Graham's Top Tips

[Penners]

In my young days, last century(!), I used to do all my own car maintenance (this was in the days when you could lift the bonnet and actually recognise the individual components underneath it).

Whenever I did a job, I always had a few bits left over, and the car always seemed to work perfectly well without them. I kept them all in a large box, and I swore that one day I would build a car out of the contents of that box.

And that, folks, is how the Trabant was born.

 

[skier-hughes]

You keep it parked next to that lvely house Penners?

I used to love messing with cars. I rebuilt a proper Lotus Elan, 1967 series 2se, it's what bedrooms were designed for wasn't it?

 

[middi]

There you go Aidan, you could have built a ' Renitroen' form all those mixed up car parts, :wink:

 

[Me!]

I rebuilt a proper Lotus Elan, 1967 series 2se, it's what bedrooms were designed for wasn't it?

Bedrooms? No, kitchen tables are for rebuilding bits of cars! How did you get a Lotus down the stairs when you had finished putting it together :?

 

[Nemesis]

Don't smooth out the ports on your cylinder head in the kitchen using brushes etc on the end of a drill.

The tiny pieces of metal dust will land on your painted brick walls and rust next time you boil a pan of spuds and put steam in the air...

 

[Flyfisher]

I used to do all my own car maintenance (this was in the days when you could lift the bonnet and actually recognise the individual components underneath it).

Absolutely! These days commercial garages seem to be more like operating theatres (in fact maybe cleaner than many hospitals!) and the 'mechanics' just seem to plug in a computer and change all the bits listed on the screen while you sit in a reception area modelled on an airline exectutive lounge with plasma screens, wireless internet and all the drinks and snacks you want. Hardly surprising that an oil change can cost the thick end of £200 :evil:

 

[skier-hughes]

How did you get a Lotus down the stairs when you had finished putting it together :?

We might have lived in a bungalow

I built up all the individual bits, such as suspension etc, then assembled the final car in the garage.

 

[Penners]

you sit in a reception area modelled on an airline exectutive lounge with plasma screens, wireless internet and all the drinks and snacks you want.

Not exactly the experience I have when I get my ancient Volvo serviced at M******'s Motors, at the other end of the village. There, you pick your way between the car lift and the pit to get to the cubbyhole office and dump your keys. You then have to wipe the grease off the soles of your shoes before you get into your wife's car to go home.

They do a good job, though, at the more modest end of the second-mortgage scale.

 

[Me!]

Don't smooth out the ports on your cylinder head in the kitchen using brushes etc on the end of a drill.

The tiny pieces of metal dust will land on your painted brick walls and rust next time you boil a pan of spuds and put steam in the air...

That reminds me of another one. Do not use an electric drill outside to drill an aerial hole in your newly resprayed car when it is about to rain. Because the very first drop of rain to fall will go exactly through the airvent in the drill causing a huge spark, make you jump, snap the drill bit and put a scratch in your beautiful new paint!

 

[NT]

In my young days, last century(!), I used to do all my own car maintenance (this was in the days when you could lift the bonnet and actually recognise the individual components underneath it).

Whenever I did a job, I always had a few bits left over, and the car always seemed to work perfectly well without them. I kept them all in a large box, and I swore that one day I would build a car out of the contents of that box.

And that, folks, is how the Trabant was born.

One time I had a couple of rocker arms left over. And it ran better than it did before It may be funny, but its true.


NT

 

[Anys]

When told you have been visited by a 'rogue bat' in the roof space, do not assume you have escaped accommodating a whole colony of them ... just wait and see, as you know there's absolutely nothing you can do about it.

 

[Penners]

One time I had a couple of rocker arms left over. And it ran better than it did before.

Presumably you carried out some mods on the car, so it would work without those rockers?

 

[Gervase]

Why is it that when I read of rogue bats in the roofspace I have a vision of some harridan in the attic?

 

[DaveBrigg]

When installing a new water supply, think twice before leaving the old disconnected pipe in place beneath the floor. The first time there is heavy rain outside, it will provide wonderful drainage for the garden and serve as an unplanned indoor water feature.

 

[NT]

One time I had a couple of rocker arms left over. And it ran better than it did before.

Presumably you carried out some mods on the car, so it would work without those rockers?

The only necessary was to leave the rockers out. Very simple but always seems to confuse people


NT

 

[Penners]

Well, my incredibly witty pun fell on stoney ground, eh?

 

[Gareth Hughes]

Why is it that when I read of rogue bats in the roofspace I have a vision of some harridan in the attic?

Oh, that's unfair Gervase. Nemesis posts from a little outshut on the back of her house
<ducks> :twisted:

 

[Craig]

No Penners, not at all - it was very funny, although perhaps a little too far off the well trodden path.

 

[Nemesis]

Hughes - you will suffer for that. I will make sure of it.

And to think today I was going to go out and take a new pic of the mill at Warwick Bridge for the BaR book 2007... the existing one consisting mainly of scaffolding and not making it seen too attractive a rescue really.

(We once completed a historic rally with a broken rocker shaft, and still beat many a modern rival, but that's another story entirely.)

 

[NT]

Well, my incredibly witty pun fell on stoney ground, eh?

ohhh

NT