Dodgy shit hidden by sellers

[Split_Pin]

A story from 1998 this time.

Big Grant at the Haulage Company was a decent fellow, not perhaps the brightest but at nearly 7ft, could lift heavy things. He was so tall that he had to duck to see when driving his lorry as the seat didn't go down far enough. Poor sod.

Anyway, he bought a Sierra Sapphire. Normally these early MK2 Sierras had flappy door bottoms by this time but this one had Good Doors. It looked pretty smart at the time, painted in a very 90s shade of dark metallic pink. It obviously needed new brake discs because the next time I saw it after he'd had it around a week, the car was parked in our yard with the offside rear bumper hanging off with the brake discs he had recently bought to be fitted later,  poking through the collapsed boot floor. 

[HMC]

W210 merc estate I went to view once. I was impressed with the description of “ no rust”

Both wells in the boot had rotted out each side so you could see the road from the boot side hatches. Ignorance rather than deception maybe, but I would have to have checked the car out a bit more before saying there was “no rust” as a vendor. Plus - it’s a w210 pull the other one.

 

[Zelandeth]

I think the thing which gets me the most about some of the bodges and such we've seen here is the degree to which they must in quite a few cases taken longer and in a good few cases ended up costing more than actually just fixing the original problem!

[Rocket88]

1 hour ago, HMC said:

W210 merc estate I went to view once. I was impressed with the description of “ no rust”

Both wells in the boot had rotted out each side so you could see the road from the boot side hatches. Ignorance rather than deception maybe, but I would have to have checked the car out a bit more before saying there was “no rust” as a vendor. Plus - it’s a w210 pull the other one.

 

Did “ no rust “ just mean “ no metal”…..

[RoverFolkUs]

34 minutes ago, Zelandeth said:

I think the thing which gets me the most about some of the bodges and such we've seen here is the degree to which they must in quite a few cases taken longer and in a good few cases ended up costing more than actually just fixing the original problem!

100% this

Salvage rebuilds uk had a fiesta recently, the depths a previous "repairer" had gone to in order to avoid buying new parts was unbelievable. 

When the guys ripped it all apart and did it properly, it supposedly didn't take them that long, and as you say it would probably have been quicker to do it right in the first place! 

[stuboy]

13 hours ago, RoverFolkUs said:

100% this

Salvage rebuilds uk had a fiesta recently, the depths a previous "repairer" had gone to in order to avoid buying new parts was unbelievable. 

When the guys ripped it all apart and did it properly, it supposedly didn't take them that long, and as you say it would probably have been quicker to do it right in the first place! 

just drill another hole till the bumper bar fits... they saved that poor fiesta

[Boycie]

Slightly off topic but it's fair to say the tourists are back in Scotland , short staffed so covered checkin as well as my own job today , out of the 35 rentals cars I checked over 7 had tyres damaged ( some cases destroyed ) by Americans/Canadians knocking them off various points of Scotland .....Kwikfit fella was certainly earning his keep , had a Merc Gle returned with the NS mirror knocked to bits , full of electrics ( poss a camera to ) it's be bonkers money to fix , you,ll be glad to know the future of autoshite is safe , had my first real drive of a MG 3 today ...in yellow ..... fuel injection is interesting .....the cityrover lives on 

[Boycie]

Update on the Merc Gle , new mirror assembly had 9 parts Inc a camera , all in its £1300 plus fitting ....£1300 for a door mirror , I've a brand new Merc c300 delivered new faulty , just been told it needs a new front camera ....it's out of stock and not expected to be in stock till August , on better news my company car of the week a fiesta ecoboost hybrid has just had a service , there a cracking wee car when the engines not going bang 

[Dyslexic Viking]

I have remembered something that I have tried to forget and I am not proud of. On my first car that I drove I fixed a large rust hole with a piece of gutter and fastened it with self tapping screws and which was covered over by large amounts of underseal. And the worst part was that I sold the car without telling about it to the next owner. In my defense, I was young and stupid and did not know better.

[mk2_craig]

There's some horrendous bodges being talked about here! I can't bring myself to do that sort of thing to any vehicle where there's a risk of the next owner finding out and phoning me up to complain, especially if I haven't done it well enough and it breaks.

I think about the worst lash-up I can recall carrying out is "fixing" the rear lighter socket drawer on the horrible E83 X3 that we had for a year.  This is an unnecessarily over-engineered thing that you push to open (which it is supposed to do in a progressive, damped fashion) and push to close, however on this particular example it was all floppy and shite because something had worn/gone out of kilter/snapped/fell to bits.  As no doubt is the case with any of these cars that have carried kids in the back at some point.

