[svsantosh]

NO PICS yet...

I got to drive the completely refit car. Seats put back, new inner-trim, bumper, new head lights, LPG kit thrown away, Assembled AC kit too thrown away, Only O.E Blower kept as it is. Audio working fine. Most important 'timing' was set using that torch-on-denso thing (dont know name) and now the 1st crank is crisp and pickup is much more linear and no jerks.

Painting and tinkering bill was 7,500Rs. Parts like inner trim, new lights, radiator grill, indicators, misc rubber parts awaiting billing from spares team. Should be 2-3K more.

Drove around for 3-4Kms for testing for rattles, noises, braking issues after parking for a month - thankfully none. Cant wait to take delivery EOD.

Delay is because we found the right axle (long) diff-rubber boot was cut and we are replacing it. Got to take a pic of the current axle and this part# matches the M800 Type-1 Manual GB axle (drive shaft) Yay - I need not worry about finding a rare part for a Autobox like the hyundai's.

[prajwalkashyap]

I have a feeling that this will not just be a learner's car. I think this will be for keeps!

Prajwal

[svsantosh]

The car is back and I am satisfied she has returned a tad nicer to look at than before. All the rot is gone and interiors cleaned up nicely and the 24years of dust/smell is no longer felt.

Timing adjustment has given it a more audible engine noise, say more grunt and a short 2 km drive back to house parking didnt go justice. Hope to put some more kms to get a hang of a AT again.

[ajaypjayaraj]

Originally Posted by svsantosh

The car is back and I am satisfied she has returned a tad nicer to look at than before. All the rot is gone and interiors cleaned up nicely and the 24years of dust/smell is no longer felt.

Just came across this thread. Never knew good old 800 had an AT sibling! Congrats on the rare possession! The car does not show any signs of being 2 decades old. The restoration looks amazing too!

[blackasta]

Awesome thread - may I suggest not selling the car? You would get peanuts for what it is actually worth!

[svsantosh]

Originally Posted by blackasta

Awesome thread - may I suggest not selling the car? You would get peanuts for what it is actually worth!

Sure, and i dont have funds now to get even the nano AMT if it gets launched too. So let this run till she wants to.

And after the month long hibernation i put in a small 100km test drive before i hand it over to wife. The car and mechanicals seem perfect, need to bump the idle a tad higher to compensate the D mode RPM drop.

[svsantosh]

Technical Update and a funny one too

After the minor rebuild and respray of the car, wife started driving the car again. Exactly a Km from home, the car used to die and she used to pull over to the left, take a ric to her work place and I used to go and recover the car. This happened for 2-3 days and I got frustrated and had to hear a earful from wife too.

Problem was everytime I used to go and recover the car, it used to run superb, all fine as if nothing happened

This reminded me of the Pontiac-Vanilla-Icecream-Allergy story... I was sure there is some reason behind my M800 car acting like a mid_life crisis husband who loves to ditch a wife in the middle of the highway.

2 days at the MASS - again!, top mechanic all over the electricals and carburretor overhaul - again! Changed Jet (old was original! boohoo), changed plugs (they were less than 500Kms old), changed point-set (they looked slightly worn), ordered a New coil - and I said enough! Before you end up giving me a A-Star Automatic (by changing all parts of course) - lets go for a spin.

The MASS guys had driven it around a lot while trouble shooting, I decided to go for another 30-40Km drive with the mechanic.

We spoke of lot of probables, fables, rum, children, bad roads, and finally driving habits - hehehe! A quick call was made from highway to wife, whilst cruising comfortably and like a Jasoos, I asked the exact sequence of steps wife does when she drives the car to work, learnt she never pushed back the choke inside after starting the car.

You may ask how was she driving for all these days! All these days the carb setting was done by a mechanic who did not have access to the timing light tool, so it was all touch and feel and that extra choke-fuel helped it along!

So now after a few days of testing in my hands, the car is perfectly normal and driving like a dream... Requested wife to avoid using choke at all costs.

