Questions for Jiff (or any other tame former MOT testers :p )

[Rave]

My crappy old Mondeo is due it's MOT again. The things I know are wrong with it are as follows, so I'm wondering if I need to bother fixing them before I take it in?

1) No rear view mirror on the windscreen- my mum managed to pull it off while trying to adjust it, and in the process of trying to reattach it with superglue I managed to fill up the ball, so that now even if I could stick it back on, it would give me an excellent view of the headlining. Side mirrors are fine, I assume an internal rear view mirror is not a requirement since you don't get them on panel vans etc?

2) The front undertray has come loose where it attaches to the bit of the chassis that runs across the lower front of the engine compartment. The plastic has broken around two of the mounting holes; I might be able to stick a connector up the one in the middle (they seem to just be held in place with sort of plastic poppers), or with a bit more faffage, try and find a suitable bolt and run a tap up the hole if it isn't already threaded (or a self tapping screw, come to think of it). It's only hanging down about a centimetre though, and it doesn't clonk on speedbumps or anything- or it doesn't now that I've pulled off a random bit of foam that I found hanging off and can't even figure out where it should have been.

3) nearside washer jet doesn't work; there's clearly a loose connection hidden under the bonnet sound deadening material as that's gone a bit wet and mouldy. Should be an easy fix if I can figure out of to get at it (lost my Haynes manual in the house move it seems ).

That's all I can think of, apart from a marginal front tyre. About a month ago I got a bit of a weird resonant vibration on a bumpy French a-road which disappeared as soon as you let off the throttle, which was a bit disconcerting, but it's not recurred on any English roads.

TIA .

[Rave]

Looks like I'm O.K on the mirror:

http://www.motuk.co.uk/manual_810.htm

I have 'two of the above'.

[filbert]

Not done them for 7 years, but from what it was then,
1) drivers door and 1 other needed, so your ok
2) undertray not tested, but I could refuse to complete the test if I thought it was dangerous ( very unlikely)
3) all the screen has to be cleaned, so unless the offside covers the whole screen then it will fail.

[Rave]

Nice one mate, that was the conclusion I'd come to after a brief perusal of the manual (I'm pretty certain that the undertray is not at all dangerous, though I plan to fix it just for aerodynamic efficiency). Looks like I'll be swearing at the underside of the bonnet tomorrow morning then.

[finlay666]

My old accord passed with the rear mirror in the glove compartment so it'll be fine

[Moby-Dick]

cable tie the undertray

[filbert]

Just had a thought on the screenwash, if you take it on a freezing day and the water has frozen, it'll pass

[Rave]

Well, I spent an hour or so fiddling about with the washer jet, having removed the bonnet lining, losing several of the poppers down the engine bay in the process It wasn't obviously leaking from anywhere, but it still wasn't working properly. I poked a bit of stripped cat5e down the jets and got it to work for a bit, but not very well. Then I lockwired the rubber connector on with a paperclip and got it working quite well....for about 15 seconds. I'm pretty sure that there's a bit of grit in one of the two jets on the NS sprayer. Still, I figured one working would satisfy the MOT man and headed off.

In the end I'm pretty sure he didn't even test them. He did however inform me that one of the bushes on my OSF wishbone was knackered. I guess that was what was causing the weird vibration I experienced on an undulating French a-road last month. Asked him how much- £85 + vat supplied and fitted.

Well, I was already down 55 quid for the MOT, so I figured a further £102 for another year's worth of booze cruises, trips to the tip, and the smell of burning veg oil in the summer was worth it. Still, to keep a car that's basically worth about £150 on the road for a year is going to cost me over 700 quid once you factor in insurance, tax, and MOT. Crazy really, but what can you do.....

cable tie the undertray

Erm, but, er....that wouldn't work, would it? I'm embarrased that I didn't think of that myself TBH. I'll do that as soon as I find my big tube of cable ties which got hidden somewhere during the recent move. Then it'll be time to finally give it an oil and filters service- and maybe take a holesaw to the airbox, see if I can persuade it to actually make some power above 3000RPM instead of just blowing a lot of smoke everywhere.

[Zak33]

/mumbles.....

can get a lot of frenh booze in a small french car... they're designed for it

/mumbles

[Tumble]

/mumbles.....

can get a lot of frenh booze in a small french car... they're designed for it

/mumbles

Yeah... but that's only so you have something to do when the thing breaks down AGAIN....