[kamilharis]

That's one beautiful restoration happening in Kerala.

Stock Civic, Type1/2 City, Esteems are very hard to come by in Kerala these days, most of them are going over the board and modifying it to the extremes. Happy to see one gaining back its glory, good luck, and thank you! Would love to see it in person one day.

Waiting for more pics and updates.

[BeemerBug_06]

Hi Sohan , must say this is a lovely thread . It's absolutely heartwarming to see your connection with the Esteem. Sorry to hear about your dad. I'm sure he must be smiling from up above looking at the love and care you're giving the car ! Be sure never to part ways with her

PS:- Type 1 Maruti Esteems are a rarity these days , especially unmolested and original cars like yours . Even more so in that metallic maroon shade. I look forward to seeing the outcome of the restoration !

Good Luck and happy driving !
Do feel free to drop me a pm if you need any help with sourcing parts

[sohanbala]

Its been a month since we completed our exterioir painting, unfortunately the second wave of Covid has forced us to pause.
With garage opening only on weekends and logistics at halt,spare parts movement has delayed beyond me earlier estimates.
However the bonus time had helped in identifying more sources for parts.

May 2021

Just when we stopped works, a weeks relaxation has been given to garages and some essential services.The very next day a major shipment of parts came in with almost all the rubber trims I've ordered.
We have recieved the following.

Rear Windows Sash
Window Inner Moulding
Door Opening Trim
Rear Quarter Window Trim
Window Mooulding Upper
Window Moulding Lower
Weatherstrip * 4
Roof Driprail * 2
Weatherstrip trunk
Front window Moulding
Rear window Moulding

Enough to start fitments
The new relaxation allowed all spare parts shops to remain functional.

Part Hunt

Anticipating an extending lockdown coming up, I decided to use this week as much as possible, however the challenge was to do this staying home.
For the next few days I had phoned every single shop that had maruti spares listed on Google.
Reached out to my old college friends in different districts wherever I found a leads to get them shipped.
All the work did bring some good finds.


Type 1 OEM Headlights



M1000 Radio Antenna



Type 1 Amber taillights



OEM 13" Rims



SGP Grab Handles




The following parts were also found

1. Type 1 White Corner Lamps
2. OEM Wiper Arms
3. Type 1 Wiper Garnish
4. Trunk Lock and Cable
5. Tail light wiring and holder
6. Side Scuffs
7. Type 1 Bumper fitment kit

Paralell Developments

Audio Console



This Sony unit was working until recently, have given it to a technician to see if we can get it back to life.A sticker on the console says October 95,I believe the dealer had fitted this back then.All 4 speakers and the rear speaker garnish also says Sony.Perhpas they all came together as a complete set.
Hopefully the console can be serviced.

Upholstery

Currently the car has a brown pattern american cloth cover,I remember this one being fitted in 2007.It badly needs a replacement.Thanks to alpot of threads here,after going thorugh the old pamphlets for Esteem, Ive decied to go for a light interior with leather trims.



After going in and out of many fnacy car stores found this small old shop run by a guy.Sounded very comfortable to work with,he mentioned that a vendor had some old stock of microfibre cloth (Japan Fibre is what they called it) which was stock for the Esteem.He alone runs the shop,the lockdown will give them ample time for stitching.

Observations

To my suprise, except for the dashboard all stock interioir plastic trims including AC vents seem to be supplied by Daewoo.




Some exterior panles and lights by Tokaidenso




All wrapped up awaiting an unlock

The proposed 7 day lockdown reached almost a month now.
Rubber fitments are complete.Wrapped up for better days ahead.

[AntPaul]

The 3rd gen esteem had black rims OEM. All other generations IMHO had silver rims. I hope you ordered the correct color. Also I hope you have the black hub caps stored. They are missing in the pics from paint booth.

I can see the (that reads 'esteem' in English in 3rd gen esteem)sticker is missing in your steering wheel. In the 1st gen, it might have been Maruti in Hindi letters. Are the sun visors in 1st gen Esteem same as the cheap-ish ones in later models which 'swells' with time?

Patiently waiting to see the car unwrapped with all trims fitted.

[sohanbala]

Originally Posted by AntPaul

The 3rd gen esteem had black rims OEM. All other generations IMHO had silver rims. I hope you ordered the correct color. Also I hope you have the black hub caps stored. They are missing in the pics from paint booth.

I can see the (that reads 'esteem' in English in 3rd gen esteem)sticker is missing in your steering wheel. In the 1st gen, it might have been Maruti in Hindi letters. Are the sun visors in 1st gen Esteem same as the cheap-ish ones in later models which 'swells' with time?

