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Panda (Classic) 1988 Fiat Panda 4x4 Sisley "Four by Fork"

Introduction

Hello everyone, as some of you saw, I am now the proud owner of a Panda 4x4, as previously discussed in this thread: https://www.fiatforum.com/panda-classic/448853-sisley-ebay.html

Rough around the edges, rusty around various edges as well, but ready to go. Ticketed till next year and just been insured and taxed in my name so I'll be on the road in it by tomorrow!

When I entered the Panda scene, the 4x4 Sisley soon became a dream for me, little did I know this one would present itself so soon and so nearby. Once it had come up, I had to go see it. After a very thorough look around and a little bit of haggling, the seller took an offer for the car and we drove away that night. Here's a picture of the Fizz and Sisley sitting pretty on the seller's farm :)
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The Sisley surprised me at how different it was to my 93 Fizz at first. The gearbox and stick has a different feel, and the manual choke/carb/distributor is all something new compared to the auto choke, SPI, distributorless 93 engine! I'm definitely excited to get acquainted to the Sisley though, and I am also looking forward to making the most of the 4x4 system off road at some point. Pictures will be coming soon off road of course, when I get it there, but first a picture of the car sitting with Pandino and Chaz at home :cool:
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All in all a bit of works needs to be done but this is definitely a great start for me in the 4x4 scene. I hope to meet some other 4x4 owners off road once I've learned some skills as well, so more on this lovely little Sisley to come, stay tuned! :D
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Oh, and the nickname, "Four by Fork". Reason being, as soon as I saw the car advertised, I noticed it looked like the number plate said Fork. I dabbled with the idea of "The Forking Panda" and "Forkie", but once I thought of "Four by Fork", I knew that had to be the one... though I suppose I can still call it Fork for short, and if it ever decides to conk out on me then it'll turn into Forking Panda really quickly! (y)

I'll be posting more updates here soon but if anyone has any interests or questions then let me know. What I've done so far is fit a parcel shelf and started to clean the interior, as well as refit the bonnet vent as it wasn't on properly before!
Thanks to all for the ideas and help on the sump guard thus far. For now, I am going to attend to the idle and prop fix as they are paramount, and then onto the sump guard after that. I'm thinking that if worse comes to worst, some aluminium signs put together may do just for the one meet (transport in the car, put on for off roading, take off to come back) and come up with something better when I do get time. May come up with an idea before then that's better but something would hopefully be better than nothing :)

So, parts have been ordered from Freddy and I've got a few bits from Halfords. Need to make an order from Ricambio, and then I'll have all the bits I need once it all comes in. Then I've got a few weeks before July so I need to get a move on ;)

Watch this space, Fork will be getting some tlc soon...
 
The dirty old cv joints were removed today, needed to take the circlip off with some external circlip pliers first, but everything came off smoothly. The joint we greased up a while back actually fared quite well, but the other one had dry horrible gunk that wasn't doing anything and it didn't look quite as nice...
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One clean shaft later!
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The joints needed to be cleaned completely. To be sure that it was all going to be fine, even the re-greased one was completely dismantled. By pushing the inner parts outwards, you can remove the ball bearings and the inner metal pieces. Brake cleaner, cloths and so on were used to clean all the old horrible gunk off the joints and get them as clean as possible. The whole of the joints were cleaned and then completely re-greased (lots and lots of the stuff!) and put back together. The gaiters were new (sourced from Freddy, thanks for that!) and all that is needed now is some pinchers to pinch the ear clips holding the gaiters back onto the shaft. The gaiters were very much needed new as the old ones had completely vanished, probably partly why the grease was getting bad and the joints were so dirty...
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With the shaft pretty much back together now, I just needed those pinchers. The cv boot pinch pliers have been ordered so I am just waiting on those, once they are here I can get that done and then get that propshaft back on the car! While the shaft is off and lying dormant waiting for the tool, I thought I may as well give the prop a bit of paint... it is by no means a full on job, but a little bit of surface rust treatment and Wilko exterior gloss deep red paint hopefully goes a fair way to making the prop look much newer now! ;)
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So the plan from here:
Get the pinch tool and get the clips clamped down
Order inner gaiters and bearings
Sorts all gaiters/bearings on driveshafts and replace gearbox oil
Consider sump guard plans

Still got the front lights in the planning stages and have the brackets for them so maybe I can fit them into a gap where I have some time and waiting for parts or something, they are not as essential as the other tasks right now though so they can wait if they have to!
 
