Remember when broke a headlight and replaced it with a £50 used replacement bought from the scrap yard? That’s no longer possible. Put a non-authorised replacement part in your modern car and it might reject it and shut down the whole car! Parts are now locked to the VIN of your car! Rip-off or great anti-theft security feature?

Remember when fixing your car was… well, fixing your car? Let’s say you clipped a wall and cracked a headlight. The dealer quoted you £500 for a replacement. You laughed politely, wandered down to your local scrapyard, picked up a perfectly good used one for fifty quid, fitted it yourself in an hour, and everyone lived happily ever after. Those days are disappearing. On many modern cars, fitting a second-hand headlight, ECU, instrument cluster, infotainment screen or other electronic component can trigger warning messages, disable functions or simply refuse to work altogether.