Patiently waiting to see the car unwrapped with all trims fitted.

Hi
Yes, the rims I ordered are silver. I believe the same is shared with the zen
I've also managed to find new black hub caps.
The steering badge that reads "Esteem" is there, though the paint has worn off over time.
I'm replacing the badge aswell.
Unfortunately it's the same old sunvisor in type 1, my stock ones have totally swelled up.Im trying to arrange a replacement for the same.
Hopefully everything will fall in place

[rr_zen]

All the best for your restoration of the Esteem. My 2003 Esteem is also getting ready for a good make-over and I have sourced quite a few OE items from boodmo. Can you share details of any other sources from where you ordered spares for your car ? Thanks in advance.

[sohanbala]

Originally Posted by rr_zen

All the best for your restoration of the Esteem. My 2003 Esteem is also getting ready for a good make-over and I have sourced quite a few OE items from boodmo. Can you share details of any other sources from where you ordered spares for your car ? Thanks in advance.

Boodmo definitely helps.Your best friend is your local MGP dealer,you can place order for parts open for sale with the partnumbers available on Boodmo through your local MGP.
Some MGP dealers in Bangalore and Coimbatore had offered to ship post lockdown.
If they ship,I'll mention all at the end of this thread

[Balenokid30]

Have seen this work personally, my Baleno is serviced at the same garage . Kudos to the effort and commitment behind it 🙂

[sohanbala]

3rd Week of June 2021

I wad unable to write for a while as everything was on a standstill due to local Covid restrictions.

Eventhough everything was shut, my mechanic was able to to get someone to start the car and let her idle once every 3-4 days, lately restrictions have been tightened, we had no other choice than to leave the car wrapped with the battery removed for a month.
Finally, the proposed one week of lockdown which ran for almost 2 months has reached its end. Relaxations have been announced, and garages are allowed to function partially

Work Resumes

All this while I've been waiting for the lockdown to lift, now that its up, I wasnt sure on where to resume.
With spare parts shops partially open and logistics at halt, it felt like the unlock isn't helping at all.
I was desperately trying to get an ETA on a few parts I had ordered through various dealers, just when I was thinking what next, got a call from the upholstery guy informing the seats have been done. It had completely slipped my mind that I had given the seats before lockdown.Thankfully he was able to complete the work during that time.
So for now, until everythng gets back to full swing Ive decided to work on these.

1. AC Kit Installation
2. Seats

AC kit Installation

The technician had informed that some changes need to be made to the piping since the kit we took was from a car with power steering.
We got the piping changed, replaced the blower, compressor and condeser.
Just as we checked, it appears that the condenser fan motor has given way.
MGP dosent have the part and has listed it not available.
A huge letdown, yet I kept my hopes and started checking out stores one by one and voila, a shop dealing with autoelectricals had the same denso motor in stock.



Replaced the motor, flushed the system and filled it up.Finally Im able to sit in this car without sweating.The new setup seems to cool up much faster and has more cooling.With a slight rise in the idle as the compressor is engaged, the power draw is notable.Something I had long forgotten after driving newer vehicles.
Overall the AC setup seems to be doing a fair job now.

Seats

Since the bigger shops here didn't have anything of my preference, I went this small place who was willing to do as per my spcecifications.
I wanted the seats as close as possible to the stock setup.
To give an idea I had shared some old Suzuki and maruti brochures for refference when I gave my seats in.He said he can do it and asked me to rest assured.2 months of lockdown, and now that the seats have been covered, I asked him to send me pictures.



Boy I was elated!


Part Finds

Glove Box Door
As I have sourced most of the plastic trims, one major bit remaining was the glove box, the one I had taken from scrap had also started breaking near the fold.Since the type 1 glove box door is very different from type 2 and 3, I had zero hopes of finding a good one.Thanks again to MGP, I was able to source a new unit.

All 4 door trims, grab handles and centre console has been replaced.

Trunk Lid and Reverse Lamps


Over the years Esteem went through quite a few facelifts, externally these changes were primarily with the front end and the rear trunk panel.
Esteem Type 1 shared the same panel as the M1000, all black with a floating reverse lamp setup.Eventhough I love how type 2s had an all red panel with integrated lights.I wanted to retain as it is.After almost 4 months of search, Maruti had informed that the rear panel is available with one dealer in North Kerala and the reverse lamps in Chennai.Again regional lockdowns and issues posed a lot of trouble, ultimately I was able to get them both.




