Stopped for a cuppa and a cambelt...

[forddeliveryboy]

DSdriver's mention of a head gasket while waiting for the ferry at Calais -

 

I once replaced the headgasket on a mini with my mate, on the dockside, in Calais, waiting for a ferry. So get on with it  <imagine a smiley here cos it wont work for me>

 

- reminded me of similar events, whether a '85 Passat's front dampers in the carpark at Sainsbury's or a 2cv back axle at a beauty spot in Northern Scotland.

 

I found the car and owner miles from anywhere, no phone reception, no breakdown cover. The eagles were circling. Honestly. She was more distressed when I told her why the engine had stopped - two massively overtightened axle bolts had sheared, allowing the rear axle tube to move up and bear on the body, trapping the fuel line. I wonder how many electronics would be needed to switch an engine off in similar circumstances.

 

Anyway, I digress as usual - we found some phone reception and she rang the outfit who'd recently rechassied the car (teaches you not to choose the cheapest quote). Next afternoon the parts had arrived and I negotiated a price with the garage, who had wanted me to bodge it with some large jubilee clips or wire.

 

So on a baking hot afternoon in May with views of unparalleled amazement, I removed the axle and fitted the new bits. Some ignorant twat turned up in a Mondeo and generally threw insults at the car while his brattish family chucked litter everywhere. Someone in a Renault 16 offered help, he lent us a breaker bar and a length of scaffolding - "leave them behind that rock and I'll be by next week to collect". A little later a lovely, slightly eccentric old couple in a Jag offered help in the form of a bottle of whisky. They stayed until the job was over and were fantastic, not afraid to get their hands dirty. Turned out he'd used Traction Avants in North Africa, during the war. We were all like old friends and dined out together that evening, rather sad to part when all was finished.

 

What other tales of repairs at the roadside?

[twosmoke300]

Did a power steering hose on a mates Mazda 323 in a layby . But I left one end attached to the rack and plonked the 80kg hydraulic pipe crimping machine on the top of the engine and put a joiner in .

Having that kit in my van was one of the perks of being an agricultural engineer. Less good was climbing up over massive curtain side trailers to fix the beacon while artics thundered by .

[320touring]

Had a rear topmount failure on the lhs in the 320 one Sunday in Bucharest. .

 

A limited vocab plus no idea where the nearest dealer was led to an ingenious solution.

 

3500 miles later, we made it home with a sock tied round the shock to stop it clattering off the remains of the topmount.

[saucedoctor]

Fitting a new wiper motor in my mate's Mini, in the pissing rain on the way home from Iron Maiden's 1993 concert, in one of THE roughest areas of Belfast.

 

The motor had been playing up periodically, and my mate hadn't got round to putting the replacement one on (it was in the boot). Luckily, because it was a Mini, plenty of tools were carried at all times. Just stopping and waiting for the rain to stop wasn't an option for 3 reasons:

 

1. It wasn't going to stop raining for hours

2. We knew how to change it, just hadn't got round to it

3. We were exactly here

[Micrashed]

Umm.

Fixorated the ropey wiring loom that had caught fire on a Mk 2 Fiesta just outside of York in a car park.

 

Changed the water pump on the same Fiesta with pair of wheels up on the kerb in place of a ramp or jack to help me get under the car for draining duties ( reused the stuff that came out). That was in Newall Green the arse end of Wythenshawe.

[Albert Ross]

I was moving house form Lincoln to Doncaster about 15 years ago. Mk1 Sierra 2.0 Ghia Estate. Slight misfire started at Gringley on the Hill. I nursed it into Gainsborough (Return trip) and to Motosave. Looking up at the display of gaskets, "I'll have that head gasket please mate" (AH860?) and paid the lad £4. My Mrs went off shopping for lunch with the two boys, then 12 and 13.... 45 minutes later I popped back into the shop and asked for water. Job was finished, and my Mrs turned up with food!  Apparently Motosave had just done a head gasket on a 2.0 Pinto Sierra...... and it had taken the lad an afternoon and morning..... I was offered a job. I declined!

