Tow Woes

 They say that lightning doesn’t strike in the same place twice. But my experience having back-to-back episodes of towing failures put myself and others in life threatening situations.



The first nightmare came about in dealing with my son’s broken car, which he had recently bought without my knowledge. Because he lives a day’s drive away he didn’t have me around to help him choose a car and he wound up buying a real hulk that had a lot of hard miles on it.



By the time I saw it and went to check it out, the hood wouldn’t even open—a foreshadow that stirred a pang of fear. With some coercion I got the hood unlatched and saw under it a tired old run down motor. It was covered with oil and dirt, and looked as if it had been leaking oil for a long time. He informed me that when he tried to get the oil changed at the local oil quick-change place, they turned him away. I could see why. It was a real mess, it looked like oil was leaking out of everywhere.



A little spray lube fixed the hood latch. But not knowing how bad the oil was leaking was my immediate concern. Maybe it needed a little tender loving care. Some fresh high-quality Mobil-1 oil and a good filter might do some good, at least it would be a start. And sometimes the seal swelling agents in good motor oil will actually help swell tired old seals and the leaks will disappear—or at least diminish.



I planned on having my son keep track of how fast the engine drank the oil in order to learn more about the extent of the consumption problem. I needed this information in order to assess the extent of the leak and make a plan.



There was no service history and the ticker showed way over 150 thousand miles on it. But that’s still not unreasonable for an 8-year-old car. A quick check with the VIN number on the Internet showed no record of odometer tampering. At least that was good.



And then the nightmare reared its ugly head. What had started out to be a simple oil change turned into a lifter failure. Shortly after the fresh oil and filter had been changed the engine began to give out a new sound, a faint rhythmic tapping. The tapping grew in intensity until it had the full-blown noise of a collapsed lifter.



I reasoned that the detergent in the oil had caused some crud to cut loose, and the crud had found its way into one of the lifters tiny passages. The lifters have the smallest passages in the entire engine, and if a piece of crud is going to get lodged somewhere, a lifter is the most likely place.

I said a prayer that the high-detergent oil would clean out the passage and the noisy lifter would clear up and quiet down. I’ve seen it happen many times. You simply drive in low gear at 3,000 rpm for a few miles and the lifter clears out and pumps back up again. Been there, done that.



I hopped in and ran some errands around town. But no, it’s never easy—the rattlesnake kept on making its ominous sound! I was leaving the next day and would have to turn the car back over to my son with an engine noise that wasn’t there before I had worked on it. There was little else I could do.  I briefed him on the situation with the lifter noise, and told him to drive it. Hopefully the lifter would shut up.



If it didn’t I would deal with it the next time I returned. Dealing with the lifter would mean having to pull the cylinder head in order to fish out the lifters from the block. While the head was off, I would have a valve job done, which would be prudent on a high mileage engine.



But before I could return, the engine blew a head gasket! Now the nightmare was in full bloom. And because I had worked on it last a huge burden of guilt hung around my neck. Every seasoned tech knows how working on a family member’s car can easily turn into a nightmare! Now all I could do for my son was to start making arrangements for another engine.



The quandary of living in a distant city made the situation even more difficult to deal with. To start with, his car really wasn’t worth fixing. By the time I paid a local shop to install a used engine, I could buy another hulk just like it. The only way I could make it work out would be to find a good used engine and then take the car back home to do the engine swap.



After spending an afternoon on the phone, I discovered that he wasn’t the only one with a blown engine. It turned out that all the other cars in wrecking yards which had his engine were in similar shape. Engines were far and few between. But I finally found an engine, and began making preparations to get his car back to my home town.

A fellow shop owner had a trailer that was just the ticket for hauling a car over the mountains that lay between the busted car and home. The trailer was fitted with drive up ramps, tandem wheels, an electric winch, electric brakes, and a backup battery. The battery powered an emergency system that was supposed to apply the brakes to stop the trailer all by itself—in case the hitch were to break. Supposed to. But it didn’t!



Loading the car on the trailer went smooth with only one bugaboo. When I started to pull it up the ramp and onto the trailer the hitch popped loose from the hitch ball. The latch didn’t hold the tongue of the trailer on the ball. When the weight of the car pressed down on the back of the trailer the front popped loose from the hitch.



That was strange. I thought I didn’t get it to latch properly on the first try. So I reinstalled it, not comprehending that the ball latch mechanism wasn’t functioning properly. But I was unfamiliar with this kind of hitch—and after all it had held just fine on the first half of the trip.



Once loaded, the trailer towed just great. The tandem wheels took most of the weight off the hitch so the tongue weight was very light. The electric brakes were very powerful, and it didn’t tax my tow vehicle brakes very much coming down the mountains. And because I had to cross several mountains, I was really glad for those electric brakes.



Everything went well all the way back home. Then the bugaboo happened again when I was unloading the car from the trailer. There was a “bang” and suddenly the hitch popped loose from the ball—and the front end of the trailer was bobbing in the air above the trailer ball!



Had I somehow failed to secure the hitch to the ball? Was the hitch lock defective? No time to trouble shoot the hitch problem, I would tell my buddy about it when I got there. It was getting dark and I hurriedly hitched the empty trailer back up to my tow vehicle and took off. I had less than a dozen miles to go and needed to return the trailer before I got caught in rush hour traffic.



With the trailer empty it seemed like my tow vehicle suddenly had developed 100 more horsepower. It’s like a free feeling, not being bogged down with all that extra weight. In fact, the weight of the trailer was so minimal that it was easy to forget that it was back there. Merrily I flew along as I headed to my final destination to drop off the trailer. My thoughts were of dinner, and being home again.

I was only about a mile or so from my buddy’s shop when I went over some railroad tracks. I heard the trailer rattle as it bounced on the tracks, and checked it in the rear view mirror. Everything looked and felt good. Then all of a sudden, in an instance, it happened. The trailer came loose!



It felt like a tug. A sideways tug—a sudden pull to the right. I glanced in my rear view mirror and I could see the trailer listing over to the right. I immediately knew something was wrong. Somehow the trailer had come loose!



Looking in the mirror I saw it veer first to the right, then to the left. It was like a big fish fighting to get free. I watched in the mirror as it swerved back and forth and instinctively let off the gas and coasted. I was thinking it would coast to a stop behind me. I was wrong.



The sideways jerking of the trailer caused the right hand safety chain to pop free. As the trailer continued flailing back and forth it was only restrained by one safety chain. Then in a blink of an eye the second safety chain sprung loose and the trailer was a loose cannon!



In horror I watched in the rear view mirror as the trailer took off on its own. It somehow reminded me of a huge shark gliding along. Maybe it was the way it had a pointed nose and glided low against the ground. Like a giant fish that had freed itself from the fishing hook, it now zoomed along on its own.



Cars behind me were slamming on their brakes and diving in all directions to get out of its way. In horror I saw it take off to the left going across the centerline and into the oncoming traffic lanes. Fortunately, as the trailer zoomed along, the oncoming traffic was caught at a redlight and the road was empty.



I turned my head and watched it out the side window as it went onto the shoulder and plowed into the weeds and thicket where it finally came to a stop. It was a miracle that it didn’t hit anyone and there wasn’t a guard rail in its path. The thicket and underbrush brush brought it to a safe stop without causing any damage. I was blessed as a little angel must have been sitting on my shoulder.



So much for that fancy emergency break-away safety stopping system! The break-free pull-pin worked just like it was supposed to, but the backup battery was too old and weak to operate the electric brakes. Once free, the trailer was sailing unfettered all on its own. I shudder to think about what would have happened if the hitch popped loose when the car was still on the trailer!



I turned around and headed back to the trailer which was no where in sight. I spotted the back end of it sticking out of the thicket. I got out and walked over to it and found that it had come to rest against a sapling—which was bent over causing its final stop.



I was surprised that no one had stopped to offer any help. But I had some rope on board and figured I could pull the trailer back out of the underbrush and up onto the shoulder. This was going to be a risky maneuver because there were only a couple of feet of pavement. And the shoulder embankment had a pretty steep slope.



And worse yet the trailer was facing the wrong way—into the oncoming traffic and I wouldn’t be able to turn it around. I figured I’d wait for the light to change and make a break across the oncoming traffic lanes onto to the right side of the road. Not a good situation, but no other choice—just hope there’s no more problems!



By now darkness had fallen and I had to work by flashlight. The front of the trailer was on the ground making it impossible to get the trailer tongue pole jack in place. Since the trailer was facing slightly downhill, the weight of the trailer tongue was too heavy to pick up. So I grabbed the jack from the tow vehicle and managed to get it hitched to the tow vehicle once again.



I plugged the break-away pin back into its socket to make sure the trailer brakes wouldn’t somehow activate and plugged in the trailer taillights. When the traffic light turned red and the road was clear I made a break across the road and was on my way again. But I only got two blocks when the trailer came loose!



This time I was going slow enough to safely stop before anything else happened. The crossed safety chains had caught the tongue of the trailer as they were supposed to, and I brought it to a peaceful halt. But why had it come loose this time?



Fortunately this side of the road had a turn lane and the trailer tongue was up high enough for the trailer pole jack. Then I reached my fingers inside the hole for the ball hitch and discovered dirt packed inside! In my hurry to get it hitched up I had failed to check it out for debris which had gotten inside when it traversed the underbrush. The dirt kept the ball from hitching properly.



I grabbed a stick from the side of the road and cleared most of the packed dirt out of the hole. I finished the job with my fingers and a rag and once again hitched the trailer to my vehicle. The last few miles went without incident and I was glad the nightmare was finally over as I finally unhitched the trailer.