Anyway it was pissing me off and I was coming to the conclusion that I didn't want to own the car any longer so I carried out the practically free repair of temporarily taping it in the closed position, then crudely firing a screw that I had lying around after being taken out of an old Sierra dashboard or something straight through two sides of the frame and into the lighter socket housing, and refitting it back to the console, never to be opened again. 

One less obvious fault for potential buyers to spot and take issue with.  Hardly Macgyver-grade but I was quite pleased with myself!

Of course, in order to be quids in from the endeavour, I took the opportunity to remove the lighter socket itself for potential retrofitting into some unspecified vehicle that I might own in the future, which fortunately didn't seem to create any issues with the on board computer sensing that it was no longer fitted and throwing a strop.  Then got rid of the car before the turbo had a chance to shit itself.

[maxxo]

the XM is the gift that keeps on giving

blower fan didn't work, was told it was simply a dodgy connection, dirty terminals

looked under the dash

hmmmmmm, it's unplugged, simple fix

plugged it back in and went out on my way

decided to turn it on.......pop, fizzzzzzzzzzzzz loads of smoke from the dash

you know, even me, the one who never gives up on a car is getting really fucking sick of it

[Bren]

16 hours ago, Dyslexic Viking said:

I have remembered something that I have tried to forget and I am not proud of. On my first car that I drove I fixed a large rust hole with a piece of gutter and fastened it with self tapping screws and which was covered over by large amounts of underseal. And the worst part was that I sold the car without telling about it to the next owner. In my defense, I was young and stupid and did not know better.

Gutter tactics.

[HMC]

I once nearly put k seal in an Alfa 166 v6 because the heater matrix was leaking a bit and apparently it’s replacement is a total war. In the end I couldn’t quite bring myself to do it - but I did tell the buyer the heater matrix was leaking.  I know it’s probably ok but I really dislike the idea of k seal.

A female friend of mine had a 2002 corsa which started with suspected hgf so she and her dad put k seal in - and sold it without mentioning anything to a private buyer. I was a bit surprised and for this reason I’ve decided not to buy a car from them if an opportunity arises 😂

[Richard_FM]

It's normally not a good idea to buy or sell a car to someone you know.

When my cousin was selling his old car I did think of buying it, but I was persuaded not to because it was beginning to get a bit rough around the edges.

It was probably a good idea in the end as a few months later I was made redundant & wouldn't have been able to afford to run it for most of the next 18 months!

[wuvvum]

10 hours ago, HMC said:

I once nearly put k seal in an Alfa 166 v6 because the heater matrix was leaking a bit and apparently it’s replacement is a total war. In the end I couldn’t quite bring myself to do it - but I did tell the buyer the heater matrix was leaking.  I know it’s probably ok but I really dislike the idea of k seal.

A female friend of mine had a 2002 corsa which started with suspected hgf so she and her dad put k seal in - and sold it without mentioning anything to a private buyer. I was a bit surprised and for this reason I’ve decided not to buy a car from them if an opportunity arises 😂

I bought a Fiat Scudo a few years ago which had HGF and had been fixed* using K-Seal.  It worked well enough that I was oblivious until I decided to replace the blocked heater matrix (a much easier job on a Scudo than a 166) and when I refilled it with coolant (now sans K-Seal) it immediately began pressurising like feck.  Head gasket replacement is an engine out job on those (and the engine has to come out from underneath) so it went for scrap, which was a shame as it was a cracking van other than that.

A mate was selling a slightly tired 3-pot Corsa C some years back, and the oil light kept coming on once it warmed up.  He tried putting 20W50 in it but that didn't sort it, so in the end he filled the engine with 4 litres of gear oil he'd nicked from work - that did the trick apparently, at least for long enough to enable him to flog it.

[Richard_FM]

I've heard to filling engines up with heavy oil to quieten a rattle, but often these are caused by things like water pumps &  the heavy oil ends up putting too much strain on the engine.

Supposedly a lot of Volvo 440s were scrapped because they ate their clutches after 10-15 years, & a replacement was an engine-out job that would normally write them off.

 

[sierraman]

Saw a funny one today, a Fiesta 1.6 diesel as it goes, the ad said ‘sometimes goes into limp home mode if you floor it but it’s never bothered me, in fact it encourages you to drive gently given how much fuel costs at the moment...’

