The final curtain of the forth decade

So, really from 2010 onwards, I've become a taxi driving, non bike riding general manager. The Jagaur X-Type was replaced with the MINI One in September 2011, as my mother stated "the Jaguar is too big for you!" So, from one extreme to the other!

Out with the odl Jaaaaag, in with the new Dinky

Since then, it has been a MINI adventure. I joined the Surrey New MINI owners club, have done three London to Brighton Mini runs, and lots of other shows up and down the country. It's been great fun, but this year I have been a bit quiet on the car show scene.

Work is still going strong, I have a good team around me. Who somehow have stuck with me, even when we've had a lot of shit to put up with!

New friends have come, old friends have been on adventures and returned!

At times, I think my life is stuck, or just been placed on hold. My mum likes to point out that the only time she gets out of the flat is with me on a Saturday. I try to keep getting her out every weekend for her shopping trip to Marks & Spencer, somewhere in the country.

Just before Christmas 2014 we received the sad news that my aunt passed away from cancer, That was very upsetting, especially for my mum, as it was her youngest sister. 64 is too young. We now try and have a family gathering every month or so, just to get everyone together for a good old gossip over a meal. It's fun, and it gets us out for an adventure somewhere.

Now I'm half way through 2015. I started running just to lose some weight back in January, and after 11kgs, and now 11 parkruns, I'm still enjoying it!  Long may the running continue.

New plans for the rest of the year... Well, Sunday I pick up my new toy.

2005, my 30th birthday, I got an Aprilia 125cc, 2015, my 40th birthday, I've just bought a Kawasaki Ninja 250. I hope to be collecting it on Sunday! So, in ten years, I've managed to double the engine capacity of the bikes I buy near my birthday!!

To my friends I have meet over the last ten years, Malcolm, Kay,and the others, it's been a fun roller coaster, and long may it continue! The world of Loon is never quiet!! Especially if the Monster is working!!

Cars in a bike dealers forecourt?? It must be raining!

Roll on show season!!

The new look, 2013 Dinky has now been completed. Well, albeit apart from a wash!

It's taken a few months of planning, a bit of faffing around on eBay and a few MINI websites; Sign My Ride,  My Beautiful MINI, and thanks to Dan @ surreyminigraphics.co.uk for fitting the roof decal today (after a slight delay due to the snow last week!).

January has been filled with tinkering. New parts fitted for 2013;

Genuine MINI black spot lights
R112 16 inch alloys
SMR cleaning instructions decal
Genuine MINI spot light covers (R56 ones!!).
New radiator hoses (not a mod, just a requirement!!).
Union Jack interior door pulls and glove box button cover
Union Jack sunroof decal
DM centre wheel caps
Matt black mirror caps (they suit the car better than the UJ ones!)

And that's it!

The first big show we are attending this year is the Mini Day @ Brooklands Museum on Sunday 24th March. At least it's a nice local meet to me!

Now the car is finished for this year, I think it's time to start playing the resurrection of the Monster!!

A small update

As January 2013 chugs along slowly, the depth of winter has arrived to the South East of England. Snow, floods, a bit more snow, cold, dark and damp. In other words, it's just like summer, but with a bit more snow!!

In my world, not a lot has changed in the past couple of weeks. The car is getting dirtier, the Monster is a bit more dustier and the day job is going along slowly.

I'm working on plans for next month already. The starter motor needs to be taken off of the Monster, so fingers crossed the workshop will be a bit warmer in February. The MINI needs a good clean before the next Mini night at the Ace Cafe and then there is the LSMOC Breakfast Meeting on the 10th February. The little local car meetings will slowly get me into the spirit for the 2013 MINI show season, which starts again in March!

I think it is now time for a bit of shut eye.

LSMOC Breakfast Meet January 2013

Just a little bit of icing sugar.

Drained....

Then refilled!

Today has been spent mostly dealing with the coolant system on an R56 MINI. I did actually prepare everything. The old hoses were removed on New Years Eve, with a fair bit of swearing and wondering why I don't (or didn't) own a set of hose clip pliers. A couple of hours removing the air filter box, coolant expansion tank, remaining coolant and finding bodywork hose clips on the floor the coolant system was cleared out.

The MINI was left in the workshop, and the hoses were ordered from the local BMW dealers. On the way back from the dealers, I thought it would be a wise idea to actually buy some hose clip pliers. Job done thanks to Halfords.

After picking up the replacement hoses today, and two 5 litre bottles of coolant, it was time to play rebuild the MINI. Well, with no help from the forums (yet), as the instructions I found only covered the R50 and R53 MINI engines, through a bit of trial and error, I finally managed to refit the hoses and started bleeding the system slowly. With the ignition on, the heater set to maximum heat and fan on setting one, the first stage of filling the coolant system was done, slowly mind you! The engine was started, and left for a few minutes (remembering to refit the coolant expansion tank cap), and no heat was coming out of the vents! Ok, I need to do the final bleed of the system. Engine off, twenty minutes of searching through the interwebs MINI forums and finally I found a picture of the sort of area where the thermostat bleed valve would be hiding. Yes, they do hide it well, behind some wiring, right on top of the thermostat, in a small gap you can just fit a long screw driver in!Slowly the screw was turned, and finally I heard the nice noise of hissing and then looked to see coolant coming out of the bleed screw! Success! Screw tightened up, coolant topped up to the required level and engine started....

Hot air finally came out of the vents, no leaks noticed from any hoses, so finally the job was completed. In total it took approximately 3 hours to complete. Not bad for someone when last confronted with a complete coolant system bleed, I owned an Alfa Romeo that just had a total loss coolant system!

