Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Clive Ansell — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 14:34:19 GMT

Plus, they are not limited to BMW's, any make or age of car can be catered for. In addition they specialise in draining central heating oil tanks too!

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Bob Russell — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 14:01:53 GMT

Cackers here! (very non-PC smiley) and I bet they can drain the tank in a fraction of the time BMW can! (even more non-PC smiley).

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Arlo Guthrie — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 10:50:17 GMT

[quote user="Clive Ansell"] There are some gypos pitched up near to where I live, they routinely do it for nothing![/quote]

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Hannah Wynne Richards — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 10:48:21 GMT

Now , now Clive Gypos is most non-PC

Wynne

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Clive Ansell — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 10:30:49 GMT

There are some gypos pitched up near to where I live, they routinely do it for nothing!

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Arlo Guthrie — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 10:15:27 GMT

Apoplectic now. My car had been taken to BMW in Bath, who quoted £500 for draining the tank. Out of curiousity, I rang Salisbury BMW, who for the exact same job quoted £300.

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Evelyn Barbour-Hill — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 00:42:36 GMT

Third daughter and boyfriend skiing in the Dolomites at Christmas.

Car (diesel) would not start after long skiing day..... would fire a couple of times then die. Boyfriend manages to get it to run for long enough to finally die in the car park entrance......... much Italian horn honking and arm waving. Finally they get a push out on to the road. Now boyfriend has flattened the battery too. Fuel gauge showing one-eighth full. Heck! Everyone round here uses special low-temperature diesel, we've still got the ordinary stuff (not sure about that) maybe it's waxed up. Call the Italian AA equivalent (third daughter is a member). They are not like our own dear AA! Three blokes turn up, stand around, mutter, no attempt to fix anything. Chief bloke says "have you got a lighter?" Eh?!! The Italian AA man was seriously suggesting setting fire to the car and claiming insurance. Some fags are smoked. Then one of the others suggests putting some petrol in the tank. Daughter and boyfriend not happy with that, think they will keep it as last resort. Boyfriend has bright idea at last: walk to garage and get a gallon of diesel, put that in tank. Persuade AA men to use jump leads since battery still flat. Car starts fine. You have guessed it: the fuel gauge thingy had frozen up and they had simply run out of fuel.......

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Wren — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 18:24:49 GMT

[quote user="Mark Hedberg"]Avoid main dealers like the plague. Your repairs are subsidizing their shiny showroom, legion of salespeople, and keeping a dozen cars up for test drives. Not to mention keeping all those new cars sitting on the showroom floor that need constant cleaning from customers and tire-kickers all day.

Just go to a full time garage. Much better value for money.

[/quote]

I've just been to a BMW garage to get some bodywork done on my car (non-BMW but insurance job and nearest bodyshop). It was fantastic: leather armchairs, up-to-date copies of The Field and Country Life to peruse, china cups and saucers of whichever hot beverage you prefer and Chopin tinkling unobtrusively in the background. Oh, and they gave me a Mini Cooper to play with for a week - fun, if impractical.

Ah, I see your point!

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Rob Reid — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 10:45:32 GMT

[quote user="alex gough"]apparently RAV4s never breakdown,[/quote]

I beg to differ - I had one when I used to be in mixed practice, cost me a few hundred quid when the sync mesh went in the gear box. Technically I suppose it wasn't a breakdown as you could still drive the car, just meant that everytime you went into 5th if you didn't physcially hold gear lever in the 5th gear slot, it would pop back into neutral.

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Alex Gough — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 10:29:23 GMT

I've done it twice although in neither case did the car suffer ill effects (once is unfortunate twice is carelessness?). I thought it was much worse putting diesel in a petrol car than vice versa?

As for idiot of the year, try this:

I went to Birmingham last year to see a rock concert, and made the foolish mistake of wearing glasses instead of contact lenses when in the crowd at the front. I got knocked over on the second song in the general melee and lost a shoe, and by the time I had found it and stood up, I realised I could no longer see properly. I looked down and somewhere under the leaping feet were my glasses. I made my way out blindly to the hotel room to get my car keys, then had to locate my car in the car park in the dark without my glasses. I found my spare pair of glasses which were 20 years old, but were probably better suited to the 70s, and got to watch the end of the concert from the back.

The next day I drove home and the oil light came on, so I stopped at a garage to get oil. There was a cap next to the dipstick saying dont open when hot, so I put the oil in here but it only took about 250ml, so I rang the Toyota garage to ask what I had done, and they said I had put the oil in the engine coolant!

After some discussion with the AA as to whether they were going to charge me for being an idiot, they came out and drained it for free. In my defence, the guy who came out didnt know what he was coming for, and he said he had been talking to a colleague on the way down, trying to work out what was wrong with my car because apparently RAV4s never breakdown, and his colleague said, well last week I had someone put oil in the coolant system. And the oil cap isn't at all obvious (hidden in a gloomy recess, with oil in small letters embossed black on black).

Still, was an interesting 24 hours

Alex

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Gina Dungworth — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 10:23:05 GMT

I've never put the wrong fuel in a car yet (touch wood), although one friend has put petrol in her diesel Discovery at least twice that I know of. Dad managed to put diesel in one of the 1920s Humbers last year: on the way back from a weekend rally, so he had the excuse of being tired. He reckons he'd have got home (about 20 miles) if they hadn't stopped off to eat, but as it was they had to phone a friend for a tow and then deal with the problem in the morning.

