Jonola14

A CAR-TASTROPHE

Those of you that have been to the Jottings section of the site may have read an article called P75 BPM, which is a history of the problems I had with my old car. Well, I sold that one when I got a company car as part of the package for joining Renault UK.

Back in September 2006 I left Renault UK and had to give up the company car, which was a rather nice Mégane Coupé Cabriolet - recommended, and I went until October 2007 without owning a car, without having a company car and without even driving a car. I was a train connoisseur. Not a spotter though, thank goodness.

Anyway, I bought my brother’s MGF off him in October 2007 and to date it is the single most expensive thing I have ever bought. It sailed through the MOT test, had a full service and was so well cleaned when I came to pick it up that it might as well have been new. I knew I wasn’t going to do thousands of miles every year, and it hadn’t done that many miles when I bought it, plus with one careful owner it was a good deal.

Although when I was sitting in the cab of the recovery truck, the day before New Year’s Eve, with my shiny MGF winched up and being towed, my car luck really hadn’t got any better. The worst that had happened previously was a flat battery, but nine weeks and a mere 800 miles after buying it, I’d managed to blow the cylinder head and gasket system. Hopefully the last of the problems, but given P75 BPM’s history, somehow I doubt it…