Just recently purchased a fiat stilo 1.6 dynamic from 02. I got it cheap since the front springs are broken and the winter tires were bad. I paid 17000 SEK for it (1900€). It also has a few scratches and dents on the right side near the rear wheel arch. I would do most of the repairs myself so I got 5000SEK (570€) off the original price.

However after I purchased it i drove it to my sisters, a 200 km drive and noticed a grinding sound from the back. :yuck: I knew then that the rear brakes were bad so i inspected it when i got back home. Turned out the rear right side break pads were worn down to the metall and was grinding the disc. This would set me back around 1000 SEK. The other brakes were all good. There was also a sqeaking sound from the front left brakes but I couldnt see anything wrong with them. Ill just probably rough up the discs in the front and lube the glide pins.


In the rear I suspected that the glide pins were stuck as my old car had the same problem this spring. As i was removing the breaks i noticed that the glide pins were all fine. The brake pads were stuck in the holder so maybe that was the problem. I had to buy an expensive break caliper tool for the pisons. There wasn't a fiat dealer in our town. How matter hard i turned the tool i couldn't get the piston back into the bore. Got pretty pissed at this point. I even tried turning it the other way if i got the directions wrong. It got pretty late so i gave up for today. Almost started throwing stuff in the garage. I read somewhere someone had to tap it to go in and try turning it after that. The piston had popped out quite far. I'll try that tomorrow. Worst case i might have to rebuild the caliper or buy a new one. This would suck Haven't rebuilt any break caliper before. The kit to rebuilt it cost around 400 SEK (40€).

Does someone have any tips or some detail I might have overlooked?

Also I purchased used winter tires for the car. Turned out that one of the "new" tires had an nail in it. I pulled it out and I got a flat tire. Went back to the shop and they fixed it. Seems like i keep getting things that annoy me

I ordered new brembo rear brake discs, brembo pads and KYB front springs for the struts. I'm not that comfortable using cheap spring compressors so I might remove the shocks and go to a workshop so they can fit the new springs. Hopefully the other parts on the springs are ok so I wont have to buy new ones. I also might go to a car body workshop to get a quote on the dents and scratches in the rear. Might be worth the money to have a car that looks good.

Other than that I like the car. Haven't driven it much due to the rear brakes. I also have a Skoda felicia that i bought 2 years ago when I didn't have alot of money and needed a car for work. I got really tired of it. No driving pleasure and the small enging size. I replaced the clutch and repaired the front breaks this spring, but don't feel like its worth doing mayor repairs on it. It drives well now however but looks ugly as hell, with rust, dents and failed paint job (my fault).

I'll enjoy reading posts and chatting with other Stilo owners in the future as I dig deeper into the car. Any tips or comments are welcome!

Drive safe!

An update on the brakes.

I managed to get the piston out from the caliper and removed and cleaned the bore and piston. It went back in without a problem but now i have to buy a caliper rebuild kit.

The bore was full of dirt and crud and the brake fluid was very dark. The hand brake lever was very hard in the beginning. I couldnt move the lever without a tool. After i cleaned it and worked the lever it now moves alot better. Hopefully this will be enough to fix the brakes. I have no idea how to take the whole caliper apart if i need to do more. The caliper rebuild kit comes with alot of seals and parts for the internal components. Don't know where to start to replace those.

Hi Esaus! Welcome to FF :wave:

the rears can be a bit of a pain to rebuild i tried it once but after stripping and rebuilding it lasted about 2 months before it siezed up again :bang: ended up getting a new pair for not a lot of money. see HERE had them on a year and not missed a beat yet!

as for your front suspension... if you're doing the springs its advisable to do the bearings/top mounts if you're there and also you may consider renewing the Dust Cover Kit

I already ordered the springs for the front. I really don't want to wait too long before i can drive the car again. I could just do the brakes for now and still drive the car. And do the front springs when I have all the parts for it. How advisable is it to replace the dust covers and front bearings? The car has just passed 100 000 km.

Thanks for the tip btw!

//Esaus

It would be advisable to change them at this point due to mileage but also as a course of preventative maintenance, best to replace any other parts while the shocks are off to ensure they last longer and you don't need to remove them again in future

well done MT you're learning! couldn't have said it better myself!

I'll order the parts i need for the bearings aswell.

I found the bearings cheaper at mister-auto for around 15 € a piece for the KYB ones. I'll finish the brakes and do the struts this weekend. I also ordered the springs, brake pads and discs from that site. The shipment takes a few days but since its half the price to local dealerships it is worth it.

