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CAPTION: Why don't we run our cars on sauerkraut. Think about it.

 

You'll need to read on to absorb the meaning of today's title. And, hey, if you've come this far? I think I can promise it will be worthy of your interest.

It is amazing to me retelling these stories how much daily life has changed in twenty years. As late as the mid 80's, you weren't much of a man if you didn't at least change your own oil, or rotate you own tires, or put in a new fuel pump if it was time.

Do some of those things today? 

"Im sorry sir you've voided your warranty."

So, travel back in time with me again for part two of:

             The Carburetor Did It

 

Prior to the latest queries from my panel of WRENCHMEN, I’ve changed the oil, moved up to an advertised brand of gas, and the gas station attendant tells me my plugs are fine.

 

(Boy! I didn’t see that coming’ before I typed it. For me to describe to ye of fewer moons the personage referred to as a gas station attendant? I think it would be very time consuming, and I don’t believe, sadly, I can come up with a similar wide spread existing role to give you a comparable. So save me from having to add a footnote to this tome. Just ask someone over the age, oh, I’d say, to be safe, of 55? And to those of you who at one time or another thought Oregon was on another planet? Here’s some support for that theory. They still have gas station attendants. And it’s the law.)

 

Well, at least I’ve narrowed down the possible sources of my problem. And at this point I’m sticking to the WRENCHMEN’S big hit, “DON’T WORRY ABOUT IT.” The problem is still intermittent and the car is still getting me to and fro.

 

BUT! A few days later the cancer spreads to the battery. On random days I walk to the car, toss my briefcase into the passenger seat, slide in behind the wheel, jam the key into the ignition slot, turn it only to hear? CLICK, CLICK, CLICK, CLICKETY CLICK. Now I’m covered on this issue short term. I’ve got one of those little battery chargers where you string an extension chord across the living room, out the window, back into your garage and hope you still have enough length to reach the battery terminals.  With an hour delay on given days I am back on the road.

 

Well puzzlement finally makes me a man of action and I call in the BATTERY unit of my WRENCHMEN.

 

“You’ve got a short in the system somewhere.”

“The battery is sulphating on you.”

“You’re putting too much strain on the battery with all that stopping and starting.”

“Sounds like your alternator is going bad.”

“Have you checked your belts?”

“When’s the last time you cleaned the terminals?”

“It’s those damned original batteries.”

“Have you checked the water level.” (Something else you’ll have to ask an age superior about.)

“It has to be in the ignition system!”

 

As I’m getting accustomed, I get no specific remedial advice. But of my own initiative I run out to buy a new battery. Well a funny thing happens to me on my way to the battery store. Half my horn system decides to take a break. I know that because? Well this idiot pulls in front of me with a milli-second notice, inspiring me to shout out a few of my favorite “emotional expressions” AND LAY ON THE HORN. What comes out is this little “tweet-tweet” like your hear on a scooter.

 

It had to have been quite heart pulsating to the miscreant in front of me. In fact, he quickly pulls to the shoulder and slams on his breaks. As I pass him I see him slumped over the wheel taking in deep breaths.

 

Okay, I arrive at the battery store, and this young man who’d just graduated from gas station attendant school, jams these two big ice picks into the battery’s mass. (Walter Mitty or Don Quixote would have seen a matador, daggers over head, ready for the moment of truth.) The moment of truth as he pulls out the daggers?

 

“Nothing wrong with this battery.”

 

I get a full charge on the battery and leave with a certain air of pride. I’ve sort of fixed the problem myself. A faulty horn has been drinking the battery's juice. The HORN did it. I don’t even care that I drive a street legal tank that goes, “tweet-tweet.”

 

 Still I’ve yet to resolve the stalling problem. While it remains occasional it begins to happen during some rather life threatening situations. Well, like stalling out whilst racing a semi to a merge lane. Still I’m hesitant to call in the WRENCHMEN because nothing new has happened. Then one stormy wintry day, comes a new automotive behavior. The car starts making this POPPING. "POP! POP! POP!  Let me see if I can tastefully describe it. You know when you eat of bowl of sauerkraut? And then about an hour later…? Well just magnify that a hundred times. Time again for a meeting of the experts.

 

“I just knew it was the choke.”

“Boy, that timing really is off, isn’t it?”

“The son of a bitch is flooding on you!”

“Somebody has the wires crossed on the firing sequence.”

“I think you’ve jumped the timing chain.”

“I still think it’s those new fangled electronic ignition systems.”

“Your plugs have got to be bad!”

“It might be in the distributor.”

 

“Why don’t you get rid of that damn thing.”

 

NOW THIS is the only explicit action advice following months of turmoil. But who will buy it? And? Well buoyed by my fixing of the battery I vow I will fix it all myself. Well not exactly by myself. I’ll call in my father in law who I trust explicity in this arena. We decide on a course of action. We tie down the choke, clean the air filter, and as he explains it, advance the distributor a quarter of an inch.

 

WOW! WOW! WOW!  It’s running like its brand new. I am bouncing up and down in my seat. And the fixes are so simple. I want to drive everywhere. I don’t think I even hear my father-in-law say, “I doubt we’ve solved all the problems.” It is running, it’s not popping or stalling. And I kind of like the “tweet-tweet.”

 

Crisis averted? What do you think? Will "tweet-tweet" and "pop-pop" be back? If I were you, I'd be back tommorrow to find out. It's what EVERYONE is going to be talking about.