Tom's China 1.8 Meridian 2014 - Project Deja Vu

[Toms306]

Most of you have seen the car I bought 11/02/14....needed a cheap stop gap, that was also reliable with a bit of a space and a bit of spec...and ended up with this!





So gave it a service (oil, oil filter, fuel filter, air filter, spark plugs) and then set about tidying up the little annoying niggles.

Firstly the stereo had no surround and the steering column stalk didn't work, so fitted a spare surround and plugged the stalk in...works! But drivers speaker still doesn't.





The badge has taken a bump at some point and was kinda hanging off, though it doesn't really show in the pic. Had a brand new badge that I won cheap on ebay a while back so swapped those!





Also stuck the ABM projector lights on, which resulted in broken hockey stick clips...£1.25 for a pair of clips and that was sorted.





Then got rid of the tiny floor mat that did nothing except creep under the pedals... Fitted a set of OEM rubber mats, using spare Vauxhall mat securers lol.



Then the mirrors stopped working, as well as the speaker, so knew it was a broken loom...cut it open to find these! Fixed with crimps but no pics as it kept raining and wanted the door back on quick lol.



Also debadged the doors, but kinda like the rear badges so left them for now.



Xsara mist jets and Aerotwins that I had in the garage...



Fitted my cyclones with a new pair of rainsport 3s on the front. Sharkskin tech ftw.





Also fitted a ph3 spoiler which I had, along with good condition steering wheel which I won cheap on ebay.

Oh, and of course a black ice tree!



Had recently been valetted....possibly by Stevie Wonder with an excess of dashboard gel...everything was slimy, including the controls! So gave it a wash yesterday and polished today:

Jetwash
Autoglym shampoo
Super resin polish
Nattys blue wax
Fast glass the windows
Black the spoiler, mirrors and tyres
Vacuumed inside
cleaned glass inside
Used many anti-bac wipes on controls etc
And Mr Sheened the dash

And heres the result so far. Shame my camera doesn't pic up the depth of colour but I'd forgotten how nice china is!










To do list:

-Get ph3 parcel shelf. Currently has a well built but stupidly heavy stealth shelf with 2 6x9s which makes boot access difficult.
-Fit rear badge - got a domed one in the post
-Try and lighten the clutch with a new cable
-Fix front grill which has taken a bump and broken it's clips, though the grill itself isn't broken so will whip the bumper off and drill and cable tie the back of the clips

Long term would like a cone filter and replace the daft downturned exhaust...how anyone can fit a downturned tip with a bumper cutout I don't know lol. Also have a few more plans, but have to be done as cheap as possible, so we'll have to see what gets done.

Cheers
Tom