Monday, March 19, 2018

Jade Gets Shanked

Haven't done a lot about Jade here, because there hasn't been a whole lot to post about, but now I've got a couple things. A couple weeks back we were driving home one evening, and there was a loud noise from under the hood and the alternator light came on. Pretty instantly I correctly analysed the problem to be the serpentine belt to have let go. We're around 7 miles or so from home still, but on the freeway and moving pretty good, and it's been California-cold these nights, so I kept her moving with an eye on the gauges. Coming off the ramp by our home, and it made a pretty bad sound going around, so I pulled into a parking lot for a quick visual inspection. Sure enough, there's tattered belt, but nothing else seems out of sorts. I proceed home, going around the back way, which is not as steep so as not to get the engine any hotter than it already is. About halfway, it starts not going, like the engine has lost power or the transmission is slipping a lot. Parked and walked home for the other car to fetch my wife.

On my way home the next evening I pick up a new belt, then head over with my tools and a scissor jack. The belt is a little tight, but is a lot easier if you pull the top engine mount off and jack up the engine a bit. Only five nuts to pull the mount, but I'd forgotten to grab my 15mm deep socket, so it didn't come off so easy. Tried with my combo wrench, and could only get one. Oh well, I'll try just snaking it in and working the tensioner to see if I have any luck. I start trying to get the belt in position, and notice it's short an idler pulley. Hmmm... I start looking closer, and there it is, down by the crank pulley!!! I fish it out, and even find the bolt that is supposed to hold it on resting on the frame rail!!! Looks like the bearing on it has seized up, and I theorize that having done so, it unscrewed the bolt. Looks like I'm not finishing tonight (and it's just starting to rain) so I try starting her up and driving her, and she works just fine for the little bit over the hill and down to our home. The next night I picked up a pulley and finished that job off with no further issue, and she's been running fine since.

THEN, this last Friday, We're out on our way to pick the younger up from school and head out for some dinner, and as we're getting near I start hearing a tick-tick rotational noise coming from the rear right. Huh. When we arrive, I go to investigate, and as I near the offending corner, I can hear the air hissing out!!!

I check it out, and discover it feels like a spike sticking an inch or more out of the inner sidewall!!! I ask my awesome shadetree mechanic friend if he's got a local place that'll sell me a tire, and he says he's got one guy who'll set me up with a used one for $35, or another place that will sell me a new one for around $55. Of course, for $20 difference, I'm going new!!!

We head over, and since he knows the guy he goes in and asks the guy if he's got a tire for $50, and the guy right off says yeah. Should have said less!!! I say at that price I'll take two!!! That's all mounted and balanced, for just a bit more than some shops charge just for the labor!!! A bit more background, Jade had two nice Goodyears on the back when we bought her, and a couple cheapies worn off on the edges in the front, and a pretty good pull to the right. Early on, we took her for an alignment where the guy noted the disparity in tires and suggested rotating the good ones to the front, which I'd already been planning. He did so at a bargain rate.

Anyway, that's the good news, it got the bad tire. When he got it off, it turned out to be a hex driver bit that had nicely speared the sidewall. In the shot of the strut, you can see it has an area where the paint is chipped away to metal!!!

Turned out, it was a lot longer than it originally appeared!!!

Sunday, March 11, 2018

Hinkey

Since my last post, I've managed to get a couple things taken care of. I took her to an alignment shop and got that taken care of. I also disconnected the idle control valve and sprayed the connector with some contact cleaner, and that seems to have fixed that problem. When I was getting the steelie out of the shed, I'd discovered a BF Goodrich tire I'd saved when I'd bought tires last for Scruffy, because it was in great condition. Another project altogether, the back tires on the Falcon have been going flat again for a while. I had one off already, so I jacked up the other side to pull the other one. I was using the jack from the Camaro, which is like a horizontal bumper jack with a cantilevered arm at the end. As soon as I got the tire off and was going to set it down on a jack stand, it tipped the jack up and slid about a half a foot over, onto the floor pan!!!

Took the Falcon wheels and the oldie but goodie BF Goodrich over to a tire shop while I was getting the alignment done and had it mounted on the back right that kept going flat, and bought a new pair of tires for the Falcon. With that steelie on the front left and the BF on the rear right, I've got a half decent set of tires on Scruffy!!!

The new tires for the Falcon were largely so I could move her around some, and have some driveway room opened up!!! Not to mention, it pretty much gets it back to road ready at any point, only other things would be going through the exhaust hangers and replacing them. As previously mentioned, 3 is up for a smog check, and preparatory to that I was doing an oil change and piston soak. We went on a quest for Shamrock Shakes and Szechuan Sauce on Monday in the Falcon, and parked her on the street. Tuesday I drove 3 to work, and backed her into the driveway when I got home. After I'd eaten, I pulled the plugs and started the piston soak procedure. Wednesday I cranked all the oil out, and did round two on the soak. Friday I cranked the oil out again, did the oil change, and rotated the tires for the first time in a while. I'd been hoping to get the 17's onto Scruffy, but ran out of time. This morning I went out to drive her, and hitting the remote to unlock her did nothing. Huh. Used the key on the door like a caveman, and discovered why the remote wasn't working!!! The battery was completely dead!!! I've got the charger on her now, and discovered that I'd popped the trunk, probably Friday afternoon, so it was likely the trunk light did the deed.

Anyway, I've been rolling more miles than usual on Scruffy this week. Mostly she's been doing fine, but there's one thing. Long ago, I'd bought a replacement radio for Scruffy (can't remember, or find a post if I did one, may even have been for Janice) that seemed pretty sweet. It's "mechless", meaning it has no physical drives, but has input for Aux cord, an SD card slot, and a USB jack you can play music through, as well as AM/FM tuner. Also was a bit before Bluetooth connectivity was much of a thing for car radios. It seemed pretty good, but it doesn't tune AM very well at all, and the display is pretty dim. Recently it has gotten to where the display will go out completely. Another thing she's doing is sometimes the fuel gauge won't work. The last couple weeks, if one is working, the other doesn't!!!