06/02/2010

I blew the budget this time. The plan had been to keep the Challenger to lug stuff around and the CLK for everyday use. But since I was cutting down on the fleet there didn't seem much point having 2 car to do this so I thought I'd combine the 2 and buy one good all rounder. I had been considering a Discovery TD5 when at our Club meeting one of my mates (John) overheard me talking about it and asked if I would be interested in his Range Rover. I hadn't considered one as they were generally out of my budget. So I had a look at it and to cut a long story short as they say, I blew well more than the budget and bought it!  But considering the spec of this car and it's condition I just couldn't pass it up. Being an Autobiography It has every extra you can think of and cost around £43k when it was new in 2001. I won't have it home until the end of next week but couldn't resist a few photo's.

15/02. Got a chance to take a couple more photo's.

16/02. The buttons on the key fob were looking a bit worse for wear so I bought a little kit that replaces the buttons along with the battery cover. Took all of 5 mins to do.

17/02. Dropped the car in at my mates exhaust and tyre center on the way to work to have him check a rattle from the exhaust. It wasn't long before I got a call from him to tell me that the middle box was riddled with holes and was about to fully split at the weld. (I forgot to take a photo of it). Luckily he had a new handy and fitted it. He aslo de-catted the car to release a little more power. Clearly the cat has been off before by the look of the welding on it.

I don't know about more power from the cat removal but the car is noticably quieter. 

25/02. On the way to work this morning I ran into a blizzard. The car got a little snowy.

03/03. The little black plastic bit for locking the fuel cap fell off while I was getting fuel this morning. The little plastic spud on the rear of it had broken off. I glued it back on with ruber mastick which is very strong and moulds to the shape.

10/04. Took my family out for the day in my very clean RR. By the tme I got back it was the dirtiest I have ever seen a car that belongs to me. It had a good wash after the photo's and I'll be getting the underneath cleaned as soon as I get a chance to.

13/08. I haven't posted anything about the car in a while, simply because there was nothing to report. However over the last week I got a chance to  pamper it a bit and give the car a god polish and clean inside. 

The lines on the carpet are just the imprint of the rubber mat. 

The wires are from the DVD player I sometimes put in the car for the kids to watch on a long journey.

The boot floor is very clean but the tailgate is a little dirty so I'll be steam cleaning it when i get a chance. 

I was changing the rear indicator bulbs as they are the orange type and had badly faded so it gave me a chance to take a photo of the base box for the stereo the car is fitted with. It's very loud. 

Engine bay before cleaning.

And after cleaning. I added a little bit of badge engineering

I left it in to have it's tracking and headlights done, and today I got the underneath washed. I usually do this once a month but with working on the lancia I never got a chance last month.

While the car was being washed underneath I took a photo using my phone. Not the best picture though.

    

 And who says Range rovers aren't easy on fuel!

14/08. The car wasn't due the mot until the 19th but since I'd checked everything out and all looked ok, well apart from the 2 indicator bulbs I changed, I managed to get it in for MOT today. Not only did it fly through the test but the tester commented on it being one of the cleanest ones he's came across. I was very pleased at that. But I was even more pleased when one of the other testers said that if I wanted to sell it to let him know as he had 2 of them and neither were as nice as mine. I told him I'd been for selling it a couple of weeks ago but decided to keep it. I did tell him that if I was offered enough I could be tempted to hand the keys over to a new owner. well everything has it's price. 

20/08. Cars just turned 97,000 so time for a little service. New oil filter, fuel filter and air filter, and not forgetting oil of course. 

The air filter definately needed changed.

Oil was just about due a change to.