While I was gone, Carmen did a fair amount of work. The most noticable is the new stereo, to replace the hole in the dash that was there originally.
On sale from JB HiFi.
Fitted with help from our mate Matt, who helped untangle the mess of wires in the dash.
We also picked up a set of door trims to replace the ratty ones that were there, and they came with speaker mounts (and speakers). Since the head unit came with speakers she decided to fit them instead.
Looks pretty classy.
The other major addition is new hatch dampers.
The old shocks were dead, so you had to hold it up yourself. A right pain in the arse when you're trying to load the boot. With a steel hatch, the thing weighed a ton. It could probably take someone's head off if they weren't wary.
However, the biggest job was the one we couldn't do ourselves. That is, the stupid coolant leak. The service manual makes it sound so easy, "Undo all the belts, move the engine out of the way, replace it" like its replacing the windshield wipers.
At any rate, we gave Andrew, The Engine Whisperer, a call and he came around to do it for us. He did make it look easy, but still not in a way we'd like to attempt by ourselves.
It turns out that "moving the engine" is as simple as putting a trolley jack under the sump, undoing a mount,
and then using the jack to lower the engine a bit.
To be honest, he came over twice. The first time we got to the point where we had moved the engine and pulled all the belts off. However, trying to get the crank pulley off ended up with the bolt winning.
The offending bolt.
But, with the assistance of an upgraded air compressor, and a screwdriver into the gearbox, he managed to get it off.
The claw works a lot better when you can loosen the bolt.
We were going to do the timing belt as well, but just in case Andrew locked the existing belt in place "as good practice" so we wouldn't have to set everything back up afterwards...or risk destroying the engine.
It was just as well. It turns out the timing belt we bought off eBay, that was "definitely for the GTi", was too short. It looked like it came off a SOHC vehicle, as there was no way you'd get the belt wrapped around both cam gears and the pulley. Lucky it was only $10. So, we've still got the existing timing belt, and Andrew's good practices saved us a lot of time.
The block, de-pumped.
As for the pump itself, it had clearly seen better days.
You can see the stains where it was leaking out of the pump. The water was trickling down the engine block, and following the seal around to leak at the front where we could see it.
So, with a shiny new pump in its place (this one actually fit the car) everything got put back together. And, we finally put it back on the road. Kind of.
Unfortunately the car hadn't been driven for a while, so the battery was deader than disco. We thought we'd take it out for a drive.
Unfortunately, the new intake pipe is a trifle too long for the engine bay. I don't know what Swift it came off, or if our chassis is just too bent, but it just won't fit.
The pod filter was touching the back of the headlight, and the middle of the pipe touches the strut tower. The vibration from the engine pushes the pipe against these things, and leverages open the silicon hose we use to join them.
As such, the intake bleeds air. Unfortunately, most of the air is past the airflow meter and so the car runs rich, we lose throttle, and then the car stalls. With a dead battery the car was really reluctant to start afterwards. We got lucky that, the first few times, we were downhill so we could roll start the car.
Unfortunately, near Parramatta, our luck ran out. I tried to jump start the car, but due to a misunderstanding with the colour of the terminals I got the polarity wrong and blew a main fuse instead.
A quick call to Andrew and he came around to assist. In what I am sure was a funny sight, he plugged his soldering iron into a power point at the nearest servo and soldered the fuse shut.
It would be enough to get the car running, but he warned me that if I did the same thing again I would fry something far more important.
So, lining up a new battery and a new fuse, the car was left in a "basically running" state. Enough to do the grocery shopping and for us to ferry around a friend, which is better than the other cars we own.
