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A cautionary tale .....

Passion, instruction, buying, care, maintenance and more, any form of vehicle discussion is welcome here
MonsterMork
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A cautionary tale .....

#152743

Postby MonsterMork » July 16th, 2018, 8:18 pm

Had a chap drive up to the workshop today, parks up and walks in, asks if we can have a quick look at his wife's car as it's making a squealing noise from the back end and he reckons it might need new pads. Apprentice goes out, has a quick nose, and yes, needs pads mate, we knew this from the racket as you drove past us! No prob says customer, book me in for next week. Gets in and tries to drive off. Gets about two inches and bang, going nowhere, not forwards, not backwards, not sideways, up or down, ain't moving a micron. Apprentice goes out to look. Ah, there's your problem! Pads are so stuffed one of them has actually fallen out and jammed the wheel solid.

Well, needless to say customer ain't going anywhere like that! So now I have to remove the wheels and brakes outside in the car park just to get the stuffed pad out so we can then push it into the workshop :evil:

Gets it on the ramp, wheels off again, strip off brakes (needless to say half the bolts were seized), to find that the brake pad was non-existant and half the backing metal missing, and a full 50% of the brake disc worn clean away as if it had been put in a lathe :o I'm not joking here, I have never come across a worse set of brakes :o

Wifey reckons its been squealing for a while, said customer, but she ignored it and just turned the stereo up a bit more. :roll:

New discs and pads on the back end and customer goes away 220 quid lighter to have a quiet word with the wife :x And he will probably need new calipers at 250 quid each in the very near future, and new front brakes as well, so about 800 quid all in, on top of what he has just spent, all because wifey ignored the noise.

So what is the cautionary thing about this then, I hear you ask? Think about it. His brakes exploded and jammed at one mile per hour in the car park. What would have happened if they had gone bang when braking for a bend, roundabout, other traffic etc? Or worse, having to do an emergency stop for a kiddie running out into the traffic? It would have speared him off into the scenery, or a bus queue, or oncoming traffic, that's what. :shock:

Well I have news for you good folks out there in Lemon Land, many brake pads (though not all) have a thing called a squealer on them, wot is designed to start making a racket when the pads are low and need changing! When you start hearing a squeal from the brakes, head to your nearest car fixers and get the chuffin' things sorted immediately, if not sooner, lest you end up spearing off into the scenery or worse, killing someone other than yourself.

MM

redsturgeon
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Re: A cautionary tale .....

#152744

Postby redsturgeon » July 16th, 2018, 8:39 pm

How was this car getting through the MOT?

John

Redmires
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Re: A cautionary tale .....

#152770

Postby Redmires » July 16th, 2018, 10:24 pm


MonsterMork
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Re: A cautionary tale .....

#152771

Postby MonsterMork » July 16th, 2018, 10:26 pm

John[/quote]

No idea! New customer, so never been tested by us. Don't know when it was last tested.

Mind you it is entirely possible to drive away from an MoT and, say, stuff your suspension on the way home having hit a pothole, but as far as the law is concerned it has a valid MoT for the next 12 months. The only time the law will be interested is if you have an accident and the vehicle is then examined and found to have buggered shocks as a contributing factor in the crash, or you get pulled over either by plod or by DVSA/VOSA for a roadside check (more common on vans and wagons than cars, but it does happen).

Remember people, just because a vehicle has an MoT doesn't mean it is still fine, say, 8 months down the line. The onus is on YOU, the DRIVER, and not necessarily the actual OWNER (company car drivers, for example), to make sure that the vehicle you are driving is in a roadworthy condition. An unsafe/unroadworthy/dangerous vehicle gets the DRIVER the points and big fines. If the owner is not the driver then they will usually only get a small fine for allowing an unsafe vehicle to be driven. This is also why anyone taking a vehicle for an MoT is called the Presenter, not the Owner, and any queries about the vehicle from the tester have to be made to the Presenter, not the Owner.

MonsterMork
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Re: A cautionary tale .....

#152772

Postby MonsterMork » July 16th, 2018, 10:29 pm

Redmires wrote:It wasn't this car, was it ?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-norfolk-44819316


You are correct, it wasn't :D Saw that story, and sometimes I wish we were allowed to have a shotgun as part of our MoT tools :lol:


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