Roof Moulding

These small little rubber trims above the C pillar that covers the gap between the rear glass upper moulding and weatherstrip were the most difficult to find.Both of these SGP parts were closed for order.I had found LH side intitially from a local dealer.The RH was later found from an MGP dealer in Bangalore.(Maruti shows 2 part numbers for each side with one available for order,please be informed that the one available for order is white in colour and not black.)
Black ones end with part number ending -ODG and the white ones are 26U



Other small parts

Fuel and Trunk Door Lever
Bush for hood and trunk door




Thankyou all for your wishes and suggetions.I have alot of major updates coming in here, this month

[sohanbala]

Part 5 - One last wish | Restoring my father's 1995 Maruti Esteem

By the first week of July we had moved to Dashboard installation and wiring inspection. The instrument cluster switch Assembly for lights and wiper has been replaced with a new one along with console light bulbs and a few AC ducts that we found in old MGP stock.


Next on line was the entire upholstery work.
First on my list was floor carpet followed by seats, roof liner and door pads.
I wanted to maintain the stock OEM looks, thanks to all your inputs I was able to clearly identify the stock materials used originally, many brochures posted here helped.

Floor Carpet

After a bit of searching around I was able to find OEM floor mats, however they came in Black while the default ones on my Type 1 were grey. Hence I decided to get the new one made, it was a bit of a trouble finding the material which was dark grey, with ribbed lines, installation was rather quick and easy. New control cables for trunk, fuel lid etc was lined through next.





All 4 door sills, seat cowls, fuel and trunk levers were replaced with new OEM ones that came for type 1.

Since we are doing the floor, I wanted to cover all elements here.
The stock ABC Pedal pads had never been changed. The new ones sourced locally was of better quality but had a different texture. Thankfully we got the stock ones online. Thus the pedals received some treatment and the pads back to its glory.

Before


After


Trunk

After 25 years of service the mats here had quite a lot on them, since all the pieces were there, we used it as a reference to make the new pieces.
The entire trunk consists of
2 Side liners(LH and RH)
1 Base Liner
1 Top liner that covers the latch section.
Since we used the original mats layout here, it fitted like a charm. Added some extra Velcro to keep the new ones secure.



The cardboard trim underneath had been replaced and the utility boxes bolted back in.

Door Pads

New cardboard inserts were cut, and wrapped in Grey, the bottom lining was heat pressed onto the leatherite. Window winders, door handle and AC Vent has been replaced with OEM Grey ones.



Since we had sourced the door rubber inserts earlier, all we needed to do was plug them in as soon as we got the pads made.

Roof Lining

My existing roof has gone all dark grey to an extent that its the darkest grey tone in the cabin, after a lot of search, going throug various pictures of Esteem ,It seems that the roof liner had similar tone as the stock seats.I believe all the dirt had made the exisiting one darker.So picked up the same fabric fibre cloth used for the seat. Luckily we had just enough for the roof.
Along with the roof liner

• Grab Handles
• Roof Clips
• Sunvisors
• Sunvisor Holder
• Front Cabin Light
• Centre Cabin light

The following had been replaced with the OEM Grey ones for Type 1 we found earlier. Yet I was a bit worried, wondering if my roof shade has gone wrong.All that faded away as we installed the clips and roof lights, the plastic colours of the new parts perfectly match my roof



Its been lmost 2 months since we started the upholstery works, lockdown slowed us down but gave ample time to gather more resources.
Now seeing this coming together has definitely been rewarding.

Installed the gear shift cover, park brake cover with the rear ash tray and popped in the front console box completing our cabin trims, for the finishing touch replaced the steering badge with the OG Esteem badge..




Next Post on remaining exterior works.
Thankyou for reading.

[Nanolover]

Excellent job sohanbala on the esteem. It honestly looks better than new now ( the interior!). Must be adding up to quite a bomb now on the spending part .

Can you please share the contact number of the upholstery guy as he has done an excellent job. Would love to get him do my s presso up. Thanks in advance.

[sohanbala]

Originally Posted by Nanolover

Excellent job sohanbala on the esteem. It honestly looks better than new now ( the interior!). Must be adding up to quite a bomb now on the spending part .

Can you please share the contact number of the upholstery guy as he has done an excellent job. Would love to get him do my s presso up. Thanks in advance.

Mr. Joy near West Fort, Near Udupi Hotel.Temple Rd.
I'll mention all contacts and names of places I got various works done at the end of this thread.

[sohanbala]

Part 6 - One last wish | Restoring my father's 1995 Maruti Esteem

Its been 5 months since the restoration project started, the lock down and delays in parts slowed us down by a month, but now with he interiors and body works complete I am glad to finally get the car back on road soon.

