Wednesday January 3rd - Another Rolling road session!

 Since fitting the new Weber carb on the Green Cortina I'd been meaning to arrange a rolling road session just make sure that the car is running as it should. So, I rang Atspeed Racing in early December and got booked in and put on their waiting list. (very popular this place)

My booking date was January 3rd, so after moving cars around I got the Cortina out and had a leisurely drive down to them. 

I left it with them and walked back home and then went to work. Later that afternoon they rang me to say my car was done and ready for collection. They said all it need was a different Idle jet and an accelerator pump jet. The carburettor was brand new, but carburettors ideally need to be tuned to suit your engine. Just bolting on a brand new carb wont always cure your issues. 

I collected the car next day and as usual, they had done a great job and the car now runs smoother and feels quicker. Another job off the list and a good start to the year! 

Thursday December 21st. An early Christmas present-for me, from me!

 I hadn't been looking to replace my every day car, the trusty Renault Clio, but a car came up for sale at a very good price and looked a very good option for me. There's nothing seriously wrong with the Clio, but it is getting on now and has also covered over 200,000 miles! 

The car in question was a Peugeot 308 Diesel 1.6 HDI estate. It's been very well looked after and drove very nicely on the test drive. It has lots of creature comforts that the Clio doesn't have, built in satnav, automatic handbrake, separate driver and passenger heating controls, air conditioning, digital radio, cruise control and even a speed limiter! (That will come in handy on that bloody A127) etc. It also has a 6 speed gearbox which makes it very economical. 

So, I'm very pleased with my new purchase and think I've got a good deal.  One of the things that used to bug me about the Clio was that the AM band on the stereo never worked, so I could never listen to the footy. The new Peugeot has a digital radio and an AM band as well, so my footy days are restored!

 

I will soon be doing a couple of small jobs on the Clio and then putting it up for sale. It's been a good servant, and been very reliable, but I'm afraid it's time for it to move on. 

Saturday December 16th - A bit of heat for the garage.

 After considering different options of types of heaters for the garage I decided on a diesel heater. I've tried various heaters in past, such as space heaters (too damn noisy) and fan heaters (too damn expensive) so this time I thought I'd try something else. 

A guy at work has been using a diesel heater in his garage for years and highly recommended one. So after looking at different models I put in an order for one and to my surprise it was delivered the next day. I set it up on the work bench first just to perform a test run and then figured out where in the garage would be the best place for it. Eventually I decided it was going to sit on the floor next to workbench, although this meant extending the exhaust to the other side of the garage and exiting it through the outside wall. 

Now, due to the fact that this heater obviously runs on diesel and has an exhaust I am well aware of the potential problems should anything go wrong that might lead to fumes building up in the garage while I'm in there. So, I took the precaution of buying a carbon monoxide detector and alarm and have mounted it on a shelf in close proximity of the heater so that should any leaks occur, I'll quickly know about it. 

At present, the weather has been fairly mild, so I've not really used it yet, but I'm sure that will change in January!