Pug 406 HDi MOT fail advice please

Hi All,

I've been offered a V-plate 406 HDi, in very good nick, one owner from new for £450. The one problem with it is that the MOT is up tomorrow, and the current owner has been quoted £500 to get it through. I think this is taking the piss somewhat. I have the fail sheet

  1. Front number plate has become degraded - piece of cake
  2. Front N/S brake hose has excessively deteriorated - pretty cheap?
  3. Offside front CV joint gaiter split - can't be expensive surely?
  4. N/S rear suspension arm has excessive play in a ball joint. This I have no idea about. I've done front balljoints, but not rears - hard? Expensive?
5.Nearside brake binding. Brakes were replaced less than a month ago.
  1. Excessive level of metered smoke for a turbocharged engine? Injector cleaner, new filters, and a damn good caning down the motorway?

Is it worth me taking a risk with this motor? It drives well, it's clean, and for a winter hack to save my poor old Xantia Activa it should be well worth it and at 50mpg somewhat cheaper to run.

cheers

Mike P

Reply to
Mike P
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Mike P gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

It's just the usual PSA trailing arm bearings.

Probably just needs a good clean and copaslip.

Probably. One owner from new, probably elderly? Sounds like a pootler. But HDi = common rail... It won't have a partic filter - too early to be a 2.2. Even so, lots of potential complication...

Reply to
Adrian

On Tue, 26 Oct 2010 19:37:18 +0000, Adrian boggled us with:

Not sure it is. I'm guessing it's the rear stabiliser arm , item 6 here..

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That's what I thought.

Colombian woman, 40 last week

Oh yes, I can walk quicker than she drives. One of those ultra PC types who never exceeds a speed limit because it kills children and trees.

That's what I fear. I'm going to ask Ray Williams tomorrow, but I'll be surprised if it's anything like what the owner was quoted. Not counting the rear brakes, I got it to £40+vat for the parts from GSF.

I *could* do it myself. It's raining and bloody cold though.

Reply to
Mike P

Mike P gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

Oh, bloody hell. I'd forgotten 406s were all _complicated_...

You're buying it off your missus?

Reply to
Adrian

On Tue, 26 Oct 2010 20:12:26 +0000, Adrian boggled us with:

Whole arm with balljoint and bush is only £21, it doesn't look that hard to do - take wheel off, put on stand, jack hub up to take weight off. Change arm.

I'll tell her you said she was 40. She's only 39! It's actually one of the South American womens mafia of Twyford and Wokingham. There's loads of them! We've got Argentinians, quite a few Colombians, some Mexicans and Bolivians around here. They all look like us though so.... Shit, wrong group..

Reply to
Mike P

Mike P gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

Yebbut they probably talk funny.

Reply to
Adrian

Probably, but no guarantees. If you can't fix the smoke then don't piss = =

around with the rest of it.

Reply to
Duncan Wood

I have often found that different testers use diferent methods of pressing the pedal down, which gives widely varying results on diesel smoke. The tester I use has a very sympathetic way of testing which 99 times out of a hundred gives a pass figure for smoke.

Reply to
Mrcheerful

On Wed, 27 Oct 2010 12:41:17 +0100, Mrcheerful boggled us with:

I have a feeling that the garage are taking the piss. The owner and her husband have no mechanical knowledge at all.

Why do I think this? Well, it was tested at the same place for the last 3 years. Oh, and they turn up in a brand new Merc to collect it, and aren't short of money.

Each MOT for the last few has advisories on it. None of which were ever fixed, and none of which appear as advisories or failure on the next MOT. Is that odd, or just my perception?

I spoke to my friendly Pug/Cit specialist this morning. He reckoned on less than £200 to fix it all bar the smoke - simply asked me to bring it in so he could have a look at it and see what is causing the smoke. He apparently has some sort of evil spray that can be sprayed down the inlet which often drops smoke dramatically. We shall see.

Reply to
Mike P

  1. You can get a gaitor kit that you cut down to size and glue on. My escort needed one. =A312 or thereabouts.

McK

Reply to
McKevvy

Is it still on and in one piece?

Reply to
Mrcheerful

On Thu, 28 Oct 2010 10:09:31 +0100, Mrcheerful boggled us with:

If it's one of those ones with a split in that you don't need to dismantle the hub etc to fit, then I'd be surprised seeing as he's actually driven the car... ;-p

Reply to
Mike P

Mike P gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

I've heard of them working well enough long-term, but only if you're so utterly anal about cleanliness that it'd probably be quicker and easier to do it properly.

Reply to
Adrian

On Thu, 28 Oct 2010 09:23:31 +0000, Adrian boggled us with:

Which is why the 406 is presently over at that place on Slough Trading estate that you told me about..

Reply to
Mike P

These are not a good proposition, the job has to be spotless so you get the glue to stick, if not they come apart. Still difficult to fit.

Reply to
Rob

On Thu, 28 Oct 2010 09:27:35 +0000, Mike P boggled us with:

Well, they couldn't even get it to make smoke at all when they put it on the MOT station tester round the corner, so that's a good thing.

Unfortunately, the rad burst on my way to them this morning...

Reply to
Mike P

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