Hello!

Hello!, and welcome to my blog. My name is Lewis Heyward. I work as one of the motor trade's great unsung heroes, the "Bucket Monkey" or to be more precise, a Car Valeter.

This blog is about motoring for pennies at a time when due to (rightly or wrongly) new legislation, a government hellbent on getting everyone on public transport, insane road tax charges for certain cars, cars that are no longer possible to fix when even putting a headlight bulb in is a "four c**** and a b******" rating in the Haynes manual of life.

So how did i come to attempt to write this blog then?, well i've been car mad since i was a little 'un. We didn't have a car but somehow (i don't know how though...) i got hooked on cars, and i had tons of Corgi "Grey Porridge" style toy cars (Escorts, Metros, and my beloved Corgi Sierra and 2CV's...) but no actual full blown car of our own, because we didn't have the finances for one, not even for a scrappy Datsun 120Y or Marina.

Where we lived didn't even have much accessible public transport, so we were very limited to where we could go, and to be honest, we were pretty much house bound, a horrible situation for anybody.

Shopping was even worse and at times when we bought something bulky, we carried it home in my (then) baby brother's buggy. I'd walk home with my folks and wonder what it would be like to have a car and go for days out.

We didn't get a car again until 1991, when i was 11. (a rotten 1982 1.6L Cortina)

With harsh memories of walking everywhere for nearly ten years (i won't include the years of being pushed in a pram for obvious reasons...) and near-non existent buses and overpriced train travel, i decided when i was 15 or so that i would get motorized mobile transport as soon as possible. This started with a desire for 50cc mopeds, envying my School freinds riding their £50 Puch Maxi's around fields (which i could imagine being very harsh on the posterior if it was the non-sprung "S" version...)

I got my first moped, a £275 Honda Melody, when i was 17, and it's hard to put in words how much freedom it gave me, freedom not to be stuck within 3 miles because i was limited to a knackered old pushbike, freedom to actually go places without being charged a fortune for them. I even used to use the Melody to commute to my first job, 17 miles from home. It was slow, (22 mph tops) and it was bloody cold, but i was free, really free!

I got some more bikes, then i passed my driving test and now it was serious business, Car Time: my first driveable car was a Pug 205 Diesel, a trade in at a local garage, with short T&T.

Now i was really mobile, there was now no limit, except for the fact that i was a very nervous new driver so i kept local, then made trips to Skegness and Lincoln. I was 19, loaded with spare cash and a car, i felt like king of the world, as so many of us do, when in this position!

One car led to another, and another because i got bored with cars very easily. First it was the 205, (which developed a slipping clutch) and then a brilliant 309 Diesel with sporty old school bodykit, then another, then another, and now i've had 35 cars since 1999, mostly Bangers.

Bangers, because firstly, they're cheap, obviously, and secondly, by the time they were bangers, when i started driving, they were cars that i'd grew up admiring and wanting, and when they were up for four hundred quid, well i guessed that i'd best take custody while i still could.

The noughties were a golden age of Bangerdom, old cheap cars that you could mostly fix for yourself for under £500, and they didn't have to have a beige interior either.

You could fix them yourself, but they were so plentiful, you either ignored the problems, (Renault 5 Campus with worn brakes, which being a novice to cars i didn't notice, until my Dad offered to drive it one day...) or sold them via the local rag (Mk3 Fiesta 1.6S, rotten.) and then you'd buy another one, because they were so cheap. (1988 Fiat Uno 45S, £90 with four months MOT)

Fast forward ten years. It's now 2011. It's Bangers Jim, but not as we know it...,The "Next Generation" is here. All those modern cars with £9-15k price tags a decade ago are now today's bangers, the first ones designed with electronics and main-dealer mechanic tinkering only in mind are now today's sheds. That's not necessarily a criticism, that they've lasted ten years is a bonus in itself, at one point it would be a good innings if a car could last ten years (or less if you had a Lancia, but that's another story.), and yes, they run well, and are undoubtedly are safe in a crash, but they ain't cheap to fix.

And that's why my little blog is here. Like all of us, i've suffered in the recession, being out of work more times in the last three years now than actually in. When this happens, your motoring life suffers, at times i've had to make do without a car, but even now though i live in the sprawling metropolis that is Peterborough, the local bus won't take you to the door of a job, and cycling's not really an option unless you really know the city, (which i don't, will have to remedy that someday...), likewise a moped/scooter unless you live in the city centre, so you really need a car: no car, no job. no freedom.

So this blog is about motoring for pennies, some of it is going to be serious, and some irrelevant, some educated, and some completely thick as it's just my own personal opinion. The opinion of a man who is worried about the future when the only banger choice is a 51 plate Renault Laguna with a slipping clutch and no history...