I have a CE with a 1098cc engine in it. I have purchased it recently and the history was not complete. When i drove it, it was fine.
It was only recently that a small ticking noise (as cars tend to make at some point or other) started to come from around/in the engine. My old neighbour in Bristol is a Morris Minor owner and said it might be the tappets and as the car's service history was incomplete, she helped me to give it a full service as I'm not a mechanic but am keen to learn.
So, yesterday we
Changed the oil (halfords 20w50)
New plugs
new oil filter
new HT leads
new rocker cover gasket
new airfilter
new distributor
and resetting of the tappets (as per haynes manual 0.012 i believe it was)
Anyway, did all the work to it and put it all back together and the engine still had the small ticking noise.
As the engine still seemed to run ok and had done for the past few weeks, i decided to try and drive it to Swindon where i currently live and where i need it.
I drove it 2 blocks from bristol and this ticking noise got louder and louder and i decided to pull-over where the engine cutout just before i managed to stop it.
Things i noticed that it was doing during that 2 min drive and after i checked it by the roadside:
Loss of power while driving
smokey exhaust
hard to put it into gear
the clearance on front left wheel vs the wheel arch was 1 finger high versus front right (3 fingers high)
Long story short, I spent my evening being towed back to swindon on the back of a recovery truck. I don't know if it was inevitable as there was already a ticking noise before my neighbour and I performed the service or whether it was something that we did wrong.
I'm SOOO gutted. I love this car and I NEED it to work. I was wondering if anyone has any clues (it may have happened to someone before) or what things i need my local garage to look out for??
Also, i have only recently moved to swindon and do not know what garage to trust and feel quite unsettled by someone I don't know look at it. Can anyone recommend a trustworthy place? If there are any experts out there that can help, i would be really grateful.
Is there a general rule of thumb that if a the price of repair is above a certain figure, it isn't worth repairing and instead finding a new engine?
-Oli