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Workshop day yesterday, Stuart came over from Scunthorpe in his 2003 TF 135 in x-power grey, to leave it with us for a couple of things.

The nearside sill needed a bit of welding, the car will now go along to our paint shop neighbours on the site to have this colour-matched next week. It should have gone over straight away, but sadly someone backed into his, usually pristine, car and dented the back end and cracked the rear bumper, in a car park, and, yes, the car was parked well away from other cars and, no, the owner in question didn’t leave any of their details. How very frustrating. He’s managed though to source a bumper from a chap on our site as he was walking around this morning, fortunately, how lucky was that!

The car was also showing error code P0420, so we swapped out the (useless) CAT for a homologated one. We had fitting of the new back box on the list, a Daytona, but he’d already done that. So car all good to go and no error codes showing.

Good to see Stuart again and have a chat before he headed home.

I had my head deep in the books all morning, putting the final touches to one of our upcoming trips, in a couple of weeks, to the south west of the country, with a couple of calls on the way. We’d been recommended by a friend to someone down in Ilford who was requiring a minor service and a pre MOT check up, and the owner of the car asked if we could come in November when the MOT and service was due, against my better judgment, given time of year, I agreed to go, said person then asked if we could find someone else nearby so that the travel costs could be shared. So yep no problem in doing that, and a trip was soon put together, thereby a few others benefiting from the reduced travel costs and the added trip in the diary. Confirmation all sent out to all concerned on the trip, all fine except one chap, who had scrapped the car and didn’t need our help anymore, hmm nice to be informed. 🙄 But then! Said person in Ilford asks which MOT station we wanted to book the car into, and they would make the call, erm sorry, but that wasn’t the arrangement, so I explained that we don’t take cars for MOTs when at distance, apart from anything else we’re not insured. So they immediately responded in a rather abrupt manner by canceling the whole booking! Taken aback? Yes, we certainly were. Not only that, it mucks up the entire trip, where the costs and logistics are concerned. So yesterday evening was spent rearranging the hotels and contacting the other people. I know we should have asked for a deposit, but when it’s come from a ‘friend’ you automatically assume that it’s all going to be fine. One should never assume! So it’s going to be a shorter trip than anticipated, three nights away instead of five. Given the time of year maybe that will be a bonus.

On to a brighter note, we collected ‘Princess’ this morning! Mum and daughter, Leona and Laura are wanting to venture on to the NC500 next year and would like to do it in their 2001 MGF 1.8 (original paint code LQW), but as a lot of people will know that Princess is sparkly pink! Not only doing that trip they just wanted her recommissioned so they can get out and about with their MG friends again, on runs and days out.

So we went along to Broomfleet to pick her up from Laura’s house and then took her back to the workshop for a good wash and brush up, initially, before putting her up on the lift to see what needs doing. We’re very much looking forward to getting her all sorted for them to enjoy once more as she should be. Good to see them both again, and as a bonus the sun was out, as she did take a little bit of persuasion to move from her spot. – https://ift.tt/P5nUVuj