What did you do to your MX5 today ?

[TOM 5252]

These battery chargers are in Lidl at the moment.
https://wikilidl.com/2020/10/31/ultimate-speed-vehicle-battery-charger-ulgd-10-a1/
I bought one last weekend, because of the intelligent trickle charging for battery maintenance.

I am posting this because this charger has a feature not mentioned on the box or on the on-line specs.
There is a button for choosing the mode after switching on the power, but I switched off for 8 minutes
or so and back on, and it resumed charging as before. Other intelligent chargers with the one button
control that I've used would sit doing nothing, waiting for the button to be pressed, if there was a mains
voltage interruption. It also has a setting for AGM batteries and one for trying to revive dead batteries.
Seems to be an alternative for the CTEK, that's always recommended, but at half the price.

[Pops]

That looks very good, should be very useful in these times when cars aren't used as much.
I got a similar Ring smart charger which was great while I had a problem with the car draining the battery, some people seem to think the products from lidl and aldi are poor quality but I've never had any problems with any of the tools I've got from them

[Steve]

Thanks Tom, I have an optimate but a 2nd with dead battery revival would be great.

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[LORSEIW]

Cheers Tom - I had a c-tek on Santy’s letter but after your post picked one up yesterday - thanks LiamO.

[TOM 5252]

Since this forum is so quiet at the moment.

Here is a new addition to my car.

IMG_20201213_145133606.jpg

I had one of these sockets on the rear bumper of my mk2 mx5. So after using my new battery maintainer
clamped directly to the battery with the bonnet slightly open, I decided to do the same installation on
this car. On the previous car I had first used a 12volt Power-In plug and socket as used on CCTV camera
leads etc. but the socket mounted on the bumper didn't last long due to corrosion. So I replaced them
with a gold plated plug and socket as used on audio + video leads.
So I fitted a gold plated bulkhead mounting socket near the bottom edge of the bumper cover and a gold
plated plug on the charger cable. Then I discovered that if I pulled the plug without supporting the
socket the plastic of the bumper would flex quite worryingly, so I added a supporting wire from the
exhaust heat shield.

IMG_20201226_105613045.jpg

I added a little plastic cap to keep the weather and road dirt out while out driving.
The yellow positive wire and the black negative were taken up through the grommet of the reversing
light cable and the black one earthed at a shield mounting bolt.

IMG_20201213_142521731.jpg

I took the yellow wire forward to the fuse box in the passenger foot-well and soldered it to one end
of a 10amp fuse plugged into an always live spare fuse socket. So no need to find a way through the
bulkhead to get to the battery.

IMG_20201213_144229901.jpg

I still always unplug the cable and fit the protective plug before driving out of the garage, but if I was
to forget there would be no damage done. To get a tight fitting cap for the socket I used a piece of
tubing sealed at one end with a glue gun and tethered with a piece of fishing line going in through the
mounting hole.

[Pops]

Good thinking there, looks like you're making good use of the lockdown, it's a bit of a nuisance not being able to go anywhere, the mercs road tax was due for renewal in January and before it came to the end of December I was in two minds whether to tax it for 3 months or declare it off the road, unfortunately I left it too late and had to tax it, €200 to have it sit outside the door

[DarrenC123]

After nearly a year on axle stands my project 5 went on its first drive to Icetronix to get a new centre pipe an all went well thankfully, needs alignment etc but so far so good seems as car has been off the road since 2012 which was previous owner iv only owned it a year it was bought last May as a lockdown project but as soon as I got it I was called back into work so it has took longer than expected

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[Pops]

Well done, nice to get it on the road, hopefully lockdown and weather will allow us to make use of them this year

[DarrenC123]

Well done, nice to get it on the road, hopefully lockdown and weather will allow us to make use of them this year

Thanks Pops! Yea was great to get it out on a spin but was pity about the weather as you said hopefully it clears up soon it be great not looking likely as we are supposed to getting snow

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[Steve]

Great stuff Darren!
(Btw, are you from rathcoole?)

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[DarrenC123]

Great stuff Darren!
(Btw, are you from rathcoole?)

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Thanks Steve, No I just took that photo outside icetronix

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[Steve]

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[Real Rayzor]

Great to see another one saved, well done

[Steve]

So I kinda bought another MX5, BRG MK2. Bought it pretty much blind bar a few photos. It arrived via transporter on Sunday, haven't had a really good poke at it yet but like what I see so far. I'll start a thread soon


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[Len]

Well done Steve, I just missed out on what looked to be a nice MK1 Eunos last night !!! Bigh clock but great value. Whoever got it bought a lovely car.

Darren, well done on the work on the 5. Great to see it on the road. Hope it goes well for you. Looks a lovely car.