A not so smart James bags himself a broken microcar
As it turns out, friends don’t appreciate it when you dump cars on their front lawn. I discovered this for myself when my Rotherham mate Lynn got home from work to find a battered Smart car abandoned in her front garden. ‘Is this something to do with you?’ My suggestion that this multi-coloured Smart would make a pleasing garden ornament didn’t wash with her. She told me the kids had named it ‘Arfur’. Why? ‘Cos look looks like ‘alf a bloody car’. But how had it ended up in Lynn’s lawn?
I’d first spotted this City-Coupé (known as a 450) at a friend’s place in Aberdeenshire in April 2022. Surrounded by numerous classic Swedes, it was in a hedge and missing a nose cone. While Nick had enjoyed this 40,000-mile example for a while, the Smart’s electronic gears had begun to play up until eventually the car became unusable. Noting my enthusiasm for it, he pledged to drop it off next time he was heading south with an empty trailer. Eleven months later, the phone rang. ‘I’ve got the Smart on the back of my trailer and I’m going as far south as Yorkshire. Are you near Yorkshire?’ I live in Northamptonshire. Conveniently located on the corner of a modern housing development, Lynn’s garden sprang to mind.
On picking the car up a few nights later, her young daughter Holly noted the missing nose cone. ‘He looks like he’s sneezed and blown his own nose off’. I would need to source a set of new clip-on panels as the originals had seen better days – achance to personalise it in the way Smart had intended. There was more to contend with first, namely the gear issues and an engine that wouldn’t turn. Most of us have a speciality, don’t we? A lifetime of Citroën experiences means I’m fluent in the ways of the double chevrons. Eighteen years of Smart Roadster ownership means I also speak Smart. My assumption about the engine issue was correct, in that a seized alternator is a known trouble spot for 450 City-Coupé and Roadster owners. They’re quite exposed to the elements, so if you park up for a lengthy period after a wet weather drive, corrosion can strike swiftly. There isn’t much space to play with, but you can get a shallow 24mm socket on the alternator and give it a thump and, often, break the rus
