Broken down, again
 

Getting my money’s worth out of the AA.

Went to start Banana, going up to Matt’s to get the throttle body changed over and getting him to check the handbrake shoes as advised by the AA last Saturday.
Turns over bur refuses to fire. Cannot hear the pump working. Tried slamming the boot, locked the car up, unlocked, locked up again. Unlocked but still no joy.

Used the AA app and help will be here before 11am.

Maybe the car just likes being around other yellow vehicles Bob maybe get some AA stickers for it. At least it happened at home this time.

I can see the opportunity for a "how to" coming up Bob. How to grin and bear it, though I doubt some of us could. Good luck.
Fred (planenut)

With patience, all cars can get sorted - just hope yours doesn't wear thin.

I just passed a 21 plate Volvo stranded beside the M25 with the hard shoulder live! Its not just our old cars. Regards Graham

It will get worse in the future - there's more stuff to go wrong.

Yes. All that extra tech means many more slowly oxidising low voltage connections.

As I was not a priority breakdown this time as I was parked at home. So the Yellow van finally arrived at 11.15. Very nice chap tried to start Banana, but no sound from the pump. So he took the rear seat out. Checked the filter then the pump. No power to the pump, his box of tricks that was plugged into Banana told him that there was a mis-fire on 2 cylinders. How? We had no engine running. Daft!

So he then removed the ECU as he said most times they are under water, but Banana’s plenums are perfectly dry. But he still removed the ECU and sprayed contact cleaner on all the contacts. Still no power to the pump.
All the fuses checked under the bonnet and under the glovebox, all ok. Next all the relays were taken out and swapped around. And the relays under the glovebox were removed and put back.

We now had power to the pump, and she started. He then set about putting Banana back together again, but he dropped one of the scuttle clips into the engine bay. But he left looking for that till the end. With everything back he then carried on looking for the elusive clip. In the end he took the under tray off and the clip fell out. So the under tray was put back.

Before shutting the bonnet he wiped everything down, removed a few grubby marks. He then made sure that all his tools were removed from under the bonnet before closing it. Then he typed out his report.

Now for the interesting part. He is AA mechanic but is normally based in Gloucestershire, where he lives. But for the school holidays he brought his motor home down to Looe with his family, wife and two kids. Towed the Yaris behind for the wife to use. He then collects the AA van from a local depot and carry’s on working as per normal but just covering Cornwall and Plymouth. What a marvellous idea. He said that he works every other weekend.

And he loved Banana till I showed what the Bear had under her bonnet. “ Oh! That is the first one I have actually seen. I knew they existed. A very nice rare motor, better still it has a supercharger”.
And he finally left at 13.05.

Certainly getting my money’s worth out of the AA.

She just wants her money’s worth out of the AA. We might have had a few choice words this morning, but she will have her party once she gets to the moon.
Many a person would have given up on her by now but she means so much to me. So I’ll keep her for awhile longer.