As I've mentioned previously in some posts, the little Abarth was technically the wife's runabout. My wife named the Abarth Raven, by the way!

Then, out the blue, circumstances conspired against us and the wife's employment took a bit of a twist - not necessarily for the better. The poor little Abarth wasn't what was required anymore owing to my wife's new found extensive commute, inc. toll road for additional financial wounding. I did make a vague attempt at selling the Abarth to fund a diesel hack for wifey but secretly I wasn't trying hard. I liked it too much.

The Abarth went into storage at the end of December, cudos to the grandmother for offering up the space to have it off the road.

All the while I had my Audi A8. 4.0 twin turbo diesel it had near twice the ponies of the Abarth, the torque of a lamborghini murcielago and did over 30mpg. More gadgets than you could ever possibly hope to fathom. It was all things to all men.

So I had a decision to make. One me, two cars.

Today the decision is made as last night the Audi went to it's new owner.

In what can only be described as the swift application of liberal doses of Top Gear logic I've decided I'd prefer the car that is smaller, less reliable, slower, less economical, less well equipped and significantly less comfortable to drive.

And I couldn't be happier! Today is the day I get my Abarth back.

Plan for the weekend / coming week is to get it back to roadworthy having been sat for a few months.

Service is due as it was last serviced in Jan 2016, so I'll give it a service, oil and filters. I'm intending a belt change a little later in the spring. It's been done once so probably doesn't need doing just yet but personal preference would be for additional change.

The front brake pads were reaching the end of their usable life but not into the 'squeal' material yet. I'll get the brake discs cleaned up with a bit of use and change for new pads.

I need to clean, lubricate and reassemble the bonnet release. It's seized up a little being sat so opening the bonnet requires a pair of pliers on the cable rather than the handle.

Then I need to work out refitting the engine tray. It had sagged and dropped during wife ownership so got removed pending further investigation, so I need to review the fixings and re-apply. May require new clips or riv-nuts or something.

And of course a dam good polish and a valet.

I also have a sport steering wheel to fit at some point but mechanicals first, details second.

Congrats on YOUR new car..

Charlie

Cheers Charlie.

Minor set back yesterday. My grandmother had sent her car off for MOT. The garage that collected it left their can on her driveway blocking my car in, so i couldn't get it out haha

Her car is up for MOST this morning so it'll hopefully be free some point this afternoon. Such is life!

Hope you managed to get to get to it!

Hope you enjoy it again!

kevgibs said:

Hope you managed to get to get to it!

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Cheers Kev

Got it out and home yesterday. Have given it a good bath and polish up. Have complained a little to meguiars and asked for their advice as their 'ultimate' polish was a top notch pain the ass. Couldnt get it to buff up for love nor money to the point of having to t-cut the thing to get it to come off. A different polish is in order I think. Will get some poor boys black hole.

Got the battery charged up overnight and will throw that back in shortly. Need to get a full systems check. The instrument cluster is flashing the odometer which means proxy alignment has dropped out across the CAN network somewhere - so something is potentially not happy.

I suspect it's a case of the battery having gone flat and being jump started meant that something wasn't 'alive' when she booted up and has therefore been dropped. It's easily sorted though.

Other than the brakes being a bit crusty and suspension a little squeaky (oh and 1 flat tyre) I think she is in good shape.

MOT due 01/05 so will soon find out. I'll get it in and tested just as soon as I can and work from there.

Will hopefully get it serviced tomorrow when shops open. Have been suffering a bit of a cold and so didn't get as far as I would have liked yesterday.

OK so systems check revealed that the radio and heater matrix wasn't working.

I didn't spot this yesterday having left these turned off to allow for 'jump start' and it was a nice warm day, so just had the windows down whilst I listened to her to make sure she was running OK.

Put the battery in it this morning and went to go see mother for mother's day and wife decided she wanted the radio on - but nothing happened. We then noticed the heater matrix not responding to commands either. D'oh.

