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And I thought driving up and down the Uk through the night to various far flung auctions at short notice was hard ! Very interesting Marcus.

HI GUYS HOPE EVERYONE IS WELL AT THESE UNCERTAIN TIMES I HAVE JUST TAKEN DELIVERY OF A 17 VW TOUAREG, EX VW CAR ,PROPER TIDY CAR,IM HAVING PROBLEMS WITH THE RADIO, OTS RNS850, BUT ITS NOT PICKING UP FM/DAB, AS IF ARIEL IS NOT CONNECTED. MY WIFI/RADIO GUY HAS ALREADY CHECKED BUT THESE ARE ALL OK. ITS OUT OF WARRANTY BY A FEW MONTHS SO BEFORE I DROP TO DEALER CAN ANYONE HELP??

The only thing that is any good to properly diagnose and rectify MB's is SDS and a good operator ................ iCS is a good code reader resetter for later MB models, but it doesn't do 30% of what SDS will do.

If it happens again best get the registered keeper to call call DVLA, pay £25 over the phone it it arrives in 3 days. Have done a couple the last few months including a Rolls Royce V5 for a key worker.

Why on earth the newspapers print such tripe about a greedy punter who doesn’t understand basic mathematics is beyond me. But then again, why on earth someone would be happy to have their stupidity & ignorance plastered over the newspapers is also beyond me! It’ll come to the day very soon that discussions at the sales desks will be recorded.

Yes, that sort of fraud and thieving began when the Russians began to 'get their legs', rather later into the 90's ; I started as soon after the wall came down and as I could begin to figure out the logistics of it all and was up and running by Spring/Summer 1992. The issue then was paying not to have your lorry/s kidnapped - in Russia, you always have to know/pay the right people, I was lucky to make friends with a well connected lady lawyer, she could get anything sorted in St Petersburg. The profitability slowly got less and less and eventually, as said, they did it themselves, but I kept a exporting timber business until about 2007, then margins got bad on that, so I quit and sold the entire business except for keeping the office building, as it's in Riga City centre. I did most trade in Latvia & the other 2 Baltic states, I have no desire to go back to Russia - ever. That was pretty fortuitous really, as I sunk the money into USD at 2:1, plus managed to miss the 2008/9 crash during very long periods at the holiday house doing very little, I was totally exhausted after almost 15 years constant traveling by then TBH, plus I missed much of my kids growing up - but these chances don't happen often and at least they got a great private education which is more than I ever did. I really only first came back when I bought all the cars I had space for in Autumn 2009, kept them all until Summer 2010, then fed them into BCA Bedford weekly during June/July 2010 when there was no used stock available if you remember - that again was a big gamble, but also worked out rather well - not everything always did or does though......

Selling to the Russians,you did well.In the 90’s the story was that the Russians were big at stealing top cars in Europe taking them home,changing their ID,getting issued with new docs then flogging them in different European countries.

NO - never had, never will - I'm pretty old fashioned when it comes to borrowing and most simply put, apart from my monthly CC Bill, I pay for everything on the nail. When things were booming in the late 90's I even cleared my main home mortgage, only 50k and the 2nd one I'd had; I know conventional wisdom say borrow because it's cheap, but that don't sit well with me. I suspect, like most models, the new Defender has not had sufficient and full testing done; sadly that seems common with most/all new JLR products, the insane # of software and panel gap issue recalls on the 2016 F Pace, not to mention leaks, another good example. I bought a lot of LHD P38 RRovers in Germany and sold them in Latvia and Russia, they loved them but even those had various build issues, despite being mostly BMW powered; I once literally had the entire glove compartment fall out of one - some drove lovely though and had a pretty good grunt for the day.

Small world moment today. Just came back from a few days in the smoke, stuck in a traffic jam caused by................ a new shape Defender in black with an expensive puddle of some fluid pooling under it.....a very unhappy elderly couple sat in it. Whatever went wrong must of been quite sudden as it was parked on the piss. Having the time to look at it as we slowly drove past, I can't help but think it looks 10 years out of date already

So you wouldn’t like to have a 200 grand stock loan like a lot of the guys now.The thought gives me a headache but most traders have no alternative.

You could try sending an email to the DVLA Chief Exec . Julie.lennard@dvla.gov.uk I know someone who did and got a polite reply giving the email address of a colleague to sort it out.He was furloughed so gave the email for someone else who referred them to The Department of Transport.I doubt Grant Shapps will be interested.

It annoys me the way newspapers always make it look like there's something shady been done when it comes to cars and theit buying/selling - had to get the crutches in the photo..... It occurs to me, unless this is her first car on finance, she may not come out too well; then of course her benefits will increase, so we taxpayers can keep her creature comforts. I bet she's got the latest phone and all that jazz ......... I clipped an X Trail bumper on a car park and left a note, it was only a quick smart repair, she talked my painter into doing the whole bloody side of the car, 3 panels.

Thanks for the comments guys, been a long day over in my unit doing stuff - but if you like stories - I've got a boat as I've traded in many counties and done all sorts, but it's late just now. - Be well all, there's some rough times not too far ahead, but on a brighter note - people will still buy cars, but to a different pattern/budget/spec than some of type/s different than we've got used to recently.

As for the women feeling like an idiot, yes love, you are. Pretty simple maths, £200 per month, £2400 per year, how many years should a £18000 car with interest take to pay off? Dont think its 5 years, but then I don't have arthritis so might be different rules for me.

Brilliant.Jags to Holland and Yanks back.There was a big Yank pitch near us early 70’s in Newcastle and late 60’s there was a guy from Warren St came up every week to buy Jags.He dressed like Arthur Daley and smoked cigars and just ignored me. Can we have more stories from the golden age please Marcus.The millenials won’t believe them.

/\ /\ /\ This ...................... No one machine does everything, but this is the best bang for the buck to get a decent Generic (multiple marques) Machine I have Autel, Delphi and Snap On, plus about 18 dealer Level Kits, but Diagnosis and Rectification of complex issues is what I do as core, for a general Car Dealer the Autel is the best. Snap On and Auto Logic, Bosch KTS etc have priced themselves out now, especially with updates, subscriptions etc. HTH

Good profit in fixing them if you have the right staff.

pm me vin. Or if you want it done often register free for BMW AOS