Claim's Cabbies Corner. Repo Revenge.

[AutoshiteBoy]

If not Dacia, then Honda. I'd be torn between value and proper engineering.

[FhakeConcern]

Probably not the place to put this, but I don't know where would be better...
As I have mentioned on other threads I cycle a fair bit (last year over 7700 miles and more than in my Ovlov). When alone I usually have no issues with car drivers, but for the last 9 months or so Mrs Concern has been riding with me. Now the first part of our ride is a coast road, just about wide enough for two cars (normal rather than the fat SUV type thing) and most of the time we ride two abreast. Before you all get annoyed I am constantly looking out for cars and drop behind Mrs Concern as soon as I spot any aproaching from front or rear. As you may imagine many drivers pass stupidly close, in stupid places approaching blind bends and some even appear to deliberalely intimidate us with unsafe passes. What I have noticed is that cab drivers seem to be way more considerate than the average car driver, waiting until it is safe, giving the maximum amount of space to us and also usually thanking us for singling up with a wave or the hazard flash. So there you go, cabbies generally get a bad press, but a thank you from me (and Mrs Concern)

[mercrocker]

That's a bit at odds with one experience that I've had. The only person I ever pedalled like a loony to catch up after being brushed by a nearside door mirror was a local cab twat in an Octavia. Claimed not to have seen me - oh Ok that's why you blew your fucking horn then....

Generally, though, I do agree - probably in the top echelons of road user normally. And I never ride two abreast with Mrs Rocker - I normally let her ride ahead so I don't have to keep looking back to see if she fell off again.

[Warren t claim]

Probably not the place to put this, but I don't know where would be better...
As I have mentioned on other threads I cycle a fair bit (last year over 7700 miles and more than in my Ovlov). When alone I usually have no issues with car drivers, but for the last 9 months or so Mrs Concern has been riding with me. Now the first part of our ride is a coast road, just about wide enough for two cars (normal rather than the fat SUV type thing) and most of the time we ride two abreast. Before you all get annoyed I am constantly looking out for cars and drop behind Mrs Concern as soon as I spot any aproaching from front or rear. As you may imagine many drivers pass stupidly close, in stupid places approaching blind bends and some even appear to deliberalely intimidate us with unsafe passes. What I have noticed is that cab drivers seem to be way more considerate than the average car driver, waiting until it is safe, giving the maximum amount of space to us and also usually thanking us for singling up with a wave or the hazard flash. So there you go, cabbies generally get a bad press, but a thank you from me (and Mrs Concern)

I suppose that begs the question as to whether us taxi drivers drive like arseholes.

Locally we haven't had a driver killed on the roads of Wirral since 1992 when a driver in his late 20s driving for Blue Star Taxis went through this junction in his Sierra without stopping. The rumours through the bush telegraph were that he'd been working far too many hours as he was trying to raise money to buy the firm.

tdf1.PNG (1.4 MiB) Viewed 2254 times

As is taxi tradition in Merseyside, if a driver dies while at work his callsign is never reallocated to another incoming driver and dies with him.

There's a certain reputation that weekend night drivers have for driving like there's no tomorrow. A lot of this dates back, certainly in my area, to the time when all of the nightclubs chucked out at 2am and as Birkenhead is a centre of excellence for drink related violence we were under pressure to empty the streets ASAP. Back then Wirral restricted the number of Hackney plates to 124, 24 of which were "kept on the shelf" by one Liverpool fleet owner who I'll talk about at length later. This meant that there was absolutely zero chance of finding a hack out on the streets after midnight.

To keep the peace Merseyside Police not only turned a blind eye to pirating (which is when private hire cars illegally do unbooked street pick ups) but they actively assisted by flagging us down to put people in our cars. During this golden age taxis had a virtual immunity from being stopped for speeding as the police wanted us to work as fast as we could to prevent fights outside the clubs. One copper told me that the police policy was to get the drunk arseholes in the back of our cars before they had to put them in the back of theirs.

[youtube][/youtube]

Fast forward to 6.50 to see our town centre base in all its glory and the problem that existed at the time.

[Warren t claim]

As I alluded to in my last post about the Liverpool fleet owner with 24 plates on the shelf I suppose I should tell the tale of William Atwell Kelly, AKA Billy Kelly.

