Wrenchin' Weekend+

This was a couple of weekends ago.

Actually started out the Wednesday before, they had one of the hooey red flag days. I fired up the Falcon and drove it to the bottom of the hill and parked it there. Took a lot of cranking, and I flooded it and had to let it sit for a minute on the initial starting. Have I made mention that I bought a deep cycle battery for her a couple years ago??? Some of the best money I've spent on her!!! On my way home on Thursday, I took 3 to the you-scrub car wash, then drove the Falcon over and washed it off, too. Ran flawlessly.

On Friday, I finally did the rear brakes on Jade. As always, the worst part is getting the drums off. Saturday, after I got home from work, went down to drive the Falcon back up, and it wouldn't crank from the key. Huh. Popped the hood, and jumpered the start relay, and it spun with no problem. OK, maybe now it will crank. Got back in, and tried again, and it didn't crank. Had my wife make sure the gearshift didn't pop into reverse, and went back under the hood to fire it up under there, and realized I hadn't put the crank wire back on the relay!!! That fixed it!!! On Sunday I had my mechanic friend pull several bits of metal out of the rear driver's side tire on Scruffy, and plug the hole of the one that made it through. That was one of those things I've been wanting to do for a while, ever since I noticed it. Never seemed to leak any air, anyway.

Sunday afternoon, we were out in Jade, and stopped into AM/PM for some soda. Came back out, and it wouldn't crank!!! Called up my roadside assistance, and told dispatch I need a tow truck. MIGHT be able to put jumpers on it and have enough juice to get it to crank, but the battery is almost new, so I didn't think that would be the case. MIGHT be able to give the starter a few whacks and get it to crank, but probably going to need a tow. Took them an hour and a half and three calls to get someone dispatched, and about that again before they got there. In a pickup truck, with a jump-starter. He knew it probably wouldn't work, and it didn't. Called up again, and the rat bastards told me I've used up all my service calls for the year!!! Still haven't gotten any satisfaction from them yet. Called another tow service, and it was another three hours!!!

I had the driver set it down on jack stands, so it was ready to go to work on. Ended up with a middle shift on Tuesday, so I pulled the starter out after work. Exchanged it after work on Wednesday, and put it in on Friday. That went fairly easy, but the fun came afterwards. I was jacking it up to drop it off the stands, and the jack tipped over!!! The jack stand on the passengers' side was completely clear of the car, and the driver's side ended up in the exhaust tunnel. The back tire rolled up onto the wheel block. Used a scissor jack to get enough room to pull the floor jack out, and got it lifted up enough that the jack stand was... hanging from the O2 sensor wire!!!

After that, I got the rod ends I'd bought for 3 installed. I'd gotten a look at the ones on Jade while I had her up on the jack stands, and I think those were in worse shape. Today, after work, I did a bit of sanding on the rear bumper of Scruffy, and did some primer on the areas I'd done a little filling and sanding on a while back. That rear bumper and hatch are my next targets to finish up!!!

Random Triple Shot

A few things happened. Thought I'd do an instant post and cover them a little.

My uncle on my dad's side came to town. It think it's been about 45 years since I've seen him, when we'd gone on an epic family road trip hitting about 7 states. He hails from Colorado. He remembered me from before that, probably 48 or so years, when he'd visited us and I was playing dinosaur and was eating my food off the ground. Anyway, his wife of decades just recently passed, and he was out visiting my parents.

This was the front left brake line on Scruffy. I bought all the flexible lines to replace, but thus far this is the only one I've replaced. Also, it was the only one showing visible wear, so, priorities. Eventually I'll get to the others, but I've got rear brakes for Jade and rod ends for 3 (as well as that transmission temperature plug!!!) to put on, still. I've got an extra transmission fluid filter, and it would probably be a good idea to change the fluid on both of those sometime, too.

Alt 98.7 was hosting a test of new voting machines last weekend. Menace and Greg Gory were at one local to us. It was going on while I was at work, so my wife and younger went over. Now his count is 2 Menace meet ups and one Ravey, to my 1 Menace and 2 Ravey. He saw but didn't get to meet Greg. The boy isn't old enough to vote yet, but he's registered now for when he is, a young Republican. They had a bunch of sample questions for Southern California centric questions, best beach, most instagrammable, worst freeway. Favorite sports team was the Dodgers (who just this evening were knocked out of the playoffs) who took more than 50% of the vote. The two basketball teams followed, then the two football teams. I was a bit surprised that the carpetbagger Chargers had more votes than the prodigal Rams. Anyway, I see no possible way that an electronic voting system like they are rolling out could possibly have any fraud or tampering or hacking!!!