The grumpy thread

[Partridge]

I had that screenshot as my facebook cover for ages

[vulgalour]

This is a long-standing grump, it's one that'll likely never change.  "I'm not repairing that, the car aint worth enough".  Excuse me?  You are able to repair the panel and I am able to pay you but you won't because the car itself isn't worth enough money in your opinion to warrant spending the money on the repair.

 

How does this even make any sense?  The number of places that won't do the door repairs on the Princess because it's a Princess is pretty depressing.  So far I've only found one place that will even entertain looking at the car, I've found several that have been very polite discussing the cost of the repairs right up until the point they find out what the car is and then become quite rude.

 

I do understand the desire to only work on a particular kind of car and I can see why the Princess might not fit into that.  Fair enough, but at least have the good grace to tell me that's the reason you don't want to do it.

 

What I don't get most of all is that if it had a different badge there'd be no hesitation.  If this were any number of truly rotten 'popular classics' then I'd just be given a very large number to pay.  It's stuff like this that makes you realise how much harm a bad reputation can do for a car and its survival, if I'm struggling to find someone to even talk about the repairs it's no wonder nobody else bothers.

[PhilA]

What I don't get most of all is that if it had a different badge there'd be no hesitation.  If this were any number of truly rotten 'popular classics' then I'd just be given a very large number to pay.  It's stuff like this that makes you realise how much harm a bad reputation can do for a car and its survival, if I'm struggling to find someone to even talk about the repairs it's no wonder nobody else bothers.

 

Remove door, trimmings, handles etc and bring in. Claim it's from a Maserati Biturbo. They're about the same profile. The rust won't be questioned either.

 

--Phil

[Richard]

[Volksy]

H.Imp and I had a similar issue when looking at getting the Lancia's front wings sorted. I don't think it's badge snobbery, its more that sorting rust out is now pretty much unheard of. Most body shops these days are just fitters and painters. Look at what gets written off and for what these days.... Scrape on the bumper of your '03 plate Fiesta? That'll be a CAT D then Sir, take it away, we can't be arsed.....

 

Chatting to one place, he wasn't willing to repair the wings, as he said "You'll only be back in year when they start bubbling up again - and I don't want the hassle."

Despite reassurances that we wouldn't, he said that he can make more money doing the general car park dings and scrapes in the same time that it would take to sort ours. Economic sense I guess. 

 

The same goes for a lot of mechanics, My mate wouldn't touch H.Imps Audi Coup' as it needs a front wheel bearing. If we bring the suspension leg down off the car he's happy to fit one, but as he's a small operation with only one ramp, he knows that if something goes wrong with the job and it's stuck on the ramp for a day, he's lost out on maybe the time to do two services. Which is easy money for him. Sadly seems to be the way of the times. I'm not slating the guy, as he's one of my oldest friends and a proper old school mechanic but needs must i guess.

[Angrydicky]

This is a long-standing grump, it's one that'll likely never change.  "I'm not repairing that, the car aint worth enough".  Excuse me?  You are able to repair the panel and I am able to pay you but you won't because the car itself isn't worth enough money in your opinion to warrant spending the money on the repair.

 

How does this even make any sense?  The number of places that won't do the door repairs on the Princess because it's a Princess is pretty depressing.  So far I've only found one place that will even entertain looking at the car, I've found several that have been very polite discussing the cost of the repairs right up until the point they find out what the car is and then become quite rude.

 

I do understand the desire to only work on a particular kind of car and I can see why the Princess might not fit into that.  Fair enough, but at least have the good grace to tell me that's the reason you don't want to do it.

 

What I don't get most of all is that if it had a different badge there'd be no hesitation.  If this were any number of truly rotten 'popular classics' then I'd just be given a very large number to pay.  It's stuff like this that makes you realise how much harm a bad reputation can do for a car and its survival, if I'm struggling to find someone to even talk about the repairs it's no wonder nobody else bothers.

Talk to Sam Skelton, see if he can recommend any local bodyshops. Several members of the Maestro & Montego Club have had this problem, finding places to take their cars seriously. But there have been some absolutely flawless results gained, so there are good places out there.

