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Do you service your own car or take it to a Garage?


Butch

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What about things like manufacturers warranty and maintaining the value of specialist cars - I was always led to believe that any servicing/repair work carried out on a vehicle that was not done by a main dealership/recognised specialist would invalidate any manufacturers warranty.

Also having owned many specialist performance cars if you did'nt have servicing/repair work carried out by manufacturers/specialists there used car value would plummet.

Obviously as an Aircraft fitter by trade i would carry out ALL work on my cars when i did'nt have the money to pay a garage, thankfully those days are long gone. 

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mt bro seriesescortrs completely orignal he bought did a few jobs to get it back on road after it sat in garage for 5 yrs after owner passed away.went to replace the rotten battery tray which is come on these cars.next minute interior is out engine out suspension is off the car is flip on its side with help of 2 stands.he stripped the underside repaired any rotten areas properly photoed all the work.resealed it all in garage and painted it,went it to paint shop to have all the bottom repainted cost £900 then took another 2 years slowly putting it all back together even sent bolts off for plating.did nothing to engine just had turned every couple of months so it no sieze up.got it back together connected up all pipes primes it all check everything and fired up straight way.he did have it up for sale on pistonheads for about 8 months for shy of 40grand  took a deposit for it till he found a noble m12.but he changed jobs earning more so he decided to keep it now as there is no signs of a noble m12 he wants out there.he uses most weekends when weather is good.has all the bills for everythign he has spent on it since he bought it for £5000 and the price is still going up for these as there is not many out there which are still standard from day they left factory

62419683_10161846966080483_5636926911352406016_n.jpg

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4 hours ago, Pumpuynarak said:

What about things like manufacturers warranty and maintaining the value of specialist cars - I was always led to believe that any servicing/repair work carried out on a vehicle that was not done by a main dealership/recognised specialist would invalidate any manufacturers warranty.

Also having owned many specialist performance cars if you did'nt have servicing/repair work carried out by manufacturers/specialists there used car value would plummet.

Obviously as an Aircraft fitter by trade i would carry out ALL work on my cars when i did'nt have the money to pay a garage, thankfully those days are long gone. 

Apparently you can do the work yourself these days and not invalidate the warranty, just keep the receipt for the parts.

In the past you had to have it dealer service.

Something to do with a change in customer rights or law's.

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1 hour ago, galenkia said:

Apparently you can do the work yourself these days and not invalidate the warranty, just keep the receipt for the parts.

In the past you had to have it dealer service.

Something to do with a change in customer rights or law's.

In the US car manufactures might be seeing the handwriting on the wall based on lawsuits John Deere is facing.

Deere Right-to-Repair Lawsuits Grow

What started as a single lawsuit in Illinois against John Deere over the right to repair farm equipment has now spread like wildfire to three additional states, prompting Deere to ask a federal court in Illinois to transfer all the cases to that state.
...
All the cases alleged the company violated the Sherman Act and seek damages for farmers who paid for repairs from John Deere dealers beginning on Jan. 12, 2018, to the present.
...
The right to repair increasingly has become an issue in agriculture and other industries with state legislatures introducing bills in at least 32 states, including bills in 21 states in 2021. The state of Nebraska may become the first state legislature to vote on legislation this year.

Equipment manufacturers currently will not allow farmers the hardware or software needed to diagnose a problem, much less repair it. So, dealers must send their teams out to the field to diagnose a problem and likely order parts, then come back out to make the repairs. There may be other complications with repairs.
...

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5 hours ago, thunder367 said:

mt bro seriesescortrs completely orignal he bought did a few jobs to get it back on road after it sat in garage for 5 yrs after owner passed away.went to replace the rotten battery tray which is come on these cars.next minute interior is out engine out suspension is off the car is flip on its side with help of 2 stands.he stripped the underside repaired any rotten areas properly photoed all the work.resealed it all in garage and painted it,went it to paint shop to have all the bottom repainted cost £900 then took another 2 years slowly putting it all back together even sent bolts off for plating.did nothing to engine just had turned every couple of months so it no sieze up.got it back together connected up all pipes primes it all check everything and fired up straight way.he did have it up for sale on pistonheads for about 8 months for shy of 40grand  took a deposit for it till he found a noble m12.but he changed jobs earning more so he decided to keep it now as there is no signs of a noble m12 he wants out there.he uses most weekends when weather is good.has all the bills for everythign he has spent on it since he bought it for £5000 and the price is still going up for these as there is not many out there which are still standard from day they left factory

62419683_10161846966080483_5636926911352406016_n.jpg

Mate of mine in the early 90's had one of those, ended up swapping it for a Renault 5 Turbo 2, the one with the flared arches.

