[GTO]

Happy Birthday to GG! That picture actually looks like a birthday party where all the guests have circled the cake. Love how you've placed Gods on the chair too.

Going to our homepage tomorrow

[John316_WRC]

Happy birthday to GG!

Your post's keep inspiring me to pick up a Dolphin/800 to restore and use it, hopefully in the not too far future I will come across a good opportunity.

Also special mention to the yellow Priya which looks amazing!

Beautiful garage

[mohitm29]

This celebration has made my day really. She looks so cheerful, looking at the cake with her bright eyes and her beautiful smile on the grill. Kudos to you Shashi and my hearitiest congratulations. Many more to come...

[Toni]

Happy Birthday to GG.

Congratulations to Leoshashi, you have very well maintained the car of over two decades old.

It reminded me of my Maruti 800DX

Wish you many more years and miles ahead.

[nikvint]

Wow, congratulation to you and GG. Hats off to you for maintaining the car like this and arranging a Party with it's mat. These photos are heart touching. I am inspired to keep my Polo like this for more than 20 years.

[fastestindian]

Congratulations and thank you so much for posting this. Brought back so many memories to me. Hope you cherish it even more.

A Naples Yellow Maruti 800 was my families first car and served us for 17 years. My sister cried the day it left our garage. I suppose its our uniquely Indian value system that makes us fall in love and get attached to inanimate objects like its a family member. I hope we never lose this.

[shancz]

Originally Posted by Leoshashi

Her garage mates:

Happy Birthday GG, now that's what I call a party
Loved the cake table

[Phantom 510]

Wishing GG a very Happy Birthday !!

[CrAzY dRiVeR]

Congratulations Sashi

So heartwarming to see GG ageing in reverse. Next one is going to be very special

[Gennex]

Happy birthday to G G . It requires a lot of nurturing to get to 24. Kudos to you. Cake on wheel is absolutely brilliant.

[Sam800]

Start looking for a bride for GG now, Shashi sir. Very happy birthday to Golden Goose. May she lives a long healthy life. I wish to meet GG someday. My 1995 SB turned 29 this Feb too.
Surprised to see Jimny here. Maybe i missed some post regarding it.
Happy & safe rides, sir.

[subie_socal]

Belated birthday wishes to GG. Wishing good luck for another 25.

[Samfromindia]

Originally Posted by Leoshashi

GG turns 24: GG turned 24 years old on 25th March, unfortunately I was unable to post updates then as I was travelling, but better late than never.

Happy Birthday !

Mine will turn 10 in few months & I plan on doing something similar

[Leoshashi]

Lots of updates on GG

Part 1: Gearbox: I was offlate facing some issues like

-Gearshifts becoming hard when AC compressor kicked in. This was eventually traced to a broken gearbox mount.
-Gearshifts weren't as butter smooth as they used to
-This got worsened if the car was driven for long. Gearshifts became progressively harder as temperature went up. Clear case of bad pressure plate.
-There was a mild release bearing sound coming too.

This was surprising because clutch was fairly new and wasn't used much. I also came to know that Maruti is doing silent recalls of release bearings as some batches had issues.

My 800 originally came with Exedy Clutch(3 spring design) and NTN Japan release bearings. That feel never came with MGP parts. Hence I decided to get parts from Japan. Also we decided to comprehensively check the gearbox as it was being lowered. I decided not to give it to any workshop, instead overhaul and clean the stuff perfectly at home. Parts collection took nearly 3 months as most of them came from Japan. Also some parts were discontinued long time ago, and were tough to find.

Subsequently, we replaced the following
-Engine Member
-All Engine & Gearbox mounts and cushions
-Gearshift link rods and associated bushes
-All Needle bearings of gearbox
-All Oil seals of Gearbox
-All Synchroniser rings, two of them were worn out
-Clutch Set and Release bearing
-Speedo Drive gear
-Gear Oil

The removal and disassembly part was fairly easy and I could manage it almost myself with a bit of help from dad. But for assembly, I took help of Arjun and his associate.

Cleaning and careful analysis of each part took most of the time. I guess we spent nearly a week for gearbox overhaul.

Some pics:

-Exedy Clutch Set from Japan:

-Shifter

-Synchros and bearings from Japan:

-75W90 GL4 Total Gear Oil:

-Collection of parts:

-New Engine Member:

-SGP NTN Make release bearing:

-Gear lever mount, notice the quality difference between MGP and SGP:

-New Flywheel, however we didn't change it later. Kept it for future use as this has been long discontinued:

-Parts disassembly begins:

-New vs Old Clutch:

-Speedometer Gear:

-Used this Jugaad to hold engine in place while the engine member was being replaced. Must say, this was the most risky moment, glad we pulled it off!

-New vs Old member: The old member had changed in dimensions significantly, thanks to engine load:

-I then started cleaning the gearbox comprehensively.

-Bought this bearing remover toolkit, instead of hammering to remove things:

-Arjun and his associate assembling back things:

Also used this opportunity to change engine oil and oil filter. As usual, used Shell Helix Ultra 5W40.

[Leoshashi]

Part 2- Steering column change: I always felt my 800s steering was a bit heavier than other 800s. However all workshops and mechanics ignored it, saying engine is different hence front is a bit heavy. I also changed the steering rack in 2019 but it didn't help much. Ordered the entire steering column on Boodmo which comes pre assembled(and not in 2 piece).

Also this new column was collapsible type, compared to the rigid type original design.

The column change did a world of good to the way GG now drives. Must say, the original unadulterated steering feel is back!

Also got new SGP airfilter as I wasn't happy with the way MGP filter was sitting in my metal filter box. Actually the metal one is Nippon Denso make and the MGP filter sits perfectly in Plastic filter box(Lumax) but doesn't sit well in Metal one.

Finally some pics of GG once she came out after a major overhaul:

Regards,
Shashi