64 Nissan Note no cabin heater?

When you say 'disability', do you mean Motability?

If so, you should not attempt to carry out any repairs to it. To do so would be a breach of the lease agreement. The supplying garage will prioritise repairs to it.

Chris

Also (in the case of a Motability vehicle): Only drivers named on the motability policy can drive it and you only get two, that includes the disabled driver, but sometimes you can pay for a third. If your Mrs is not named on that policy she can't drive it.

The car is owned by the motability organization and you can only drive someone elses car if you have the owners, not keepers, permission even if your own insurance says you are covered to drive others cars (your policy will say something to that effect).

I'm not sure any of this applies to the OP; however, the rules tightened significantly a few years ago:

Yeah, whatever it is that the disabled can get carwise. ;-)

I had no intentions on so doing, even if I could / wanted to. ;-)

Understood.

Well, the 'supplying garage' in this case has (allegedly) suggested she speak to the AA or RAC as they are too busy to book her in (or was at the time) ... but like I mentioned, any of this could be misinterpretations of the fact. ;-(

Butanyway ... we left it running on her drive for probably 30 mins and I saw the temperature go from about 10 DegC around what I believe is the block around the thermostat area to about 70 (max). The main hoses / rad stayed at about 10 till the block got to about 50 then crept up to about 30.

I have since been told that if you 'previously' (prior to it having service ...) if you set the temperature to 30 it would get very hot, pretty quickly. However, on a recent trip (from London to Brummy and back and also post the 'service') the heater didn't get very warm at all (potentially because it was being cooled by the flow of cold air compared with when being tested stationary).

When the block was around 70 and then I turned the heater on to full (30) I measured 50 on the inner heater vent flap. If you held your hand over the vent at that point it was nearly unbearably hot.

So, my thought is it's either a thermostat not closing fully or opening too soon or if it's electric, something in the ECU has changed (firmware upgrade on a service?) or it is doing the same electronically (sticking valve = early / overcooling)?

Cheers, T i m

She is. ;-)

(To be sure I understand you correctly ...) You mean 'someone else', who isn't on the insurance of said Motobility car can only drive said car on their own car policy (assuming they have the 'you can drive any car not owned by you with the owners permission' (and generally only

It (hers) does, 3rd party etc. She's a named driver on mine and I believe that inclusion doesn't always (ever?) apply to a named driver (possibly with the exception of 'emergencies')?

Cheers, T i m

Another question that has come out of this though is what are the rules re my Mrs taking the car into the garage for her on her own?

We understand that the typical use is to involve the person who is the registered keeper of the Motobility car and a garage would be insured and driving it as a representative of the garage but would we have to take two cars up there with the disabled person and then drag her back in our car (assuming the garage won't come and get it themselves)? [1]

Cheers, T i m

It will take longer to warm up in cold spell we just had.

How far did they go? Is it Diesel? They don't get warm very quickly and even petrol won't be any good until about 1 mile.

T-stat is part open so coolant goes though rad all the time, then it takes a 60-70 mph run to get warm.

No coolant?

I'm pretty sure that would be OK:

'The car is used by, or for the benefit of, the disabled person. This does not mean that the disabled person needs to be in the car for every journey. In practice, this means other named drivers in the household can use the car for shopping and other routine activities, as long as the disabled customer will benefit'

The rules say the car is to be used for the benefit of the disabled person and I see that taking it to be fixed would be of benefit to that person.

I don't know if the garage would provide a loan car. If it's off the road for any length of time the disabled person should get a loan and I would expect the garage to do their best to provide one. I've only had mine for six months and I'm not quite sure what will happen when it goes in for it's service. I will either have to wait or have a loaner.

No one can drive a Motability car on their own policy because Motability will not give them permission (as I understand it). The Motability info that I have say that even if you have permission you cannot drive the vehicle until you get the insurance policy with your mane on it as a named driver. The disable driver will have a Motability information pack that came with the car if you want to get it from the horses mouth.