Putting things back together

The next task was to install all the new OEM Type 1 parts Ive sourced so far.
Parts to be installed

• ol
• Trunk panel
• Reverse lamps
• Tail lights - Amber
• License plate lamps
• Bumpers
• Roof Antenna
• Front Grille
• Headlights
• Windshield washer motor
• Corner lights - White
• Windshield washer Nozzle
• Wiper Arms and blade
• Rear and Front Bumper

The entire work took 2 days to finish, the bumpers, front grille and trunk panel was painted Black in Dupont 80% matte finish.



Watching her coming back to shape was a bliss.Installing the bumper would have been extremely difficult if not for the new bumper stays.The front and the rear bumper has 2 clips that help hold the lower and upper bumper part together, these stays are specifically made for the esteem making it very difficult to hold the bumpers in place without them.

Lamps

Luckily another Maruti Dealer had 2 License Lamps in stock.




I am retaining all the type 1 elements, the amber turn indicators, white floating reverse lamps and the black trunk garnish.





The type 2s had a different tail light with white turn indicators and the trunk garnish replaced to a full lit red panel.

Pending works included under body coating and glass polishing, the audio setup was kept for later.

Day 3
After numerous days at the garage, finally I'm getting to take her back.
The mechanic was called in to test run the car to identify minor adjustments needed which can be scheduled for a later day.I spent the entire day from morning 9 Am till 7 Pm in the evening,Countless runs to and fro various spare part shops, searching for clips and bulbs as we kept running out.
For panel clips we found the clips supplied by Tata for Tiago to be very sturdy than the Maruti ones. Having spent so many days , everyone at the garage was happy, finally seeing the car readying for roll out. The car kept getting some last minute adjustments like pedal free play, tuning etc

By evening after seeing me at the garage with the car for the whole day,without getting to drive the car. The shop owner suggested that we go together to get some fuel in the car. Despite of seeing the car all this while and working on it, this was a moment of joy, as if I've never been in this car before.The quick drive felt very smooth as we stopped at the fuel pump all eyes were on the car and us with its gleaming new paint shining through.As we got out of the pump and went a few meters ahead, things didn't feel good as a slight judder started creeping in.I went cold as the engine kept choking, we had to pull over with the engine refusing to start.Since it was a downward slope we were able to pull over safely without the engine power.My first concern was "did i get the wrong fuel ", without another thought I ran back to the pump, a breath of relief as I saw it was indeed the petrol only bay from which we had fueled.In the midst of the crowd I ran back to the car, a few more attempts and the engine stated, but sounded very constrained.We turned back to the garage, on the way back my mechanic was saying its something with the fuel line and it had to be the pump.
For the past 10 years or more, we were running on an aftermarket pump when the OEM ones failed.Back at the garage upon checking, it was indeed the fuel pump.Earlier I had decided not to go back to the stock setup as the assembly isn't available anymore for non mpfi Esteem, only other option being to replace the motor and retrofit another one (instead of the aftermarket pump in the engine bay)
I decided to try my luck to find one, next day after hopping a few scrapyards, we found an esteem (carb) which was drove in recently, It had the stock pump assembly.Got it removed and checked there, everything looked okay.



Cleaned it up well and swapped the fuel filter.Now the new trouble was to get the fuel gauge working properly.After fiddling for an entire afternoon we finally got the gauge to work properly, The float was slightly misaligned as they took it out, to make matters tough my tank was almost full, making it heavy.We had to take the tank out thrice after installation, lastly we just swapped the float from the old assembly, this helped.
Now going back to the default setup the pump noise from the engine bay was gone,
Since we have completed the one work I skipped, It was more like bound to happen, I told myself.

