Bluefox's 2003 Superb TDI

[Bluefox]

Ok, so here she is just after I picked her up.



53-plate, 2003 Skoda Superb Classic 1.9 TDI 130 in blue pearl. No extras I can see, just the standard stuff like CD player, enough airbags to shake a stick at, climate control, interior LED lighting, and of course, wheel trims. What else?

First mod was to remove the "Superb" badge because it certainly didn't look it.



After this, came the wheel trim incident. Within the first week I'd lost a trim, and as Skoda dealers are few & far between I finally found on in Cannock called Autosales, who will feature a lot in this thread... top marks to Mike in parts.

Anyway, a swift £25+vat later and I had a new trim. Only to loose another literally on the way home... argh. Much swearing. Mike felt sorry and I only paid about £20 inc vat for the second one, but I mean the best part of £50 for two trims? Seriously? Bring on the alloys...

Much time passed, and she was generally used and abused as the family wagon for myself and Donna (Mrs JB), and later on Gabriella.

The old Symphony stereo, good as it was...



Soon made way for my trusty Alpine CDA-9831R, an aging but still sweet head unit and a haistily installed holder for Donna's MP3 player:



...which damaged various pieces of trim. Or rather, I did with my ham fists. Christmas then came, and Donna got me a nice new shiny Alpine CDA-9653R.



...which was duely fitted, along with missing button blanks and new trim.

[Bluefox]

The now infamous tuning box incident then followed:



...which is all detailed here.


Nothing happened for a few months from there, general use really. All except some **** decided to drag his or her key down the nearside front and rear doors:



Nice.

Anyway, next thing I knew was when my front brakes wore down so much they were literally metal on metal. Sweet. So then, a boot full of parts:



... a quick couple of photos (without the ££££££ wheel trims, for that motorway look)...





...and some "action shots" taken with a camera phone (sorry about quality)...







As you can see, the discs were fairly shafted...



...and the drop on the springs isn't too shy!

After this,she returned with some nice shiny Delphi Lockheed brakes all round, new brake fluid and, of course... the KW -40mm lowering springs!

[Bluefox]

Just kidding, it's not that low. Low enough, I hope: I'm catching the sump guard if I hit speed bumps at anything over 20mph. Good job it's plastic, but that might be the next job...

That brings us upto date, only addition is a "Happy Flower" Maxi Cosi Priori XP, which roughly translates as a pink child seat. I'm so street.

[Bluefox]

The current situation is regarding alloys, as my tyres are, er, "on the legal limit".

Original plan was these, refurbed, diamond cut and lacquered:





...but until I can afford coilovers, I've kind of shelved that idea.

A quick chop, and:



...I'm going for 18" A8 replica rims. A stolen pic from elsewhere on this site reveals what a real car (as opposed to a photoshop) looks like with them on:



All that's left to decide is tyre size, and to go for Skoda or Audi stickers on the centre caps... hmm, descisions descisions...


That's all for now!

[Bluefox]

...another change of plan.

The alloy idea quickly got shelved, only good that came of it was the descision to go for coilovers before the alloys.


...soon a reality...?


That way, I can have a play with 16" rims as much as I like... so it could be Merc, could be Audi, could still be TSW Holstens... who knows?

Watch this space. Coilovers following in the next few months...

[Bluefox]

Ok, a swift update.

Was on holiday last week, and as I was driving there I had some work done the week before we went.

Another pile of parts...



...and the required cambelt/water pump/tensioner/coolant change was carried out, along with a brand new set of 4 205/55/16 Goodyear Eagle F1 GS-D3's:




Thanks to Nationwide Autocentre and Hi-Q Tyreservices in Stafford for their help and fantastic prices, and again Mike @ Autosales Cannock for the parts and jokes.

Anyway, despite the £££' spent in that week she was looking a little sorry for herself.





So, I did the only decent thing and spent two days cleaning & polishing her. So out came this lot...



The pics really don't do the finish justice. Other than washing with my usual Zymol wash, I started with Autoglym Ultra Fine Abrasive B03 on a lambswool bonnet-ed electric buffer, followed by a couple of coats of Autoglym Super Resin Polish to buff the paint back up again after being restored, then finally a coat of Zymol Cleaner Wax for shine. Finished off with more Autoglym stuff, Bumper Care and Instant Tyre Dressing - which is very good if you apply it from a jar with a brush. It's not if you spray it... trust me! Thanks Chrism from dieseldonicely.net for putting me onto this one





That's it for now. All that's left is chucking my sub in the boot and an iPod adaptor in the glove box for my commute to Redditch, and we're done for now.

Next plans will be LED bulbs, European-style plates and dieseldonicely.net branded numberplate holders... watch this space

Loaded her up with stuff for the holiday, including my 2004 Carrera Vulcan, one of the other money pits in my life. Also borrowed Chris's roofbox (thanks again) for yet more space... no pics of that though.



Old Thule 591 fork mount carrier with Thule roof bars. Well worth the cash, although the carrier did only cost me £25. Working at Halfords has it's advantages, eh?

[Bluefox]

Nothing else to report, tyres bedded in nicely now and they're a definate improvement, she's completely different to drive now. All that remains how long they last... I've been assured the GS-D3's last much much longer than the GS-D2's, which is good as I've been told I could only expect about 6k on a Mk2 Golf GTI...

Anyway, hit the big six-oh this week:



It's also nearly MOT time (end of Oct)... so she'll be four! Aww, bless. Four years and 60k...