The left side rear brake was in good condition. It appears someone had serviced them before and replaced a few bolts as they had different sizes and the lube on the slider pins was of a different kind. They had forgotten the dust cap on the bleeder screw so it was rusted inside. I'll just order one service kit for the rear calipers and do the right side brake and use the bleeder screw from the kit on the left side caliper. Hopefully that will be enough for the brake repairs.

An update!

I've ordered and waiting for the kit for the break caliper. It will likely arrive tomorrow.

I received break discs, shoes and shocks yesterday. When i was about to put on the discs i notice that they are of the wrong kind. The car has 4 bolt holes and the discs have 5! The article number is correct but the discs are wrong. Turns out that brembo had stamped the wrong article number on the discs at the factory and shipped them as discs for my car to Mister-auto.

The article number for the ones for my fiat is 08.3126.14. But it looks like ive gotten the discs that should have article number 08.3126.24. Looks like someone at the factory had a little bit too much to drink the night before or wasn't paying attension. I like to think they atleast got a bj while writing the article number in the machine as they were stamping the number into the discs. My irritation level is steadily rising.

To top it off the customer service person checked the wrong item to be shipped back. They selected the break pads as to be returned to them. I just noticed as i was doing my final check before shipping them. Now i have to wait another day before i can send them. Atleast they thanked me for taking detailed pictures and pointing out the error so they can look at their stock to see if there are more like mine. If one is faulty then more of the same batch are aswell. Atleast i will get my money back so i ordered new discs of a different manufacturer so i wont get another one with the wrong discs in them.

Things just keep piling up! lol :bang:

More wonderful news!

I was fitting the rear brake discs the other day and as i was tightening the bolts for the caliper bracket i noticed the torque wrench didn't click. After a few turns i knew something was wrong again! I looked and the bolts had started to get thinner in the middle. Good thing I didn't continue turning or they would have snapped. I ran around trying to find M12x1 bolts that would fit the car but no dealer had them. Even tried speciality tool shops. In the end I had to order new ones from the new fiat store in town.

Also i started to take down the front struts on the car. The bolts and nuts were somewhat rusty but i managed to get them down fairly easy without any air tools. When I have taken down the right side I'll go to a workshop in town and let them replace the springs and the bearing.

However I also saw that the stabilizer bar was worn so I'll have to replace that one aswell on the drivers side. :bang:

Adding to my already annoyed state I also notived that the lower control arm bushing was torn. Probably why the car was pulling to the left all the time. So now I have to take down more parts and have them replaced. Great! :bang:

I don't know how the right side of the car looks like yet. I tried bending with a crowbar at the bushing and it was moving up and down a little bit. I'll take the struts down tomorrow and will know more then.
Atleast the brakes were working. Will have to take them down on tuesday anyway to replace the bolts since they are only slightly tightened so I could lower the car and raise the front.

Cheers and wish me good luck :slayer:

Atleast the bushings aren't that expensive

An update!

I'm finished with the repairs to the car! It feels and drives like new! I'm happy with the results.

In the end i had to replace rear disc brakes, brake pads and refurbish right rear break caliper. Air the brakes and replace brake fluid. Bought a set of 4 winter tyres.

I also had to replace front springs and dampeners. Replaced both of the stabilizer bars. Also had to replace one of the wishbone bushings but i replaced all 4 in the front since I already would need an wheel alignment.

I did all the repairs myself and only payed a mechanic 20€ to push in 2 of the wishbone bushings since while trying to push them in i broke my vice.

I had the wheel alignment done and all wheels were spot on! Lucky! Still had to pay for the alignment tho

I also found slightly curb damaged 16" stilo aluminium wheels that i bought for 50€. I will need to repaint them if i want them to look good. So that is my next project during this winter after i do some repairs to my old car and sell it. I might even to a how to guide on the wheels if I'm bored enough.

There are some slightly annoying things as the front brakes make a high pitch sound as i brake and i suspect i need to replace the air cabin filter also. Might replace cooling fluid and flush the heater core at some point. Don't know yet. But the brakes come first, they are in good condition but the discs seem a bit too shiny.

That is all. Ahhhh

Decided to add to this since it has been some time since i did the springs and rear brakes.

I've been fixing my old car (Skoda felicia) and getting it ready for sale. Replaced oil, cooling fluid, did a flush. Had to replace the steering rack since it was worn and caused worn front wheels and a knock. I also replaced accessory belt and a pulley. I replaced the timing cover gasket and the oil pan gasket. It should have a kork gasket but someone had used silicone on the oil pan. Damn it took long to remove it. Leaky as hell. But now its all good. I suspect the car has poor pressure caused by a leaky head gasket. It has been like that for a while. But it doesn't affect the car much so i wont do that to such a crappy car. It is a small engine and the head gasket is farely quick to replace on that 1.3 l engine if it blows completely.