It was truly a miracle no one was hurt. I realized how blessed I was. But that was only the first episode of my trailer double failure woes.



My nightmare was not over yet. There was still one more monster waiting to rear its ugly head. It had to do with the fallout from the engine bought from a local salvage yard. The engine was worthless scrap metal, essentially a boat anchor.



After it had been dropped off and the delivery truck had driven away, we discovered the engine block was ruined because both of the lower bellhousing mounting bosses were destroyed.



It looked like the bosses had been broken off when the tech at the junkyard yanked out the engine. And those two bottom bellhousing mounting bolts are really easy to miss if you aren’t looking for them. They’re buried way down there where the sun don’t shine. And by the way, you need a special socket to fit them.



I called to complain and the guy at the yard said no, the engine was just fine when it was delivered, that we broke it. But there were three of us standing there when we lifted up the engine and we saw the broken mounting bosses. The ensuing telephone conversations were awful. Culpability and finger pointing continued over the several phone calls, but in the end the wrecking yard coughed up another engine and that nightmare finally ended.



Then, less than two months later I experience a second hitch failure and had another towing nightmare. It was just getting dark and I was pulling my small motorcycle trailer at 60 MPH going up Mitchell Hill, north of Pittsburgh. I had just started up the hill when it happened.

I heard a loud metallic ripping noise and felt the vehicle jerk. The jerk was reminiscent of the feeling when the trailer had come loose the previous month, and I my heart welled up with fear. Looking in the rear view mirror took away my breath. The trailer was moving away from my vehicle and the air was filled with sparks coming from the front of the trailer.



 I slowed my vehicle hoping that the safety chains would contain it. But it was fruitless. The trailer was skidding along on the front jack stand and no longer connected to the car. I continued to slow down in front of it, hoping to prevent it from slamming into anyone else on the road.



The cars behind the trailer were slamming on their brakes and veering out of its way as it continued to shower the night sky with sparks. Again blessings were with me as the gentle upswing of the hill brought the trailer to a fairly rapid stop in the middle of the road.

 Two men pulled over and got out with flashlights and began directing traffic around the trailer. It was a blessing that it broke loose as we just started climbing Mitchell Hill—a half-mile further and the errant trailer would have rolled backwards down the mountain and into harms way.

I turned on the 4-ways, got out, and surveyed the situation. The welds for the hitch assembly had torn loose from its mounting plate and the safety chains were still attached to the hitch. I backed up and connected the safety chains to the undercarriage so I could drag it out of the road and safely onto the shoulder. The only damage was to the trailer tongue jack post, and the broken hitch welds could easily be rewelded.



Once again, angels had surrounded me and kept a disaster from happening.



Lessons Learned

· Always test the trailer ball clasp. Jack up the tongue of the trailer and make sure it will not let go of the hitch ball.

· Always install the catch safety pin or lock. This will insure that you have latched the catch.

· Do not rely on the safety chain S-hooks to stay attached. Replace the S-hooks with a D-ring fastener with a screw-down type of clasp.

· If the trailer has a backup battery and break-away system, test the break-away switch and the battery power to see if it will operate the trailer brakes.

· If your trailer ever does come loose, immediately apply the brakes hard enough to keep the tongue of the trailer up against the back of your vehicle until you have safely stopped.

· If the ball hitch fails and the trailer is only holding on by the safety chains, steer straight ahead and do not try to steer off the road. Wait until you have stopped, then slowly drag the trailer to the shoulder.

· Be prepared to have a backup system to jack up the tongue of the trailer in the event the trailer pole jack fails. In most cases, the tow vehicle jack will suffice.

· Always have a flashlight and safety flares handy in case you need them in a panic situation.

· Always have wheel chocks within quick reach in the tow vehicle in case you need to quickly stop the towed vehicle from rolling.

· At every rest stop inspect the hitch, hitch ball and hitch welds for potential problems like bending or cracks.

Chrysler engine v6 oil leak, check oil cooler!

Chrysler engine v6 oil leak, check oil cooler

TRANSMISSION WOES!Check simple things first

TrANSMISSION WOES!Check simple things first

Running low on Gasoline might not be bad for your fuel pump!

running low on Gasoline might not be bad for your fuel pump!

Electric Cooling Fan Noise & Shakes

Pat Goss-Timing belt tools, no no

Pat Goss-Timing belt

Pat goss on Cheap ball joints

cheap Ball Joints

How Car Parts Have Evolved | Goss' Garage

Totally Tool-less

A mechanic is only as good as his tools. If your car happens to break down while you are out on the highway, you’re pretty helpless without a tool to attack the problem. Even if you know what is wrong, there is little you can do to prevent from being stranded.



That’s what happened to me when the coil pack failed and the check engine light came on in the middle of nowhere West Virginia. We were on our way back from seeing a lifelong friend in North Carolina. It was fall so we decided to cut though the country and take a gander at the fall foliage.



My wife was driving, and we were going up the side of a mountain around four o’clock in the afternoon on a nice day at the end of September. Suddenly the engine began to falter and misfire, like one of the cylinders had stopped firing. Then the check engine light started flashing.



Ever since the advent of OBD II in 1996, the check engine light was given more authority to warn of engine problems. And when the check engine light flashes, it is telling you that there is a very good likelihood that if you try to continue driving, you cause damage.



Specifically, the flashing check engine light meant the catalytic converter was being damaged by the misfire, and the converter would soon become so hot that it will go into a cataclysmic melt down. The floorboards will get hot, and if you park over dry grass, you can set it on fire.



Knowing the potential for ruining an expensive catalytic converter was imminent, I told my wife to pull onto the shoulder as fast as possible. Once parked, I told her to call our motoring club for a tow truck.



I started the engine, opened the hood, and took a look around. I tugged at each of the plug wires, just to make sure that one hadn’t somehow come loose. Everything was nice and neat, yet the V-6 was only running on five cylinders.



The plugs and wires had been replaced not too long ago, so I figured they were okay. I immediately suspected one of the coil packs had gone bad, which was pretty likely given the age and mileage of the car.



But what could I do without a replacement coil pack and a 5.5mm socket to unbolt the darn thing? I was like a rebel without a cause, fully knowing what was wrong yet helpless to do anything about it.



It took the tow truck over four hours to rescue us. During our wait, we had plenty of time to think about our course of action. There was a fairly large town about fifty miles away, certainly large enough to support a dealership. We would have the tow truck drop us off there, and then find a motel near the dealership where we would spend the night.



The tow truck driver was really friendly and we chatted once we were on our way. It turned out that his tow service was located in the large town where we expected to find a dealer, so I asked about the town and if there were any good independent repair shops.



I figured that if I could find an independent shop, the tech might be kind enough to lend me the necessary socket and ratchet, and I could replace the coil pack myself. Anything to save a buck, especially during these hard economic times! And, maybe I would get a break if I told the tech what was wrong and saved a diagnostic charge.



The driver told me that their tow service ran a repair shop, and the tech who worked there was top notch. To quote him, “He can fix just about anything with wheels on it.” And, he said that if we decided to have them do the work, they would knock fifty-percent off the tow bill.



He also went on to say that there was a brand-new motel just up the road from their shop, and they gave a discount on the motel room rate to their customers. Hey, it sounded like it was a good thing, getting a break on both the motel and the tow bill.



I asked my wife if she thought it was okay and she gave me the thumbs up. So we told the driver to forget the dealership and take us to their shop. He said that it was a good thing because there were no motels anywhere near the car dealership.



As the driver turned off the main road he pointed to the motel which shared the corner with an all night diner. “Oh boy! Dinner!” I said. We could just walk across the parking lot and catch a meal. How convenient. Everything seemed to be working out.



As we wound our way down that West Virginia road, it became narrower and narrower. We passed another motel, the “Well Spring,” and he said, “You don’t want to stay there!” There was a gun and fishing supply store next door, and a short distance further a huge wooden building on the right. The building was painted completely black and was all boarded up, giving it an eerie appearance.



I asked the driver what it was and why it had been shuttered. He said it was the local watering hole, but there was a shootout a few weeks back and they closed it. “Shootout? You mean like a holdup?” “No.” He said, “Some of the locals decided to pull out their guns and started shooting each other.”



As I looked around at the dinky houses – or should I say shacks – that lined the road, I felt like I was now witnessing a scene from the movie “Deliverance.” Some of the shacks were so run down, their roofs were caving in. “Nobody could be living in that shack, could they?” I asked.



That was like a cue for him to begin his discourse on the locals. “Yep, a drug dealer lives there. And another one lives there,” he said, pointing on the other side of the street at another hovel.

By now the road had disintegrated into mostly dirt, which covered a one lane...path. He went on. “That old hag keeps calling the cops on us for going through the neighborhood too fast. And from time to time that jerk comes out and screams at us to slow down,” he said pointing at a small wooden shack painted blue.



I expected to see someone sitting on one of the old disintegrating porches playing a banjo. It would be an understatement to say that we were off the beaten path. Just then, we rounded a slight curve and slipped through the gate of the tow lot where the dirt road ended. And that’s when my nightmare began.



I looked around the lot and saw two other tow trucks. That made sense, since the tow service operated 24-7. The lot, which was dirt, was littered with abandoned vehicles in various stages of decay. Not a good sign. The repair shop was nothing more than a large metal building that had no wall on the side facing the lot.



