Two years running I have used an MOT only test centre. I pay £45 I get 10 day free retest. Now this year a new strategy £30 for a test at a normal garage, with a free re-test as it says in the advert in the local rag.

CATCH is, and you only see the catch written on the fail sheet: If you take the car away from the garage and bring back for a re test, you may be charged half the MOT test fee. I live 8 miles from the test centre, one of the fail bits I can fix myself and I want to take the car home. This kind of unadvertised rule really annoys me. MOT only test centre next year for me.

So what have we failed on?

Excessive play in the nearside track rod end – the garage is going to replace it (charge one hours labour) It I will get the part for them from ECAS.

Indicator stalk is insecure – not sure when this came loose, but at least it is easy to fix.

Two bits of welding required as near rear seat belt mounts – one needs a small plate, one needs a dribble of weld. They’ll do it for £110

The lure of the garage this year is simply lack of time to fix things myself, so I’m happy (if that is the right word) for the convenience (if that is the right word) to use their services. I am probably just a tight wad having a moan.

Advisories were interesting:
No tell-tale light for main beam – tester warned me this will be compulsory next year. I warned him that we (the rebel mid 1980’s 2cv owners) are the exception to the rule.

***DANGEROUS*** he did not like that my old defunct steering lock (which I have been meaning to remove but can’t – key broke off in it) is still there while I’m using a second ignition switch –rather crudely attached as I can’t get the old one off. His worry is if the old lock suddenly locks up the steering – I’d not thought of that, never been mentioned on previous tests. This does actually worry me.

Re test next Thursday along with the repair works.

Collected the car back from the garage. I now have a years MOT, which is nice. I did not get charged the retest fee, which is nicer. My car now makes a rub-rub noise as I do right hand turns at 20mph plus, which is fecking disappointing. I gave the mechanic the ECAS how to tighten the castle screw info on the track rod end, but something somewhere is not right. Any ideas?

Inner wing rubbing on driveshaft?

I have to say, it's really worth investigating your nearest Just MoTs centre: I booked in advance and paid £35 for an MoT - booking 6 months in advance it's £25! If it fails you can take it away and bring it back within 10 working days for a free retest.

The just do MoTs (funny that!) so you know they have no interest in finding things that need doing. I've also found my local centre (Bognor) to be very fair and they take a real interest in the car.

I would never again use a garage/MoT centre. The other advantage with Just MoTs is they have a fixed time slot so they don't hang about (although if you're late you have to rebook at no extra charge).

I want my car to be safe to use, and I know that it is. But on the flip side, I don't want companies to go looking for problems which was my experience with the place I used to use.

You can disable the steering lock quite easily if it will give you peace of mind. Otherwise if you've no way of getting the old ignition barrel out I'd change the whole bracket. You have to cut or drill the U-bolt but it's not difficult.

I raised the front of the car off the ground. The rub-rub sound, on further inspection, seemed to be a swollen (through corrosion) wheel rim. You could see where it had scraped against the bottom of the kingpin. I took the wheel off and gave the blister a good talking to with the hammer, filed off the crusty bits, then dabbed with Kurust. This will have to do until I buy a new rim, which I fully intend to do. No further noise on the test drive after

This is a library picture to show you my Siamese ignition locks, the lower one works and has been cable tied to the older lock for the past 4 years. Time for action. I drilled through the u bolt that holds the lock on. After much drilling I cut through, but the bolts held and the lock would only loosen but not come off. So junior hacksaw came into the gap created from the loosening, then off it came. Not a pretty job, hammer, punch, metal files all came out the tool box to join in the fun. You’d have to be a well tooled up thief to remove this steering lock! Five star security to Citroen.

I have ordered a new u bolt from 2cvcity to go with my working old steering lock. I’ll put it all back together next weekend and clear up all the metal fillings scattered inside the car.

So here we have the carnage from drilling/sawing off the old steering lock u-bolt.

To fasten the new (non shear) bolts on the new u-bolt, I had to modify/cut the anti tamper bracket from behind the dash, so I could actually get a tight turn on the nuts.

All in place for improved left knee room. Odd thing is, the steering lock, well, it does not lock when I take the key out and turn the steering wheel

Anyway, I still went for a test run, any excuse

Bit warm to still have your muff on?

Sometimes lately a cold sea mist comes in, and she is not happy about. This week looks firmly muff off weather roof down too.