Nightmare MOT!

[junglist_matty]

Took my LCR in for its MOT yesterday and thought it may fail on front tyres as they are pretty much on the wear markers (thought they'd be an advisory) and other than that it appeared to be in good shape...

Turns out I was wrong... The front offside wheel is wobbly as hell (track rod end totally gone), this really annoyed me because I took it to the same garage a few months ago saying it felt unstable when driving at higher speeds (i.e. motorways); I'm not the most familiar with diagnosing issues on cars (mainly because I have limited knowledge of cars; I'm just learning as different stuff goes wrong). So I asked the garage to do a 2 wheel alignment as I thought the tracking was at fault, they did the alignment and charged me £40 for it but why the hell didn't they notice this???? ...Because they are a bunch of complete muppet cowboys!

So then it turns out the rear wheels look fine from looking at them on the car, but the inside edge of the tyre's are pretty much bald with threads showing... After looking, it appears the camber of the rear wheels has been set at a very strong angle with the outside edge hardly touching the road (some stupid previous owner obviously thought they knew what they were doing and set it up completely wrong!).


So they rang me to say it failed the MOT and NEEDED the following work to pass:
- Track Rod end
- New Anti Roll Bar, bushes & clamps
- 4x Tyres (quoted £350 for some rubbish cheapo tyres)
- headlight adjustment
- rear wiper blade

To which I said no; went to pick up the car and they gave me the MOT documents:

Failures:
- Worn out anti roll bar bushes
- Worn out track rod end
- Offside Headlight too dim
- Rear tyres bald on inside edge
- Front tyres on wear markers (half expected)

And advisories given:
- Rear discs pitted
- Rear pads worn out
- 4x Coil springs severely corroded
- Exhaust back box has a crack and should be changed
- Anti Roll bar severely corroded


I checked over the car with a colleague at work (who knows everything about cars); he said:

- All 4 coil springs look in perfect shape; he showed me and they have black paint with no corrosion what-so-ever
- Anti Roll Bar in good shape; has a bit of surface corrosion (to be expected on a 7yr old car) but in good working order.
- Headlight looked fine (maybe slightly out of alignment)


Anyways... Booked it in to get the track rod end and bushes replaced today at a local garage with two old boy's working there who don't rip you off (recommended by a friend); paying £60 for track rod end fitted and £40ish for anti roll bar bushes fitted. He's also going to look at the headlight for me and let me know (I replaced it a few months ago and maybe I put it in slightly wrong so it could just be at the wrong angle).

Friday morning getting 4 new tyres fitted (Falken Ziex ZE-912 225/40 R18 W (92), Reinforced) - Ordered from blackcircles.com (£330)

Friday afternoon going to formula one garage to get a 4 wheel alignment and sort the rear tyre camber (£100ish - they charge depending on what alignment needs doing). I'll also get them to do another MOT (£25) which should hopefully pass.

So all in all:
£55 failed test
£60 track rod end
£40 anti roll bar bushes
£330 4x tyres
£100 4 wheel alignment
£10 headlight adjustment (if required)
£25 MOT test

£620

Oh well!!! Least it should be sorted for another year; service next month!

 

[Booya]

Dang!

 

[junglist_matty]

edited

 

[DannyC87]

Rear camber isn't adjustable. Interested to hear the outcome of this..

 

[LEE69]

Don't use:

 

[greck999]

I thought the rear camber couldnt be adjusted as i was a fixed torsion beam.
The only way to adjust was to fit shims to the stub axle............

Sounds like a nightmare senario though...... One that you dread.

 

[seatcupramad23]

I thought the rear camber couldnt be adjusted as i was a fixed torsion beam.
The only way to adjust was to fit shims to the stub axle............

Sounds like a nightmare senario though...... One that you dread.

your right it can't ,

 

[carlossus]

If it makes you feel any better (unknown to me) my engine mount bolt sheared and the other stripped last week. I took it to my local saying the engine was knocking and I suspected the mounting. After 2 days they said all they could find was a broken exhaust mount. Happy I drove all weekend until the driver's side drive shaft started clicking turning left.

I took a look myself. Open bonnet... engine is listing on the left. Surprise, surprise the engine mount is hanging on by a couple of threads of 1 bolt. FFS.

Now booked into a decent VAG specialist.

Also, my gearbox is whining, my clutch is slipping, my 120K service is due and I had to drill the engine mount to secure it to get it to the garage.

