[skip_rat]

So this is a little rolling restoration of the Honda Concerto I bought on eBay a few weeks ago. On the drive home I noticed that the heater seemed to be stuck on hot, the brake pedal had a fair bit of travel and there was a horrible wobble if you went over 60mph. Luckily the wobble was just wheel balance.

This is the car at the moment:



I've fitted a new caliper on the drivers side as the piston seal was leaking slightly. I'm not 100% happy with the passenger side but i need to clean it up further before I decide if it's OK or not. I also replaced both front drop links for the anti-roll bar as they were pretty perished.



The heater problem turned out to be a rusted stuck valve in the engine bay. That cleaned up easily and some grease soon had it moving again. The problem was the control cable was also bent inside the car. It's amazing just how much trim I had to remove to get access to the end of the cable to straighten it back out. It's working now but still needs putting back together.



As the car is for my wife it needs to have a height adjustable drivers seat. I've bought a nice (and cheap) set from Bill who was breaking a 418 Touring. They need a bit of a clean before I fit them but I like the material much more than what's currently fitted.



The material on the door cards is loose and coming away in places so I'm going to recover that in something like black leather or vinyl as I don't have the matching door card material for the seats.

I've done the usual service stuff like filters/plugs/oil but as the car came with no service history I will probably replace the cambelt just to be safe. I need to check over the rear brakes and flush out the last of the old brake fluid in those lines. After that there is some bodywork to attend to, mainly dents and perhaps see if I can get the aircon working.

[Vulgalour]

I may be able to furnish you with some matching fabric as I've just pulled out the same interior from my 400 so I've got all the door cards and all the seats. The foams are fairly worn out so the seats aren't going to be much use but I could strip the fabric off them and then you can cut the best bits to size to retrim the Concerto inserts. I wouldn't be surprised if the inserts are removable so you can re-wrap them for a factory look before putting them back together again.

[skip_rat]

I may be able to furnish you with some matching fabric as I've just pulled out the same interior from my 400 so I've got all the door cards and all the seats. The foams are fairly worn out so the seats aren't going to be much use but I could strip the fabric off them and then you can cut the best bits to size to retrim the Concerto inserts. I wouldn't be surprised if the inserts are removable so you can re-wrap them for a factory look before putting them back together again.

That would be great thanks, my alternative is to resort to vinyl/leather. The insert does look like it would be removeable and I've had decent results recovering similar panels on other cars.

The drivers seat has now bean cleaned up nicely thanks to Vanish spray foam cleaner. It did take two goes but the centre panel now shows up the multicolour flecks really nicely, they were barely noticable before.

As suspected the passenger caliper is also leaking slightly so I've ordered a replacement. I'll refurbish the old calipers as spares later on as they are suitable for both the Concerto and the 416.

[ROVER Cabby]

A/C too, nice !

[RoverRevival]

They just couldn't get more similar to the rover model could they

[crepello]

They just couldn't get more similar to the rover model could they

They did manage to with the Diesel variant!

[Rover dave]

They just couldn't get more similar to the rover model could they

I think the rover looks better from the front as I think the honda looks a bit bulky with those large indicators and big bumper only my opinion , that is a tidy car though .

[Vulgalour]

The door card fabric may be going to someone else if they can collect the door cards, but all the fabric from the front and rear seats is available. If you'd like it, drop me a PM and we can work out cost of postage, or collection if you're anywhere near Middlesbrough. I don't want anything for the fabric, just the postage.

[skip_rat]

So I got the passenger side caliper replaced and moved on th the back of the car. Ther rear brakes don't look to bad but I'll probably replace the shoes anyway as I want to give everything a strip down and clean.

However I also noticed this:



I'm pretty sure the bush is torn right through top and bottom so I can't imagine this is helping the ride quality much. The drivers side is torn at the bottom so I've ordered a set of bushes plus seeing as I have 2 R8 based cars I've splashed out on a proper press rather than resort to bashing it out. It's still cheaper than a few hours labour at the local garage plus I have the tool if I ever need to do a rear bush on the other car. The other rear bushes seem OK apart from the lower shock absorber bush where it mounts to the lower arm. I'm not sure if that bush is available though.

[crepello]

Do let us know how the bush press works out for you. Been thinking about getting one myself, as the last bush replacement job I did was torrid!