Lou’s E85 Z4 2.5i | Bad things come in threes
I’m beginning to think that my Z4 is jinxed. Within the space of one month someone drove into my rear three quarter – fleeing from the scene of the crime, leaving me to pay for the damage. I then locked my only set of car keys (the other half has ‘mislaid’ the spare one) in the boot, requiring a vehicle locksmith. And then the glass from the driver’s side door mirror fell out on the M25.
Believing that bad things come in threes, I was of the opinion that I could now stop hating the car and start enjoying it. Wrong. Whilst coming back from Waitrose (other good supermarkets are available, and a lot cheaper!), a quarter-of-a-mile from my house on a rather narrow country lane I found myself forced to hug the verge because of a car coming the other way. All of sudden, I heard that awful noise when you become victim to a pothole. I limped the car home, hoping that all would be well but I knew in the pit of my stomach that, yet again, I’d made another dent in my wallet. As soon as I got out of the car I could hear the air rushing out of the tyre. For the first time, I started to regret having swapped over the run-flats for normal tyres, as the Z4 has no spare. My only option was to jack the car up and take the wheel and tyre to SE Tyres, except that I didn’t have a jack. So the following day I called up my good mate and assistant manager, Phil Hall, (who I should now have on speed dial) and asked whether they had a mobile service. Thankfully they did.
They had someone out to me that very same day, with the tyre make and size to match the other three. My only worry now was whether it had caused damage to the rim. Suffice to say everything that could be crossed was crossed. After removing the wheel, we could both see it was bent. The technician asked if I wanted him to try and take the dent out. As it wasn’t cracked or fractured, it was a no-brainer; the answer was ‘yes’ – I had nothing to lose.
Unbelievably – for an aluminium wheel – he managed to straighten it. This man was the hero of the hour. Shod in new rubber, I was mobile once again. When I went back to the spot where it happened in daylight I noticed that the pot hole I hit, along with what must have been at least a dozen others on that stretch of road, was sprayed for repairing. And they stayed that way for another month, getting worse and worse until the council closed the road for two days – not to re-tarmac it, oh no, but to patch it. What do we pay road tax for again?
I called the local council and asked them to send me a form to claim for the damage caused by the pothole. It turned up almost two weeks later. Even more shockingly than that, the first two pages advised me to carefully consider making a claim as it comes out of public money. The bloody cheek of it. I was not going to fall for their guilt trip, even if it did take the best part of an hour to answer all of their ridiculous questions, draw diagrams and reference GPS coordinates.
A fortnight later I receive a ‘claim form acknowledgement’ postcard from Kent County Council which stated: ‘We hope to provide you with a decision on liability within at least __ weeks’. Yep, whoever sent it couldn’t even be bothered to write in the gap of how long it would take. The incident occurred on the 28 February and, as I write this, it’s now the 24 April.
I hope that my next update won’t be another rant but instead a bit of positive news but who knows, especially considering my luck!
Thanks & Contact
SE Tyres
Autobahn Servicing Longfield Road, Tunbridge Wells
01892 540760