So, my bill will not be pleasant. I feel your pain

 

[junglist_matty]

I had a friend (who knows cars like the back of his hand) look at it and he said he didn't think the rear wheels looked like they could be adjusted from what he could see (car wasn't jacked up).

Turns out the guy at the garage today (who has replaced the track rod end) told me they wouldn't be able to do much to the rear wheels!

So I'm baffled as to why they are at such a camber angle? Surely LCR's don't come with such a stupid camber? and if its not adjustable, how has it got to be so bad? ...I'll try and get a good photo of the rear tyres to show how bad it is

thanks for the info

 

[Pyro]

Wow I thought mine was bad we have a place called Motest here that do a no pass no fee thing it's great to find out what's wrong with it

 

[B3N-R]

I would of been tempted to book it in for another MOT in a different garage before carrying out the work. I always question the consistency of the MOT testers, It may be just me but i think if you go for the cheapest mot in the area like the £25 offers you end up spending alot more on repairs as they are more desperate for the work as opposed to a more expensive tester who is less reliant on MOT repairs

 

[Jamie225]

you cannot really fail the car on the anti roll bar unless its about to disintigrate. its bolted in so cannot go anywhere. are the rear suspension bushes ok? may cause uneven tyre wear.

 

[greck999]

It could be the rear bearings if they are kernackered, and you have sizeable play...
Worth a good look though.

 

[bruceR]

I know how you feel matty, put mine in for MOT today and came back failure on
1. leaking fuel line - to be replaced in 2 days
2. headlight alignment out - I have HIDs fitted and have passed 2 previous MOTs?????? they said they tried to re-align but it's the actual pattern that is dazzling oncomers!!! am going to put the original bulbs in and see what happens

 

[junglist_matty]

I thought the rear camber couldnt be adjusted as i was a fixed torsion beam.
The only way to adjust was to fit shims to the stub axle............

Sounds like a nightmare senario though...... One that you dread.

Going to check the rear camber tomorrow; a friend at work has a camber gauge so we'll check them over... I'm pretty sure its not right, but I've a thread specifically for this discussion...

http://www.seatcupra.net/forums/showthread.php?t=311576

Just a quick question... how do the rear wheels on your LCR last? If you could have a look at the photos in the above thread and write what you think; personally, I can't see that being "normal" wear for rear tyres... It's not as if I drive it very hard either...

Cheers pal.

 

[junglist_matty]

I know how you feel matty, put mine in for MOT today and came back failure on
1. leaking fuel line - to be replaced in 2 days
2. headlight alignment out - I have HIDs fitted and have passed 2 previous MOTs?????? they said they tried to re-align but it's the actual pattern that is dazzling oncomers!!! am going to put the original bulbs in and see what happens

Unlucky mate... hope you manage to get it sorted! my headlight failed, although I think mine is because I changed it one evening in the winter (was going tesco's when the bulb went) so got a bulb from tesco's and put it in although I couldn't really see what I was doing and I think i've put it in slightly wrong so its prob sat at the wrong angle or something like that (or at least I hope its that simple!)

 

[junglist_matty]

It could be the rear bearings if they are kernackered, and you have sizeable play...
Worth a good look though.

If the bearings had sizeable play what are the tell tell signs? We had the rear jacked up and the rear wheels don't move at all (no play)

 

[greck999]

It was just an idea, but if you have checked and there is no play then it cant be those....

 

[junglist_matty]

According to the garage (who rang me this morning), the anti roll bar on my car needed replacing because it has plastic sleeves on the bar where the bushes hold it in place; the mechanic told me that these plastic sleeves had deteriorated and broken away which was the reason I needed a new bar as well as bushes and clamps.

After hearing this new information I took a vernier caliper to my ARB right by the bush and measured the thickness of the bar to be 18.1mm.

I then rang Seat dealership and asked him the internal diameter of the ARB bushes for my car (after giving the VIN number) to which he informed me they are 18mm which means they'll fit perfect onto the current ARB (no need for a new ARB, unless this so called plastic sleeve is 0.05mm thick which I highly doubt), so ordered a set of clamps and bushes that I'll fit myself.

 

[MJ]

Yeah the ARB on 1m leons have no sleeves on them at all, just a solid metal bar, most of the time the bushes perish causing excess movement but you would'nt feel it when you check it on an mot and if you could i'm certain you (who drives the car) would have heard the ARB knocking if they were that far gone.