AGH! Broken down in London on way to delivery, return ferry to IRE tomorrow!

cormie

I've a van in the UK on a job and it's just broken down in London E10 7

It was on it's way and is 7.7km from the delivery location (just 10 boxes, a bike and golf caddy) but needs to get on the 14:10 ferry in Holyhead tomorrow. Luckily I have AA cover, but does anyone have experience of how this is going to work? It's the first break down overseas I've had!

Waiting on call back from AA now to see what they can do.

I think it may be an alternator issue. The battery light came on and the driver kept going but it eventually gave up, the radio turned off and then the GPS stopped charging and within a few meters the van stopped, airbag light came on etc. Hopefully it can be fixed at roadside and won't need a new alternator (any 24 hour alternator service/shops?)

If anyone has had a similar experience, please share what I may be in for...

CiniO

cormie wrote: »

I've a van in the UK on a job and it's just broken down in London E10 7

It was on it's way and is 7.7km from the delivery location (just 10 boxes, a bike and golf caddy) but needs to get on the 14:10 ferry in Holyhead tomorrow. Luckily I have AA cover, but does anyone have experience of how this is going to work? It's the first break down overseas I've had!

Waiting on call back from AA now to see what they can do.

I think it may be an alternator issue. The battery light came on and the driver kept going but it eventually gave up, the radio turned off and then the GPS stopped charging and within a few meters the van stopped, airbag light came on etc. Hopefully it can be fixed at roadside and won't need a new alternator (any 24 hour alternator service/shops?)

If anyone has had a similar experience, please share what I may be in for...

If you are lucky it might be just alternator belt which snapped. If so AA will probably fix it on the spot.
Otherwise it might take a while, unless there is some overnight garaged in London (I suppose there should be).

Can you not rebook the ferry for later?

cormie

Will have to rebook the ferry if I need to alright. Is it possible it may be the battery also? The light first appeared on the motorway down to London and it stayed on. An engine restart didn't help.

I had some electrical work done in the van recently to hook up some dash cams to a secondary battery. That was a few weeks ago and it's been fine since. Unless a wire was hit off and loosened or something since?

CiniO

cormie wrote: »

Will have to rebook the ferry if I need to alright. Is it possible it may be the battery also? The light first appeared on the motorway down to London and it stayed on. An engine restart didn't help.

I had some electrical work done in the van recently to hook up some dash cams to a secondary battery. That was a few weeks ago and it's been fine since. Unless a wire was hit off and loosened or something since?

It could be some short circuit, but batter itself - I don't think so.

cormie

AA due at 21:00. Hopefully they can sort it on the spot

Someone on the ford transit forums suggested the battery. Great. I see an Irishferries add above me here on the reply to thread page :rolleyes:

Cee-Jay-Cee

cormie wrote: »

Will have to rebook the ferry if I need to alright. Is it possible it may be the battery also? The light first appeared on the motorway down to London and it stayed on. An engine restart didn't help.

I had some electrical work done in the van recently to hook up some dash cams to a secondary battery. That was a few weeks ago and it's been fine since. Unless a wire was hit off and loosened or something since?

Its very very unlikely that its the battery. If the alternator is working the engine will continue running so long as the battery is intact and didn't get damaged somehow. A battery will not lose power like that unless the alternator isn't working. Once the light came on the battery started draining. If the driver had turned off lights radio sat nav, heater etc etc he would have got further.

cormie

AA arrived, alternator issue. Belt still fine so not sure what it might be. The AA guy will drive behind so the delivery can be made and then try arrange for the van to be brought to Holyhead. I don't know if they'll say they are only going to do one run (breakdown point to customer address). Hopefully there won't be any issues.

dieselbug

If you get really stuck, send me the details of the van, make model, year etc and the post code of where it is located. I may be able to put you in touch with a reliable garage.

cormie

Ok, I'm pretty impressed if this goes as the AA said it will...

So 1st guy arrived, diagnosed alternator issue, charged van, drove with van to customer and while my guy was unloading at the customer, arranged for another recovery truck to come and take the van to Holyhead.

In the mean time a car pulls up near the van stops for a minute and out steps a warden with a ticket bang on the van, £65 fine. They said if I request from the AA, the AA can get it cancelled.

A little while later a Dubin number calls me asking if everything went ok, I said yeah but there's still the issue of getting the van to Holyhead, he said to give him a few minutes and he'll get on to the European centre. He rang back to say a truck should come to take the van to Holyhead immediately and that another truck would then meet the van in Dublin and take it to my mechanic and my driver can get a taxi anywhere to the value of €200.

I asked twice if that's all included in my yearly fee and it is so if it all goes to plan, I'm very very impressed! Have used the AA in the past with great results but have always been afraid of what would realistically happen if there was a breakdown in the UK. This sounds pretty good!

Alanstrainor

Wow :eek:

Absolutely fantastic service.

MrDerp

Nah.

Nice try, Conor, you almost had me there! I still ain't signing up

cormie

dieselbug wrote: »

If you get really stuck, send me the details of the van, make model, year etc and the post code of where it is located. I may be able to put you in touch with a reliable garage.

Only saw this now, thanks a lot. If anything goes pear shaped I'll let you know