Was an easy fix though, turned out to be a 10a fuse had blown, F49 i think from memory. Had suffered this once before and wife remember it happening and said it was one of the red ones (10a). So had a flick through owners manual to narrow down offender and sorted that pretty easily.

Also been a little naughty, as I had a spare 15 mins this afternoon, so I popped on the sport steering wheel. Did it without disconnecting the battery too - living on the edge!

Whilst giving the Abarth some love I've just ordered her:

Key key fob case in black
two new key fob Abarth badges (to replace the Fiat one, seeing as I'm missing my badge anyway)
New rear tailgate Abarth badge - mine faded so removed it
Two new black Abarth wing badges - these are additions as it has no wing badging currently. Will see if I can find somewhere complementary for these to go (if I can't, I won't).

Fresh fill of 0w40 oil and a new BOSH oil filter this morning. I wonder if Fiat could have made the oil filter any harder to access. What a pain.

Noticed what I suspect may be a slight leak from waterpump. This may accelerate plans for cambelt job. Something to monitor.

Artermis said:

Couldnt get it to buff up for love nor money to the point of having to t-cut the thing to get it to come off. A different polish is in order I think. Will get some poor boys black hole.

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It may be worth taking some clay to the surface to get rid of any contamination in the paint. The Meguiars stuff might contain Carnuba wax and that's a little bit moody if you apply it over something it doesn't like. I have problems with Carnubish waxes over the top of Autoglym Aqua Wax, for instance.

Just clay off the old "waxiness" (whatever it is) and start again.

Black Hole is a glaze which fills minor scratches left over after polishing (T-cut is a polish).... but then evaporates off fairly promptly so it's not a top coat finish.

Soooo... once you've clayed, polished and glazed it then you need to wax it. Staying with Poorboys - try their Natty Blue Wax. It's good value, comes off really easily, lasts for ages and smells of bubble gum You could do worse..

I experimented with Natty Blue on my old 155 (black paint) and I found that 3 or 4 coats of the wax is optimal (apply sparingly). I went up to seven coats just to see what happened.. but it wasn't getting any glossier after 4...


Ralf S.

Ralf S. said:

It may be worth taking some clay to the surface to get rid of any contamination in the paint. The Meguiars stuff might contain Carnuba wax and that's a little bit moody if you apply it over something it doesn't like. I have problems with Carnubish waxes over the top of Autoglym Aqua Wax, for instance.

Just clay off the old "waxiness" (whatever it is) and start again.

Black Hole is a glaze which fills minor scratches left over after polishing (T-cut is a polish).... but then evaporates off fairly promptly so it's not a top coat finish.

Soooo... once you've clayed, polished and glazed it then you need to wax it. Staying with Poorboys - try their Natty Blue Wax. It's good value, comes off really easily, lasts for ages and smells of bubble gum You could do worse..

I experimented with Natty Blue on my old 155 (black paint) and I found that 3 or 4 coats of the wax is optimal (apply sparingly). I went up to seven coats just to see what happened.. but it wasn't getting any glossier after 4...


Ralf S.

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Yeh it has really annoyed me how bloody difficult it's been. Believe it or not the ultimate polish is actually a glaze; it calls itself a "pre-waxing glaze" on the tub - so you're right not truly a polish in the strictest sense of the term.

Still, whatever it is - it's crap.

It sounds like you haven't discovered the awesomeness of a clay mitt, mate. Check these out:

G3 Clay Wash Mitt

Use one of these as if it was your sponge (obviously using the clay side). They don't last more than half a dozen washes or so but it's not like it's something you need to use every time. The work brilliantly and seem so much easier than the traditional bar. You can literally hear the difference in the paint as you wash off the bonded contaminants.

I have one of these but don't have a clay bar - so didn't think of that. It's a good idea though. I gave the clay bar to my dad for his bike as it's easier to use round the small surfaces of a bike.

Agree re the natty's blue wax. I have a tub of that already and it's fairly new. I got some of that to wax up the Audi. Shined up a treat with it too. If memory serves I used a coat of meguiar's tech wax (liquid) first, as that's got quite a gloss to it, then went over with the natty's for a more resiliant hard wax protection layer.