[Richard]

A friend of mine had a V4 Mk1 Transit that used to regularly snap crankshafts because of some alignment issue in the engine, he got quite adept at changing cranks at the roadside. The long term cure was to fit a V6.

[chaseracer]

Not so much a roadside fix, as mechanical sympathy and familiarity with the beast in question avoiding same...

 

Scally Rally, September 2006; the Spanish border after a long, hot run along the Mediterranean coast from Monaco, including tacking into the Mistral hurtling down the Rhone valley.  The Guardia Civil decide to check random cars/documents - Schengen Agreement notwithstanding - and the multi-lane queue grows.  And grows.  

 

Our crusty GSA cries enough, as its oil begins to boil.  'Spanners' (AKA Jon, builder of the red hot flat-four) shouts at us to get out and push which we do, much to the amusement of civilians and paramilitaries alike.

 

Two hours cooling down with the bonnet up plus the removal of the chequerplate from the bull bar (blocking the airflow - D'OH!) and all was well.

[hennabm]

Small one compared with some here.

 

An old Renault 12TS of mine - driving through town with someone who shouldn't have been in the car, cough cough.

 

Throttle cable breaks. Thankfully I always carry some tools for "emegencies", so I have to jiggle enough cable through to get a strand back on the linkage and then nurse it to the destination and drop off "someone" and then sneak back home again.

 

Another 12 I had, the exhaust front pipe fell off in Fort Augustus. Used a pile of gravel on the road side to "jack up" the car on one side so I could reach underneath. Again a handy tool box with some spare nuts/bolts ensured enough support until a proper job could be made.

[lisbon_road]

The clutch cable went on my Sierra in Norwich.  I tried to bodge something but couldn't so I drove 200 miles back to Southampton non stop.  I got it going by warming it up then starting in gear and making clutchless changes up. 

 

After that, I carried a spare cable and could change them in a few minutes without getting under the car.

 

(I've been on a bus in China where they changed the head gasket in a rural area)

[dollywobbler]

I've had to change a 2CV clutch cable in a car park. With no tools. Fortunately, with such a failure in mind, I always leave the adjuster nuts finger tight. There's simply no need for them to be tighter. Got bloody covered in oil though!

 

When we went to the Swedish 2CV World Meeting, our mate had to buy a gearbox at the event as the one in his Dyane shat itself. He just made it to the event, so we changed the gearbox ready for his successful drive home. I say we - I just took photos.

[Rocket88]

The clutch cable went on my Sierra in Norwich.  I tried to bodge something but couldn't so I drove 200 miles back to Southampton non stop.  I got it going by warming it up then starting in gear and making clutchless changes up. 

 

After that, I carried a spare cable and could change them in a few minutes without getting under the car.

 

(I've been on a bus in China where they changed the head gasket in a rural area)

Drove round the Paris "perifique" in 1979 in an FD Victor with no clutch....................

[Inspector Morose]

Many a Trabbi engine swapped over at the roadside or in car parks, I did chuck a seized twin pot I had lying around and drove to Sheffield where a mates engine had thrown its bearings. Freed the spare using the cheap coke down the bores before setting off then gentle persuasion when I got there. Swapped over without much fuss the engine and gave strict instructions to my mate to gently drive it home to Wolverhampton. A day or two later a call from my mate to say the replacement engine had blown a head gasket and can I rescue him? I sent a spare head gasket with a spanner in the post to his hotel with a note to change the 'kin thing himself.

 

Did a Warty head gasket next door to Bloxwich bogs while I had a prospective mrs FPB7 in the passenger seat. Felt it go, pulled over made my excuse, pulled out the spare gasket and socket I had in the boot and 20 mins later we were on our way with a slightly nonplussed lady beside me. (She already knew I was weird when I picked her up in a 1957 Wartburg 311)

[UmBongo]

Years ago at a deserted beach our Austin 1800 wouldn't start.

 

My dad fixed the points - I think - with an old fork and the car burbled into life.

[spike60]

I changed the rear propshaft U/J on a MK2 Tranny camper in a French orchard with circlip pliers, hammer and allen key bought from the local Leclerc's.

