Finally got the lovely 100 sx 1.6 today, and can i just say what a lovely car it is, hasn't been used properly since 2008! timing belt changed 5k miles ago at 66k miles and been sat on my nans drive way ever since. Well yesterday i charged the battery, refitted it, then my nan got inside.

At the turn of a key, the engine sprung to life like it had really disliked being sat there and not used for so long But by god, i had never heard anything start up so smoothly after all that time.

Fluid condition was rather good too, and the old petrol had not gone stale yet (Wtf?)




Ok guys, marea lovers, owners, your my right hand here, and we have some issues more serious then others!

Ok first things first!
What went wrong with it in the first place? your probably asking, well i'l tell you!

The car cuts out when coming to a stop, simple as that, revs drop below idle limit, and the engine stalls, sometimes it jumps back to life with say a last spark .

What could cause this?
Injectors, Sensors, (Stepper motor?) Filters, Dirty Inlet Mani?
I don't know which is why i need your help, and i have some suggestions!

Another problem is the bonet, it refuses to close >< I now know why!
The bonnet cable is sized, it won't operate, and i need options from you guys, would it be hard to take a bravo one and feed it through the engine bay? or can it be unsiezed, you guys gota help me here, because today, this drove me nuts!

Summary
Primary Problems :
Stalling when coming to a halt.
Sized bonet cable resulting in no bonnet closure!
PAS fluid is black! needs a purge!
Need new air inlet plastic at front of car (Useless screwy things broke)
Full de-rusting operations need to commence.

Secondary Tasks :
Full filter change (Oil, air, fuel, pollen maybe, others?)
Fluid purges! (Coolant, possibly oil!)
Give the bugger a good clean, more like a primary!

I would appreciate any help you guys can give, this post will serve mainly as my primary blog i suppose, it doesn't need to be on the blog list as its more of a repair (And guide through, i will show people what i've done) post then anything else.

Keep our mareas going strong!
Migs .

News update guys!

Found a metal wire brush for my drill, well chuffed!

Derusting operations began with WD-40 and the wire brushes!

My first problems are now solved!! Proper happy, the marea is coming along,

Today i started with a wash, the whole interior needs a good clean out, and i am loving this electric sunroof, greesed up the rails so the old motor had less difficulty working, although the card/wood whatever cutout is being a bit annoying, can remove that if im not happy.

Yesterday the power steering pump was quite loud! i wasn't happy, although shes R reg, the fluid was pitch black, very thick (Normally contaminated?)

Well i ripped the hoses out, drained as much fluid as i could (Although maybe i should have tried pumping air into the system with a bycicle pump gently, i dont know, but some black fluid remained!

Replaced the stock fiat clips on the PAS fluid hoses with more accesible jubilee clips (So handy here!) and filled it with DII halfords fluid for PAS and auto transmission, pump now runs smooth as a nut and the loudness is gone, one thing that does concern me is that at full look, it gets loud, almost as if the pump is still trying to turn wheels? I don't know! SCAREY.

My best and happiest moment of today, unsiezing the bonnet lock! The cable was siezed, some WD-40 on the nut points and hit the points, then pried against the lock with a screwdrive and it just edged free, only problem is i have to manually reset it each time i use it >< (Probably not MOT worthy right?)

Car still runs excellently, been hitting the rust with the drill wire pad and WD40, but i need a converter next and stone chip protection.

Some damaged paintwork too where rust has crept through too, maybe a respray in the future,

PICTURES TO COME
Migs.

Sounds like your making some good progress there.
I don't suppose any extended running has improved you idle cut out issue at all?

Hard to say at the minute venters, i do believe that it hasn't been used enough, i think 4k miles over space of 9 months and then the idle just dropped off, i think it still has 2 year old petrol in too, how its firing up every time first time round has me confused, but i will have to get some injector treatment im sure.

I wonder if the crank sensor looses effectiveness as the outer crank wheel rusts? i'm still for the maf sensor and sticky throttle body(motor thingy) but got to explore all possibilities!

