A Highland Z3 1.9 roadster

[Ianmc]

So today, Friday, it was back in to the test after a run and ... CO 0.28% PASS

Good news that the car passed MOT. However, my emissions certificate (attached to MOT certificate) states that the max is 0.20 for CO?
Since having a BMW cat installed, my actual CO emissions were 0.00 (May 22) and - (minus) 0.01 (May 21).
All seems a bit odd really!

 

[Pls]

My car is registered 2/5/1998, so the Fast Idle CO max is 0.30%. For cars registered on or after 1/9/2000, the CO max is 0.20%, according to DVSA 'In Service Exhaust Emission Standards for Road Vehicles' Nineteenth Edition published December 2017, in Table 1, page 12 of 261:

If there are any Z3s registered before 1/8/95, there is no max!

Cheers

Paul

 

[Synclare]

.

 

[Ianmc]

Thanks @Pls .That is most interesting; seems that my MOT testing station is using the wrong CO value, as car was first registered in June 1997. Have used the same testing station for almost 20 years with various BMWs, and they have always been fair.

 

[Pls]

Not sure, but maybe they enter the reg no in the machine and it decides?

Anyway, the other good news is that with all the fettling to get it through the MOT, Ratty's running sweetly: just filled up with 17.03 litres after 157.8 miles = 42mpg

Cheers

Paul

 

[Pls]

Back in October, I posted a picture of the new tensioner and pulley I got to replace mine which had started to make a bit of a noise. But then I failed to fit it as I couldn't get the pulley off the power steering pump whatever I tried. The noise had got steadily worse and thus week I decided to have another go. I was this time prepared to remove the power steering pump, or at least move it aside, to allow replacement of the tensioner and its pulley. Having removed the fan shroud, fan, air filter, air intake hose, power steering fluid reservoir and alternator, I then started looking at the bolts that retain the PS pump. But I thought I'd have another go at getting its' pulley off, as BMW now told me that a replacement (plastic) one was now available (£60). (Febi Bikstein on eBay £27) if I wrecked it in doing so.

But, with much better access and with eight months for the WD40 to have worked its' magic, the pulley eventually came off with gentle tapping from behind as I rotated it. So replacement of the tensioner and pulley was straightforward, and the PS pump pulley went back on having been cleaned up.

So with it all reassembled, the noise had gone and Ratty was back to his old self. Then today we were out for a run to Dornoch, for the beach and ice creams,

and a ferry ride across the Cromarty Firth on the way home.

Cheers

Paul

 

[Pls]

The car is going like a bird since fixing the belt tensioner noise by replacing it. We were out today, this time dropping in for tea and cake at the Earl of Cromartie's pad, Castle Leod ( pronounced 'loud' like McLeod).

Being July in the Highlands, it was raining (summer is usually a few days in June). The house is lovely, very informal, open just 25 days a year. I think they had nearly ten visitors today. There's no gift shop, or café, but you can make yourself a cup of tea and have a piece of cake (for a donation) in one of the kitchen rooms, which is of the fourteenth century, but has electricty now.

The Earl, an explosives engineer by profession, affably greets everyone at the door. The grounds contain the tallest sequoia tree in Britain, and a sweet chestnut planted in 1550 by Mary Queen of Scots' mum. Lovely spot.

At the dentist this morning, another BMW parked next to me.

I looked it up and apparently it cost over £50,000, or £1,200 a month to lease. I know that Ratty was a bit of a bargain for £700, but the X5 must be very good indeed. I wonder if you have to inflate it every day to keep it that big?

Cheers

Paul

 

[Ianmc]

I hate SUVs with a vengeance, and it's godawful ugly. Think they are leased by "little willy" men.

 

[Pls]

Nothing to report on the maintenance or repair of the car lately, but yesterday, after visiting friends near Drumnadrochit, we avoided the camper vans on the A82 along the shore of Loch Ness, by climbing up the steep hill to Abriachan and over past Belladrum and home through Beauly. The bulk of Ben Wyvis, our nearest munro, is in the distance.

