robinmasters

Port Lympne yesterday with the wife, went for a safari on this:

Collection collected.

This car came with rear discs and pads, the previous owner hasn't had time to fit. When the MOT rolled around last November, I had a go at fitting them; turns out someone had rounded off the bolts holding the rear calipers, so I gave up rather than making them worse as access was terrible-i couldn't have done it myself in the road. Funds etc being in a before Christmas state meant I only took it for an MOT today; obviously it failed (there were also ABS and airbag lights on, the seller had told me about these). In addition to these known faults, it turns out someone has "repaired" the rest suspension mounts at some point, but the repair wasn't even MOT standard, and the garage quoted me £1,500 in total. I had expected £500-£600 for the bits I knew about but couldn't or hadn't fixed myself, but the additional £1k for the welding (obviously subject to further issues being discovered when the previous patches came off) means this just isn't viable for me. Is be lucky to get £1,200 for the car, once repaired. So I've taken James Brown's advice.

Apparently the current surfacing on the A303 was designed specifically for Jaguar XJ220 drivers.

Blade.

I was on the A2 a while ago, in lane two, overtaking. A grey van closed very quickly on me, really aggressively tailgating. When I was past the traffic I had been overtaking I moved back into lane one, and gave the van driver the Gareth Hunt hand gesture. Only then did the (unmarked) van put their blue lights on. There's a police vehicle compound at Nackington.

I split daily duties between a 2000 Xantia and a 2002 Rover 75, the former being relatively modern and the latter the sensible, reliable, safe modern, but both normally the oldest car in the car park at work. Pretty much anything from the nineties onwards can be treated as an car and as long as normal maintenance is kept up it'll be fine. Anything before that, as long as you avoid rust, can get parts, and know how maintenance differs from a modern, will also be fine. Also, run two cars, on the proviso that as soon as one breaks, fix it.

As they were paraphrasing Super Hans I think you can get away without crediting them. I've had a Citroen 'Desire', an 'Aura', and my wife currently has a 'Flair'. The whole concept of giving cars, or any other product, a name is daft. Give it an alphanumeric code or a factual description. Anything else is marketing, which Shirley no-one with an IQ higher than single figures falls for?

I was a bit concerned that LED sidelights might look a bit Halfords, but the 'candles in a jam jar' sidelights had to go, especially next to the projector headlights. Gave it a good hoover and glued up the flappy grill bit too. Little wins.

In other news, the Berlingo van is for sale. Thread in the appropriate forum.

Busy busy busy at the moment, so a full introduction to the 75 won't be here for a while. Suffice to say it's lovely; took over five hours to drive back from Colin's, only stopped once (near Grantham, for a pasty, see above), and thoroughly enjoyed the whole drive including M25 misery, biblical rain, and much tiredness. I've had a quick look at it this morning, cleaned out some rubbish, and discovered a load of parts in the spare wheel well. For those that didn't know, the boot floor in these has a hydraulic strut and a light; LUXURY. Sightly improved the cloudy headlights. It needs a thorough clean, the headlining is drooping, and it's got ABS and airbag lights on. Other than that, it's flippin' lovely.