Don’t look back in anger

John isn’t happy when he breaks two of the Opel’s mirrors

1984 OPEL MONZA GSE 3.6 ‘IRMSCHER’

With perhaps some whimsy, the first trip the Monza made once its new petrol tank was fitted was to be filled with bits of scrap Monza and driven to the local tip. Of course, it got its revenge. As I got in the car and closed the door, the driver’s door mirror fell off and smashed to the ground. But with the tip closing in 20 minutes I set off anyway. Once there, I reached through into the folded rear seat load area to push stuff backward, caught the rearview mirror on my back – and snapped it clean off. So I had to drive the twomile trip home with only a passenger door mirror to see out of. Luckily the rear view mirror wasn’t smashed, so I might only be due seven years bad luck instead of 14...

Halfords’ mirror gluing-on kit’s activated-mesh adhesive system works very well, but fixing the door mirror was more involved. I unearthed a whole mirror assembly from my collection of spares, but then realised that using it would involve splicing in the wires for the electric heating element and adjuster. So I carefully prised it apart and rescued the mirror glass, which I was then able to stick on the car with industrial strength superglue. Time will tell how long it lasts.

The Monza had another unpleasant surprise in store for me, though. I hadn’t used its heater since getting it back on the road, but when I finally did the passenger footwell filled with rusty water. My first thought was that the heater matrix was leaking, but it didn’t smell of antifreeze and there was no loss of coolant. Pursuing this theory the following day, I left the car running with the heater on full for two hours.

The screen misted up for the first hour or so as the heater pumped damp mist onto it, but then it began to demist and dry up. I can only conclude that the heater matrix area had somehow filled with water and running it for that length time had effectively boiled it off. This obviously doesn’t bode well for corrosion, but I’m certainly not taking the dashboard out to Waxoyl the heater matrix bulkhead, so I’ll have to take my chances for now!

Back on the road and looking better than ever, but there are still problems to sort out.

Plastic plate with milky failed adhesive behind the door mirror had to be removed before a new one could be glued into place.

Fitting mirror on re-glued ‘stub’ with an allen key, which John later dropped between the seats and couldn’t find…