I’ve always had a passing interest in cars I suppose, but I wouldn’t really call myself a “car nut” or similar. I’m not one of those people that obsesses over all the new models and can name all the engine codes; as a general rule I’m more into the underlying technology – the how it works. Having said that, as I was growing up the one car I really liked was the Volkswagen Corrado and I convinced myself that one day I would own one.
That day came shortly after my birthday in 2008, where I picked up a 1994 VR6, for the princely sum of £1900. Prices were at rock bottom and I now had a small amount of disposable income to spend on frivolities. If I’m honest it was a bit of a nail when I got it. On the test drive there was a strong smell of coolant indicating the heater matrix had gone, there was extensive lacquer peel on the roof, a fair bit of rust around the doors and wheel arches, but it was mine!
Obviously the heater matrix needed replaced. This involved removing the entire dashboard – quite a big job and a bit of a baptism of fire on my first foray in car maintenance. This was a gateway drug though and I got the bug for pissing about with cars. I won’t exhaustively go through everything I’ve done to it, but the big jobs included refreshing and repairing the braking system (including fixing the deliberately disabled ABS light), replacing the timing chains and tensioner, upgrading the brake calipers, installing a decent stereo; all the usual stuff.
In 2010 I went outside to drive somewhere and to my horror my beloved car wasn’t there. Long story short it had been stolen, likely because it was one of the few cars still on the road that was easy to hot wire. The police eventually found it parked in ASDA at The Jewel. If you’re familiar with Edinburgh that will probably make sense. They’d made a bit of a mess. The steering column was broken and obviously the ignition wiring was not in a great state. They’d helpfully bent the locked fuel flap open and damaged he surrounding body work. I’d left it with very little fuel in it, perhaps they were going to top it up for me? Anyway, I parked it up in the garage at my flat and contemplated my next move. What I decided was that I might as well use this as an opportunity to teach myself about doing bodywork and welding. This seemed like a good idea at the time. What followed was a long process of the repair and respray.
I was pleased with the results, but I’m not sure it was worth all the stress and angst that it involved. It also cost me quite a lot of money relative to the value of the car and I did question whether it had been worth the investment, both financially and in terms of my own time. Nevertheless I did pick up multiple useful skills along the way and I certainly don’t regret that.
