How important are these MOT advisories?

colino

"All advisories are faults found on the vehicle which haven't failed this time round, but in the fullness of time, will deteriorate to the point of MoT failure, or even making your car unsafe to drive." Is an absolute untruth spread by rogue NTs and garages.
An MOT Advisory is where a particular NT decides on the day to go beyond the pass/fail of a presented vehicle and, in their opinion/discretion, brings to the presenters attention items that they think require comment because a) is an MOT item that may be near to failure, but are passes at test, b) is a peculiarity of the presented vehicle or c) defects on non-testable items that the NT has noticed.
Advisories are wildly abused in some quarters to get work on perfectly serviceable vehicles.

alex0789

Oh god, just checked this again and it seems people are highly divided on whether or not I should persue to fix these within the near future. :wall:

I really only have a budget of around £150-200 for the next few months that I can afford to spend fixing the car (student problems )

Out of the advisories which should I prioritise?

Thanks again everyone.

alex0789

forgotmyname wrote: »

When was it serviced last?

Around 11 months ago.

thescouselander

My view - they are important button urgent (yet). It's probably best to get the dust cover done first because if it goes it will only cause you more expense. Then I'd address the struts and steering rack next. The rest can probably wait a bit longer but you should probably get it looked at before the next mot.

arcon5

The balljoint and strut will most likely knock long before it becomes a danger.

Any further deterioration in the discs will be seen or felt on the felt.

Headlights, if you can see and be seen wouldn't worry.

Steering rack, any jolting or any strange feeling with steering?

Okay, you may get lectures about this and that and how they should be looked at so you don't kill a bus full of nuns -- but frankly it doesn't sound like a death trap.

If you feel or hear anything then take note. On your mileage I doubt there will be any problems any time soon.

gilbert_and_sullivan

Just do the few jobs that need doing when the weather warms a bit, most of these are cheap as chips DIY jobs.

1&2, try polishing the headlights with T Cut or metal polish, if they come up give them a few coats of wax.


3, that dust cover will probably be in the same state next year, if you fancy doing the job a new TRE will cost anything from £5 to £15.

4&5, have a good look at the discs, how bad are they, can't be too bad or the tester would have failed the car, wait till the front pads are worn out and buy a set of discs when you replace the pads, easy DIY, total cost from £40 to £80 depending on the vehicle.

6&7, leave them be, when the start knocking or creaking get them changed, they might last the life of the car.

8, might be worth lubing the steering rack, by unclipping the boots and feeding some of the correct grease in.

9, rusty? wire brush and paint. Degrading rubber bushes? replace both drop links in due course on a nice warm day, probably the same price as buying the bushes alone and they tend to snap when you try to undo them anyway so easier quicker and just as cheap to replace them.

There's nothing on that list to be worried about, no nuns carrying baskets of kittens on their bicycles are in danger.

salubrious

It helps to say what the car is.

Anyway, the steering rack inner joints are the things to pay close attention too - They cannot be failed on an mot so in effect can have an awful lot of movement present and still pass. At the same time get the track rod end cover/joint done.

jttmots

alex0789 wrote: »

Hi all,

I got my car MOTd today and it passed without anything having to be done, however, it came back with 9 advisories... :eek:

I only drive around 3000 miles a year, and rarely on long distance, motroway, drives. So I was wondering how imporant, or urgent, these advisories are to take care of (aswell as how costly they would be);

1 and 2. (Both) front headlamps deteriorated but light output not reduced

3. Offside front track rod end ball joint dust cover deteriorated, but preventing ingress of dirt [2.2.c.1c]

4 and 5. (Both) front brake discs worn, pitted or scored, but not seriously weakened.

6 and 7. (Both) front Macpherson strut has slight movement at the upper attachment [2.5.a.1c]

8. Play in steering rack inner joint(s)

9. Both front drop links deteriorated

Any help is appreciated,

Thanks.

Hi there

Have to say there is some poor advise given out on this thread by person who clearly guessing at the state of your vehicle.

As a mot tester and VE (own My own Testing Station) maybe I can shed some light on the advisories issued.

I am not sure of the vehicle you have, would be great if you could let me know as most vehicles have a common defects so one can give better info.

9. Drop Links deteriorated, rather than saying have play, this means that the rubber gaiters will be worn or may have a pin hole or minor split or cracking up. however they are preventing dirt from getting into the joint. This is also the same for Item 3.

Upper McPherson struts have slight play, in lay terms means the top mounts on the suspension strut have slight movement, on some models such as Ford Ka's this is normal from factory, and the mounts would need to be cloncking bad in order to fail

Front headlights deteriorated, very common on plastic headlights, this is very common on Clios and Puntos, Only if the beam image is effected during the headlight align on the mot would this cause a fail.

Steering joints, for every 10 mots I carry out i must advise steering joints on 2-3 out of the 10. this is very common.

Also note that some testers use advisories others don't, i have scene some silly advisories in my time and some garages use them to upsell work, a 4-5 year old car with 9 advisories would be a sign of this as in reality no vehicle that age would constitute that many advises. however a old vehicle say a 12 year old Ford ka this would be more realistic.

colino

OK JT MOTs, what words of wisdom are you trying to impart? Are you an NT or have you been busy on google?

s_b

jt's answer is spot on
my only concern would be the inner steering rack joints

looking at all the advisories my leaning would be this vehicle is a vauxhall corsa but seeing as theres no advisory for the orange light of gloom on the speedy head i must be wrong

to the OP these are all advisories from a tester keen to keep his job or a newbie nominated tester (NT),dont worry your car is safe today