Thought I'd say hello. Just bought myself a 2000 4.0lt P38 - 109k on the clock in pretty good nick - all for £1600 which was a good deal imo. Previous owner was a pleasure to deal with and even delivered the car.

Just overhauling everything I can think of before using in anger.
New water pump
oil filter and oil
gearbox oil and filter
rebuilt the compressor
air and pollen filters
new viscous coupling
new radiator and hoses and thermostat (leaving the heater matrix for now as I don't want to scare myself yet!)
Replaced the gear lever housing and cable as the old one was knackered (£27 of Ebay) and relatively straightforward
Keyfob refurb kit so now have 2 working keys.

Just waiting for the metal heater pipe to turn up (old one was seriously corroded) and fill up with OAT coolant and we are good to go.

Looking forward to some fun.

Cheers all

Ant

Well that’s this week sorted out, what’s on the agenda for next week, lol.
Seriously, welcome to the forum , be careful handling the metal pipes as they can disturb or crack the heater Orings, then you will have a next week sorted out, when you fill the system, lift up the expansion tank and shove a rag under, take the hose off the small bleed off on top of rad, it makes it easier to get it filled first time.

Welcome Ant, sounds like you're doing it the right way, sort out what is likely to fail before using it and complaining that it keeps breaking down. As long as you didn't get a Britpart water pump or radiator, you should be ready for a few years use.

Where in the country are you?

Thanks guys - and thanks for the heads up regards refilling the expansion tank - noted.

I did quite a bit of research before buying the car I did - looked at 8 or so around the country (furthest Nottingham). I am really happy with the old girl so far. Having had 3 S3 in the past and put new chassis in them, I am stunned by the lack of evident rust!

Gilbert - 20 minutes south of Norwich in Norfolk

Welcome fellow Norfolkite. Nice to see another one in the county. Where abouts in south Norfolk are you? I am Cromer way.
Rob.

Cheers Rob - about 2 miles from Loddon.
Snap - Oslo Blue is a great colour btw

Hi everyone,
So, just refitted everything as I hope it should be and started the engine. Thanks for the tip about the rag under the expansion tank - saved a fair bit of water going everywhere!

So far everything looks great but I have a couple of questions (apologies for any potential dumbness!) -

1. I put in 6 litres of OAT coolant and have topped up with water but only got about 3-4 litres in (with engine running). I had the heater on as advised and after a while, and a large burp from the tank, the heater is blowing nice and hot so I'm pretty sure that the heater matrix is full. I have turned everything off and am now waiting for things to cool. The advice is that the system takes over 11 lts - I did flush into the top engine hose to wash out all the old blue coolant and also flushed the heater matrix until it ran clear so am I right to assume that there may well have been a couple of ltrs in the system? When the tank 'burped' it looked like the liquid was being pumped so I also assume that the thermostat (new) had opened?

2. Will I be OK for a short test run and watch the needle (in case the thermostat didn't open)? (Sorry - slightly paranoid from previous experience).

3. When I reconnected the battery, the doors didn't lock but various 'window not set' codes were displayed. I have locked and unlocked the car and everything appears to function OK and the error codes appear to have cleared - is this normal/correct?

Thanks in advance and apologies for my potential over cautiousness, just keen to get out on the road and get some mileage done....

Following on from earlier - I've now done about 30 miles testing.

Everything is fine thus far. Reset all windows except the front passengers - it is jumping on the toothed arc about half way up. If you stop and lower a little it will go back up but I can't 'reset' it whilst it is like this. Managed to find a new regulator for £28 (no motor, which I'll swap) so hopefully that should sort it.

Having never really driven one of these, I'm loving it! Taking a while to familiarise myself to all the noises it makes and I've definitely got some sort of foreign object in the passenger side blower motor (sounds like a leaf or bit of paper vibrating and changes as fan speeds up or slows down) Are these easy enough to access? - I may try blowing it out with an air line. I'm guessing the glove box needs to come out?

Anyway - a happy owner so far :)

Simple test to see if you've got all the air out is to take the header tank cap off and squeeze the top hose. If you get a constant squirt into the tank from the hose from the bleed nipple on top of the radiator, then you should be OK. I always use that as a final 'get the air out' move. Squeeze the top hose, put finger over the hole where the water would squirt out and release the top hose. Do that a few times and if you get a constant stream each squeeze and can't hear any gurgling noises, then you have got rid of all the air. It doesn't matter if the heater is on hot or not. It's a full flow system where the temperature is adjusted by flap valves in the airflow rather than a tap in the heater feed like lesser vehicles. With the thermostat closed the coolant can't go anywhere other than through the heater so that will flush any air in that straight out and back to the header tank.

Leaves in the fans usually get in through the pollen filter housings so if you are lucky you can fish them out through there. If you can't, just try winding the fan up to full and leaving it, it will soon get spat out into the trunking.....

When you reconnect a battery it will stay in the state that it was in when it was disconnected, so if it was unlocked when you took it off, it will stay unlocked. It is only if it was locked when the battery was disconnected (or went flat) that it will immediately lock itself again. Windows not set is normal. The window position is stored in memory and by disconnecting the battery that has wiped the memory so they need to be set again.

Thanks Gilbert - I have followed your advice and think the cooling system is OK.

I changed the pollen filters earlier on and they were filthy and had loads of leaves in - I will try the full bore approach and hopefully that will sort it.
It just sounds like a load of crickets at the moment which is a little annoying - interferes with the V8 soundtrack!

Just a tip, when you do the window regulator, they’re pop riveted in, 4.2 mm if I remember correctly, some people nut and bolt them, I always re pop rivet.

But if you do choose to use nuts and bolts, make sure you use washers and nyloc nuts or you'll be pulling the door panel off again in a few days to stop it from rattling.

Thanks - Pop rivets all the way. Got them in stock so all good when it turns up.