I never tried applying more than one layer though. If it stays a bit overcast tomorrow I might give it another go. Washing a black car in any kind of warmth / direct sunlight is just asking for grief!

Artermis said:

Also been a little naughty, as I had a spare 15 mins this afternoon, so I popped on the sport steering wheel. Did it without disconnecting the battery too - living on the edge!

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I've seen there's a guide to getting the wheel off, how tricky is it? From that point how much work would it be to get the indicator/wiper unit off?

I bought one because my indicator wouldn't stay on and I planned on replacing it, but it just turned out to be the rubber around the stalk bunching up and getting in the way.

I can live with it popped out but the new part isn't as worn and it has the cruise control stalk, so if it's not too much bother I might swap it out,.

kevgibs said:

I've seen there's a guide to getting the wheel off, how tricky is it? From that point how much work would it be to get the indicator/wiper unit off?

I bought one because my indicator wouldn't stay on and I planned on replacing it, but it just turned out to be the rubber around the stalk bunching up and getting in the way.

I can live with it popped out but the new part isn't as worn and it has the cruise control stalk, so if it's not too much bother I might swap it out,.

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I had the steering wheel changed in under 15 minutes start to finish. It's very simple.

Start the car - engine running......

pull the car forward or backward and rotate the steering wheel so that one of the 3 spokes of the steering wheel (at 3, 6, 9 o'clock on the wheel) are up at the 12 centre position - this gives you access to the bolt hole on the back of the wheel.

Undo the allen bolt that holds the airbag on the back of the wheel for the spoke in the 12 o'clock position.

Repeat for the other 2 bolts rotating the wheel to get the other spokes into the 12 o'clock position.

Keep the engine running and move the car back and forth whilst spinning the steering wheel so you don't static steer the car, which puts a lot of load on the steering and scrubs the tyres.

Once all 3 bolts are loose - note the don't actually come out the wheel, they just undo from the airbag, centre the wheel at the straight and level position. This isn't necessary as the steering column is keyed but it makes life easier.

Turn ignition off - quite important. Probably disconnect the battery if you're nervous around airbags. I didn't but hey... Never unplug an airbag with the ignition on as the system is live.

Disconnect the two airbag connectors - yellow and green for multi stage bag. Also unplug the little white plug on the wheel body for the horn.

You're then going to be presented with the nut that holds the wheel. It will probably have a little rubber boot on it too. Remove and undo.

Wheel should slip right off.

If you're going to be working further in the clock spring, apply a bit of duct tape or something to it now, so that it doesn't get knocked and spin off - this will upset the car. It lines up with a connector hole on the back of the wheel but if you knocked it and ended up 360 deg out or something it'd go bonkers.

For the clock spring - you're going to want to remove the steering column cowl as well. Thats I think 4 screws on the bottom half, which unclips and removes over the steering column adjust lever. There is I think 4 more screws on the top half to locate. 2 of them are quite well hidden under what would have been the base of the steering wheel - which you've now removed. That should then unclip and pull away.

Check out the guide for changing the instrument cluster for more detailed info on removing the column surround as it has to come out to pull the cluster.

Then you're down to the clock spring. I'd add that this point that I believe you need to hook the car up to diag to tell it that the clock spring has been changed, otherwise the ABS / ESR freaks out because it senses a steering angle and sends the system into meltdown.

I think - but am not 100% - the clock spring can be removed from the stalk set and then the stalk set is removed, but I've never gone as far as to remove these before, I've never had a need.

You might find if you remove the cowling you can re-seat and tidy up the rubber boot and solve your issue. Also cruise control I believe is a retro-fit item that can be done with just removing the cowling and plugging it in. Note that you will need a cruise control ready cowling or need to cut the existing cowling to accommodate the additional stalk. It shouldn't need coding either, just turning on although it might take a minute or two for the car to figure out what's happened.

