Back on the Road

This past week has been rather hectic at work, hence the lack of writing. However, two vehicles close to my heart, and in one case wallet, have been returned to service. Firstly my car, which went down with a failed gearbox. A quick quote from a garage confirmed that it might be possible, but would cost much the same as launching a space shuttle mission, but not as much as putting a wheelie bin out on a Thursday at 06:59 hours. Time to take matters into my own hands. I put the bin out at 07:01, and went online. After looking around for a bit, I didn’t find a gearbox but did come across Series 4 of Secret Army on DVD that I’ve been after for a while. So I narrowed down the search criteria slightly, and after a couple of camera reviews found what I was looking for – a useful ‘search for strange bits of cars’ facility, that scours the lists of breaker’s yards and car bits specialists to give some quotes. To avoid any misunderstandings, you type in the registration number of your car, and this allows an exact search for your particular model so that any ordered parts have a reasonable chance of actually fitting your vehicle. This is essential, as car manufacturers deem it necessary to ensure that everytime a new model is introduced, every single component on it will be entirely unique. With new models introduced every other week or so, getting spares can be a tad tricky. You could almost be forgiven for thinking that all these manufacturers that spout their green credentials would prefer you to discard a perfectly good vehicle and buy a new one! But that would be hypocritical, and they wouldn’t do that, now would they?

Anyway, I got a gearbox after some searching around, and using the Old Boys network at work, got it fitted along with a new clutch at the same time. The car is now back on the road, but as MOT time is looming, I’m certain that it will be gracing these pages again shortly.

"In your own time, dear."
It's at moments like this that I'm a proud supporter of equality.

The second vehicle to be brought back to life is my Iveco car transporter. Having smoked itself half to death a few weeks ago, it went up to Doncaster for some open gasket surgery. The mechanics found a litany of faults with it, all of which had been blamed on my imagination by our regular so called mechanic. It now has new pistons, new injectors, air pipes and received new filters for the first time in three years – and this lorry is used for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week – so no wonder it was under performing.

"Oh it's you again; always moaning about something. I've told you before, a puff of smoke is nothing to worry about. It's all in your head, go away and let me count my money in peace."

Today was it’s first outing with a load to Peterborough. The changes are mind blowing; no more red-lining to get up hills, simply drop one or two cogs and it was running smoothly and purposefully ahead. On the return run, when empty, it even overtook one of our Actros artics, which didn’t manage to catch up for the remainder of the trip. Just goes to show the difference that a real mechanic can make – so no, I didn’t get him to do the work on my car!