post avon damage - opinions please
Turbo Mini Forums

Sorry to hear about this wes. Looks fixable, its just a shame still.

Back once again like a renegade master

Definitely repair it yourself with your friend paying.Most insurance companies now have contracts for the disposal of write-offs and wont let you buy them back.This IS an insurance write off.

ive just been having a read through my insurance docs and it does have a section in there about salvage, saying that if i expressed an interest in having the car back after they would do what they can to arrange this with the underwriters. it does use the words 'try' and 'everything possible' so is by no means a dead cert. was wondering only if it was a write off or not, didnt cross my mind that it might be catogorised high enough not to be allowed to buy it back. hmm, REALLY not sure what to do now considering this!

the though of 'neck pains' did cross my mind i can certainly see why modern cars have head rests now though, having that happen with low back seats would be nasty.

thanks for all you opinions though, i will speak to my friend who hit me and have a good think. will keep you all up to date with any developments.
cheers.

yes, looks repairable. The insurance route is possible but full of pitfalls. One option though is to retain the car yourself - don't let it go to a garage for evaluation- take it there and bring it back. That way you are still in control of it.

This happened a few years ago with my old metro - i kept it in my garage and the insurance inspected it there.

oh ian they may have some new old stock genuine sides up there i could ask if you want .

Medusa + injection = too much torque for the dyno ..https://youtu.be/qg5o0_tJxYM

With Tom on his comment, I hit our Escort bent the wing/inner wing and bonnet.... not major you could have contined to drive it for years... anyway company wrote it off and it would have been Cat C for me to buy it back. decided not to bother. I suspect if the people that look at the car don't realise it's repairable then it's a C at least.

shame your day ended like that but least your ok.
M

what ever you do do not let the insurance take the car away for assesment if you want to keep it, we wanted to keep the corrado told the insurance co but the body shop scrapped it when the car was released from the insurance company

Just to let you know you can get a half rear panel hertiage (sp) i just on my self. Stops at the bottom of the window

Tom

as others have said chop the damaged metal off with your grinder/cutting disk, leave the rear panal on & get some wood & a bottle jack, use them to jack the boot floot straight-ish! then cut the panel off! straighten it all up & weld ya new panels on, fit an alloy tank & primer it & its finished, easy peasey!

bad luck with it getting dented but its defo fixable! keep it & do it up! its worth it due to the rest youve done to the car alone

SKYLINES ARE LIKE CLITS, EVERY FLANGE SEEMS TO HAVE ONE: see this sticker on my silvia

the Search-section on this forum is blummin superb & simple to use, unlike some other forums, without the search-section & the help of this bunch of chaps on here i'll never be able to !!!Start the day with a 998cc turbo!!! :) i'm getting closer though!

Tom Fenton says: I have it all, make me an offer

You're gonna scrap a car like that because of a dent as small as that????
From what I can see from here that is very repairable.
Just make one or two little checks to make sure you wont need lots of pulling.
Check the door gap to see if the whole rear quarter hasn't moved forward.
Measure from A pillar to B pillar on both sides and compare.If the passengers side is a lot less then the b pillar will have moved.
Also measure from C pillar to B pillar and compare.
Also have a good look at the sills the see if they have creased.
And lastly measure up the rear subframe properly,though if the car still drives straight it probably isn't damaged.

Warning:Stig in Training

dont give it to the insurance!
my friend had a slight dent in the rear quater where a drink driver hit it on his way home, they took it off her!

i think they called it something like "uneconomical to repair" :(

lets start a new rat look turbo mini club, mines dented too!

Previous Engine: 1040cc Morespeed engine, 1275 turbo head T2 Turbo Mirage Manifolds Megajolt
Previous engine: STD metro turbo, megajolt
Drives: 399bananahp (flywheel) Honda Civic Vtec b18c4 T28 Turbo 1968 Mini

Megajolt maps to download: http://www.jamesfawcett.co.uk/cms/index.ph...&gid=3&Itemid=3

Yeah, smack it about so you can get a light on it and make sure its at mitp

Im not sure that insurance will be the right thing, i think they will just end up writing it off

abit of an update for you. thanks for all your comments, it made making a decision about what to do a little easier with all your input.