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1988 Fiat Panda 4x4 Sisley "Four by Fork"

We're the ball bearings bright and shiny ?
The gaiter clips can be closed by a pair of side cutters .
 
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Re: 1988 Fiat Panda 4x4 Sisley "Four by Fork"

We're the ball bearings bright and shiny ?
The gaiter clips can be closed by a pair of side cutters .
The front ball bearings were a lovely bright colour, the rear ball bearings were very dirty where the grease and dirt was heavily built up, they're all cleaned up but they're not bright like the front ball bearings were!

Already got a tool on the way, will come in handy for cv gaiters when I get to that too.
 
Re: 1988 Fiat Panda 4x4 Sisley "Four by Fork"

The front ball bearings were a lovely bright colour, the rear ball bearings were very dirty where the grease and dirt was heavily built up, they're all cleaned up but they're not bright like the front ball bearings were!

Already got a tool on the way, will come in handy for cv gaiters when I get to that too.


If there not shiny grit has been in with the race those will be on the way out !! Did you strip down the joint? If so you would have found a groove or indent which has been worn in this will possibly vibrate or be noisy and will need to be replaced soon fitting new gaiters will save any more damage but beware !!
All the best. panda are for life
not the weekend !!!
 
Re: 1988 Fiat Panda 4x4 Sisley "Four by Fork"

If there not shiny grit has been in with the race those will be on the way out !! Did you strip down the joint? If so you would have found a groove or indent which has been worn in this will possibly vibrate or be noisy and will need to be replaced soon fitting new gaiters will save any more damage but beware !!
All the best. panda are for life
not the weekend !!!
Yes the dirt will have got into the grease because there was no gaiter before, there is a slight groove because of this, I do not have another joint so can't do anything about that yet. I was thinking of trying it as it is with new grease and gaiter and then getting a new joint if needed afterwards, would there be any harm to trying it as it is? I asked Freddy while I was doing this and he said there should be no harm in it and should be a lot better with the new grease and gaiter and I can always get a new joint another time if needed!

It was noisy before but should hopefully be better now :p

I agree completely, need to keep as many Pandas on the road as possible! Though of course I do not have an endless pocket to replace everything unfortunately, I am doing things bit by bit and keeping this one on the road and being used :)
 
Agreed with you it's not going to do any more damage the new grease will make things better just making you aware of things mate !! Best of look with the reassembly
 
Agreed with you it's not going to do any more damage the new grease will make things better just making you aware of things mate !! Best of look with the reassembly
Just stick stick the CV on the other side so wear will take place in other direction.
Thanks to both for the help. After speaking to a few others I found out that someone has a new joint that I can buy anyway so while the prop is still out it made sense to order it so I can use a new joint rather than re-using this one. I'm sure it would have been fine but I got a good deal on the new joint so it only makes sense to go for a new one while the prop is ready to go :)
 
Thanks to both for the help. After speaking to a few others I found out that someone has a new joint that I can buy anyway so while the prop is still out it made sense to order it so I can use a new joint rather than re-using this one. I'm sure it would have been fine but I got a good deal on the new joint so it only makes sense to go for a new one while the prop is ready to go :)
Im sure it would have been fine, but sometimes good deals come up and its like "why not"

You are doing a great job man, relax! You should be very proud. I am certainly impressed with your work
 
Im sure it would have been fine, but sometimes good deals come up and its like "why not"

You are doing a great job man, relax! You should be very proud. I am certainly impressed with your work
Especially with cleaning it completely and the new grease I imagine it would have been but exactly that, if you can get a good deal and renew things then definitely "why not"! :) Lucky I have a lot of CV grease so I can grease another one - I can always keep the used one as spare anyway!

