[dannius]

Does anyone else get god damn mad about the condition of the roads sometimes? The amount of times recently that i've driven through a HUGE pothole in the road causing my car to thud into it beggars belief.

It can't be doing my car especially my suspension any good and no doubt one of these days something will break, and who'll be paying for those repairs? Not the council, I know!!!

EDIT, sorry an old rant I know, i'd just got home from a journey with Essex County Council desperately trying to ruin my car again!

[qwerty321]

Originally Posted by dannius

Does anyone else get god damn mad about the condition of the roads sometimes? The amount of times recently that i've driven through a HUGE pothole in the road causing my car to thud into it beggars belief.

It can't be doing my car especially my suspension any good and no doubt one of these days something will break, and who'll be paying for those repairs? Not the council, I know!!!

EDIT, sorry an old rant I know, i'd just got home from a journey with Essex County Council desperately trying to ruin my car again!

Actually, sometimes the council will pay! Around 2 years ago I hit a big pothole and it caused a fair amount of damage to my car. Around £200 worth and I got most of it paid back. It was a pothole on my daily commute, I hit it in the morning and on the way back that day took some photos.

Called the local council who sent me forms to fill and funnily enough the pothole was filled the day after I reported it. Took 3 months in all to get the money back after I sent their insurers repair receipts. They claimed wear and tear and didn't pay 100% of the costs but it was good enough. Turns out one of the things I had done was a separate issue!

[FZR400RRSP]

The condition of the UK's roads prompted me to change my car.
I got sick to the back teeth of my Alpina 19" wheels getting damaged.
Then I started getting so paranoid about avoiding damage that I started taking routes well out of my normal way, or even avoiding certain journeys at all.
I'll never go back to big wheels/low profiles again.
I now have 16" wheels with big balloon tyres, and my pothole paranoia has gone!
It's really little wonder 4x4 style vehicles are popular, with their ability to soak up bumps.

[Big_Si_Owen]

I lost both passenger side tyres and alloy wheels to a massive pot hole last winter. Didn't get any money out of the council as that piece of road had been inspected a month or so before £450 worse off as a result

[FZR400RRSP]

I tried and failed for wheel compo as well.
I think I was on around 4 or 5 repairs and 1 whole new wheel in my Alpina.
At least two new tyres too, due to carcass damage.
Then I needed BMW KDS alignment twice as well.
Easily thousands of pounds of hole related expense.

[Stinger69]

I work in the Bexley borough area and some of the roads are horrendous.
What really pees me off though is the amount of money spent on vicious speed bumps! They are everywhere. To be honest with the condition of the roads they are so unnecessary. Also, is it me, or is the whole of the south east of England being dug up at present? I don't seem to be able to drive 200 yards without coming up to a set of temporary traffic lights that are badly phased.

My rant over.

[niceguy235uk]

Our local council have been doing a fantastic job of sorting potholes properly and resurfacing many roads.

[alexs2]

Originally Posted by niceguy235uk

Our local council have been doing a fantastic job of sorting potholes properly and resurfacing many roads.

Kind of wish ours would.....there are a few around here that would swallow a car easily enough!

[FZR400RRSP]

Our council spent £30k on a 'jet patcher' machine, and became utterly obsessed by it.
It's basically a big jet wash style lance that 'sprays' a mixture of goo into a hole.
It's rough, ready and leaves your car in a helluva mess when you drive over it.
Thankfully, they seem to have realised a temporary repair is one they have to keep going back to.
So they are starting to repair roads properly.
More expensive at first, but no having to go back.

[Monty Burns]

Originally Posted by dannius

....

You think you've got it bad? Try riding a bike on it! Worse that happens is you get a little mechanical damage, for us we can come off and end up dead.

Cage drivers, don't know how lucky they are....

[Desmo]

My wife suffered a blowout and buckled wheel on the way home from work tonight

Luckily she's OK but the state of our roads is a joke to be honest.

[FZR400RRSP]

Originally Posted by Desmo

Luckily she's OK but the state of our roads is a joke to be honest.