Let us start with what the man is like himself. Billy is a wealthy eccentric. He's a 73 year old alcoholic teddy boy with a soft spot for dogs, his garage has several purpose built kennels to accommodate dogs in need of a new home.

Billy is universally hated by old time Wirral hack owners for single handedly forcing the council to delimit the number of hackney plates by his endless legal challenges citing that there was "significant unmet demand" for hackneys in Wirral. When numbers were capped at 124 a hackney plate on Wirral was worth £11,000 and the cab owners were keen to keep the prices high.

Sick of his legal challenges, Wirral Borough Council threw in the towel back in 2003 and said that anyone willing to buy a TX1/2 less than three years old could have a plate. To stop the whinging from the trade and to delay the ranks flooding, WBC banned the use of the cheapo Peugeot van conversions earlier that month.

Despite being hated by the trade I actually like the guy! He's a genuine taxi enthusiast.

I first met him when I needed a hack quickly as my Metrocab was an utter bag of shit. As my plate was under 124 I had the grandfather rights to put it on any hackney regardless of age as long as it was wheelchair friendly. Wary of his reputation I turn up at his yard with the ex Mrs_Claim who was somewhat pregnant at the time to see what he had on offer cheap. We get chatting, no doubt helped by us getting on great with his alsation Max, and he decides to give me a tour of his premises.

He first shows me an early Metrocab in blue and asks me to guess who it used to belong to. I wrongly guess Prince Phillip but he tells me it was owned by Fred Housego, the taxi driver that won Mastermind. He then leads us to three cabs under dustcovers. He pulls the sheet back on one of them to reveal an M reg, 1974 FX4 with 200 miles on the clock, the other two undercover are the same! At the time he was trying to force WBC to issue plates for them as when he first started his legal challenge they would have been acceptable for plating! Sadly, as I've never seen these on the road I can only assume he lost this case as they are not wheelchair friendly.

I eventually buy a very tidy, green, 1994 Fairway off him under the agreement that it'll pass a taxi inspection, something I'm not sure it will as it has a cracked screen. As he sends us on our way to get it tested he puts Max the alsation in the back and tells us to take him with us! Apparently, we're the only people he likes and hasn't tried to bite on sight! At the teat centre the tester shits himself when Max goes for him, the lad didn't know Max was in the cab! We're asked to take him out so they can do the brake test and to my surprise, the Fairway passes.

bkmax1.PNG (605.94 KiB) Viewed 2252 times

Here's Billy and Max.

https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/li ... me-3492327

[Hooli]

I don't believe all this about safe taxi drivers. I'm sure most of them think there is a legal minimum of fatal accidents they must cause per year to keep the job, it's the only way to explain the majority of driving you see from them.

[Warren t claim]

Over the years I've had the pleasure of working many makes and models of cars. All have had their strengths and weaknesses so I thought I'd start a list on the pros and cons of them.

These are in no particular order.

Peugeot 405.
+Comfy and roomy. Nice seat fabric. Decent boot. Powerful enough even in NA diesel form.
- Gearboxes rarely last more than 60k. Lots of trim rattles. Can suffer rear brake problems.

Citroen Xantia.
+Comfy seats in Series 2 guise. Series 1 pre airbag dash had a handy space to store the 1,000,000 candle power rechargeable spotlight. 1.8 petrol OK on fuel.
-Trim literally falls apart. Series 1 version has totally Marmite seat comfort, a few drivers loved them but the vast majority suffered backache. Clutches on petrol models very sharp.

Citroen BX.
+Cheap to buy. Usually quite well kitted out. Diesel lump better than the equivalent Ford GM engine. Nice seats.
-Interior light absolutely shit for reading fare charts or counting out change at night. Hardly reliable. Citroen suspension can make pissed punters puke.

Ford Mondeo Mk1/2.
+Cheap and roomy. Handling and roadholding fantastic when hustling between jobs. Zetec petrol engine indestructible when maintained properly. Mk1 has a cubby under the radio that will fit a taxi radio perfectly. 1.8 diesel suits taxi usage well.
-Clutch replacement a bitch of a job. Bulkhead lacks grommets to push wires through. They fucking eat suspension bushes. Prone to airbag light issues.