If you drive a car without the owners permission it's classed as theft (twoc or something) is the root of the situation and the keeper isn't the owner.

I've come across people who aren't clear on that and thought I'd rather point it out even if you knew about it.

Thanks for the clarification on that (rp / Chris).

Agreed.

The car in question is used for fairly local trips to the hospital, typically minimum once, often twice a week (with my Mrs driving) plus some social stuff on the weekend (typically with her Son).

We could use our car for the hospital visits (and often do if it's further away and I drive to be able to drop them both off at the dropoff point etc) and her sons car for the weekends so it's not really a dealbreaker if it is away for a few days.

Cheers, T i m

Ok.

Ok.

Interesting. I think I have seen (UK) TV cop shows where even if the owner doesn't specifically state that the person *had* permission (eg, that they weren't saying they specifically *didn't* have permission) then it wasn't considered 'taking without permission'? (But I may have got it wrong etc). It could be semantics or circumstance or there could be a big difference.

Say a mate gives me permission to drive his car (on my insurance cover) but it turns out it's easier for my Mrs to drive his car and me to drive ours (on her separate insurance). If he was asked if he had given my Mrs permission he would say 'no' (because he hadn't implicitly) but at the same time he would have done [1] had the question / thought come up. Not sure how that would play out in the eyes of the law though.

Not the same things as a scrote taking it of course. ;-)

Ok. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

Understood.

The first time they noticed it, only about a mile or so but they (well she, the owner) is used to it heating up quicker than it did that first particular time.

Petrol.

Agreed ... or even 'ever', as I remember from my Rover 219SD. ;-) (That can be handy in that I drove 10+ miles home with little coolant in the system twice by driving it on the temperature gauge). ;-)

Understood. Better in traffic etc.

Or traffic ... because the typically journey where this was first notices is fairly 'urban' I don't think there would be any real stretch where they wouldn't be out of traffic (and / or driving though

Checked that earlier, expansion tank bang on max and the rad filled to the top (I checked that as well in case there was an issue with the expansion tank etc).

There seemed to be more than just a temperature sender over what looked like the thermostat housing that I thought could have been an electric valve (assuming there is such a thing)?

Cheers, T i m

Presumably a garage holds insurance to cover customers' vehicles in for repair or MOT.

Does Motability have to be specifically asked to give permission where the garage staff need to drive the car?

The dealership would have a contract with Motability which would presumably cover such details.

Chris

From my deepest memory I think I remember the lady in question saying that at the previous dealer (Ford as it happens) there may have been 'nominated' drivers who would come and collect and deliver her (Motobility) car for her.

Cheers, T i m

So, we dropped it into Nissan this morning and they offered to check it out while we waited, in case it was something simple 'like the pollen filter not clipped in properly'?

Happy not to just go and sit in the rush hour traffic and / or go back and get it later, we said we would wait and an hour or so later they returned saying it was sorted. Keen to find out exactly what they had found / done, I got to speak to the mechanic that had done it but didn't really feel I'd been given an answer as such.

I was told that 'the coolant had been drained and replaced', that it had been checked / bled, that the pollen filter had been clipped back properly, that some motor had been reconnected and something had been reset (something that needs doing after removing stuff to access the pollen filter apparently)?

Anyway, we (he) couldn't take it on the motorway for a test drive ... or take it over 60mph ... (for reasons to do with insurance or their test drivers getting stuck in a traffic jam or some such) as I was saying the only 'real' test would be to cruise on the motorway at a reasonable speed (and light load on the engine / on a cold day) as that's when the owner first noticed the issue (after a 'big service' (~5k miles?) that may have included a pollen filter change).

A test drive locally demonstrated the cabin heater air was red hot (on full) so maybe they had done *something*.

Like I said though, we will see how it goes when cruising at motorway speeds on a cold day. ;-)

Cheers, T i m