50+ and proud of it.

Part The First. (Tuesday) 08:50 Arrive at work via lift from wife. 08:52 "Um, hello Mercedes dealer, I've broken a stud in the turbo on my smart roadster, can you fix please?" "(sigh) I suppose so, bring it in tomorrow." "Ah. I can't drive it 'cos it ain't got no exhaust on it." "Err, do you want to take advantage of the smart recovery service? Here's the number." 08:54 *ring*. Explain. Counter-explain about costing money and AA Recovery service. 08:55 *ding* Text. "Hello it's the AA here we'll be at your house at 09:05" 08:55 and 30 seconds. "Sh*t, give us the keys to the beamer pool car! Gotta go!" 09:05 *ring*. "It's the AA man, where are you?" 09:05 and 30 seconds. Wave to AA man. AA man puts roadster on trailer. 09:20 Drive back to work. 10:00 *ring* "It's Mercedes, your car's just arrived, we'll take a look at it now, not tomorrow." 10:30 *ring* "It'

We were coming back from a nice barbecue the other evening with my wife's family when I kept hearing a slightly different tone from the rear/exhaust of my smart roadster. It sounded a bit more "barky" than usual, and so, armed with a 13mm spanner and a cup of tea I decided to take a look the next morning. How hard can it be to take off half a dozen nuts and bolts? To cut two hours into a couple of sentences goes like this: Undo all nuts. Pull. Find O 2 sensor still connected by cunningly hidden cable. Manage to disconnect sensor plug - 20kgs exhaust drops onto chest. Swear a lot, finish cold tea. Go get another cup. Tighten a few things but can't find obvious problem. Check exhaust nuts are free running on studs. They're not. Screw nut onto stud to free it up a bit. Nut get stuck and strips thread. Undo nut, nut removes most of the thread on the stud, iron filings drop into eye. (see 4) Use proper Britool stud extractor to remove stud. Stud snaps inside the frig