What i have planned after this is to do a service on my Fiat stilo. I recently had to replace the car stereo since i couldn't get any FM station on it. CD worked fine. Read on forum that many others had the same problem. I bought a facia kit from ebay and used my old car stereo in the car. Did some rewiring and all works really well! Now i can connect my phone to the stereo and have a richer sound. I feel however that the speakers are a bit lacking so maybe I'll get new ones at some point.

Back to the service. I have planned to do a oil change, new oil filter, air filter, dust filter for air con system and new spark plugs. I will also replace accessory drive belts since the AC belt squeaks in cold weather. Will check condition of pulley tensioner and other things at the same time. I'll go through the car for others things i might take care off while doing all this.

Also thinking of getting a new left headlight unit since it has alot of small cracks in it. People tend to blink their lights at me and i think motd wont pass it. And while doing that replace all the lightbulbs in the front since it is easy to get to when the front bumber is gone.

Will also go through and clean the fusebox and the G4 connector i think its called near the fuse box. I had a problem with car security system and no start condition this winter and that might be the cause. Also have a problem with the break light connector not working properly so I will replace that.

I did replace the heater control light bulbs when i replaced the stereo. Was a pain in the ass to get the new facia in and when finished noticing that the lights are out. Had to pry off the screw hole protectors to get it off. Now they are a bit damaged. But i saved it by making them larger so it looks like a screw driver hole to pry them out.

And since i don't trust that the previous owners cared much for this car checked with a company that does engine flushes with a flushing machine how much it would cost to do it. In case the previous owners didn't do proper oil changes I want to get that grime out before it causes problems. Price was 150 € if i bring my own oil and filters. Anyone with experience with these kinds of flushes? They use a maching that connects to the oil filter and oil plug and flush some kind of cleaning compound through the system and filter it all out a few times. I don't have any engine problems but it eats some oil, which is a common thing with stilos i think. In any case a cleaner engine will probably do good in the future.

In all I guess when previous owners don't care to fix front springs for 2 years they probably wont take care of other things aswell. I like to fix things and tinker so I don't really mind doing things. I think its fun.

Peace out! :slayer:

nice read that... yes it is frustrating when things are not done properly.... i am crazy about doing things the correct way and making sure all is good, i had my stilo just 2 months before i had hunter wheel alignment and tracking and tyres and it drove like a brand new car after and still does, i am about to change the suspension and front brakes on my car now but i may wait and get new shocks too and top mounst this way it wont take long to swap over the struts

I found that the shock absorbers were shot when i took it apart. I thought it was only the springs but they had been driven like that for long. Had to order new ones and wait some more until i got them.

One note however! If you have the spring bracket thing installed on your shocks you might have to do some adjusting to get them to fit your new shock absorbers. I ordered monroe reflex E7001 shocks that should give little better handling but they were a couple milimeters wider under the spring tray compared to the oem ones. I had to use an anglegrinder to cut the spring bracket so make it fit. Its there just in case the spring breaks so it wont have to take the load of the car for that long so I don't think that adjustment will matter much. Could be that the shocks I ordered are a better fit to later model stilos since i have a 2002.

Hope it turns out good for you! :slayer:

Spring service update!

I ordered all the things for my service that I will do before the car inspection.

Got a new front left headlight with foglight and dipped headlights. Cost me around 50€. Also ordered new light bulbs for everything in the front . Got the philips eco longlife ones that should last for a loong time! Won't have to replace them in the near future i hope.

I also ordered new spark plugs. I went with the champion RC10YCC specified in the manual, but I noticed after that the nkg ones were on ebay aswell. I'll get them the next time since the price difference isn't that large. Never used champion before and the nkg ones for my other car have been really good.

Futhermore i ordered the flex ac drivebelt. The alternator one looked like new and the pulley was rock solid so I wont replace those.

Got 2 new oilfilters and ordered Auto-rx from http://www.auto-rx.com/. I'll use this instead of the engine flush since it is cheaper and is safer for the engine. I've read that engine flushes might cause damage due to disloged grime but the auto-rx should be safer since it cleans the engine while you drive over a long period of time. It only takes off little at a time and you replace the oil and filter after the rinse period. Got 3 bottles since the only place to get it is from their US website! I hope I dont get extra import taxes!

I got new exhaust rubber mountings. The old ones are barely held together and are the worst looking rubber mountings ive ever seen condition wise. The exhaust is a little bit rusty. Ill take a look at it and do some minor repairs to prevent it from breaking this year.

Did get the rear brake light switch too! Hope it is easy to install.

