Monday, February 13, 2006

She's aliiiiive! Again.


Cars.

Once you've had one, you can never go back to being without one.

Which is why, despite London's fairly good public transport, I felt marooned when the alternator in my Vitara died a few days ago. To be fair, she has done just under 120 000 miles, so a bit of wear & tear is to be expected.
But still!

I got a few fairly bruising quotes for new or 2nd hand ones.... but then! Inspiration! .....ebay to the rescue!! £13 and a bit of postage later, I had a slightly muddy replacement in my hands.
Its just a pity that I'm about as safe around car engines as Helen Keller is in a needle factory.
A bike I can just about handle; with enough silicone, zip ties and a good pliers you can just about fix anything on a XJ650.

My normal mechanic, who's very, very good and does a damn fine job for the money he charges, was going to be my next port of call. Fortunately I checked my bank balance before making the appointment. Blegh. Alas, Mr Mechanic won't work on the basis of an IOU, nor will he barter his services for a chicken and a basket of fruit.

So, I did the sensible thing. I rang Big D.

Big D is an old friend of the family and a dab hand at fixing things that suck in petrol and make any type of whirring or vroom noise. He's also the man who once snapped a Gedore spanner with his bare hands. True as bob (yes, I know, bob's dead) he was up for it, and a couple of days later (this Friday just past, actually) he arrived, toolbox in hand.

The short version is that my Vitara is healthy again, no more funny warning lights and electrics that spontaneously die on the way home at night. (You'd be shocked to know how many times people will flash their lights at you if you drive through London without your headlights on. Obviously no one here pays heed to urban legends..)
Anyway, the jeep is fixed. Took her for a nice spin on Saturday to charge the battery and so far all is sweet like a banana.

The long version is this: Big D was actually quite busy this weekend, so he had to come over on Friday night. After work. When its very, very dark. And very, very cold.
I believe the temperature dipped to around 0 celsius on Friday night. And what were we doing? Sprawling on the road, headfirst under the engine because the goddamn Japanese engineers who designed the (admittedly sweet) bloody engine left enough space for a starving four year old to get a spanner onto the bolts to loosen the alternator cradle. Jeeziz, what a mission. We froze our asses off, skinned several knuckles and got soaked in engine coolant... did i mention it was cold?

Anyway, we survived, thanks to the trays of coffee the missus brought out to us and the fine folk at Domino's, who provided essential nourishment.

Result!
Posted by Mark :: 22:24 :: 2 Comments:

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