the general consensus is that it is definitely repairable, but there is a good chance the insurance company will right it off.
i have totalled up the cost of panels and parts etc needed and this alone will be around £500, thats before any paint etc. therefore i think i am going to go down the avenue of getting his insurance involved to try and get the car written off, so i can then buy it back and repair it myself (or even reshell it as the sills and floor pan have all been patched up at various stages so could do with a freshen up) using the money i get from insurance.
i'm going to take the advice from here and try not to let the car out of my sight during the insurance assessment process. i will either get them to view the car at my house or, failing that try and get them to agree to have the bodyshop which my friend works at do the assessment. that way he can keep an eye on it and keep me updated at all times as to whats happening.
my only real concern at this stage is if its declared a Cat B and they dont let me buy it back, but i think this is VERY unlikely as i dont think the damage is anywhere near enough to warrant this. The only other concern is that they may get really picky about the modifications, trying to get out of paying up. All modifications were declared when I insured it but with a car this age they could always find little things that are not the same as when it left the factory, eg chrome fuel cap or something stupid like that they may try and use to get out of paying.

looking at all the options i think this will be best overall. this way the car will be better in the long run, and i wont be spending any money on it at the moment that i dont have. it does mean that its going to put off getting it back on the road but when it is back it will be better than ever!

thanks again all for your imput - the mini will be back, watch this space!

Edited by Ian_W on 18th Jul, 2008.

Good luck with it mate

Paul

I seriously doubt it!

Be very very careful. If they do classify it as Cat B you'll potentially lose the lot, engine, gearbox etc etc etc.

Personally I think its borderline, an assessor not familiar with Minis could see the quarter panel splayed out and the boot floor crunched and deem it structural damage when its not that bad to those in the know.

I agree entirely with Tom, the reason I mentioned the categorisation earlier in the thread.

A lot of Insurance Assessors won't have ever seen a Mini and will be "trained" in modern cars (crumple zones etc designed in) so knowing its design pre-dates crumple zones, just immediately say that if a structural panel (ie, boot floor as the subframe, ie, suspension, is bolted to it) is crumpled, the car should not go back on the road - Cat B.

The insurance company has nothing to lose - not even the buy-back value as they will decide the payment/settlement on the basis of potentially getting a bit back from you.

With Cat B you can theoretically re-use major components, but I doubt they would let you dismantle it, would probably have to be an authorised disposal agency.

Sorry if I'm being a pessimist, but I think Cat B is quite likely.

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

I think if you do go down the ins. route, I'd be getting the engine/box out, plus any expensive go faster bits, before it went anywhere. At least you then still have those parts. Not sure how you'd stand with the insurance company if you did this though.

glad you decided what you want to do.

like i say im having the same with my lupo, someone crashed into it, its just been written off but is still sat on my drive.

all i did was say i wanted vw to repair it, i would have either been happy with vw fixing it or being written of and buying it back. i just had to it to vw to get a quote and the insurance assesor did the rest!

its well within your right to take it to any garage that is approved.

i would think yours would be a cat d or c at worst, theres no way it could be a cat b!

i have a shell with full 6 point sd cage rear bins and seat removed and an fg flip front, its got new rack on it and a half decent rear subby too £300 sils are good front floors have had repair panels welded in but its not the neatest job also battery box removed and plated over

Speeding is like masturbating, everyone does it, but not all of us film it and put it on the internet

[quote=fab,8th Oct, 2010]fuck off

My mini suffered the same damage. Not wanting the local cowboy garages to fix it, I presented my insurance company a bill for £1200 for my labour and parts and they were happy for me to fix it myself. They saved money that way since I never charged them much for the labour

Iain, what happened with this in the end?

Team Racing

it was patched up the best we could for mitp last year and then pretty much stayed like that until now! it drove fine so carried on using it as it was and kept a look out for a new shell.
its currently sitting in my garage slowly being taken apart for the new build...

tidy! Hows the head buddy?? did you manage to get any photo's of the night? Hope to see you at the next bash christmas time

Team Racing

lol recovered now, took a while though, the drive back wasnt so much fun!
was such a funny night, no photos unfortunately (was struggling to remember my name at times let alone remember to take pics!)
christmas bash sounds good (perhaps just without endaf behind the bar making the drinks, i might survive then!)
cheers

I had similar damage done to mine. The Insurance company were going to have it repaired by one of their cowboy garages but I didn't want it thrown back together
I sent the Insurance company a quote for parts and my (cheap) labour to fix it myself and they agreed and sent me £1200. It was cheaper for them that way.
When the Insurance assessor came to have a look he wasn't interested in all the mods (which were all declared.) He did however carefully check the tyres so make sure your tyres are all legal.

Edited by dazibee on 30th Jul, 2009.