Thanks man, didn't realise there'd be so much in it. Double checking the part I've got there's no clock spring on there (and because I bought it cheap I didn't check the part no. :bang, so I might see if I can replace the stalks without getting into taking the whole unit out. Or, like you say, just fit the cruise control stalk. Been keeping an eye out for the replacement cowling for that, looks tricky to find.

Anyway, sorry to derail the thread, looking forward to seeing what you do next!

The yoke with the levers on it is a separate item than the clock spring. I changed mine to see if that solved a problem with the headlamp high-beams that turned out to be a Body Control Module issue.

Once you have the airbag off, the clock spring pieces just lift away from the yoke. I didn't take any special steps to hold mine together (in ignorance) and got away with it.. but it's a good tip to tape the beast together before you remove it, to stop it moving.

The reluctant indicators are more easily solved. Get a huge knife (I used a Stanley knife) and then pull off the rubber boot and "shave the side of the hole that is causing the stalk to pop back to centre. You can remove half a millimeter without any problems..

Replace the rubber boot (it will be looser.. but unless you removed too much plastic it will still remain in place) and Robert is your mother's brother.


Ralf S.

Not happy with the cleaning on Sunday I gave it another go yesterday - much happier with the results.

Got rid of the Meguiars crap and used some pro stuff a mate of mine - that runs probably the best body shop in town - gave me. It's the stuff they use on Ferraris, TVRs, Porsches and such like, so if it works on them it ought to work on my little Abarth!

And it did.

Pics attached are before I'd waxed it - needed to get the new Abarth wing badges on whilst the paint was still bare.

Like my new little Abarth badges.

Today's little detail done.

New key fob case in black to match the car and the Fiat badge replaced with an Abarth badge - seeing as it's a Stilo Abarth.

Much smarter

How's it been behaving for you lately?

kevgibs said:

How's it been behaving for you lately?

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Not had much chance to do anything with her but drive. I had an audio install to do on the wife's car, plus she had a couple of dramas when she put petrol in it (it's a diesel) and a coolant hose came off. So that's eaten up a bit of time sorting it all out.

I got her a new battery last week as the one that was in it didn't have the appropriate rating.

When I bought her for the wife back in Jan 16 the battery that was in it was stone dead broke, so the 'dealer' put a new battery in it. Sadly I think the dealer just grabbed any cheap battery the had laying around rather than the right one. The battery that was in it was rated at 40ah and 330CCA (cold crank amps).

Don't get me wrong - that battery started the car and it ran OK, but there is a risk you blow the battery if you spike a heavy current when starting the car.

Now has a heavy duty battery at 60ah and 520cca, which is far more appropriate to starting this car. So that's one detail ticked off!

The last of the new badges arrived and I fitted that after I gave the car a wash at the weekend. This was to replace the faded and damaged Abarth tailgate badge, so it's looking a lot healthier there now.

Lastly, the replacement front suspension arms and anti-roll bar links arrived yesterday ahead of my planned install over the long weekend - weather permitting.

I know the MOT is due before end of the month and I'm not particularly happy with the amount of noise coming in particular from the near side front, which I believe is just worn bushes. So will replace. After that it'll go in for MOT and see if anything else fails.

Slight 'brown' moment on Monday when I may have accidentally tangled with a speed camera van - i'm not sure yet. Was cruising down a local 50mph dual carriage way when I spotted the camera van and noticed my speed had crept up to nearer 60. No excuses but not sure if I've been 'got' or not.

I have some bits i'd like to do, I want to visit a local breakers yard to grab some interior trim to experiment with but if I've spent £100 on being a criminal that takes a chunk out the budget, so I'll hold for a couple of weeks and see if I get a letter through the post before I make many more moves.

Really need to do something about the audio - really missing not having DAB radio so I think that's coming up my priority list. Mechanicals first thought and I'm still fairly sure the waterpump is leaking.

Well this was not what was required. Went to jack up the car this morning in order to get after changing the lower suspension arm and I spotted this. Think something might be wrong.