Get that air moving again. One common problem on a lot of modern cars is a lack of air flow through the vents and even burnt out fan motors. This can be down to the all too often forgotten pollen filter. This little filter sits in the ventilation system and as it says, filters out the pollen and dust drawn into the car. These tend to get blocked and need regular changing otherwise the fan is trying to work a bit like a hoover with a full bag. When put in they look crisp and bright white, when removed, well you can see for yourself.

Feeling very chuffed tonight. After a little while of keeping secrets, we have appeared on Car Sos tonight. Tim and Fuzz picked up a Citroen DS from france and bought it back to the UK to be worked on. During its work, Tim visited the workshop and we sorted them out with some hydraulic parts to get the old DS back into shape. It waa a good few hours filming with the crew that visited and a fun day with a serious end to it. The show was on National Geographic channel tonight.

Its springtime........ Well its often springtime in the workshop for Simon, as spring happens all year round. We get a lot of these to do and often get asked to replace just the broken one. Our answer is and will always be a firm no, it just doesn’t make sense to replace a single spring as the other side will be a worn spring whilst the replacement, nice and new and the suspension would be dangerous. We will only replace springs in pairs. So far, nobody has disagreed with us on this and is happy to have the job done correctly.

So we often get asked the question, when is the best time to change a cambelt? The answer is, the day before it breaks, but unfortunately we dont know when that is! We also get asked to inspect the belt and the answer is, we cant because it can often look fine in the part that you can see, but may not be fine all round. This one below was on a car that came in on a low loader, the engine stopped and would not restart. On inspection, the belt was on and looked fine in the top cover but the lack of compression told us that a problem was there. On removal it was found that the belt had stripped its teeth causing the same symptoms as a snapped belt. Most engines will suffer catastrophic failure when the belt has gone but it is sometimes worth just re timing the engine and fitting another belt, in this case the car started and a compression test proved that all is fine. One lucky customer.

Simons puzzle......... So this car comes in from the village favourite private hire company 5 Star private hire, has the engine management light on and is not quite running right. The diagnostic gives a fault of the EGR valve, a fairly common fault. Now the puzzle begins, in order to remove the EGR valve first the exhaust manifold and DPF filter is in the way, so to take thse off, the steering rack is in the way, to get this off, the subframe is in the way. So with a pile of bits on the floor, the offending EGR valve is replaced and then the car is put back together. A lot of work for what on most cars is less than an hours work.

We do service and repair all vehicles from the old to new and the odd ones!!

Clever boy Simon.. This Volvo came in with running problems, it had a mind of its own and would rev up on its own at random timesand sometimes cut out too. First stop these days is to put the scanner on and see what codes come up, some random codes to do with the electronic throttle pedal were present so Simon checks the connections but is not convinced that this is the real problem. Further investigations under the carpet reveal several wires that had been rubbing and had rubbed through the insulation, shorting these out and maybe this was the cause. A fix up involving soldering in some longer wire insured that this would not happen again. Simon dissapers on a test drive and comes back to the workshop with a big smile. Clever Simon.

Sphere sphere sphere. Ever wondered what kind of magic is inside? Well not a lot really, just a diaphragm and nitrogen and in the case of the accumulator below, a non return valve. This one below is the brake accumulator as fitted to the Citroen DS and SM. They arrive in various states of not working and as you can see, it is normally down to the diaphragm has had its day. These spheres are stripped down, cleaned and a new diaphragm fitted, they are then charged to full pressure before being painted and returned.

One of Phil’s regular jobs. The Rolls Royce front active ride strut, these struts are sent in on a regular basis, Phil works his magic hands over them and they go back, better than new for another life rather than being binned and new units bought. Cheaper and better for the environment.

A very dirty and rough looking steering rack from an old DS came in for reconditioning, sometimes these can take ages just to get clean enough to start on. The racks get totally stripped down to the last washer before being cleaned and inspected, all worn parts are replaced before being rebuilt using a new seal kit and gaiters, then its test and paint before being returned for fitting back on the car.

A very nice Citroen BX came in for quite a bit of work as it had been standing around for a while off road, one of the major problems was quite a bit of water in the oil. New head gasket fitted along with a cambelt and water pump. This old girl has a new lease of life.

Timeline Photos

Simon has used up all his cleverness for this morning. A new customer phoned us as he had decided to change his flow plugs on his car. This is a fairly simple job that can be done in the driveway by most with a minimal amount of knowledge. unfortunatly for him, the last glow plug was seized in and it snapped, this can result in having to remove the cylinder head. Simon gets to work and is not troubled by this, as you can see the glow plug comes out end all the bits are there meaning that nothing is rattling about inside the engine. A tricky job that took a while, but still quicker and cheaper than removing the cylinder head. We have made a new friend.