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| As of 3/28/15 |
Back in March, Vic was dead in the driveway for a
while. It would crank and crank, but not
start. The first day this happened, the
battery sounded like it was dieing. So
we picked up a new battery and I installed it ($170 later…).
Still didn’t start.
After a bunch of time looking under the hood, we decided
maybe it was one of the wires in the front wiring harness that had been
repaired in the past. We wiggled stuff
and swore internally. Somehow, the car
started and all seemed well. Then it
didn’t.
One thing I noticed was the car would start only if the
engine light lit before cranking. If
that light didn’t go on, the car wouldn’t start. If it was on, it would start and either stay
running, or shut off.
We decided then to look at the starter relay. It is in a box under the hood, along with 2
other identical relays. We swapped them
around, even added a new one, and we thought (again) that all was well. In fact, I drove the car about 70 miles the
next day. BUT, on the way home the car
started to cut out and restart on me.
Next day, dead again.
So we messed around with it and got it running, then drove
it to Taxi Guy to have him check for bad wiring, etc. The result?
A bunch of bad sections of wiring harness cut out and repaired. Problem solved.
… until last week when I drove the car .5 miles to a
day-job. When I went to take it on a
coffee run, it wouldn’t start. Wouldn’t
even crank. One tow later, I had a new
starter.
So Vic has been worrying me lately. But I really can’t complain too much, as I
have been driving it for 15 years now.
The poor thing is rotting away and there isn’t much I can do about
it. Soon we will swap on the summer
wheels/tires and that will spiff it up a bit.
But the ultra-cheap Bondo jobs are really bothering me…
The winter of 2015 has dumped a LOT of snow on New England so far, and the Boston area has been particularly hard hit. I've lost track of the actual amounts. Let's just say my father's decision a few years ago to buy a snow blower was a VERY good one!
Todd's Vic has also been under the weather. Last month we hit the road for the day and it was running real rough. It was behaving like it had bad gas, or water in the tank, which with all this snow wouldn't be surprising. We got some dry gas, put it in the tank, and it didn't work. As we headed for home, it was decided that it could be a bad spark plug or coil pack. It was a Saturday, but Taxi Guy was still open and we got some A1 service, as usual. It took him no time at all to figure out one coil was weak. Less than 15 minutes later, Todd's car had a new plug and coil pack. The old one was actually steaming when it came out. It didn't smell like coolant, but now we need to keep track of the intake, as it has not been replaced yet in the car.