Cheers, probably not quite managing at your pace but I'm learning as I go along. I've never actually touched a cv joint before, so it's always nice to learn how to take things about and how to put them back together and learn how they work along the way. Slowly but surely! Thanks Cam!
 
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Cleaned out the flanges, the rear one had grease that was pretty much solid... glad I changed the joint out now! Packed the flanges with grease as well. There's absolutely no way somebody can tell me I didn't put enough grease in there! :p

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With the new paint, new gaiters, ears clamped, renewed joint and new joint all with new grease, it was all ready to go with new bolts. I have to admit the paint didn't go as planned but it'll give it a bit more protection anyway.

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A lot of time and achy arms later, the prop was put back in (by removing exhaust mount first) and bolting it all up. Hopefully one job successfully completed, though I'll have to take it for a test drive next... :)
 
Dont tell me arms, my achy breaky arms :)

Got the achy arms myself, will post to my thread later

Hope the test drive went well! I imagine it would have
That's how it always is I suppose ;)

I haven't actually had chance to test drive yet! Was too busy cleaning up Pandino yesterday and went to the Forza show today. I'll test drive in the week, as will I need to order inner gaiters (which I keep putting off because I don't know if I need more from Ricambio)!
 
Re: 1988 Fiat Panda 4x4 Sisley "Four by Fork"

Looks nice and shiny that!
Be really muddy soon !!!! Great work there well done Owen [emoji1360][emoji1360][emoji36][emoji1009][emoji36][emoji2]
Cheers Freebo and Sj - though Sj is right, it will be muddy soon ;) Just you wait until the Yorkshire meet :D

Sisley is getting the test drive tomorrow as I need to go to Castle Combe. I may/may not explore a couple of the narrow lanes down near there too but we shall see, depends if time allows and if the prop is actually okay or not!
 
It will be fine with the work you've done test it well if you can't break it that's good
If you brake it it shows up a problem it can be fixed
 
Test drive complete, the sound is gone! As the rear joint is now new, it works a dream and all went well. Refurbed front joint will keep it sweet too and no dirt can get it now I have those new gaiters. I haven't tried the car off road yet but don't worry, I will soon... I got fairly close to going off road though, drove through the sticks near Castle Combe, got a couple of snaps too :)
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Today was a very warm day! More work on the Sisley today, started off by removing the sump guard and then inspecting it (behind lots of shade as to get out the sun!). Then, the aluminium signs that I have were looked at and compared to the size of the guard. I think the best thing to do as a temporary thing is to have one sign longways down the guard (either centered or slightly to the left to protect sump). The ends will be angled so that the sign won't catch on rocks sticking up etc... the sign will be held on using other metal pieces placed behind it, bolts and nuts used to attach the sign to the other metal pieces. This means that the sump guard is not drilled into or anything so I can come up with a better and more permanent solution in the future!

Tried having a look at the tow hook piece my father's friend had previously used on his. The way we planned to put it on would have it facing upwards so ground clearance was not ruined, however we have found it will not go on as the actual car structure above it is in the way! Putting it on the downwards direction will compromise too much ground clearance for my liking so that is being left as is for now...

Anyway, on to actually doing a bit of work after the sun calmed down a little. The interior boot panel was removed and the washer pipe was re-attached to the washer end piece I salvaged from the CLX. Now I have a rear washer that works, yay! Speaking of the CLX, the boot lock was transferred as well as the Sisley boot lock wouldn't work at all! The CLX one is great, though means I'm ferrying around another key now. Still, at least it locks now too :D
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