Trouble over the horizon, and over the cars

 Today isn't as bright as I would like it to be for the Mercedes and Lotus.

Well, to start, the Mercedes has been having several issues noting to the transmission. While the transmission at its best can shift pretty smoothly, the gearbox in ours has overtime begun to, well, not shift smoothly, being more akin to a smooth manual shift. Furthermore, in today alone, it has lurched about twice, neither being very minor jerks. We were initially to bring the car to the workshop regarding a broken coolant tank and sensor, but expectedly and unexpectedly, its now in for diagnosis of a far larger problem. 

We've checked the coolant before when it displayed a notice on the cluster mentioning to top up coolant, which in fact did not need new coolant. What the fluid color came to be was a murky and purple color instead of a more traditional green shade, and we didn't know what to make of it until now. Lo and behold it seems to be transmission fluid, indicating that the transmission and coolant fluid have now been cross-contaminated. The hope is that the transmission isn't severely damaged, but I suspect it is with the above symptoms. 

We've had some lurches before when on the brake in drive, but honestly, each time I've told my father to bring the car in to check, he's more or less always dismissed it, citing that the car needs to be used almost daily and therefore wouldn't have time to bring it in for a diagnosis. I suspect that may now be biting him. We estimate that the total costs to replace not just the transmission (or overhaul it) and to replace three tanks, could be somewhere around the 10k mark.

As for Elanmi, its less major, but its usability is directly affected, so it is comical timing for both situations to have arose on the same day. Similar to the Mercedes' transmission, this is an expected failure because of past experiences with the issue happening in a smaller scale.

As seen in the provided video, my headlight motor has completely given up the ghost. I'll be trying to get hold of a headlight repair kit from an ex-owner and we'll see if it can be used.

Its rough that these has happened on the same day for both cars, frankly.

~Efini

ROBLOX: Malaysian pride in the heart of Celestar

Heya!

Just over on Friday, Cafebara, our leading local sponsor for car meets, hosted another car meet at Devine Rd Carpark. This time, the meet was recommended to have a Malaysian twist to it. The way I see it, it all just looks like a compilation of our 1990s and 2000's motoring heroes. But hey, figuratively, I think that's just icing on the cake!

The venerable Charade GTti. I think its a presentable lineup; Honda Civic EG9, Proton Satria GTi and the Daihatsu. Its great to see it again after a few months.

It would seem to be that we weren't able to coax any Perodua Myvi owners into joining, but we did have the best alternative and a relative to the Myvi; the Daihatsu Boon X4. Spun off the same chassis, the X4 is effectively a homologation car, sporting all-wheel drive, roughly 131 horsepower from a turbocharged 1.0L and weighing around a ton, this variant may be the most performance-focused of them all. Its great to see one in the flesh, let alone for a car meet with the focus on cars like the humdrum Myvi, which sadly did not have any turn up.

The closest we saw to a Proton Perdana. I didn't take any photos and it could show up in past and future posts, but this Mitsubishi Galant VR-4 sports an Evolution 6 spoiler, and that is incredibly nice.

Another one of those cars that could tickle your fancy; the red Mitsubishi Evolution 3 isn't your typical E3. This is an ex-rally car used by Proton PERT. This generation of Lancer Evolution is largely the most well known rebadge from Proton, being more known than the homologated Evolution 5, 6 and 7 all also bearing Proton badges for rally homologation. This again, is one of the ex-rally cars, brought in late by C&C and has since been registered here. Its a surprise what Malaysian cars we tend to have here. (And yet we couldn't have a Myvi owner turn up...)

But apart from the old-gen cars, we did have some newer examples too, such as this Suzuki Swift Sport and Proton Satria Neo R3. The Neo in question sports a supercharger, and would be toe-to-toe with the likes of other Honda Civic hatchbacks.

Post-meet, I was around the area and wow! A Celestar-registered Proton Putra. These weren't a big seller locally then, with the GTi being a far popular choice. Compared to the 54 units of Satria GTi (Which you could read about here), the roadtax registry lists only 15 still around. I am humbled that there is that many, but it still isn't alot. Speaking with the owner, this 2-owner example was saved from scrappage, being originally driven by an older folk who wasn't able to drive anymore. Having been laid-up for about 4 years, the Putra underwent restoration and 2 years on, it is now finally back for use on the road. 