What sort of arsehole do these people take prospective buyers for? 🤣

[camryv6]

1 hour ago, sierraman said:

Saw a funny one today, a Fiesta 1.6 diesel as it goes, the ad said ‘sometimes goes into limp home mode if you floor it but it’s never bothered me, in fact it encourages you to drive gently given how much fuel costs at the moment...’

What sort of arsehole do these people take prospective buyers for? 🤣

Have you got his number........................................erm asking for a friend

[Out Run]

I was once unfortunate enough to acquire a 1.9 dti Laguna, as part of a deal. The POS decided to drop its gearbox out of the engine bay, so after bodging it with a length of timber and a ratchet strap, enough to be able to kinda close the bonnet and tow it home, I retapped the threads and - it done it again. I had it Helicoiled, next time. Sorted.

Only issue was, the tripod joint on the driveshaft fell apart and I lost some of the needle bearings. Chucked it back together and sold it with a 'wheel imbalance'. I reckon the true cause of that vibration may never have been discovered.

[Boycie]

The mk1 Laguna was near indestructible ...the mk2 fell apart driving off the transporter into the showroom !! 

[maxxo]

11 hours ago, Boycie said:

The mk1 Laguna was near indestructible ...the mk2 fell apart driving off the transporter into the showroom !! 

maybe that's why i want one?

[Zelandeth]

12 hours ago, Boycie said:

The mk1 Laguna was near indestructible ...the mk2 fell apart driving off the transporter into the showroom !! 

Except for the front wheel bearings which were made of cheese.

[The_Equalizer]

Great thread for creating a list of who not to buy a car from.

[Datsuncog]

On 6/12/2022 at 9:17 AM, Boycie said:

The mk1 Laguna was near indestructible ...

So near...

...yet so far.

In fairness, this one had been badly bodged by its previous owner, and I hadn't twigged just how badly. 

Aquatic pipe, lino offcuts and jubilee clips do not, it transpires, equate to the manufacturer designed oil breather system. Who knew?

[Out Run]

1 hour ago, The_Equalizer said:

Great thread for creating a list of who not to buy a car from.

Don't worry. The real bodgers will be staying quiet, for that reason. 😅

[The_Equalizer]

5 hours ago, Out Run said:

Don't worry. The real bodgers will be staying quiet, for that reason. 😅

And I now feel like the council's noise abatement office who has just shut down a good party. 

Anyway, a couple to get the ball rolling again.

Current Land Rover, the engine of which was a bit more noisy than it should have been when purchased. Turned out to be a head gasket that had been put on the wrong way round which then blocked the water ways the rear two cylinders. The temperature sender is at the front so, although nothing registered on the temperature gauge, the rear part of the engine cooked itself. The was done by a well know Land Rover specialist- bill on file as they say.

Another was a C-Class Mercedes. The rear two after market alloys being held on by no more two turns of wheel studs that were too short.

Oh, the the one owner car that actually had five.

[Dead_E23]

Just to raise the bar back to 'horrendous', the motor trader friend I mentioned above once bought a Metro that had been in a BIG side impact with a motorcycle that had completely smashed in the driver's side of the car.

He tacked a cover sill over the buckled one, held a door into the aperture and tack welded it into position then put a big baggy seat cover on the driver's seat to conceal the buckled floorpan.

Into the auction it went, with 'drivers door does not open' in the description.

[5speedracer]

On 6/9/2022 at 8:29 PM, Boycie said:

Update on the Merc Gle , new mirror assembly had 9 parts Inc a camera , all in its £1300 plus fitting ....£1300 for a door mirror , I've a brand new Merc c300 delivered new faulty , just been told it needs a new front camera ....it's out of stock and not expected to be in stock till August , on better news my company car of the week a fiesta ecoboost hybrid has just had a service , there a cracking wee car when the engines not going bang 

A neighbour has had her Merc GLA off the road for about 3 months now waiting on a mirror assembly, on at least her 3rd courtesy car now.

[St.Jude]

A friend of mine works at JLR in Solihull, and was telling me that after the cars come off the production line they go for a shake down around the factory. Mix of town and “spirited” country lane driving.

There are some though who take it too “spirited” down those roads, and end up scratching and scraping the paint as they go too far in to the roadside bushes and brambles on the drive. I think a few have also had their wing mirrors smashed.

What do they do? Well instead of parking them near where they are meant to be, they park them at the other end of the car park which is host to a few skips. They then hand the keys in saying they couldn’t get a parking space any closer to the office.

[busmansholiday]

Rear brake shoes missing and a slight* mod to the hydraulic system.

Oh, and why use a split pin when a nail will do ?

Both on the Matiz I bought last year.