The office consisted of an old beat up run down trailer with a grungy old metal three-step staircase attached to the door—which was propped wide open. Inside sat a grossly overweight woman in her mid-forties who was talking to someone on a cell phone.



She sat behind an old wooden desk that was completely covered with papers, phone books, old magazines, and other trash. The floor looked like it had never been cleaned, and there was nowhere to sit down.



I asked her when they started work in the morning, and she said the shop opened at eight. I told her that I was a tech myself and wanted to talk with the tech about the car before he began working on it. She pulled a blank piece of paper out of somewhere in the pile in front of her and began jotting down the info about my car.



I shuddered at the thought of what the tech looked like, and at least hoped I could oversee the guy to keep him from damaging anything. And maybe my idea about borrowing a wrench and replacing the coil pack myself would pan out, and I wouldn’t have to worry about some stranger messing with my machine.



I told her that I diagnosed the problem as a bad coil pack and that all I wanted the tech to do was to “Check and advise.” She wrote down, “Check engine light flashing. One cylinder missing, possible coil pack, check and advise.” Cool.



I asked if I could get a ride from the motel in the morning, and she said it would be no problem. We got our luggage out of the car, and I left my Snap-On tote bag sitting conspicuously on the passenger seat so the tech wouldn’t miss it—just in case he arrived before I could get there.



Another tow truck driver was on his way out and we caught a lift back to the motel. At eight o’clock the next morning I caught a ride with the same driver—who had been working all night—back to the shop. On the way there, which was only a mile or so, I saw my car coming toward us with a stranger driving it!



“Hey, that’s my car! Who’s that driving it?” I exclaimed to the driver. He said it was the tech, and he was probably test driving it. It turns out the tech had gotten there ahead of me and had already installed the coil pack! And there wasn’t anything I could do about it.



When we arrived in the tow lot, there was a man standing in the middle shouting profanity at someone he was talking to on his cell phone. There was another driver standing there next to his rig and I asked him if that was the owner and why he was shouting. “He’s firing someone,” he said.



I climbed the stairs into the trailer and another huge woman was sitting behind the desk. I asked her if the tech was test driving my car and she told me it was fixed already. My heart sank. “Fixed already? What time had that tech gotten there? At dawn?” Apparently the tow truck driver tipped him off that I was a tech and would be there first thing in the morning. So he got there extra early so I couldn’t see what he did to my car. So I decided to ask him.



Just then the tech drove into the lot and slowly passed by the owner, who was still shouting profanity, waving his arms in the air, and was now threatening to kill the person on the phone. It was a scary scene!



The tech got out of my car and I got a good look at him. He wore grease stained jeans and a T-shirt that was so obliterated with grease stains that I could barely make out the “Snap-On” insignia.



“Hey, how’re ya doing?” I asked. He nodded. “Got it fixed already?” He nodded again. “Was it the coil pack?” “Yep.” “How’d you know which one was bad? Did you look at the Misfire Monitor?” He grunted, “Nope. Just pulled them plug wires.” I winced.



Pulling off the plug wires on a distributorless ignition system is a big no-no because it puts stress on the coil packs and ignition module. Only a back-woods mechanic like this guy would resort to it, not caring if it was okay or not.



I watched as he put down an hour labor on the ticket, even though it couldn’t have taken him more than 10 minutes tops and the flat rate for the job is only two-tenths of an hour. With the tow bill, parts and labor, the total ticket was close to two hundred dollars!



When I got home I pulled off the coil pack he installed and discovered it was a cheap one made in China. So I replaced it with a high quality Blue Streak one. I also replaced the other two coil packs just to be sure. After all, he had stressed them and they could fail at any moment.



In retrospect, I am grateful that we were able to hit the road while it was still early morning. If we had ended up at the dealer, the price of the repair would have been much more, and we would have probably had to wait until later in the day before they could work on it. But most of all, I’m grateful that rube mechanic didn’t damage my car.

A Hidden Problem on a Vortec Engine

Story of the Month- "THE 308 TIME BOMB"

The Ferrari 308 had earned an ugly nickname at the dealership..."The time
bomb." It would run perfectly for several months and then, boom! It would blow
the catalytic converter right off the back end of the vehicle. When the catalyst
exploded, it would do so with such force that nothing but the header pipe would
be left. The rest of the fragments would become roadway shrapnel, never to be
recovered.

The foreman who was assigned to the problem had seen it through the first three
catalytic converters. The car was still under the five year/50,000 mile
emissions warranty, so the dealership kept having to replace the catalysts.
There never was enough of the catalyst left behind to give a clue as to what
caused the explosion.

After the car came back with its fourth exploded converter, the foreman was told
to assign the job to another mechanic. The foreman, Willis, didn't want to give
up the car, telling his co-worker that he never could make it happen. "I drove
it and drove it. It never acted up. I think the owner is nuts. I think he is
taking it out and going over a hundred when it happens. I can never find enough
road to get it over 60, at least not around here."

It was true. Traffic on the busy Hollywood 101 freeway made it nearly impossible
to attain speeds above 60. Why did the car have it in for converters? It was as
if the car was a wild stallion that refused to be tamed by a catalyst. The 308
engine had a continuous fuel-injection system with two separate ignition
systems, one for each bank of cylinders.

Ace, the next mechanic on the shop totem pole figured the problem had to be
related to the ignition system. He remembered how Dan, his high school friend,
used to get going about 50 mph and turn off the ignition. Just before the engine
died, he would turn it back on. Bang! It would make a terrific explosion and
scared the daylights out of the girls. Finally the muffler blew apart.

Systematically, Ace went over each connection in the primary ignition system. He
tested every connection and everywhere he looked everything was in perfect
order. He was looking for something that was loose, or a connector that had
backed out of its holder. He reasoned that vibration was causing a harmonic to
develop in the car and the wiring harness was breaking down somewhere.

Finally he worked his way back to the car's computer, which was located in a
side panel in the trunk. As he removed the computer from its moorings, the
engine faltered for a second. Every time he wiggled the connector to the
computer, the engine faltered. Aha! It must be a faulty wiring harness.

He proudly showed the foreman what he had found and was told to order a new
harness. Before he placed the order, he decided to test the multigang plug on
the computer side of the harness. It was just a hunch. Maybe the connector on
the computer was the cause, not the harness. Ace's hunch was right on the money.
The computer connector had a cold solder joint and was making intermittent
contact.

When the driver got the Ferrari going fast enough, a harmonic vibration was
created in the rear end that was sufficient to cause the connector to open up.
When it did, the ignition system would shut down. Since the car had a mechanical
continuous fuel-injection system, fuel continued to flow. In the time it takes
to blink your eye, the catalyst would fill up with a perfect mixture of fuel and
air. When the computer made connection again, spark came back and the engine
started firing again. Nanoseconds later, flames from the exhaust would hit the
converter and BOOM!

"But why couldn't we duplicate the problem on a test drive?" asked Willis, the
shop foreman. The owner finally came up with the answer, "Because it always
happened late at night when I went from San Francisco to Palo Alto... at speeds
between 100 and 150 mph."

Expensive Plastic Parts

4 Electric Failures Part 3

4 Electrical Failures Part 2

4 Electrical Failures Part 1

two scenarios

Basically, there are two scenarios when it comes to car repairs. There’s the
successful, and the unsuccessful. And each of these categories has two sub
categories. The first and second categories are the knowing and unknowing.

First, the knowing are those repairs the owner knows all about, no surprises.
No hidden or unneeded parts added to the final bill, either. You know what
you’re gonna get, and that’s what it takes. Nothing more, nothing less.
Real predictable.

The second successful category is the unknowing successful. Your car breaks
without warning. You don’t know what it needs to fix it, and don’t care. You
just pay someone to make the problem go away. This category leaves the owner
uncertain if the repairs were actually needed, and he or she is not ever happy
about it. They don’t get involved in the repair enough to find out the root
cause of the breakdown in the first place.

Most people are this type of car owner. And because of this, most people
don’t have a good feeling about their car repairs. They never know what they
don’t know about the repair. And what’s worse, because they never know, they
don’t do anything to prevent it. If they did, most of their car problems would
never happen. These people are the ones who don’t believe in preventative
maintenance. They orchestrate their own car problems.

The third and forth categories are the knowing and unknowing unsuccessful.

Third, the knowing unsuccessful, is an easy one. These are the people who take
their car to be repaired and go away with the same problem, only their wallet
has been lightened in the process. They know they got screwed, but they don’t go
back anyway. They let their feet do the talking and bounce from shop to shop
until someone puts them out of their misery and fixes their car.

Forth, there’s the unknowing unsuccessful, the worst of all. That’s what this
Mechanic’s Nightmare is all about. These are the people who are screwed, and
never know it. Or, by the time they realize it, it’s too late to do anything
about it. This is the place where Mr. Rip U. Off works. This is the category
that gives the auto repair industry a black eye. This is the type of repair shop
reported on the 6 O-clock TV News sting operation advisory alert.

When the National Association of Attorneys General did a study to try and find
the root cause of why so many people get ripped off on their car repairs, the
results were not surprising. But they were disappointing to the scandal-seeking
news media. To their chagrin, it turned out that mechanics aren’t so dishonest
after all. In fact, the study didn’t find they were any more dishonest than any
other trade, such as doctors or lawyers. But here’s the big surprise. They found
that most of the time, greater than eight out of ten, the problem was a simple
communication breakdown.

