Paul’s misadventures - testing times

[Paul]

Sadly the truck is still giving me grief with emissions and I'm awaiting another salvo from the parts cannon, but until then I've consoled myself with buying a lemon. Quite literally.

Having sold the trusty but dull Suzuki Wagon-R+ I found myself with cash in my pocket...for all of 5 hours.

Now, real ones know the modus operandi of the average shitbox driver, and this one is no different




Yup, I've bought myself an SLK!

Here are some very flattering soft focus grainy pictures from the FB advert for Sir's pleasure

[Paul]

Why? Not sure really, but it does have a few things going for it.

Since the expansion of ULEZ I've been driving the very sensible, very dull 2020 Golf to work. It's quiet, super efficient and very high tech but utterly soulless.

This SLK is one of very few (some early, early 230 Kompressors were compliant but late 90s egs are rusty as hell) that is ULEZ compliant - so I can take it to work. Throughout the cold, wet winter. Obviously.

Now, it's a manual (so ever so slightly more sprightly than the autos) and it may have the smallest engine, but better MPGs. It's also got the right wheels (all kerbed) and they're not going anywhere because there's no locking wheel nut 🤣 No aircon, so no broken aircon. No heated seats, so no broken heated seats. Wonderfully comfy place to be. Remarkably electric mirrors work and the roof goes from erect to floppy in 28 seconds, which is healthy I'm led to believe. Amazingly rear heated screen works?!?! CD player (remember those) does not however. No undue creaks and rattles that I can hear and a totally clean MOT cert.

Rust, you say? More than enough I say. It'd come through the front two wings, and the rear arches are bubbling up. These are problems for future Paul.

Money light? Mostly on.
With the P/O's consent I plugged in my OBD reader (most of the lower dash fell out when I tried to remove the cap on the OBD port 😅), flashed the ECU and wiped the codes. Remarkably they stayed off for the test, but nor much longer. Apparently clearing codes doesn't fix codes.

Front bumper has clearly had a disagreement - and lost - with a bollard/deer/prone pedestrian. The front grille is missing, but then there's nothing left to clip a new grille too and where the hell am I going to get a bumper this colour? May try and fashion something from black chicken wire and sikaflex🤣

It's got an occasional misfire when GIVING IT TEH BEANZ which chucks the money light on and feels (in my painful, limited experience) MAF related. Possibly plugs. Giving that MAF cleaner is a fiver and a set of plugs a tenner I'll start there.

Who am I kidding?

This is the face of my poor, wheezing, hiccuping engine when I drop £150 on lowering springs instead of actually fixing it 😆

[grizz]

Sorry about the lemon, I may be on a similar roll right now, but too early to decide.

However……

I love the colour…..

Gotta have balls for that…..

But you don’t see the colour when driving it, and people will move aside, respectfully, as they expect old giffer skills.

I would as you know, choose that car happily, based on the colour being one I have never ever laid eyes on.

Loads of them in very pretty, or bland colours.

I would expect this one to have had a good life.

Good luck on your ownership.

✅✅✅✅✅

[grizz]

Just read post no2

Liking it even more now.

Lowering springs indeed.

[Paul]

Nov 12, 2023 8:30:49 GMT grizz said:

However……

I love the colour…..

Gotta have balls

✅✅✅✅✅

Much appreciated- I'm not sure it's a total lemon, but it's what my son has called it...I quite like it.

As a younger man I would have baulked at folk who picked a car based on the colour - "oh but what about the spec? The history? The technicals blah blah blah"

Which left me pondering...is it okay to pick a car based pretty much on the colour? And as a gent of advancing years I say...yes! I think it's great even if I'll never find parts to match...

[mrbounce]

The 52-plate 230 SLK I had was brilliant mechanically (and that had done 135k). Front wings and rear wings? Much like many others from the same era. Flipping rusty. However, pretty much the only 2 things I needed to change on it were headlight/sidelight bulbs and a new panel for the roof switch as mine was broken.

