Hello all,

I am not sure if this should be posted here or in the waffle section, but this is what must surely be the first instalment regarding 'faty', my SD1 2400 diesel.

I set off from North Wales this morning at 7am to collect my new e-bay buy with the biggest trailer I have ever towed. I was delighted to win (and travel 160 miles) to receive the car for £205, as I have had every engine size of the sd1 range but never a diesel. I have been making my own 'diesel' to run my battered mondeo without problems, and as Mr Brown is delightedly happy to keep fuel so bloody expensive, I thought I would own one of my favourite cars and run it on a shoestring budget.

Sadly Faty does not look as good in the metal as she did on the e-bay pictures, and is tatty to say the least. Almost every panel is dented or scared and the interior is a right miss-match. All questions were answered with just the right amount of aviation to the facts. Having brought cars before on e-bay, it was a shock, but from a breakers yard I should have expected less than from a private seller with more to lose.

Worst of all, I don’t think she is a 2400 td at all.....

There is no choke switch on the dash, like I have seen in all diesels, and I cant see a glow-plug light symbol on the dash display. The rear seat belts are missing, and the part that the belt passes through in the rear boot trim, has never had a belt fitted through! Sr1 perhaps?

I think I have brought a 2000 fitted with a diesel vm engine. For the price I cannot grumble, so I just winched her on the trailer, gave the ape-like yard owner my cash and set off on the five-hour drive home.

Once home and still on the trailer I briefly gave the block a look over. It looked crack free and quite well serviced. There is even a quite new radiator, three good tyres and a good exhaust. The sills are solid, as is he body. I tried some water in the header, but I just sighed as it pissed out from the rear top of the head/block rear and looked no further into the problem. I fitted a battery and cranked the starter. The engine turned but that was about it. There was not even the faintest chance of her starting.

I pushed her into the garage with a feeling of being a bit let down. She is the most battered sd1 I have ever had, and I have had at least ten. I have passed over better diesels in the past for less than £500 and now I have some bastard child, between a base model o series and an Italian truck.

Now on my third pint of cider, I am thinking about the cars future, and I am left with four choices.

1) Scrape her through an mot and use her as a battered workhorse for dragging trailers of scrap, building waste and using everyday without respect.

2) Blow s**t loads, putting her back to beautiful condition as a converted 2000.

3) Go wild. Find some leather seats from a vdp, give her a low price custom job by making my own dash coverings, door clappings and other mods that sd1 owners like myself would not like on all sd1's, but respect to individual owners taste.

4) Give in. remove engine and box and await a good and damage free shell and make my own diesel conversion.

Anyone have a view? I would be very pleased to hear from you, whatever your thoughts on the matter.

I will post pictures soon, giving a link or something, so SD1 fans can see the state of this bitch, including the drivers only electric window, with a switch fitted to drivers door clapping and looks like something that fell of a second world war bomber....

I remember talking to someone and we couldn't (at the time) figure out why it only had one battery under the bonnet.Other than that its as you say,looked decent enough in the pics on e-Bay.

I'll hold off on any opinions of what to do until you post some pics and I get a true sense of what she really looks like,though I gotta say I'm running a base 2300 at the moment and I love having a daily driver out of it,without having to worry too much about it.

Blimey! What a story. It does sound like a dogs breakfast of an SD1. The 2400SD was quite a
plush model, so should have had electric windows. My brochure suggests rear seat-belts were an
option on early cars though - which probably includes your 'Y' reg car.

The VIN should confirm if the car is a genuine 2400SD. I believe the VIN should read RRHWE7CMxxxxxx.

Thanks for the replies, its nice to have some interest and encouragement regarding this FAT monster. I will post some pictures this week, so you can see what a gem she is…

Had a look at the car again this afternoon and now have a better idea of what's wrong with it.

COOLANT LEAK
I used a mirror behind the block to trace the leak, and it looks the rear-most cylinder head gasket has gone. I guess that ‘Rimmers' or some such place should have one for a high price...

ENGINE
Using a nice big battery, brought this morning from a breakers yard for £21.15, I connected it up and tried to start her again. After a few cranks she started and sounded reasonably healthy! I only ran her for half a minute as the water was pouring out from the head.

SIZED CLUTCH
Crawling under the car I had a poke around for rust and at the same time had a look at the slave cylinder in the bell-housing. Using a 'self-bleed' kit, I drained the black crap in the brake fluid reservoir, flushed and re-filled the system.
I pumped the clutch and it felt fantastic! Three depressions later it went a bit stiff (clutch not anything else...). Four pumps later, there was a bit of a pop and the clutch dropped to the floor. Megga bummer.

It looks a bit wet from the mating surface between slave and housing, but no fluid loss.

Either slave seals have blown, or there is a problem with the clutch mechanism seizing. Oh, and I am not sure, but I think the brake fluid filled cap blew off during the 'pop', but I'm not sure if I left it off or not, and it fell on the floor as I scrambled over the wing to get out the garage.

BODY ROT.
Not bad. From first looks, it seems that only a small section of chassis of about four inches on driver’s side, and a bit of plating on passengers floor pan. Easy stuff. No more than an afternoons work.

I am off now to price cylinder gasket, clutch slave and to be ready for the worst-case problem- price a whole clutch kit….

This will be it ?

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Was Watching this myself - very close to where I live

A bit (lot) too much work for me though