[vulgalour]

I do have a contact Sam gave me, but I've been holding off getting a quote since splurging all my pocket money on that breaker, I like to at least have some money available if I'm getting quotes for stuff.  I completely understand a garage/bodyshop not wanting to do rust repairs, that's fine, but when they tell you they're happy to do a rust repair and then change their mind when the hear what the car is that smacks of badge snobbery to me and that's what I'm encountering more often than not.

[Cavcraft]

To be fair I expect a lot of the places get bombarded with requests to paint the wing and door on a 25 year old car, then the car owner starts calling them robbers because if the costs involved, or just promise to come back then never return.

[RedSparrow]

I can confirm this. My dad runs a garage and has a lot of love for old rotters, owning several himself, but he will often not want to get involved in fixing customers classics. That said he has a few regulars with classics who have been going there for years.

[trigger]

To paint a door or wing your looking around £150 a panel, when you turn up in a tatty Princess and being quite young i suspect it's hard for a garage to take you too seriously without thinking time waster with no money.

[overrun]

Or due to the nature of the car in question, it starts bubbling up again.

People ask who done the job, an unfair reputation for shonky work could be gained...

 

I can see both sides of this tbh. Hope you get it sorted though.

[RedSparrow]

Are there any locals you know with classics? They'll probably know a of more helpful garage.

[Partridge]

I think this ought to have a thread of it's own-I'm sure others can help.

[vulgalour]

It is a moot point at present, but I'd certainly like to get some localised repair work done on both cars.  I'd also like to brush up my own welding abilities so Dad muttering about getting a MIG welder may pose a solution.

[Angrydicky]

I must admit I hate repairing door skins. So easy to distort the panel while welding.

[chaseracer]

Where are you, Vulg? I know a bloke who's mobile.

 

And he repairs 2CV bodywork without twitching...

[vulgalour]

warped door skins?  No problem.

 

 

+

 

[vulgalour]

@chaseracer:  Just off J30 of the M1.  PM me for a more exact address if required.

[Partridge]

I knew a bloke who did up a ex rozzer Volvo 240, and said it was a bloody nightmare to do body work on-because it was too well made. Errr...

 

FYI, I'm no longer in contact with him so I've no idea how the restoration went, or if it was ever finished.

[oman5]

I knew a bloke who did up a ex rozzer Volvo 240, and said it was a bloody nightmare to do body work on-because it was too well made. Errr...

 

FYI, I'm no longer in contact with him so I've no idea how the restoration went, or if it was ever finished.

Funny that. I came out one morning and one of the back doors on my 240 had been dented- someone just kicked it as they went past.  I opened the door, slammed it shut and it just popped straight back out, not even paint damage.

[wuvvum]

A while back I got a fine for driving the Rover with an expired MoT.  Fair enough, I was a twat for not remembering when the ticket ran out.  The copper told me at the side of the road that the fine was £100, but when I went onto the automatic payment system it told me to pay £60.  I rang up the 0300 number on the ticket to check that I wasn't doing anything wrong, gave them the ticket ref and the offence code and they confirmed that £60 was the correct fine for that ticket.  So I duly paid.

 

Saturday I get a letter in the post from Norfolk Constabulary saying that the officer wrote the reference number on the ticket incorrectly, and giving me the correct ref.  I went online and typed the correct ref into the payment system, and lo and behold it came up with a fine of £100.  Now that would have been fair enough (a bit irritating, but fair enough), but the system didn't take into account the fact that I'd already paid £60.  Rang the 0300 number again and they said they couldn't do owt about it at their end, I'd have to ring Norfolk plod and get them to sort it on their system.  The traffic office is closed at weekends, so I duly rang this morning.

 

Turns out that the ticket had already been automatically escalated to the magistrates' court for non-payment (even though the letter informing me of the correct ticket ref was dated 1st October and received by me on 5th, about right for Royal Mail 2nd class).  The chap I spoke to at the traffic office was actually quite pleasant - he said he'd fax the magistrate's court to get them to stop the proceedings (which I have to say doesn't fill me with confidence - who still faxes in 2013?), but there's nothing they can do re the fine.  I am now supposed to go online and pay the full £100, and at some point in the next 6-8 weeks I "should" automatically get the £60 refunded.

 

Which has pissed me off royally.  It was going to be a fugging tight month as it was without having to fork out extra cash and be out of pocket for two months due to a traffic copper's cock-up.  Not a happy bunny rabbit.

