Ace Mechanic, me.....
In the early 90s I was working in a particularly shite job in London, a 2 hr commute from home in East Sussex. My wife worked near to home, but had to drop our toddler son off at the childminders on her way to work. Several days in a row, she would drive the 10 miles in our ancient Volvo 360 to the childminders, drop the sprog, and return to the car only to find that it refused to start no matter what.

Twice, and because I needed little excuse to bail out of work, I left work in London (having only just arrived) to come and rescue the car. I would arrive at the car and it would start first time.

Staring under the bonnet, I realised that that when the engine got warm the radiator coolant would rise in the expansion bottle bolted to the inner wing. That bottle was cracked, and the water would soak the wiring that ran beneath it, causing it to not start once stopped. Leave it a couple of hours (the time it took me to get back from London) and the wiring had sufficiently dried to let it start again. £5 for a replacement from a scrappy, everyone's happy, except me... I had to go back to work.
(SausageWarrior destination Zululand, come on boys jump in the van, Tue 18 Oct 2011, 19:37, 2 replies)

Could you not have joined the AA or the like?

( Mrs Entity is in hiding., Tue 18 Oct 2011, 22:16, closed)

Yes

(SausageWarrior destination Zululand, come on boys jump in the van, Wed 19 Oct 2011, 4:16, closed)