Cheers

Paul

 

[Pls]

It'll be time for a service soon for Ratty, my daily driver. It's been very well behaved over the winter, including on some very icy days when I had to get where I was going. On a couple of occasions I was forced to touch the brakes, in a straight line, on an icy back road, and proceeded to slide. But the ABS worked magnificently and each time the car just kept going in a straight line, without deviation, stopping gently.
Anyway this week the handbrake needed adjusting, the first thing needing doing for more than six months.

Cheers

Paul

 

[Pls]

This week, some routine maintenance tasks were completed.

After more than 10,000 miles around the Highlands this year, it's MOT in a few weeks' time. So an 'oil service', and a pair of brand new windscreen wipers. And a wash too, with the stalwart PMA Wash and Wax, although that won't last long!

Cheers

Paul

 

[Althulas]

Still looking shiny Paul, hopefully the MOT will go favourably.

 

[t-tony]

Just beat me to that Mark. That picture belongs in the POTM.

Tony.

 

[Ian&Sue]

This week, some routine maintenance tasks were completed.

View attachment 292861

After more than 10,000 miles around the Highlands this year, it's MOT in a few weeks' time. So an 'oil service', and a pair of brand new windscreen wipers. And a wash too, with the stalwart PMA Wash and Wax, although that won't last long!

Cheers

Paul

Looking good & obviously going strong! Good luck with the MOT.

 

[Pls]

Thanks Althulas, Tony and Ian & Sue. A few weeks yet!

Cheers

Paul

 

[Pls]

Well, today Ratty has failed its MOT - probably fatally. One or two easily fixable things, but the guys could not get the CO emissions down whatever they tried. Same thing last year, but eventually it scraped through then. But this year despite a new cat, new lambda sensor, six months' with cleaning additive on every fillup, service lights reset and a good blast up the road prior to an immediate emissions test, still it wouldn't get below 0.46%, 0.20% or 0.30% being the maximum, depending on who you ask. The concensus was that perhaps the engine is just worn after 180,000 miles and is not running as efficiently as it used to. So a younger replacement engine? Or a BMW cat might fix it, but at £850 - £900?

So now I am intending to retire the car and get another Z3, but in better condition and with lower mileage. So I've taken it off the road, and will probably offer it for sale for parts. It has oem roll hoops, a decent stereo with bluetooth and so on, and of course, goes like a bird! There are loads of photos on this thread. I have retained the number EHZ3120, either to go on the new car or to sell if someone's keen. And DVLA have told me that Ratty is reverting to its original registration, R424ECL.

Sadly tucked away for the time being, until we see what happens.

So, five years after being rescued from going to the scrapyard, and after another 40,000 miles of all-seasons fun, the car doesn't owe me anything but will be sadly missed. But Sara has told me that we're not giving up open top motoring yet, so another Z3 roadster it's going to be, I'm happy to say! Sara's cousin Ray has a farmer friend in Avoch who still has a Little Red Roadster that just might be the one .......

That was it when I first saw it 18 months ago - I think its done a few hundred miles since then. We're going over to drive it tomorrow and get it up on the lift to check it over.

Cheers


Paul

 

[Althulas]

That’s a shame about Ratty but I suppose you have to call time at some point and 5 years of fun is nothing to be sniffed at. The potential replacement looks tidy but when you put it up into the air just unscrew the Jack pads off that will give a fair indication of the inner sills condition but I should imagine you should be able to visualise the inner ends well, I hope it’s not a disappointment.

 

[Ianmc]

The only way to fix the emissions properly on the M44 is to install an OEM cat. Mine was over £1K a few years ago, but cheaper than an (unknown) second hand car. Sometimes you just have to stump up and try to look happy.

 

[Duncodin]

. .

The only way to fix the emissions properly on the M44 is to install an OEM cat. Mine was over £1K a few years ago, but cheaper than an (unknown) second hand car. Sometimes you just have to stump up and try to look happy.

Yes. If I was attached to a car and knew all its problems and it needed an OEM cat then even at £1k+ it's still cheaper, in my mind anyway, than buying another totally unknown car.

