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Panda Meet Bea. The scrap yard find 1.3 Mjet

Introduction

it feels strange this.. more round, more powerful, more.. modern. being a strict Panda classic man i never thought i would get a newer shape panda but here i am!

This is the story of Bea (pronounced "Bee") named by my sister.

so how did i happen to find Bea?

well i was looking around our local vehicle scrap yard (the same one i got the Seat Marbella Fun from) for bits for my BMW E46. now for me its always a a few hours looking around at everything else as well. when i first entered the yard i noticed a rather nice looking yellow panda parked next to the weigh bridge booth.






while i was talking to the chap on the weigh bridge i asked what was with the yellow panda. he told me that it was towed in for scrapping due to flood damage and the engine not running he also said it was a damn shame as it only had 19k on the clock. soon as he told me it was diesel i was interested.
on hearing the "flood damage" part i was interested to see if i could get it to run. i have managed to save many engines from water damage before, mass air flow sensors save 90% of engines from getting bent rods. thinking to myself that the worst case would be that it could have bent con rods or something along that line i thought it may be worth the risk and buying the car. we agreed on £500 if i bought it, he gave me the keys and said that the day before 2 other yard workers pretty keen with engines tried to get it started with no success. hearing this and the fact the engine did try to turn over gave me a little hope that is was not a solid hydro lock. my idea being that given it was a modern diesel, as soon as water droplets hit the mass air flow sensor it would have cut the engine out before damage was done.
first things first when checking a hydro locked engine.. water in the air intake system. thankfully no water in the turbo. the MAF sensor was "wet" however.
the air filter was a bit wet, but not soaking like how i would have expected with a lot of the filter still dry.. all good signs so far!
with the guys trying to get the car started the day before the battery would not crank the engine over so i got Ratchet (my crazy classic panda 4x4) to give this yellow one a jump start. given the car had no EML it told me that they had not unplugged the MAF sensor. so i did and went to start it. it took a fair few cranks but i got it going on one cylinder then another kicked in then then next and then all 4. it was running! and running rather well too no nasty sounds or incomplete combustion, no smoke. just seems to be fine.
chap on the weigh bridge could not believe i got it running, but still honoured the £500 agreement. i asked if i could take it for a little test drive, well it drove fantastic, a bit smokey to start with but i classed that as all that
misfiring injected diesel burning out of the exhaust, that cleared away after a while and was fine. anyway i stuck a £150 deposit on it and went to collect and pay the rest today.
outside the car does not have a mark anywhere on it. its immaculate! with it having a very light colour interior the drivers seat is a little dirty but i am sure that i can clean it up easy. the carpet is wet but theres no water in things like the cup holders or anywhere where water could sit telling me that the water level never got very high.
i can soon get the seats and carpet out and give it all a good cleaning and a drying out.
and i am happy to say that i think this will make a great first car for my sister who is just starting to learn to drive.

so here it is now at home with its "death sticker" still on it heh











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FIAT Cars
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Dragon Man
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