Strange things my cars do

[HillmanImp]

Dollywobblers comment about his Siron cutting out turning left made me think of odd things my cars do. Examples: 

 

The white Audi (Auschwitz) used to always cut out turning left onto my street - nowhere else. 

 

My old Vauxhall Disastra used to have electrical malfunctions at the garage on street lane in Leeds where all the lights on the dash would go funny and the central locking wound not work.

 

These are probably explainable and mendable (except the Disastra garage which I think was maybe due to telephone transmitters) but nothing that bothered me enough to mend it/sort it.

 

Does anyone else have odd things that their car does or did do?

 

 

 

 

[M'coli]

When enthusiastically pressing on in the Cavalier, the oil pressure light would flash on during the direction change from left to right in tight roundabouts - I presume it's the wire moving around shorting out somewhere, but it's not a problem that I've deemed needs fixing as yet.

 

The 205 also has roundabout problems, it has a tendancy to jump out of third as you give it a bootful of throttle due to soggy engine mounts.

[overrun]

When enthusiastically pressing on in the Cavalier, the oil pressure light would flash on during the direction change from left to right in tight roundabouts - I presume it's the wire moving around shorting out somewhere, but it's not a problem that I've deemed needs fixing as yet.

 

Sounds more like oil surge in the sump.

[KruJoe]

My Volvo 850 Auto has an annoying problem of stalling when braking from high speed. It seems to fall out of top gear and the revs slowly dwindle to nothing. I'm usually ready for it and can slot it from 'D' to '3' when the revs fall to about 1500rpm. This pops it into 3rd and it can't stall.

I've read loads on this problem, but as yet not solved it.

[derskine]

Polo crunches into 1st gear at the end of my street only

[M'coli]

Does it do it when the engine's both cold and hot?

 

Cavalier's oil light problem had been investigated as oil surge, but it's too instantaneous for that (I've seen oil surge in another car).

[sutty2006]

My landrover has a strange habbit of not fixing itself............. is that legal?

[fordperv]

^ that's called p.o.s syndrome fella

[Ratdat]

I used to have a Galant of about an '88/89 vintage which had a issue with one driveshaft popping out of the gearbox on roundabouts occasionally. It was easy enough to reach under and pop it back in but but it always meant it leaving a trail/pool of ATF on the road. I used to carry a gallon of ATF in the boot.

[M'coli]

Strange that-I had a pushbike I always fell off of on roundabouts with some guy fannying around with a Mitsubishi's gearbox not far from the exit...

[saucedoctor]

My R6 Metro GTa made a weird farting sound when the ignition was switched off. Never did get to the cause!

[wackywacerwill]

The modern Leon beeps and flashes warning lights as standard for low fuel though in the colder weather the cooling system joins in the fray and on and off the oil warning light does the same.

I find non of these features endearing and as such they will eventually lead to it's demise as if it continues to give false accounts of it's fluid then I can't be arsed to give it a cam belt.

[rml2345]

Occasionally mine just doesn't start. It's never failed to get going in the end, just occasionally very grumpy about it. I've never managed to find the cause.

[phil_lihp]

My Citroen AX had an infuriating problem with the starter motor - at random, usually incredibly inconvenient times it either clunked or did nothing when the key was turned.  It would then take 340 additional turns of the key before it would engage.  It spent quite a lot of time in the garage for this and other issues, the cause was never found despite a new ignition switch, battery, starter solenoid and new starter wiring.  Sometimes it would go days without a problem, then it would do it every single time for a week.  One day it suddenly stopped playing up altogether and was absolutely fine for the next year until I got rid of it.

[Stanky]

My spectacularly reliable Almera has taken to developing an annoying misfire, however it only manifests itself in one very specific place

 

Here: https://plus.google.com/116395525367931957093/about?gl=uk&hl=en

 

Only heading north too. I drive or coast down the hill to the lights, then it gets all grumpy and misfires like mad all the way back up the other side of the valley towards Privett then behaves completely normally from that point on. By the time I reach this point I've been driving for >20 miles and well over 40 minutes so the car is nice and warm. it never does it anywhere else, and to be fair it doesn't always do it there, but if its going to, that is the exact spot that it happens.

 

The only conclusion i can draw is that something horrific happened to another almera which was either one before, or one after my car on the production line, and there is ghost of it haunting that spot. My poor car is so traumatised by the ghost of its close relative that it cries inside its engine, causing the misfire.

 

Something like that, anyway.

[Spiny Norman]

The black Royale would often stall turning right into Morrisons at Anniesland in Glasgow, which baffled the fuck out of me. 

[Aston Martin]

In heavy rain the injector light comes on, causing the car to lose all power for a second or two.

Whoever fitted the cig outlet, wired it into the headlight switch, so I can either have lights or something charging. 

[daveb47]

I  had a j4 van in 60s that kept turning into pub car parks.....

Where it refused to start until all on board were suitably refreshed,sometimes overnight.

[Station]

My Starion could run all day long - but would cut out within seconds if I thought about it cutting out. ECU fault/telepathy?

[D-Dubya]

I had a 96 Seat Ibiza that used to cut out leaving asda car park in Wigan, leaving from the exit to the saddle junction. it did this whether it was hot or cold, just started or running none stop for an hour (used the car park to bypass traffic) and what ever the weather. it was always as you pulled up to the stop line it just faded out to nothing. baffled the fuck out of me. never did it anywhere else

[mouseflakes]

My R6 Metro GTa made a weird farting sound when the ignition was switched off. Never did get to the cause!

Did you have a wind-bag passenger who was using the sound of the running engine to mask that of their flatus? Perhaps they were regularly caught liberating the last of it at the end of the journey?

[petr]

My Rover 200 SR made a mooing noise when parked in the garage in hot weather! I tracked it down to something to do with the fuel tank breather. But it had me puzzled for a long time, though I had a cow hiding in my garage? O:-)

[twosmoke300]

That's just reminded me that my friends Yamaha FZ 750 used to moo when put away hot. That was from the tank breather too .

[michael1703]

That's just reminded me that my friends Yamaha FZ 750 used to moo when put away hot. That was from the tank breather too .

Yamahas moo,but kawasakis whistle

[twosmoke300]

Kawasakis usually bankrupt me . Still love em though

[Impmadman]

Had a pug 306 estate which always used to jump out of top gear when I drove it, but did it for nobody else, especially the pug garage who allegedly used to road test it. After about the 4th time, I clocked the mileage and found out they road test for about 200 yards. Gave up in the end, and lived with it for 100 thou miles as a co car, now some poor old sod has had to put up with it. Felt very guilty.

[Skoze]

Capri won't turn it's lights on the first time unless you flash the full beams as you switch them on, find that quite cute. Better than the Land Rover's "just started" quirk of locking the brakes on the first time you use them when the servo pumps up! 

[Formula Autos]

I had a Pug 106 where the 'ticker' for the indicator would sound for a few seconds when driving over one particular zebra crossing. The indicators or hazard warning lights on the dash never flashed. It just made a ticking noise, at this one location. If someone was crossing the road there and made me stop at the crossing though it didn't tick.

 

I just decided it was something weird, not worth fannying about under the bonnet and/or dash to investigate.

 

That car also developed a deep love of the work of Paul Weller, and refused to let me have a tape of Stanley Road back from the tape deck. It would play fine, but wouldn't eject. I did fix that though as, good as Mr Weller is, a solitary cassette tape as in-car entertainment started to get a bit annoying after a few weeks.

[sierraman]

Sounds more like oil surge in the sump.

I wouldn't have thought so, unless the oil is really low or you are on some severe camber.