Maintenance evening courses in Surrey/Hampshire area?

[martyjmcfly 0]

I'm trying to search for a decent evening course so i can learn a bit more about looking after the C. All colleges i've contacted don't do them. There mostly full time, held in the day etc. nothing really geared around someone who has a day job.

 

So far its been a little tinkering - changing the oil etc but i want to take it a stage further without bodging something and having a car sitting on the drive for 6 months with no wheels on it. :wink:

 

If anyone has been on one or knows where holds them please let me know.

 

Cheers

 

M

[Jonny_L 0]

I did an evening course on welding at brooklands college. I seem to remember seeing something in the prospectus about an evening maintainance course. might be worth a look if you haven't already.

[martyjmcfly 0]

Most appreciated Jonny_L

 

that's not to far at all.

 

I have requested a prospectus so i'm hopefull.

 

Was the welding course worth doing (can you weld now)?

[Jonny_L 0]

Definately worth it, when I went in, i was just blowing holes in everything, came out with a City and Guilds certificate in mig welding 10 weeks later, not to blow my own trumpet, but they said I would've got a distinction if I was doing the NVQ 8) .

Nice people there too, everyone's car mad. They were all pretty interested in the rado of course. They've got a decent sized workshop there with loads of tools and machinery.

 

An advanced tip if you do go there... Park in the gym car park on the left past the security barrier, it's just next to the workshop. For 3 weeks I parked in the student car park which is horrible, covered in rubbish and about a mile walk from the workshop!

[khurrado 0]

Where's brooklands. Sounds familiar. Id def be up for a maintenance course, Ill have a look into it, im sure you can do evenings through local council etc.

[khurrado 0]

Also, from what a recall ,a mate of mine donated his corrado to a university for a year, to the automotive engineering deaprtment.

 

THey completely restored his corrado for him. Lucky bstard.

[Jonny_L 0]

It's in weybridge. if you've not been, the brooklands car museum's pretty cool.

I'd love to donate my car to a uni, bet he was well chuffed! knowing my luck, mine would get fed to the chavs and come back worse!

[Jim 2]

Was looking for a car maintenance course down here in Coventry for ages and had to give up. The old college I used to work at USED to run a light vehicle night workshop but due to lack of interest they scrapped it. Great. Took up German on Thursday nights instead!

 

You'd never think that in a city with such a proud automotive history, and with big car companies in the area (well.. not for much longer) you'd struggle but there you go! There was Rover, BMW just over in Hams Hall, Peugeot at Ryton and a few Jaguar plants!!

[martyjmcfly 0]

down here in Coventry

shouldn't it be UP here in Coventry

 

:) :) :)

 

just light hearted humour - please don't ban me mr Mod

 

It's crap when a place stops a course when your lovin it. That happend to me mid way through a windsurfing course. I was all paid up to get to the top qualification and then .................cheers

[Phil K 0]

I'd be well up for something like this too - maybe would could organise a group buy on the tutoring fees :lol:

 

Keep me posted if you find anything...

[martyjmcfly 0]

Oh this is starting to sound fantastic - a whole group of southern corrado mechanics on the way :lol:

[Tekara 0]

You could always approach a friendly local Garage and see if they'd offer any unpaid work on a Saturday. Bonus of this you'd have tools and ramps at your disposal making maintenance easier.

[Jonny_L 0]

Now that you mention it, I might be up for doing another course there too. I know a fair bit about mechanics, but since i've only ever done work out of manuals/common sense, there's probably a lot that I could learn still. Keep us posted how you get on. I think anything now would start in January, they're usually 10 week courses.

[khurrado 0]

dont suppose they do breaking corrado courses aswell do they? lol. This is an absolute nightmare!

[martyjmcfly 0]

Update:

 

Brooklands College only offer a 1.5 days a week course i.e not evening.

They advised me to try learn direct who were very helpfull and put me in contact with Guildford College - they offer a basic vehicle maintenance course which is set out over 10 weeks, 1900-2100 hrs. The next course starts in January. When i say basic this may be oil changing and changing a wheel??? I'll do a bit more digging and try and obtain a syllabus to see if its worth it? Other than that it may mean giving up part of my working week which would be nice but stupid.

 

Cheers

 

M

[Jonny_L 0]

Guildford's good too, I did A levels there, for about 4 months before I sacked them :lol:

 

It might be worth looking into, though it'd suck if you paid to get on a course that only taught you how to remove a drain plug! Keep up the good work, I'm quite interested too now. Would be funny to get a corrado bias in the class, that way the teacher would be forced to teach us all about them instead of crappy cars!

[martyjmcfly 0]

Well - after speaking to a women on the help desk at Guildford college the information i managed to get out of her was limited shall we say. They are unable to provide a syllabus for the course or get one of the instructors to speak to me. I was told from her own understanding that it entailed changing the oil and changing the spark plugs.

 

Its not sounding too good but i'm in no way a mechanic. I've learn't these basics with my dad but there must be more to learn if the course is 20 hours - but definately not timing chains on a VR6 - damn!!!.

 

So there you go - the course is £160 'basic vehicle maintenance' and its code is xx04ce0b00fp. The next course starts in January, the next one March.

 

If anyone goes on the course and has to change a wheel please don't hunt me down and kill me. If anyone else wants a go at getting more information as to the course content the no. is 01483 448585 - good luck and please let me know if you find out more. :)

[Jonny_L 0]

Doesn't sound too convincing does it, that's a shame.

I tend to drive past a few times a week, so I'll try and pop in sometime. with a bit of luck they'll be more helpful in person.

 

If it's run anything like my welding course was, the teacher kind of makes it up as he goes along. Maybe asks what experience people have and what everyone wants to do. Then either gets a majority vote for the class, or everyone splits up and does their own thing. Maybe a group per car, which would be quite good.

 

They might cover cam belts, which are just like cam chains, only much, much easier to get to :)

 

I bet they won't cover auto to manual conversions tho :lol:

 

Edit: Just had a look on the Guildford college site, is the course number XX04CE0B004P, with a 4 instead of the F you put in? wanna make sure we're looking at the same course!

[martyjmcfly 0]

XX04CE0B004P

 

You are quite correct my fine fellow - i should have been asleep well before that post.

 

I'm kinda tempted to have a go at the course as i've had no formal training as such. The teacher may have contacts as to further courses?

[Jonny_L 0]

That's what I was thinking too. I have loads of experience of working on cars, but nobody's ever told me how, I just kind of guessed!

Chances are there's quite a few little bits and bobs that i've not done properly in the past, some that I know of, which I caused me more problems than I first started with :oops: :lol:

[martyjmcfly 0]

Sent my application form off today - course starts 10th January, i hope there's space on the course and if so i hope i learn something - nice

[Jonny_L 0]

Thats cool, good work. I'm quite tempted too, though I might be cutting it a bit fine now.

 

I never got round to popping in to talk to someone, did you find out anything else about the course in the end, or are you just giving it a go?

[khurrado 0]

Let us know how it goes, if it is any good ill be joining in march

[G60SC_Stoney 0]

i would be up for this too, sounds ike it would be quite a fun way to spend an evening or two, my girlfriend does an evening course up there too on monday nights....spent too much time washing her hair instead of learning maths!! typical woman :roll: (Q the abuse!!)

[G60SC_Stoney 0]

maybe we should see if we can get a load of us to start in march??!!??