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• About to buy a new Volvo? 30 Jun 2005 (Forum)
  The owners club website explains how the system works but as you can negotiate a good discount anyway it brings some new Volvos into the realms of the price of a 1 or 2 year old version. Sadly the scheme was not up and running when I got my S60 D5S recently. After a lot of negotiation I got mine for £17,100 including Metallic paint (against a list price of £22,013) from a Volvo dealer (a saving of over 22%). If I had been able to use this scheme above as well I would have got a further £1,283 off (7.5%) and £500 for the metallic paint i.e saving a further £1,783.
• Accident investigation looks for blame? 7 May 2005 (Forum)
  I know the answer is going to be financial but with true costs of even minor injury accidents, let alone fatals, running into ten of thousands of pounds apart from personal misery surely it would become cost effective. As an example, a local dual carriageway suffered three fatal crossover accidents before money was found to put crash barriers in.
• Peugeot 205 Gentry - Engine Flush et al 25 Apr 2005 (Forum)
  My PUG was recently examined by a mobile engine tuner who, after conducting his numerous tests, affirmed that there was no adjustment of any kind required as the car was running very well(he still charged me the fee of £55 for coming out and doing the tests!) - but it left me secure in the knowledge that my PUG's engine was fine. Checking through it's history, I don't think it has ever had an engine flush and/or injectors cleaned.
• Yet another "senior moment" 20 Feb 2005 (Forum)
  Got it at a fire sale price from a chap who had to leave the country in a hurry ;+) Not bad but the engine is a bit puny at that size compared with the Harleys and one wouldn't dare show up on a metric bike at The Manila Mad Dogs MC Tuesday night run............not if one valued one's standing in the community, that is. First thing I need to do is rip off the mufflers and get some open drag pipes from Mr Vance and Mr Hines so it sounds a bit more like the business.
• Time of life? 5 Feb 2005 (Forum)
  In a nutshell it boils down to this: Should I a) Sell the Alfa and buy a new Nissan X-trail SVE DCi as my main personal transport, running up 25,000-30,000 miles per year or b) Keep the Alfa until the wheels fall off, using it as my main car, and spend a not dissimilar amount to the purchase price of a new X-trail on the purchase of a secondhand Maserati 3200GT (likely to be a 1999 or 2000 model, with perhaps 30,000-40,000 miles on it), using it for no more than 5,000-8,000 miles per annum.
• Peugeot 306 1.8 XT Juddering/idle probs 21 Jul 2004 (Forum)
  I have done a lot of work on the car and yet i still have a problem with it. The car is petrol and runs with a catalyic convertor. Basically when i start the car from cold it seems very noisy, even for a peugeot. However prior to this car i did own a Vauxhall Corsa SRI which was very quiet. Once I start driving away I find the engine to be noisy, a slight knocking sound (nothing major).
• Low trade-in value being offered... 16 Jul 2004 (Forum)
  Of course, if you look at my other recent posting, you\'ll know that there is a teensie problem with the car (i.e. either the head gasket or the heat exchanger could be knackered, causing a constant coolant fluid leak - or it could just be a loose pipe in the depths of the engine somewhere - no loss of performance of the car) so maybe I\'m best just to take the £4k and run?
• Private Sale - Let Seller Beware? 21 May 2004 (Forum)
  Anyway, I'll try and keep it brief: I recently sold a 1992 Peugot 405 for £300 (inc. 6M Tax and 2M MOT). Car was a bit tatty, but running OK, I agreed with buyer that car needed "some attention". A week later, he phoned me to say he's had an inspection and it'll cost £600 to get it through an MOT. This was much more that he originally thought, so he wants to return car for full refund!
• D'oh, why me? 3 Mar 2004 (Forum)
  Crawls underneath, checking every pipe, hose, boot, connector,etc but appeared fine, very dirty, but fine and dry!. Crawled back out and started engine, in case it leaked whilst running,whilst i was waiting for it to warm up, neighbour comes out and says "that was only a sapling yesterday, this morning it's lifted your car up!.. must be something to do with sellafield....ho-ho-ho-".
• Could Have Been An Expensive Blunder 12 Jan 2004 (Forum)
  Service Bloke said yes, so I asked if the MOT had already been done and he said they're doing it now. So I said just to fail it and I'd get the work done next week (MOT doesn't run out til next Friday). He didn't seem to like that but eventually understood that I didn't want to give him £200. He's just left me a voice mail saying that as I was so adamant I didn't want the work done, he's double checked the MOT criteria and although there's a hole in the exhaust (which will grow apparently) it hasn't actually failed the MOT.
