Why do cars break when it's raining?

[Brian4]

Our daughter rang up last night 'my car is making a funny noise, bit like a twang' she says. So when she gets home I have a look and after jacking it up and wheel off found the front spring has snapped and the noise is the two ends rubbing together.
Got the spring today, BMW car club discount, but now got to fit it at the weekend so will have to sort out a tent, next door's garage or friendly garage man round the corner.
Also spotted the steering rack boot is split as well.

That's what Dads are for though.

 

[Shelly]

Good old mums n dads , what would our children do with out us,
Our car went in for mot last week and our two back coils had gone , got the Z back now , all mended and ready to go on the whisky tour at the weekend

 

[GazHyde]

Probably the same reason why I left my drivers door window open halfway for the last 2 days. Couldn't do that while it was dry could I

 

[jonco]

Probably the same reason why I left my drivers door window open halfway for the last 2 days. Couldn't do that while it was dry could I

Oops - at least it's a simple fix !

 

[GazHyde]

Oops - at least it's a simple fix !

Simple apart from the soaked interior...

 

[jonco]

Simple apart from the soaked interior...

True - the bigger problem is if it has got through to the foam backing - there's no way out. Found this soaked on mine recently when I had seats removed. If you look under the car there is a rubber bung in the floor but in my case this was also covered with mastic patch on the inside - had to gouge through this to create drain route and then squeeze foam to get excess out. Ended up using a hair drier ( well what else would you use on a hairdresser's car!) to fully dry it - complete pain.

 

[Brian4]

Fixed daughters car only changed the one spring, will have to do the other one later I know. wasn't too bad a job in the end on her TT. The spring was already broken as well, broken top and bottom. The bottom had been broken for ages looking at the rusty end. Once I worked out how it came apart and some invention of tools to get the top mount apart. Audi are not as good as BMW with on line manuals and parts guide.

I was also amazed at how much water can soak into the foam backing of the carpets, fortunately I found ours in the summer last year and managed to leave the carpets up and roof off for a few dry days. With the carpets up the water still drained out of the foam.