When my Scimitar snapped a wishbone mount on the A19 just north of the Tyne Tunnel I limped into a industrial estate and stretched some fabrication companies MIG welder out the fire door and welded the remains to the chassis.

[tooSavvy]

Wipers stopped in a downpour, mk2 Escort. Socket worn out where motor drives mech... polythene bag doubled over and whacked in place got us home.

I cut a bit of placcie ... like a tuning fork shape ... and screwed it onto the mech, stopping ball coming out .FIX4WINNAHS.

 

 

TS

[Micrashed]

Pulled the back wheel off a Plack-90 and fixed the puncture (inner tubed) tyre at the side of a road on the way back from work.

 

Not sure if that counts as automotive heroism as they are not that difficult to do really.

[dave21478]

The clutch cable went on my Sierra in Norwich.  I tried to bodge something but couldn't so I drove 200 miles back to Southampton non stop.  I got it going by warming it up then starting in gear and making clutchless changes up. 

 

After that, I carried a spare cable and could change them in a few minutes without getting under the car.

 

(I've been on a bus in China where they changed the head gasket in a rural area)

 

 

I bought a C15 van with minor* clutch issues sight unseen via ebay which turned out to have no working clutch at all (release bearing had seized and chewed through the springs on the cover plate) and drove it from Manchester area to Aberdeen like that.

 

It was a bit of a worry around the Manc housing estates as i didnt know how good the battery was so sweated a bit at each junction when I had to switch off and re-start in first gear to get going. Happily the battery was a goodun, and once on the motorway it was easy enough for the rest of the journey. Well, except Dundee and its dozens of roundabouts in rush hour.

I changed the clutch on my sisters driveway with her £14.99 Argos tool kit supplemented by a couple of torx bits and a cheap jack bought from the local Halfords.

 

That van is still going strong on the farm here today.

[dave21478]

And I did the classic shoelace repair when the accelerator cable snapped on my track prepped 205 at Crail dragstrip. It snapped half-way up a run - not my best 1/4 miles time! - so I coasted to the end and got a friend to drive it back to the paddock with the bonnet open while I sat on the engine and worked the throttle by hand.

 

For the trip home, I undid my shoelaces and tied them together, knotted one end to the throttle lever and ran the lace out the engine bay by the drivers side of the bonnet, which I left on the first latch, in through the open drivers window where I could pull it.

Progress was rather alarming at first until I got the hang of it, but roundabouts were tricky as I needed on hand to gently work the string, one hand to steer and one hand to change gear.

 

On the plus-side, I could wind up the window and trap the lace in it while on the dual carriageway for ghetto cruise control.

[forddeliveryboy]

My Dad once drove an Austin 7 which had knackered its prop centre bearing by holding the shaft up with his belt. Driving through rush-hour cities seems to be popular, my city of choice* was Leeds, in a BX dizzler. Doesn't half hone your powers of reading the traffic ahead! The rest of the journey - about 160 miles - was plain sailing.

 

A friend of mine had a V4 Mk1 Transit that used to regularly snap crankshafts because of some alignment issue in the engine, he got quite adept at changing cranks at the roadside. The long term cure was to fit a V6.

 

In a roadside layby, I presume? There are all the nuts and bolts you need in case of a shortage, scattered in the oily puddles.

 

 

'Spanners' (AKA Jon, builder of the red hot flat-four) shouts at us to get out and push which we do, much to the amusement of civilians and paramilitaries alike.

 

Ah, that name rings a bell, I think he put together my mate's old Dyane flat four.

 

Dollywobbler, I thought a 2cv's clutch cable outlasted the chassis by a fair margin? They're built to pull the Queen Mary, aren't they? Only time I've known one go is when routed the wrong way past the X-box. I've also known the nuts rattle down the thread and put the clutch out of adjustment. Don't ask how I know! I once had someone with one of these cars which was needing constant slight adjustment to the cable, turned out it was the release arm on its way out. That's the trouble with tough cars, you never expect them to wear out but eventually they do, every bloody component. I must find a nice low-mileage ID from the mid-60s, if finances ever recover.

