Took the midget to a garrage to get it MOT’d, it somehow passed the MOT first time with a note that the handbrake needed adjusting. I knew the ignition and fueling were way out so I asked them to check those (done) and adjust the handbrake.

Last friday (day 1), yup, it’ll be ready at 5

Sorry it wont be,

Monday, sorry, it’ll be wednesday, it needs a new handbrake cable.

Wednesday, sorry it’ll be tomorow, something else has been on the ramps all day.

Thursday:
It’s all done (phoned at 4:30pm) I get halfway to picking it up and get a call saying dont bother the ignitions gone out of wack again, its undrivable (surely they noticed this the 1st time they tuned it?).

Friday:
Yup that handbrake we fited on wednesday, we didn’t actualy fit it, and its the wrong one, do you mind if we cut a bit off the mechanism and make the new one fit? And we fitted a new set of plugs and points to cure the ignition problem (is it just me that would have expected a £15 set of plugs and 99p points to be replaced BEFORE you set the ignition!)

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

I know some of the faults are fiddly and ned correcting, I gave them a list when I droped it off of the points it was going to fail on seeing as I’d rebuilt every other concievable MOT failiure point in the last year!

And breathe……….

The joys of classic cars? ‘Classic – stye’ service garages! 😉

Is this a garage that specialises in classic cars ?

Are you Tony the Tiger?

(-:

yes, yes, and no

It will all be fixed, and I will get it back, but under no particular time scale and if I want to know what’s going on I’ve to do the phoning!

Thankfully their hourly rate is classic as well!

Are the workers ex British Leyland as well?

ned correcting,

I understand this is Scottish thing?

Exactly the reason I do my own car stuff.

If he has a proper MG Midget it will be BMC not BL

Although the handbrake cable runs down the inside of the transmission tunnel its a very simple job to adjust.

Simple jobs best off done yourself, as someone else has said thats why I dont use garages. To be honest if you can spanner a bike you can spanner a car-just bigger bolts at higher torque settings 😆

That sounds like a garage that specialises in not getting repeat custom.

That said, were any of the jobs things that you couldn’t have done for yourself ?

Jobs done myself this year,

Engine out
clutch change

new hub bearings all round

new brakes up front

new pads and drums out back

new brake lines

The MOT stuff was the carbs and ignition, but I neither have a lambda sensor or a stroboscope lying about in the shed :p

As for the handbrake, the issue was that the car is a BMC midget but the rear axle is BL, so the handbrake is not a bit of a bodge!