Just got home from a trip south with a few friends. One couple with an 08 ZM BMW, another couple with a 96 328 convertible, and my wife and I with the 98 B. My shift linkage let go approaching Port Allegheny. We managed to find third gear and limped to a shop where as we were treated unbelievable.Three young guys who were eager to work on a car they had never seen before.They put her on the hoist, lowered the sub frame about four inches to give them room to work. and McGivered a fix . There is a Hiem joint on the linkage which basically just disintegrated.Actually a really bad design from Fiat.$50.00 later we were back on the road and had a great week on exceptional roads.

Sounds like you were very lucky to find such a helpful and inventive bunch of mechanics. My local workshop have said they can't even look at my ailing B until the 2nd week of June, so I'm having to make a trip to the Lake District next week in my Panda

For folks on this side of the Atlantic, the BBC website has kindly provided the following explanation of the verb to Mcgiver/McGyver: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-34075407

I like the Urban Dictionary definition: "Someone who can jump-start a truck with a cactus"

Didn't Marge Simpson's sisters have the hots for him? Maybe because he was so inventive?

Reminds me of the time I was travelling from Lytham to Aberdeen in my previous barchetta. Got to Stirling when something went wrong. Got rescued to a local garage on a tired estate. Dreading it. The guy turned out to be brilliant when I told him I was delivering the pedal car barchetta I had with me to my nephew. During the repair he teased me by naming local hotels and singing this song https://g.co/kgs/AXtneB particularly the line where you gonna sleep tonight! Anyway an hour or so later after fashioning a repair from bits I was on my way. Total mcguyver!!