But this isn’t the kind of fodder that makes it on the news. Ripoffs are something
everyone wants to hear about. Honesty doesn’t pull in TV audiences. So, the study
and its findings has sadly fallen on deaf ears. Or rather, it was a non-story. No
one ran it. People want to hear about unsuccessful repairs that happen to the
knowing. People want to commiserate with those who have suffered. They want to
wallow in their suffering, and seek out and consume their tales of woe.

In due course, and in keeping with that vein, I’m going to tell you stories,
too. These stories fit all four of the scenarios listed above. Both successful and
unsuccessful, knowing and unknowing.

To start with, let me say that my experience has born out the findings. I
personally know that auto mechanics are among the most honest and hardest-working
of all trades. My bros’ have gotten a bad rap, that’s for sure! Enough said, so let’s
get on with the story.

Lets begin by talking about noises. Noises are freaky. To some people a howl
is a moan. To some a moan is a creak. And so on. Some noises are even imaginary.
And some are made up. This first story falls in the category of successful for
the unknowing.

There was a service writer who was employed at a Mercedes dealership in a
major city where I worked. His name was Ralphie, and he liked to make up noises.
Especially ball joint noises. He’d take a customer’s car for a test drive and
come back claiming he heard the lower ball joint knocking. Kinda’ a Clunk
on Bumps noise. No matter how hard I tried, I never could hear it.

But let me tell you, that dude sold a whole bunch of lower ball joint
replacements! Man, he could really get rich folks by the ball joints! And little
did they care. They were unknowing. And their cars were important, so they would
just say, How long's it going to take? Or. When can I have my car back? They
didn’t give a hoot about the dollar amount. It was probably just a business
expense anyway. They’d have to use the Jaguar. What an inconvenience!

Ralphie wasn’t malicious or anything. In fact, he was a down-right nice guy.
He just wanted to fatten up his paycheck a bit when things were slow. The owner
didn’t know. He was from the unknowing group. The tech who did the replacement
didn’t know. He was just doing what he was told.

The whole process was seamless. No one was the wiser. That’s how it always is
with a successful repair and the unknowing owner. Kind of like a quiet bloodletting.

Then there’s the unsuccessful and knowing. The story goes like this: The guy
walks in to the local dealer with his car problem. The service writer greets him
as he drives up and begins to take down all the important information. Then he
gets around to asking the guy why he’s decided to pay a visit to this fine
establishment. And does he need a ride to work?

The guy says, "Yeah. You see, I’ve got this clunk-on-bumps problem. Sometimes,
when going over a bump, I hear this noise. Like a clunk or something. Maybe a knock.
Or is it tap? I dunno. But it’s freaky. And I don’t like it. Maybe you could check it
out, huh?"

The adviser, who’s already checked the odometer reading and knows the car is
no longer in warranty, figures this as a no-brainer. He thinks, Let’s see. Lots of
miles on the ticker. Don’t have to worry about the warranty. The most likely
suspect would be shocks! It’s gonna’ need a set of shocks.

He thinks this is a safe bet, and the owner will go for it because it’s not
a big ticket item. An easy sell. And maybe we can find more things once we get it
in the shop. So he writes on the repair order, Replace shocks. Then he tells the guy
he’s gonna’ need a set of shocks, and to sign right here. So the guy thinks this is
the right thing to do, and he signs his life away.

Then, he gets the car back, pays the bill, and is driving home. He hears the clunk
on the first bump he comes across, and he realizes he was taken. Well, not that it
was done intentionally. He was taken because of the problem that the Attorneys
General study talked about. The actual problem was communication. If the mechanic
was told to diagnose a problem with clunk on bumps, instead of being told to replace
the shocks, he might have had a fighting chance that his problem would have been
corrected. Instead, the guy’s car repair was unsuccessful, and he certainly knows
about it.

Communication problems just like this are primarily responsible for the bad
image of the mechanic. In reality, there was no ill will, malice, or evil intent.
The repair was unsuccessful because of the system, not because of any one individual.
Sure, the service advisor didn’t have to sell the man a set of shocks. Sure. But
shocks are a common cause for that type of complaint at that mileage. What you’d
call a sure bet. And of course, the owner could have insisted that the tech be paid
some diagnostic time to drive the car and witness the problem before beginning any
repairs. And finally, sure, the tech could have insisted on being paid some
diagnostic time in order to verify the problem. But none of that happened. Why?
Get real. This is the real world out here, and everyone is too busy. That’s why.

Okay, OK. Maybe the man did need shocks. But the problem was the mechanic didn’t
make the diagnosis. The wise-ass service advisor did. Not. Maybe if the mechanic
was given a chance to check it out before the service advisor went and messed
things up by suggesting shocks. But, then I can see the service advisor’s point
of view, too. He wants to get the guy to commit to a dollar amount for something.
Maybe it’s not going to be a set of shocks that fixes this car. Maybe it’s upper
shock mounts, or even a ball joint. Whatever.

So he’s just trying to usher the guy on his way out the door as fast as possible
so he can get on to the next customer who’s been standing there next to his car
and patiently waiting in the service aisle. He assumes that the mechanic will
know what’s causing the clunk and will report back to him. He assumes. Now we all
know about assume. Right?

The mechanic is already up to his ass with alligators nipping at him. His
IN box is over brimming with work. And then there are the jobs he didn’t get to
yesterday. Parts have come in for jobs he opened up last week which he’s getting
grief for not having finished. And to make his day complete, he’s already got a
ten-o’clock headache!

So, he cranks the work out as fast as he can, and by early afternoon starts
looking for some gravy work so he can slide. He’s been saving the RO with Replace
front shocks, the one that started out as a clunk on bump complaint. The tech
pulls his copy of the RO, which has by now already had the parts listed and tallied
on it. He walks over and picks up the shocks that await him at the parts counter.

Once he’s finished installing the shocks, using his fancy pneumatic on-the-car
installer tool, he parks the car and knocks off for the day. He’s feeling good
because he beat the flat rate by more than half! Easy money, a quick in and out.

Now I ask you, did that mechanic rip off the customer? Did the guy's car
really need those shocks? Should the tech check the car for the complaint? Should he
have questioned the service advisor? It may seem odd, but the answer to all four
questions is no. First, and I’m sure you knew this was coming, the car certainly
didn’t need shocks. Second, the tech isn’t paid to check a problem. Unless he’s
instructed to do so, he ain’t gonna. Why should he? He’s not in the habit of
giving away his time free. Right?

When you go and see a doctor, he doesn’t just hand out pills free without
charging for his diagnosis. He may even decide to run some additional lab tests
on you. Not only do you pay the doctor to look at you, but you pay some other
doctor to look at your lab tests and to make a diagnosis based on those tests.
And you wind up getting billed from the first doctor who examined you, from the
lab for the tests, and from the doctor who looked at the test results. Have you
heard people complain about rising health care costs?

So, bringing this all back home to the mechanic here in this story, he didn’t
get paid to check the car first. The car owner trusted the advice of the service
advisor, as in this case, replace the shocks. This was assumed to be his problem. It
had a high likelihood.

So, the answer is most certainly NO. The tech shouldn’t be made to give
away his hard-earned time to freely check the car first. Not unless he’s told to
do so, and given some diagnostic time. But in this case, that didn’t happen. He
was given an RO that simply told him to replace the shocks.

Then, should the tech question the service writer? Not. Why should he? It’s
not in his job description. He doesn’t have time. If he just minds his P’s and Q’s,
he’s free and clear of any flack that might come his way if the customer bitches.
After all, he wasn’t paid to check out the car in the first place and to see if it
needed shocks. Hell, he’s not psychic enough to read the customer’s mind and to
figure out why he asked for shocks in the first place.

One of my favorite rip-off stories concerns a shop owner whose shop is
located in the Nation’s Capital. (the owner is seen weekly on Motorweek!)This shop owner keeps a customer black list. No
kidding. He actually has a list with the names of people who’s cars are banned. And
if the customer happens to come back, he or she is told to vacate the premises
immediately or the police will be called.

You see, there’s this greedy shop owner who’s waging his own personal war
against the knowing. You’d better look out if you wind up having an unsuccessful
repair at this shop. When you show up at his door with a clunk on bumps, and the
shop owner or his staff sell you shocks, you’d better not complain when the
shocks don’t fix your problem! Because if you do, you’re history. Really!

If The Boss says you need shocks, you need shocks. And when the shocks
don’t fix the problem, Mr. Authority comes back at you again saying that you most
certainly needed them, and you also need ball joints and upper strut mount
bushings. You’d better not question his diagnosis. You’d better not argue. Just
curtsy and hand him your money. And just so long as you remain the unknowing,
you’re business is welcome.

Customers who bitch and complain about the cost of the repair had better
watch out! The boss man angers easily, and he’ll quickly tell you to take your
business somewhere else and to never come back. And your name gets put on his
black list. After all, there’s plenty more customers in the D.C metropolitan
area. And even better, many of the customers are transient and will never come
back anyway. Diplomats, attaches, and their staff. Lots of money and lots more
where they came from. Mr. High and Mighty’s shop doesn’t need a good reputation,
just lots of advertising, like full page ads in the Sunday paper.

Speaking of advertising, one foreign car repair shop in Tampa bought
full-page advertising in the phone book. Hard to believe. No, it wasn’t a car
dealership. However, they did sell used cars. They did have a parts storefront
too. Thanks to tourist dollars, which are in abundance in Florida, and that big
ad in the phone book, our phone never stopped ringing.

