You may remember from this earlier blog that I stormed out of my local Citroën main dealer when they proposed a fee of £235.00 for changing a headlamp bulb.

Well, I showed ‘em.

I bought two Xenon D2R bulbs off eBay for £17.95 and took the car to a little garage down the road.

Result? A bill for £397.15.

It could have been more.

The mechanic said I could wait while he changed the bulb. He reckoned 10 minutes, and it would cost £20.

As I had seen the process in this step by step photo guide on an Australian website and it involved taking the front bumper off, I declined and said I’d pick the car up later.

The garage rang later that afternoon. “We changed the bulbs but he no work. Mebbe wiring loom, we check fuse OK. We get lecrician man to check Thursday.”

The electrician man duly checked on Thursday for a nominal £23, and said that the headlamp itself had corroded, and needed to be replaced.

A massive old corroded headlamp from a Citroën C5

A new headlamp for a Citroën C5?  Certainly sair, that’ll be £701.65 from Citroën UK, please sair. Seven hundred and one pounds sixty five pence. That’s $1,080.96. That’s €854.07. For one headlamp? That’s more than the car’s worth.

How about one from a breakers’ yard, I wondered. They tracked one down very speedily, at a bargain price of £150.

So three hours labour, plus the parts, plus the lecrician man, plus the VAT (and I dare not count the time) came to £415.10.

To change one headlamp bulb. There’s progress for you.

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