Hi,

After a couple of 'incidents' this morning, I was left wondering where the responsibility lies for the safe merging of traffic joining a busy motorway.

'Officially', there is a 'give way' marking at the end of the slip road - so it might be argued that it is the sole responsibility for the joining driver to match his/her speed to that of the road being joined. I always do my best to accommodate joining traffic when I'm in lane 1, but sometimes it's very difficult when the road is busy.

How, then, do you cope with a joining vehicle (usually bigger!)which just forces its way onto the motorway? Can the driver in lane 1 ever be deemed at fault for a 'coming together' in this way? Read more

Has anyone used this water/petrol/coolant additive in the past. I have and believe it has had a positive effect. Anyone else care to comment?

I was thinking of buying some more but it's quite expensive. Can anyone suggest where I might find some reliable test-data? before I shell out again for it.

Thanks Read more

I know this is a bit of a 'how long's a piece of string' question but maybe one of you can give me a rough idea...

Due to my exceptional parking skills I 'nudged' a colleagues car in the work car park. The colleague's car is a '98 Scenic in a pale blue metallic colour and I've scraped the passenger door with my bumper - damaged area about 8" x 4". At a push it might be T-Cut-able but you can see the white primer in places. There is no dent.

So the question - I agreed to pay for the damage rather than claim on insurance and now the estimates come in.

One garage has said they will need to respray the whole side of the car to 'match the metallic paint' - £250 + VAT. Another has said much the same and quoted £220 + VAT.

I might be wrong but this sounds overkill - surely in this day and age they can get a pretty good colour match in a local area (lower door)?

Any views, idea on costs or links to these mobile franchises (if they are any good) would be much appreciated.

Thanks
Paul Read more

My new car is the very devil to fill up, and I'm assuming it is an air lock in the petrol tank causing the problem.

I've tried everything: re-inserting the nozzle at a different angle or only only inserting it a short way, squeezing the trigger very lightly, going to a different garage - you name it. I can't fill up fully to get rid of it that way because I just haven't got hours to stand on a windy forecourt (it took me at least 10 minutes to put less than a quarter of a tankful in this morning), so consequently it gets a fiver's-worth every so often and is permanently running on almost empty - which I'm know isn't doing it any good for lots of reasons.

I'd suspected it might be a quirk of the marque and in fact I did learn (from - ahem - another Forum) that this is so: I find it odd that the manufacturers haven't sorted this out though.

And I still don't know how I'm going to get the thing filled: if I put just a little in, remove the nozzle and let the vapours rise for a few minutes before carrying on, would this work? Or just take the filler cap off and wait for a bit before starting? I've never had this problem before and it's damned annoying!

My only other solution of course is to persuade my husband to do the petrol run.

Cheers
Carole Read more

I have a VW Polo 1250 CL 1990 H reg. I wanted to check the gearbox oil level so I checked with the Haynes manual. It said there was a level plug and a drain plug but failed to describe where they were located and didn't give a photo or diagram. I therefore undid the most obvious candidate for the level plug - in a similar position to those on Vauxhall Cavaliers and Novas I have worked on in the past. A small amount of oil came out when it was removed so I assumed all was OK and replaced it. It seemed odd because it seemed to have a rod going into the gearbox but I assumed this was a scavenging magnet. I then found I was unable to select first or second gear and reverse was very stiff! I rang VW and they told me that there is another bolt on the front of the gearbox that looks like a level plug but actually supports the reverse shaft inside the gearbox! Apparently I'm by no means the first to make this mistake. They said the gearbox will need to come out and be repaired (£300+ at VW). Thats some mistake!
Why oh why does the Haynes Manual not warn about it when the consequences are so disasterous?
Has anyone else had to deal with this? Are there any tricks I can use to retrieve the situation without taking the box out?
Read more