pbaldacchino
New member
- Joined
- Oct 24, 2010
- Messages
- 5
Hiya all,
Have been meaning to post for a couple of weeks, but have only now just got around to it...
So, during the months of Sept / Oct / Nov / Dec of last year I was looking to get a replacement car for A-B / work / daily grind... I have a family and the main car is left at home with the waffe ..
Wasn't really sure what to look for ... In my mind went through many different cars. Something with a wee bit of poke, fun and not too expensive to run... Many moons ago, probably about 1998 a work colleague had a very newish Puma. Having been in his car as a passenger and thinking back to then it was great little car. I thought I would look at the Puma option. After much googling and forum hunting, I stumbled across this one(forum). Lots of advice, folks in the know, and many of the common faults discussed and detailed fixes described...
So I started looking, mainly on Autotrader during the tail end of last year. Budget seemed to keep going up as I kept thinking to go for a car with lower mileage. That then pushed the spend into areas of other models out there... However, I kept reverting back to the Puma for the reasons mentioned above. During Xmas / New Year, I found one advertised with a trader, Dec1998, 38k miles, lux pack, AC, silver, clean rear arches .... Looking at the past MOTs, the car had hardly been used for the last few years. Trader wasn't able to prove the cambelt had ever been changed. Car bought. Drive 50 miles home. Noticed the following issues -
It was quite cold, but it seemed to take an age to get to normal running temperature. Immediately thought thermostat…
Once at normal running temperature the heater temperature seemed to be all over the place. Could have been related to the thermostat, but I also thought maybe the HCV. (after researching this forum and reading this being a common fault.)
Anyhow, once the car was back I had read some of STEAVIE’s posts on this forum and PM’d him. 1st on the list - cambelt, I didn’t think it was worth the risk driving it until this was done. Well, if you do the cambelt, you may as well change the water pump, and it would be silly to not change the aux belt. With my first drive experience I thought might as well look to change the HCV and the thermostat and change the coolant. Ordered in all the parts over New Year. Post delays were a bit of **** .. But hey Ho. Parts finally arrived, car taken to STEAVIE …. VERY reasonable price to do all the work. Job done…
No more issues (apart from that darn parcel shelf!). What a great little car!! Have really enjoyed driving it and seeing what it can do. Must admit I agree with many that brakes are a bit wimpy. Fine for normal driving, but if pushed it’s immediately obvious that the car would benefit from more stopping power. I would love to in future look at the 4-2-1 manifold + s’steel exhaust. But to be honest, for me, the car is exactly what I wanted. Nippy, fun, well supported, and different. What other car has aged so well since 1997 / 1998 !! ? And big thanks to STEAVIE for doing the work on the car… A**** job, and great car you have there Steve with all those upgrades!
PB
:grin:
Have been meaning to post for a couple of weeks, but have only now just got around to it...
So, during the months of Sept / Oct / Nov / Dec of last year I was looking to get a replacement car for A-B / work / daily grind... I have a family and the main car is left at home with the waffe ..
Wasn't really sure what to look for ... In my mind went through many different cars. Something with a wee bit of poke, fun and not too expensive to run... Many moons ago, probably about 1998 a work colleague had a very newish Puma. Having been in his car as a passenger and thinking back to then it was great little car. I thought I would look at the Puma option. After much googling and forum hunting, I stumbled across this one(forum). Lots of advice, folks in the know, and many of the common faults discussed and detailed fixes described...
So I started looking, mainly on Autotrader during the tail end of last year. Budget seemed to keep going up as I kept thinking to go for a car with lower mileage. That then pushed the spend into areas of other models out there... However, I kept reverting back to the Puma for the reasons mentioned above. During Xmas / New Year, I found one advertised with a trader, Dec1998, 38k miles, lux pack, AC, silver, clean rear arches .... Looking at the past MOTs, the car had hardly been used for the last few years. Trader wasn't able to prove the cambelt had ever been changed. Car bought. Drive 50 miles home. Noticed the following issues -
It was quite cold, but it seemed to take an age to get to normal running temperature. Immediately thought thermostat…
Once at normal running temperature the heater temperature seemed to be all over the place. Could have been related to the thermostat, but I also thought maybe the HCV. (after researching this forum and reading this being a common fault.)
Anyhow, once the car was back I had read some of STEAVIE’s posts on this forum and PM’d him. 1st on the list - cambelt, I didn’t think it was worth the risk driving it until this was done. Well, if you do the cambelt, you may as well change the water pump, and it would be silly to not change the aux belt. With my first drive experience I thought might as well look to change the HCV and the thermostat and change the coolant. Ordered in all the parts over New Year. Post delays were a bit of **** .. But hey Ho. Parts finally arrived, car taken to STEAVIE …. VERY reasonable price to do all the work. Job done…
No more issues (apart from that darn parcel shelf!). What a great little car!! Have really enjoyed driving it and seeing what it can do. Must admit I agree with many that brakes are a bit wimpy. Fine for normal driving, but if pushed it’s immediately obvious that the car would benefit from more stopping power. I would love to in future look at the 4-2-1 manifold + s’steel exhaust. But to be honest, for me, the car is exactly what I wanted. Nippy, fun, well supported, and different. What other car has aged so well since 1997 / 1998 !! ? And big thanks to STEAVIE for doing the work on the car… A**** job, and great car you have there Steve with all those upgrades!
PB
:grin: