CRISIS AVERTED

THE BOXSTER AND MORLEY WERE FANGING ON BACK ROADS UNTIL THERE WAS A FUNNY SMELL. GENTLY BACK TO THE MBC THEN

- DAVE MORLEY

How can you tell if you’re on to an honest mechanic; a good guy or gal who won’t dud you? You send them a job that could be a big-dollar fix, only to have them discover a much smaller problem and charge you accordingly. This was brought home to me the other day when the Boxster S put the first blot in its sexy little copy-book.

There I was, fanging along a nice piece of back-road, when I suddenly popped out of paradise, back into suburbia and struck the first red light in about 50km of – ahem – spirited driving. Because it wasn’t actually raining speedboats at the time, I had the roof down and, as I slowed to stop at the intersection, I could suddenly smell coolant. So, back at the MBC, I checked the level of the expansion tank and discovered that, yes, I was down a cupful or so.

Now, I could have stuck the Porker on the ramp and checked it out. But you know what? This is a mid-engined car with three (count `em) radiators in the nose and the expansion tank in the boot. That’s a lot of potential for getting the bleeding process wrong, leaving a hot-spot somewhere in the water-jacket and torching something inside with a part number that begins with a dollar-sign. So it was off to Cascone Auto Sport (who did the IMS and clutch replacement when I first bought the car) for a professional diagnosis.