since it seems to be my destiny to own a coupe ive found out about a coupe specialist in wigan lancs,named james twist,anyone heard about or used him for his services cheers steve

Lots of experiences on here. Search against "James Twist" and spend 10m reading the various posts. Job done.

I drove my first coupé at James Twists

Last time I was there was when I smashed my front suspension a couple of years ago on a Lakes Meet. Sadly, it wasn't a pleasant experience as I had to take the car back 3 times and ended up parting with the wrong end of £500 for what should have been a straightforward fix. The guy who runs the place is called "Wigan Paul" and if you've got him working on your car there's no issues. The problem seemed to be inexperienced mechanics (at that time) and I haven't been back since.

Having said that, as this is your first coupé it'll be worth a phone call / trip over to see what they have in stock and maybe get a test drive. As above, Paul really knows coupés (he once had the only genuine Yellow Plus I've ever seen) but my bad experience has tarnished things for me.

Might also be worth PMing Came2Dance - he's had a lot of work done at Twists in the past.

As MABR said it depends who works on your car. Paul is ok and I think the lads know their stuff - maybe not just 100% coop orientated. If you do read through all the posts you will find pretty mixed reports. I suppose it depends on your own knowledge what your expectations are too. They have done the clutch and the timing belt and the exhaust and serviced mine, oh, and discs and pads and flexi hoses, oh and the exhaust manifold. All ok but I haven't been there for a while due to the bad press he got on here.

Where abouts are you located since you're asking about Wigan Paul

^^^ Well that's saved a PM!

im in chorley,lancs inbetween wigan and preston guys

I'm just north of Preston and will be interested in any recent opinions of James Twist too!
Picking my Coop up on Sunday

Cheers

Avoid James Twist. I had mine there for something minor and it went back three times. It cost a lot and was only fixed after much bulls***ting by them, add to which they gave the car a 'full' service which I never requested. I cannot advise enough, avoid.

Cheers for that James, where do you take yours now?

Mark.

Motormech in Birmingham, easy to reach from the M6 and it's worth it.

Tim (James!?)

what have you bought rugratsrus,ive just bought a portofino,pick it up next week

Sorry Tim - and I thought I just had verbal diarrhea, it's obviously taken hold of my fingers now too!!!

Cheers, Mark - you can call me anything you like!!

A Sprint Red (totally red and not pink) 20VT from a forum member.

Cheers, Mark.

I used James Twist without issue from 2001 to 2006, then they really messed me around over an injector problem

I'd asked them to run a diagnostic and replace no. 4 injector if that came up as the problem (I was 99% sure I knew exactly what the problem was having had an injector fail once before)

They called me to say the diagnostic had returned injector 4 as the fault but they'd cleared the fault from the ECU and the car was now running without any problems

I picked my car up at closing time and within 10 mins of driving the same problem reappeared (I think what they meant was the car was ideling without any problems - not really the same thing!)

When I phoned them the next morning to say its not fixed, please just replace the injector like I told you to, I was told the next avalible slot was 8 days

I was really pissed as I needed the car, so went to Fiat, purchased an injector and did the job myslef using the How To from this forum - the job took about 40 mins and my car was fixed

I've never been back as I was so disappointed with being told I'd have to wait 8 days for a 40 min job, especially as I'd spent £'000's there over the preceeding 5 years

My car now goes to Motormech

I had my cam belt and aux belts done there a couple of years ago with no problems.

Kev

I went to wigan pauls about 2 years ago , the coupe was cutting out all the time, they could not find the cause of it so they did a compression test and said the engine is f--cked , i could not beleive what i was hearing, i said bulls-it and left, i called paul at motormech, i was upset and he said come down asap and he did a compression test he said you have a realy healthy engine and the problem was an aftermarket chip and he put a standard one in and the car runs like a dream, i would AVOID.
Bev...

I'd forgoten all these bad events Seems like Motormech is good advice. That's probably where I'll go in future

Nice to see you on here Bev/Kev. How ya doin

A good alternative to Motormech if thats too far for you is Alitalia (ex Paxtons Garage) in Wrexham, North Wales. PM Theresa for more details, otherwise, Motormech it is.

Gareth

Cheers Gareth

Yes, if we're too far for you to travel to, then after years of listening to and reading reviews on here, even I'd recommend Motormech

No problem Theresa, you have a PM by the way, I have a Alitalia related question for you!

G

Never experienced Wigan James, but was at Motormech today to have my eibachs fitted and thought it wise to get the lower arms done as their 2 years old and done 15k ish in prep for track days.

Had a call from Paul putting himself out of work telling me the lower arms were spot on and didnt need changing.

Another vote for MM from me.

Hi chris ,were doing fine thanks taken a long time to settle down here in the midlands , hope to see you at some meets soon,and its nice being so close to motormech.

Bev Kev..

Ha Ha, that's proper coop paranoia