Tuesday, August 20, 2002
Kam’s Column - 20/08/02
Hello Again!
I hold my hands up – I made a mistake last week (gasp). As many of you have reminded me, Derby didn’t win against Sheffield – the glorious victory was in fact against Reading! It was a mere moment of madness, brought on by the large influx of work that had landed in my lap (at least we know that plenty of people are reading the column!). So far this season, Derby have beaten Reading, lost to Gillingham and snatched victory from the jaws of the Grimsby team last week. As for Forest, I’ll update you in the next column!
On a more serious note, you can’t have missed the fact that police have now found the bodies of Holly and Jessica in Soham. As a parent myself, I can only imagine the grief that those girls’ families are experiencing. I know what I would like to do to the murderer –but I think my strong and controversial views would be seen as an incitement to riot! Terrible as this discovery is, at least the families now have an answer and can begin to grieve properly. My heart goes out to them.
On Monday, the team here finally solved a mystery that has been rumbling for some weeks. To begin, as they say, at the beginning - Mrs Pauline Walker (name changed to protect the innocent) brought her Vauxhall Tigra into the workshop about two weeks ago.
“Kev, do you remember changing the timing belt and water pump on my car?”
“I sure do Mrs Walker,” I replied. “What seems to be the problem with it?”
“Well, it’s losing water quite rapidly. I’m having to refill the water bottle several times each week. I have to confess, I don’t know much about cars, but I have been looking around for any drips or water splashes. Haven’t found any though.”
“Let us take a look for you.” Mrs Walker borrowed a courtesy car as I thought we’d need the Tigra in for a few hours.
I asked Andy to hook the car up to a pressuriser, which mimics the pressure of the engine while running. After four hours, there were no obvious signs of water loss. So, I whipped the timing belt and water pump covers off, just to check that there were no gremlins lurking down there. Everything was just as we had left it six months ago – in perfect working order. As we couldn’t see any problem – or evidence of one – we let Mrs Walker take the car away.
She returned a week later. “Kev, it’s still losing water.” Again, we took the car in and hooked it up to the pressuriser – and still nothing. Mrs Walker had asked us to give her Dad, an aircraft engineer, a call to let him know what we discovered.
“Well Kev, if you can’t find anything, then leave the car with us. I’ll take it out a few times and live with it for a few days, see what I can discover.”
On Monday morning, the unmistakable purr of the Tigra appeared at the end of the road. “Still losing water?”
Mrs Walker nodded. I looked over to her Dad, who just shrugged.
“Can you leave it with us for a few days this time? That way we can do even more tests on it.”
“No problem Kev, give me a call once you know some more.” After I’d waved Mrs Walker off in a courtesy car, I called Andy over.
“Andy, you’re the Vauxhall expert – the job’s yours!” The first thing Andy did was to fill the water bottle with antifreeze and reconnect the pressuriser. After an hour, there were a few small drips from under the car, where a water hose had perished.
“Is that it?”
“I don’t think so Kev,” he replied. “Have you noticed that each time I’ve moved it in and out of the workshop, there’s been a little smoke from the exhaust? I think that the head gasket is leaking.”
Sure enough, Andy was right. There was a slight leak between the water system and the cylinder head, which came off and was crack tested (it passed superbly) before being reskimmed. Once the heads were back on and a new timing belt fitted, I asked Shaun to take the car home for a few nights.
Three hundred miles of testing later, the car was still running absolutely perfectly. I’d bet my house that there won’t be any more leaking through those cylinder heads (just don’t tell Mandy I said that)!
Well, story time is over for another week – I’ve got three timing belt and pulley changes to carry out on a trio of Land Rover Discoveries belonging to a local farmer. Lovely fiddly jobs – just right for a Tuesday!
Until next week,
Dr Kev Allen
I hold my hands up – I made a mistake last week (gasp). As many of you have reminded me, Derby didn’t win against Sheffield – the glorious victory was in fact against Reading! It was a mere moment of madness, brought on by the large influx of work that had landed in my lap (at least we know that plenty of people are reading the column!). So far this season, Derby have beaten Reading, lost to Gillingham and snatched victory from the jaws of the Grimsby team last week. As for Forest, I’ll update you in the next column!
On a more serious note, you can’t have missed the fact that police have now found the bodies of Holly and Jessica in Soham. As a parent myself, I can only imagine the grief that those girls’ families are experiencing. I know what I would like to do to the murderer –but I think my strong and controversial views would be seen as an incitement to riot! Terrible as this discovery is, at least the families now have an answer and can begin to grieve properly. My heart goes out to them.
On Monday, the team here finally solved a mystery that has been rumbling for some weeks. To begin, as they say, at the beginning - Mrs Pauline Walker (name changed to protect the innocent) brought her Vauxhall Tigra into the workshop about two weeks ago.
“Kev, do you remember changing the timing belt and water pump on my car?”
“I sure do Mrs Walker,” I replied. “What seems to be the problem with it?”
“Well, it’s losing water quite rapidly. I’m having to refill the water bottle several times each week. I have to confess, I don’t know much about cars, but I have been looking around for any drips or water splashes. Haven’t found any though.”
“Let us take a look for you.” Mrs Walker borrowed a courtesy car as I thought we’d need the Tigra in for a few hours.
I asked Andy to hook the car up to a pressuriser, which mimics the pressure of the engine while running. After four hours, there were no obvious signs of water loss. So, I whipped the timing belt and water pump covers off, just to check that there were no gremlins lurking down there. Everything was just as we had left it six months ago – in perfect working order. As we couldn’t see any problem – or evidence of one – we let Mrs Walker take the car away.
She returned a week later. “Kev, it’s still losing water.” Again, we took the car in and hooked it up to the pressuriser – and still nothing. Mrs Walker had asked us to give her Dad, an aircraft engineer, a call to let him know what we discovered.
“Well Kev, if you can’t find anything, then leave the car with us. I’ll take it out a few times and live with it for a few days, see what I can discover.”
On Monday morning, the unmistakable purr of the Tigra appeared at the end of the road. “Still losing water?”
Mrs Walker nodded. I looked over to her Dad, who just shrugged.
“Can you leave it with us for a few days this time? That way we can do even more tests on it.”
“No problem Kev, give me a call once you know some more.” After I’d waved Mrs Walker off in a courtesy car, I called Andy over.
“Andy, you’re the Vauxhall expert – the job’s yours!” The first thing Andy did was to fill the water bottle with antifreeze and reconnect the pressuriser. After an hour, there were a few small drips from under the car, where a water hose had perished.
“Is that it?”
“I don’t think so Kev,” he replied. “Have you noticed that each time I’ve moved it in and out of the workshop, there’s been a little smoke from the exhaust? I think that the head gasket is leaking.”
Sure enough, Andy was right. There was a slight leak between the water system and the cylinder head, which came off and was crack tested (it passed superbly) before being reskimmed. Once the heads were back on and a new timing belt fitted, I asked Shaun to take the car home for a few nights.
Three hundred miles of testing later, the car was still running absolutely perfectly. I’d bet my house that there won’t be any more leaking through those cylinder heads (just don’t tell Mandy I said that)!
Well, story time is over for another week – I’ve got three timing belt and pulley changes to carry out on a trio of Land Rover Discoveries belonging to a local farmer. Lovely fiddly jobs – just right for a Tuesday!
Until next week,
Dr Kev Allen
