November 2009
Hi, Welcome to my Essay Competition.
This is basically a little `positive thinking` fun - intended throughout to leave participants feeling comfortable and that their entry has `brightened the day` for others.
As such, negative, critical feedback has no place here.
New visitors to the forum are welcome to join and post an entry - there is no clique here and your entry will be valued as much as that from our longest serving members.
All essay submissions will (again) remain anonymous, with the exception of the
winner. Honest John has agreed to be the Judge.
You can, if you wish, identify your own work - following judging.
Rules.
Essays to be 250/ 300 words.
Marks are for content only - no subtractions for spelling or grammar
Once it`s posted - it`s posted - no alterations deletions of
subsequent re- submissions.
Final submissions, Friday 27th November, 5pm
Multiple choice titles
1) Write a short story about `motoring` - the only limits being your imagination.
2) `Manfred` is a European HGV driver who is `forced` by his employers in Germany to deliver goods the length and breadth of the UK. As such we are `foreigners` to him as he drives amongst us in the UK.
Write an account of his experiences here in a compassionate yet humorous style - from his perspective.
3) It`s hard working in a garage - really hard. The cars are not the problem, it`s the customer.
Write a story of your worst experiences in dealing with customers - and the strategies you have to survive.
4) You are Uriah Heep (brought to life from a Dickens novel) You are just entering a car showroom to buy a car and the salesman is approaching.
Write a short play of the encounter.
5) In a parallel world to our own everything was identical except for oil and coal deposits which have not formed, other than in small traces.
Despite this you are a motorist in 2009.
Describe your motoring trip on a day out to the coast - in detail.
Entries to be submitted to pugugly_moderator@ honestjohn.co.uk who will them post them to a hidden thread which will be unveiled shortly after the closing date.
oilrag Read more
fill the engine to the brim with cheap 20/50 engine oil
cover anything that might rust in grease
things like starters wiper motors brake calipers keep away from a damp garage,ideally keep them in the nice cupboard under the stairs
keep the hood in a safe dry place too and watch for rodents eating and pooing on everything,its not nice Read more
Go on, have a guess ...
tinyurl.com/go-on-guess
Wow! Read more
...Wish I knew how to post a link to the Damart website.....
www.damart.co.uk/home
Top stuff - it can get a bit chilly in the caravan at this time of year.
hi all, new to this forum but seems to be an excellent place for help!
I recently took my 306 d turbo with the lovelly DHY engine for a clutch change. Having done the job (and at the reasonable price of £275) I took the car out for a spin. No problems! However, the next day, torrential rain caused flooding in my area, and while driving the car stalled. Called the RAC out, and it turns out the car is hydrolocked! Apparently, the garage left off the ducting running from the air filter to the back of the engine, and it sucked up great gulps of water! I returned to the garage and they admitted the mistake (still on the workshop floor!) and are happy to "have a look".
What I would liek to know is 1. should I have to pay for anything? 2. how much are repairs likely to cost (best and worst case scenario) 3. can they just bung a salvage engine in and 4. can they just refuse to repair it, and claim on their insurance or something?
I REALLY love the car, and dont want it to die (especially with the new clutch)!
Thanks in advance, people.
PS: sorry to be so long-winded about it all! Read more
thanks for all the replies peeps, just an update if anyone's interested!
Apparently, the car has a bent conrod. It's being repaired on a good will basis because the air inlet is sooo low on the back of the engine. They;re had it since Tuesday, but apparently it won't be ready until NEXT tuesday?!? Never mind: at least it's free!
I don't usually start threads about individual cases of bad driving I come across, but this one in Bristol is worth the effort.
I was using a very tricky sliproad where there's limited visibility of traffic approaching from behind on the dual carriageway I was about to join. Speed limit 40 mph, and I was doing about 40, close to the white line preparing to pull on to the dual carraigway.
A dark metallic coloured Aston Martin Vanquish comes up behind, then, just as I'm pulling on to dual carriageway, the Aston driver swerves to the left and boots it, undertaking me and cutting out again in front of me, the great ugly bulbous flanks of the supercar just inches from clouting the front corner of my car. The Aston roars off, with astonishing acceleration, way in excess of the 40 limit.
The Aston was dark metallic - either metallic black or very dark blue or green and it had a short personalised registration. We were quite close to the Bristol City football ground - I don't know if that's of any relevance. But the person behind the wheel of that car is obviously a menace on the road and not fit to be behind the wheel of anything! Read more
An example of the saying "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men...."
a friend had an accident a year ago and thought the claim was settled.
a letter has come from the other parties solicitor claiming money for injuries.
he has moved insurance companies and doesn't think he had legal cover.
should the insurance company still deal with it? Read more
They have to write to you because the claim is against you. But then you pass on to your insurance to deal with it.
