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Thread: Alfa Romeo 147 2.0 TS (2008)

  1. #31
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    Jan 2004
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    Perth, Australia
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    Hey, I appreciated it, but I don't have a car to try it on..
    Life's too short to drive bad cars.

  2. #32
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    You see, I find it impressive but I've always been much more in the "Lift-off Oversteer Appreciation Society" camp.
    Lack of charisma can be fatal.
    Visca Catalunya!

  3. #33
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    Sep 2006
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    No worries

  4. #34
    Join Date
    Sep 2006
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    Six months of ownership balanced.

    Driving a car is expen$ive here. And this isn't even a Ferrari. Welcome to The Netherlands.

    But hey, I am enjoying it (driving the car, not paying huge amount of taxes)!

    Alfa Romeo 147 2.0 TS 16V Business Pro (11/2007)

    Purchase price: 12K, including service and 6 months warranty at dealership
    Day of purchase: 17/02/2012

    Km's in total: 56.900
    Km's driven by me: 10.431

    Tank stops: 21
    Fuel consumed: 966,27 liters
    Average consumption: 1 litre / 11,1 km
    Total fuel costs (Super/Euro98 only) : €1.733,1

    Total road tax costs : €342
    Total insurance costs (all-risk) : €387,59

    New tyres: €453,20
    Replaced wheel bolts: €77
    New hub caps: €30,06
    Leather repair: €85
    Fixed parking dents: €148,75
    Touch up paint pencil: €12,70
    New wiper set front, front city light replaced: €49,50
    Amount of car washing/polishing stuff: No comments

    Number of issues: 0
    Overall rating for the car so far: 9/10 (as it is no V6 GTA)

    The car drives like a dream. Only wish it had some more power under 100 km/h. Fuel prices are ridiculous here, still I only use Super/Euro98 fuel because I like to punish myself. The car only gets the best.

    Next week I will give it a full polishing treatment. I know not many people here will be endlessy interested, but due to lack of social life, I might feel the urge putting the pictures here after doing so. We are expecting rain next week, that sucks.

    Despite the higher costs I have not regret this car for a single minute. Viva Italia!

    Cheers!
    Attached Images Attached Images

  5. #35
    Join Date
    Feb 2005
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    Quote Originally Posted by Man of Steel View Post
    Fuel prices are ridiculous here, still I only use Super/Euro98 fuel because I like to punish myself. The car only gets the best.
    I can echo that feeling.
    Lack of charisma can be fatal.
    Visca Catalunya!

  6. #36
    Join Date
    Sep 2006
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    This week I started my quest to make the car more shiny and sparkling then a black diamond, removing most of the irritating scratches caused by incorrect washing of the car from previous owner. We had a few sunny weeks (which are now long gone) and in bright sunlight the car looks bad. The task was initiated earlier this week by doing the (for me oh-so-regular) cleansing of the wheels and interior.

    Today I used my trusty new high pressure cleaner to generate some snow foam, used as a pre-wash. It was fun to have snow in September already. Fourth picture looks like the car is photoshopped on the background, it is not but found it amusing enough to post it. Without explaining further here in all too much detail, after that I used clay to remove tar and contaminants from the paint. As it only rains here, I drove the car into a garage and started polishing and waxing. One helluva job, only finished the roof today.

    To be continued tomorrow, Wednesday and Thursday and hope to finish everything on Saturday then. Not exactly the fastest worker here but it is done precise and with all the dedication, as it should be done. When I am finished the car will look better then leaving from the dealership. Plus it is a hobby still (but always glad when I am finished)!

    At least the roof is all done and protected.
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    Last edited by Man of Steel; 09-17-2012 at 02:02 PM.

  7. #37
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    Sep 2006
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    Some more progress today. Finished hood, roof components and started on front bumper. Tomorrow I will finish the front using a smaller backing plate on the polishing machine, due to the spoiler and the awkward number plate position.

    Then I am finished with the smaller parts and can concentrate on the side panels.

    Pics 1 and 2: This is called beading! You can see if a car has a proper wax layer when you see this raindrop pearly effect.

    Please ignore the polish traces and dust on the other pictures, it is stil work in progress. But the parts which are finished almost look liquid

    Very rewarding but hard work, but someone has to do it
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    Last edited by Man of Steel; 09-18-2012 at 10:49 AM.

  8. #38
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    Looks great mate!
    Life's too short to drive bad cars.

  9. #39
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    Four days of hard work and basically not able to finish everything I wanted to do still in approx. 32 hours, excluding cleaning the wheels and interior. The misson this week was to improve the state of the paint however, which was a succes. This was the third car I polished ever, so it is not that I am a professional of some sort. But with a good machine (500 Watt in this case), some common sense and a lot of patience, everyone should be able to get this result, even on neglected paints. The panels got back their original shine again and the reflections can be seen everywhere. Uni-black is just wonderful and I already thought the car looked better then decent when I got it in February.

    So what did I do? First properly washing the car with a good shampoo, wash mitt and two buckets with water. Claying the car with a special clay removing tar and road contaminants (the black dots on your car which you can not remove by washing). This step will certainly already improve the shine on any vehicle as it will also remove all of the dirt you can not see on your 'clean' car. It makes the paint smooth as glass and will also assure that the wax layer will hold better and longer. But we're not there yet. After claying I started polishing. I would not recommend doing it by hand as in my opinion it is useless, you can only dream to remove scratches on your vehicle by hand. The machine makes 12K RPM's per minute so you're not going to keep up with it unless your Superman (duh). I used a mild polishing product and not heaviest polishing pad, as Alfa paint is relatively soft. Still I did two passes on the whole car, to make the correction as good as possible. The paints of VAG vehicles (Volkswagen for instance) seem to be a bi-hatch to correct as it is very hard, but luckily this is not the case here.

