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The Car Thread


MadManMike

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Twin skinned? From the pic the quarter (bare metal) looks lower in profile than the plastic trim, that added to plenty of filler usually means accident damage repair, I suppose whoever repaired the rust before could have knocked it in a bit to get a level.

Welding repairs are kinda my thing so I thought I'd share my thoughts with you earlier.

The lip inside the wheel arch, is 2 layers spot welded together. It's the inner wheel well meeting the outer rear quarter.

The guy I bought it from said he had the arches done at a cost of £600, but it seems that it's just been fillered and blown over.

The filler is about 4-5mm thick.

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£600! fuk me sideways, that filler must be expensive sh!t. :D They probably filled both arches and painted most of the arse end for that. The trouble is to do it propperly you'd be into new quarters and inner arch repairs, more than the value of the car I expect, there may be some aftermarket repair panels out there which would bring the costs down, but a propper job still won't be cheap, unless you've got a body shop at your disposal :)

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Bare sick post.
If you're not into cleaning cars or seeing many pictures of the same car, take this as a warning. There are lots of pictures of the same car, and lots of cleaning.
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So a month ago I appraised this vehicle for part exchange -
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To me, it wasn't what I was interested in at all. It was a diesel, the bodywork was filthy and it was covered in swirls scuffs and scratches. Bleurgh.
I gave the spec and condition of the car back to the other salesman (who had asked me to do the appraisal because I was into Audi's) and that was that. I told him to take it for a drive and see if everything worked, and then walked off.
I got chatting with the owner and discovered it was a one owner from new, with full Audi history to interval and had never wanted for anything in it's life. I also discovered the other salesman hadn't driven it, so for my own piece of mind having appraised the car and put my name on it I took it out for a quick spin.
It drove sooooooo well.
Anyway, the guy did buy a car off us but said he wasn't trading the car in and that he would offer it to his brother. So I didn't give it any further thought.
Later that evening I started thinking about it as I jumped in my 250bhp solid mounted track ready daily driver and scraped down the road to my girlfriends with my brakes honking, fillings falling out and spine shattering with every turn of the wheel. Not to mention the inability to drive it at all in the wet, or the fact I looked like a nob.
I thought about the A3 a couple of times over the following weeks, and how nice it drove and I thought. "Hmm, well actually I would like a new car...Maybe."
Well much to my delightment I decided to work last Friday; and early in the afternoon the Audi pulled up outside. And the customer collected his new car. And the Audi stayed parked outside.
Hmmm...
By 6PM I had the keys, log book and was on my way to the customers house to pick up the service history and pay him for the tax disc. Very very happy indeed :)
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It had evidently been a very much loved family car, and the original owner and her husband were totally in love with the car and were gutted to see it go. But equally happy that it was going to me and that it was going to a new owner who would also love it.
That said, the bodywork was still a pretty big issue. It had clearly been too busy being driven to have been polished, the wheels were black and the interior was as you'd expect an 8 year old 100,000 mile old Audi that had been home to a family of 4 since new. But it was all there, and in very good condition.
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Now until this point I had been VERY selective on which pictures I posted, and how they were edited. Because I don't want anybody to see my car in anything but mint condition.
Today I did a full 7 hour paint correction on it, and it is by far the best I've done yet.
Iron-x'd.
Clayed. (including glass)
Trims cleaned with Autofiness APC,
Wheels clayed.
Paintwork prepared and cleansed with Dr Beasleys.
Paintwork refined with Black Hole and a rotary.
Waxybox Anniversary wax was used to finally seal in the paintwork and to provide a glass like gloss with great depth.
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I cleaned the interior with Autofiness APC, treated the plastics with Megs' interior trim protector and wet vac'd the upholstery. The leather was fed with Glyptone and buffed with a microfiber.
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I love the car, it really is great. And after having the 8L for so long I am missing it; but this is such a better chassis. I may keep it for a year or so and then upgrade to an 8P S3. That's what I'd like to do anyway.
Edited by Pashley26
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BMW paint is normally quite thick, and usually very very nice to work with. Have you tried using a rotary?

I rotary'd my old E36 with a lake waffle pad and Menzerna Fastcut, refined that down further with Menzerna FG400 Fastgloss. Came up like new. An E36 with f**ked paint is the PERFECT place to learn on; I'm almost certain BMW used superglue for lacquer.

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When I got it the car was almost matte!

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I've just found this picture on my Photobucket looking for E36 pics.

I miss this thing.

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Edited by Pashley26
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So last night I did a basic correction and protection on the A3; I woke up at 6 this morning and the sky was clear and it was set to be a spot on day.

So I got the rotary out, donned my harshest wax striping foam and set about getting a better finish on the A3.

I cut the paint work even further, as much as I could safely go without a paint gauge, and refined it further still with black hole. There are no pictures of this actually happening, because I wasn't sure if it was going to rain and time wasting wasn't an option.

So the car was re-cut, and then re-cleansed with Dr Beasleys, further refined with a tiny amount Black Hole and a buffing pad, then given three coats of wax with the final coat being finger applied.

NOW I'm happy with it.

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I re-addressed the interior plastics, I wasn't happy with the finish of the Megs trim protector. So I went over it with Nanolex.

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Sorry for boring you all.

-

Sam, I couldn't say no to this. The price was ridiculous.

Edited by Pashley26
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Top work Jardo.

My boost leaks were annoying me, I can see loads of oil from the intercooler connectors so I'm certain that was leaking too so I did some "man maths" which I heard about yesterday haha and apparently the only conclusion I could come to was that I should just go and buy a full FMIC kit with all new piping from the turbo to the inlet...

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:D

It's also pretty big compared to the forge aftermarket one.

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Edited by dann2707
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