Wherein my car gets laughed at

[blas]

I'm used to people laughing at my vehicles.

Not so much with the Neon, because most people I work with have equally shitty and old cars (well go figure, we didn't get raises for 2 years and we don't make enough money to get new cars, let alone fix the ones we have!).

Mostly it's the richy rich college kids and dumbfucks I see at the bars who make fun of my car. Sorry, my parents aren't doctors or lawyers and I don't make enough money to afford a brand new car every year. Oh, and to some of you idiot fucks, leasing a car doesn't mean that it's yours. So give it up already.

[KabeRinnaul]

Reading all this car talk makes me want to ask about a problem mine - formerly Kheldarson's - has. Is there any way to fix a stuck odometer? It apparently hasn't changed since about 70,000 miles, and this being a '91 car, we're pretty sure the actual mileage approaches twice that.

[AccountingDrone]

Reading all this car talk makes me want to ask about a problem mine - formerly Kheldarson's - has. Is there any way to fix a stuck odometer? It apparently hasn't changed since about 70,000 miles, and this being a '91 car, we're pretty sure the actual mileage approaches twice that.

Could be a number of things - on my 74 mustang the connection of the speedometer cable got corroded and unattached itself.

Not really certain what you could do other than take it to a garage, no idea how handy you guys are, usually it takes popping the dash off and putzing around with stuff to figure it out.

Oh, and you might need to guesstimate the mileage and remember to certify that the odometer is incorrect if you sell the little beastie. I know when we had odometer replaced on one of my previous jettas we had to get some sort of certificate from the garage that the mileage on the new odometer was off by however much milage we had on the old odometer. I think it was printed by the DMV on the back of the title paperwork.

[Der Cute]

What's funny about me and cars... I like to go fast.

Was in a shop the other day, guy asks me what car do I have. I say "camaro. uh, no I meant CAMRY. CAMRY, really." Was chuckling about it later. I wouldn't mind an older camaro.....and a f-150 ranger, and a 65 Mustang, and a 74 Nova..but I'm not picky.

Cutenoob

[Shalom]

So what happened? Details, man!

Not a whole lot. As part of the inspection they used to put it on a dyno and run it at speed while checking the emissions. So they stopped the truck with the rear axle over the dyno, put the tailpipe sniffer in, put it in gear and launched it...

Fortunately they got it stopped after a few feet, although the worst that would have happened was that it would have done the brake test ahead of schedule (the skidpad was the next in line).

Weird thing is, I don't think the truck was even in 4WD at the time. It could be that there was some viscous coupling or something that transmits some torque even when the shifter is nominally in 2WD. They eventually chocked the front wheels and got it to spin the dyno correctly without running anyone over.

[KabeRinnaul]

Could be a number of things - on my 74 mustang the connection of the speedometer cable got corroded and unattached itself.

Speedometer works fine. There's just no odometer or trip odometer. Might ask my cousin about it. He and my uncle were both mechanics.

[protege]

Reading all this car talk makes me want to ask about a problem mine - formerly Kheldarson's - has. Is there any way to fix a stuck odometer? It apparently hasn't changed since about 70,000 miles, and this being a '91 car, we're pretty sure the actual mileage approaches twice that.

It could be a couple of things--a bad electrical connection to the gauge, a faulty (or snapped) speedometer cable, or the gauge itself could have failed. On many cars, a "dog" gear runs off the transmission. These can sometimes fail.

In fact, I dealt with this on the MG about a month ago. Back in January, imagine my surprise, when, I'm driving home...keeping up with traffic...and notice that the speedometer is registering a big fat zero All sorts of things were going through my mind, since the original Smiths gauges are no longer available, and there aren't any aftermarket items that will fit.

Turned out that the angle drive mechanism off the transmission had seized. This is supposed to take the motion from transmission's "dog," turn it through 90 degrees, and then spin the speedometer cable. *Supposed to* being the operative words. Anyway, since it's a common MGB fault, most owners simply bypass them by fitting a longer speedometer cable from an overdrive-equipped car.

Figuring out what was wrong was the easy part. Actually taking things apart...was not. Let's just say that I removed the wrong part on the transmission...resulting in the draining of oil from said item, and the refilling of said item when everything else was back together. Oops

[Flying Grype]

*looks up Plymouth Duster* What kind of lowlife would be embarrassed to be seen in that car? I'll bet they turn up their noses at good wine, too...

