DIY mechanics success stories

[MGJohn]

DuncanM said:

MGJohn said:

By the way, that tidy breaker yard 620 had a recent MoT failure sheet in the glove box. It had failed only on inefficient handbrake. Usually an easy TLC fix....

This makes me sad, I like the 620 and can't believe one would get scrapped for such a small issue

I have seen much better cars thrown away in local yards. These include so called 'prestige' marques with valid six monthe MoTs in the glove box and even six weeks VED Disc on the screens. Unbelievable.

The most guilty being the local "Arthur Daley" used car dealers who taking tidy older cars in part exchange, for various reasons do not see them as "nice little earners" and simply weigh them in for metal scrap value. Not one or two, buy hundreds over the years. I was there one day a few years ago when a dealer drove a low mileage very tidy black MG Montego Turbo into the yard. I started it up whilst the dealer was sorting the papers and the engine was superb and the car near immaculate. Not seen as nice little earner.

I went straight up to the office and made increasingly higher offers for that nice old car. Far in excess of any scrap metal/parts value but, nothing doing. The yard owner explained he had an arrangement with many local dealers to take those older cars in strictly on the basis that they are not resold as complete cars but, broken for spares and the remains going into the crusher. Almost criminal but, that's business.

Very, very wasteful...

[Prolex-UK]

Built a ginetta g27 fitted with a rover v8 in 1997 rebuilt the engine ported head etc was a great car took 7 months

When it fired up the first time the feeling was awesome

[LeeMad]

i had a saxo vtr a few years ago and the gearbox went. with no previous experience with tools i started researching as much as possible and changed it myself. all went well so i thought id have a go at putting a vts engine in, more research and i managed that too.
being stuck in a dead end job in insurance i decided id like to move into mechanics, 2 years part time doing motor vehicle maintenance at college and i was qualified to go to uni to do mechanical engineering. and im now second year degree student.

so a broken gearbox on a crappy little saxo lead me onto a new career path with much better life prospects. success in my eyes

[HustleRussell]

When I got my Caterham in 2009, I had only done servicing work previously. Last month I changed the engine in the paddock at Cadwell park on a Sunday morning in time for a race in the afternoon!

[DuncanM]

LeeMad said:

i had a saxo vtr a few years ago and the gearbox went. with no previous experience with tools i started researching as much as possible and changed it myself. all went well so i thought id have a go at putting a vts engine in, more research and i managed that too.
being stuck in a dead end job in insurance i decided id like to move into mechanics, 2 years part time doing motor vehicle maintenance at college and i was qualified to go to uni to do mechanical engineering. and im now second year degree student.

so a broken gearbox on a crappy little saxo lead me onto a new career path with much better life prospects. success in my eyes

Great story

Someone mentioned earlier how awesome the Internet is for fixing stuff and I have to agree.

Being good at googling a problem is a real skill in itself I reckon

[Andy_sx]

Do as much as possible (which used to be everything until recently)

Started off with a Fiesta with a pretty saggy engine mount, so would munch rad hoses on enthuasiastic starts. Then onto a Bravo which I was a little too heavy handed with, learnt to replace gearboxes and clutches, and had it down to such a fine art, i could do it in a morning with a bacon butty stop and started doing it for people in the owners club for beer tokens, making a decent amount myself and still being 80% cheaper than a garage. Also had to o a full top end rebuild on the first bravo.

Have done engine swaps (NA to a bigger turbo engine) built a kit car and generally try and help familly and friends as much as possible to save them money, plus i enjoy being on the driver with a brew, my tools, a pack of smokes and some music.

The most frustrating car to work on is the current one, the VX is like a giant mecano set, the front and rear of the car comes off as whole pieces, but getting the parts etc replaced is harder due to either seriously tight packaging, or exposed, and therefor rusted, bolts / screws

[eltax91]

nadger said:

Sadly no! I do have a mate who used to be a mechanic, but now he's a builder (don't ask!) and as such never has time to do his servicing himself!
I will learn one day. I have a 4 month old son and have a sort of idea in my head about restoring something together sometime in the future! Hopefully that'll happen and we can learn together!
Any suggestions of classics of the future to learn from?! ;-)

I have a 4 month old too. I'm a little like you, only perhaps a tad more advanced as I've learned the basics myself. I can do brakes, servicing and other minor jobs. I learned by enrolling in night school a few years ago when in a particularly boring job.