The person who you spoke with was Ed. Most convincing of all people I’ve
ever met, Ed. He was the service writer and could talk a duck out of his feathers.
Ed came on ever so gentle and mild, drawing in his prey with sickening sweetness.
You’d never think he was capable of anything but your best interests. Then he
would pounce on you, turning into a pirate. Once he got a hold of your car, man
you were toast. He was so excellent at making up and creating so many wild
scenarios. Non-existent problems. Once he got your car in the shop, your wallet
would simply empty right out.

And of course you never came back after experiencing Ed turning from Mr.
Nice Guy to Jose Gaspar, the pirate! It was an amazing sight to see. After the
customer saw the bill, then had a moment to pick herself up off the floor, the
screaming would begin.

Ed’s mild mannered face would turn into a Jose Gaspar, and he’d go into
his scary routine. Systematically, he’d attack and belittle the customer for their
negligence. He’d blame them for the way they treated their car. He’d harp on and
on about how bad it was before we fixed it.

It was absolutely amazing how a clunk on bumps complaint could turn that
money crank! By the time he finished with you, you got all four shocks, both motor
and transmission mounts, a couple of ball joints, maybe both upper and lower ball
joints if he figured he could get away with it, and some custom exhaust work to
boot. Oh, including a complete set of exhaust hangers. Whew! He was brutal. And
if you came in with a starting problem, you always got a starter. Maybe injectors
or a carburetor, too. Not to mention the usual cap rotor, plugs, wires, and ignition
coil. And maybe throw in a sensor or two.

But, the Ed story is unusual. Interesting, but unusual. As I have said
again and again, almost all mechanics and repair shops are honest. The National
Attorneys General study showed that the whole problem of rip-off auto repairs
really stems from problems with communication. No Duh.

I just saw a statistic that said something about how mechanics spend
eighty percent of their time trying to figure out what’s wrong. The rest of
it is easy, with only 20% of the time needed doing the fix. Wow. Four-fifths
guesswork. One-fifth fixing. Pretty scary, huh? Roger that. I mean, it’s gotten
so complicated that even a genius can’t figure it out anymore.

They’ve got dealer service bulletins, independent service bulletins,
dealer tech hotlines, independent tech hotlines, and of course, call-in radio
shows. And still, people can’t get their cars fixed right the first time! And
why not? Well, according to that Attorneys General study, the whole problem is
communication. Right. Like the guy knows the service advisor is telling him the
straight story when he says he needs shocks?

So, does the mechanic mean to rip off the customer most of the time? No.
Usually the customer rips himself off by not communicating his problem. The rest
of the unsuccessful and knowing people with problem repairs can be chalked up to
a bad diagnosis. And the bad diagnosis resulted in an unnecessary repair. The
unsuccessful as in unsuccessful repair and the knowing. The owner clearly sees
that the problem is still there.

Then there’s poor preventative maintenance habits. And since lack of
maintenance doesn’t fall into one of the four categories, we’re not gonna’ go
there. To put a wrap on my lecturing, I want to share with you one of my favorite
rip-off tales. A story that falls in the category of the unsuccessful and
knowing. Over the years I’ve been told this story by many different techs, as
well as shop owners and other auto industry personnel. Here’s it is, with a few
embellishments of my own:

I hate my job. I am an assembly line worker at an automotive plant in
Michigan. I build cars. Boring. Same thing hour after hour, day after day. Yeah,
sure the pay is great. Yeah, sure the Union benefits are terrific. Yeah, sure.
Dull. Yawn. Snore. ZZZzzzzzz. Someone wake me up when it’s quitting time. I’ll do
ANYTHING to fight this boredom!

Hey, I know what. I’ll play a practical joke on someone. I’ll think of a
real good one to pull. A real whopper. A real wing-dinger. One that will drive you
nuts-o, daddy-o. It’ll be a real zinger. Not an easy one. No. A hum-dinger. A
mind blower. Now lets see.

Okay, I’ve got it. I’ll make a time capsule. Put a message inside and seal
it up r-e-a-l good. Seal it up in a nice piece of metal pipe, a nice little pipe
with my note inside. And I’ll leave it behind for someone to find. Someone far away,
far, far from today. Someone in the future. A message for someone to find real
far off in the future.

I’ll just drop this nice time capsule in side of this body panel, and
leave it for someone to find way off in the future. And it’ll rattle around in
all its glory, clanking and clunking its way through the day, until finally
someone discovers it’s there. Until someone cuts open this welded shut body
panel and finds my capsule inside. He he, he he!

Noise? What noise? has been the routine for so many years. Dozens of
techs have been assigned the job of finding the evasive Ssshhhh clunk noise.
Hundreds of dollars spent, with nothing but the same old sad report, No problem
found. Of course, the owners had to pay the diagnostic fee, along with environmental
surcharges and shop fees. And the noise persisted.

Eventually, someone does find it. But not until the first owner of the
car gives up trying to get his clunk on stops problem fixed. He trades it in.
The next owner fights like hell with the dealership that sold it to him, claiming
he got stuck with a lemon. And the car passes through a couple of other owners'
hands until a savy repair tech uses a high-tech listening device to track down
the location of the noise.

Inside a body panel. Something loose inside this panel. He cuts open the
body panel to find out what’s loose inside, and retrieves the time capsule. Fishing
it out with his long-skinny grabber tool, he retrieves the metal capsule. And
when he unscrews the cap and looks inside, he finds the note left by the unhappy
practical joker factory worker so many years ago. Unrolling the scrolled-up
piece of paper he reads.......

Editors note: This shhtt..clunk! story has been around for decades, and has
become an urban legend for auto mechanics. The kind of car is usually a Cadillac.
The time capsule has been anything from a metal film can, prescription bottle,
and pipe. The location has been inside the frame, body, and kick panels. The sound
it makes is always the same: An intermittent clunk that’s accompanied by a hissing
sound, but happening only when braking, sometimes. The owner reports hearing it come
from under the seat, inside the door, in the dash, and the trunk.

The lessons to be learned from this Mechanic’s Nightmare are:

· Always expect the unexpected.

· Do whatever is necessary to be a witness of the problem.

· Make it happen, then record the circumstances involved.

· Look for connections (or clues) between the circumstances involved when it happens and the actual problem occurrence.

· Beware that the problem you’re dealing with may have been built into the vehicle right from the factory.

Bearing Catastrophe

Motor Mount Problems

School Of Hard Knocks

I was working on a 1997 Sebring JX, which is a convertible in case you don't
know Chrysler terminology. Anyway, I was looking for a noise that the owner said
was driving her crazy. Now, it's not unusual for me to try to check out a "noise
complaint." But this one turned out to be one of the most interesting ones that
I've come across. And when I finally did figure it out, it reminded me of some
of the wacky things I've run across in my many years turning wrenches.

Anyway, the owner says the noise is coming from somewhere in the dash-console
area. And it doesn't seem to matter if the car is running or not. The noise is
supposed to be there all the time. Sure enough, I hear the noise. This is an
important distinction. Quite often I just can't. Sure, it might be there, but I
just don't hear it. Maybe my ears are just too old or maybe I'm just not
familiar with the cacophony of sounds that the car normally emits, and the new
addition is just drowned in the background.

But this noise is distinct. It is a clear beep. And if you were to time it, like
with a stop watch, which is what I did, you'd discover that it beeps exactly
every 2 minutes. On the dot. And like most noises, it's damn hard to locate. It
seems to be coming from everywhere. Kinda' like a pager going off in a crowded
room and everyone looking down at the same time. And being a convertible made
matters even worse, because the noise was less confined than it would be if
there was a top on the car.

I have this cool tool that is essentially a pair of headphones connected to a
microphone. You can use it to hear teeny weenie sounds that are impossible
to locate. Just stick the microphone where you think the sound is coming from
and give it a listen. It hears valve tap, piston knock, and water pump bearing
noises really well. It also hears air leaks and hard to track down squeaks and
rattles. And you can turn up the volume and even hear your own heart beat!

So I grab the tool and find the beeper lodged between the passenger seat and the
console. The lady owner lost it a week before, and was absolutely grateful when
I showed it to her. Now how do you charge for a job like that? Anyway, it
reminded me of other strange jobs I've had. Like the 1991 Buick Regal that came
in with the red battery warning light glowing. Open the hood and there's a
brand-spanking new battery and alternator. Whoops. Something really wrong here.
Somebody's spent a bundle and isn't very happy.

It turned out to be a real hair-puller too. Turn the key on and start it, and
that light is there staring you right in the face. So I decided to do a little
detective work and pull the alternator connector, which should turn off the
light. Right? Wrong. This means there's something wrong in the wiring. Big time!
Further investigation with a razor into the wiring harness reveals a mass of the
harness wires melted all together. A real mess. But oh no! It just doesn't end
there. Not a chance.

I spend a whole day splicing and repairing the wiring harness only to find that
this doesn't fix the problem, which was a dead short. Further detective work
found aluminum foil wrapped around the courtesy light fuse. But that was not
all. No, it doesn't end there. Nope. The reason the fuse is wrapped with
aluminum foil was because of a dead short in one of the accessories, mainly the
cigarette lighter. And the kicker is that someone (maybe the same boyfriend that
was kind enough to wrap the aluminum foil around the fuse for her), has put a
brand-new shiny penny in the cigarette lighter socket.

Which reminds me of another weird alternator electrical one on a 1989 Cadillac
Deville, which was towed in with a no start complaint. After running the
standard charging and starter draw tests, it looks like the alternator is bad.
No biggie. Wham-bam thank-you-ma'am and it's done. Right? Wrong again, Charlie!

Two days later, it's back in my face along with the customer who's this
hot-headed 22-year-old military dude swearing that I'm a rip-off and he's gonna'
call the police. I say wait just a sec while I check this out, and lo and behold
I see that the battery cable ends are toast. Funny, I didn't remember them that
way before. How could I have missed it? So I slap on a couple of those
do-it-yourselfer battery cable ends and send him on his way.

Well, the Cadillac is back in my face a week later, hanging from the back of a
wrecker. And Mr. Military Macho-man is madder than ever. Well, this calls for
some further investigative work and I tell him to call a cab and I'll let him
know tomorrow what's the problem with his Deville. Now, mind you, this ain't no
ordinary Deville. The suspension has been chopped, the wheels are "stylin"
California super-chromed with tires the thickness of rubber-bands. The windows
are all blackened-out and the floor in front of the back seat is covered with
huge speakers. And there are more speakers mounted on the back deck and woofers
under each of the seats.

And this time, when I go to turn the key on, I'm greeted with an audio
bombardment of gansta-rap that is loud enough to loosen my fillings and give me
a concussion! It scared me right out of my wits, and I couldn't move fast enough
to turn the damn thing off. Which of the 57 buttons is OFF? You know, the kind
of lyrics-that-spew-expletives-every-two-words kinda' rap-music. Did I say
rap-music? Now that's a real oxymoron.

Oh yes, did I forget to tell you? There's a hole where the factory radio used to
be and stuffed in it and hanging half-out of the hole is a huge stereo. And in
the trunk, next to the pair of 27" speakers is a huge amplifier. Gingerly, I
grabbed hold of the stereo and pulled it out of the dash. There was a huge gang
of wires going to it, and the factory harness was severely butchered. The first
thing I noticed was that the orange wire with a black stripe that goes to the
Body Control Module was cut and spliced, and that the dash stereo was tapped
into it using common household electrical wire nuts.

While wire nuts are fine and good inside an electrical outlet box in the wall of
your house, wire nuts are not meant to be used in automotive wiring. Why? They
aren't shake proof. And I cringe any time I see wire nuts on a car or truck. I
can't tell you how exasperating it was to see literally dozens of them in the
wiring that was hiding behind the radio. I still shudder when I think about it.
More detective work reveals that the A/C fuse is missing, which just happens to
be on the same circuit as the alternator. Okay.

With the fuse happily back in place, the alternator begins charging again. But,
why was it removed? Did it blow? Further investigation and charging tests reveal
that when the stereo is cranked up, which I'm sure this brain-dead soldier must
do when he's cruising, causes the system to draw more than 80 amps. Now, this
alternator is only rated for 75 amps. You do the math and you'll understand why
the alternator fuse blew when I cranked it up (with ear protection this time).

The key to unraveling the mystery in the Gansta-Deville was knowing that we as
mechanics are having to deal with a whole new breed of customer. To solve the
riddle, it was necessary to crank up the stereo so that it became obvious that
the charging system couldn't handle that kind of drain. That lesson I had
learned the hard way, literally from the school of "Hard Knocks". It involved a
1994 Chevy Caprice that came to me with a low power complaint.

The reason this Caprice comes to mind is because it also involved one of those
high-powered stereo systems. But, I hadn't been to the school of "Knocks" and
didn't know that the stereo played a part in solving the riddle. Anyway, owner
had some other shop install a junkyard engine in the Caprice, and that's when he
said the problem began. But, this was one of those kinds of problems that only
happens for the customer. You know, it just wouldn't run right for him, but
purred like a kitten for me.

Finally, after trying and trying to do what I call "Put a wrench on his word
problem," I decided to make him show me exactly what he was talking about. So,
we jump in the Chevy and off we go for a spin. And we're not very far down the
road when he reaches over and turns on the stereo. Then, he proceeds to crank it
up to ear-shattering levels. Well, there I sit with my fingers sticking in my
ears while he is driving and sure enough, the engine starts to falter, surge and
buck.

"Whoa! What's happening here?" I shouted. He says, "Wait a minute," and proceeds
to turn down the stereo. And the moment he did, the problem vanished. "That's
why I couldn't find your problem. It's connected to your blasted rap music!" I
said. I never ran the stereo, nor would I think to run the stereo while checking
out his problem. In fact, I never touch anyone's radio while working on their
cars.

Oh sure, I've seen plenty of techs blasting their customer's radios as they
service their cars. And from time to time they get caught, as the customer gets
into the car, only to turn on the ignition and be greeted with a huge blast of
their stereo. And of course, it's always playing the kind of music they hate
most. And even worse, the volume is left turned to full blast. Now imagine a
little old lady who only listens to classical music, getting into her car and
being greeted by gangster rap at 130 decibels! Not a pretty picture.

And those car radio presets are an even worse problem. You know, the programming
feature that lets you set the stations to the ones you like to listen to. The
radio loses its presets when you disconnect the battery to service the
terminals, right? But even worse, probably Murphy's seventeenth-law or some
such, it will automatically program itself to those stations that play the kind
of music the owner of the car hates most. If the owner likes country, it will
reset to classical. If he likes classical, it will reset to rap, and so on.

And when the customer returns and gets in his car to drive away, he is convinced
that the mechanic purposely reset all the stations to the kind of music the
mechanic likes. As if we mechanics have the time in the day to sit around and
reprogram our customer's radios! Right! But, thanks to Murphy and his laws, it
sure does get us in trouble, or at least leaves us with some explaining to do.

And to make matters worse, the late model radios will just plain lock up and
refuse to work if you disconnect power from them. And boy, howdy-do, you take a
customer's music away and they'll really get hopping mad in a big hurry. In
those cases, you have to contact the dealership and get the unlock code to make
the radio work again. Talk about a hassle!

Anyway, as I was saying before I drifted away into radio land, this Chevy would
only run bad when the radio was cranked up. Talk about an odd problem! "Now what
can playing a radio loud possibly have to do with how a car runs?" you may be
asking. I sure was.

The very next thing I did was to monitor the computer with my diagnostic
scanner. Why? Because I had a hunch that the noise the speakers were making were
somehow rattling a circuit in the engine control computer, which is pretty much
in the vicinity of the right-hand radio speaker. I figured that this would show
up somehow on the data stream from the computer

Well, I was right and wrong. While the computer didn't show any problems with
the data stream when I cranked up the stereo, the engine knock detection system
did. In fact, when the stereo peaked with its "bump-and-thump" chest-pounding
rhythm, the engine timing retarded in perfect cadence. It was as if the engine
knock sensor was keeping time with the stereo!

Not believing that an engine knock sensor could be so sensitive as to be affected
by the stereo, I decided to do a little detective work. I would try another
knock sensor. That's called "test by substitution," and that's when the fun
really began. When I went to the side of the engine block to unscrew the old one
and replace it with a new one, it was gone. There wasn't any place for it to
screw it into the engine block, and the wiring harness that should lead to it
was clipped!

How could I be seeing a knock signal, if the sensor is missing and the harness
has been cut?" I asked myself. Well, to make a long detective story short, it
turned out that there was still a knock sensor, and it was still connected to
the computer. You see, in order for the General Motors engine timing control
system to operate correctly, the knock sensor must be present and accounted for.
If you disconnect it, the engine control computer will immediately miss it,
throw off the timing and turn on the "Check Engine" light.

So when the engine block had been swapped out with another one, the used block
didn't have anywhere to mount the knock sensor. The previous mechanic had
clipped off the wire, thinking that he could simply eliminate this little sensor
and no one would be the wiser. But then, when he started the engine and the
check engine light came on, he realized that he wasn't going to get away with
it. So what do you think he did? Well, I'll tell you. He traced the knock sensor
wire back to the computer, spliced in another wire, and added the knock sensor
back into the circuit right there at the computer. And when he was done, he
tucked the knock sensor out of sight, right behind the speaker! And that's why
the Chevy ran so bad every time the stereo was cranked up. The knock sensor
thought the engine was pinging and the computer responded by retarding the
timing!

Anyway, as I said when I started, this business of being a mechanic has
certainly turned into a challenge. You never know what kind of strange and
unusual problem is going to roll into the door next. I remember the time a fat
rat got into a Fiat timing belt and ruined the engine. Ah, but that's another
story.

a learning video. part 2

It's not what you think part 1

Runaway monte carlo

I had a nightmare with a Chevy Monte Carlo. It was a 2003 model 3.8 liter engine with only 50,000 original miles. The problem was the engine speed would go to 3,000 RPM. But it was intermittent, and could happen anytime in the bay or on the highway. The owner was afraid to drive it because it had unintended acceleration.



The local Chevy dealer installed a new ECM and reflashed it. Then he claimed the problem was a vacuum leak. Not! The first thing I did was to install an aftermarket ECM and reflashed it. No change.



Watching the data stream when it happens, I saw the ECM make the idle control counts go up and up. Then it would peg at 255 counts, with the idle controller fully open. I also noticed that the radiator cooling fans would come on and pulse their speed.



The data for RPM showed actual engine RPM, and all other scan data is normal. Looking for the problem by default I unplugged the following items with no effect: Alternator, A/C compressor, cooling fans, TPS, and the automatic transmission harness. But when the coolant temp sensor was unplugged, the engine stops racing and immediately stalls.



The coolant temp data reads normal, so I installed a resistor to substitute for the coolant sensor. That made no difference. Expecting there might be a short, I opened up and examined every inch of the engine wire harness and found nothing. Just in case you’re thinking, there is no remote starter or alarm, nor add-on electrical accessories.