Montego Prima Diesel.
+Loads of room for people and luggage. Remote boot release. 50+MPG. Capable of shifting whilst leaving a trail of black smoke.
-Headlinings sag. Trip meter is prone to breaking. Dim interior light. No PAS. Passengers taking this piss out of it. Frequent hub bearing replacement required. Exterior door handles snap off. Pain quality shit with laquer peel common. Weak heater output.

Vectra B.
+1.8 petrol quickest in class. Great speakers. Nice and light PAS. OK on fuel. Easy to change odometer and trip meter to KMs so you can rip punters off on the mileage.
-Headlamp bulb replacement a nightmare. VERY unreliable. Gearboxes even weaker than a Peugeot 405. Wet weather traction abysmal.

I'll lob a few more reviews up later if you want.

[mercrocker]

Our local rank used to be almost all 405s but as they died off it struck me that none of them were getting 406s - or hardly any. Maybe some regs changed locally too to allow other than 3 box saloons, I don't know about that.

Anyway, as I'm bored between waiting for paint to dry between coats on some Minor wheels, I've looked at our local licencsing authority list of approved Hackney Carriages and they boil down thusly....


Eurotaxi 4
Octavia 24
Superb 6
MB Citan 1
Vauxhall Insignia 1
Berlingo 2
Peugeot E7 1
Toledo 18
Pug 307 1
MB E220 3
Kangoo 1
TX4 1
Grand Espace 1
Mondeo 3
Leon 6
Auris 2
Ducato 1
Viano 1
Vito 1
Rapid 1
Tourneo 8
Partner 5
i30 5
Passat 1
Caddy 8
MB C220 1
Audi A6 1
i40 1
Galaxy 3
Prius 2
Alhambra 1
VW Transporter 1

PH list is pretty similar but about twice as many plates which I can't be arsed to go through but include expected oddities like S Class, XF Jag, A8 etc. We live on the very eastern, urban fringe of the New Forest licensing area so are not representative of the borough but we see mainly the Octavias and Toledos working our ranks.

[Warren t claim]

Ford Focus Mk2.
+1.8 diesel seems less prone to wet belt failure than Mondeo. 45+mpg. Tolerant of neglect. Solid flywheel swap causes no problems.
-Bonnet catch mechanism fucks up. Plugging anything into the cigarette lighter socket causes radio interference. Lemming like wheel trims. Rear springs prone to snapping. Strut top bushes wear quickly.

Citroen Xsara Picasso.
+Loads of room inside. Rear seat passengers can find their seat belts. Capable of high mileages. Large front quarter light independent of the front door is ideal for sticking a sat nav or phone to.
-Brake light switches fail. Shit clutches that are both shit to use and don't last long. Slightly suspect handling.

Toyota Avensis Mk2.
+Well kitted out. Great front seats. Plenty of room. Huge boot. Plenty of oddment space.
-Sat nav only lets you input the first six figures. Insipid steering, a bit like a Mk3 Cavalier. Seating position a bit too high for me.

[Warren t claim]

Our local rank used to be almost all 405s but as they died off it struck me that none of them were getting 406s - or hardly any. Maybe some regs changed locally too to allow other than 3 box saloons, I don't know about that.

Anyway, as I'm bored between waiting for paint to dry between coats on some Minor wheels, I've looked at our local licencsing authority list of approved Hackney Carriages and they boil down thusly....


Eurotaxi 4
Octavia 24
Superb 6
MB Citan 1
Vauxhall Insignia 1
Berlingo 2
Peugeot E7 1
Toledo 18
Pug 307 1
MB E220 3
Kangoo 1
TX4 1
Grand Espace 1
Mondeo 3
Leon 6
Auris 2
Ducato 1
Viano 1
Vito 1
Rapid 1
Tourneo 8
Partner 5
i30 5
Passat 1
Caddy 8
MB C220 1
Audi A6 1
i40 1
Galaxy 3
Prius 2
Alhambra 1
VW Transporter 1

PH list is pretty similar but about twice as many plates which I can't be arsed to go through but include expected oddities like S Class, XF Jag, A8 etc. We live on the very eastern, urban fringe of the New Forest licensing area so are not representative of the borough but we see mainly the Octavias and Toledos working our ranks.

A few of those are on my "to do" list!