    After mild polishing you already saw the mirror effect coming back on the panels, removed the scratches caused by 4 years of incorrect washing by previous owner (apparently this was a normal person). I guess the lady used the washing street frequently, or those brushes at the gas station which you can use manually and have all the sand from the previous vehicle in them. Not the way to wash a car in my book, as it will create countless circular scratches which most of the time can be best seen in the sun. Especially on black vehicles, lucky me. Not only you will see the scratches in the sunlight (which annoys me like hell), they will also take away the 'new' shine on the vehicle. I was really surprised as the car appeared to be darker then normal after I was finished. After mild polishing, just like with sanding, you have to build down the job by using a lighter polish product and polishing pad. This step created the wetlook effect as seen on the car and will make the result more smooth. Finished? Not really.

    Then I used Black Hole, an optional step. It is a filler, which fills the scratches which are left behind. It is impossible to do a 100% correction and the car is no Trailer Queen, so there will always be scratches and they will allways re-appear with normal use of the car. As it is not feasible to polish the car every month or so, the product helps to hide the scratches which remain. After that, I applied two layers of paste wax and buffing it out with a microfibre cloth. The car should be protected for at least 3 months or so and the paint has a wonderfull 'hydrophobic' effect. Rain does not like the car anymore and the car is dry after a short ride already, drops are gliding off the car due to the smooth finish which looks very nice if you are into that sort of stuff. Oh and beading of course (see earlier pictures), raindrops like pearls when the car is parked

    Basically it is not finished still. When you open the back doors, the wheel arches are still scratched but I was out of time and it is less important then the outside. Although I had taped the rubbers and plastic, polish residu is an enemy and it can still be found on some parts of the car, also on the paint. This also annoys me but every regular person will hardly notice. I will finish those details soon, restoring the rubbers and plastic trims to their original glory as they now look grayish versus the paint. I already touched up the paint under the front bumper, as earlier owner had damaged the car there and this was now very visible due to polishing product which has gotten into the plastic. No one will notice now.

    Like said, I am no expert but it is a hobby which has lost control a bit and I still learn with each detail job. Overall, the results get better and better and I enjoy doing so which is the ultimate goal. I got many people asking me to do their car but I hardly have time to do my own, as you can see it took forever to do the 147 but at least the result is there. You also don't have to rush these jobs, like car cleaning companies do asking €200 for it and leaving the car still scratched. Again, 90% of people will hardly notice but I am already lost so no use helping me anymore. And yes the car is used daily and only washed once a month or so, the treatment it got last week is only needed once a year when you wash the car properly.

    Unfortunately, rain started and I was unable to make decent nice shots, so you have to live with these. The shine is impressive in real life and can hardly be caught on standard camera. However I guess you will find a nice impression below.

    Cheers!
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    Last edited by Man of Steel; 09-25-2012 at 03:12 PM.

  10. #40
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    Apr 2003
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    Rozenburg, Holland
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    when the car is finished, bring it along and we'll do a shoot.
    "I find the whole business of religion profoundly interesting, but it does mystify me that otherwise intelligent people take it seriously." Douglas Adams

  11. #41
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    Quote Originally Posted by henk4 View Post
    when the car is finished, bring it along and we'll do a shoot.
    Excellent, many thanks! These pictures will follow here then

  12. #42
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    Car looks showroom fresh!
    Lack of charisma can be fatal.
    Visca Catalunya!

  13. #43
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    Nov 2012
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    Cool car! congrats

  14. #44
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    Cheers!

  15. #45
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    Well, after a deafening silence on this topic for seven months or so, I figured I would be able give an update. I have driven over 20K now with the car in a year without any noteworthy issues.

    In February the car got serviced at the local Alfa dealership. I already knew since last late year that the front brakes suffered some tear and wear - this was certainly a point of attention. So the car got front new discs and brake pads. The difference in brake feel is tremendous. Braking power is now impressive, while it first was 'good'.

    The Twin Spark engine may be thirsty for oil, but it looks like the car is behaving so far. I must say that just before servicing the car in February I made a hefty stop and the warning light with 'low oil pressure' appeared for a few seconds. Honestly I did not check the oil level for a longer period, I might have done that before doing the oil change to get a feeling about the usage. Anyhow, at the dealership the man implied that 'about a liter was used up - but it might be a little more'. So have to take his word for it

    Anyhow, the car stands or falls with regular maintenance so with the yearly service which is planned nothing worries me so far. I am already mentally preparing for next year's servicing though as in 2014 the timing belt needs to be replaced. Yes sir, needs to be done each 60K or every 3 years for Alfa's. I will not be taking any risks on this.

    The somewhat higher costs for this car are still completely overruled by driving pleasure. With all the earlier blah-blah regarding how nice the car is, I will not bother boring you all again. But it is a fact. I needed this car and I am happy with it, even while it is not perfect.

    Reading a few paragraphs above people could think I am a polishing idiot or carwashing nutjob. Well, to some extent they are right but another fact is that the car was last washed in September. I do not have a garage and I hate washing the car in cold weather. Hopefully the snow and salt left the undercarriage of my Alfa intact.

    In April the wheels on the car were grimed black with brake dust and the bird shit and dirt on the car irritated me. So this weekend I gave the car the attention again it deserved. Of course, in the full sunlight I always see imperfections in the car which I do not like. But I learn to live with it - car is used everyday and to the average person it looks better then new.
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    Last edited by Man of Steel; 04-29-2013 at 01:19 PM.

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