pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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May 15, 2018 13:31:11 GMT
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We had a first gen Mazda 3 over here, it was a decent blend of reliability, fun and practicality. The only change I made was longer springs for what passes as roads over here.
We were looking at the new 3 (with the 2.0 and manual box) last year, but only didn't go for it as we had some other big costs coming up, liked most of what we saw though, and they do get good reviews. The CX3 is more like a lifted Mazda 2 for size - inside they're considerably smaller than a Mazda 3 - we looked at the CX3 too but it was just a bit too small inside for regularly taking both kids everywhere.
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Mar 20, 2017 15:43:25 GMT
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George, if you're short of work at the moment, and fancy seeing South America, there's going to be a lot of projects going on here soon, not sure if it's made the news over there, but here we've had terrible flooding and mudslides, and it's destroyed a huge amount of infrastructure, and as most of the railways run alongside rivers.. there isn't much left anymore.
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pauls0
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Posts: 31
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Nov 21, 2016 20:18:24 GMT
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On my old AW11 I used to have a problema with water ingress in the plug wells - if you went through deepish water, or parked at an angle with overnight rain, it would gradually fill up the spark plugs wells enough to cause a mis-fire. From memory it was getting in through the engine lid vents, which also drips into the alternator, eventually wrecking (several) alternators...
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Feb 10, 2016 21:56:17 GMT
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George, make sure you coordinate well with Island 4 x 4 with regards to the invoice, they were always very helpful with me, but I sometimes had to ask a few times to get the invoice from them, to start 'negotiations' with Customs, all the while being charged storage by the Courier.. For some reason the hard copy never seemed to arrive with the parcel, so it was always a soft copy emailed over.
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Jan 28, 2016 13:25:31 GMT
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Oooo, good luck with the signing!
No sadly, the dealer never answered, and I got fed up asking in the end. Whilst a couple more have been up for sale since, they've mostly been horrendously overpriced (even by Peruvian standards), or in such terrible condition they weren't worth bothering with, especially with keeping the Disco3 going too - I'm just about to hand over nearly 2 weeks worth of salary for just a pair of front brake discs and pads, and oil&air filters. I was going to order from the UK like normal, but it was going to work out well over twice the cost once Mr Customs had his grubby mits on it.
It's more fun in Peru.
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Jan 25, 2016 22:48:54 GMT
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Thanks for cheering me up George! I'm still missing 3 parcels from November, and one from April. The one from April had a set of balljoints and bushes in for the Disco, Serpost (Peruvian supposed mail service), claim they sent it back to the UK in July as the address wasn't valid - it never arrived, and they couldn't explain how the other parcel shipped from the same place, the same day, with the same address, managed to arrive fine in June...It's good fun
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pauls0
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Posts: 31
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Bloody hell George, best wishes and hope all goes ok.
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pauls0
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Posts: 31
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Oct 19, 2015 16:18:17 GMT
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Glad to hear you've survived ok George. Poor old Mary the Queen does have a bit of a list doesn't she?! Is the rear loading door still down?
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Good job on the cooling system George. I'm still pondering another green oval, and whilst perusing the local classifieds here in the land of Paddington Bear, I came across this Discovery -don't you just love those wheels, all 20" (?) of them...?!
I may yet go and have a look at it, as it's a good notch cheaper than other Disco 2s here (it's been for sale for over 6 months, and started out at $12,000), and I can always get some new wheels from the UK (as you did).
Fingers crossed your snap on tool chest turns out to be a good deal!
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Sept 10, 2015 17:39:15 GMT
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Good effort George! I look forward to the updates as the project progresses.
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Jul 17, 2015 13:46:48 GMT
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Cheers George. For comparison to get an idea of the nightmare that is driving in Lima, our Disco 3 (auto box with the Ford Cologne 4.0 V6) averages around 8mpg on gas, and around 12 on petrol. Even my little Mazda 2 consumes an impressive 21mpg on my 'commute' (30 minutes to travel around 2 miles). Petrol costs are S/13.9 for a US gallon of 95 octane and LPG is S/1.6 for a litre (yes they sell different fuels in different units). What passes for Diesel is cheap at S/9.9 per US gallon. I would walk/cycle but I need to take my 2yr old and her bag and my work stuff, and I don't want to get mugged regularly.
School costs? Horrible! Well, there are public schools but the standard of education is rather lacking, so you have to go private. Most of the decent private schools are $10k upwards for admission, plus S/.1500 - S/.2500 monthly (about $500-$800). We happened upon a new school that is a bit different to the usual here (the usual being strict catholicism, and don't particularly encourage independent thought and creativity), and as it's new the admission quote is half the normal. Now those who are paid in good 'ole GBP may think those numbers aren't bad, but when you're paid in Peru's finest Nuevo Sole (for which you need nearly S/.5 to buy one good old pound), it is a big old chunk of the salary... Costs here in Lima have soared in the last 5 years, it used to be fairly cheap to live here, but costs are starting to get similar to Europe, but salaries, sadly, are not.
