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[humbucker]

OK, so I'm driving home and, not for the first time, one of those council gritter machines comes by and absolutely blasts the front and side of the car with grit. Every time it happens I tense up and go mental, absolutely petrified that The Mothership is going to look like she's been attacked with an air rifle.

Mrs ilovemyelite holds her breath expecting me to explode or break down in tears hahaha!

The roads surrounding home are fairly narrow country roads too so nowhere to hide.

I know they're doing their best to keep me from driving in the river after skidding on ice at night (!) but even so, I'd still like to haul the driver out of his cab and lob him in the river myself.

Furthermore, I started thinking. Let's say half the paintwork HAS come off the side of the car, would you be within your rights to try and claim damages off the council?! Anyone tried this before?

I hate gritters. Period. Bah.

[miggy]

OK, so I'm driving home and, not for the first time, one of those council gritter machines comes by and absolutely blasts the front and side of the car with grit. Every time it happens I tense up and go mental, absolutely petrified that The Mothership is going to look like she's been attacked with an air rifle.

Mrs ilovemyelite holds her breath expecting me to explode or break down in tears hahaha!

The roads surrounding home are fairly narrow country roads too so nowhere to hide.

I know they're doing their best to keep me from driving in the river after skidding on ice at night (!) but even so, I'd still like to haul the driver out of his cab and lob him in the river myself.

Furthermore, I started thinking. Let's say half the paintwork HAS come off the side of the car, would you be within your rights to try and claim damages off the council?! Anyone tried this before?

I hate gritters. Period. Bah.

Dont know but the grit driver would have been in the river, i would have followed at a distance then attacked when he got out.

[Darth Loo-knee]

OK, so I'm driving home and, not for the first time, one of those council gritter machines comes by and absolutely blasts the front and side of the car with grit. Every time it happens I tense up and go mental, absolutely petrified that The Mothership is going to look like she's been attacked with an air rifle.

Mrs ilovemyelite holds her breath expecting me to explode or break down in tears hahaha!

The roads surrounding home are fairly narrow country roads too so nowhere to hide.

I know they're doing their best to keep me from driving in the river after skidding on ice at night (!) but even so, I'd still like to haul the driver out of his cab and lob him in the river myself.

Furthermore, I started thinking. Let's say half the paintwork HAS come off the side of the car, would you be within your rights to try and claim damages off the council?! Anyone tried this before?

I hate gritters. Period. Bah.

Dont know but the grit driver would have been in the river, i would have followed at a distance then attacked when he got out.

Bully so that Gritter drivers and RAC windscreen fitter men

[miggy]

OK, so I'm driving home and, not for the first time, one of those council gritter machines comes by and absolutely blasts the front and side of the car with grit. Every time it happens I tense up and go mental, absolutely petrified that The Mothership is going to look like she's been attacked with an air rifle.

Mrs ilovemyelite holds her breath expecting me to explode or break down in tears hahaha!

The roads surrounding home are fairly narrow country roads too so nowhere to hide.

I know they're doing their best to keep me from driving in the river after skidding on ice at night (!) but even so, I'd still like to haul the driver out of his cab and lob him in the river myself.

Furthermore, I started thinking. Let's say half the paintwork HAS come off the side of the car, would you be within your rights to try and claim damages off the council?! Anyone tried this before?

I hate gritters. Period. Bah.

Dont know but the grit driver would have been in the river, i would have followed at a distance then attacked when he got out.

Bully so that Gritter drivers and RAC windscreen fitter men

No, gritters and Autoglass man..

[Darth Loo-knee]

OK, so I'm driving home and, not for the first time, one of those council gritter machines comes by and absolutely blasts the front and side of the car with grit. Every time it happens I tense up and go mental, absolutely petrified that The Mothership is going to look like she's been attacked with an air rifle.

Mrs ilovemyelite holds her breath expecting me to explode or break down in tears hahaha!

The roads surrounding home are fairly narrow country roads too so nowhere to hide.

I know they're doing their best to keep me from driving in the river after skidding on ice at night (!) but even so, I'd still like to haul the driver out of his cab and lob him in the river myself.

Furthermore, I started thinking. Let's say half the paintwork HAS come off the side of the car, would you be within your rights to try and claim damages off the council?! Anyone tried this before?

I hate gritters. Period. Bah.

Dont know but the grit driver would have been in the river, i would have followed at a distance then attacked when he got out.

Bully so that Gritter drivers and RAC windscreen fitter men

No, gritters and Autoglass man..

Lmfao

[humbucker]

inspected car in daylight this morning. definite evidence of stone chips from last nights 'attack'. called council's highways division and lodged complaint, requested speedy response. let's see where it gets me.  

[waspy]

inspected car in daylight this morning. definite evidence of stone chips from last nights 'attack'. called council's highways division and lodged complaint, requested speedy response. let's see where it gets me.  

Good for you pal. I know you can claim for damage as a result of pot holes etc, & there's more spent each year in compensation claims than in repairing the roads  :-? :-?
Just bloody typical.
You've just made me remember when i was 18, we lived in Yorkshire & my dad had a new Morris Ital van. I followed a Gritter at what i thought was a safe distance & some thing flew out & shattered the windscreen, i had to drive for about 7 miles peering through a small piece that was less cracked than the rest.
But that was in 1984 & now they wouldn't get away with showering vehicles with grit the size of marbles. WOULD THEY  :-/ :-/

[Kevin Wood]

Morris Ital van. I followed a Gritter

Surprised you got home before it rotted away. It it was anything like my Ital, that is...

