I hate my car

wannabee_in_credit

And I hate that I don't know anything about it.
I've just rang the garage and the earliest they can look at it for me (and give me a courtesy car which I will need to get to work) is next Wednesday.
Anyway, when it went in for its service a couple of months ago, I reported a burning smell coming from front passenger wheel arch. They told me they couldn't find anything wrong with it. Fast forward to last night when I was stuck in traffic for an hour and the smell of burning was nearly killing me. Definitely coming from front passenger wheel arch.
Any ideas? Brakes? Clutch? CV joints?
And can it wait until next week when I can get a courtesy car? I've driven it in this morning and it smelt a little bit but not too bad.
Thanks in advance

Weird_Nev

How can you tell where a smell is coming from?

Most common things to smell of burning: Clutch - horrid acrid burning smell, sometimes accompanied by screetching.
Plastic bag trapped on exhaust/manifold. Plasticy burning smell.
Possibly if a tyre is rubbing somewhere then you might smell burning rubber, but damage to the tyre should be visible.

Hard to say really unless you've noticed any associated faults.

TrickyWicky

Coiuld also be the blower motor that has something burning (an electrical connection) or your engine could have a leaky breather system and the blower is sucking in hot oil (like mine did).

mcjordi

is it pulling to one side? or brakes feel dodgey?

pinkteapot

I once had a front brake that was sticking on. Smelt of burning for miles in a traffic jam (mum and brother said it must be coming from another car!) then eventually I had to pull over when steam started billowing off the wheel.

It didn't make the car feel any different to drive. After it was fixed, the mechanic said it should feel like the wheels were moving more freely. I couldn't feel anything different.

wannabee_in_credit

Well, it's gone into the garage so we'll see what they say. Main train of thought is either clutch or brake caliper.
I've noticed it making a clunking noise over speed bumps, but nothing else associated. It was only serviced last month and no issues with brakes. My stepdad told me last week it looked like the tyre was about done (after only 30000 miles).

I could tell that the smell was coming from the front passenger side wheel arch because that was where it was at its strongest.

LincolnshireYokel

One problem is that modern cars are becoming unfixable by amateurs. One thing i liked about Sierras was there was nothing on it you couldnt fix on a driveway with a halfiords spanner set. You lift the bonnet of a modern car, thes nothing you can do. Nothing toi tweak, adjust or otherwise check. Eventually we'll get to completely sealed plastic engines that you just swap out when it goes wrong, one plug for the electric, two or three pipes on clips, four clips holding it down, done. Ten minute job. This is why the skill has gone out of a garage employees job. Mind you, IT has gone the same way, everything works automatically, no skill required, just follow the script, so they employ monkeys on minimum wage who havent a clue. Same with garages, they are just glorified fitters.

Weird_Nev

LincolnshireYokel wrote: »

One problem is that modern cars are becoming unfixable by amateurs. One thing i liked about Sierras was there was nothing on it you couldnt fix on a driveway with a halfiords spanner set. You lift the bonnet of a modern car, thes nothing you can do. Nothing toi tweak, adjust or otherwise check. Eventually we'll get to completely sealed plastic engines that you just swap out when it goes wrong, one plug for the electric, two or three pipes on clips, four clips holding it down, done. Ten minute job. This is why the skill has gone out of a garage employees job. Mind you, IT has gone the same way, everything works automatically, no skill required, just follow the script, so they employ monkeys on minimum wage who havent a clue. Same with garages, they are just glorified fitters.

Not really the case in my experience.
Brakes, suspension components and service items are as easy as they've ever been. Jack up car and gt the spanners out.

Resetting service indicators is usually trivial once you have the software or "know how", and neither are hard to find or expensive.

Sure, cars have engine covers on them now. Pull that off and guess what? there are still valves, camshafts, spark plugs, coils, HT leads, injectors and fuel lines under there. No dark arts or magic.

On top of that with the OBD standards the amateur mechanic can access "deep" information direct from the ECU. A £7 cable and free laptop software is all you need to obtain in depth information about the running of the car and any fault codes it may display. With owners club and internet resources, it's possible to diagnose most common problems and fix them yourself.

I have a bluetooth OBD adaptor which plugs into my OBD port on my 2005 car, and gives live real time ECU data and fault logging on my android Phone. The set up cost less than £15! I can see everything from intake and exhaust temperatures to injector duty rates, fuel flow and timing advance.

So I think the addition of technology to cars on the whole has been positive for the home mechanic.

TrickyWicky

LincolnshireYokel wrote: »

One problem is that modern cars are becoming unfixable by amateurs. One thing i liked about Sierras was there was nothing on it you couldnt fix on a driveway with a halfiords spanner set.

I didn't know metal wazs so light that you could lift out an entire engine with just a spanner set..

Could you also do piston rings and timing belts too?

photome

wannabee_in_credit wrote: »

Well, it's gone into the garage so we'll see what they say. Main train of thought is either clutch or brake caliper.
I've noticed it making a clunking noise over speed bumps, but nothing else associated. It was only serviced last month and no issues with brakes. My stepdad told me last week it looked like the tyre was about done (after only 30000 miles).

I could tell that the smell was coming from the front passenger side wheel arch because that was where it was at its strongest.

Is this a wind up?

Your tyre is nearly done after "only 30000 miles"

photome

TrickyWicky wrote: »

I didn't know metal wazs so light that you could lift out an entire engine with just a spanner set..

Could you also do piston rings and timing belts too?

Almost...ok I needed a hoist to lift out my old granada engine on to my lawn but the piston rings were changed with a few tools from halfords...was a long time ago

made a bit of a mess of my "rented" house lawn though