Serviced it myself and it went really well. When I was looking for one, there were only 4 colours I fancied (as everyone has black and silver) - blue (which I ended up with), maroon, kingfisher blue/green and yellow. So you aren't the only weirdo

See if you can pick up a wind deflector to go inbetween the rear roll hoops. It's amazing how much difference a small piece of perspex can make to the amount of wind in the interior.

I loved mine, probably more than I should have, considering it was really cheap and not the greatest body-wise.

[Paul]

Nov 12, 2023 11:26:51 GMT mrbounce said:

The 52-plate 230 SLK I had was brilliant mechanically (and that had done 135k). Front wings and rear wings? Much like many others from the same era. Flipping rusty. However, pretty much the only 2 things I needed to change on it were headlight/sidelight bulbs and a new panel for the roof switch as mine was broken.

Serviced it myself and it went really well. When I was looking for one, there were only 4 colours I fancied (as everyone has black and silver) - blue (which I ended up with), maroon, kingfisher blue/green and yellow. So you aren't the only weirdo

See if you can pick up a wind deflector to go inbetween the rear roll hoops. It's amazing how much difference a small piece of perspex can make to the amount of wind in the interior.

I loved mine, probably more than I should have, considering it was really cheap and not the greatest body-wise.

Wind deflector is a good shout - it gets a bit blowy over 40 for sure 😀

[brachunky]

There are a good few buys around on these and some probably worth spending a bit of dosh on. This one caught my eye at £1000


www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/304332455878943/

[Paul]

When I bought the car it had a bunch of fault codes which, with the old owner's permission, I cleared on the spot.

One kept coming back - P0243 - which is officially a Turbocharger Wastegate Solenoid fault- but is actually a generic code related to the the function of the throttle actuator and could indicate a MAF problem, boost leak or sundry other issues. Occasionally under what at around 4k the car would misfire and stumble just enough to throw a CEL...could go 30-odd miles and never happen, and only seemingly when cold.

Instead of just firing the parts cannon I actually took my time and did a little investigation.

I cleaned out the MAF with some compressed air (it was full of crud rattling around) and some proper spray, and began investigating around the SC itself.

Lo and behold...


This cheeky little thing was hiding under the throttle actuator, invisible from up top but definitely not good.

£2 worth of 5mm vacuum hose later, code cleared and I've not been able to repeat the fault...we shall see. Hopefully it's that simple.

Now just to tackle the locking wheel nuts with no key, the missing front grille, the brakes are supermodel thin all round, and there is a distinct absence of spine-shattering lowness.

[thomfr]

Get your welder out and weld a bolt or a nut (depending on the type of space available) to the locking nut and spin them out easy.
Thom

[teaboy]

I like yellow.

In a world of greyness it is a shining beacon of hope...

[Paul]

Good shout that - although these fancy deep alloys don't have a huge amount of space to play with. Took out some as a tester and to check the size to replace them, they aren't in too tight...

[Paul]

Today's quick win:





6 minutes.

Didn't need a welder, just my fluted wheel nut removal sockets, a mallet and some bravery.

I took one of the other wheel bolts out to check the size earlier this week and it wasn't tight - I'm guessing they've been out recently, so that helped.

Consigned to the bin and, with springs keeping warm in the front room, we're one step closer to (sensible) lows 🙂

[glenanderson]

Locking wheel nuts are an absolute pet hate of mine. The only person they ever stop doing anything or inconvenience is the actual owner of the car. Anyone who wants to steal the wheels will have the kit to get them off quicker than you can say “Alexa, order me a locking wheel nut removal socket”.

Almost as stupid as a system that makes it impossible to just buy a replacement for the number plate you’ve just had stolen.

[Paul]

Today was the day to install the new springs...here's the original height for reference


Rear springs look a little shorter than OEM, but also a bit meatier



Not a lot to it really - removed the inner bolt on the trailing arm and down she goes


Mercedes offer 4 different size of spring top mount doughnuts...this one is 13mm flavour. They go as low as 5mm should you want to drop it a bit further.



New springs in place



Front actually required less bit removing than the rear...just the lower shock bolt and (which isn't mentioned in the online guides) you'll get a lot more flex if you remove the ARB link. Without that i didn't have quite enough play to get the spring out.



