Uh Oh!
In the interest of keeping this blog going – an update for the weekend.
We had family over to celebrate my Lexie’s 8th birthday so I took Charlie out for a ride. ?I’m still very much babying the car, easy shifting, no hard acceleration. ?While we were out I passed the 100 mile mark – feel that’s an achievement in itself.
On the way back, doing about 30MPH, there’s a rattle and then a series of bangs – something’s clearly rattling its way along the bottom of the car. ?We quickly pulled over, killed the engine, and put the hazards on, then walking back to see what happened.
A quick check of the main suspension setup and couldn’t see anything missing. ?Walked back, found nothing aside from a squashed soda can. ?Could it have been? ?No, I don’t think so, it really did sound like a nut or bolt.
Started up and drove home, very timidly, about 1/2 mile. ?I want to say the car felt different, clutch, gear shifts – but that could well have been psychological.
Parked up and let her cool down.
Today, I jacked her up and put her on the stands. ?A cursory overview of the underside didn’t reveal anything obviously missing. ?I did see that I had an engine mount needed tightening – but nothing missing. ?It looks like it just settled as the torque indicator hadn’t moved. ?Some settling is expected, this ‘100 mile service’ was planned anyway.
Next steps – go through the build manual and create myself a ‘torque check’ list that I can use in future as well as a dry build list of every nut and bolt to check. ?No rides until that’s done.