And finally I also bought a new air filter and a air conditioning filter with active coal.

All in all it cost me around 200 € for the car parts and 80€ for the auto-rx oil addative. I'll have to add oil to that but I will use the cheapest engine oil I can get since i have to flush it after 1000 miles or so and it works best with mineral oil. There is a cheap oil brand that goes for 10€ for 4 liters so I'll get that one. I'll just swap to that for the duration and then go back to fully synthetic oil afterwards.

Some minor things! I got 2 new locking clips for the boot shelf. They were missing and I foung a couple on ebay for 7€ or so. Now it wont sort off tilt in a wierd way and hit against the back door when I close it.

What I'm looking for now is a new ashtray for the rear since mine is missing the locking mechanism so it keeps falling out all the time. My boot light isn't working either. I tried replacing the lamp but it didn't work. I'll look into that more later.

Stay safe!:devil:

Looks like I haven't added anything to this post for a while.

I replaced the front headlight and bulbs last year. It took some time since I had to remove the front bumper and do it in the rain but it got done. Had to align the light afterwards which wasn't easy. Had to do the motd twice to adjust the headlights properly according to Swedish law.

Replacing the sparkplugs, belts and all was easy and fast. Had to get a flex belt tool for the flex belt at a cheap car parts store. Was impossible to remove or mount the new one otherwise. I just cut off the old one and used the tool to get the new one in place. Changed air filters and all that which I had ordered.

The oil changes went well. It took away alot of grime in the engine and it runs alot smoother and quieter now. I don't think the last owners were that keen on doing proper oil changes so im glad I did it. I had a engine tapping noise which I think came from the lifters not getting enough oil pressure and it fixed most of it. It only appears during really cold weather for a couple of minutes during cold start.

The break ligth switch was easy to replace. Took 30 minutes and most of it was just fiddling with the switch under the dash.

Also I had a annoying sound whenever I used the fan. I thought I had to replace it but after i had took out the front passenger seat, part of the interior to access it I found out that it had slipped out of place. I removed the fan and adjusted the rubber mounts to straighten it out. Then i scraped of the plastic that had rubbed on the casing and put it back. A tip is to run the fan and run a knife on the edge that has been rubbing to scrape off extra material. It fixed the sound problem of the fan. Didn't have to buy a new one! It took a long time to get to and removing the seat was a pain. And had to get new plastic clips to replace those that broke while removing the panels.

I replaced the rubber mounts for the exhaust. I have also noticed I might have to replace the rear engine mount. Im going to check its condition the next time im under the car. The rubber parts on the car don't seem to be off a good material.

I have noticed that my idle runs abit rough at times. I got some throttle body cleaner and I'm planning on cleaning it and doing a relearn to see if it helps. Might have to clean or replace the map sensor if it doesn't work.

Still happy with the car. I have however noticed some rust starting to appear on the rear latch and the paint has chipped way under the front wheel arch. I will have to repair it so it doesn't become worse soon. We have alot of salt on the roads during winter and gravel for ice.

I don't have any big repairs planned, just do an oil change, fix chipped paint and maybe do an front wheel align since the front wheels are wearing more on the inside.

//Esaus

An edit to the last post I did.

The noise from the engine probably isn't hydralic lifters as i stated. I think it is poston slap since it isn't that loud and only happends during cold weather and quickly dies away as it warms up. Shouldn't be any problems from it.

An update!
I've decided to tell my Stilo and get a Saab 9-3 vector 2.0t. So I fixed the engine mount and changed the oil and filters for selling it. I got a can of spray paint to fix some chipped paint. Saw that the exhaust mounting bracket had broken from the excessive movement of the engine and rust. I'm not sure if u should replace the middle exhaust pipe for the sale however. It only cost 50€ so I might.

Well the day came!
I repainted the wheel arches and fixed the dents to the right side of the car. The car came out really good considering I used aerosol cans to do it. Did require alot of wetsanding and polishing to look good. I replaced the exhaust with a sub 100€ exhaust system from germany that i got free of delivery charges, replaced the engine mount and did a oil service.

I put it up for sale for 2300€ or 23000 SEK. Got a few calls and bad bids for the car. Now a month later a girl came by with her dad and they bought the car. Got 2000€ or 20000SEK for the car which is a ok price.

It was a nice car while I had it. Seems like the girl will enjoy the car and I hope it has a long future.

I'll see if I buy a fiat again. Might come one day. For now I'm enjoying my Saab 9-3. Planning on tuning it and doing a ethanol conversion, already bought new bigger brakes.

C ya fiat forum!
Have a nice one!
:slayer:
//Esaus