Steve Kennard, teaching drivers how to survive the world of modern motoring – imparting wisdom to the next generation of motor technicians.
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Here’s some facts about Steve in his own words:
Born in Brighton in 1956 and grew up on the old Whitehawk estate on the east side of Brighton, I say old Whitehawk estate as it underwent a major rebuild in the 80’s. I attended the local junior school and managed to get selected for Brighton & Hove Grammer School. I guess like most people there are always various events as we go through our schooling years that dictate the paths we take. Mine was the army cadets which was part of the Grammer Schools curriculum and started my interest in the Army from an early age.
I left Brighton & Hove Grammer School at 15 in the summer of 1971 and went to the local Army Careers office which was in Queens Road Brighton to find out more about ’The Regulars’, and attended selection courses and got accepted to join the R.E.M.E (Royal Electrical & Mechanical Engineers) in January 1972.
I had always been interested in finding out how things work, and used to take things apart virtually as soon as I could hold a spanner, to my parents dismay. My very first bike soon got the treatment always looking to try and modify in some way. I used to make ‘4 wheelers’ as we used to call them, even at an early age understanding the need for good roller bearings to make them go faster through less friction.
It was quite a daunting time at 15 to leave home and ‘join up’. I went to the Army Apprentices College at Arborfield near Reading to learn the trade of a vehicle mechanic as well as of course learn the discipline of a ‘Squaddie’. It was a very good learning curve and training given was second to none. I wish the trade training of today was as comprehensive and as in depth.
From the very start I had to learn how to work metal even touching on blacksmithing to understand the ways metal can be treated, making components from raw materials and how to strip vehicles down to the last nut & bolt then reassemble & test to make sure it worked ok.
I had my City & Guilds and was posted to a workshop in Mulheim Germany before I was 18, where I worked mainly on heavy trucks continuing to gain experience as a mechanic including recovery techniques , various welding techniques and of course various socialising techniques, many a lost weekend! And many a story to tell (could be a few pod episodes here)
Anyway, I left the Army with a lot of life experience and trade experience along with a HGV licence in 1977 after I was threatened with a posting back to Salisbury, now anyone familiar with a Salisbury posting knows it is bull—t garrison and would have been to much of a shock to the system, so it was civvy street for me to adjust to a different way of life.
I have worked on vehicles of all sizes from motorbikes to armoured personel carriers including articulated trucks to 16 wheeled cranes and of course cars of all types.
I lived in Northampton after leaving the army, working on a variation of vehicles including HGV’s which also included numerous accident & breakdown recovery’s from the M1.
By the early 80’s I moved back to Brighton and started my own garage business and apart from a period of emigration to Toowoomba Queensland in the early 90’s, I am still here in Brighton running my vehicle repair centre (as they tend to be called now) with a small team of experienced technicians tackling the numerous problems we get with the modern car.
I have always maintained in order to understand how things work you need to see how things are made, if you can do that, it makes fault finding a lot easier to diagnose, add to that methodical &logical thinking you are then on your way to being a top technician , Diagnosis is the key !
I could fill in the past 30 years with many experiences and probably turn this into a bit of a novel, but would it ever be a best seller? who knows, maybe a few tales will find their way into the podcasts.
