1982 Colt Galant 1600 GL: Equipped

Duuuuuuuuuude... I seriously fancied this when streetrules had it up for sale, but I had to go on holiday and stuff and missed out.

Looking foward to seeing how it turns out now.

Glad you made it back OK. She's a good motor - glad it went to someone who'll appreciate her.

But you can't read any of those books until it's decked

Enjoy! And thanks for the kind words on the Benz. The other little interesting car decided not to start this morning. Very dissapointing.

Oh, can't see your pictures btw. I wanna see her post-clean!!!

Pics don't work Hirst !

Uber cool Looking forward to seeing it low and wearing those new rims

The pics were broke for me too earlier but now beigeness has appeared

That rocks Hirst
Might be worth having a chat with Stuyizz about parts etc, I think they share a lot of parts with the Sapporo

Ahh, the beige Galant.

Quality vehicle, liking the sound of your plans, I'm glad someone has decided to turn this into reality after all the great suggestions from before, which sadly came to nothing.

Looking forward to seeing how you progress.

Nice work Hirst,

Its funny, In a bored sessh this aft i looked at autoshite for teh first time in months and monts, and saw this and thought i'd missed this RR RR's

It makes sense you had to buy this it had to be done, explains teh wheel purchase IIRC too looks like a beautiful beast, interior is nice, don't even mind the steerer.

Potential, plenty Mitsi Gurus to advise on silly engines

You see, it all falls into place, mystery wheel purchasing, avatar subtly changed from Charmant to Galant, sudden interest in Mitsubishi parts.

I'll get some daytime pics later today, as I need to go out and get my hair cut. The Galant isn't kept at my house at the moment, it's currently on a borrowed driveway, hence the stock images for now. Once I get it insured properly it'll be parked outside my house.

I've been using the Charmant daily as preparation for using an old car every day since the Galant will take over the new daily driver role from the Mira (which I intend to keep and use as my weekend special) as of mid-December. Had the carb set up properly and it is super smooth now, a real pleasure to drive, it was running rich before. No more constant choke adjustment! Gearbox oil has been changed now too, such a difference!!

Anyway, back to the Galant! Mechanically it is very good! Although the engine didn't get very warm, I'd imagine it to be a case of former elderly driver, or it could just be the cold weather. I'll whip out the thermostat to put my mind at ease and replace if required. Apart from that it runs super smooth, loads better than the Charmant was when I got it, seems to be set up right which helps me considerably as my carb knowledge is feeble!

I'm aware the gearbox has a minor leak but I've not had a chance to look at that. Going to get it up on a ramp and have a proper look. Given that I intend to put some miles on it, could be worth me having the garage sort it. Seems a bit spongy so would probably benefit from a full gearbox oil change anyway. Thought about swapping in a 5-speed but the 4-speed is just too cool!!

Extremely pleased with it overall, glad I went for it!

Thanks for the tip! I love the 4-speed but if it blows up or something, I might well have to move onto a 5-speed.

Anyway, today I went out in the Charmant to get a haircut. Also got a huge Bockwurst at the Christmas market thing. And a quarter of chocolate raisins. And a small bottle of Irn Bru (which came in handy later). Then I drove over to the Galant stashing point to inspect it in the daylight and get some goodies out of the boot (including a bottle of shandy I left in there).


Here it is! Still wearing its Nurburgring sticker. By chance I had a bottle of polish in the boot of the Charmant and a bit of cloth, so after using it to remove the bird muck I decided to try it out on a few panels and see if it made much of a difference.


Polished the left half, since the weather was dull you can't really tell, but it brought it up to an amazing shine! When I get it home, I'm going to give it a thorough clean!


I decided to award Galant keys to this little fat salaryman who is having a bit of a cry. The Charmant one is in the same series, a skinny guy with a tie around his head drunkenly lying on the floor.


Set the clock properly, also used this is an opportunity to test the engine, started first time with no issues - great!


Radio is a Mitsubishi Electric unit with MW and LW! Impressive reception whilst it was playing "The Locomotion". The little tat-holder box underneath is a tape deck on higher models, so I'm going to see about swiping one of them.


These seats are my least favourite thing about the interior, they're just ugly (not in the cool way) and don't go with the chocolate brown dashboard at all. On the upside, they're quite comfy. As a temporary measure I'll cover them up with wooden bead covers.


My first mod is these Werthers Originals. Impressively large glovebox, I bet you could get all sorts of biscuits in here. I reckon I'm going to go for a mixture of Bourbons, Custard Creams and if there's room, a small packet of "Nice".


Car still wears the German versions of the "Team Beige" decals, read Practical Classics for more info.....


The back! Will benefit from having the big dent pulled out, but it isn't harming anyone. The car is impressively free of rust, largely just little surface patches around the bottom of arches and the driver's side wing. The rear strut tops need looking at too, but nothing major. Most importantly, the sills and the rest of the panels are impressively clean. Think I might try tackling some of the bodywork myself, I very much like the sound of that Deox stuff. Would rather have shonky slightly mis-matched paint than rust, could get a bodyshop to finish it off properly later.


Started to inspect the rear arches to see how lowering and wider wheels would affect the car and see if it has a lip around the arch which would need to be folded in to permit wider wheels - amazingly it doesn't have a lip, not only that, the arches are huge! Used my empty Irn-Bru bottle to work out how wide I'd be able to go without arch-rolling or tyre stretch and was pleasantly surprised!!


Checked the underside out to see if anything would prevent lowering. The only thing I can see being a problem is the exhaust which has already seen a welder anyway. Will need to consult a mate who has already made his own homebrew exhaust system for the Mira to see if we can make a custom jobbie which sits higher.

And now I have a question!

The rear seats have a horrible set of seatbelts which appear to have been put in by the UK Colt distributor. They're the non-retracting weird looking ones which just look a mess. I don't ever carry passengers in the back anyway. What are the legalities of removing these altogether (particularly MOT)?