Kevin

[waspy]

Morris Ital van. I followed a Gritter

Surprised you got home before it rotted away. It it was anything like my Ital, that is...

Kevin

Hi Kevin.
We didn't keep it long enough to find out, very reliable though  

[humbucker]

Got a call back from Highways Division of council; they asked me to clarify what happened. Explained again that i was chased for miles by a rogue gritter driven by a maniac who was wearing a t-shirt bearing the slogan 'i hate omegas' there is damage to the paintwork.

Guy I spoke to said that he's going to check all the information on the truck ie. speed of delivery of grit, type of grit, speed of vehicle etc etc electronic-taco data etc. They're going to send me out a claim form to request reimbursement of costs for repairing. I'm a bit worried about corrosion on chipped paint cos of the weather so I might get a touch up stick and take a photo or two of chipped bodywork first to send with claim form.

I figure I might as well request reimbursement for full respray on wing and drivers door against council insurance.

Watch this space. While the forms are coming out to me today I imagine the process, notwithstanding the bank holiday weekend, will take a while to complete...  

[Tony H]

Got a call back from Highways Division of council; they asked me to clarify what happened. Explained again that i was chased for miles by a rogue gritter driven by a maniac who was wearing a t-shirt bearing the slogan 'i hate omegas' there is damage to the paintwork.

Guy I spoke to said that he's going to check all the information on the truck ie. speed of delivery of grit, type of grit, speed of vehicle etc etc electronic-taco data etc. They're going to send me out a claim form to request reimbursement of costs for repairing. I'm a bit worried about corrosion on chipped paint cos of the weather so I might get a touch up stick and take a photo or two of chipped bodywork first to send with claim form.

I figure I might as well request reimbursement for full respray on wing and drivers door against council insurance.

Watch this space. While the forms are coming out to me today I imagine the process, notwithstanding the bank holiday weekend, will take a while to complete...  

The bodywork shop will probably do that any way as opposed to just blow ins, especially if it is a metallic, you may even get the full side re-painted

[hotel21]

I wouldn't count your respray before its agreed....

The kit used by the council up here, probably in common with those up and down the country, is all computer monitored.  ie location via GPS, times via Greenwich clock, grit flow though a counter, direction of travel, route followed etc etc etc....  You may (or may not) come unstuck saying it was at such and such a location at so and so time whilst the telemetrics on the waggon back to base place it several streets away..

Not saying or implying anything whatsoever, simply indicating that the Council chappy said he will ceck the on board stuff and take it from there....

[humbucker]

I wouldn't count your respray before its agreed....

The kit used by the council up here, probably in common with those up and down the country, is all computer monitored.  ie location via GPS, times via Greenwich clock, grit flow though a counter, direction of travel, route followed etc etc etc....  You may (or may not) come unstuck saying it was at such and such a location at so and so time whilst the telemetrics on the waggon back to base place it several streets away..

Not saying or implying anything whatsoever, simply indicating that the Council chappy said he will ceck the on board stuff and take it from there....

we'll have to see what happens. the road in question is a country b-road with nothing coming off of it for about 4 miles so its likey they will be able to place it on the right road providing i havent got my times muddled up...!

i have no doubt they will do everything they can to wriggle out of it but im determined to give it my best shot. why should i have to pay out for corrective work simply because the driver was too inconsiderate to pause hammering the road for 2 seconds, especially as he could see me coming for hundreds of yards and i was the only other car on my side of the road... with nowhere to hide!! i realise they're trying to do a sterling job and all, but really, common sense tells you if theres a car coming the other way that is going to be right up against you that maybe you should cut some slack and ease off the bombardment!

 

[humbucker]

an update on this for those interested...

i wrote a letter to the highways agency along with the claim form, a batch of 'before and after' photos, illustrations etc etc and they politely wrote back to say they'd received it.

a week or two later i got a call from someone from the highways agency who wanted to come and inspect the car for damage to determine whether i was trying to pull a fast one or not. so he visited me at work.

he concluded that the damage to the wing, door, grille and wing mirror was definitely caused by a gritter on account of the fact that the chips in some places span 6mm, the exact size of the salt stuff used in the gritter. also you could see the direction of the 'attack' from front drivers corner across front of car.

he said he was happy for the council to accept liability and that i should be hearing from them shortly. i asked 'what now' and he said they'd probably simply write to me with an offer of reimbursement in the form of a cheque as the council 'have a reserve of cash put by to compensate members of the public' for things like this.

i called this week to say i still hadn't heard back and was told that they are a very small team and so havent had a chance to respond. they are going to be getting in touch this coming week apparently.

while i'm not picking up the phone to the bodyshop just yet, things are looking pretty good on this front. i am going to be dead chuffed if they come up trumps as i was / am so unhappy about it. as you can see from the photos on the following thread, the condition of these body panels was fantastic before this!!

http://www.omegaowners.com/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1204376087

anyway, i'm glad i complained and am looking forward to hearing from the powers that be with regard to compensation...

more to follow when i hear back...

[FRE07962128]

Although you have not received compensation yet It's obviously looking good for you, and just proves that with perserverance you can achieve your aims against all the odds.  Well done!

I know many years back how difficult it was to obtain compensation from local councils when  just your windscreen was smashed by the road menders grit, so you certainly have a result if they have admitted liability to damage by a gritter.