Bianca Ratlye

[C2K]

Spent the afternoon on it today, quite productively. Got the two broken bolts out of the bumper mounts which was quite time consuming in the end.

Whilst the rear carriers were off i treated them to a lick of silver hammerite, preferable to rust colour:


Rather than watch paint dry, i headed back into the garage to sort out the rear hubs. Copious amounts of furious wire brushing and a bit of tapping action saw me with all 4 disc screw threads and a ready-to-go hub.


Car only had two screws in the rear, so made a plan...

To the random bolts tub! every garage should have one:


Found about 12 of the things in the end.

Whilst I was there I managed to crack off both of the bleed nipples, which was satisfying. I know I can proceed with a brake fluid change now. Continuing on the brake theme I greased up both sliders, rotated them, pumped them 30 or 40 times til they felt really smooth, then bolted the calipers back on.


Greased up the caliper piston, applying a little WD40 to the boot to allow it to slide rather than knot itself up, then onto the other side. Rinse and repeat.

I pulled off the split boot and raided my brake spares tub as I knew I had a spare piston boot. Wind out the piston and clean it up:


Give it a nice coating of suitable grease:


Add a rather neatly designed seal and voila:


Job jobbed. That's the brakes sorted - once the carriers are dry I shall put them back on and fit the new discs and pads.

Moved onto fitting the replacement bumper, now I had the broken bolts out. The original had a massive crack on the drivers corner on top.


That'll do nicely. Mounted the number plate back on for now as i'll get new ones after the MOT. Fitted the bulb holders that I cleaned up yesterday and job's a good'un, they work.

Brake lines all look healthy, though it looks like i'm going to need to study service box and buy a handful of clips. Don't understand why the previous owner unclipped them all but whatever.

That takes care of today then.