SLROC Forum

The title has been my feeling for the last 2 days,
Are you sitting comfortably? Then let me begin.........

After having knocked of the hub and caliper replacement on the Disco in just over 2 hours, there I was all chuffed with myself, good job, well done, (looking back now it was suspiciously staright forward, none of the usual Landy issues,you know what I mean, that one, siezed, rounded off bolt/nut combo that turns a 30 minute job into a 4 hour test of endurance type thing.)   
Driving back from the workshop, off up to the stables, the brake pedal started to feel a wee bit spongy, hmmm I thought, still some air in the system, I'll have a look at it once I'm at the stables, possibly bleed it again, didn't seem too bad though, checked all the nuts and bolts on the front caliper were tight, yup no issues there it seemed. Hmm I thought again, so I stopped for fuel, to notice a huge pool of fluid under the car as I returned from paying, on further inspection the spongy brake pedal revealed itself as the complete failure of the rear n/s brake pipe, totally shot, rusty and corroded through, which is kinda odd as it was only MOT'd at the end of April and nothing was mentioned, anyway, got it recovered back to the workshop, both rear pipes replaced front to rear tonight, whilst it was up on the ramp I thought I'd have a wee look at the n/s front bearing, to find it was in an even worse state than the one I'd just replaced on the o/s side, which had an advisory at it's MOT, with no mention of the n/s!

Soooooooo, the car is off the road, the n/s bearing is way too dodgy to attempt running it until the new hub arrives, so off I tootle to hire a car, nearest place is Edinburgh Airport, take my dads car there, follow the signs for the car park, I'm corraled into the express car park, as the drop off area is no good, bimble up to the car hire place, pick up the car, off tootles the mrs in it, I wander back to my dads car, all the paperwork etc. having taken, oh, no more than 20 minutes, to be charged ?26 b***dy quid for the privelidge, grrrrrr! Turns out the signs for the short term car park are pretty small, and obscure, and are not visible from the direction I entered from, so to cut a very long and no doubt boring tale I've managed to spend nearly ?800 in 2 days doing 2 hub bearings, a caliper and 2 brake lines. So I'm just a wee bit frustrated and pee'd off at the minute, but I'm sure there are a lot of folk a lot worse off than I am just now so maybe I shouldn't be, I do love my Land Rovers but some times they can really test the limits of your patience!

Here endeth the rant, and thanks for listening!

 
Lol that did make me smile i bet you feel much better you got that off your chest.
Know how you feel my newly converted 110 is deciding now it has a new engine its gona break evrything else. Last night the front propshaft stripped its splines. Week befor that the door locks decided they wont work.The list grows .Its why i put hammers well out of reach...
Deffiantly a love hate relationship with landys

Hi,

The guy over the road form me is building a 90 on a galv chassis. He thinks Land Rover ownership is an illness that has no cure.

Geoff

Agree with you on that one Geoff!!!

After all my old girl went through last year after getting smashed into, to now be grounded due to a broken chassis, would probably be enough to send any sane non-landy person off the edge.. ..!!!!...but then if your not a landy person, you cant possibly be sane!!!!

Rural Rebel-hope you get your Disco back on the road soon.

Scott-ALL hammers are banned from within a 20 yard radius of the Goddess!!! 

Haha yeah felt better last night after my wee rant, thanks Truckster, it should be back on the road this weekend, after the n/s hub is done, that is of course until the next thing breaks/falls off/catches fire etc!

All my friends think I'm mad, I keep being told to get rid of it but I just can't, because when she's good, she's brilliant but she's a fickle beast lol!

Cheers guys, I don't feel quite as if I'm the only one frustrated by the green oval!

No dont get rid of it BUT I would take a wee run thru to the tw*t that mot'd it and take your anger out on him, the thing with brakes is you only find out they are broke when you hit the pedal coz you need to. this could have turned out bad had you not seen the fluid under the truck.

Very true,
But,
That professional that checked your vehicle
 & put the owners & the general publics life at risk
is seeing a vehicle once a year for 45 mins.
He does have to answer for his actions tho.
(the get out is always 'that the check is to the minimum requirement at the time of the examination'.)

The home mechanic that can replace Wheel bearings & Calipers has a fair degree of responsibility
as well tho..
A very great requirement to ensure the vehicle is always in a safe condition.

If doing home maintenance
they have the vehicle 24/7 all year around.
Can slide underneath & inspect it anytime they like.