Yesterday i revved to about 6k and let it fall and it did drop to about 40 odd revs and then fired up again somehow!! no idea why its doing this, people tell me fuel pump but its like, if it was lazy it'd struggle to hit the revs, my marea revs so freely its unreal!

I'l see if i can get video up, but like i say pics and vids to come!
Thanks for readin!
Migs

i have a questio am trying to convert my marea wikend jtd 105 to vegetable oil and i need som info haw to do it thank you

also a marea lover

Hmmm no idea on the vegetable oil, sorry mate.

Anyway, progress was going well, until a few years back the stupid garage messed the head up on the airbox screw (One of them) and completely rendered it un-usable! How stupid are they, not only that but they snapped the airbox, and i have idle issues? man oh man...

Its frustrating because now i have to find some way of preferably fixing the airbox because i don't want to go through the hassle of dissmantling the current setup!, i think i'd have to jack the (rusty) car up, remove wheel, remove arch liner, remove bolts, clips and slide down and out, its just not work the effort for something that small yet >< and the possibility of doing more damage just angers me more hah.



The bumpers pretty messy too, well upper half, there is another marea in scrappy but i don't have much experience with ripping large body pannels off (Only wings :/)

On a bright note, i will soon begin heavily de-rusting, check out my little stash



Will keep you posted.
Migs.

Very busy week, trying to get the marea the way i like it is tough, but alas i'm very happy with how shes doing, which is much better then expected, after owning my micra which is 11 years old with about 120k on clock, no fault at all, but rust building here and there, i wasn't sure the marea body would be anywhere even close to the build quality of that nissan (even if the marea has 70k on the clocks) but alas been damned suprised, marea body/pan is in much better shape then i would have ever expected, but i'l move onto that.

To start, some more eye candy for the viewers, showers and sun have been on and off today so its been funny my work routine .

Such a fantastic stance to a car, and one of the best fronts in the world in my oppinion, blue lights would suit it well, hopefully i can get some bulbs for her in the near future!

And the boot is beaut, the size of it makes all tasks seem do-able, it really is a work of art, and i admire the engineering that went into this car.

Anyway what have i been up to this week? Well remember that stupid airbox with its destroyed screw heads, well i thought to hell with it, threw it in the bin, got another, lubricated the screw threads and heads topped up with grease!



Have no fear, all that gunk is castrol grease! filter sits away from the forward threads so no risk of leaking either!

Had to jack the car up, remove the wheel, remove the frontal arch liner, remove top of airbox, remove the airbox elbow to the resonation boxes, then remove the two screws holding the airbox to the mount walls and then pull it through the small forward arch liner gap! what a job i tell ya!(gave me a good chance to look at the 3 year old disks too!

And not only that, because of the previous drilling i had conducted, there were small fragments and shards of metal in the resonater boxes, so i went and removed the whole system, then cleaned it, then refitted it, which also involved removing the dam headlamp! That stupid ball joint was quite corroded, so its partially damaged now, but its still usable *Phew*.

Might need new disks, not sure, maybe a good brake would sort it out, tried removing some of the crust around the lip with my tool, so shouldn't get any strange grinding atleast!



I mentioned cleaning the interior, still needs work, maybe some kind of restorer on some of the materials.






Marea seems in much better shape now, idling average (Not certain), no more cutting out! Still running on old as fuel!, Idle can sometimes be a bit flakey, or its the exhaust spluttering thats messing with my head!, my exhaust is quite leaky, so maybe i need to go for a hammer run when its due its MOT, it does need new fuel though, want to check sparks etc etc also, so far so good, shes running great!

Last part of the post today, moving on to the de-rusting process,the sills i believe are seemingly good, the floor/pan seems in good shape too, rust cropping up here and there but i'm trying to slam it back to bare metal now using the rust remover and my wire brush/dril thing haha, i may do two metal rust remove treatments to be sure then i don't know whether or not to hit it with primer or straight to underseal, i think primer/underseal/sand to smoothen and if i feel it, another primer coat + metal paint (Standard black tbh), i think someones already tried removing rust before! looks a good job too .