Re main dealers: Porsche dealers can beremarkably helpful if you wander in wanting an obscure part for a 1985 924. I've had them charge me list price for something so small that it then cost more than that to post it to me! I still phone round Europarts,GSF, etc if I want anything too big to go in the regular post though (and they've come out cheaper in the past than what the little local garage were going to charge me for the same parts).

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Rob Reid — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 10:11:48 GMT

[quote user="Arlo Guthrie"]

[quote user="robloxley"] The AA will send out a van and do the draining at the roadside. Couple of hundred for members and a bit more for non-members. Obviously if it's under warranty then you may be stuck with having to use a main dealer.[/quote]

Wish I'd known that at the time!

Car now comfortably outside the warranty - the only reason I use a main dealer is because I reckon they're the only ones that understand their own cars these days. Also, I think it probably looks better when you come to sell if all the work has been done by a main dealer.

Still, 500 nicker is hard to stomach.

[/quote]

You don't need to use main dealers now to keep your warranty vaild. Any garage that carries a legal stamp can be used provided they use the correct parts. This changed a couple of years ago to stop main dealers from fleecing customers with their labour charges in order to 'keep their warranty.'

I avoid main dealers like the plague - I am lucky enough to have a friend who is a mechanic so I get parts at wholesale price through him and he charges me a far more reasonable rate for his time (as long as I throw in a case of beer!) I also reckon he is a far better mechanic as he is used to working on lots of different types of car - including classics. The only advantage main dealers sometimes have is having the right computer set-up to diagnose faults on the most modern cars (though in saying that my mate has a similar machine that works for most things including my Mazda.)

As a general rule, main dealers are extortionate - they charge ridiculous mark-ups for parts, charge you for things that don't need done (I had one try to charge me £5 for screen wash after I had topped it up the day before) and think nothing of charging you ridiculous amounts for labour.

Hmmm wait I've heard some of those comments before.....

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Mark Hedberg — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 09:22:18 GMT

I bet it sure didn't stick to the pan!

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Hannah Wynne Richards — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 09:20:44 GMT

Not done that one,my siliest mistake recently was to mix lemon washing upliquid upfor olive oil-and try frying salmon in it -definitely not tobe recomended

Wynne

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Dagmar Steele — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 09:12:57 GMT

agree agree agree!

Just go to a full time garage. Much better value for money.

[/quote]

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Mark Hedberg — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 09:10:20 GMT

Avoid main dealers like the plague. Your repairs are subsidizing their shiny showroom, legion of salespeople, and keeping a dozen cars up for test drives. Not to mention keeping all those new cars sitting on the showroom floor that need constant cleaning from customers and tire-kickers all day.

Just go to a full time garage. Much better value for money.

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Arlo Guthrie — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 08:21:30 GMT

Wish I'd known that at the time!

Still, 500 nicker is hard to stomach.

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

vs0u — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 23:14:18 GMT

I put £46 worth of petrol in my diesel just before christmas, then drove it till it broke down 9 miles later. (I thought I might make it home, having been fine with about 10 litres petrol in it before) 'fuelflush.com' (manchester area - highly recommended) came and pumped it out for £150. It started straight away and has been fine since. They told me diesels are always ok after they have been pumped. I think the dealers like to con people into paying for extra stuff.

The annoying thing was that as it was snowy none of the recovery services would come out and the police ended up towing it off the clearway - for another £150...

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Anthony Todd — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 22:40:34 GMT

Get onto pistonheads.com. Many will give you good advice, particularly on BMWs and comment on Porsche engines' needing rebuilds.......

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Rob Loxley — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 19:34:27 GMT

The AA will send out a van and do the draining at the roadside. Couple of hundred for members and a bit more for non-members. Obviously if it's under warranty then you may be stuck with having to use a main dealer.

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

bob lehner — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 19:16:03 GMT

Not a very exclusive club to belong to !

I did it just after moving to France. I had bought a LHD diesel and proceeded to fill it with unleaded. Fortunately I realised what had happened and didn't start the engine - but did have the problem of sorting it out in a strange place and in a foreign language. Fortunately the local garage was superb and had it sorted within the hour at a very modest cost. The garagiste just gave a very Gallic shrug and muttered darkly about 'Les Anglais.....'

'BMW main dealer' - aaagh - says it all !

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Michael Woodhouse — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 19:08:03 GMT

It was common before winter diesel came along to add up to 25% petrol to your diesel in winter to prevent 'waxing'. We would still do it on the farm I used to work on if really cold temperatures were forecast.

The diesel engine [even in a modern car] is surprisingly unfussy - it would run on chip fat happily.

A few litres won't make any difference. I know a mechanic who drains people's tanks then put the fuel in their own car! It's not a problem

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Gillian Mostyn — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 18:59:15 GMT

hahahahaha - very quick!

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Robert Whiteford — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 18:51:50 GMT

[quote user="Gillian Mostyn"].but they did have to row it away[/quote]

That's cause the engine was flooded.......??

Re: Idiot of the Year Award 2011

Gillian Mostyn — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 18:44:11 GMT

It IS much worse to put petrol in a diesel engine than the other way round - odd though that seems. Petrol is a solvent and basically causes the engine to seize - you can even have to replace the engine if you put enough in and then run the car for a while...

My mum used the wrong pump when I was with her - luckily she realised as she was replacing it so didn't turn the engine on. Also luckily her breakdown cover does coer this .....but they did have to row it away and drop us off home...!!! Cost her about £50 plus the wasted fuel....car was back the next day.