Dr Kev. - Kam Servicing Network.

Hello again!

Regular reader, I am totally ashamed by the latest outbreak of football violence in Turkey. I'm not going to speculate on which team started it, or who threw the first punch - but I will say that it is totally reprehensible and does even more damage to the beautiful game. Someone once said that rugby was a hooligan's game played by gentlemen and football, a gentleman's game played by hooligans. On the strength of the antics in Turkey, I'm left wondering...

There's a fight of a different kind brewing in Parliament. Iain Duncan Smith (or Ids as he is known - sounds like a medical condition to me) has, apparently, acted improperly and employed his wife as the diary secretary when he became leader of the Conservative Party. Well, I'm sure that is very wrong and very naughty, but let's face it regular reader - do we really care? Let's ignore the minor issues and get back to proper politics - healthcare, education, law and order, pensions and the like. If this country spent as much time worrying about the things that matter as the little fringe bits that don't make a blind bit of difference in the real world, I feel that we'd actually get something done... I will get off my soapbox now.

Which reminds me... David Blaine is coming to the end of his "Box Stunt" - 44 days sealed in a glass box dangling over the Thames. A feat of endurance, surely, but I personally don't see the point. Hunger strikes are nothing new and it isn't really anything that special. Now, a Buddhist 100-day fast retreat - that's something different...

This week's tale concerns a Mr 'X' - name completely obscured to totally protect his identity and prevent his misguidedness becoming common knowledge. Anyway, Mr X owns a brought his 'P' plated Peugeot 306 in for its full service and free MoT last week.

"Now Kev, I know what I'm about with this car" he said, waving in its direction. "There's nothing wrong with it, it's mint. I'll see you in a couple of hours."

Well, let's just say that Mr X didn't really know what he was about with this particular car as it failed the MoT on plenty of minor points, although to be fair all of the major systems scraped through. As you know, as well as providing the MoT sheets, we also do a thorough inspection of the vehicle, which we carried out before performing the full service. We do it this way around, because then we can give the customer an instant idea of exactly what is needed, rather than finding the faults in dribs and drabs.

I was quite shocked when I got to the rear brakes. Removing the drums was quite a job - not helped by the large amounts of brake dust that liberally coated every surface and were compacted into every groove. Once they were off, a familiar sight greeted me - the cylinders were leaking from behind the dust seals but hadn't quite got to contaminating the brake shoes.

Naturally, I advised Mr X of this when I gave him the full rundown of the car's health. However, the knowledgeable Mr X only gave me permission to fix the MoT points and a few of the service recommendations.
Now, I'm a man of the world and understand all about budget concerns. I know that sometimes the ready cash isn't there to fix everything at once, but the brakes were potentially deadly. We insisted that it should be done, but Mr X wasn't having any of it and refused to get his wheel cylinders replaced.

A few days later, Shaun took a phone call from a very panicked Mr X.
"Shaun, I need you to retrieve my car from a brick wall!" As it turned out, Mr X had had to stamp on the brakes to avoid a cute, fluffy bunny rabbit that had leapt out of a hedge at him - and found that the brake pedal just went to the floor! That cute, fluffy bunny rabbit had a lot to answer for, by the sound of it (it wasn't Mr X's fault of course - or was it?).
Shaun naturally dispatched the Kam Rescue Team to the scene and disentangled the wall and the 306. Fortunately, the 306 only sustained light cosmetic damage and wasn't seriously injured.

Once back in the workshop, Shaun started to strip the brakes - and guess what he found? The brake cylinder dust seals had given way and dumped all of the cylinder fluid over the brake shoes! It didn't take that long for Shaun to fit new shoes and cylinders to make the 306 roadworthy again.
"I should have listened to you the first time," said a dejected Mr X. "If I had done I wouldn't have hit that wall and would have actually saved some money..."

It isn't our business to tell our customers how to spend their money, but we do try to give the best professional advice that we can. It's obvious that we are in this trade to make money (we do have to eat!) but not at the expense of our customers. As I hope you, and any potential Mr X's out there, should know - we only fix those things that need fixing so if we do recommend something, you know that it really should be attended to. And of course, if you have got a particular budget, we do our utmost to stick to that.

Until next week, drive safely!

Dr Kev Allen