IMHO that person should know their vehicle inside out & all its faults & requirements.
'Was the vehicle not checked over properly before being put in for a MOT test?'
& then action taken about the advisories, & the vehicle looked at underneath in the next month?

Just being Devils Advocate there.
george

yeh you have an arguement there, but the mot tester is there to inspect all safety critical items and to ensure that the vehicle being tested is safe when on the highway when our wives, children, loved ones are sharing the highway with it. Land Rovers must be one of the easiest vehicles to Mot, you can see every bit of it you need to test, this tester got it wrong, badly wrong. I would have taken him to task.
home mechanics are like everything else in life, some good, some bad. 

George I agree with some of what you say, I am a qualified ag mechanic though, and do check my vehicle regularly, but I am not an MOT tester, and therefor do not know what standards are required, my method of deciding is that if it looks dodgy, then it probably is, so preventative maintenance needs to be under taken and the part replaced or repaired.

With regard to 'The proffesional that checked your vehicle[sic]is seeing your vehicle once a year for 45 minutes' I'm sorry but thats his job, and as an MOT is a legal requirement then I'm sorry but the onus is on him, as a proffesional, to detect and report faults, irrespective of how well or not maintained the vehicle is by it's owners.

Do you give your vehicles an MOT style check every week? I certainly give it a check over, but I've got neither the time or facilities to do an in depth mechanical survey of my vehicle every week. Therefor I put my trust in the professionals, who's job it is to test and report on my vehicle, the privelidge I'm made to pay for, to do his/her job, and tell me what needs attention, if anything.

The post was meant as a little bit of fun, to ease some frustrations but as usual some people start taking things too seriously, playing 'devils advocate', or as I'm taking it, foisting there superior attitude on others, I could say more but I won't, suffice to say the car will be SAFELY back on the road this weekend.

And further to my last, the MOT tester has been spoken to, as has his boss, very apologetic and want to see the hub and pipes, which they'll be seeing next week, as I've kept them all to support my complaint, so you see, we're not all as stupid as some might think.....

Sorry to upset you.
Nothing to do with superior attitude.
We all like safety & mostly your own & our dearest.

Yes i do check my 4x4 every week if being used offroad, its actually checked several times a day when used offroad..
I do know the condition of my brakes, pads, pipes, hoses etc. on any vehicle i have.

Takes 10 minutes to look & visually check, i just do it while checking tyres & wheel bearings etc..
Thats after the maintance & checks that gets done if its used offroad for any time.
Thats when i check my brake hoses & underneath generally.

If you dont know what corroded brake pipes look like, & you are a qualified mechanic well thats strange,
but lifes strange..
(when did time served & qualified Motor vehicle mechanics start to become qualified to a lesser standard than a MOT tester? (many of whom have less actual qualifications than a working mechanic, Re 'Quik Feet' dancer MOT testers)
& Who serves their time & studies & gets passed without the abilty to visually check a vehicle.
Thankfully i never trust in garage workshops now exept when i know the mechanics ability.)

Please tell me,
 as a trained & qualified mechanic, do you only repair or replace parts that are pointed out to you by a more quailfied mechanic, a sort of super mechanic with an inspection lamp & pointy screwdriver thats sees things ordinery mechanics cant recognise as being in need of replacement or attention?

See i can be less serious & superior.

george

George,

I really don't want to enter into a slanging match over what was meant to be a not too serious post. But I feel I must state one or two points in reply to your last post.

I find the content and the attitudes expressed in your post argumentative, confrontational and offensive, not only do you attack my character, competence as a mechanic and pretty much imply that if I'm not undertaking an MOT level inspection every week then I am not fit to own or run a vehicle, you also degenerate pretty much all mechanics and MOT testers as incompetent and under qualified.

There is more to this story than I've stated in the origional post, but I didn't feel the need to go into both my work and travel habits over the previous 2 years, they aren't anyone's business and certainly aren't any of yours George, maybe you should withhold your opinion until you are fully furnished with all of the facts, but sadly in my experience, I usually find those who express their opinions under the guise of playing ?devil?s advocate? are generally using the term to disguise the fact that they think they are right and everyone else is either stupid or wrong, and think it ok to be rude and offensive in the process, because, of course, they are playing ?devil?s advocate? which obviously makes everything they say ok.

I'm glad that the other forum members took the post for what it was, If I'd know it would degenerate into a character assasination then I wouldn't have bothered, suffice to say I'll think twice in the future.

Now, now, now boys!

Behave and play nicely or this all goes in the electronic dustbin!

Rural rebel, George.
Fancy a pint? (or 2)
Drew