[Chromatix]

It could be that "2WD" or "not 4WD" actually means "AWD". In AWD, one pair of wheels has direct drive from the engine, through the normal diff, while the other pair is set up to take some traction if the primary pair begins to slip, and has it's own diff. One way of doing that is indeed a fluid coupling.

On that kind of system, the "4WD" setting just locks the diffs and the coupling, so that all the wheels are directly driven, and no torque loss is possible due to only one wheel slipping. But the flexibility is the diffs is lost, so on tarmac you will scrub the tyres.

A more sophisticated system, as found on many modern sports cars, is to use three limited-slip diffs - one for each pair of wheels and another between the pairs and the engine. This setup can deal with a much wider variety of situations without needing to be locked up, and accordingly most of them don't have a lockup facility at all.

A reasonable alternative is to have a limited-slip diff on the front-rear connection, but ordinary diffs on the pairs. This is cheaper than the triple version, and gives you some of the advantages of 4WD without the drawback of tyre scrubbing.

In any case, if I was putting a car on a dyno, I'd tie it down!

[plan9au]

God i love the 'Classic' cars,

Im nearing 30 (rapidly) and it took me nearly 15 years of scrimping and saving, driving peices of Crap and taking the laughter with good humour, (also bringing a couple of cheese sandwitches to school/uni/work everyday) not going to the pub every night like all my mates,

But it was worth it when i turned up to my school reunion in an as new 1966 Ford Mustang (my dream car), Gotta love the classics.

[Midorikawa]

*looks up Plymouth Duster* What kind of lowlife would be embarrassed to be seen in that car? I'll bet they turn up their noses at good wine, too...

Certainly not me. I love my car to death. These kids were about just-graduated-high-school age, so it's likely they don't know better. That's when they learn, is from the side of the road, as my bulletproof slant 6 powers past their busted up piece of junk on the freeway.

It's got a junk yard engine in it, so who knows what abuses it's seen. I know the oil filter gasket failed on the freeway one morning, and I dumped all the oil at 75MPH. She still runs like a champ, if not a moody little thing. :-D

My one gripe about the slant 6 is it doesn't take much for it to start dropping cylinders. It's redeemed, however, by the fact that I've driven the car home on 2 firing cylinders.

[Crossbow]

Certainly not me. I love my car to death. These kids were about just-graduated-high-school age, so it's likely they don't know better. That's when they learn, is from the side of the road, as my bulletproof slant 6 powers past their busted up piece of junk on the freeway.

It's got a junk yard engine in it, so who knows what abuses it's seen. I know the oil filter gasket failed on the freeway one morning, and I dumped all the oil at 75MPH. She still runs like a champ, if not a moody little thing. :-D

My one gripe about the slant 6 is it doesn't take much for it to start dropping cylinders. It's redeemed, however, by the fact that I've driven the car home on 2 firing cylinders.

I can understand why. My first car was a '74 Pontiac Ventura hatchback (similar to your Duster) with WAY too big of an engine for a 16 year old to have. Loved every minute with that car.

[ThirdGenRetail]

*looks up Plymouth Duster* What kind of lowlife would be embarrassed to be seen in that car? I'll bet they turn up their noses at good wine, too...

I second the motion there! *Guilty of going to look it up, too*

My dream car is a... I think it was a 58 or so Cadillac? Just after they dropped the fins on the back of the cars. It's been a couple years since I thought about the exacts there... And a convertible, to boot. Big hitch there is finding one that fits my specifications of car/make/model, AND convertible... I think I found an entire 1 image online a couple years ago. That and I want the '88 Ford Ranger sitting in our driveway, even if it needs repairs out the wazoo. Dunno why, but I've fallen in love with that truck... That and it'd be my first vehicle, which is exactly what I want - I want to learn to appreciate the car through repairing it, not just get a new car.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Hey, this must be what your car looks like, huh?

If so, I are jealous. My parents used to have cool cars. My mom had a couple 60s and 70s Mustangs and my dad had an old Chevy Nova.

[Midorikawa]

Yep. That's what my car looks like. Here's a photo of the car that I just took in the parking lot a bit ago. The dark spots are rustoleum, since we actually have a winter here. She'll get the love and care she needs, as soon as I get more money for a body job, and an interior refit.

linky