don.binary

rear is fine, nothing wrong with it... i get the fixed rear axle causing tracking problems but honestly rear is as straight as anything its just front wheels have noticeable camber... I will try get a pic tomorrow but i think im just going to try correcting steering and leaving camber for now as it handles really well its just having to have the wheel at slight angle it annoys me lol

Yes I did think it was a little weird I've never heard of a car's tracking not being adjustable... As for the hole being slightly elongated I never noticed that when I had the struts off :-s might have to have another look at that...

I'm finally back on the road, now with a full license. Money has been a bit of an issue and it's cost me quite a lot to get car sorted and get my license but i'm finally there. I took my car for the MOT the other day and it passed after a little bit of work. I had to change the rear shocks and springs all round so to save a little money and improve the handling of the car I decided to fit Spax lowering springs. The problem is that now the tracking is miles out. For the car to drive the wheel has to be turned about an 8th right (half of a quarter turn-ish) but if I let go of the wheel while its there the car holds straight with no dramas (as if the wheel is held straight and tracking is perfect). You can see the camber is out on the front 2 wheels but not there rear and its quite bad on the drivers side which is, i believe, what is causing the problem. I asked the garage that did the MOT about tracking, and they said that they don't think anything is adjustable on my car so they don't think they can fix it. Is this true? I mean I suppose I could just reposition the steering wheel and live with the camber but I would prefer to sort the camber out if possible.

Peterborough mate

That sounds like some pretty good advice for my case cheer buddy... I haven't used 3M compound yet, its my uncle that was telling me about it so might have to mention this to him, I don't really have any swirls or scratches, but my paints faded. Really I need a respray cuz it looks like this was a learners car before (LOL) as theres scratches on every corner as if its scraped some poor F*ers car in a car park lol (I swear none of this was me!!) but the rest of the paint work is just faded, almost a matt pink, so from what I'm told by my uncle that compound will work wonders until I can afford the paint for him to paint it hopefully going Satin Black ;)

Yea I know, I just meant to say that the water beading is just an indication that the wax isn't water-soluble, thats all. Gives no indication of the quality of wax at all as paint needs protecting from (ironically) light, not water. Water leaves smears on the surface, light penetrates and degrades paint, making it fade. I know which I'd rather my car be protected from But the 3M compound shines up your paint prior to waxing so makes the perfect polish (for red cars at least, not sure if they do compound for other colours) and also protects the paint itself from sunlight (if the bottle is telling the truth lol) meaning that you don't have to worry about fading and can focus on ridding your car of nasty water smears sorry for confusion there mate, not thinking clearly today lol

Well it depends on the colour of the car... My mate got some waterless wash & wax stuff made by Bees Knees a few years ago, that worked incredible on any colour but I can't find it anymore and I THINK it's been rebranded to ProShine... For red cars, most would say T Cut for leasing new life into your paint, but 3M's pro-cut compound (or something like that) is a million times better and what i'm getting in a couple of weeks just to keep the car looking nice until I can afford to paint it... For black cars my mate used to swear by Black Hole (something like that anyway) and would never buy anything else, his car always looked a really deep but gleaming black so I can't fault it really... As for the "beading" of water that most look for, an interesting fact about that is that its JUST a waxy coat sat on top of your paint which yes protects it from water residue and shines nicely but the paint underneath is still in exactly the same state so in my eye it's useless unless your looking for a temporary shine, I would personally use 3M compound to buff it up and sort any imperfections/fading in paint (on mine anyways since its red) then buff it up with turtle wax, a simple t-cut and turtle wax made my car gleam for about a week and my paint was pretty bad looking, needs doing again though as some of my window cleaner leaked and kind of took off the wax lol

Sweet mate will do, i'll be in my one and only n/a Starlet she still got some oomph though haha

Sweet well i should be there

Ok he's up for it, is it a UKSO thing or just a general cruise?

might have to make an appearance if my Dads up for it ;)

So it's been a couple weeks since I been on here, been a little busy with the car and whatnot... Done brakes front and back, new rear wheel bearings done, now just need tyres and springs all round and shes ready for MOT... Fitted a cheap head unit (love the wiring in my starlet, was just a case or red to red, black to black, lellow to lellow etc lol) so I can listen to the toons and been driving her regularly, now off on a "long drive" but unsure of where to go... Any suggestions? lol I'm not paying petrol so I don't actually care where I go! Would be nice if there was a little meet on somewhere today

Welcome to UKSO buddy, only joined myself early hours of yesterday morning. That's a beautiful car you got there. Enjoy!

Thank you all for being so welcoming, you might be interested to know i drove her for the first time today. Been so long since i've drive I damn near wet myself lmao... Dad was screwing at me for doing 70 on parkway where speed limit is 70... Trying to tell me that learners are only allowed to do 60 (which is complete bull, and in fact its quite the opposite learners have to do speed limit, mate got minors for doing 65!) so need a new passenger whos gonna shut the F up and not make me more nervous than I already was. Will find one eventually. Other than that absolutely LOVE the car, decided to call her Emiko ( 笑子 ) which written like it is there means "smiling child" because that's how I felt driving it. Never driven a car without power steering, which for some reason threw me off and confused me when reversing out of the parking space but after I got going she was great best car I've ever driven by miles! Going to look at weather and consider buying paint tomorrow, she deserves a nice treat after that performance. Then hopefully buy all the parts she needs for MOT next week and jobs a goodun Again thanks for making me feel so welcome, let's hope I can pass my test soon so I can start coming to meets and get a job to fund more extensive mods ;)

Looking good mate I just got my Starlet last Thursday and have an almost identical dent on the bonnet same side of the badge and everything. Thanks for sharing pics as I've never seen a 5dr Starlet before, didn't even know they existed! Good luck man, keep up the good work!

