Taking a car off the road - best way to maintain it?

[Webby]

Those nice people at the DVLA have revoked my licence on medical grounds.

It's going to be some months - at least 6 I would imagine - before I'll get my licence back so it's not worth selling the car. What can I do to keep the car (which will be untaxed) in the best possible condition?

[jmkent]

No option of insuring someone else instead and keep it in use??

We've done a similar thing with gf's car at New Year, all I did was take it out for a good run first (fully charge the battery) and then after putting it in the garage, I disconnected the battery - should keep better than the constant small drain of the immobiliser.

[john_h]

i was in a discussion on a different forum in regards to something similar...basically someone couldnt afford the insurance as he has another car aswell. so he was going to put his focus in driveway storage.

what he did was:

-drive it untill the reserve tank light came on. (diesel gets algae over time)
-carry out a full service of changing oil, all filters, coolant (stops it freezing)
-emptied the washer fluid bottle (stop freezing and gunge build up)
-washed it fully, inside and out
-removed the battery
-chocked the wheels, so every now and again he goes out and releases the brakes to stop them sticking
-cheap tyres and rolls them every now and again on his drive (prevents flat spots apparently)
-put a cover over the car to protect from elements

every now and again he will connect the battery and start her up and run for about 30 minutes to keep everything from seizing up.

he claims its still going strong

EDIT: further to this you will also need to inform DVLA and declare SORN otherwise they will come and pay a visit and you can still loose the car...even if on your drive.

[Webby]

I didn't really want to insure anyone else to charge about in my car saving wear and tear on theirs at the expense of mine but perhaps it makes sense in the long run. On the other hand, insuring someone else means keeping the car taxed and insured at increased cost. Can you get insurance for a laid-up car, I wonder?

I note your point about the immobiliser but disconnecting and reconnecting the battery is a bit of a fiddly affair on Pugs isn't it? Better, I think, to leave the battery in-situ and run the engine up weekly to keep the battery charged and the air-con lubricated. But what else can I do to keep the car in good order?

[jmkent]

Yes, disconnecting batteries on these is a bit of a procedure, but not too bad - did it last night for mine to change the battery, and all seems to have gone OK.

If you were disconnecting for a period of time, its not too much hassle to go through - not something I would want to be doing if you planned to regularly run it up.

[sterion75]

As john says roll it every now and then because the tyres will set a flat patch on them. Best way is jack it off the ground, let tyres down, and cover them over from light. Get a maintenance charger for the battery, it will keep it charged and do small discharges and recharges to keep the battery healthy. The discs will rust and the pads may stick to them, cover them over with rag and then wrap an oily cloth or sacking over that for protection. Oily, not soaked and dripping!. When you remove it spray brake cleaner liberally over the discs and pads to make sure there's no contamination.

[Gibbo]

Originally Posted by Webby

I didn't really want to insure anyone else to charge about in my car saving wear and tear on theirs at the expense of mine but perhaps it makes sense in the long run. On the other hand, insuring someone else means keeping the car taxed and insured at increased cost. Can you get insurance for a laid-up car, I wonder?

You could use insurebyday.com or dayinsure

When I had two cars I used to buy a weekend's insurance (it only cost about £11 IIRC) and gave the spare car a good run over the weekend.

[Webby]

I've decided that I will probably add my son and daughter to my policy - it's cheaper to add 2 than 1 apparently(!) - and get them to give the car an outing every fortnight or so.

Talking about insurance, I'm with Saga and they said I couldn't get someone with comprehensive insurance to drive my car under the third-party insurance cover that most comprehensive policies give for driving other people's cars. Does this sound right to you or were they just trying to squeeze extra money out of me?

[jmkent]

What I would suspect they mean is... you can't have someone else drive yours under their 3rd party cover unless your car is also insured too. The 3rd party cover only covers them on cars that also have insurance in someone else's name. Otherwise, you would have someone with a Porsche for example, not insure it, then buy a 1.0l Corsa and insure that fully comp, but then drive the Porsche... see where I am coming from??

[chopper1192]

Kentie is right. While another driver has 3rd party cover on themselves, the car itself needs to be insured to cover its very presence on a road or other public place.