Frustrated after wasting hours and hours trying to nail the cause, I emailed my problem to the fellow members of the MotorWatch Technical Committee in hopes of getting help.



Mike answered, “What is the TPS reading while this is going on? Sounds like I would also look at the MAF sensor, it helps calculate engine load.” I checked his suggestions and found nothing wrong.



Mark’s son Brian is a GM tech, and he had a lot of suggestions: “This engine has the plastic upper plenum which caused problems with the intake melting around the EGR port inside causing an internal vacuum leak. Check the data stream while idling and when it goes to 3,000 rpm. Most of the time a GM product will show you the problem through the data stream. Look closely at the short and long term fuel trim. This will let you know if it’s a problem the computer is recognizing through the oxygen sensor. This engine also has MAF sensor problems that can result in idle fluctuation, lean, or rich conditions. I would also monitor the TPS value, and with the engine off make a full sweep of the TPS/gas pedal to verify no jumps, or voltage drops. In 2 separate cases I have had a similar problem. And when looking at the current misfire status on each cylinder, it will show a misfire on every cylinder on bank 1 or 2. This ended up being a upstream oxygen sensor. The vehicle didn't display any drivability concerns related to a misfire and didn't feel like it ran bad or had a misfire at all. I also I would check to see the status and correlation of the CKP & CMP. It may or may not have thrown a code for this.



Bob asked if a "Known Good" ECM had been substituted. “I know you have tried factory remans, and I am doubtful that two remans could be identically bad, but I still have to ask.”



Bob continued, “I was on a 3-week internship program at the Buick Powertrain Engineering plant in 1991, and worked with the Driveability Task Force, a crew of their best techs, who would visit unfixable cars (yes, on site) and take everything with them that could be replaced. After some preliminary electronic diagnosis, they would just start substituting parts until the car was fixed and then go backward until the symptoms reappeared, then forward until the car was correct. At that point they would take the bad parts and go home for factory analysis of the replaced items. I never asked if there were cars that were truly unfixable. When you do not have a factory subsidy, this is a tough (expensive) way to go.”



“I know you disconnected the A/C compressor but is it turned off at the control? Has the switch been disconnected? This is the AC anticipate signal--but it shouldn't make it go to 3,000 RPM. Could the combination of PSPS and AC anticipate be a clue? Is the radio/sound system off, and disconnected? Has the intake manifold ever been removed to determine if there is some kind of weird crack that opens with heat? This doesn’t seem like it would correspond with high IAC counts, really just the opposite.” 



“Have you tried driving it with the IAC disconnected? Is the high IAC count a cause or an effect? Could the brake booster have a massive periodic leak? Is it normal on this model car for the engine to stall with the CTS disconnected? Don't think so, but gotta ask. What about harness routing? Could any previous repairs be responsible? Suppose you’ve checked and rechecked every possible ground? I know this doesn't go along with high IAC counts, but could the 255 IAC counts by itself cause 3,000 RPM? Might be interesting to manually put IAC at max, then disconnect. Could cruise control coming on be a possibility? Glad it's not my nightmare!”



Systematically I checked each of Bob’s suggestions and still found no clue as to the cause.



Then Ken offered his explanation, “When the Body Control Module starts to command the cooling fan to cycle on, it also sends a command on the data bus to the ECM to increase the idle speed. Each time the BCM cycles the fan, another command gets sent to the ECM, with the result of the ISC counts ratcheting upward until they reach 255.”



I never suspected the problem could be a faulty BCM. The strange cycling of the fans turned out to be the clue since the BCM is responsible for the cooling fan operation. This explains why the engine would suddenly surge to 3,000 RPM. Since it was still covered under the emissions warranty, the BCM was replaced at no charge by the Chevy dealer.

RUNAWAY DIESEL

Ever since I was a kid, I've been fascinated by things that blow up. When I was barely a teenager, I blew up the garage. I was unsupervised and messing around with some powerful chemicals. As a parent, I can see clearly now that I should have never had gotten my hands on them. One rainy day, in my garage laboratory, I was mixing up combinations of powders to make a home-made bomb. The Potassium Chlorate is very unstable stuff. The result was a blown up laboratory and permanent injuries. Now I confine my fascination to store-bought fireworks.



I may like explosions, but there's one kind that I hate, and that's when an engine blows up. And, exploding engines can be very dangerous to life and limb. They can throw large masses of metal with great force. Everyone in car racing knows about a scatter shield. One of the most feared truck engines with the worst reputation is the Detroit Diesel which has massive flywheels that have been known to fly off.



Actually, it happens in three states. First, a linkage problem throws the engine into an uncontrolled free rev -- full throttle. The linkage for the rule rail is very tricky. This can easily happen when the fuel rack control rods jamb -- holding the fuel rack wide open. The first thing a student in diesel truck school learns about this engine is the importance of the fuel control rods.



If you get them installed wrong, they will jamb the throttle resulting in a ran away. And because this engine has this tendency, it comes fitted with a "Slam Door" and a big heavy metal door that is built right into the intake air box. If the engine starts to run away, you can crop the slam door and close off the incoming air, and kill the engine. At least, that's the idea.



But, it doesn't always work. They don't call them oil burners for nothing. By having the habit of feeding on its own oil, the Detroit engine is one of the worst offenders. The reputation partly comes about because that engine is a two-stroke. It has ports on the sides of the cylinder lines for air intake.



This is important here, because it provides a place for the oil to be introduced into the engine. If the air box gaskets are weak, they will be sucked right into the screaming engine. This unwanted source of air will allow it to keep running away. Then it begins feeding on its own oil as superheated oil, which is being pumped past the rings into the combustion chamber, fuels the fire even more.



Finally, it runs out of oil and seizes up. That's what launches the flywheel, the crankshaft suddenly stops turning and something's got to give! The flywheel bolts shear off, and the massive fly wheel comes crashing right out of the bellhousing.



But that's nothing new to race fans. Exploding clutches have brought the requirement for scatter shields on race cars. I guess it took enough severed legs to find out the need for this protective 'device. But there is nothing to protect you from the flywheel off a runaway Detroit Diesel. I've heard that the massive flywheel will go through concrete walls.



And what a noise it makes! It's one of the most terrifying sounds in engine can make. When I say screaming, a runaway Diesel is louder than a speeding train engine. And, at the same time, it belches smoke like a blast furnace. I happen to know firsthand, because I had an opportunity to witness one that ran away. It happened while I was attending night school for heavy-duty mechanics at Sequoia Diesel Institute.



One of the students jammed the rack levers on a Detroit Diesel and the engine went full rev as soon as it was started. The teacher pulled the lever for the slam door, and the engine slowly died. But for one terrifying moment, it. screamed and roared like a metal monster gone amuck. That's when I first heard the story of the runaway Detroit Diesel flywheel busing through walls. The teacher saw it happen. The engine ran away, exploded when it seized up. The flywheel came off and went through three walls before coming to a stop halfway into a fourth.



And that was where I learned about CO2 fire extinguishers. The teacher explained that in case the slam door didn't stop the runaway, we should use a CO2 fire extinguisher to stop it.



Since CO2 doesn't burn, it stops the engine dead in its tracks by starving it of oxygen. It's quick, efficient and works every time.

Years later, while I was wrenching for a Mercedes-Benz dealership in Palo Alto, I was instructed on the MBZ way of shutting down a diesel engine. According to factory protocol, the proper method is to open the fuel injector high pressure supply lines, starving the engine of fuel. While this worked okay, it was really messy and takes up valuable time. And when an engine is at full-rev, every second counts. First, you had to find the correct wrench size for the injector fuel lines. Then you had to break them open one by one, which creates quite a mess. Diesel fuel spurts over the entire engine compartment.



You're probably wondering why MBZ diesels run away. First, they rarely throw off their flywheels and seldom explode. But, it can happen in one of two ways. The first is when the throttle linkage sticks. This isn't much of a problem as long as you keep the ball-sockets properly lubricated. MBZ fits the engine with a shut-down lever that looks like a choke knob. Also, located right above the injection pump, is a manual fuel cut-off device. But, modem MBZ diesel engines use a shutdown system that's operated by the ignition key. A small vacuum motor mounted on the rear of the injection pump performs the shut down.



The second way is when the vacuum motor diaphragm ruptures. The owner find that the only way to shut down the engine is to get out, open the hood, and press the manual shut down lever. Not the sort of thing that MBZ owners could be likely to do, huh? Well, the replacement of the vacuum motor can be tricky. It has a small tang on it that must catch in a notch on the injection pump rack. If it doesn't, it'll jamb the rack in a wide-open-throttle position and bingo, "Runaway Diesel."



And it happened right next to me at the MBZ dealership where I worked in Palo Alto. The tech next to me was installing a vacuum motor and didn't' get the tang right. This launched the engine into a screaming fit as soon as he started it. And while he was making a mad dash for his toolbox to find a wrench to open the injector lines, I grabbed the CO2 fire extinguisher from the wall and shot it into the air intake. The engine's screaming died right away, even before he got the wrench!



He stood there amazed. And when the engine stopped, so did all the work in the shop. You could hear a pin drop. Everyone was looking at the two of us as we stood there. Me with the fire extinguisher in my hands and the tech with a wrench in his. That's when the stop foreman got involved.



