Making Progress

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A day off work but an early start, I was in the garage at 8am to remove the power steering pump. Turned out to be a relatively easy job only taking just over an hour to remove. Before setting out to BBA Reman in Rochester to pickup a reconditioned pump I phoned my local Mini dealer to get a new high pressure hose. Luckily they had one in stock, unfortunately it’s over £200!

After a two hour trip to Kent and back (with a quick bite for lunch and a welcome cup of tea) I started on the job of removing the old high pressure hose and then refitting the new parts. Sadly the whole process took over three hours and caused me to swear on more than a few occasions. But now I have a whisper quiet steering system with no leaks!

After that epic job I decided to cheer myself up by fitting some of the new parts from GT Tuning. Firstly, the new induction system which was a joy to fit and took hardly any time at all, I made a brief static check and it does seem to make some very nice whooshing noises.

GT Tuning Ram Induction Kit

After fitting the induction kit I turned my attention to the new intercooler. Being much larger than stock the new intercooler covers over the spark plugs so I would need to swap them for the new high temperature plugs before fitting. Sadly I discovered another example where my old tools which worked fine on an air-cooled VW won’t do the job on a new car, my plug socket simple won’t reach (or fit in the holes!). The rest of the job will need to wait for the weekend.

Intercooler Trial Fitting