Thread: Looking at it for 5 years finally it's mine

Photo's are to follow as soon as I get it home but I just scored myself a bit of a paddock find.

For 5 years or maybe more I have been eyeing off this Series 3 from a distance in a paddock I pass almost daily.

If you are in a normal road car you wouldn't see it over the reeds in the dam by the fence which has also stopped me from having a closer look previously, so it has remained undisturbed all that time, in fact has apparently been there for at least 10 years.

Anyway I was driving home from work yesterday and saw 2 guys in this block of land working on a excavator and thought I might at least ask if it's for sale?

He said I was welcome to have a look and on the way down I happened to ask what was wrong with the 30 tonner they were working on.

The brief description was it's F*&Ked but it turns out that it ran out of juice and wouldn't prime.

He asked jokingly if I was a diesel mechanic to which I replied kind of and said jokingly back to him If I get it going can I have the Landrover to which he replied for sure.

After a quick look at the S3 I then waved a magic wand over the injector pump and in about 5 mins it was running.

The problem happened to be a faulty shut off solenoid but more to the point not only did he give me the Landy but $50 for some beers as well.

Today a mate, my son and I went down and pulled it out of the hole it had slowly been sinking into with Casper and had a closer look and to my pleasent surprise it's a 2.25 Diesel 109 2 door wagon with Sals, still has axel straps, comes with the back full of empty dog food bags and dead rats, all the trim is in good nick bar 1 light in the dash is missing, the dash pad is cracked and the back of the drivers seat has 1 bit of stiching come apart.

It does though have plenty of rust in the bulkhead, lots of surface rust in the chassis and the doors are cactus but I should be able to repair the worsed of it and replace what I can't (e.g. the doors).

It's going to be a long term project as I have a lot going on right now but it gives me something to play with when I bored and something for my 14yo son to get into to give him a bit of mechanical experience to balance out his interest and enthusiasm.

Tomorrow afternoon I will get it out of there and back to my mates place which is virtually next door I will get some numbers and more photo's of it to post and get some opinions on what I should do for now.

I'm thinking of keeping it relatively original as it seems to have almost everything there now but then again I'm tossing up a 300Tdi conversion if the 2.25 is no good.

I have never been so excited about something that my wife has already referred to as rubbish and has to be kept out of site, I can't wait till tomorrow night when I can have a good look and clean it out.

Cheers All,

Casper

Deja vu?

Well done Casper

Looking forward to your restoration thread. I know others will be watching it keenly too.