MOT Day… It didn’t go as planned.
So a last minute cancellation appeared on the DVA website allowing me to trundle Sadie on her first road test to the MOT center.
A route was chosen by me so that if the inevitable happened and I broke down totally, I’d not be stuck on the motorway. So I stuck to an inbound city route through the middle of Belfast headed to Newtownards.
All bulbs checked, windscreen washers filled, headlight washer filled and off I went. The drive went well with the car feeling good, power steering was a little on the heavy side I thought, but at least it was working. Foreshadowing at its finest there.
Sadie made her way happily through the Belfast evening traffic, with me keeping an eye for warning lamps and another eye on the water temps and an ear for any weird noises all seemed spot on. Even the brakes that had been sitting unused in deepest darkest Omagh were getting better with use, result.
I arrived in Ards a little early and decided to have another walk around of the car to check everything was ok. It wasn’t, the drivers side washer had stopped squirting. Damn. So with a packet of safety pins purchased it was unceremoniously jammed into both nozzle and given a dammed good wobbling. It seemed to work and squirted out at a tremendous pace.
Oh and one last thing… a soft drivers side front tyre. Great.
So with some expensive air added to the tyre, no doubt imported into the compressor from the Swiss Alps, to get me to the MOT center and then home again no matter the outcome. On approach to the MOT center gate the steering got VERY heavy indeed and just, let go. So, no power steering. Wonderful.
Off Sadie went into the shed of doom, and I took a seat in the luxurious waiting area.
15 mins later, the verdict arrived. Not great, an inevitable failure. Even more annoying that some of things I had checked had appeared as failures too. Meh, check better next time I guess?
So parts were ordered, along with tools to get started on this basket case of a Mini.
See you in the next one!