He came storming over shouting, "What the hell do you think you're doing?!" I replied in as calm a voice as I could muster, "Just a trick I was taught a Sequoia Diesel." "Oh yeah?!" he shouted back at me. "You just ruined this motor with that stuff." he said as he began removing the air filter, expecting to find it full of something. When he lifted the metal cover, it revealed what looks like snow piled up going into the air filter -- nothing more. He reached over



 and touched the frozen CO2 as it rapidly disappeared into wisps of smoke. He said in a caustic tone as he turned and walked away, "Well that may be so, but we don't do that here!"



The only diesel to run away on me happened when I was working at Larry's Autoworks. And it scared me big time! I was doing a major service on a Peugeot 504D. It's a pretty straightforward diesel engine, there isn't much that you can do to hurt it. But I did find one Achilles heel. The air filter uses foam that resides in an oil-bath housing. The foam stays wet by the oil bath, which is an old method used by trap dirt.



And when I cleaned the foam, I make a big mistake. Unknowing, I cleaned it in the parts washer solvent and didn't dry it before installing it. Oh sure, parts solvents works really well at removing grease. But, it became trapped inside the foam. Since it was combustible, it caused the engine to run away for a brief moment. I remember standing there, not knowing it happened. It was over so quickly.



But, for just a brief second, I thought the engine would explode and I would be killed. And it was all over, and after careful checking, there appeared to be no damage. I didn't say anything to the owner, for fear of losing my job. Well, I thought I had gotten way with my mistake until the next day, when the Peugeot showed up on a tow truck. When I saw it, my heart sank. I feared the worse: a blown engine. Actually, it only wouldn't start.



The compression was excellent, and nothing mechanical appeared to be amiss. Further checking revealed that all four glow-plugs had been burned up by the solvent's fiery blast. Because it had warmed up when I worked on it, the problem didn't show up until the next day, when it was dead cold. Here's when I needed the glow-plugs to start. All it took to fix it was a set of glow-plugs.

But by far the worst story I know about an exploding engine happened on a diesel-powered car. Those of you who have been around the diesel engine trade know about the horrible automotive diesel engine that GM made. They modified the 350 gasoline engine to run on diesel. Big mistake. It was never designed to hand that kind of compression or torque. When trying to get one to start, a mechanic was shooting ether into it. The engine exploded, blowing off of the cylinder heads, which dismember one of the mechanic's arms. But that's another story.

You're going to want one of these. part 2

You're going to want one of these

67 Years of Chrysler (FCA) Automatic Transmission Fluid - ATF History Part 4

69 Years of Ford Automatic Transmission Fluid - ATF History Part 3

80 Years of GM Automatic Transmission Fluid - ATF History Part 2

THE RIGHT-HAND RINGER

"Intermittent stalling, especially on right-hand turns," read the repair order.
Tony thought it was peculiar. "Right-hand turns? What's that got to do with
anything?" He opened the hood on the truck and looked things over. "Must be in
the carburetor. Float or something. Maybe the float is sunk and it's flooding
out."

A new float and carburetor kit was ordered and Tony disassembled the carburetor.
It was pretty clean inside and he had a hunch someone had been there before.
Somehow he wasn't surprised when he took the truck for a test ride and it
stalled on the first right-hand turn. "Drat! Now I'm in trouble... Did a carb
overhaul for nothing. What-ta-do-now..." He thought.

Must be something to do with gravity. Maybe the manifold is somehow developing a
vacuum leak when the inertia pulls it to the side...on right-hand turns. He
pulled the manifold and resealed it. The truck stalled, like a clock, at the
first right-hand turn.

What about left-hand turns? What if I back up? Nope, it would only stall on
right-hand turns. Maybe something is shorting out inside the distributor. He
disassembled it, looking for a loose wire or something. "Nothing, zip, zilch,
nix."

Maybe it runs out of gas when it goes around the corner. He rigged up a gas can
and hooked a hose from it to the fuel pump. It still stalled. Could the
carburetor still be the problem? Maybe it had something wrong inside, something
that couldn't be fixed. He tried another carburetor. It still stalled.

Tony had to go to automatic transmission class that night, so he thought he
might ask the teacher for help. "Hey teach, what's the deal with this Ford
truck?" He told the teacher about his dilemma.

"Bring the truck to class tomorrow night and I'll show you the cause," the teach
said.

"Aw, come on, you mean you know the problem and you won't tell me?" Tony
lamented. "Just bring the truck, you'll see."

Tony could hardly wait for the day to finish. Avoiding right turns, he made it
to class in the truck without incident. "Okay, teach, show me the problem," he
said as he opened the hood. The teacher didn't say anything, but put his hand on
the fender-mounted starter solenoid. "Teach, this isn't a starting problem, it's
a stalling problem," Tony said with irritation.

The teacher reached over and pulled one of the two small wires from its
connection on the solenoid. "Go ahead and make it stall now... Bet you can't!"

He was right. The truck made right-hand turns without so much as a hiccup. "But
how is this connected?" Tony asked.

"The solenoid is loose inside and is grounding out the ignition terminal on the
solenoid when you make right-hand turns." The teacher said, "I disconnected the
ignition terminal and prevented it from shorting out the ignition primary
circuit. All you have to do is replace the solenoid, and you've solved your
problem."

The History of Automatic Transmission Fluids (ATF): Part 1 - Introduction

Honda 4 wire pressure switch

Oh Two For You

Antiseize compound is wonderful stuff, when it works. But when it doesn’t do its job, you’ve got problems! And so it was with this fitful last minute chore, which ran against everything I’ve been telling my customers for years and years.



Don’t wait until the last minute! Don’t bring in your car for a major service the day before you’re driving out west on vacation. There’s nothing worse than to install a brand new spark plug – or set of plug wires – and have it fail when my best customer is halfway across the Great Plains and in the middle of nowhere.



If a part is going to fail, you want to be around so you can do something about it. And anyone who has been in this business for awhile knows that even a brand new spark plug can be faulty and begin to misfire a day or two after you install it.



So that’s why I tell my customers to have their vehicle serviced a couple of weeks before taking off on a trip. “Give it time for everything to break in and mellow out before you leave,” I always say. Then why didn’t I listen to my own advice?



Here I find myself on Friday night, Memorial Day weekend ahead, leaving in the morning on a seven-hour trip, and I’m going to replace the oxygen sensor. It was long overdue for replacement, with over 160,000 miles on it. And with the price of gas breaking the bank, I decided to go ahead and bite the bullet and replace it.



I had been meaning to do it at work, where I could get the car up on a lift making the job much easier. But I had procrastinated until the last minute, and here I found myself having to do it in my home workshop, lying on a creeper under the car.



But, let me defend myself by saying that I had planned for the worst, and had my oxy-acetylene tanks freshly filled and ready to go for the extraction. I call it an extraction because the old sensor never wants to come out easily, and always needs assistance from the best nut buster of all times – the heat wrench.



I figured it would be a cakewalk. No big deal. No muss, no fuss. Easy pickings. Just heat up the sensor’s mounting flange until it’s cherry red hot and it’ll unscrew right out. After all, they installed it at the factory with antiseize compound, right?



Haw, Haw! What a joke. Sure, that slippery stuff is made to keep things from becoming stuck together, but after a dozen years it has turned to dust. Oh, don’t get me wrong. The sensor came out with nary a sweat. But when I held it in my glove, I saw the threads—or should I say what was left of the threads (see photo below).



The oxygen sensor has pulled out most of the threads with it, I didn’t have a heli-coil and the shop where I work was closed. We’re supposed to leave in the morning! Nothing like a little pressure to get the old mind racing. I rehearsed my speech to my wife, “Honey, I just broke the car so we have to rent a car for our trip!” Not! She would hand me my head!



I thought about running a tap in the hole to chase the threads. What threads? The threads would be so far gone that by the time I ran a tap through the hole, the new oxygen sensor’s threads would have practically nothing to bite into.

A vision ran across my mind of us driving along out in the middle of nowhere when the oxygen sensor blows out of its socket – POW! This would be immediately followed by the roar of the huge exhaust leak that was just created. My imagination continued the movie of us driving into the dark night with the exhaust roaring as we limped along.



I mumbled to myself, “It’s never easy.” Why is this always true? Why does Murphy’s Law always seem to rear its ugly head at the worst possible moment? And why me, why does it always happen to harmless me, me the good guy? I remembered my wife’s wise answer to this epic question, “God never puts more on your plate than you can handle.”



She’s right, I’m not defeated that easily. This old dog still had a trick or two up his sleeve. If the old oxygen sensor came out so easily with heat, maybe I could reverse the situation and use heat to get the new one back in. If I heated the flange up until it was red hot, it would expand. Right?



Then, while the flange is nice and hot and expanded, I could quickly spin the new oxygen sensor right down home in the flange socket. Then, when the flange cooled and shrunk, it would squeeze what was remaining of the threads nice and tight onto the new sensor. Right!



Well, it worked like a charm. That is, until the new sensor had screwed seven-eights of the way home, then it got hot and expanded and didn’t want to turn anymore. But I was determined. So I grabbed the heat wrench and once again heated the flange until it was cherry-red hot.



I worked as quickly as I could, laying under the car on my back with pieces of hot metal dust falling into my face. Grunt, grunt, groan. Creak, creak, the sensor let out a screech as it made its way home. I did it! The new sensor was in place firmly buried in the flange socket. And our vacation was not going to be ruined!



Then the doubt crept into my mind. “What if I ruined the sensor by heating up the flange?” And then I thought, “What if the new O2 sensor was defective right out of the box?” But, no. My mechanic’s nightmare had ended and everything was peachy-keen from then on. Our vacation was terrific!