OK 2025 has been an interesting year and a year that I thought I was heading for an all time low maintence cost year, but that kinda fell through at the last hurdle!
I had done a new new rear upper suspension arm and associated bits that go with, another seized fan replaced (these fans really do struggle to survive, can't be the design of the fan as they are used in the industry widely, could it be the environment they sit in? who knows but they regularly require replacement!), a cambelt service and a new clutch pump all this and I was still on for a record low running costs year....... then..... storm Dairah (spelling?) came by our shores and it all went a bit wrong!
While doing some cleaning on my 488 in the garage requiring the doors to be open I had left my 360 outside as the storm swept in, I thought it would be fine like it normally is, but not this time.
It was the morning of the Classiche event at Graypaul our local main dealer and I had booked an inspection of my car so I was keen to attend. On start up I immediately thought it was firing on 4 with a bank down but I thought it would dry out and be fine. I was wrong, and critically the car did try to tell me. Engine warning light on which is unusual for my car, I rarely get a MIL and if I do it gets sorted quickly - ususally it's something and nothing. However this time it was something and somthing significant. Driving 3 miles up the road the car was still down on power and it was doing a cycle of steady MIL and then flashing MIL, then it was the dreaded 'SLOW DOWN' message followed by a loud bang and the car sounded like an unmuffled race car, so I stopped. The engine bay was on fire(!), although that's hamming it up a bit, it was nontheless true. The LHS catalyst was glowing cherry red and bits of it were falling on to the undertray where a little bonfire was building, literally a pile of bits on fire, flames and all! I had a bit of drinking water in the car so chucked that on and it extingushed it immeadiately. Crikey!
The upshot was that the car got relayed to Sam at Stradale Italia and as it happened, I flew out to HK for a holiday!
On return from Hong Kong the car wasn't fixed as some extra bits were required, so in total this is what it had:
A good used OEM cat complete with Lamda sensors, a new OEM thermocouple, new OEM injectors x4 and 2 new OEM coil packs.
The long and short of it is that yes they can survive in rain, but a severe storm will get water into the coil packs/spark pugs and a bank will go down. The really annoying thing is that, had my car not been parked out in the rain, and it normally is not (a car port at home and in a secure multi story car park at work) then this just would not have happened. Equally if I had not been a complete idiot and ignored what my faithful 360 was trying to tell me, it also would not have happened! Oh well, we live and learn and it has survived to tell the tale, just at a cost!
The good news is that my tech believed that the car was running lean on the left hand bank and with the new injectors this has been resolved and it is running better than ever, much more smoothly wothout any pull away torque holes which I thought previously may have been the calbration but now seems more likely to have been fuel delivery.
My recovery company, AutoAid, were great, they recovered me back to my home initially then sent out a truck a few days later for when Sam at Stradale Italia could take it in and get on with the work.
I'll see if I can post some photos.
The next post will be the cost breakdown of this years running, it was going to be a celebration, but now more of what I am used to!
Cheers, Giles
