My Project

[JDoors]

So I'm drivin' to work and hear rattle-rattle-clatter every time I hit a bump, comin' from the front left corner. After work I jack up the car, slide underneath, and the left front swaybar link is broken. Tried to take off the link but it's not budging without power tools. On a hunch, I look at the right link. Of course, it's broken too! I wonder how long THAT'S been there?

Call my mechanic (since I can't budge the bolts), start telling him about the noise and he says, "So the swaybar link's broken?" Uh-yep, how'd ya know? He couldn't get it done that day so I have an appointment Monday.

[Bubba Bob]

Oh fun. Nothing harder to remove than old suspension & steering components

[blim]

Cars!

Hubby gets a Year End bonus each December and we call it "the car check" as every single stinkin' year we have at least one broken car around Christmas (well, ONE year in the past 25 we had a "pass". ONE stinkin' year! ) At least this year we had a little bonus at the end of the car repair....so far....still considered the Holiday Season for a few more days....*knockwood*

Hope it isn't too expensive, Jdoors. I hate cars.

Liz

[bobbynichols]

I hate cars, ditto.

Wife and I are having to "retire" our car because it will not pass California State smog tests. That means the state will give us up to $1000.00 (nothing specific) if we can drive our car to a surrender location to be scrapped; which we are sweating because we have a wonky clutch switch that will not allow us to even start the car sometimes, although we can push/clutch-start it (most of the time). It is also running real rough now which coincidentally started just after we had taken the car to get smog checked?!

We've been without since the end of November, making due with family and friends to get around. I have an older van and an '84 truck parked on the property, donated by friends of my church, that need repair before we can get them registered/smogged so we can drive one or the other. Past history for our vehicles is similar... I'm far from being competant when it comes to car repairs and we've always struggled to make due with what we got. Cars up here in the California Sierra foothills really take a beating and good mechanics are scarce. Sometimes I long for the city just so I could take a bus or rapid transit or taxi to get where I need to get.

I've been able to set a little money aside bit by bit and hope, prayerfully, to get 'something' done in the way of personal transport soon.

Did I mention I hate cars ?

[Honda_Boy]

Gotta love podunk counties in Tennessee. No emissions testing. You can run straight header and it still be registered. You just might get a sound violation but even, I don't think the cops give a crap. They only care if your radio is too loud (I should know, I drive a loud Honda and got "pulled over" for my radio being too loud , no ticket at least).

Amazingly enough, my car has been really reliable recently with no major screw ups or anything. The front tires even have more tread than I thought. Only prob I'm having is my driver side fog light is starting to well, ummmm, fog up. The must have gone bad somewhere. Oh well, that's what you get when you get the cheap replicas. I'd have real JDM fogs if weren't for the extreme difficulty of finding Authentic JDM OEM Raybrig Yellow Square foglights for the 96-98 models and for the $300-500 price tag on most of them. So I have to settle for the Depo JDM OEM Replicas.

[Bubba Bob]

Honda Boy- Federal ticket for removing emissions items such as cats is $20k

Bobby, try a different quicky lube for inspection. Those underpaid greese monkeys are always looking for a little extra money if ya get what im sayin...

[JDoors]

I had a thought today (just one), get another car. Not a replacement mind you, just something to drive that A.) Gets better mileage (for commuting, long trips, etc.), B.) I never have transportation when the Explorer's in the shop (so I sit at home and wait for the repairs to be done), and C.) I used to have two cars and miss having that option, and the backup when needed. I somehow managed to squeeze out the cash for the monthlies on the Explorer, and that's been paid off for about a year now, so ... another payment? Doesn't hurt to start looking.

Unfortunately, if past experience is anything to go by, I'll prefer the newer car and the older one will rot in the garage (that's what happened to the Cobra, it was getting old, I bought the Jeep just before Winter for commuting, and never really drove the Cobra again).

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The Explorer's ten years old now and I know what it means to REGULARLY have something go wrong with a car, so all those reasons seem to justify the expense (or I'm just crazy and stupid, which is hard to deny).

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I live in a "collar" County, it USED to be far enough from Chicago I didn't have to do the emissions thing. The Cobra had straight 2 1/2" pipes so it was a good thing they didn't test back then. But, civilization's spread to our area, and it's been mandatory for a while. I haven't had any problems so far (and beginning with the Explorer my cars have been new enough to just need to be plugged in for two minutes for the test -- drive in, they plug in, I drive out, easy as pie).

[Pete_C]

So I'm drivin' to work and hear rattle-rattle-clatter every time I hit a bump, comin' from the front left corner. After work I jack up the car, slide underneath, and the left front swaybar link is broken. Tried to take off the link but it's not budging without power tools. On a hunch, I look at the right link. Of course, it's broken too! I wonder how long THAT'S been there?

Call my mechanic (since I can't budge the bolts), start telling him about the noise and he says, "So the swaybar link's broken?" Uh-yep, how'd ya know? He couldn't get it done that day so I have an appointment Monday.

Before they break you can generally get them off with the right hydraulic jack and some shims if you get things alligned right to have even pressure. Or you can get the proper tool. Once they break you generally need to heat em with a torch and beat on em if I recall correctly.

I keep a set of heavy duty breaker bars, torque wrenches and some heavy steel pipe to act as extensions for difficult nuts and bolts; still I can recall a couple I had to brace one against the ground and then use a hydraulic jack on the other and let the weight of the vehicle bust it loose.

[bozodog]

Don't forget Auto Zone now loans most tools, like pickle forks for suspension work.

[JDoors]

Before they break you can generally get them off with the right hydraulic jack and some shims if you get things alligned right to have even pressure. Or you can get the proper tool. Once they break you generally need to heat em with a torch and beat on em if I recall correctly.

I keep a set of heavy duty breaker bars, torque wrenches and some heavy steel pipe to act as extensions for difficult nuts and bolts; still I can recall a couple I had to brace one against the ground and then use a hydraulic jack on the other and let the weight of the vehicle bust it loose.

... I guess ... I used to do whatever work was needed (probably the most dramatic was removing the entire dash to replace one part that sat behind it, though I've also removed and rebuilt an engine in my garage) ... But now? God, I hate crawling around working under a car (I used to do it for a living actually, my first "real" job was working on cars).

In this case it's just a simple matter of removing a nut from the bottom of the link ... a relatively large nut on a stud with relatively coarse threads. Should be easy, but the link spins when you turn the nut. So, grab the link with something, right? Only it's up in the suspension, is hard to grab, and without having the car up on a lift it's almost impossible to both hold the link and turn the nut. Let somebody else do it (fighting to call it something other than laziness).

Then I turn around and cancel bringing the car in today. Oops, it's New Year's Eve! Doh. I'd probably have to do without transportation 'til at least Wednesday afternoon and there's just too much going on.