Tuesday, February 03, 2004
What a weekend.
Sunday I was driving home from Santa Monica and I decided to take Wilshire Blvd the whole way back. No worries, except I was in the right hand lane and it gets surprisingly rough (right in the spot where tons of the rich folk live too). Well, a pot hole here and a dip there and my left tail pipe was left behind! A well intentioned stranger pulled up next to me and informed me that I had left a tailpipe in the middle of one of the busiest streets in LA.
Crap.
So I turn off, go down a side street and come back around to Wilshire where I find my tailpipe. The nice shiny cylinder has become a scratched, flattened piece of trash. I don't even bother to stop and grab it. Damn. So, I'm one tailpipe short of a set.
That's not the end of it. I was late getting back to the apartment so I had to drive to a super bowl party. No worries. I head over the hill to the valley (yes, the valley) and just as I get to the bottom of the hill I stall (a common problem, I have to check the fuel filter under the gas tank and make sure my fuel pump is pumping with gusto) but when I start her back up she's making the loudest noise! It sounds like I lost my muffler! Obviously I hadn't. Not only was she noisy, but I lost about half her power. Hmmmm, related to the tailpipe incident? Perhaps.
Perhaps not.
I make it to Chris and Mike's place and I check the engine real quick. Everything seems in order. What could it be? Well. I posted on the trusty newsgroup and sure enough I get a dead on response. It seems my lil bug spit out one of her spark plugs! I didn't see it intially because it was in the back (well, front really) of the engine compartment. There lie the sparkplug still attached to its cable. Well, I put that back in and made sure it was good and tight, then I double checked the others. All is well despite the fact that I still have one less tailpipe.
I'll pick that up soon.
Sunday I was driving home from Santa Monica and I decided to take Wilshire Blvd the whole way back. No worries, except I was in the right hand lane and it gets surprisingly rough (right in the spot where tons of the rich folk live too). Well, a pot hole here and a dip there and my left tail pipe was left behind! A well intentioned stranger pulled up next to me and informed me that I had left a tailpipe in the middle of one of the busiest streets in LA.
Crap.
So I turn off, go down a side street and come back around to Wilshire where I find my tailpipe. The nice shiny cylinder has become a scratched, flattened piece of trash. I don't even bother to stop and grab it. Damn. So, I'm one tailpipe short of a set.
That's not the end of it. I was late getting back to the apartment so I had to drive to a super bowl party. No worries. I head over the hill to the valley (yes, the valley) and just as I get to the bottom of the hill I stall (a common problem, I have to check the fuel filter under the gas tank and make sure my fuel pump is pumping with gusto) but when I start her back up she's making the loudest noise! It sounds like I lost my muffler! Obviously I hadn't. Not only was she noisy, but I lost about half her power. Hmmmm, related to the tailpipe incident? Perhaps.
Perhaps not.
I make it to Chris and Mike's place and I check the engine real quick. Everything seems in order. What could it be? Well. I posted on the trusty newsgroup and sure enough I get a dead on response. It seems my lil bug spit out one of her spark plugs! I didn't see it intially because it was in the back (well, front really) of the engine compartment. There lie the sparkplug still attached to its cable. Well, I put that back in and made sure it was good and tight, then I double checked the others. All is well despite the fact that I still have one less tailpipe.
I'll pick that up soon.
