Dr Kev. - Kam Servicing Network.

Hello Again!

Mandy's been complaining this week about her newly rediscovered status as a football 'widow'. I keep explaining to her that this is Football, not just any old obsession (did I really just say obsession?) but she's having none of it.

However, when I pointed out that I would be taking the kids out for the morning on Saturday, leaving her to some much needed peace and quiet, she almost pushed me out of the door! I must have won that little argument, as she's bought me a new Derby scarf. Or perhaps she wants me out of the house more often?

After last week's story, we've had tale after tale of electrical disaster coming into the workshop. The most perplexing came down from our Sutton-in-Ashfield car sales site. They'd taken a two year old Ford Galaxy in as part-exchange and were giving it their usual complete mechanical and physical check over (which includes a full pre-sales service and MoT). Anyway, everything appeared to be spot on, until the inspector finished the test drive, parked up in the parking bay and tried to lock it. The central locking refused to work from the driver's door. There was no motor noise, no resistance against the key turn, nothing. However, all was fine from the passenger door.

"Kev, it's Paul up at Sutton - I've got a problem that I need you to fix. In fact, I could do with it done sharpish as I've already had someone see the car arrive and are hassling me for a test drive!" (Paul's the manager up at Sutton by the way)

"No worries Paul, I've got a willing victim," I shot a glance over to the as-yet unaware Shaun. "We'll get it sorted for you."

Once the Galaxy arrived, Shaun took one look at it and informed me that I was the finer auto electrician and that he couldn't possibly tackle a job of this magnitude. He disappeared after delivering this little speech before I could see whether he was just trying to unload a potentially fiddly job or was being straight-up. What do you think regular reader?

It looked like it should be a fairly simple fix, so I got down to the task of removing the door panels to check the motors. And what do you know? Both the driver and passenger door were chocked full of new bits! Each had a sparkling motor, linkages and even micro switches! It seems that the previous owner had had everything replaced without actually getting the problem solved and so had chosen to offload the car! From a quick mental calculation, I estimate that around £600 had already been spent...

I checked each of the components and the interconnecting wires with my trusty multimeter and found nothing amiss. Once I'd put the panels back into place, I tested the locking again, just in case it had decided to spark back into life, but found that it still didn't work from the driver's door.

Just as I was going to get myself a contemplative brew, I happened to notice that there was a service history folder sitting on the rear luggage cover, so I opened the boot to pick it up.

That's when something very odd hit me - I had only just locked the doors (from the passenger side), but hadn't put the key anywhere near the boot lock! When I removed the inner panelling, I couldn't believe my eyes - the tailgate was devoid of any central locking parts at all! The brackets were present and correct, but there were no motors or anything! Curious...

It is possible that the lack of locking apparatus in the boot could cause a fault further down the system, so I replaced all of the missing parts (which we would have had to do to make the car sellable anyway) - but still no joy! I could tell that this was going to be one of those really perplexing tasks.
Once I'd sorted out the rear tailgate, it was time to have a look at the service history. It was here that I found my next clue - a small receipt for "Bodywork Repair: tailgate, primer and paint", but with no more information than that. This got me thinking, and I started searching around the rear of the car looking for any signs of damage.

Why the back? Well, if the car had been in a rear end shunt and had to have the tailgate replaced, then this could explain the lack of locking motors. It was a long shot...

But, in true Kam style, that hunch paid off when I located a piece of trim that hadn't been refitted quite flush with the boot lip. Under here lay a collection of loose wires and the Central Locking Control Box (affectionately nicknamed the 'Black Box'). All of these were showing signs of water damage, where rain had blown in under the incorrectly fitted trim panel. As a new 'Black Box' is a rather costly item (to say the least), my first course of action was to try and repair the existing unit - which didn't do any good.
I was sure that the 'Black Box' was at fault, it could only have been that - but I didn't want to order a new one without being 100% certain. Fortunately, luck was on my side as we were servicing another Galaxy for Sutton, so I borrowed the 'Black Box' from that one and put it into the problem car.

On first turn of the key, all of the doors locked! Dr Kev wins again! I could now order a new 'Black Box' safe in the knowledge that this was the problem and so avoid any extra expenditure.

For what I hear, the water had barely dried from Sutton's pre sale carwash before the Galaxy was out on a test drive! And of course, the new owners can be certain that it will lock perfectly every time. If only the prior owner had known that we could have fixed the locking without replacing every componant needlessly, maybe he would have held onto it!
Until next week,

Dr Kev Allen