September 2007
I witnessed the most incredible display of lazyness and bad manners today in an Asda car park. A fairly respectable looking woman filled her 4x4 boot with shopping from the trolley, closed the tailgate, realising that she could just drive forward through the parking space in front, she just left the empty trolley there to be blown around by the wind or to block her old space from any new shoppers. What is wrong with people these days, can they not even do the most basic things out of good manners, that make life a bit more bearable for the rest of us ? Read more
Hello all,
I hope someone can help me. I parked my pickup near where I was working on a factory overall, which included other personnel spraying external fittings. The wind must have carried their spray as the pickup is covered in a clear 'gritty' substance like varnish. I managed to clear the windscreen with thinners, with some difficulty. I am concerned about the paint work. I tried some 'hand glaze' paint cleaner without success and also tried some thinners on a small section and this seemed to help to a degree. Is it safe to use thinners on the paint work? Is there anything else I could use?
Any help much appreciated.
Mak Read more
I had the same problem (cheap respary of door & wing). I used clay bar with excellent results. I had to do it twice though, but took off every bit of the overspray. If you havent used it before look it up on google, theres plenty of tips out there - main one ,as mentioned above, is use plenty of lubricant.
Do people carrying out roadworks have any duty to minimise the delays they cause or to set up appropriate diversions? The reason I ask this is that I have been severely delayed on two occasions in the past week.
The first was when half a road was dug up on my side and the traffic going in my direction had to wait for a gap in the traffic or for someone displaying a degree of courtesy. There was no attempt at traffic control and to rub salt in the wound an apology with the added comment 'due to essential works'. I do not imagine there are non-essential works unless people feel bored and decide to dig up a road!
The second occured when I left home to go to a specialist shop at the weekend. It is a twenty mile round trip and there was an hour before the shop closed. A road on route was closed and a diversion signposted. The problem was that the diversion lead to a right turn onto a busy road. This resulted in a horrendous tailback. I eventually gave up as there was no way I was going to make it.
This type of thing seems to be getting worse as if the delay is irrelevant as we are only motorists!
s Read more
Some countries have local databases where ALL service details are kept: details and drawing sof power lines tec...
Here most are so incompetent even the utility suppliers do not know....
(after all when BR was privatised it had no idea what it owned...).
How can you manage anything efficiently like that? Answer: you cannot
madf
Don't know if I am expecting too much in buying my g/f a new car, but it will be the first time I have ever spent over £3k on a car and after saying i'd never buy new because of depreciation, I changed my mind, but now I think I regret it.
From day 1 its been a pain in the dingdong buying a new car:
1. Deciding what car to have, then what model, fuel type, options, colour.... (and that was the easy bit)
2. Went to look around showrooms at various garages ready to spend £8k cash (or take finance if it got me a better deal). About half of the dealers never came near us. I hate pushy sales men, but a salesman at all might help and even when you show interest they are indifferent....
3. The test drive - literally 10 minutes down to the nearest roundabout, right round and back up. Not even in the same variant as the car I was looking at.
4. The price - when we finally decided what car we wanted we asked how much - he answers with questions like "are you buying today" and other stupid questions... He gives us the price (which we had already researched on the internet and he came back, not with the total price but "£289 per month". This really angered me - maybe its just me, but I would NEVER buy a car that I didn't know the total price of.... Eventually got the actual price and got him to drop a good amount to near enough what an online broker was offering.
5. Walked away and had a think about it. Decided to go for it so called back and he said yep, no worries, come down. Got down there "Sorry, really bad news, managers been on the phone and we can't do that deal anymore, it loses us too much money"
6. Rang up well known online broker which I have heard good things about, sales person speaks to me like I am something he stood in, even though I was only asking very valid and sensible questions.
6. Went back to well known online broker , placed order. Hear nothing from them. Finally get the call today and the price that we purchased at has gone up because they can't deliver until October and Ford's prices go up in October.
7. Manage to find another online broker (Deal Driver) that has same car cheaper, but not heard of them before. Ring back first online broker and tell them we have found it cheaper - he says "Fair enough then, bye" and puts phone down.
As I said, maybe i'm expecting too much here, but £8k is a lot of money to me but so far I fell like i've had better customer service buying a pack of Polos from Spar than from the people above. Is this the way everyone gets treated when they buy new cars, or have I just been unlucky?
BTW, if anyone has purchased from Deal Driver, please e-mail me with your opinions as i've never heard of them, but they seem ok.
(sorry for the mini-rant) Read more
"everybody happy"
Just as long as she doesn't read this thread!
Hi,
I have a fiesta 1.25 LX on a 1998/R-reg plate. Before I had it serviced I noticed the water level was going down slowly but consistently. I asked the garage where I had it serviced to check it but they forgot, and said give it a week to see it it goes down again and bring it back. Just over a week has passed and the water had gone down about an inch from the MAX level mark on the tank (in another week it will drop about another inch). I'm taking it back but just wondered if you had any ideas what the cause could be so I'm not told porkies!
