Capncol wrote:Any Progress?
Very little.
The last month (particularly last week) has been immensely frustrating. It’s been very difficult to find any late model CC’s that are being broken anywhere nearby.
About 3 weeks ago through eBay I found a guy in Manchester who was breaking quite a few CC’s, including late model ones. He told me that he had an exact match for my ECU & BSI. Or he would let me remove a complete main loom (as long as I did it carefully) for £100 from an 07 plate that he had.
So I took a day off work, drove up to Manchester, and spent a morning getting the main loom out. While chatting about the project we came to the conclusion that I would need the engine loom too, so that cost me another £40, and a couple more hours to take out.
Eventually I jingled back home, happy with my day’s work, and then found to my horror that the new loom was exactly the same as the one that I’d already put in. The 07 plate car turned out to be a late-registered 04 model! The seller wasn’t interested in taking the parts back as he never normally sells looms on their own, and I had taken it at my own risk. But said he would do me a good deal on the ECU and BSI from the same car.
So I paid for them the weekend before last and waited for them to arrive. I was on holiday for the week so was looking forwards to completing the car. But nothing turned up. Every time I rang the seller’s number it just went to answer-phone. I ended up getting very frustrated and sending an “annoyed” message via eBay to say I’d tried ringing him lots of times, and wanted to know when I would either get my parts or my money back.
He replied to say he’d been in hospital and didn’t know where his phone was, but refunded me immediately. A relief, however it got me no further forwards with the car. It just left me stuck with another incompatible loom and £140 on top of the mounting repair cost. I looked into swapping wires around in the loom to get power to the ECU, but it was impossible.
The other alternative was to buy a written-off vehicle from Copart, strip off the bits that I needed, then sell the rest for spares or repair. There were 2 auctions that I had my eye on, both of which were ending last week – 1 car had been vandalised and had no wheels, keys (so unknown mileage), paint-stripper on every panel, and had been bashed up the bum! I thought it might fetch £225, so that’s what I set my maximum bid at, and it went for £450! The other was a nice gun-metal one which was a Cat C, but the only visible damage was to the front nearside wing. I thought that might go for £850, or maybe up to £1000 – it went for £1400! Mad prices and WAY above my budget.
Yesterday I finally had some luck – I won a blue Allure with very similar damage to Capncol’s recent black one. It has everything I need intact, and even a nice grey leather interior that I can swap before selling it. So I pick it up tomorrow and will be very busy over the weekend and the next few nights. Once the black one is working it will pressed into service ASAP so that we can sell Lisa’s Clio, then I’ll get the blue one driveable at my leisure before eBaying it.
