I took the Xm up the road to the local garage this morning for a mot even though I swore I wouldn't use him again after he left a bolt out of the engine on my Pug 405 and it discharged engine oil all over the place.

I thought its only a mot he should be ok with that.....................WRONG!

I rang him up after 4 hours and he said he couldn't mot it cos he couldn't get the jack under it! He said they have to be mot'd on the high setting to keep the pressure up. He also said the brakes were useless and wouldn't hold the car and thought it had a serious hydraulic problem!

I put my coat on and walked up. As I crossed the road I could see the car outside sitting right down on its bump stops!

I went in and he repeated all the above and gave me the key. He followed me to the car going over the same thing again and again. As soon as I sat in the car I saw the level lever on minimum! "you've set it to low" I said. "No its on high" he said.

"No!" I said "its on low!" and I put it into drive height and up it came!

"Ok I can do it tomorrow for you"..........not bloody likely!

Why oh why didn't I listen to myself!

Great aren't they.
I was standing in a tyre place a while back and watched one of the monkeys tilt and stare at the rear jacking point of my S2. Unable to figure it out he promptly moved the jack to under the sill and started pumping it up!
Took all of about 3 milliseconds for me to shoot over and ask what the hell he was doing
It just scares me what could potentially happen to my car when I'm ever forced to leave it somewhere unattended to have something done. You just cannot let them out of your sight with the uninitiated!

Had someone look at my Xantia a while back, and they proclaimed the brakes were shot "because the rear drums just aren't holding the wheel when the pedal is pressed". Drums eh... they obviously looked at the brakes very thoroughly!
I had to explain about the way cit rear brakes depend on the suspension load... i.e if you test them with the rear of the car off the ground, they won't do anything!

Even my dad last week, bless him, tried to move my S1 out of the drive, and after he moved out and parked, I watched amused through the window while the car repeatedly rolled backwards and then the brake lights came on. I know the parking brake is a bit different, but come on its not rocket science and I've explained how to use it about 6 times!

I sympathise demag

Ciarán

As an afterthought, the Xantia height control lever has the max and min settings at the opposite ends from the XM one.... maybe hes been used to doing a few of those, and can't open his eyes and observe the symbols printed beside it. My six year old daughter was able to work out what those meant.

But surely anyone with brains would try the lever in a different position, mainly the middle one.

That's why I do my own work.

Steve.

You would think, wouldn't you, it doesn't exactly take Stephen Hawking to work it out I agree

On the other hand - I needed tyres a copule of months back so went to where I get my bike tyres. I parked it in the bay and went to the waiting room. One of the lads came over before he had even touched it and asked that I could put in high as it was easier to get the jack under. At least they understood where Citroens are concerned! Stand up Buckley Tyres in North Wales.

It seems that many garages now are incapable of tracing a fault unless they can do it with a laptop!

My local chap is very good, I always go on the ramp with the car, he just shouts 'up, down, press the brake pedal' etc, then goes off for a cup of tea and leaves me suspended in the air for about 15 mins. But he will look at the car, give me a list of problems (often none) and allow me to go and fix them, he will even get the parts for me if I ask.

In view of others experiences I conside myself fortunate to have such an accomodating mechanic. I have been going there for about 35 years.

Peter.N.

Pretty frightening-especially when you think that these people decide if our vehicles are safe (or not) to go on the public roads!

if he'd gotten to start the test, he'd likely have failed you on the handbrake too - the un-initiated will be checking the rears for the handbrake linkage and never find it.....

I saw one of those cop shows once, where the police pulled over this taxi driver in a white Xantia for making an illegal turn or something.

When they stopped him, they began poring over the car, looking for dodgy tyres, broken lights etc. They couldn't find anything, then one of them decided to try the brake pedal. The car had been off, and they had been standing talking for about 20 minutes at this stage.
The cop said "your brake pedal feels funny, theres something up with it, theres obviously a fault with your master cylinder or something, we can't let you drive any further".
Despite the guy's protests, he wasn't allowed to take it any further and the whole shooting match was trailed away!

Ciarán

In response to Peters post about tracing faults with laptops -

Usually the 'technicians' fail at this too, even though the engine management says a sensor is reading incorrectly it doesn't always mean the sensor itself is at fault as most of us Citroen drivers know. The motorist just keeps paying until the fault is found by replacing parts until the fault clears. I read Car Mechanics every issue and there's a great section on ECU fault finding that gives you some idea of how difficult it is to find and fix faults unless you have real skill and insight.

I'm not having a dig Peter, just saying how poor servicing is these days.

Steve.

I had new tyres put on my old GS at a tyre chain once (I can't remember which one now!). I decided to wait while they did the work, and was very glad I did. On a GS, the bonnet release isn't spring-loaded - you have to push the handle back in or the bonnet won't close again. I can forgive the fitter for not knowing this, but I can't forgive him for just continuing to try to slam the bonnet, even once it was clear it wasn't going to shut. I really thought it was going to bend.