cars breaking down

[andyman]

Where has your car broken down and was it in a busy place etc.
Today at some traffic lights i saw a guy in a vs commodore where the radiator just cracked and started to spitting out the coolant everywhere.

[1991_Vn2nV]

I havent had my car break down yet....touch wood. But I did borrow a VS commodore to go pick a girl up to see a movie a while back and the plastic bit on the radiator that connects to the radiator hose snapped and the radiator hose came off and i lost all the radiator fluid...

I carry tools in my car but there was nothing in this VS so I had no ties or anything for the radiator hose...i just tied it up as best i could with a rag and filled the radiator with water lol
Incredibly embarrassing, and we missed the movie...

[andyman]

dang that would of sucked

[1991_Vn2nV]

yeah the rag tie only just lasted to the servo as well...where i got it tied on properly... Oh well...thats what happens when Holden stops using all metal radiators like what was in the VL...Plastic is cheaper but it comes at a price of its own..

[vkberlina]

I had a radiator split in a middle lane on the sydney harbour bridge once in my VK commodore. I ended up getting a flat tow from someone I was with off the bridge but it was an experience I dont want to relive.
anywhere else it wouldnt have phased me but there was a shocker..

[Rinn_P]

The scariest place my car has decided to be a bitch is on the Hume highway around Goulburn. Was in the overtaking lane, overtaking a big truck...with another truck up my back end. CAS had a spack. So I was accelerating then suddenly totally lost all power and the car essentially turned off into accessory mode. That was hella scary!

Rinn

[slappa.]

mine wasnt that bad.. only thing thats happened to me is on the pacific hwy fan belt snapped, lost steering and engine temp shot up like shit. i now hav nrma's number in my fone.

[andyman]

i'd hate to be travelling somewhere and the engine just stop, the only thing i can remember is my dads old hilux used to stall sometimes just out of the blue when idleing, it caught us one day waiting at some traffic lights, but we had enough time to start he up again!

[90VN55]

this didnt happen to me but i was in the car

heading back from hervey bay we hit a hare and we kept driving and as we started going up a hill we started losing power. and the temp gauge went right up(didnt realise for 30 seconds). then the car stalled.

so we rang racq and got a stupid b**** on the phone that doesnt no anything!! asking stupid questions like "how far are you from the nearest town?" "we dont know we are in the middle of no where between crows nest and some other town" "we need a distance" "about 10 km from crows nest"

anyway the tow truck finally gets there and the 3 of us squeeze in the front of the truck with the driver. and we were actully 20 km not 10. and the driver doesnt have much fuel(thinking 10km he will make it there and back)
so we get about 10km up the road and the truck stops (out of petrol)
so we get out and he calls his mate to bring some fuel. 10 mins later he pulls up puts the fuel in trys to start the truck batterys flat(the lights on top were going the whole time).

so they jump start the truck and we finally get to crows nest.

then we had to get from crows nest to stanthorpe.
we ring my uncle and he comes and gets us the next day (we had to pay him a days wages)

we finally get to stanthorpe and 2 days later we get a call from the fella in crows nest and we have to organise to get the car from there to stanthorpe(insurance paid for it).
so when it gets here we get told that the engine is fu**ed(the hare busted a radiator hose and cracked something on the engine)
(insurance paid to fix it)

the mechanic said that the engine could have serious problems down the track cause there was some other things damaged.
so we sold that and bought a new car

the car that got damaged was a holden astra
the person driving was my dad
the hare that fu**ed the car deserves what it got
this is probly full of spelling mistakes and bad grammer
took me 30mins to write

[Outlaw Torn]

lol, at a roundabout in the middle of a city in peak rush hour, the gearbox thru a hissyfit. The clip that holds the gear stick in decided to disintegrate, couldnt put it in gear, ended up pushing it through the roundabout and off the road to find out the problem

Hoseclamp was the quick fix, and its still there, 2 months later.

[vh-holden]

the vh decided to die at the traffic lights on mitchell st in the city. it's the main drag in town, lots of pubs, clubs and restaurants. i was 2nd in line at the lights and the car stopped and wouldnt' start. hopped out and started to push. the people behind just stared at me and waited. eventually a pedestrian came and gave me a hand to push it round the corner.

[Demons1964]

The VS stato had a water pump fail, and it also had a battery on its last legs. So as soon as the pump died, there was no battery power left and I came to a halt straight away right in the middle of the intersection of Narre Warren-Cranbourne Road and Pound Road. For those that know the intersection it was before the lights were installed and there had been a number of deaths there over the years. Fortunately it was late on Sunday night and another kind commodore driver helped me move the heavy thing out of harm's way.

Worst one my missus had was at a busy T-intersection facing uphill and the alternator gave out - Friday night peak hour = not much fun. She couldn't move the car forward because the hill was too steep and couldn't roll back because all the traffic was queing up behind her. All the other motorists did was honk their horns for the next hour and yell abuse at her until the RACV towed her away.

[Jamie_87]

i was going up to taree to visit some relos in the vp , got to just before mooney mooney bridge and i heard this bang and kept driving, thought nothing of it, prob a rock or sumthing, then the ppl next to us told me i had a flat in the back, as i was going around the corner i felt the back starting to sway a bit (at 100k's not fun), so i pulled over, tyre was buggered, but then the jack wouldnt extend enough to lift the car up enough , so my uncle,cuz, n brother had to go searching for a rock to lodge the jack on so i could jack up the rear, anyway put stocky tyre on ran good up to taree,no probs, as soon as i got to taree, running up the main street, heard a bang then a whining(like a s/c), pulled over, pop bonnet to find the idle pulley bearing missing and the fan belt running on the metal bit that the bearing sits on , i thought stuff it, my relos dnt live to far, ill see how far i can make it, got to the bottom of the street my relos live on and the belt snaps, losing my pwr steering everything , but engine was still going, just enuf to get into their driveway and onto front yard, 640buks later i got a new fan belt , pulley and 4 new tyres(as my old tyres pretty shotty and wouldnt last back to syd) that was a roadtrip to remember.

another time in the vp i was coming home from work on a friday, at the lights, on hume hwy my lights dimmed, lose engine power,fuel gauge going down to empty slowly etc... neways just make it home where car almost died, next morning tried to start wouldnt kik over, rang nrma, guy came i told him the prob he jumped the car, it started, then he bashed the alternator with a rubber mallot(when he hit it u could hear the alt working again) and said let the car run for a while before u turn it off as u need a need alternator regulator , i went down to spare parts place bought one for 5buks and problem was fixed, the brushes on the regulator were badly worn, so they werent connecting with the alt, making me run the car off the battery.