I agree, yet people get criticised for buying the likes of a Qashqai etc.

"Oooh, it's not a proper offroader..", you will hear from critics.

So?
It has big balloon tyres that can sail over potholes.
So you can see why they sell well.

[shodan]

Originally Posted by FZR400RRSP

Easily thousands of pounds of hole related expense.

I don't even know where to start with this one... ;-)

[Berties]

come off my bike, smashed my specs up - didn't get money from the council. Also brother pretty much knackered suspension arms up, clicking and steering tracking was knocked out.

Not from the same pothole.

[FZR400RRSP]

I seriously don't know what you're expected to do to win a pothole claim.
I thought my claim was pretty watertight.
I had photos of the hole, receipts for damage.
I even knew the daughter of a family that lived beside the hole and they wrote me a letter confirming it had been there for weeks.
I still got nothing.

[qwerty321]

Originally Posted by FZR400RRSP

I seriously don't know what you're expected to do to win a pothole claim.
I thought my claim was pretty watertight.
I had photos of the hole, receipts for damage.
I even knew the daughter of a family that lived beside the hole and they wrote me a letter confirming it had been there for weeks.
I still got nothing.

I think its just pretty much pot luck.

Did you contact the council before hand saying you wish to put a claim in? It probably varies with each council but when it happened to me, I was sent some forms to fill in.

After that I was passed on to their insurers and dealt with them.

[FZR400RRSP]

Originally Posted by qwerty321

I think its just pretty much pot luck.

Did you contact the council before hand saying you wish to put a claim in? It probably varies with each council but when it happened to me, I was sent some forms to fill in.

After that I was passed on to their insurers and dealt with them.

Yeah, they sent me a claim form and (months later) I heard from their insurers (Zurich) stating it has been rejected.
From memory, they stated the council couldn't be liable because 'no-one had notified them of the hole', so they hadn't had sufficient notice to repair it.
Which was annoying to read when people living next to the hole had said it had been there for weeks and I wasn't the first person to whack it big time.

[MIghtyG]

Originally Posted by FZR400RRSP

Our council spent £30k on a 'jet patcher' machine, and became utterly obsessed by it.
It's basically a big jet wash style lance that 'sprays' a mixture of goo into a hole.
It's rough, ready and leaves your car in a helluva mess when you drive over it.
Thankfully, they seem to have realised a temporary repair is one they have to keep going back to.
So they are starting to repair roads properly.
More expensive at first, but no having to go back.

its still doing the rounds here, did a few roads in my industrial estate about 2-3 weeks ago.

Maybe the 3rd time these roads have been done in about 18-months.

And like you say, the amount of stones it chips up is insane, if my car wasnt already peppered with stone chips when I bought it I would be rather ticked off!

[FZR400RRSP]

Originally Posted by MIghtyG

its still doing the rounds here, did a few roads in my industrial estate about 2-3 weeks ago.
Maybe the 3rd time these roads have been done in about 18-months.
And like you say, the amount of stones it chips up is insane, if my car wasnt already peppered with stone chips when I bought it I would be rather ticked off!

You should email them, questioning the financial sense of repetitive repairs and complaining about the mess that bloody jet patcher makes.

[qwerty321]

Originally Posted by FZR400RRSP

Yeah, they sent me a claim form and (months later) I heard from their insurers (Zurich) stating it has been rejected.
From memory, they stated the council couldn't be liable because 'no-one had notified them of the hole', so they hadn't had sufficient notice to repair it.
Which was annoying to read when people living next to the hole had said it had been there for weeks and I wasn't the first person to whack it big time.

Funnily enough, the insurers I dealt with were also Zurich. The only resistance I got was when they wouldn't offer the full value. They said 75% due to 'wear and tear'. They said that would be the only offer they make but I pushed them up a bit to around 85%.

Quite how they can claim wear and tear I don't know. The parts are fine one day, hit the pothole, not fine. My car was also MOTd and serviced the week before with the affected parts having no issue.