Well guys, it has been quite a while. It's been so long infact that 2 of the forums I was on have closed down haaa.
My apologies for the lack of updates. In the last 18 months - 2 years since I've updated the progress thread, I've been in New Zealand, then back in the UK but with a lot going on and without much spare money, so there hasn't been the same kind of progress as previously, but there has been some... I just never got round to updating the thread.



Out in New Zealand the majority of cars are Aussie wheels (Holden/Ford/etc) or Japanese, often JDM imports. They're pretty cheap, and 3rd party insurance isn't a legal requirement, which means a) you don't need it, and b) it's a lot cheaper than in the UK if you do want it... if it was too expensive people just wouldn't bother, whereas since here in the UK we have to have it that means the prices are driven up as we can't choose to buy it or not.

I started out with a 1993 Holden Commodore 3.8 V6, nice RWD cruiser, but not as fun as it may sound... it was pretty lazy, which was great for long trips around the North Island, could drive for 10 hours without so much as an ache, although it was not as great at drifting as I'd hoped, plus it drank as much water as petrol.










So then I started thinking about getting something else... Ideally a station wagon, so that I could take 4 people and skis/snowboards down to Mount Ruapehu, or 3-4 people and surfboards across to Raglan. I figured why not get a Scooby Legacy, because the non-turbo ones are in abundance, they're EVERYWHERE, and since insurance is so cheap, sod it.
So after a week of looking, I got a 1997 Subaru Legacy GTB. Japanese import JDM spec... 2.0 twin turbo... VERY quick off the line, chucks you back in the seat and then just as you start to recover it throws you back even more in the seat as the second turbo kicks in. Handled brilliantly too once I fixed a few things like the steering rack. Not bad for a barge. Surprisingly economical too when driven off boost. And it managed to fit 5 people, 3 snowboards, 2 pairs of skis, 5 overnight bags, all our snow wear, plus food and drink, with plenty of spare room. And we managed 5 people to Raglan too, but could only get 4 surfboards on the roof (although the 5th person didn't have their own anyway).











Then three days after my 280km round trip to pick it up, I was sat at some traffic lights round the corner from my apartment waiting to turn right when the truck infront of me decided he didn't want to turn right anymore and reversed back to get into the centre lane. Unfortunately he didn't look before he did that, if he had he'd have seen me. So he smacked right into the front of my new Scooby... towbar first...
3rd party insurance isn't a legal requirement in New Zealand, so some people don't have it. (You still have to pay for all damages though). Fortunately this guy did have insurance, as it turned out to be quite some hefty damage.
New bumper, new radiator, new air con radiator, new reinforcement bar, new bumper mounting brackets, new foglights x 2, new upper & lower grilles.
Took 10 weeks, but eventually his insurance agreed to the cost of repairs and I had it booked in and got it back good as new.








I still have the Scooby in a storage unit near Auckland for when I go back... probably gonna need a new battery and possibly new tyres as it's been sat for a long time now, but can't wait to drive it again.




Anyway, back to the Focus...

Firstly, the original steering wheel was getting quite old, tired and worn... so I decided to replace it. I wanted a black alcantara one with a blue "12-oclock" mark, but couldn't find one. Instead I found an RS wheel but re-trimmed in alcantara with the blue/black and the 12-oclock mark, so I went with that.






In the last year, it has worn a bit and got a bit grubby, so looking at replacing it again at some point, this time with a black leather one with the blue leather 12-oclock mark.




I got some spare door handles ages ago, along with a few other bits like door strips to get them colour coded. Finally got them sprayed up and took even longer to fit them, but did that back in December 2013.



Before


After




Also the week before Christmas somebody tried to make their way into the car by trying to pry the rear quarter window out... there was only minor scratches and damage to the bodywork so fortunately wasn't as bad as it could have been, but did mean I needed to pay £75 insurance excess for Autoglass to fit me a new one.





Used some of my Christmas 2013 money to buy some genuine "Focus" door sill trims. Have to say I was slightly disappointed as I thought they were brushed stainless steel. Turns out they're silver plastic, which makes me seriously wonder why they cost so damn much. But once fitted they look good anyway and don't look cheap or plasticky so it's ok.












So back in March (2014) I had a spare morning, so finally got round to using the 3M Headlight Restoration Kit I'd bought a while back.
When I bought the ST170 Xenon headlights, they weren't in amazing condition, quite a bit of deterioration to the plastic lenses.

The 3M kit has a few levels of abrasive pads and compound to gradually polish out the scratches, and work a treat. They look good as new now.
Also took the opportunity to replace the LED sidelights as one of them had started flickering. The old LEDs were too white, and didn't look that good with the Xenons, so after a bit of various forum hunting, I found that people like the Osram "Warm White" LEDs, so went for a pair of them, and they're a perfect match... LEDs are 4200k colour temperature, the Xenons are 4300k, so nearly identical.

Here are the results of the headlight restoration.