Good Morning all!
(well, here in South Africa it is now morning)
I've been lurking here for a while getting to know the P38's a little in anticipation of buying my first one. This past weekend I found one that matched my wants and I pulled the trigger. Collected her yesterday:
She is a 2001 4.6 HSE in Blenheim Silver with a Lightstone interior (I think I'm correct with the colour names, correct me if I'm wrong?) and 252000 km on the clock. The previous owner rebuilt the engine about 13000km ago including tophat liners, new bearings, reground crank etc. He also out her back on air, rebuilt the valveblock and EAS compressor along with a bunch of other maintenance items like refreshing the brake system, new oil in the drivetrain etc.
She drives beautifully and I'm really excited about owning her! I've been eyeing the P38s for about a decade now and I've finally decided to pull the trigger.
I'm planning to use her for road trips exploring Southern-Africa as well as just pottering around town. I'm very comfortable with electronics as well as automotive maintenance in general having rebuilt a LR Series IIa as well as a Fiat X1/9 in the past.
My first few bits to sort are the following:
ABS pump runs on every press off the brake pedal. I'm guessing the best pace to start will be a replacement accumulator? Anything else to check before I order a new one?
I parked her in a level garage last night and this morning she had lowered herself to the bumpstops. My guess would be a leak on one of the corners is causing this. I drove her again this morning and the compressor runs regularly without me adjusting the ride height. My first check has been to park her on a known level surface and I've pulled the timer relay to see which corner is the culprit. I'll start hunting for a leak from there. Any other suggestions?
Trim clips! A bunch of these are missing from the interior, especially around the seat bases etc. Any suggestions for suppliers? These are interior colored (lightstone).
Radio volume knob and HVAC fan speed control knobs are erratic in operation. Can I just strip the head unit and HVAC unit apart and clean up the contacts on the internal PCBs? The HVAC has some dead pixels so the zebra strip needs doing also.
The indicator stalk is wait too eager to self cancel when turning right and doesn't self cancel when turning left. Is there and adjustment somewhere?
Any other urgent bits I should be checking out to get and keep her reliable? General advice or suggestions welcome!
As an aside: this seems like a superb forum with some great advice and lovely vibe (not so common online). Excited to be here :D
Cheers,
Justus