That's very strange indeed. Well I'm glad you were able to fix the problem

I'm sorry Phil, while I respect your opinion I have to disagree. The term "boy racer" is defined as: "a youth or young man fond of driving very fast and aggressively in high-powered cars." - copied from Google Dictionary. Calling someone a "boy racer" just because they have a modified car is like saying "that person is a terrorist because they are Muslim", or "that man has darker skin than me, he must be a criminal", or even "look theres a guy taking a whiz in a bush at the side of the road, he must be a rapist or sexual deviant!". It's derogatory and offensive, and police should not be allowed to use the term. It's just about respect for your fellow man that's all, I don't mind being called a modified car enthusiast because that's exactly what I am. However I don't drive in an aggressive manner, or particularly fast. So why should I be automatically labelled as if I do just because I want my car to stand out and because I'm young? Anyway it's a never ending debate, some don't mind the term others do. Freedom of speech and all that, everyone has the right to think and say what they like without interference. All I think is that police and journalists should not be allowed to use the term. Ever. It gives the wrong sort of message.

Thanks buddy

Haven't read every post but yes I agree the term "boy racer" is very derogatory and where it's not on the same level as derogatory racial terms it is still offensive and hurtful. But what can we do? They use offensive terms to describe us, the minute we call them "bacon" or "pigs" we get arrested under section 5 of public order act. lmao

Thanks Djaniero, your definitely right there and for £400 with 98k on the clock and only a couple little wear-and-tear related faults I consider that a bargain it will be slow progress but she will get there

Thanks StarletSr, and yes I love her to bits I can do all the work she needs and then some it's just about finding the cash to buy the parts Dads going to lend me some cash hopefully next week then I can start sorting out the niggles Going to be great to get in and go, don't want to risk it right now as it's raining quite heavy on and off and tyres aren't very reassuring lol.

I'm going to be buying some new springs next week as the ones that came with the car are all corroded quite nastily from what I can see. Now cheapest I've found new stock springs for are roughly £60 a piece!!! So I've been looking at lowering springs, I know FKs are usually the cheapest and mates who have them say they're brilliant. This question really comes in 2 parts, the first being does anyone know where I can get some lowering springs for as cheap as possible, or maybe someone has some used springs (preferably lower by 35/40mm all round) or coilys that they wouldn't mind selling me for quite cheap? THESE are the cheapest that I found so far, not sure how much they lower car by so would definitely be phoning before buying. The second is that I know that with cars fitted with PAS lowering the car slightly car improve the handling, but mine doesn't have PAS (and I don't want to spend time + money fitting it just to make the steering lighter but car heavier lol) so how will this affect the steering? Using logic I'm thinking that the weight being lower down and the slightly stiffer springs may make the steering a little heavier but that will be compensated for by the improved handling. Am I right or am I going to end up with Arnold's arms in 6 months? lol. Any opinions/advice is both welcome and appreciated Thanks guys...

I know this sounds quite silly, but could you have knocked a weight off your wheel when swapping? Happened to my mate once he had tracking done and everything only figured out problem when he had new tyres fitted and wheels balanced... Failing that I have no idea, everything else I can think of has already been mentioned

Thanks John

Considering I've only just got the car, haven't had a chance to drive it yet and don't even have a full license yet this may seem a little weird to some. I'm 22 years old, I got my actual "first car" at 15 just to learn mechanics on. A £100 Fiesta which (don't get me wrong) I did like but this was only because I was the only person I know around my age that had a car! Haha. DVLA decided that a residential car park was actually a public road, and this ended up getting taken off me because it was declared SORN. No surprise there. The next car I got at 17 while I was originally learning to drive, a Peugeot 106 1.1i. That needed some work doing but I still had to get my license so it was all good. Later on financial difficulties would stop me obtaining my license and force the sale of the 106, but no matter I never really felt much love towards it. Over the next few years I would just ignore my passion for cars and my love of driving, only lapsing to go to an occasional cruise or to help a friend with modifications etc until a few months ago when I decided that not having my license was holding me back. Since then I have desperately tried to scrape together as much as I can to fund my venture, but to no avail until about a month ago my Dad told me that he would get me a car and help me pass my test for my 22nd birthday present! Since then we have been searching for a decent car until we stumbled on to the Starlet by mistake, and I'm ashamed to say that (god knows how) when we first drove past it I thought it was a Micra! I only noticed otherwise when my dad jokingly pointed out a rust-bucket Rover 25 for just shy of £1200 that was parked next to what would become my lickle beast. She was priced at £395, her paint work is faded, her springs are corroded, her tyres are barely legal, both her rear wheel bearings need replacing, she has no power steering, her interior is rather girly, and most uneducated folks would call her a "bag of faecal matter". However she is now (after just 5 days and 0 minutes of driving pleasure) my pride and joy, I have never felt this excited about a car, or been this happy with a decision I have made. She won't make it through her next MOT in 3 months time without my help, but she will now get all of the love, care and attention that she deserves... As soon as I get some money lol. I'm sure most of you will find it funny that after just 5 days of owning a car and not even having a chance to drive it yet that I have created such a strong bond, I'm a little surprised myself. She may not be much yet, but watch this space she will be a head-turner in no time! Sorry for the large picture, it's all I've got I had to link it from FB and sorry for the essay of an introduction, I'm David by the way. Nice to meet you all, and hope nobody gets too ticked off about me joining up so soon