Hello everyone,
I think I may have made a big mistake. A guy I know says to me "Can you give me a hand pulling this old car out of the barn so that the scrap man can take it away?" "Of course" I say, "No problem." After all the guy in question has given me a lot of work over the years and it would be rude not to. "It's just an old Fiat Panda" he says "Scrap man says he'll give £90 for it, shame though because it's a 4x4 and I think they're quite rare".
Now, I read Practical Classics mag every month and I hate the idea of stuff going to the scrappy so I get a bit interested. "Tell you what, I'll take it off your hands if you want." I heard a voice say, my voice it would appear. And before I could ask for authorisation from the boss we had it winched out of the barn and onto a trailer before I could ask pertinent questions like "Does it run? What's all that brown flakey stuff lying on the ground? Why does it smell like a rats lavatory inside?" The basic upshot of this rambling nonsense is that I now own a formerly red, formerly road worthy 1987 panda 4x4 plus (plus what I don't know) which, as we speak, is quietly leaving marks all over my decking (onto which it had to be lowered down a small flight of steps by the way). It hasn't run for about 12 years and is suffering from tin worm in all the usual places. It's been under its sheet since I collected it in Feb so I had a look under the bonnet yesterday. Cut a long story short, engine looks ok but a bit perturbed by the loose spark plugs and some water in the bores. Think it's rain rather than coolant as there wasn't any water in the oil. Head's off and looks ok as do the the pistons and bores. The rest of it I haven't had the courage to look at yet.
Basically, I've got seven years until my son turns 17 and needs it for his test. Any help from the collective would be most appreciated.
Thanks for listening.
I think I may have made a big mistake. A guy I know says to me "Can you give me a hand pulling this old car out of the barn so that the scrap man can take it away?" "Of course" I say, "No problem." After all the guy in question has given me a lot of work over the years and it would be rude not to. "It's just an old Fiat Panda" he says "Scrap man says he'll give £90 for it, shame though because it's a 4x4 and I think they're quite rare".
Now, I read Practical Classics mag every month and I hate the idea of stuff going to the scrappy so I get a bit interested. "Tell you what, I'll take it off your hands if you want." I heard a voice say, my voice it would appear. And before I could ask for authorisation from the boss we had it winched out of the barn and onto a trailer before I could ask pertinent questions like "Does it run? What's all that brown flakey stuff lying on the ground? Why does it smell like a rats lavatory inside?" The basic upshot of this rambling nonsense is that I now own a formerly red, formerly road worthy 1987 panda 4x4 plus (plus what I don't know) which, as we speak, is quietly leaving marks all over my decking (onto which it had to be lowered down a small flight of steps by the way). It hasn't run for about 12 years and is suffering from tin worm in all the usual places. It's been under its sheet since I collected it in Feb so I had a look under the bonnet yesterday. Cut a long story short, engine looks ok but a bit perturbed by the loose spark plugs and some water in the bores. Think it's rain rather than coolant as there wasn't any water in the oil. Head's off and looks ok as do the the pistons and bores. The rest of it I haven't had the courage to look at yet.
Basically, I've got seven years until my son turns 17 and needs it for his test. Any help from the collective would be most appreciated.
Thanks for listening.
they often look worse than they are, engines are common as fiat still use them just a big bigger on the insides so there be no problems if yours turns out to be dead