So i worked on it more and more until nothing else in the effected areas would fall (You can see on the underside of the body when something has gone bad because the colour changes to the rusty brown, when you find rust, then you poke around and look for any loose coating etc, make sure you never miss a spot) ONWARD!



And now i have the first rust treatment on, set to be watered down and brushed at approximately 6:00 Pm today!





Sorry about the long post! you know i like to keep you folks updated!! and i will try and help anyone as best i can whenever they need it!!

PS : Two more for good luck! take it easy all!
Migs
(Also the air feed screws must have ripped the plastic thread out, gota fix the air feed to the car too now. :') )

Ok guys quick update, just been away for a weekend at blackpool, tommorow i'm back to looking at the old girl to try and get her sorted.

As you know, this happened:



Sucks eh, need to get it welded, or i'l do the welding with lead plates since the melting point is quite low (If led will bond to the steel that is

Also i have a question regarding the rear brake lights.

Can someone check that when the engine is running and they have their main headlights on, when you brake is the light increase large (From the rear brakes) or small? mine seems to be very small . (Unless its the bulbs, i will get a video tomorrow night!

nice job man, i was getting rid of old underseal on mine at the weekend, then a heavy coat of rust treatment and then 2 coast of anti rust primer and then 2 new coast of underseal, deffo going the right way, i also dunno if you are interested but i have a set of 4 marea weekend HLX alloy wheels with centre caps and good tires for £70 if your interested.

cheers

robin

Nice Marea and great colour.

If you have not done it all ready, add new spark plugs to your todo list, and definatly change the oil first. When I got my 1.8 it had some alternative spark plugs fitted that looked fine. I fitted the correct NGK part which made a massive difference to performance.

I gave that boot thing a clean and paint aswell


If your into checking things, clean out the black plastic spats off that cover the rear sills. Mine where blocked up with cold damp mud against the metal work.


If your looking for a bodyshop near Rochdale I can vouch for a very good one.

Thanks for reply guys.

I've hit the point now where i can't really do so much without axle stands, and money wearing thin, i haven't done much at all mind you :/.

The rear still needs sorting, im after a large rubber grommit to just fit, if not i'l try weld a lead pannel and fill it with body filler, don't know.

And the saloon rear sill jack points, i don't want to jack up the car because of how scared it am, its like some of the main frame is actually exposed?? and is freying quite easily under the pressure! Even for the rear of a car! need a hy troller lift and two stands then i can get the wheels off and clean the drums up.

Also the wing support members, they might need replacing, been hit hard by rust, whatever company or unluckyness took the plastic protection covers off, its so annoying, its caused so much inner damage not having the lower frame guards on -.-.

As for the alloys, thanks for the offer but i'm outa cash at the minute , unless you intend to put them in cryogenic storage for a later time? haha. Cheers anyway mate.

And yeah, the spats are all filled with gunk hehe, problem is the rears run on bolts instead of screws, and them bolts look pretty deformed at the moment :S.

I'll keep you posted.

Oh yeah i forgot about those four bolts, mine where rusted into the plastic plugs, some snapped, i had to get good plugs and bolts from a scrap yard which the guy gave to me for free I refitted the bolts with lots of copper grease.

Actually my car is going into a bodyshop tomorrow to have the rear sill/jacking points tidied up. Ive just stripped the rear interior then washed and waxed the car ready for them to play with.

My front wind P supports could do with replacing aswell, I have one just need the other side, I plan to powdercoat them black.

Haha yeah, well hopefully i can get my drill wirebrush hitting them rusted nuts, then hammer a smaller spanner onto them to free them off, lots of WD40 ofcourse!, its just funny the rear sill mounts, i really dislike them at the minute, terrible design in my oppinion, but alas i should be able to clean them up somewhat! Just didn't want to tidy up the rear drum if i was going to put a hole in the frame .