Old girlfriend of mine had the Next gen version,MK 4 I think.

Anything sporty from this era goes for serious dough these days.

Remember a mate buying a Sapphire Cosworth for under four grand around then, were peanut's at the time.

Same my Suzuki RG500, gave 3500 for it on 1989, now a decent ones around 20k. Stroker's go for mad money now.

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My autobody shop-owning friend, who is now 73 and has been doing this since he was a teenager, told me an interesting story a while back; in his youth he worked for our local Chevrolet-Pontiac-Oldsmobile dealership, one of the biggest dealers in town and a full-service place in those days where you could have any part of your car serviced or repaired - engines and transmissions rebuilt, in-house body shop, etc. Anyway, he said that in the early '70s a General Motors rep came up to visit and they gathered all of the employees together for a pep talk by this fellow who informed them that the ultimate goal of GM was to make the cars so complicated and technically advanced that the average owner, or small service station/mechanical shop would not be able to repair them anymore and they'd have to bring the vehicles into the dealer. It seems to me that they've largely managed to accomplish this, even if it did take them decades - think of how you can't even lift a battery cable off of most new vehicles without having to pay a dealer for a code to restart them again,  and too many smaller parts are only available as a larger assembly, usually for an inflated cost - be thankful that there's anything we can do anymore on our vehicles. 

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I put petrol in mine , that's as far as I go ...

 

when I was 17 , my mate just got his first car , a 2nd hand Austin Allegro , one day it started overheating, so he decided to put some water in the radiator... only he wasn't sure which one it was.. so I watched as he took the cap off and put loads of water in .. it was still overheating though , so we pulled into a garage to ask advice ... turns out we had put the water into the engine.. when they drained it , it came out looking like custard ... 🙂 

 

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I used to do all the jobs on my cars no matter what was needed. Access to a lift and tools made the job easier. These days I hardly do anything, I have an electrical problem to sort when I get home from Canada,  but fairly confident it may be my alternator at fault. If it is I will get the local garage to swop it out. If it's the battery,  then I will fit it myself. 

 

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On 6/11/2022 at 6:24 PM, Butch said:

Haven't heard "panel beater" in a few years Gal!.

Goes back to the days of tin lead filling, panel repair and metal working, welding in, linishing or flap disc and then making good. Nowadays it's "Bodywork technicians".

There's a shortage of panel beaters these days, as it's just a matter of jigging the body straight and replacing said panels, rather than repair, welding, flatting and fillers. Traditional skilled panel beaters can make some very good money.

Mate always told me, "a good sprayer / panel beater will spray to a good finish, a bad one will cut back to it".

 

This video takes me back, though used an older version of this jig. Loved doing the heavy stuff rather than the smaller damage job's.

 

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In my younger days I used to do just about everything,stripped a Norton Commando engine down to the big ends in my parents coal shed & changed a couple of clutches in the street outside their house among loads of other shit.

I did all the routine stuff on my Harley & when I upgraded the front brakes to Harrison Billet did it myself.But my engine upgrades I got the pro's to do.I had problems with leaking bleed nipples & dowels rubbing the forks with the brakes & all I could think of was for an extra few bob I wouldn't have these problems.

I don't touch our cars,my MB is coming up to 12yo & goes to an indie of very good repute & my wife's Nissan is 10yo & goes to a local garage.Any bodywork needs doing my next door neighbour has a bodyshop so he gets our business.

I spent my working life fixing aircraft & after a while doing similar shit in my spare time became very tiresome,plus of course modern cars are not designed to be maintained by old farts like me.

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37 minutes ago, coxyhog said:

In my younger days I used to do just about everything,stripped a Norton Commando engine down to the big ends in my parents coal shed & changed a couple of clutches in the street outside their house among loads of other shit.

