Any other 'lucky' breakdowns?

[The general]

Borrowed my fathers Vauxhall Victor FD (remember them, great tank of a motor) to go to work when I was a cash-strapped youngster. It "stopped" halfway there and I called the AA on Dad's membership. Patrol turned up, diagnosed the problem and towed me round the corner to a small garage who fixed it for £8 before I needed to drive it home again later that day.

Snapped camshaft belt!

Mechanic said I was very lucky as they usually had to scrap the engine when this happened.

Was that the motor with the engine was so big it was mounted at an angle ?? In engine bay my dad had one boy didn’t it shift

 

[dave newell]

Borrowed my fathers Vauxhall Victor FD (remember them, great tank of a motor) to go to work when I was a cash-strapped youngster. It "stopped" halfway there and I called the AA on Dad's membership. Patrol turned up, diagnosed the problem and towed me round the corner to a small garage who fixed it for £8 before I needed to drive it home again later that day.

Snapped camshaft belt!

Mechanic said I was very lucky as they usually had to scrap the engine when this happened.

The old Vauxhall slang four was a safe engine, the valves would never meet the pistons unless it was over-reved and bounced a valve. Good engine in its time and a doddle to do the belt.

D.

 

[Wee Bold Davy]

Driving mum and dad in his austin princess, the wedge shaped one, i had not long got off the motorway when the front suspension collapsed and the nearside front wheel fell off. It had weird fluid suspension and the nearside strut basically exploded, losing all the fluid on the road.

I remember driving down the M9 towards Edinburgh and I could see this 'balloon' thing going slowly up in the air then back down again and again. As I got closer I realised that it was a wheel bouncing, that had come off an Austin Princess. (A car which I always fancied) I've no idea where it ended up. Hope no one was hurt.
Every time I hear the song, 'You picked a fine time to leave me Lucille' (Loose wheel) I think of that

 

[Barclaybasher]

I went out and collected a broken down Renault 16 Auto that had a broken timing chain, as the old Renault has the engine arse about face it means removing the complete engine and gearbox to get to the chain,
The owners gave me the keys and logbook and walked home, as he wasn’t prepared to pay for the repairs so said scrap it,
Had a bit of a brainwave! Removed the carpet from the bulkhead, used a bolster chisel and cut out an opening, making the timing chain accessible,
Fitted new chain and tensioner and welded up the cut panel, nearly set it alight and that car lasted three years before I sold it for £100
That’s what I called cheap motoring,

Had a few Renault 16s - fantastic cars - the big problem with them was rust - the floor was double skinned, when the rust got in there they couldn't be repaired.....

 

[makems]

On our first visit to Morocco with a fairly large group of Funsters our Merc based Rapido went into limp mode. We made it as far as Taghazoue a few miles North of Agadir and in Aagadir itself found the famous Mustafa (RIP).
One of Mustafa’s mates turned up with a Merc Star computer in the boot of his car and plugged it into our moho. We had 2 mechanics pulling things apart adn putting them back together all day and finally concluded the throttle body was shot. We had gone through some shocking rain and deep water some of which had got into the box of electronics on the side of the throttle body which was now fried. The labour cost only about £60 but the replacement parts had to be ordered from Germany and would cost £700 including the 100% import duty.
We headed back to Taghazoute where the Funsters were parked up and when they left next morning we arranged with @SUGGY to nab his spot which was frontline looking out over the Atlantic Ocean with sunsets to die for.
As Suggy moved out we couldn't get our engine to start - the part had finally given up. So with the help of a few Funsters we pushed the van into poistion where we had to wait 3 weeks for the part to arrive (48 hours for Merc to get it to Casablanca, the rest of the time required to clear Customs).
Eventually the part arrived and Mustafa came out to Tag to fit it whic took all of 10 minutes.
However we loved our spot so much we stayed another week before moving on.
Couldn’t have broken down in a more beautiful spot.

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