The MINI is back on the road!

Vehicle update time.

Let us start at the beginning. The vehicle I lusted after most of my biking life after gaining my motorcycle licence in 1993.

1: Ducati M900 Il Mostro.

904cc air cooled, 90 degree V twin engine. Dry clutch and lots and lots of character, as most of the Ducati range has. She was built in 1993, one of the first off production line, and (possibly) the oldest Ducati M900 in the UK.

I've owned here since 23rd December 2006, and we have had our ups and downs. Knocked off the bike twice on the same road, at different ends, and a week apart between each off. Two complete engine rebuilds, a few niggling electrical problems, worn out Brembo rear wheel, paint peeling off of the front wheel, but she has covered over 60k miles in the last 20 years, and approximately 35k of those miles have been covered by me!

Not too shabby for a 20 year old

2: MINI One 1.4

The changing faces of Dinky

The Dinky one. A car that I didn't think I would want, but now I've got one, I love it! I bought her on the 11th September 2011. One month later she was reversed into, and a bill for over £2000 was sent to the third party. After I collected the car from the repair workshop, it has been a slippery slop since!

The engine is still standard, not that there is a lot you can do to tune the 1.4ltr engine in the MINI One. Maybe a change of air filter for a K&N system, but unlike the 1.6 Cooper, you can't really do much else.

The interior is still standard (just about), apart from the addition of Union Jack interior mirror cover, Union Jack centre consol, Union Jack door handles and glove box opening button and a Union Jack parcel shelf cover from Go Badges. The stereo has been fully upgraded by NewMINIStuff in February 2012, and it does kick out one of the best sounds from the speakers I have heard from a car.

The exterior has been altered slightly. It's still a Lightning Blue MINI. The bonnet and front bumper were replaced by Cooper Tadworth workshop after the shunt. So far I've added the Union Jack (can you see a theme here!) mirror covers, DM wheel caps, and a Cooper S rear spoiler. The wipers have been changed to the flat aero design, Cooper S grille, genuine MINI spot lights and Cooper S fuel cap.

All of the above have been completed since October 2011, just to make the car stand out a bit more.

3: Suzuki GSF600n, the Bandit

It has become the one we do not speak of. The forgotten vehicle of my little fleet, and since 2006 I've been saying "yes I will rebuild the Bandit" on New Years Day, but it just seems to be put in more boxes.

Back in 2006, it was a 72k mile, 1999 Suzuki GSF600N. I have owned the bike since new. Nothing was really modified on the bike. Standard engine, just an aftermarket can was fitted (and fell off one bike ride). A few stickers were added to the tank, the wheels have been different colours, and the gear was changed from 15 tooth front sprocket to 14 tooth, to give it a little bit more acceleration.

The old Suzuki Bandit on her last ride out.

Well, that was a brief rundown on the vehicles under my current ownership. All three need a slight bit of repair, well one of them needs a lot of repairing and a miracle!!

I'll go off and start planing the restoration.

MINI Adventures, they are fun!!!

It's coming up to nearly three months since I collected the MINI from Cooper Tadworth. On the 11th September I said good bye to the Jaaaaaaaaaaaaaag and hello to Dinky. Before you wonder why are you calling the MINI Dinky? Well, to go from a Jag to a MINI is a bit of a downsize (as mentioned earlier in a blog), so Dinky fitted quite well. Anyway, back to the present....

I had a trawl through the interweb, and thanks to Mr Google and lots of well placed words from those interweb geeks, I managed to find millions of Mini clubs and forums across the world. The only problem being, they were Mini clubs and not MINI clubs. Some are very anti BMW MINI, lots of them seem happy that you are in a MINI or Mini of some description, and some, after a bit more searching, just cater for MINIs.

As with the Alfa, MX5 and Jag before, the forums were joined and off I looked for inspiration and maybe more inspiration and possibly a few runs out to MINI or Mini or both meets around the UK. This is when I found SnM. After going through the TotalMINI site and wondering what was happening, I found the Surrey New MINI forum, and since then it has gone downhill since.

Two pub meetings, Nelsons Diner meet, Goodwood Meet, Winter Brighton Run and lots planned for 2012! My first real run in with them was at Brooklands Museum last year at the Mini day. I still like the classic Mini, and I would get one, if I had the time, money and space to rebuild one. But when I decent second hand classic Mini costs nearly the same as a 10 year old MINI, I think I'll go with the one that has air con, ABS and a CD player built in, rather than a possible rust bucket, that would eat my wallet contents like a... erm.... Ducati Monster!

Anyway, the MINI Adventures have been fun. Driving in convoys from Goodwood to Shoreham Airport for lunch with 35+ MINIs. Driving from Box Hill to Brighton in the wet conditions last weekend, was good fun, even with the strange folk of Brighton wondering why 15 MINIs were all heading towards Maderia Drive, well we want fish and chips of course!!

But alas, my 2011 MINI Adventures have come to an end. Nothing else to do but clean the car, buy more Union Jacks and clean the car some more. I'm looking forward to next year. Lots of meetings to go to. The Brooklands Mini day, London 2 Brighton, Mini Action Day at Castle Combe, maybe also some MINI racing and plenty of other stuff inbetween, a service and MOT being two things!

Right lets upload some snaps!

Dinky at Goodwood

SnM MINIs lined up at Goodwood Motor Racing Circuit

The Winter Brighton Run

Now with added Union Jacks