How to ruin a perfect 21 year driving record...

[Peter DLM]

So, it's been an interesting week or so for my poor car. Firstly I blew out a rear tyre somehow so it's been on the steel spare as I haven't had the chance to get a new tyre on it.

So I was feeling sorry for it so I popped into a hand car wash on the way home one day and they made it look all nice and shiney again.....until....

From the A13 I have to pull across a few lanes to get to a left turn to get to my house, and this is only a few yards before a set of lights, it's always painful to do this and I guess after 12 years I'd gotten braver and more aggressive (and complacent) in achieving the lane changes. So I spotted a gap between an artic and a white van so I eyed the WVM driver and gave the throttle a prod and snuck in nicely only for the artic to stop probably dead as I was doing so. So first thing I see when I look forward is the locking handle of the doors a lot closer than I was comfortable with and then the bonnet appearing halfway up the screen. Bugger.

Struggled to exit the car, as the wing is now fouling/overlapping the drivers door.

Artic driver didn't even realise I'd buried my car under his rear end, he thought it was his load in the trailer shifting as he braked hard. A quick inspection revealed that I'd only left a tiny smear of blue paint on the RSJ type bumper, didn't even knock any of the rust off it! So he laughed and drove off. A bystander/spectator cut the airbag off and I drove the 1/2 mile back to the house leaking water.

This is what it looked like a week earlier.

 

[Shude]

Ouch! Sad to see another member's car with big dents in it

I take it you are uninjured?

 

[Peter DLM]

Yup, no problem with me.... other than the severely bashed pride.

I'd always wondered how people ever run into the back of other cars, as, until now, I'd found it to be impossible to do if you're driving properly. London traffic was bound to get me in the end I guess.

 

[C43AMG]

Accidents do happen to the best of us, glad you are okay.

 

[para alpha]

Oh dear, No one hurt I hope..

 

[Chattonmill]

Ooops! Never mind it's only metal

 

[219]

Glad you're not hurt .

By the looks of the damage , that's what you pay insurance for . Just watch , they may well try to write it off .

 

[Peter DLM]

Oh dear, No one hurt I hope..

No, thank goodness. Luckily (?!) I ran into something a LOT larger than myself. The driver wasn't even aware it had happened.

Accidents do happen to the best of us, glad you are okay.

Yes, that's true....though I took extreme pride in my record and given half a chance would bore someone to death with it. Looks like I'm gonna have to wait for a few years before I can boast again.

Glad you're not hurt .

By the looks of the damage , that's what you pay insurance for . Just watch , they may well try to write it off .

Thanks, though having seen the damage up close I doubt that I'll ever see it again. Both sets of lights, rad, two wings, door, slam panel, front panel, bumper, various water bottles, airbag.

 

[Druk]

Sad for you. Nice looking car too.

 

[bennesspipers]

Sorry to tell you, but thats WILL write it off, front end damage is always the most expensive.

 

[219]

I was trying not to dash his hopes too much .

Depending on the underlying damage , could be a diy repair :- 2x wings , bonnet , RH headlamp , radiator . Pull landing panel back out to straight , poss front bumper . Most of the parts could be had from a breaker for reasonable money , pay bodyshop to paint as required - job done .

Since lorry driver is unlikely to have reported to his insurers , keep matter to yourself and your premium will stay low .

Assuming you have no plans to sell car on - in which case I would feel morally bound ( as well as legally ) to tell prospective buyer the car had been damaged and repaired .

If still MOT'd and driving , assuming you have had it a year , you could always trade it in under the scrappage scheme as is and get £2K min for it !

 

[Howard]

Same ( ish ) damage as my old CLK .

Take whatever you want to keep out of it right now , as i suspect it will be curtains for it , and if the insurance company get hold of it , it will be a devil to get things back.

 

[Peter DLM]

Yes, I've resigned myself to it going to the great breakers yard in the sky, or in East London somewhere.

I'm not one to get particularly attached to a car anyway, as long as I get something near it's retail value so I can get another similar car, another W210 est. Presume I can't pull the COMAND etc out of it?

Don't wanna do anything naughty in this regard however.

 

[renault12ts]

What a pity. And no rust on the wings either.

 

[Sp!ke]

Oh dear, at least you weren't hurt. :bannana:

What was it like when the airbag went off?

 

[Baron_Samedi]

Yes, I've resigned myself to it going to the great breakers yard in the sky, or in East London somewhere.

I'm not one to get particularly attached to a car anyway, as long as I get something near it's retail value so I can get another similar car, another W210 est. Presume I can't pull the COMAND etc out of it?

Don't wanna do anything naughty in this regard however.

Once the car is with the insurers representative no... but do you have, or could you get something to replace it with?

Or.. just take it out and should the holding people say anything, tell them that the unit was removed previously.

 

[Smatt]

Commiserations

 

[219]

While it would be a write-off with all new parts at M-B prices , it really does look as though it could be repaired fairly easily and cheaply with parts from a donor car . Hereabouts , I'd expect to pay £30-£50 for a bonnet , £15-£30 apiece for wings , maybe £25 for a bumper and the same for a headlight , bits 'n' pieces ad to it but I'd be looking to pay a couple of hundred all told for the parts to fix from a breaker . I doubt you'd need a new door unless it has been badly creased by the wing ?

I had a similar mishap some years ago when I came round a bend on a country road and encountered a HUGE Renault tractor , the little MKII Polo I was in at the time had no hope of stopping on the wet road , even from the 25-30 mph I was doing and I hit the front wheel of the tractor quite hard . No damage at all to the tractor but very similar damage to the Polo as your car suffered ( not the wings , thankfully ) .

Nursed it the 5 miles or so home , went to scrappy next day and got a new bonnet ( same colour !!! ) , grille , 1 headlamp , a bumper and radiator for (IIRC) £50 all in . Bolted the new bonnet onto the hinges , then attached a towrope to the landing panel and got my sister to sit in the Polo with her foot on the brakes while I used one of my Mercs to pull the landing panel back out until it lined up with the bonnet again . Replaced radiator , various other bits , new number plate and car was back on road after a couple of hours' work . That car stayed in the family for a further 10 years or so and was only scrapped recently as no one was using it and lack of space to keep . Still started and ran , but was completely worthless ( Y reg Polo ? ) .

Might be a course of action worth thinking about to also preserve your good insurance record . Your damage looks as if it is confined to the 'softer' parts higher up on the car rather than the structural stuff lower down . Plenty of cars of that generation (W202,W210) now in the scrapyards , so a real chance you could find what you need ( find one in the same colour and you could really win out of it ) .

If you do want to go through insurance , you could accept a settlement lower than the 'value' of the vehicle then use the cash to finance this repair .

All assuming the car was otherwise in good condition and reliable .

 

[Lugy]

I'm with Derek on this one, but then again I hate things going to waste! Especially if you consider the excess and the amount your policy will go up by

Another bonus is the learning experience of rebuilding it if you do it yourself

 

[Will]

I'm quite a positive glass-half-full sort of person, but I think you're going to struggle with getting all the parts to repair quite so cheaply.

Rust-free genuine MB wings are going to be a little tricky to find and would probably cost more than £15-30? Same for the other stuff IMHO

I'd definately look into it, but wouldn't hold my breath that it'll fix up all that cheaply.

You'll still need to sort out the radiator, airbag, possible bent metal underneath etc and then get it all painted up in a bodyshop. There could obviously be other damage that hasn't been noticed which will all cost time/money to repair.

If you want to keep it, 'contract repairs' sound like the way forward. If you're not attached to it and it's not special to you in any way, there'll be other 210 estates out there for you

Will