How's the Auto box in the P38? I find the ZF 6 spd box in the Disco 3 not bad for an auto box, but do still occasionally fight it (mainly when I have to do the 8 hr drive ooop North, including the climb from sea level to just over 4000masl in around 150kms, amazing scenery but hard for the car).
Here's the P38 ad. It was advertised a few months back for $12k and I'm sure that advert said suspensión compressor was new:
neoauto.com/land-rover-range-rover-1997-rj8xr
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Last Edit: Jul 17, 2015 14:13:19 GMT by pauls0
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Jul 16, 2015 13:53:02 GMT
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Congratulations George!! Is it only because it was a Filipina asking, or was it just luck?!
Quick question - what sort of MPG are you averaging (both in horrible traffic and 'normal-ish' driving) ? I'm still pondering a second green oval to replace the Mazda. There's another P38 that's come up but it would stretch the Budget somewhat, though it has had new dampers aand airbags (OEM) and recent "engine repaired" (it has a shiny inlet manifold, not sure what else...I'd hope a new camshaft), plus already has LPG installed (a necessity for me), and I think a new air compressor. The chap is obviously an enthusiast as he also has a SIII too. I just need to calculate the budget very carefully, as we're just about to pay the enrolment for our little one's school for next year.
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Apr 25, 2015 16:17:51 GMT
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Exactly the same here George, for that very reason I've voided the warranty on our Mazda and done the servicing myself. For my work I look through the costs of our business, and I see all sorts of silliness, such as washing a paper filter. We also have a Fortuner in the fleet here and guess what, at 3 months old it just had: Change fuel filter and purge fuel system Wash Clean, check and adjust (!?) brakes Materials (grease, dissolvents?!, others) Maintenance of A/C (filter and recharge gas!!) Sterilise interior (!) Oil Fuel filter (again!) Sump plug washer Oil filter Washer fluid Air filter Fair enough on the normal service bits, but A/C recharge and filter, brakes adjustment?! I just saw also that our Disco3 when it was company owned had someone invoice for "Maintanance of lower balljoints and greasing the steering rack" and over US$1000 for a diagnostic scan to reset the electronic handbrake.
Bonkers, but people let 'em get away with it. The chap who used to drive the Disco drove it again recently, and was gob-smacked by how good it was compared to when he was driving it.
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Apr 21, 2015 15:19:07 GMT
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I can see a lot of similarities between Lima and Manila... A question for you George, given the spiritual beliefs over there. Have you ever come across a ritual called “passing the egg”?? It’s something they do over here in Paddington-land, when folk can’t sleep or seem troubled by"bad spirits". They crack an egg open, and wave it around over your body whilst muttering some old prayers. Apparently the idea is that all the bad spirits are collected by the egg white. Bonkers.
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Apr 13, 2015 14:03:49 GMT
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Yikes, unlucky/lucky there George... You've actually got me considering selling the very reliable (boring) Mazda, and getting a P38 now, but I'm not sure if my bank balance (or sanity) will allow running a Disco 3 for the wife and a P38 for me... But I have just seen this > neoauto.com/land-rover-range-rover-1999-rmuw6Shame it's an auto, but then driving mostly in Lima my average speed hasn't exceded 20kph in over a year!
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Yup, you've got to love the EAS, it's lovely in the Disco too, although it's a bit tired after 170,000 kms on these 'roads'. I'm not looking forward to what customs re-value the parts at for the import duties calcs when I come to rebuild it...
Never get stopped for a doc check on foot, but you have to present your ID card to use credit cards and other random stuff too sometimes when buying/paying for stuff. Unfortunately the people reviewing the docs often don't know what is what on a foreigner's ID card, which can lead to problems.
When driving I've been stopped a few times. The last time was when I was up visting our main production centre, and borrowed a pickup from work to get between two farms. It’s less than a mile on the public highway, and I still got stopped in that distance. Thankfully the docs for the car were in order!
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Sorry for hijacking the thread George, but I'm so glad it's not only here in Peru that these things happen - that sounds identical to here.. Two times a year I have to go to the main immigrations office (and various other places), once to pay a "Foreigner's tax" and once to pay to renew my ID card. When you pay the tax, they are supposed to put a sticker on your ID card to show you've paid, but apparently this year they forgot to order the stickers, so are now giving you a lovely big official letter to show that we paid, which we have to carry with us at all times... bonkers. Last year they only ran out of stickers, and told folk to come back in 1-4 weeks... I should have known it would get worse. The car tax/compulsory 3rd party insurance is remarkably easily, you can even order it online (if your docs are all in order)!
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pauls0
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Posts: 31
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Jan 30, 2015 13:57:16 GMT
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Congratulations George!
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Jan 16, 2015 19:48:51 GMT
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Hi George, still loving the updates (and similarities to Peru!) next time you need some parts you might want to give Britcar a try - much cheaper than Rimmers and their customer service is very good. Have had a couple of orders off them now. Their website may not be as colourful as Rimmers, but it has more parts and options on suppliers, and quite happy sending stuff overseas.
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pauls0
Part of things
Posts: 31
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Nov 29, 2014 14:25:22 GMT
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Fantastic George, I'm loving both the Rangey stories and the Philippine stories!
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