I wonder how this might affect the premium on their current policy - although the accident will have been declared.
Going to California next summer, collecting and dropping a car off at San Francisco Airport.
I have annual car rental insurance and annual worldwide travel insurance.
Any advice, recommendations etc about car collection, drop-off, upgrades, insurances, scams etc etc?
Gentle note - whilst I would be delighted to receive advice about where to go and what do in CA, perhaps in another thread that I posted a while ago? Thanks. Read more
Bilboman - what do you mean when you say that airport drop off and pick
up is expensive? We want to pick up the car late at night (immediately after
we arrive from NYC) and drive south from the airport to LA returing to SF
later in the holiday. Would it be more sensible to do SF first without a
car and pick up the car in downtown SF when we are ready for a
road trip?
I would not bother with the car in SF. There's buses, trams, BART and your legs. Get one of the airporter type buses to your hotel and then do a city centre pick-up when you leave SF. We booked via Holiday Autos and got a (don't laugh) Sebring soft-top via Dollar from O'Farrell St (take a torch for the inspection). The car was what we expected and OK for us (mind the front spoiler if you get one). I think you'll always get a Chrysler car from Dollar (Perhaps Chrysler GrandePunto in a few years?).
The drive out of downtown SF was easier than I'd feared, but I'd been driving the RV before. Make sure you understand California road law, particularly the 4-way stop rule.
We wanted the open top car to drive down Big Sur and then on as far as San Diego before returning to the drop off at LAX. Big Sur is simply awesome. I've also heard good things about the coast north of SF but didn't see it. Can also highly recommend Sonoma County - did a wine tour on pedal bikes which was a lot of fun out of Healdsburg. It's a lot less rich & ostentatious than Napa.
Yosemite is very busy at weekends - definitely go midweek or you could struggle to find places to stay. Kings Canyon is quieter but the drive is very exiciting in a lardy V8 petrol RV. Didn't see any kings, but the canyon part definitely helps you focus on the road. We went in May and were virtually the only people in Kings, but Yosemite was already fully booked.
Hope that helps.
As simple as that, I have a keen eye for cars and I still haven't seen a single one on the road yet!
Anyone seen one? Thoughts on it? When were they launched? Read more
It would appear that Renault might be one of the casualties from the wretched scrappage
scheme their sales being 'crowded out' by people buying cheap Indian-built Hyundais. >>
Isn't that because people who use their own money to buy cars will choose something with decent build quality which they can trust to be reliable
>>I also remember reading somewhere that SEAT sales are down sharply in the UK.
Strangely I get the impression (could be wrong) that there are alot more SEATs around than there used to be - ever since the current model Leon appeared a couple of years ago
Renting for a couple of weeks in the US at Christmas, with kids in tow.
Any thoughts?
Chevrolet Aveo - £236
Nissan Versa - £253
Pontiac G6 - £264
Chevrolet Malibu £291
Chevrolet Impala - £291
Chrysler Sebring - £306
Buick Lucerne - £316
Nissan Maxima - £321
Pontiac Vibe (4wd) - £337
Ford Escape - £347
Chevrolet Equinox - £422
Saturn VUE - £430
Cadillac DTS - £473
Chevrolet TrailBlazer - £476 Read more
Pick a size of car, but don't get hung up on a particular model - in my experience you rarely get the model used as an illustration.
In my opinion, SUVs are much nicer to tour around in. I usually get a Jeep Grand Cherokee (5 seater) or Dodge Durango (7/8 seater) or their equivalents. Luggage space can be limited though, hence taking the bigger SUV sometimes, and they never have load covers (although the rear windows are usually very heavily tinted).
hi all ,ive a a4 tdi engine code afn ,i replaced the engine due to the turbo running on engine oil , i sourced a engine from a running car 78000 miles, engine starts perfectly ,just no boost , all the sencors are off old engine so work ,when the mecahnic came yesterday ,he said that it could be that the catalyct convertor is blocked .due to the old turbo running on engine oil ,.Is he right in saying that oil could block the cat ? Read more
I unbolted cat today ,i can hear turbo whistling now ,seems to rev beter now. so must of been the cat
Browse
rare car these soft tops
one or two do indeed need keeping away from the clutches of the scrappage scheme etc
an interesting read in the history of the making of these cars if anyone fancies googling it
im not a rover fan but i see the need for unique niche models being needed for future generations to look at even if they only poke fun at it