[svsantosh]

After the ^ funny story, car is a daily driver, does 12-15 kms daily and touch-wood runs fine, except for one more stupid incident.

It was raining heavily this october, and the roads around my home are moon-surfaced! One big pot hole covered with water and one late evening wife didnt spot it and bumped the car over it, huge splash and water hit the delco (distributor)!!

Car died and after 1 hour of drying on the road side it runs fine again. Crazy.

Few pages ago I added a extra leaf for reducing the car bottoming out on rural roads, gave a sore back for wife, so got that removed and got 2 new M800 rear shockers (400~ each). Its back to a smooth driving M800 now.

Checking engine oil, GB oil, Water levels daily and all ok.

[TorqMaster]

Hello Sir,

Any updates on your car. I read the 4 pages in one go and was interested in knowing more about this small wonder.

You did infuse a lot of life into it and needs passion.

Regards
Eby

[svsantosh]

Didnt realize I had not updated this thread for 3 good long months, thats because I had nothing to update

300Rs a weeks worth of petrol, daily 15+ kms of total usage, is all it needs to chug along.

But, for a person with good ears, one can hear a faint tick-tock-click-clack of one or two connecting rod bearing/s going bang bang. It means I am close to getting a lower half block replaced soon, yay!

Hope to save enough for 2 axles too...

[condor]

Santosh - do I see your car in the classifieds ? What happened ?

[svsantosh]

Hi Condor, all,

Current home is nearly 6Km deep into rural roads/woods and after 1-2 minor breakdowns due to carb flooding/battery wire shorting out (old, hard wire), impeding engine rebuild etc - we decided to move on and upgrade.

Anyways, car is sold already (30/jan) and happily running around Bangalore now. (Yes its a TN car, owner will pay temp KA tax and use it)

I had spent close to 65ish thousand over the last year (includes purchase price, minor tinker repaint, head work, brakes, electricals etc) and sold it off for 40K.

Selling price was considering the following projected costs.

Block work (@FNM) - 8000
Insurance (TP coming up) - 1800
TamilNadu FC work coming up shortly - 2000??
Green tax, annual tax - 1500??

I was looking at 10-15K of these expenses and the owner is a avid reader of this thread and also made aware of these costs ^. He was still OK and the prospect of getting his better half a cheap to "LEARN" Auto car was too tempting to pass.

So after the final customary wash, I delivered the car along with my wife and met the newly wed couple mid way on hosur-bangalore and wished them luck with the tiny wonder.

Hope to keep updating this thread by inputs from the owner...

[Nissan1180]

Could you get any information on how much the cost price of this version was? I am asking because I wanted to know why MSIL did not prioritize this model. The Zen AT failed because it was a more expensive version of an already pricey car. The 800 AT, with the fuel efficiency figures that you have mentioned, could have made the market appreciate the automatics more.
Thanks.

[Udai.Sharma]

My father bought this in 1988 for INR 85000. We still have it and it serves well as a second car. Goes for servicing once a year and no major work done on the engine or transmission till date. :-)

[svsantosh]

Last month, the new owner in bangalore, with help of a FNG, get the entire engine rebuilt. Around 8K (without head work) and also spent on new pair of axles (same as manual 800). Now she got a new lease of life and puttering along well.

There is a odd issue after the engine rebuild. While in Reverse and slight throttle, the whole engine/GB shudders and shakes violently, we couldnt resolve the issue neither the mechanic! But only in R. D is perfectly OK!

Any pointers? ^^ (PS - Bedding mounts bushes checked once).

---------------------------------

Originally Posted by Nissan1180

The Zen AT failed because it was a more expensive version of an already pricey car....

Tell me about it!! Got a ZenAT from Delhi for real cheap to replace this M800AT and when I got the invoice to do the NOC+New number work, realized the damn Zen-AX was 4.3Lacs ExShwrm in 2002!! I need to pay some 6% of that as tax now!