timate uses the standard exhaust fittings which meant putting the rusty bracket back on. Off it came.... Image Unavailable, Please Login Note that I supported the exhaust whilst the bracket was off to save unduly stressing the cats & manifolds. Image Unavailable, Please Login Cleaned up and ready for a coat of hammerite Image Unavailable, Please Login
I always like to change the bulbs if I've got the rear grill off as it only costs a couple of quid and is much better than faffing around when they're on the car. It has been said that as the reversing lights are close to the lens it causes the surface of the lens to dome - hence why I've fitted triple LED bulbs that you can see. Image Unavailable, Please Login The wiring looms for the lights were in good order save for a couple of splits in the rubber boots which were easily repaired with super-glue. Image Unavailable, Please Login