Driving her back

Finally I'm taking the car for a test run myself, the plan was to take the car home later that evening, for the past few months Ive been completely driving cars with electronic power steering and the shift backwards to a non powered one was very difficult, I learned to drive in this car, as I started driving I recall my father saying "move the steering when in motion, this makes it easy"
Soon I got used to the steering, shifting was a breeze with turns needing some extra effort. I was pleasantly surprised by how the engine pulled now.We were easily doing 110 on the highways, I didn't want to push further as I wasn't fully adjusted to the braking yet.Being delighted with the drive I decided to take a parallel road me and my father used to go for drives long back, it was a straight stretch along the railway lines with very less traffic.As I was enjoying the drive, out of the blue my battery light comes up, I'm cruising as the speed drops with no engine power, as I pulled the blinkers to pull over they don't work either.A blown fuse for sure, anyway I informed my mechanic and he instantly came over, it indeed was the main fuse blown.We replaced it cranked again and BAM ! , it blew again one after the other. By the 4th fuse.We decided to tow her back to the garage.
As we reached the garage everyone was a bit concerned by this.The worst part was having a 2 day lock-down from the very next day. It felt hard at this point, throughout the next 2 days my mechanic would call me everyday consoling on what happened.He suggested we check the entire electrical wiring again, I was wondering if the changed fuel pump had anything to do with all these.
Meanwhile back at home, we had cleared the garage to park the Esteem as I was planing to bring the car, my 6 year old nephew being the most excited for the cars arrival.
Trying to see the better side, I was glad that these issues didn't pop up after Ive brought the car home.

Two days later, we brought in an electrical technician, after checking the wiring he confirmed the wiring is clean and insisted it cant be the pump either, after spending a couple of hours we zeroed one the culprit "radiator fan motor" .The fan runs perfectly but seizes randomly.Its the faulty fan that kept blowing the fuse.
It seems to be the original fan that came with the car.Having run for all theses years, I wasn't surprised that it busted.

The faulty fan assembly removed


The next hurdle
Now MGP had informed that they do not have the new motor or fan assembly and its a closed part, hearing this we went back to the scrap yard from where pump was taken.He had asked for a premium, hence decided to come back later if no other options are available.On my way back, I checked with the store who gave me the AC fan motor, after checking their entire stock, they had one full fan assembly for the Esteem by Denso at 2140Rs MRP.
Plugging the fan in was a quick job, and voila the fuse wasn't blowing anymore.This time I decided to run the car a bit more before taking the car home, so next in line was a good wash and anti rust under-body coating.

Under-body Coating


The car was taken to the service yard by evening, they lifted the car and washed the the under-body thoroughly.We decided to leave the car overnight so it can dry by morning after which the coating was applied.
I decided not to drive the car until evening even though l was told it will dry in 2 hrs.



Glass Polishing

Next day, got all glasses polished for watermark removal.They did an excellent job in cleaning the side glasses from inside.



Since the windshield had deeper wiper marks Cerium polishing was advised, which was done later at a detailing studio.

Windshield after cerium polishing



The wiper marks have gone and faint scratches considerably lightened.I believe the initial cleaning did help a lot for the polishing,

Tyres

For tyres I decided to go with Yokohama 175/70-13 Earth Series.Found them a lot more silent.



The tyres were balanced and vehicle alignment was checked.




Homecoming

We've clocked almost 100kms after the radiator fan change, no other issues so far except for door with a slight noise in bad roads the hinges need to be changed.I have ordered hinges and stopper through MGP, hinges are closed for order, luckily one of their branch have them in stock, which will be redirected to my dealer.

Here are some pictures we took on our way home





















I hope to finish the remaining works including monograms and audio setup by this month.
Thank you all for being there in my journey.

[ninjatalli]

There's an old school charm in these (not so) age old beauties and you never tire of seeing them or (if you have the luxury of owning one) driving them. I see one parked in my society and everytime I pass, I spend a few seconds just ogling at it. Congratulations on the wonderful restoration - your thread has been a delight to read over time.

We had a couple of Premier Padmini in the family which we sold decades ago. I yearn for those every time I see one on the road. Good for you to be able to retain and keep a family car in such excellent condition.

A few questions (from my hazy memories of these cars)
- Do the ORVMs not feel better in same as the body color (from the pics it seems black). I believe back then they used to be these black plastic ones that were an extra option to be purchased
- There would be a M (Maruti) or a S (Suzuki) badge on top of the black grill in front right? And similarly the black Maruti Suzuki badge at the back IIRC. A planned decision to not retain them?
- I'm happy you didn't go for the black bumper-ish plastic layer that used to be common on all four doors on these cars. The grey/black Esteem in my society has it IIRC. I think the current clean view looks much much better.

A request - once you are done, please do share a full exterior and interior picture(s) of the car. I know you have shared several over the thread, but one combined post is definitely needed

Happy years (if not decades) of ownership with this ageless beauty!

Edit: Just re-read the last post and your point on the pending monograms.

[revver]

Dear sohanbala,

I just came across this wonderful thread. Truly appreciate the attention to detail put into the restoration and your passion. Best part is that you chose to keep it as OE as possible.
Absolutely loved the selection of material for seats & carpet. It goes a long way to give you that wonderful period correct feel inside the car.

Wish you & family more wonderful moments with this car.

Thank you.