The owner, who I would refer to as Ben, admits that the car isn't fully standard as is and doesn't have the correct front bumper, and the interior has lost its original materials especially the 90's patterns. Ben mentions that he'll drive the car as much as he can before COE expiry, and will debate selling it or selling it off to someone else right before then. 

Just as we were parting ways, a Singaporean-registered Satria GTi turned up and we had a chat with him too at another nearby Bucky's. All in all, quite the Malaysian-themed day. 

~Emiri 

ROBLOX: Putting the Charade in, well, CharadeSpots

 Hey-hey!

Our colleague who is currently in Kuala Lumper, Ellise, very recently got a Daihatsu Charade sedan. Is it good? Partially, yes. But really, its a Charade. No, it isn't good. (Efini is going to come knocking on my door for this)

Ellise doesn't want to disclose how much she paid for the car, but it does mean she doesn't need to use Efini's Mitsubishi Airtrek.

The local community opted to host a meet, meeting and driving around KL. These are generally comprising of expats and foreign folks, so Ellise and crew were one of the few who brought in their more "local" examples.

Ah, maybe Efini should allow Ellise to write in her own articles in the future. If you see a new intro blog, you'll know who it is.

Personally find it interesting that quite a number of these cars have Penang registrations.

For now, we're still thinking of what to do with this little car. Everything on it works to a decent degree since Ellise bought it for a high price for a far better condition than most examples. What do you think we should do to it?

~Emiri

Elanmi's New floormats in

 Its in the little things.

Custom-ordered mats that I ordered 20 days ago arrived today. Got to say between the delay for the blue carpet and the tailoring process, 20 days seem quite quick, plus delivery.

Long-term and actual usage I haven't done yet, but they fit the flat spot intended for floormats basically perfectly, or to put it in a simpler way, they fit perfect. Stoked and happy to be able to replace the old mats. Embroidery has some amount of shine to it too, just fitted them so I've not really a way to check but they'll probably be one of the first things to grab your attention should you look into the interior.

Thank you Autostyle, these are nice. Their website link to order and others is here: https://www.autostyle.co.uk/catalog2/index.php

~Efini

ROBLOX: Pulsar Area accident

 Friend in the community got into a heavy accident on the road a few nights ago.

Attached below is his dashcam footage of the accident. He's okay and in the hospital receiving treatment currently, but seeing the nature of the accident, its a miracle he's still alive.

Currently, the police are still looking for witnesses to the accident, as the other car fled the scene past the crash. I'm wondering how they managed too as well.

If you know anything regarding this situation, please do let us know! Unfortunately, the Honda Civic SiR is a write-off. With a hit like that, I doubt it will return. Now likely wouldn't be a good time to ask my friend if he's parting out too. Hope someone can bring forward anything regarding this.

~Emiri

Elanmi: Lights demo

 Something I've had on my mind; considering the amount of time that I generally take for recreational purpose to make virtual cars have accurate lighting, its been a general sore to find this information for cars.

Be it Japanese, European, American, really any and every manufacturer, plus the specific models too. Manuals probably do show the lighting pattern of the cars, but never how they actually look in practice.

So for one thing, since this search of information tends to take a huge while, looking through video after video to find snippets online, I've decided to just compile an entire video dedicated to the idea. And so, here it is.

My car has a modified signal relay that speeds up the flash rate, so that's not box standard. Apart from that really, I think all of the lights are correct. And they should be universal unless Lotus fiddled around with the Alpine GTA taillights for different model years and such. Unless they actually did that, I'll say its universal for 1989-1995.

~Efini

A "Selestial" atmosphere

 Sorry, had to play with the words a bit.

But, Seletar does have some unique locations and definitely is a break from the neighbourhood and city life that Singapore effectively is nothing but.

A Bombardier Global 6000/7500 in matching color theme just so happened to be landing at the same time I was here. 

~Efini