 

[Pls]

Thanks for your comments, @Althulas, @Duncodin and @Ianmc. My problem has been that for eighteen months Sara and I have known all about a lovely red 1.9 Z3 in immaculate condition, owned by someone local that we know. We first admired it in September 2022, and it was everything that Ratty wasn't! We had literally saved Ratty from being scrapped - there was a two inch hole in the bonnet over the offside wheel, where it had run for years with no plastic wheel arch liner. It had been declared a Category C write off in the early 2000's and never had the liner replaced. I repaired the hole with fibreglass. The bottom half of the sill covers had been repaired with new steel sheet and fibreglassed over, and the four 'wings' and wheel arches were corroded. All this has required annual attention to keep it at bay.

But for £700 purchase price, the car has been a wonderful daily driver for five years, with all the usual suspension, brake and exhaust maintenance and repair carried out with best mate and cousin Ray. So I've learned a lot about Z3s. But we're both getting older, and the prospect of the effort and expense of a new OEM cat, (£1k) bonnet, wing panels and GRP sill covers (£750), probably springs and shocks and the remainder of the suspension, to end up with a car that was still a Cat C and would really need a respray was just too daunting. So the temptation to get the red Z3, from someone we know and trust, has turned out to be overwhelming. So there you have it! I agree that it would still probably be cheaper to persevere with Ratty, but there you go!

So today we went over to pick the car up for a test drive and to get it up on the lift at Ray's to check it over.

I had a good look at the sills, but there was little visible corrosion, peering in through the jacking point orifices with it back on the ground.

The seller has had it some years, and spent £1k on an extensive detail and Graphene Reinforced Ecocoat Kenzo coating (with graphene nanoplatelets!) from IGL Coatings, applied by Highland Polishing of Inverness a couple of years ago. Since then it has been under a cover in an outbuilding and only been out for a few hundred miles. I asked what was recommended for use to wash it, and he gave me an unopened container of the recommended posh shampoo - he has never had to wash it, except to hose it down occasionally. Over 25 years, out of its' current 112,000 miles, it has done 12,000 miles in the last 12 years. I hope that the car's recent relative inactivity has not or will not affect its' reliability or rate of wear, but it is still an old car!

Underneath it is in fairly presentable condition, although I shall clean it and apply some Neutrarust 661 and then Lanoguard to deal with any corrosion and provide underbody protection. It has a complete Remus stainless steel exhaust system fitted in 2006, about 70,000 miles ago, which still seems in very good condition, still giving low emissions figures at each MOT in recent years.

The car was supplied and first registered in Birmingham, then moved to Rainham, Essex and eventually up to Nairn in Morayshire before coming to the Black Isle.

It's very clean under the bonnet ...

On the test drive, everything felt nice and taut compared with Ratty - the suspension, steering and general handling felt very precise. And U2's Joshua Tree CD sounded great in the 6-CD changer from the boot, without any jumping. I've ordered one of those cassette thingies that will receive Bluetooth music, handsfree phone or satnav etc from my iPhone for the original head unit.

A bit of vinyl polish will be required on the steering wheel. The car is a bit flashy compared to Ratty, but red is Sara's favourite colour! We haven't come up with an appropriate name for the car yet, perhaps something related to its' colour!

So we went back to the farm, talked about money and agreed on £3800, which was about 10% off the original asking price. So not cheap, but not ridiculous. Recent family events have enabled us to entertain such expenditure. And I also got a litre of posh shampoo too!

Of course it rained this morning!

Anyway I phoned up the excellent National Farmers' Union to amend the insurance and it will cost £9 a year more than Ratty, I think because it's a year younger. Speaking of which, it turns out that today is the twenty fifth anniversary of its' first registration! Very serendipitous!

So on Monday, when the money's sorted out, we shall collect the car and start a new chapter of Z3 ownership! In due course, I shall confront what to do with Ratty - if anyone's interested, do get in touch - it has a lovely set of OEM black roll hoops, and nice purple leather seats in reasonable nick, etc etc! Loads of photos on this thread. And it does go like a bird! I expect I'll do a 'For Sale' post, when I get a round tuit.

Cheers

Paul