Two things I’ve noticed lately about GM:
1) It’s really sad when you have to run commercials begging people to buy your cars.
2) Claims that GM has paid off the government bailouts are bull.
Some light reading for you from Rep. Paul Ryan, explaining how it’s just another shell game.
Looks like Toyota isn’t the only car company with problems. Our beloved Government General Motors is recalling 1.3 million cars. Who’s going to get summoned to testify to Congress? If they don’t treat GM the same as Toyota, it’s just going to make the conflict of interest problem even more obvious.
As long as GM is being run by the fed, they’re not getting my business. The same goes for Chrysler as long as the fed has it’s fingers in it. It’s too bad, really, because I really like the look of the new Charger and Challenger models.
Dead battery in my truck this morning. It’s been giving me fits, but I thought it was the crappy clamp-on side-terminal connector on the hot cable, and I replaced that last weekend with a new one – coated it with terminal protector and everything.
Hadn’t had another issue until this morning – wouldn’t even try to turn over the starter, and the various idiot lights were dim to dying. I checked the battery – 12V with no load, 2.89V with the key on. Time for a replacement.
So, here I sit, waiting for a new battery. My wife takes the kids to school, so I sent the old one with her to pick one up on the way back. Of course, it always seems like that should be 5 minutes, but in reality, it’s probably 5 to one school, 5 to the next, 10 to the parts store, 5 back to the house – at least 1/2 hour of drive time, not counting time in the store waiting in line for a battery and haggling because they always try to sell the top-dollar gold-plated model.
I figure she’ll be back here by 8:30am if I’m lucky – in which case I can be back on the road before 9. It’s probably going to be more like 9 when she gets back and 9:30 to be back on the road, knowing how things tend to go.
While I’m at it, I’ve got a question for all you super-dumb drivers out there…
Why can’t you just follow the rules of the road and go on your merry way? Why must you insist on deviating from the norm and causing confusion and disruption?
You know who you are – no wait, you probably don’t. You’re too caught up in trying to be considerate or helpful to realize you’re just being annoying.
When I pull up to a 4-way stop and there are other cars pulling up as well, I recognize who is coming to a stop first, and therefore who will be pulling into the intersection first. If you break the rule and for some unknown reason instead motion everyone else though, even though you were there first, it just disrupts the established traffic pattern.
Traffic, like many things, has an order to it. It’s designed with rules for a reason, and that’s to keep it flowing with minimal disruptions, such as accidents. When someone disrupts the order, bad things start to happen.
Here’s an example. Uncle Jed is driving down the street coming to a red light where several cars are already parked. He notices Aunt Bee sitting in a private drive waiting to turn right into his lane. Being the super-wonderful gentleman he is, he stops short of the private drive so Aunt Bee can pull out. Unfortunately, Cousin Mo who is following Uncle Jed, looks down at his radio for a few seconds. When he looks back up, he sees Jed’s brakelights on, WAY before the intersection. Mo slams on his brakes and manages to get stopped – barely. Another second later and he’d have been eating Jed’s bumper.
Yes, Mo should have been paying better attention and should always be prepared for an unexpected traffic hazard. However, Jed stopping unexpectedly wasn’t just an unexpected hazard, it was completely unncessary and disrupted normal traffic flow, all so Jed could feel chivalrous.
Stick with the rules, folks. Order has meaning and purpose.
Traffic is something that everyone complains about. Too much traffic, bad roads – but the worst is dumb drivers. Here’s an example.
Here you have a typical intersection. Cars are sitting at the red light waiting to continue east. Cars are coming from the west, slowing down behind the waiting cars. I’m the black car. I’m waiting in the turn lane to make a left turn into a restaurant.
The super-helpful person in the red car, thinking they are being considerate, stops short of the waiting cars and motions me to turn in front of him. Of course, little does he know, the green car is barrelling up the other lane. I can’t see green, green can’t see me, but red is telling me to go ahead.
Luckily I’m smart enough and have been in enough close calls to refuse to take the chance. I refuse the gesture and wait until I can tell for MYSELF that traffic is clear for me to turn.
Steer clear of this trap yourself. When the insurance company is sorting out who’s at fault for your accident, it’s gonna be you, not the guy who thought he was being helpful by letting you turn in front of him.
You’ll notice I reverted my theme to the previous version. I liked the general look of the new one, but it was just terrible slow for some reason to scroll up and down. I had some good comments from people on this theme, and it’s nice, clean and fast, so maybe I’ll let it like this for awhile.
Tomorrow (in 10 min) is Thanksgiving, everyone! Time to give thanks for all those things you take for granted. Our family gathering isn’t until the weekend, so I’ll hopefully spend the time tomorrow relaxing and catching up on these websites and other things. If it’s not too cold I’ve got to get the oil changed in my truck.
Gotta love it when the heater works right in the truck. So much heat that I had to run with the windows down for awhile to cool things back off.
Next task: change the oil and filter before it gets so cold that I’m miserable doing it.
Getting a little nippy outside the last couple days, finally had to break down and do something about the lackluster heating in my truck. It wasn’t anything to write home about last winter, but I didn’t freeze, so I put up with it. This winter, however, it was noticeably worse, so it had to be dealt with.
For those who are less than mechanically inclined, there are many simple things that can go wrong with a car or truck that you can fix yourself, if you take your time and don’t get intimidated. Even if you don’t actually do the repairs yourself, you should at least understand and be conversant on the subject in general to keep from getting screwed by the repair shop.
Take this heater issue. Perfect example. I’d say 95% of the time I’ve dealt with low heat in a vehicle, it’s been the same thing – plugged heater core. The heater core is basically a little mini-radiator that sits inside your dash. The engine circulates hot coolant through it and the fan inside the dash blows air through it, generating nice hot air.
Heater cores are little things. They have lots of small passages. There isn’t a lot of direct pressure to force the coolant through the heater core. Eventually, dirt, corrosion and deteriorating antifreeze contribute to a plugged core.
To diagnose, run the engine with the heater turned on until it warms up nicely. Pop the hood, and you’ll see 2 hoses about 1 inch diameter each going into the firewall (engine side of the dash). Feel the hoses. If one is hot and the other is lukewarm or cold, your heater core is plugged. If you’re the handy sort, you should be able to round up a garden hose and rig up a connection to the cold hose, unhook the hot, and force clean water backwards through the core. I did mine in about 5 minutes. Run it until it’s clean and flowing nicely, hook it back up, and test again.
If you don’t like getting dirty or you don’t have time to fix it yourself, at least you’ll know enough to make the mechanic nervous. As sad as it may be, if you talk to a mechanic and tell them you have no idea what can be wrong, you’re very likely to end up with a higher repair bill than if you tell them you’d like a radiator and heater core flush.
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