I was following a K reg Mini on the way home this evening and something looked odd about it.
The car just didn't sit right on the road. I could see along the drivers side of the car.
It soon became apparent after the driver changed gears.
As the driver changed gears (engine not driving the car) the car veered to the right.
When power was applied again the car veered to the left.
The driver had to keep correcting the steering as the angle of the car kept pulling to the right.
This isn't the first time I have seen some dodgey cars on the road.
How do people get away with this ?
If it was me with a dodgy car my luck would have run out along time ago.
Has anyone else seen 'driving death traps' ?
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A petrol Vectra in Southport last week, had so much black smoke coming out of the back it triggered a breathing attack I just hope he got stopped later on.
Used to see several Metros which had a leaking suspension so they were higher on one side than the other.
The most common sight I see now is sub three year old cars with ilegal tyres.
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I followed a Hummer H3 a while back where even in slow moving traffic the back kept swinging out as if it was trying to overtake the front! I can't imagine what must have broken for that to happen!
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Has anyone else seen 'driving death traps' ?
I've not just seen some, I owned some! My 1936 Citroën (bought in 1956) had completely treadless (smooth as a baby's bottom) remould tyres when I bought it, and it had the same tyres when I sold it. In those days most people couldn't afford to have anything better ~ that's if they could afford a car at all. Some cars had the remould part separating from the rest of the tyre.
Edited by L'escargot on 25/04/2009 at 08:18
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In those days most people couldn't afford to have anything better ~ that's if they could afford a car at all.
Nothing's changed then... except the checks on the cars (such as MOTs) are a lot stricter...
Therein lies the problem, there are many people out there with cars that really can't afford to run them, but do, thats why we see many cars with only one (if you're lucky!) headlight, no tax, no insurance, and plenty of illegal tyres... and then there's servicing... or lack of...
Until the penalties are a lot harder on the culprits when they are caught they will continue to do it...
Edited by b308 on 25/04/2009 at 09:03
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I've seen the effect Diddy refers too, it's probably something worn or broken axle/wheel location wise, for some reason drivers seem totally unaware when things are wrong.
I don't think you need to be mechanically minded to know somethings amiss, the seat of the pants feeling should tell you...problem is we have many incompetent drivers out there who because they go round at mimse speed regard themselves as good.
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>>I've seen the effect Diddy refers too
I have driven something that did a very similar trick once, that drifted one way when accelerating and then the other as you let off the throttle. It was a front wheel drive VW Caddy van and it turned out that the front tyres had different profiles and hence one had a greater diameter & circumference than the other. It turned out that it had been swapped for the spare which wasn't the right size...
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On that mini, a pound to a penny the rear subframe mounts have rusted out allowing it to flap around.
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Edited by L'escargot on 25/04/2009 at 09:59
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You must be joking! In my younger days a secondhand car meant something 20 years
You've got a point there, as we could only just afford to buy and run the things anyway, we'd probably be maintaining them ourselves (out of scrapyards in most cases) and would know when something was amiss.
Edit...my post answers L'escargots which has vanished... i'm talking to meself as usual.;)
Edited by gordonbennet on 25/04/2009 at 10:02
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Edit...my post answers L'escargots which has vanished... i'm talking to meself as usual.;)
I had second thoughts about the post.
However, in a similar vein, cars are immeasurably safer than they were pre-MOT. It was by no means unusual for cars to have as much as 5" free movement of the steering wheel (measured at the rim of the steering wheel) before the driving wheels turned. That amount appeared to be about the limit at which a car could be steered in a straight line ~ but even then it needed a lot of skill and a lot of nerve!
I would imagine that a lot of younger drivers have never experienced free play in the steering, so don't even know what I'm talking about.
Edited by L'escargot on 25/04/2009 at 10:28
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>>It was by no means unusual for cars to have as much as 5" free movement of the
>>steering wheel (measured at the rim of the steering wheel) before the driving wheels >>turned. That amount appeared to be about the limit at which a car could be steered in
>>a straight line ~ but even then it needed a lot of skill and a lot of nerve!
30 years ago I used to drive company Land Rovers which were like that.
My "driving test", to convince the Transport Manager I was safe, involved taking the worst of the L-R's around the back streets by Belle Vue.
In his words "You kept it on the left hand side of the road, so you've passed."
The most startling thing was we had some brand new ones a year or two later - complete with synchromesh on first and second - and the steering on those wasn't much better.
The biggest challenge was towing a diesel generator which was about the same weight as the short wheel base L-R.
Horrible things.
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It was by no means unusual for cars to have as much as 5" free movement of the steering wheel ..
Some time about 1964 I shared the driving on a trip from Edmonton to the Rockies (200 miles). The car was a fairly elderly Beetle - which I had not driven, before or since - but the steering had a mind of its own. The car followed a gentle sine-wave along the road which it was a waste of time trying to correct - you just had to try and ignore it, only dealing with the more serious deviations. May have put me off VWs for life ...
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Going off at a slight tangent, I don't think the government would have got away with introducing MOT tests much earlier than when they did ~ 1964. Imagine the government telling people who had lost a limb (or worse) fighting for the freedom of the country in WWII that their tyres didn't have sufficient tread. They'd have just laughed.
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When I was a lorry driver, one day I followed a loaded 6-wheel tipper into a big grain store.
This lorry swung round in a big U-turn and when it came to rest, the two rear axles were over 6 inches out of alignment! Loose U-bolts, I reckon!