Anyway, I'm leaving my job at the Stafford store of Halfords, and as everyone there likes a joke they stole my keys this weekend... well, see for yourself.




Thanks folks.

That's it. More photos of the roofbars taking a hammering, this one involving a mate and his sofa...

[Lummox]

I like the look dropped on the steels

[Bluefox]

Originally Posted by Lummox

I like the look dropped on the steels

Thanks Lummox Hmm. I'd never considered leave it on the steels and decking it... hmm......

[Bluefox]

Right then, updates!

After a busy 12k... things are not so well with the Superb. Still getting me to work every day, always starting, not drinking too much of the (nearly) 120ppl fuel, so nothing major.

To be honest, there's nothing to report in this entry other than we're still around, plodding through the miles... but at least I've got more of a plan now... he says. At least it gives me something to work towards!

I'll also be updating this list as and when I think of more things/more things break/things get fixed.

Service and electronics coming up soon, watch this space...



Maintenance & Problem Fixing
Oil & Filter change
Fixing whatever's caused that bloody engine management light to come on again
Fixing broken o/s/f electric window mechanism
Changing fuel filter
Getting puncture repaired (and getting that god awful OE Bridgestone off)
Rotating tyres (about 15k already)
FIXING THE BLOODY LEAK!!
Clean K&N
Fixing split O/S CV gaiter

Short Term
Fixing the scratches I've acquired over winter - front bumper/bonnet/doors/boot
Fixing the rust starting to appear on some stonechips (argh!)
Replacing damaged grille & surround
Replacing faded grille & boot badges
Parrot handsfree kit
Hard-wiring phone charger into central armrest
Repairing Origin B2 camera detector's cradle and updating subscription/purchasing new unit

Medium term
Replacement (metal cased) white LED side lamps
White LED numberplate lights
European-style number plates
Uprated headlamp bulbs/Xeons
Recaro group 3 seat for Gabriella (because it's the only Recaro I can afford)
Turbo-back (cat bypass) stainless exhaust system

Long term
Parking sensors
KW Variant 1 coilovers
9x16 Borbet A OR 7x17 OE Solids OR 8x18 Dotz Roadster alloys with corresponding tyres
Non-dating/private numberplate

Looooong term/pencilled in
Stainless steel intercooler/turbo pipework...?
Remap...?
Double-din sat nav head unit...?
Upgraded sub(s) with hidden install...?
Amplified door speakers...?
Respray...?
...er...
...that's it?!

[Bluefox]

Okay, update time. Spent some money recently and picked up a couple of bargains along the way.

First though, a recap...


As you can see above, I'm updating my "shopping" list with bits & bobs after I've had them done.

This is the problem I had with the window:


...in the sense that, er, the only way I could drop or raise the window was by hand.

A bit of spannering:



...revealed a massive sheet of rivited aluminium which I couldn't remove, despite undoing all those massive nuts and swearing a lot.



It seemed as though I had to take the door lock out to take it off, but I couldn't take the door lock out as it was riveted to the aluminium sheet. No idea

Shelved that and put it all back together, after checking that the motor functioned correctly:



This pretty much underlined my suspicion that my regulator had gone.

Pants

[Bluefox]

Next thing, I thought I'd just check over the outside of the car to get a better idea of the damage I was working on. I'd decided that enough was enough and as there were some areas starting to corrode slightly I wanted to make a start sorting them out, before next winter.

A few pics of the various bits of damage:











... swift puncture repair...



...and we were making progress.

As I took that spare off, I wanted to rotate the tyres. So, checked the discs and pads, CV gaiters, so on.... brakes I'm pleased to report about 20k on and still look very new! Delphi Lockheed!



Unfortunately though it revealed some slightly dodgy tyre wear:



Notice the right hand side much more worn than the other? Ooh err. I knew I should have had my four wheel alignment done when I fitted the Eagles

[Bluefox]

That's kind of where we're up to.

The more astute of you may have noticed that I've greyed a few things out that I haven't mentioned in the last update...

I'm saying nothing till I've got all the bits I want... but for now, I seem to have stumbled across a photo lying on my desktop...

[Robshaw]

Looking good... Please say you managed to get that key mark out??

[mluton]

Nice one mate, looking good

[Bluefox]

Originally Posted by Robshaw

Looking good... Please say you managed to get that key mark out??

Thanks

No, it's still there I'm afraid. I polished out the two ends, it was a lot longer than that. What's left though is through the paint

[Bluefox]

Originally Posted by mluton

Nice one mate, looking good

Thank you

[Bluefox]

Car came back today. New fuel filter, no EM light and a working window! Woo!

That's it really. Just four more words to add though:


Yes, that's water.
AAAARRRRRGGGHHHHH!!!!

[Bluefox]

It's worse than I thought. The electronics under the carpet were sat in a few mm of water, the underlay is **** wet through and the car stinks now I've disturbed it.

Fortunately, the drains beneath the battery seem to be working okay, a quick drench with a hose proved it - although of course that means it's not a simple case of blocked drains...

My investigation now seems to centre around the pollen filter housing itself.

Anyway - removing the scuttle panel tonight, it seemed not to be fixed with anything except the rubber sealing strip. I've just had my fuel filter done by a dealer, along with a coolant temp sensor... and the above photograph was taken after it had been returned by the same dealer, and sat on my mum's drive for a exceptionally wet weekend...

Coincidence?

[Tom_vRS]

Yeah, probably is a coincidence...

Definitely looks like the pollen filter housing a bit rogered. I'm sure theres a couple of guides kicking around on how to fix this, dumdum is what you need!