Thanks very much
s Read more
Check for leaks around the water pump and listen for strange noises from the Pump.
Water pumps are a known weak spot on Fiestas.
S.
This is my first diesel, bought new in Jan 06 as the outgoing model. Before buying it, I used to criticise drivers of other diesels when they smoked under accelleration - especially if they were the car in front. 'Get it tuned', was my refrain. Now the boot is on the other foot. When I put my foot down, especially after a period of 'pootling' in traffic, as often as not I'll lay a heavy smokescreen behind me for 50-100 metres before it clears. My Passat is powerful and fairly economical (about 45mpg overall), and I know the 130 is reckoned to be an effective motor, if rather noisy and unrefined. I've done about 24k now, and at the first dealer service I complained about this and asked for it to be adjusted to run cleaner. 'We checked it and there's nothing wrong with it, and anyway, they all do that.' was the answer. Hmmm. Is it a Tdi 130 thing that I'll just have to get used to, or should I insist to the dealer that it can be improved? What's the experience of other VW diesel drivers?
I suppose I should add that while I'm not a tree-hugging pinko liberal, I do think that if I can avoid chucking more noxious fumes into the atmosphere than is strictly necessary, while I go about my daily business, I should. So it bothers me that my car does this.
s Read more
My VW diesel is a few years old, bt has a smoke quotient thread in the injection quantity programming of the ECU.
This gives a value with which the fuel quantity is divided by, the default value is one, and this will increase as the likelihood of smoke increases based on a myriad of other values, thus reducing the fuelling.
Hi there,
Earlier on today a traffic light changed in front of me. As I stopped I am pretty sure I was flashed by a red light camera behind me despite stopping before the line. It seemed to only flash once though.
I can't be 100% sure it was the light behind or the one opposite me flashing another car as it was raining heavily at the time and I was busy concentrating.
Does anyone know whether they only flash once? Read more
No one was killed. No one thought they were going to be killed. No one's life or limb was at risk. Just my wallet and my good reputation.
How will I ever hold up my head again?
I have a 2ltr 626. I stupidly crossed the wires recently when jump starting it.
The car seemed to start and turn over okay but when I took it out for a run the rev counter, lights, etc all flicked from low to high. I assumed that the alternator rectifier was damaged.
I took the car to my local garage to have a second hand alternator fitted, which they did and it solved that problem. However the car is now overcharging, I assumed that the voltage regulator on the replacement alternator was faultly.
However the garage (after six weeks investigation) have told me that the alternator is fine and that the fault lies with some sort of control box in behind the dash. As they are unable to source a wiring diagram, they can't tell me what the control box is for.
I am planning to replace the alternator with a recon/tested or new unit, to see if it makes any difference.
Any other ideas? Read more
I took the old alternator off and had it tested. I was told that the Voltage Regulator and Diodes needed replaced. My assuption is that it was overcharging due to the faulty voltage regulator, which in turn burnt out the diodes.
Bought a second hand replacement with warranty. Fitted it and the car now charges normally. Won't be using that garage again or recommending it. If this fault had been properly diagnosed by his "Auto Sparky" then I could have exchanged the faulty unit under warranty.
As it is he had the car for six weeks before handing it back saying he couldn't fix it because his Auto Sparky couldn't get wiring diagrams from Mazda.
I have a 1.4TDCi Ford Fiesta that keeps eating the bottom 2" off the plastic oil dip stick. I am now on my third dip stick which has only lasted three weeks and the end has again broken off into the sump.
Anyone else had this problem.
Is there a metal dip stick that might be of use before I fill my sump up with yellow plastic!
Read more
Must be a Peugeot responsibility-every Ford I've come across has had a metal stick-some flat,some round but always metal.
Morning all
I'm just about to take the plunge and buy a new Corsa 1.3 CDTi, and am very much looking forward to some pleasant motoring in it. In order to maintain my warranty, I will of course be following the recommended service intervals scrupulously. However, as one to whom financial planning is a little tricky, I'm quite up for seeing if I can sort out some kind of regular payment service plan type thing.
I've seen old references on t'internet to Vauxhall's "Complete Motoring Plan" which sounds excitingly dynamic, and also will provide servicing cover. Does anyone know:
- if this still exists?
- whether it's a good deal?
- whether there are third-party service plans which are cheaper and would still maintain the warranty?
Any suggestions and comments very gratefully received :)
Cheers
Phil Read more
Must have either been one of those new-fangled places where you don't have to insert a coin into the trolley, or she was rich enough (4x4 owner) to leave the coin in the trolley.
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L\'escargot.