Quote:...""Going off at a slight tangent, I don't think the government would have got away with introducing MOT tests much earlier than when they did ~ 1964." I thought they'd had MOT tests before, but suspended them.
Edited by Sofa Spud on 25/04/2009 at 12:06
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..>> It was by no means unusual for cars to have as much as 5" free movement of the steering wheel ....
Reminds me of the opening shots of Z-cars where the camera was pointing back towards the two coppers in the Zephyr/Zodiac.
The driver saws the wheel from side to side so much a real car would surely have left the road.
Unless it had 5" of free movement in the steering wheel. :)
Edited by ifithelps on 25/04/2009 at 12:31
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>>Reminds me of the opening shots of Z-cars where the camera was pointing back towards the two coppers in the Zephyr/Zodiac.
>>The driver saws the wheel from side to side so much a real car would surely have left the road.
>>
What was left of the car was mounted on bed springs ( and on a trolley so it could be wheeled around.
It used to be parked just outside of the studio doors in TV Centre White City and we would all smile as we passed by en route to our workshop.
We often gave it a little nudge to see it wobble.
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From what I remember, few of the actors on Z Cars could actually drive so most of those used in the filming were half cars to enable the cameras and sound equipment to be installed.
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>>the two rear axles were over 6 inches out of alignment! Loose U-bolts, I reckon!
Depending upon the suspension design, this might not have been too far beyond spec. Scrubbing forces on loaded bogies are massive, and hideous for tyre wear.
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it must have been cold driving the z cars car as it had no windscreen when they filmed them driving it
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I was waiting in a supermarket car park once and I heard a angle grinder type noise when an oldish Mondeo MK1 entered the car park with NO nearside tyre on the rim. After gouging a huge line out of the tarmac he casually got out went in the supermarket and came out with his bag of beers and sped off again leaving huge gouge marks. Everyone was gobsmacked. When I passed him 2 miles later, he had managed to park the car into a wall, 2 police cars were there and he was being cuffed.
I once passed a Fiesta MK2 with the front drivers wheel so badly bent (45 degree angle from the arch it was running on the sidewall. It was a frosty winters morning so can only assume he had over shot a corner and smashed the wheel on the kerb. He was in deed a shady looking character.
Edited by TimOrridge on 25/04/2009 at 19:34
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Ah TO, you've just reminded me of a noisy car this very week.
Going along in an urban traffic queue this week, my inside lane slightly faster than the outside, every time the outside lane crawled along i kept hearing this angle grinder fire up, eventually i came alongside an E39 BMW, the noise from the front wheels was dreadful, presumably a wear indicator.
The driver seemed unperturbed.
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it must have been cold driving the z cars car as it had no windscreen when they filmed them driving it
In one episode Brian Blessed,standing by the car, put his cap on the dash forgetting that there was supposed to be a windscreen in the way.
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I thought they'd had MOT tests before but suspended them.
I stand corrected ~ to an extent. "Ten Year Tests" were introduced in 1960. As I recall, they became known as MOT tests in 1964. The age of the car before testing was necessary was reduced to 3 years by 1967.
www.motester.co.uk/mot-history.html
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When Minis were common it wasn't unusual to see one crabbing badly, occasionally to the extent of leaving four discernible tyre tracks in the wet, due either to the back swing arms being bent/worn out/misaligned or the rear subfame or mountings crumbling.
The last car I saw crabbing was a Peugeot 205 this week.
There is a surprising number of people who only resort to maintenance when the car actually stops.
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...Mini subframes...
Done a few of those when I worked in a garage in the 70s.
So common, we used to keep one or two in stock.
Rotten, dirty job, particularly in winter.
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I rarely worry about dangerous cars: dangerous drivers are more deadly.
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I'm still trying to get my head round a "shady character" driving a Fiesta!
My first ever stock car race took place in an A40 on the Isle of Man, the car itself had been taken off the road by the ploice earier that day! As I understand it they didn't have MOTs then (would have been about the late 80s). I raced the first race, blew a tyre and missed the second, we couldn't find another so I raced the third race with three wheels, one on the offside front and two on the back... those were the days!
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> As I understand it they didn't have MOTs then (would have been about the late 80s).<
The MOT test started in 1960 !
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The MOT test started in 1960 !
Nope. "Ten Year Tests" started in 1960. MOTs started 1964.
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> As I understand it they didn't have MOTs then The MOT test started in 1960 !
This was the IoM, SF, I think their rules are different... still no upper speed limit on amny roads for instance...
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I rarely worry about dangerous cars: dangerous drivers are more deadly.
Problem is they are usually together in the same car...
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... so I raced the third race with three wheels...
Saw a banger race years ago in which a 'wedge' Austin Princess was raced on its two front wheels.
The bonnet was attached face down under the rear axle to form a sled.
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I once followed a mini down a narrow steep hill with 3 occupants inside, it was crabbing from side to side like the driver would have noticed by now?
An Iveco van belonging to a local motorbike workshop crabbing towards the offside, it wasn't travelling more then 30 anyway.
On a driving lesson some years ago I saw a Landie Disco approaching the opposite direction pulling from side to side like a mental land crab, I slowed down a bit as she approached, even my instructor was astonished he never saw anything like it in his driving career.
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We don't have a Ministry Of Transport (MOT) any more.
It's just a common usage term.
Why the pedantry?
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i havent seen a real bad crabber for a few years now
my old recovery truck looked weird because the body was on the chassis crooked but it did come off another truck so it was bodged a bit
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