[chaseracer]

Wuv, should you wish to make a comment about the officer's competence: http://www.norfolk.police.uk/contactus.aspx

[John F]

Not sure whether to put this in the grin thread or the grump thread, but I've received a warning from YouTube for posting comments with "atheist / anti-American content".

 

I chose the grump thread in the end, because it means that the world contains parochial cunts who can't accept that some people don't believe in invisible supermen.

[wuvvum]

Not sure whether to put this in the grin thread or the grump thread, but I've received a warning from YouTube for posting comments with "atheist / anti-American content".

 

I chose the grump thread in the end, because it means that the world contains parochial cunts who can't accept that some people don't believe in invisible supermen.

 

I find that hard to believe.  The average comments section on a YouTube video is one of the most atheistic places I've ever come across, along with BBC Have Your Say.  If everyone who posted atheistic comments on there got banned, there'd be hardly anyone left.  And YouTube / Google is a completely secular organisation.

[Station]

This prompted the solid gold classic "I only do Volkswagens mate, they're the only things worthy of my time."

 

 

I would've* responded with, as if in confirmation with, by nodding my head in agreement and said 'Yeah mate, they're shite old VW's aren't they?'

 

But in reality, you should've said "Look mate, stop fucking round and give me a quote, I'll pay you well if you do a good job. Jesus Christ man, etc"

[Hendry]

Bank of Scotland, bunch of wankers.

 

Went in to temporarily up my overdraft by £100 as works been quite this month with not many hours thus shite wage, knocked me back for increase right off "computer says no" basically but yet they are willing to give me a £2K loan I don't fucking want. Tossers.

[Negative Creep]

I find that hard to believe.  The average comments section on a YouTube video is one of the most atheistic places I've ever come across, along with BBC Have Your Say.  If everyone who posted atheistic comments on there got banned, there'd be hardly anyone left.  And YouTube / Google is a completely secular organisation.

 

 

[sporty-shite]

The Sun "newspaper". I know, and most, if not all, of you know, it's a fucking despicable rag, but with today's front page, they have surpassed themselves. I'm not even going to link to it, or show a picture, but their lead of  "1200 KILLED BY MENTAL PATIENTS" has really boiled my piss.

 

How the fuck can society accept mental illness as just that, an illness, if these sort of stories are pushed around? How much harder does this sort of shit make our jobs, working with mentally ill people? All for a cheap headline.

[Bobthebeard]

The Sun "newspaper". I know, and most, if not all, of you know, it's a fucking despicable rag, but with today's front page, they have surpassed themselves. I'm not even going to link to it, or show a picture, but their lead of "1200 KILLED BY MENTAL PATIENTS" has really boiled my piss.

 

How the fuck can society accept mental illness as just that, an illness, if these sort of stories are pushed around? How much harder does this sort of shit make our jobs, working with mentally ill people? All for a cheap headline.

Agreed.

The reason tabloid "newspapers" are so popular* is that they print stories that make the readers angry. The readers believe all this guff and therefore relate it to others as "it's true, it was in the paper". Ergo, more angry people buy the tabloids in order to wind themselves up even further.

The actual real truth is irrelevant to the tabloid editors/journalists. Just another story in the making when all the rabble end up as vigilantes or causing hate riots. More papers sold you see, they can then report the riots and hate crimes.

Bastards*

The tabloids love to create disharmony and hatred amongst the "masses"

 

IMHO.

[cort16]

It's not a great surprise but my Jag's shat it's mot

 

Nearside Front Upper Front suspension has excessive movement at a wishbone pin or bush (2.5.A.1c)

Offside Front Upper Front suspension has excessive movement at a wishbone pin or bush (2.5.A.1c)

Offside Front Steering arm has relative movement at its fixings (2.2.B.1h)

Nearside Rear Rear wheel bearing has excessive play (2.6.2)

Offside Rear Rear wheel bearing has excessive play (2.6.2)

Offside Front Rear wheel bearing rough when rotated (2.6.1)

Nearside Inner Rear Tyre tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm (4.1.E.1)

Offside Inner Rear Tyre tread depth below requirements of 1.6mm (4.1.E.1)

Nearside Rear rear parking (secondary) brake grabbing severely (3.7.A.6b)

 

Balls