In answer to your "what car", a ratty old series landy. This is what I'm going to do with my boy, buy it and strip it down when he is 15 or so, take it right back to chassis, galvanise it and then build it back up slowly, with new suspension, engine rebuild etc etc. If it takes 2 years, it'll be ready for when he passes his test.

[littlebasher]

The Crack Fox said:

Humourless pedants look away now. A picture paints a thousand words...









































and at the MOT station...



"PASS : NO ADVISORIES"

Who's Yashar?

As for your repair !

[eltax91]

The Crack Fox said:

Humourless pedants look away now. A picture paints a thousand words...









































and at the MOT station...



"PASS : NO ADVISORIES"

Awesome.

[hman]

mental not- never buy a car from this person.

Thing is - you only needed to weld that part in and you would have had a fairly ok repair!

[traffman]

Could you not have just replaced the wing?

I aint knocking your very presentable work there...just wondering.

[BorkFactor]

I was very pleased with myself after I serviced my cars, and I even changed the front wheel bearings on my old Astra!

My mechanical ability doesn't go much further than that unfortunately

[4key]

In fairness, the repair to the mx5 is nothing compaired to bumming cats.

[ninjacost]

regretably no i didnt ,was a few yrs ago sold it to a guy in holland

Manicminer said:

ninjacost said:

built a locost 7 from a pile of box section steel ali and fibreglass and fitted zx9r in it :-)

Please tell us you did a build blog! Pics?

[Mr2Mike]

hman said:

mental not- never buy a car from this person.

Thing is - you only needed to weld that part in and you would have had a fairly ok repair!

Exactly what I thought. If you put that much effort in to create a nice steel repair patch, why fk up the last part of the job by gluing it in? It's soul destroying when you find st like this in old cars.

[hman]

that makes no sense whatsoever.

If you're never going to sell it and you can afford to have the repair done then isnt that two massive reasons to get the work done properly?

Did you do it for bragging rights in the pub:-

Crack Fox: yer so it had a massive corrosion hole
Crack Fox friend: so did you get it sorted for the MOT?
Crack Fox: Yer, we made a really intricate panel that exactly matched the hole, then we toshed it in with sealant and filler.
Crack Fox friend (bemused): cant you weld?
Crack Fox: No.
Crack fox friend: dont you know someone who can weld?
Crack Fox: well I could have paid to get it repaired but I'm keeping it for life, its a bit tatty, its a weekend car so I didnt bother
Crack fox friend (Confused by strange story that makes not a lot of sense): riiiiight.

Edited by hman on Tuesday 9th October 13:54

[PhillipM]

Cost of welding? Most places would have welded you that patch in given you've already done the prep work for less than the cost of pissing about with sealants and filler!

[Brother D]

I've always done little bits on my own cars, coupled with a mistrust of other people. - The most PITA job was the heater matrix in my 306 going. - Was quoted 1000 (?) to replace it as it was a two day job apparently at the dealer. So being tight, I decided to have a go - stripped out the dash which did take best part of a whole day, then managed to put it back together in about 7 hours the next days and was very chuffed.

However after a day I had realised I'd missed connecting the brake light switch which involved removing the whole dash again as I couldn't reach it any other way

Still - saved myself close to a grand.

My mistrust in garages was confirmed - when I took the mfg into a 'Specialist' and they said the pads need changing. Wasn't outrageous cost, so fine. Anyway brakes didn't sound right at the rear, so took the wheels off and notice they had managed to put the pads upside down.. Resulting in the pad wearing at an angle due to the bump/lug on the back of the pad. Even more annoyingly they refused to believe over the phone they were the wrong way round...

At least if you do it yourself you know its done right*

• (or you only have yourself to blame)

Edited by Brother D on Tuesday 9th October 15:58

[BigBen]

A colleague and I just replaced the clutch on his Boxster. Took us ages but it all works and saved £600 odd.

If we have to do it again it will be a much quicker process and we will get a transmission jack.

In the past I graduated from the usual disk and pad type work to an engine swap and gearbox rebuild on my previous Atom.

Ben

[Gilhooligan]

I bought my first 'proper' car last year (mk1 mx5) when I turned 21. Having previously never done any work on any cars I thought it would be a good excuse to get some practice in with the spanners etc. so far I've managed to:
Fit coilovers and top mounts
Replace disks, callipers and pads
Refurb and poly bush arbs and drop links
Remove tatty softop
Respray the sills that had faded and turned grey in places
Reunderseal underbody
Replaced fluids and filters etc too
Must have saved a fortune and I find it quite enjoyable. I now have mates coming to me to help modify their cars