Fixing the Car

Over the Easter weekend we were very glad that we had planned to stay home as the car broke down ! We have not been driving it a lot and especially with the school holidays we had not taken it out in over a week. I was washing the car when I noticed that the driver's side front tyre was rather flat. This happens a lot, as the flint on the unmade drive often gives one or the other tyre a slow puncture. So, we got out the pump and tried to re-inflate the tyre, but this time it did not work ! MrShoestring did lots of research on the internet and then speculated that maybe the weight of the car had separated the seal between the tyre and wheel rim. He thought that if he took the weight off the tyre it might inflate. It worked ! He jacked up the car, reattached the pump, the tyre inflated and has been fine since ! That saved us the cost of a tyre !

However, the car still would not start and lots of electrical warning lights came on every time we tried. Again, MrShoestring did lots of research on the internet. The last time this happened we had to pay to have the car towed to the garage and then they broke something on the brakes and we ended up with a bill for over £700 to fix the damage. We were very keen to avoid the towing scenario in case the same thing happened again ! In the end, we both agreed that getting a new, cheap battery might be worth trying, as the car still had the original battery in, which was over 8 years old. So MrShoestring took the old battery out, using instructions from the internet, bought a new battery and fitted it and it worked ! The car started first time and we took it out for an hour's drive, just to check that everything was working properly. All the warning lights disappeared and the car is working fine. We have learned not to leave an older car standing idle quite so long in future. We also really glad that the repair cost £89 for the new battery and lots of MrShoestring's time, which he had as it was the Bank Holiday. A lot better than the last time the car needed repaired !

We were really glad that we knew a bit about car repair and had some basic tools on hand as it has saved us a lot of money and inconvenience !