• Satellite navigation on the cheap 3 Dec 2003 (Forum)
  Much use was made on my recent trip through Europe of my old hand-held Garmin GPS which I had connected up to my laptop for the first time running the new improved Garmin MapSource software (that now often comes bundled with their new units). My Garmin software [1] gave me route planning, very detailed maps with street names, plus a huge database of fuel stations, food and lodging and loads of other stuff.
• Penalty Charges and Bureaucracy gone MAD 14 Nov 2003 (Forum)
  This may work in other situations, however I have a busy dual carriageway outside the house and 20 yards down from my house is the Target roundabout in Northolt, which has access to the very busy A40 running in either direction. There is a lot of congestion in peak times during which the camera operates (7-10 am and 4-7pm) on the road with motorists speeding up as they get to the roundabout not slowing down.
• Mk 2 golf 1.6 coolant questions 30000mil 10 Sep 2003 (Forum)
  Ive filled the tank back up (this evening) with water (took about 1 litre) and ran the engine, squeezed pipes, put in some more water and bit of coolant. Then drove home, stopped half way to check everything is ok, got home and noticed the fan isnt running but the temp gauge was at or over the half way mark (noticed going faster made the temp go down!). Im getting the bus tomorrow, dads back at the weekend, but im away for the next few weeks Questions :- 1. is the g12 (pink coolant) alright to use given some blue coolant may already be in there?
• Biodiesel - Longer Term Verdict 8 Sep 2003 (Forum)
  Drawbacks The major drawback was that with the Biodiesel the car seemed to start hesitantly from cold, as if suffering fuel starvation. On occasions the engine would splutter and die three or four times before running normally. Once it got going it was fine. As I was away on holiday last week and could not obtain Biodiesel I had to put ordinary diesel in, and I have found that this problem has now disappeared.
• R12 replacements - Air Con. 7 Aug 2003 (Forum)
  I know its an old car (1986 Volvo 360) and not worth spending much money on, but is the r416a gas any good? or is it worth getting the car converted to run on r134a? Also, did he put enough gas in it this time? Because the sight glass on the receiver/dryer is bubbling when the system is on. Is this correct? So many questions, sorry for the long post.
• Peugeot 309 Petrol 1360 CC Problems 5 Aug 2003 (Forum)
  Also, does overinflation cause any affect on the shock absorbers? (b) Which are original spark plugs for the car? Alternative sparks? (c) I run the car on LPG. Is it necessary to change the plug to a colder one and reduce the gap by 0.1 mm? Which make and type of spark plugs can you suggest? (d) Which type of high performance air filter can I put in place of the original one?
• Thermo-viscous Fan operation - Carlton 20 Jul 2003 (Forum)
  clutch effect i.e. when enough heat is present the silicon stiffens or solidifies so that the ‘take up’ of the fan corresponds more closely to that of the engine speed and when less heat is present they ‘free wheel’ thereby creating less of a cooling effect. When running the car the gauge returns a temperature reading that hovers just above the first quarter mark. It rises to about the halfway mark on steep hills (and there are lots of those around here!). This is just a little cooler than what I had previously observed.
• Mk5 Escort problems 24 May 2003 (Forum)
  The car seems to have a low coolant level as well, but she has already arranged for a tame mechanic to give it the once over for any work that needs doing and there was no sign of mayo in engine when my Uncle inspected it, so hopefully that'll turn out to be something innocent. The car runs fine anyway, and I don't think headgaskets are prone to failure on the Zetec, fingers crossed, hopefully just a small leak from a pipe. Also, the rear wiper doesn't work, I haven't had time to try and diagnose it yet, the only thing that I noticed was that when my aunt used the front windscreen wash, the wipers didn't move, she had to switch them on herself.
• Time for a change of Identity 16 May 2003 (Forum)
  I feel a change of name coming on, as the Bora is once again running like a three legged donkey suffering an asthma attack, and i regret buying a car where you have to undo 6 bolts, 3 pipes, replace 2 gaskets and remove half the inlet manifold just to replace the number 2 spark plug I like the ride, the solidity, the level of performance, the quiet appearance I don't like the unreliability, the inability of the dealers to come up with a permanent fix. in fact, I don't like the dealers full stop.
• Can an S-Class be serviced on a budget? 25 Apr 2003 (Forum)
  It\'s had a major \"mechanical\" service a few thousand miles early and it\'s due a \"short service\" in about another 2k. I\'ve always pondered about this but I intend to run the S280 on a budget, which means not taking the car to a Mercedes dealership for a start ... having tried to buy an S-Class from MErcedes Dealerships THREE times and failed! But how much CAN I get away with in terms of servicing costs?