"Maybe its a generation thing we usually didn't have the money to buy nice new cars or to pay someone else to repair them"
Thats how I see it Gordonbennet, I noticed the service interval in an advert for a Diesel Vauxhall Astra today. " 2 years or 30,000 miles.
That would be Ten 3,000 mile services in the mid 60`s ( well it was on my Mini) I was thinking of the labour costs and the time to do the services in those days. I can remember having to jack each wheel up in turn on the Mini and manually adjust each brake, for example.
How much would that level of profession labour cost today, even without all the parts?
No wonder many of us just HAD to do DIY, the alternative was no car. Actually, my memory is of spending a couple of hours almost every Saturday working on it.
I found I then got enjoyment from it and in `doing a really throrough job`
I wonder if thats some genetic programming that would have found a different expression in the thousands of years leading up to recorded history?
Or to put it differently, as though a void was being filled, or a bonding with things mechanical, upon their *discovery* in childhood.
I speculate, that for our generation it was engines, perhaps now other things ` fill the gap` with kids.
But then, they never stood on the platforms at Doncaster, surrounded by the splendour of steam, or were let into the cabs by some of those great old steam engine drivers.
Its got to be something, because if you take a 5 year old boy and girl to a traction engine rally, the boy is transfixed.
The way I see it, there must have been an evolutionary advantage for this almost exclusive male thing. but its now expressed differently.
Regards
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Just to add, Aged 10, my mates and I used to take a 20mile train trip to Doncaster. Hang out in the station begging ( and getting) entry to the cabs and footplates of trains in the station, before they pulled out again.
Then we would try to get into the `Plant` and on to the `sheds` once getting into the cab of one engine unnoticed, pulling all the levers etc. (Not in steam)
We used to stick our heads out of the windows on the way there and back, trying to see the engine that was `pulling` us
Parents knew none of this of course, thought we were `out playing` ;=)
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I bought my first car in 1966 (£10 Triumph Mayflower, I saved up my pocket money) and have always done my own servicing and repairs ever since.
Earlier this year I took a car to a garage for the first time ever. The Triumph 2000 had developed a peculiar clutch fault, and I couldn't face doing the job all over again. After a certain age lying in a puddle of oil on the garage floor struggling to lift a gearbox seems to lose its attraction.
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Perhaps the interest for today´s ´yoof´ lies more in fitting a monster stereo, cherry bomb exhaust, lowering spring, body kit, alloys etc rather than making sure the car is actually roadworthy - and getting ones hands dirty if necessary.
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>Cliff
I recall changing clutch on a 2.5PI Triumph. The gearbox +overdrive was very heavy then .. I was around 29 at the time. It's now not an issue of not wanting to lift the gearbox but being able to:-(
madf
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I paused to admire an old Eunos. The yoof owner proudly told me he'd picked it up for seven hundred quid. He'd fitted better stereo, dash trim, ally gearknob, faux roll hoops, cheese cutter grille, quick-release petrol-filler cap, lower springs, ally wheels, rear spoiler, hard-top and just paid nine hundred quid for a respray were amongst the things I remember.
He then said a mate had told him to put some oil in the engine to get the pressure gauge off zero, he admitted it left puddles wherever it stopped.
"Nah, haven't had it serviced since I bought it three years ago"
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And if I remember correctly, Triumph would never use one bolt when two would do.
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After a certain age lying in a puddle of oil on the garage floor
... let alone a London gutter with what may be dog poo near your head and buses running over your feet... Shade tree is best, but only in summer, and the dust gets all over everything.
But a Triumph Mayflower CP, chapeau!
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I remember that as a youth, DIY car servicing was essential for 2 reasons:
1. The cars used to rust so much that every few months I would have to grind back some rust and get the Jenolite or similar out, fill the holes, prime and paint. Largely galvanised cars have made that irrelevant, now.
2. There was no way I could afford a dealer to service my car, and as they were all over 10 years old, not worth the 'investment' in maintaining a FSH. So I did it myself - which in those days really was so much easier - no electronics to worry about, no shields above or below the engine to remove, easy access for the oil filter, light bulbs, etc.
It was actually enjoyable. Nowadays it is nigh on impossible just to change a light bulb on some cars, without removing the whole bumper!
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It was actually enjoyable. Nowadays it is nigh on impossible just to change a light bulb on some cars without removing the whole bumper!
>>
'Progress' my Son.....'Progress'
Give me a Tiger Cub any day...........................MD
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i would have said vauxhall viva hc :-)..........MD
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I did an oil change on the Accord last week. It was EVIL. The filter is mounted in such a way that you can't get a tool on it, so it was back to the ol' fashioned beat-a-screwdriver-into-it methodology, at which point I started to unscrew it and because the base tilts downwards it emptied the hot oil over the engine, exhaust, driveway, and me!
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I started servicing my own cars back in 1972, and I'm still doing it. I can count 23 cars of my own in that time, plus 7 motorcycles. I started doing it because I found I couldn't afford to pay someone else large amounts of money for work I could do myself. I have paid for specialised work like cylinder head planing, but the general servicing and repairs can all be done with the help of a manual to guide you.
In the last month, I've replaced a Mini front wheel bearing, done an oil and filter change on the Mitsubishi VR-4, and sorted out some electrical issues on the XJ12. Paying someone else to do that sort of thing for me, just seems lazy. I've never bought a huge toolkit, just built it up piece by piece as I needed it. I lived in the UK from '97 to '02 and had to recreate my toolkit from scratch and service the cars outside. That was interesting, and there was no shade tree either.
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