[mercrocker]

Dunno about 2cvs but I had the cable let go on my GSA once.  On my lunchbreak up town.  Luckily there was a specialist only a 35 minute panting run away.  got back to the car.  The cable hadn't snapped at all - the bracket had literally pulled off its "welded" position on the 4 year old chocolate bulkhead.  Never did need that cable...

[oldford]

I changed the back axle on my MK 3 Cortina in the car park of Hatfield Polytechnics halls of residence where i wasn't living at the time.

[beko1987]

Stripped the scuttle off and reattached the clutch fluid pipe in a corsa c and changed a 206 headlight bulb under the street lamp in halfords car park after buying tools to do it!

[Lord Sterling]

Reattached the clutch cable of the Micra a few times on the side of the road. Exchanged header tanks a few times on various Rovers I've had.

 

I've also replaced wings, bonnets and bumpers on both the Micra and Rover, though these were done at the side of the road at home as I don't have a driveway.

[mat_the_cat]

Around 10 years ago I was called out by a damsel in distress, who'd run over the exhaust of the car in front on the motorway, after it had dropped off. This had punctured the fuel tank of her Maestro, and could I help. So I took the tank off my bike, together with a length of gas hose, which was all I had a reasonable length of. Ended up strapping the tank into the passenger seat, ran the hose out through the window and under the bonnet direct to the fuel pump.

 

The amusing thing was, around a week later I phoned up to see when I could collect my tank, only to find it was still in use!

[saucedoctor]

^ Epic!

[Mr_Bo11ox]

The gearbox in my Ital lost 2nd gear on the way home from Uni one day. Drove back to the uni and dumped it. Found another gearbox and some tools, then got some bodybuilders to kowp it on its side in the Uni car park. Changed the gearbox with a mate then pushed it back onto its wheels and drove home.

[mouseflakes]

I woo'ed Mrs Flakes by driving us round Ireland in this...
 

 
On the last morning there we were about an hour from Cork and two hours from ferry departure when it felt like the brakes were very weak.
 
Stupidly, I thought I'd check the fronts at the roadside. They were drums all round on those old Hiaces. The brake cylinders were mounted on the backplate with their axis along the vertical. I wanted to check the piston wasn't seized so I eased the one facing upwards out. This left the rubber cup and backing disc behind in the cylinder, so I pulled out the rubber cup to be sure - as you do. The result was that the spring beneath the cup suddenly expanded, shot upwards and then plopped back down into the fluid-filled cylinder - but the backing disc was no longer on top of it.
 
I then spent a frantic, sweary half hour or so, thrashing around the roadside verge trying to find where the hell the tiny part had pinged off to. Time was ticking away and we were going to miss the ferry. For the umpteenth time, I sat back down in front of the hub and tried to work out the likely trajectory of the disc from the top of the spring. This time, I picked the spring back out the cylinder to check how compressed it was before it released. This is when I discovered that during its brief moment of freedom when it sprung out, it had managed to perform a perfect 'one-eighty' and had plopped back in upside-down, with the backing disc still attached, but hidden from view beneath the brake fluid left in the cylinder.
 
We made it to the ferry just in time, but I did have to drive at stupid speeds to make it (stupid speeds in a top-heavy '72 Hiace are roughly between 32 and 43 MPH).

[xtriple]

Bought a Yugo45 from a salvage yard  about twenty years ago, it was nearly new and had had a 'light ' bump in the passenger front. Looked alright and seemed to drive, so I thought 'fuck it' bought it and set off for home (about 50 miles). About ten miles into the journey, horrible noises and smell...

 

The passenger side joint into the gearbox had split/shattered and split the gearbox casing - bugger!

 

I jumped into my mates car that was with me and we found a scrappy, bought a joint from a Fiat (Panda I think, could have been a Uno) and a tube of liquid metal/ ep90 from a car spares shop and put it all back together in a layby on the M5.

 

Worked fine and I sold it to my next door neighbours sister and it was still going five years later when it fell apart from rust.