Remember me on about changing the pass fluid fully? Well guess whats completely broken down again and is contaminated, methinks any rubber seals are perishing causing mass debris in the PAS pump, i hope its durable or its going to have a short life! Tyres need a pump up too, maybe the strain is adding to the problem?

I think side s'port members are going on ebay for about 10 pound new, i will take the wings off first to see if the general condition of the nuts and bolts is good (On my other car they're snapping all the time!) and if i can get the wing off then i will slowly move the other components in the way, all i know is they need doing, and i think 1 will probably fail on the MOT anyway (Arch liner inner mount has snapped away you see! ) but yeah, clean the wing sports up, then two coats of primer/paint/ maybe even stone chip!

Suns back out, i'm feeling ready to carry on! oh and my micra seems to have the rubber grommet i need for the marea! i hope it fits so bad haha, save me alot of hassle!!

Still need axle stands though, and a hydraulic trolley! and i think from the way i've been handling the bonnet, i've put micro dents in it, these make me so angry! i need some dry ice and a hair dryer and hopefully the metal will contract and remove these dents for me, its just where to get the dry ice??.

Thanks for replies guys, Let us know how the car gets on Adrian!

http://www.pdfqueen.com/fiat-marea-weekend

might have some useful tips for you

Pretty handy that link, thanks nav,

Anyway guys progress update, sorry i've been slow!! lets just say i made the hole bigger, mainly because its multiple sheets of metal and the odd layer has been eaten into alot, so i thought heck, rip the crust off!

So we start by removing the rear cover (Where latch is) and popping the plugs to remove the mareas main carpet completely, it makes things so much easier!, in the end the result is alot of objects in a rather (Orderly ) fassion .





Ok i lied about orderly, but it honestly works! (Does anyone else hate them useless half pint spare tyres? Come on, has fiat seen their own boot??!)

But being pulled away from ressurecting the beast, i got assigned some jobs to move stuff for my nan, the micra is an apserlute monster here due to the cabin being so huge!! but when i had finnished, my lovely nan came out with a big bag of "Marea Cleaning Goodies!"

At this point i'm smiling :slayer:



We have colour coded waxes to my marea, body filler, various waxes, glass cleaner, the autoglym set, you name it! although thats not till last body work first boyos!

Another rather awesome gadget i retrieved was this cool little oiling can!


Needless to say i feel rather retro, dont you?

Anyway, when i finally have some free time its back to the marea, but still stuck and puzzled about filling that hole, a friend come down to help me assess car, he thinks it will do well, we also believe there was some air in the system which took forever to get out (Coolant etc) but now its gone! so im happy, although im going to purge again i recon, marea i think requires alot of tlc in fluids department.

As for the hole, when digging around the back of me o'l micra (Cheekily stairing at us!)



Magic hits the corner of my eye, the micras an old girl now, heavily abused with the body not doing so well, so i decided to introduce a piece of micra to the marea!



Now thats a proper japanese rubber grommit boys and while it doesnt fit snug in the marea like it does the micra, it does cover the correct surface area, and it'l get sealed down tight (And messily i might add!)



Tadaaaa! although look at that bleed'n rust!

For the next few days i do what i can to remove rust, but i can't remove too much where the hole is due to it being fairly structurally weak but its much better then before, i';l have a friend weld a plate over it eventually, i just want the car on the road BAAAAD!



Next step on the list, some thick coats of primer, imo its pretty cool, sets nicely and after some decent application its pretty much ready to paint!



Can't forget to mask off holes, dont need shapes on the drive now do we??

After that, i pick up any form of hamerite paint (That black stuff i had) and enjoy applying a very thick layer over the primer, trying to keep the girl pretty dry inside!



I felt like a child again but this paint works fantastic and sets nicely, another coat is to go on when the rubber is sealed in, i want to discretely cover it!


