Chaps,

My 1.8i 1989 Astra CD seems to be running a lot slower than it used to. I have owned the car for a year now, and it just doesn't seem to have the power it had when I got it. I appreciate there is the 'getting used to it' factor, but friends also agree with what I think. I am not a boy racer and I do not thrash the car anywhere.

Over the coarse of the year its had new plugs (bosch 4 cathode jobbie), leads, 2 oil and filter changes, air filter, and a new rocker cover gasket as far as the engine goes. I only use quality petrol.

I have tried cleaning out the throttle body housing with carb cleaner also. When it is warm and under full load, it also tends to pink sometimes.

Any suggestions as to what could be wrong or how I can get it running properly again?
Is the pinking anything I should worry about?

Cheers,

Mark Read more

Firstly, commiserations go to the workers at Vauxhall who will lose their jobs and best of luck in securing new ones.

Who to blame? According to Sky news, the lack of sales of the ......wait for it...the Vectra! are being blamed. Well what a surprise. I'm no fan of Jeremy C when he seems to bad mouth just about any vehicle which doesn't pack 460hp of 24 cylinder raw power blah, blah. But he was definetly right on this one.

I've owned about a dozen cars inc. the mighty Cavalier, without hesitation the Vectra is the worst-the Cavalier the best. I'm not a technician but purely from the point of view from what your average driver wants from a car, it just doesn't deliver. Under engineered coupled with a largely'couldn't care less give us all your money' inept dealership network, this has been coming a long time.

Before you say it's easy to stick the boot in when someones down, complaints about the Vectra have been around since its launch. If I remember rightly the adverts for the 'improved' Vectra boasted well over 200 changes- for a new model!

Was this car a conspiracy between GM and the Trade to keep garages in business?

I sincerely hope that lessons will be learnt (love that phrase) and the industry will realise that you cannot continue to palm off crap onto the hard working public and expect to get away with it indefinetly - collectively we have a big bite! Get your act together Vauxhall and don't expect me to shed a tear. Read more

The best legal advice I ever had came not from a lawyer but from a policeman.

This was many years ago in the aftermath of a very nasty car accident in which I was involved. After my collision with another car, the ambulance, fire and police services arrived and each professionally and competently dealt with matters commensurate with their particular disciplines. Normal traffic flow was then resumed.

Whilst waiting for the arrival of my brother-in-law to arrive and make arrangements to have my undrivable car removed from the scene I was asked by the attending officer sit in his police car. His colleague was a very young policewoman. I got in the back of the car whereupon the young woman started to aggressively question me as to my driving speed, distances, weather, the other driver?s speed etc. etc. etc. each question came as bullet out of a gun. I didn?t have time to answer even one of them before the next was being fired at me.

I then mulishly ignored her having mentally decided that ?I really, really do not like you? and continued looking out of the rear window. Whilst I was idly conjecturing how I could get my hands round her throat I became aware that the policeman was talking to me whilst he was facing the front of the car. In retrospective I realised that he was probably looking at me through the rear view mirror. Initially I didn?t take on board what he was saying but when I heard him say for the third time his voice speaking slightly louder at the first part of the sentence and dropping away at the second ?you do not have to make a statement now but anything you say will be taken down and may be used in evidence? I thought to myself he is trying to tell me something, what is it, then I realised that I did not have to make a statement now. I leaned forward and told him that I didn?t want to make a statement now and could he make arrangement to come to the house at a later date. This he agreed to. Ultimately a week later he and his colleague came to the house and took possession of a statement that I had prepared, typed up and signed.

This man realised that I was in total state of shock and on the point of collapse and that I could have said anything rational and/or irrational including remarks that may not have helped my case if the matter ever came to court. It didn?t. When my brother-in-law finally arrived to take me home the policeman said to him ?watch her, she is about to blow?.

At a later point I was telling my policeman neighbour about the aggressive stance of the policewoman and he told me that she was probably just out of Police College and was being what was then known in the trade as ?puppy walked? whereby an experienced officer takes charge of a novice and teaches them the finer points of their trade. He (my neighbour) also said that the novices were always gung-ho and acted like rottweillers until the novelty of wearing the uniform began to wear off.

The policeman may have been doing no more than his statutory duty but he did it with a finesse and understanding which I have always appreciated.

Rita Read more

A comment in Steve Cropley?s Autocar column caught my eye ?I see a day when even buyers of ?quality? cars won?t want to pay prices inflated by something as unimportant as image?.

He had been talking about a quote from Opel-Vauxhall?s big chief, Carl
Peter Forester, formally quality guru, who said ?Our new Vectra is as good, as
technologically competent, as any BMW 3 series and we sell it at much keener prices?.

I had earlier been talking to a guy who is bracing himself for when the awful reality of the new company car tax charges hit the pay cheques of his staff at the end of April. Apparently, a few years ago he ran a Spanish division of the group for his employers and he said ? In Spain nobody had a company car and nobody was interested in the image of your car. I went to the office on the bus! When I moved to a new post back in the UK, everyone has a company car and I have to arrive in £30,000 of 5 series BMW because I?m the boss!?

As more people opt out and have to make their own decisions about writing cheques for cars, what price will they be prepared to pay for image? Read more

Whilst reading tonights edition of Backroom watching Billy Connolly's World Tour of Ireland etc. Excellent programme, well worth my licence fee, a lot of it filmed from the back of a hog and BC talking to camera. Superb. Read more