The Celt's Damian McCarney with his NCT-failing Astra.

NOTHIN'S EASY: NCT tests patience as well as the car

Do you know what McDonald’s means to me? Imminent failure.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not one of these foodie snobs - I’m partial to their McTastys - but I typically eat there twice a year - NCT day and retest day. I’m sure I’m not the only one, they should have a meal deal for NCTers - a Big Mac-hanic meal? Anyhoo, last Wednesday as the straw gurgled up the final tears of Coke from the ice, I dandered back to the NCT centre to suck up whatever the mechanic was going to fail me on.

When you drive an aul banger it’s a given you’ll fail on something. That’s why, before I headed down to the NCT I posted up on the Celt’s Facebook page: “I have my NCT later this evening and fully expect to fail... as always.”

I recalled that my daftest refusal/fail was on not having the name of the county in Irish on the reg plate! I still seethe at having to get a tiny An Cabhán sticker made up especially. What’s that got to do with car safety? The worst possible outcome is that kids playing the reg plate game might mistakenly guess that my car was from Carlow North.
Refusal? Oh truck off!

In fairness, though, on that same occasion I also failed for having a hole in the floor. Nor would the seat stay in a fixed position, so when I braked, I’d slide towards the steering wheel and when I sped up, I’d be driving straight armed like a boyracer. Oh, and the driver’s window wouldn’t wind down (yes it was still manual), so to pay at the M3 toll stations I’d have to get out of the car, much to the alarm of the women in the booths, who probably thought I was going to rob them of their coin mountains and then flee in the worst getaway car of all time.
I knew it was time to replace my Seat when an entrepreneur-chancer, totally unsolicited, repeatedly called to my house on Sundays to try to persuade me to sell it for less than its scrap value. The ‘98 Seat was last year’s romance; I’d upgraded to a car born in this millennium - an ‘01 Astra. It must be the last line of cars to include a tape deck. I was disappointed not to discover a record player in the boot.

Empathy
Anyway, my Facebook post sparked a wave of empathy from other NCT victims. One chap, called James, failed because the orange coating had worn off his indicator bulbs, yet the plastic housing for lights were orange. “Haven’t gone back to that test centre since,” he fumed.
Another, Paul grumbled that he failed on: “A crack on the rubber on my clutch pedal.”
A lady called Eithne recalled: “The hubby’s van failed for a tiny rip in drivers seat, they said it could impair the safety of the driver!”
Meanwhile Jacqui succinctly offered: “Loose bulb”. Enough said.
My favourite post was Christine’s: “Horn wasn’t loud enough.”
A guy called Dermot won my admiration for his ingenious response to the rule where they can only retest you on what you’ve failed: “One spotlight not working, took bulb out of working one... went back and passed, utterly ridiculous but expected in this country.”
A little bit of me hopes he’s still making his stand, whilst endangering lives of road-users with his one working bulb.
Now, the reason I make my annual McDonald’s pilgrimage is because the first time I endured the NCT I made the mistake of actually watching the mechanics at work. Abducting and brutalising my innocent Seat, they gave no quarter as it juddered, cranked and wailed for mercy. This haunting memory came to mind when a Facebooker called Anthony posted: “Well, I’ve taken two cars in and they have revved them both so hard the exhausts holed, cost me money to fix a problem that wasn’t there before”.

Fail
Anyway, back to last week’s NCT: it’s 8pm when I reenter the pokey office to discover my fate. It’s packed, and there’s a huddle at the window. An electronic screen mounted on the wall suggests there’s a queuing system, but this being Ireland, no one has faith in it. My name is called by a young mechanic standing in behind the glass booth installed as tacit acknowledgement that they’re provoking us.
“You uh, have a hole in your exhaust,” says the fella in an apologetic hush, “so we couldn’t do the emissions test.”
“No worries, grand so,” I say on the turn, but the mechanic hasn’t finished.
“You’ve a side lamp bulb out,” he mumbles, as if patient confidentiality was at stake.
The sense of shame starts to rise as I catch a glimpse of FAIL/REFUSAL repeated ad infinitum down the page.
“Advanced corrosion on brakelines...” he continues as I zone out. The rubber-neckers around me are relieved it’s not their little beauty that’s getting such damning diagnosis, but I sense them shuffle closer as the mechanic proceeds with his death list.
Fail, fail, fail, fail, fail, fail, fail, fail, fail, fail, fail, fail, fail, fail, fail. In case you weren’t counting, that’s 15 fails out of 16 tests.
I couldn’t believe that the one test I actually passed was the dip beam test! I always fail that test. Always.
I felt like hugging my wee Astra in reassurance and telling her I still love her.
I returned to the virtual bosom of Facebook to report that I’d categorically failed and exclaim, there goes next month’s pay cheque!
Postman Paddy was quick off the mark to deliver the following missive of truth: “There’s €55 vanished into thin air and your car is still let out on the road to drive.”
Still, 15 fails. That must be a record... maybe deserving of another McTasty.