You Know You're in Trouble When You Have Car Parts Sitting on Your Computer Desk
Posted: Tuesday, February 15, 2011
by Dianne Lehmann
Artisan Jewelry from SyZyGy
On a recent Saturday, as we made our annual trip to Tucson for the gem and mineral show (really, it's shows), my ancient but plucky Jeep developed a problem on the way home. I had this long and heartfelt conversation with her before setting out on the approximately 440 mile round trip. We talked about how her previous owner (we bought her in 2000 and she was all ready eight years old) had taken her to Phoenix several times a week, so she should remember how easily she did those miles and that long pull up the mountain on the way home. She assured me she was up to the task even though she now had over 182,000 miles on her odometer. Some things just get better with age. Sadly, not all things do.
I'm kind of fanatic about obeying the speed limit and not knowing how fast I was going was a bit stressful for me (see me gritting my teeth?). But because Bernd went right back to sleep, I decided to do my best not to let it bother me. After all, he wasn't a bit bothered by it. Of course, that could just have been utter exhaustion. He had worked all week and I'd gotten him up at 4:00 a.m., drove him 220 miles and three and a half hours only to get him out of the car and walk him around for eight hours. Put him back in the car and drive for another two or so hours before my speedometer went wonky.
Eventually, we got to the top of the pass where it levels out onto a huge mesa. There is a nice rest stop located there, Sunset Point (Arizona has the nicest rest stops around), and I thought about stopping there just to rest my nerves. But Bernd was sleeping so peacefully, that I didn't want to bother him and so I pressed on.
Coming down the north side of "the hill," as most folks refer to it (as in "I'm going down the hill into the valley [that would be Phoenix], do you want to come?), the speedometer quit all together. I'm not sure which was worse, the needle flopping all around or sitting dead on the zero. I couldn't resist and blurted out, "Well, now it's quit all together!" This woke up Bernd once more, he glanced at it and prepared to go back to sleep. Then I said, "I'll just get behind this semi and stay there. He seems to be traveling at a nice rate." Bernd grunted and nodded off once more.
We arrived home around 9:30 p.m., which would be just about right if I'd maintained all the proper speed limits for the remainder of the drive. I congratulated myself on my ability to "sense" how fast I was travelling and for not having received any speeding tickets.
Sunday morning we were pretty well still wiped out from Saturday. It took us until about 3:30 p.m. to feel like looking at my car to see what we could figure out. I fit under my Jeep a whole lot better than Bernd does, but he was a gentleman and climbed under there instead.
I had done a lot of research online before we embarked on our adventure of discovery. My Jeep is a 1992 and all the sites I visited said that 1993 was when they switched to electronic and did away with the speedometer cable. So I had Bernd looking for a cable that ran from the back of the transmission slightly on the driver's side up to the speedometer/odometer dial. He couldn't find any such animal but he did find a part that was dangling loose. Apparently my Jeep is one of those weird mid model-year editions, because it has an electronic gizmo called, appropriately enough, a speed sensor and no direct mechanical cable. Bernd's Intrepid is also a mid model-year edition. What are the odds?
Bernd reattached the speed sensor and I did a short test drive. No luck … the speedometer needle remained resolutely on the zero. Dang! Bernd got under the car again and took it off once more. We examined it, but not knowing what it should look like, we did not find out until we got the new part that the needle that inserts into the shaft of the speedometer gear that is inserted into the transmission had broken off in the shaft. No way the old one was going to work and no way to properly install the new speed sensor until we removed the broken bit. Luckily for us, our favorite auto parts shop stays open late on Sunday. We drove down there with the old part and ordered a new one to be picked up on Tuesday. Dang again! That meant I was going to have to drive to visit the horses on Monday without a working speedometer. I didn't know then that I would need still another new part.
On Tuesday after Bernd got home from work, he got under the car again. That was when we actually discovered that the needle (well, it isn't really a needle it's not sharp and there is no hole in one end it's more of a pin except that it is a fairly large gauge and it's square in profile it's more like a small post what do people have against calling things as they really are this brings to mind that whole business about car "bras" they're not bras for goodness sake they don't hold anything up they're bibs … oh my gosh … you had probably better just go back and read the bit that came before the opening parenthesis and skip all the bit that follows it and go directly to the bit after the closing parenthesis or it's not going to make a whole lot of sense) had broken off in the shaft and began a series of completely fruitless endeavors to remove it. We gave up and packed it in for the evening and resolved to have the broken bit out of there on Wednesday evening. This was when we learned that we would need a new speedometer gear. Bernd figured out how to remove the gear from the transmission and we took it to our basement jewelry making shop where we have all manner of small needle nose pliers, tweezers, flex shaft handpiece with a drill press attachment and all sorts of drill bits and burs. Do you think we could get that out of there?
Finally, we realized it just wasn't going to happen and that we would have to buy a new gear. Fortuitously, I had noted the color of the gear and the number stamped on it before Bernd had a chance to put it back into the transmission. We had to order this part from the dealer. No one else could get it for us. Naturally, it cost more than if we had been able to get it online or from our trusty auto parts shop. Unfortunately, I will have to drive the Jeep a few more times before the part is in and I can pick it up. Did I mention it makes me nervous to drive without a speedometer?
So, I'm sitting here at the computer, looking at the old speed sensor (the new one is sitting on the dryer in the utility room) and wondering just how many parts of a car can be missing and it still be drivable. Is it like with people? You can be missing your spleen, appendix, wisdom teeth, one lung, one kidney, a piece of your liver, a portion of your stomach, a large portion of your large intestine and all your arms and legs and still live on and function to one degree or another. How many parts can a car lose and still continue to function as a car? Somehow, I don't think it would be quite as many.
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Top-level comments on this article: (4 total)Thanks for my giggle for the day - appreciate your perspective, always!Hi Marijo.
You're welcome! I'm more than happy to oblige. :)
Thanks for reading!
Hugs,
Dianne
Very funny and you had a good conclusion that humans can still survive without certain body parts. I got rid of all my wisdom teeth because they caused me pain and my husband said the wisdom teeth have no use for me.
Hope you got the car right fixed up by now !Hi Hilda.
Did you punch him in the arm when he said that? :)
My car finally got fixed just this Wednesday. The dealership didn't get the part until several days after they said they would. It went to a distant city north and east of here. I don't know why.
Thanks for reading!
Hugs,
Dianne
Dianne, Been there! Ah, the joys of cars-TOYS if you will.
A friend and I bebuilt a '59 volkswagon engine in high scool and ended up w/ two boxes of extra parts-it ran fine for a year!Hi Bing.
Two boxes!? How big were the boxes? And besides, those old bugs are kind of an exception. Though they have so few parts to begin with that I can't imagine how you had any left over. What finally did it in?
Thanks for stopping by!
Hugs,
DianneThey were pretty dad-gum big boxes...it was that Friday night tree that did it in.
You had me laughing Dianne. I could see you sitting at your computer desk, car parts around you. With articles such as this, I can't help but see what a great team you and Bernd are. It's just plain cute! :)Hi Brianna.
We do manage to finally get things accomplished ... mostly. It took us almost two years, though, to finally fix an intermittent problem with his Intrepid. Not even the auto shop could figure it out. We're tenacious if nothing else. :)
Thanks so much for reading and for your sweet comments.
Hugs,
Dianne
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