Well, another long but successful day at MINI-Daves MINI-garage!
We started off the day working on Hagar's rear brakes - he and minicoopers43 (Clint) jumped in and had them going back together in no time. The only hitch they had was getting the left rear caliper piston to rethread onto the park brake shaft, once Clint got it to start the rest went smoothly. George's co-pilot Taffy decided to watch from the safety and comfort of the passenger front seat, but gave a wag of her tail and a head to pet anytime it was offered!
At the same time Boxer and eronning got his car up on all 4 stands and started on a full brake job - all 4 corners. All went acording to plan and we even got to try Hagar's club contribution of the power bleeder to change his brake fluid. It worked a treat and eronning drove out with solid MINI brakes again. BTW, he bought his pads and rotors from Baron at a very competetive price, so you don't have to go aftermarket to save money on brakes for your MINI. $430 included new rotors, pads, sensors, torx screws - pretty much a complete kit and a good deal!
Fortunately Dimini brought his jack too, cause it turned out we needed it later in the day. He also lent a hand on eronning's brake job......
Davester crusied by and lent a hand on eronning's front brakes, and Bluegoose came in with an
extra jack just when we needed it.....Iowa MINI came by and lent a hand too!
Chris and Marcus came in planning to just watch and learn, but we wound up going ahead with Marcus' pulley install - the first one we've done....found out the pulley tool we have just isn't the best, so I'm going to invest in one of the newer style tools from CravenSpeed. We also changed his plugs, installed the safety strap kit on his tensioner and a new belt and his car ran like new, with a little extra oomph above 4K!
Counterfit MINI came by after lunch and we changed her oil and rotated her tires, so now she's ready for winter and another 10K miles.
We went down to Jack Stack for lunch, had a great meal and lots of fun conversation, a great time was had by all!
We wil schedule another shop day for MiniMax's hitch install, and I think someone mentioned yet another pulley install.
Later in the day we heard from Bradg33, his water pump died and fortunately he had a friend with a garage. They came by to get the Bentley manual and the serpentine belt tool and a couple of torque sockets they didn't have and got his car torn down today, with any luck he'll be back up and running again tomorrow. He said he'll do his brakes another time....
It was bitterly cold out today, but somehow with all the folks in the garage, work going on and a heater, it wasn't bad at all in the shop, but we'll try and schedule the next one on a warmer day.
Thanks to everyone who came and helped out, and a special thanks to eronning for bringing plenty of coffe and donuts from the Dunkin, kept everyone's sugar levels nice and high to ward off the cold, it's a great community of MINI owners we have here!
Go here to see some pics of the action!
http://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/79952283505/
It's not like we're gonna have 3' of snow!!
I didn't want to make too big of a deal out of it but today is my birthday and I can't think of a better way to have wrapped up my 25th year, the year I became a MINI owner!