Brummy Dave to the Rescue

Monday morning and we were off, confident in getting to near Western-Super-Mare by mid afternoon, or early evening if we detoured to allow Sandra to have a swim in the amazing Clevedon Sea Pool.  Down the M6 to Birmingham the van was chugging along smoothly, the traffic was ok and the sun was shining.  At junction eight we left the M6 and joined the M5 and all was tickety-boo, then 100 yards before Junction 2, BANG, RATTLE and ROAR.  Sandra dived down the slip road and we stopped to panic about the van. 

I’m not a great mechanic, but know that when two thirds of the exhaust system is hanging off and dragging along the road we had a serious problem. 

Desperate to get off the motorway, we limped down the slip road and found an Asda at the bottom we very carefully negotiated the speed ramps and came to rest in the carpark.  A quick check under the van confirmed that the exhaust was buggered and we weren’t going anywhere in a hurry, or quietly!

 As luck would have it, we’d broken down about 3 miles from the RAC HQ at Birmingham.  A quick call informed us that “the best way to report a break down is via our website”, unimpressed this bit of ‘continuing service improvement’ we persevered on the phone eventually logged the call.  A couple of minutes later I received a text with an ETA of three hours.  Time to get creative.  A quick check on Google came up with a couple of local companies, so I phoned the nearest, Cox’s Tyres and Exhaust, 0.7 miles from Asda.  I explained the situation and the bloke on the other end of the line did the classic slow intake of breath, “VW? T4? 1995?, tricky, I think we could get parts for tomorrow, are you local?”

 “No, not local, we’re on our way to Cornwall, and we’ve got a dog so finding a hotel will be difficult…….”

 “Oh, sounds like you’re pretty buggered, tell you what, give me 15 minutes, I’ll come and have a look.”

 True to his word, Dave, the Exhaust man arrived, 5’6” tall, rotund, bald, bearded and with an accent you could cut with a spoon.  He was also fantastic, and after a couple of minutes furckling under the van 75% of the exhaust system, including the two silencers landed on Asda’s carpark, “Yep, that’s buggered, but I think we can fix it, follow me.”

 It little more than half a mile to the garage, a short but very loud trip; an old 2.4 litre, five cylinder diesel engine isn’t quiet at the best of times but with only quarter of an exhaust system it was deafening.

 Once at Dave’s garage it was straight to the front of the queue and onto the lift for a quick inspection then into the office to check parts, “I can’t get the full system but I can get most of it for a long wheel base, if we cut the last foot or so off the tail pipe, you’ll be fine, is that ok?”

 “Yeh, sounds great.”

 “It won’t be cheap, three hundred quid!”

 Without an exhaust the van wasn’t going anywhere and I had a brief vision of The Plan in all its multi spreadsheet glory; the prospect of having to re-jig everything before we’d even got to Cornwall made my blood run cold,  “That’s not a problem.”

 “Ok”.

 An hour later Dave had collected and fitted the exhaust and we were back on the M5 heading south.  While we were walking around waiting for the van to be fixed Sandra bought some beer as a bit of an extra thank you, she handed it over just before we drove off.  Dave, obviously a man who liked a pint, looked in the bag and his face lit up, “Holden’s Brewery, that’s proper stuff that is!”  Sandra had picked beer from the local brewery, one that Dave obviously approved of.

 Then it was back on the road; despite the breakdown and thanks to Dave we ‘d only lost a couple of hours, we even made Brean Sands in time to take Arthur for a run on the beach at sunset.  The walk was back on!

 The fix isn’t perfect as Dave couldn’t get the front section, consequently the van is a bit rattlely at low revs but runs fine on the motorway, Dave even gave us the part number for the missing section of exhaust.  So while she’s not been pandering to my walking requirements Sandra has found a camper van specialist, ordered the missing section and arranged for it to be fitted at the end of the month.  The timing isn’t ideal but it’s a plan we can work with.

Nigel the Van outside Dave’s Garage after being fixed.

Sunset over Brean Sands, only a short stroll from the campsite but a great place to relax after the day’s trials and tribulations..

Sandra and Arthur enjoying the beach.