Newbie

Hi there just thought id introduce myself.
My names Ash and I'm from East Sussex.
After a few years of messing about with sports cars I decided I need something a little bit bigger. I'm the sort of person who likes my car to have some character which I find most modern cars lacking. (the newest car I've owned until now was a 1992 nova.) After looking around I came across the jimny and decided it had the sort of character most cars of its age lack and it was more importantly, different.

After deciding on a jim I started looking around. I decided on a hardtop as I've got an mx5 for summer usage. Eventually I found one locally from a friend of my dad which had been in his family for most of its life and was well looked after unfortunately it was a soft top. After looking at it was too good to miss so a deal was struck and I go to pick my first jimny up Friday. Idea is to clean it up and use it as my daily and for a bit of green laning.

Anyway enough of my yacking, Hello to you all.

Welcome aboard

Welcome. I'm from Redhill, Surrey. What part of Sussex you from!

Welcome this fine forum it’s good to have you join us ................

welcome aboard!

Soft tops are loads better, so you did good

Thanks for the welcome guys. I live in the outskirts of Eastbourne.

Picked the Jim up Friday and I'm chuffed. Its a 2000 soft top in red with 90k miles. Has been sitting for a year but started first time and runs perfectly. Before coming off the road it had new cambelt, wheel bearings, king pin bearings and a monsoon roof. The cars in pretty good condition with only a small bit of rust in the boot floor. I put it in for its MOT expecting the worse as it had been sitting. It failed on the two front to rear brake lines and got advisories on the two rear lines and the fuel lines being corroded, the guy i had bought it off had warned me they might need doing so Im reasonably happy there's nothing else that needs doing.

Now after playing I've got a few questions.

1. How hard is it to do the brake lines? I've just done all the lines on my mx5 but that's some what simpler only having one front to rear line. It was also made easier by a kit being available with all the lines cut and flared complete with the fittings. Is there anywhere that sell a kit like this with the lines ready made just needing to be bent to shape and fitted for the jim?

2. Having done plenty of research before buying a jim i know the engines are fairly tough and reasonably revy. Obviously being only a 1300 it needs to be pushed to get up to speed but is the engine tough enough to cope with being taken to the red line reasonably often? I know its no race car but it would be nice to get where I'm going!

3. How does the front roof section open? I've got instructions that say how to lower the rear section but for the front section it says refer to the owners manual which I've looked at and seems to be only about hardtop models! I've worked out the catches but does the top just fold over on itself? or does it fold differently as at the moment it still covers half the aperture with it open.

Thanks for any help!

Brake lines are fiddly on any motor but on a J quite easy because its high up. Get some ramps to make it a "luxury" job

As for the engine, it works best between 3 - 4k rpm which seems to be the sweet spot.

Welcome to Bigjimny

Welcome to Big Jimny.
The front soft top roof folds as in the photos.
Hope this helps you.

Biasmechanic wrote: Thanks for the welcome guys. I live in the outskirts of Eastbourne.

2. Having done plenty of research before buying a jim i know the engines are fairly tough and reasonably revy. Obviously being only a 1300 it needs to be pushed to get up to speed but is the engine tough enough to cope with being taken to the red line reasonably often? I know its no race car but it would be nice to get where I'm going!

Thanks for any help!

You can red line it but when you do, you can watch the fuel needle move in the opposite direction & quickly too.


Dan

Hello. I am sure you are going to enjoy your Jimny. It was the little Suzukis that pulled me into owning nothing but 4x4s. I had a Landrover 2a and it nearly put me off for life. So MX5..........watch out.

welcome but why do you need to red line it ,i have been in the motor trade as a tech since 1978 only boys red line just because they no no better ,if it is to be red lined you need to keep the oil clean and changed regualy so that is half normal service time and you need a good grade of oil and do not red line unless the engine is at normal engine temp (hot)