I also now dedicate a cuboard to my marea haha, its growing in size ever so slowly



Even with some top up of fresh fuel, girl still firing water like a super soaker :O! she needs a run out, but still not ready forMOT!



I did try to twist fuel pump out, but i guess you really do need that stupid fiat tool i found in the pdf it was worth a shot though, dirty thing is that i tell ya!



Well thats all good, so next stage after the paint has dried in boot is to try and secure the rubber gromit down!, i assure you i had alot of fun soaking the car in liquid nails haha!



It doesn't need to look good but its got to cure anyway, then another level of paint can go all over it!, but thats my problem with holes in the boot solved hey??

Now there is only 1 thing left before i think its ready to be M.O.T'd (Well two)

The last object is the rear tow hook, its completely been eaten away (RUSSSSSSSST!!!) so i need to remove that small unit (Which doesnt support the car i dont believe, except holding the lower bumperside in place a bit), got two severly rusted bolts that i want to try get off, friend says angle grinder, im going to try hammer smaller size socket onto them and ratchet the suckers off, either way if the head breaks im happy!

The last thing it needs is a large blast to the M.O.T garage, shes running so great, start seems abit weak at the minute though, need to figure that out but runs proper strongly which is what i like to see

Stay tuned folks!

Also guys this may seem strange but the bonnet of my marea is getting dented alot (And i think its doing it itself??) i have no idea why, but i think when i open and close (Small drop) the bonnet, its making some dents, metal seems quite flimsey?

Its great to see some one keeping an other BIG M going keep up the good work mate very good thread

MAREA MAD said:

Its great to see some one keeping an other BIG M going keep up the good work mate very good thread

Click to expand...

Its a funny thing Marea Mad, i'm not a fan of fiats at all, but every time i see this car it feels like its looking you right in the face, always ready to go.

When in the car as well though, i feel safe, and the car feels like its got alot of capacity to do great things, its extremely practical IMO and worth the money im slowly putting into it!.

Today i cleaned the spark plugs as 2nd from the left was completely black, the reason for this is the HT's on these car, are 1000% pure C**p...

There contacts are slipping from the rubber/plastic mounts and disconnecting from the HT! so we have alot of fuel coming in and no spark (Well weak if anything) but all cleaned today and forcing the wire down the HT tube means a connection as well.

The HT connectors are also prone to (Dusting up, drying out??!) so you want some form of wire brush to clean them every so often (Although) sand paper maybe dipped in some oil seems to work well for me, i still have to clean the other 3 though lazy me.

I painted again 1 more layer on the previous paint and i slapped more stone waxoyl stuff over the rubber grommit, i no longer have any holes and the last thing before the MOT should be doable within the week !

Im so happy, hopefully im not in for an MOT shock (Although the sills do look a bit splitty, they dont look so heavily rusted yet! who knows O.O!)

I know this blog is a slow one, but hopefully i'l go to some more extreme lengths soon to getting the car up to 100% condition .

Ffs One minute your making progress and the next minute it gets p**sed on by something else...





I dont even know how to go about repairing an inner rear arch . Seems that loads of dirt has collected and moistened the hell into the metal, but its also under the petrol cap area if you get me..

Any ideas? wanted to MOT it it, but this doesnt look like a pass anymore .

Well today has been nice, my friend came down again to have a look! he thinks it wont get picked up on MOT but if it actually does, he will do the welding (he works for land rover specialist garage) free for me This news made me happy.

Hopefully soon i'l be home free for driving the girl!!!

As your mate says,don't get too hung up on odd bits of rust being an MOT fail. If you clean them up and treat them even with just rust killer, as long as they aren't too close to critical areas like seatbelt mounts, tow bar mounts, subframes etc then the tester shouldn't complain, maybe just issue an advise note.

It seems your main MOT questions are around the emissions if it's not been running right, but if you sort that then work through the list of any fails / advisories you should be fine.