A Few Thoughts…

I was going to post some of this yesterday, but my sheer lack of enthusiasm for anything (including writing) won over because of the day’s events. The day started off well, I got to work and did the normal Monday morning things. Out new phone system was implemented over the weekend, and some of my coworkers figured out how to send LWC messages to each other. The only problem with this is we have no way of retrieving or canceling LWC messages, so now all of our message lights are on constantly and we don’t know when we have voicemail.

Lunch rolls around, and instead of bringing my lunch as planned, I ended up going out to pick something up. Made a quick trip to a few other desks to see if they were interested in going to the Pasta Wagon (weird name, good food), and got one taker. I have to stop at the bank, so I volunteer to drive. Bank stop finished it’s on to food. Food arrives quickly and we head back to work to eat. Then the fun starts.

Starting the car I hear the serpentine belt start to whine like only that belt can. I know this sound, my old Plymouth Neon had problems with the belt all the time. Not something I’m happy to hear, but not a huge deal. I was going to take the car in to have the brakes looked at anyway, I’d have them replace the belt then. Driving back down 747, the whining stops and I feel relieved. That is, until we hear a snap and something hit the underside of the car. This is not good.

I start checking different components in order of importance: brakes…okay, we can still stop. Steering………I can steer, but with no power steering, which is tough in a mid-sized sedan. There’s no question now, I have no serpentine belt anymore. About this time the battery light comes on – no more alternator. We turn a few amenities off, and I roll the driver’s window down a little to make sure I can get back into my car later (though, I have a real key to let me in…I wasn’t thinking too well).

Onto Crescentville, almost back to work, and the oil temperature light comes on. We don’t smell any coolant, but it can’t be far. I stay around 35 mph (when I’m normally doing ~50), and try to be nice to my car. We get parked, after much arm strength on my part, stop the car, and that’s when we smell it. Wisps of steam are coming out from under the hood. I need to get this fixed, or I can’t go anywhere. What was left of the serpentine belt was removed from the engine to prevent it from getting tangled up in anything – which now sits on my desk.
Luckily there is a Midas around the corner from work – close enough to barely get the engine up to temperature without coolant. I make an appointment for as soon as I can get in, and
make my way over there expecting the serpentine belt, and brakes (remember the brakes, I figure I might as well have them fixed while I’m here).

A little while later I get a call – “The serpentine belt had some help” (this cannot be good). The idle pulley on my car was made of plastic, it’s bearing got jammed and overheated. Plastic + heat = melting. No more pulley to hold things in place, no more belt – $175 to replace both of those. I was way low on the coolant, since it went everywhere, so I get that flushed and replaced (it of course is the expensive coolant too) – $75 for that. Since I was having the brakes looked at too, the front rotors were passed being planed off again – $150 to replace both of those. The back drums were okay, a little worn, but not in need of being replaced. They would take them off and clean up all of the brake dust and everything for $25. Then to rotate and balance the tires (to solve the other issue of vibrations at higher speeds) was another $25 (as it turns out – someone had rotated my directional tires into the wrong direction in the back, some feathering, but I caught it early enough to not have to replace the tires – I’m rotating them from now on).

In the end, with taxes and everything, I spent ~$520 for it all. Not exactly the kind of thing I want to be doing when I’m thinking of buying a new car.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 16th, 2006 at 07:57 and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.