Internal spring compressor is a must , makes light work of removing old and installing new.


OEM front doughnut for anyone trawling the Internet in 3 years looking to confirm what they have installed from factory without dismantling it all themselves...as I may have done before now...




Old v new fronts are more markedly different than the rears




And there you go - about 3 hours all in at a leisurely pace and stopping for a cup of tea more than once...it's a bit chilly!




Obligatory 'after' shot. Like a lot of the feedback online suggests the front looks mean, but the rear is still pretty high truth be told. It may settle a bit but there's a fair bit of a gap there. May well invest in skinnier spring pads for the rear at some point in the future.

Unfortunately the throttle body code returned after a particularly spirited drive yesterday, so it's back to the drawing board with that one...

[longman]

Nice one , what size are the rear spring shims? , maybe a thinner set will get the desired results.
I run a 2 on the rear and a 1 on the front of the SL ,no springs changed..

[Paul]

Beautiful... the rear rubber doughnuts are 13mm, I ordered 5mm ones last night to reduce the rake 🤣

Today has already proven to be a huge disappointment already and it's not even lunchtime - I think I'll go back to bed.

Went to air up the tyres and 1 valve cap looked like this...you can guess why.


Sigh




Well, garages are all shut so I've ordered some valves and a Laser tool to give it a go myself.

So I went to take the front bumper off today and try to fix some of the damage...turns out my SLK has a super rare option!



That's right, mine was specced with a metal undertray! Super rare option 481 (part number A170 524 0201) - and rare because it's ruddy awful. It weighs - at a guess - 74kg and let's talk about rust. Hell, I'll let you see it



Yeah, there's no way that's going back on.

Changed out a bulb in a rare moment of success



Removed most of the bolts (that weren't already missing) from the bumper and I THINK I may have found the source of my air leak:



Yeah the intercooler has totally come away here, just flapping around merrily.

Note the wonderfully jaunty bumper bracket - this thing has had a pretty hefty shunt at the front which destroyed the front grille and I suspect the IC.


Also, I think the SUPER RARE metal undertray is responsible for a great big crack across the bottom of the bumper. Metal has less give than plastic it would seem, so when the car's had a shunt it's pushed the bumper into the metal undertray and broken it.

So I've got a flat tyre, broken IC and knackered bumper. Great.

[Paul]

Must be the new bluetooth intercooler 🤣🤣🤣

[grizz]

Well.

You certainly get a sympathetic sigh from me.

Wonder why the metal stone guard.

Still want you to enjoy this car.

[Paul]

Nov 27, 2023 8:09:17 GMT grizz said:

Well.

You certainly get a sympathetic sigh from me.

Wonder why the metal stone guard.

Still want you to enjoy this car.

Sympathetic sighs accepted 🤣

Today, as ever, was a new day...and a much better one. Sadly no pics as I was ON IT today and the constant drizzle made me reluctant to whack the phone out.

First up was sorting the broken tyre valve...now I was deeply cynical about this kit but for for £15 I thought I'd have a punt.




And lo and behold it did work! Not quite as quick as the video - and I needed to break out the mallet as the cone device was too wide for the hole in the wheel - but one job ticked off.

As luck would have it a local (17 miles away) breakers on eBay had an intercooler - for collection I haggled him down to £40.

Picked up this morning, fitted, and bumper reattached (full of drift stitches FTW) before midday. Sadly didn't have much luck with the cheap plastic welder I'd bought on Amazon... it worked fine on black ABS plastic but the little pins just would not take to the bumper. No idea why...different plastic maybe?

So pleased with myself was I that I even found 10 minutes to throw a damp rag over the engine bay



I'm almost embarrassed at not realising the IC was faulty - it now revs far more freely to 4.5k and beyond (whereas before it was out of puff at around 3.5k) and is clearly well up on power. It's like a different car altogether...

And to add to my winning day I finally got the pickup truck through its MOT!



Different tester, different advisories 🤣. But having tried another O2 sensor I can only guess the 1st 'new' one was wrong in some way as it's fine now.

The fleet is in fine fettle once again and I'm celebrating with a bottle of Lidl's budget cider in the tub. A good day.