I did all the routine stuff on my Harley & when I upgraded the front brakes to Harrison Billet did it myself.But my engine upgrades I got the pro's to do.I had problems with leaking bleed nipples & dowels rubbing the forks with the brakes & all I could think of was for an extra few bob I wouldn't have these problems.

I don't touch our cars,my MB is coming up to 12yo & goes to an indie of very good repute & my wife's Nissan is 10yo & goes to a local garage.Any bodywork needs doing my next door neighbour has a bodyshop so he gets our business.

I spent my working life fixing aircraft & after a while doing similar shit in my spare time became very tiresome,plus of course modern cars are not designed to be maintained by old farts like me.

Remember the days me and a mate used to rebuild our engine's in our bedrooms lol.

Two strokes were a doddle mostly, but my RG500 was a four cylinder stroker so went in the shop when I blew it up twice.

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43 minutes ago, galenkia said:

Remember the days me and a mate used to rebuild our engine's in our bedrooms lol.

Two strokes were a doddle mostly, but my RG500 was a four cylinder stroker so went in the shop when I blew it up twice.

Yeah, I remember rebuilding a Honda motorbike engine on my kitchen table once...

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Used to in the days of Haynes manuals. But now just give to a garage I trust. 

 

Remember getting my gf to pump the brakes, when changing rubbers on brake master cylinder. Getting a dynamo from the scrapyard etc.. cheap and enjoyable. (Then)

Edited by john1000
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1 hour ago, maipenrai said:

Yeah, I remember rebuilding a Honda motorbike engine on my kitchen table once...

Used mum's chest freezer in the garage as a surface plate to check for straightness more than once....!

One time was on the shaft through the centre of an A+ series distributor.  Despite our best efforts, it was never dead straight... which was fine as long as we remembered to check and adjust the points when cylinder 2 or 4 was tdc... if it was 1 or 3 she ran as lumpy as anything...!

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1 minute ago, Painter said:

Used mum's chest freezer in the garage as a surface plate to check for straightness more than once....!

One time was on the shaft through the centre of an A+ series distributor.  Despite our best efforts, it was never dead straight... which was fine as long as we remembered to check and adjust the points when cylinder 2 or 4 was tdc... if it was 1 or 3 she ran as lumpy as anything...!

Been a long while since adjusting the tappets. LOL

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1 hour ago, john1000 said:

Used to in the days of Haynes manuals. But now just give to a garage I trust. 

 

Remember getting my gf to pump the brakes, when changing rubbers on brake master cylinder. Getting a dynamo from the scrapyard etc.. cheap and enjoyable. (Then)

Scrapyards are history now you have eBay.

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47 minutes ago, boydeste said:

Been a long while since adjusting the tappets. LOL

Yup. Last time was on a 1980's boat diesel a few years ago... it only had 2 (single pot) so was easy to tell if the gap was too big.... you could hear them!

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8 hours ago, Jambo said:

Thai's have the right idea as their cars never need any servicing.

They just get the monk to bless the vehicle and write a short prayer on the inside of the roof above the driver's head.

I did wonder why some brand new cars had stuff painted or written on the brand new headlining!.

I've been in a few Toyota / Hyundai  Taxis in Manila, asked the driver how often they service their cars, normally the answer is never, or they might get an oil change once every two years. Says a lot for the build quality of the engines, although normally the rest of the car is falling apart

 

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On 6/15/2022 at 5:09 PM, john1000 said:

Remember getting my gf to pump the brakes, when changing rubbers on brake master cylinder. Getting a dynamo from the scrapyard etc.. cheap and enjoyable. (Then)

A bit off topic but when we were in Uvalde I had to run an engine on a BAC 1-11 & do a leak check on it.So I got the missus into the cockpit & instructed her if this light goes red then pull this lever....fortunately it didn't but I was a little bit foolish.

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8 minutes ago, coxyhog said:

A bit off topic but when we were in Uvalde I had to run an engine on a BAC 1-11 & do a leak check on it.So I got the missus into the cockpit & instructed her if this light goes red then pull this lever....fortunately it didn't but I was a little bit foolish.

Wasn't the one under the seat marked "Pull to eject" was it?.🤣🤣🤣

Last BAC1-11 I was close to was the one at Duxford last summer. Lovely Aircraft IMO.

Edited by Butch
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