Le Twingo Anglais

 Some good news this week after a bit of chasing; was the confirmation that my Twingo finally has a new UK identify and V5 document. After missing the Luton Festival of Transport; the document landed on my doorstep on Saturday. A bit of a rush round was required to get the plates made up by a local motor factor and also a new battery to replace the old one which was starting to fail.  The car finally went out on the road late Saturday and the booking I'd had for the Haynes Motoring Museum Sunday breakfast club wasn't wasted after all with the car making the 45 min trip from my house to Sparkford in Somerset. Other commitments meant I couldn't stay very long but I enjoyed the journey and a little trip across Somerset and into Wiltshire proved an enjoyable day. At one point it was even nice enough to retract the foldback roof; for all of five minutes. There are a few shows coming up which the Twingo will be in attendance at, locally and also with a bit of a trek up the countr

So I'm about five weeks into the sending off of the various documents to the DVLA to get a registration number issued to my Twingo. I've heard absolutely nothing, and contact with the DVLA is like banging your head against a brick wall. The autobot response is that "we'll send confirmation once it is processed" which is great, except I'll know it's been processed because the cheque will have been cashed by DVLA. What I'd love to know is that you've actually received it and are at least dealing with it; the one thing you can't tell me.  Anyway, I decided to take advantage of this period of sitting waiting by ordering some service parts for the car, which I had delivered from GSF car parts. Sourcing Elf oil (remember Renault a choisi elf ) was more difficult; and I had to order that via Amazon. As the service history of the car is unknown I have gone for a full oil and filter change, air and fuel filter and finally spark plugs. Coolant will be

  Finally, after a long period of slow activity on the Twingo, it has finally passed it's first UK MOT. In the last blog, an inspection revealed that the front strut tops were badly worn; and that there were 2-3 areas of rust that required plating to pass an MOT. Strut tops came via Auto Doc within 2 weeks but it took a while to find a suitable time to get the car into the workshop at my employers; so they could be changed.  With that sorted I had to get VIN insurance arranged so that I could drive the car on the road to it's prebooked MOT test. That proved difficult with several leading classic car insurers wanting silly money for cover, or were being at best extremely rude. One citing over the phone that " it's not a modern classic ". Funny that, because numerous classic car publications cite the 1st generation Twingo as being exactly that . Finally cover was arranged and a test was booked with a sympathetic MOT station in North Bristol. Cleevewood Garage specia

Monday was a day of mixed fortunes. HMRC informed me that they were satisfied by the payment of VAT on the Twingo released the NOVA document on the car, a major step closer to being able to apply for a UK registration. However; all was not so well during the evening, I had arranged with the assistance of a mechanic friend to set about preparing the Twingo for MOT. The first step was to fit the rear fog light, and this was a reasonably straightforward process. Mounting the fog light was the tricky bit, I didn’t want drill into the bumper to fit the light but whilst the car was in the air, it was decided to mount the bracket using one of the existing torx bolt slots used to secure the bumper to the bottom of the car. The bracket needed drilling slightly to accept the bolt, but the position meets the requirement for the light to be between the middle and offside of the vehicle. The existing wiring loom to the nearside cluster was cut and jointed so that a separate feed to the auxiliar

 The last blog finished on the question, how did it go? Well, considering I’d never met the car, the car dealer or the exporter it went much smoother than I expected. The CMR note issued by Transporting Wheels satisfied the relevant customs checks; and the car arrived in Essex on the Saturday morning. Unfortunately the CRO Port operation closes at 6pm on a Saturday and the delayed UK transporter missed the collection window resulting in a wasted trip. A 2 nd attempt on Monday was success and the car arrived with me in Bristol at 1pm. Collecting the car was very simple; each car has a unique reference and PIN like shipping containers do and this number was supplied by Gerdo well in advance of the car arriving. I’m very lucky that my work has a large private site; and so the car is stored off the public highway. It left Holland without export plates and its original number plates had to be removed. So, do I regret it?    Not so far, the Twingo looks very much like it is an ori

 I’ve always lived off the wise advice, never buy a car unseen and it’s something I’ve largely stuck by. I’ve bought three Fords unseen; but they were all cars that cost under £400 and I always viewed them as being worth more in parts if beyond salvation. I actually made a fair bit of cash from an Escort I bought off eBay for £72.50 and an XR3i convertible that I gave £300 for.  However; with the travel ban in place going to Holland to view a Twingo was certainly not going to be an option I could realistically do. Travel heavily restricted and quarantine for those entering the UK would cost me dearly. On balance I had to way that up against buying a car unseen from a garage I’d never seen. On paper it seems mad but when I weighed up the price I thought I could probably break the car if it turned up and was a total heap, and at worst I might be a few quid down once I’d sold the parts or the car as a complete vehicle.  I did a Google search of the dealer, they had generally good reviews.