Are We Having Fun Yet?

Automobiling

2017-05-02T13:20:03Z

The trip home from Rehoboth Beach, DE, Sunday evening was a bit too eventful for my tastes.

While zipping along I95 southbound north of Aberdeen, MD, the battery light came on. A minute later, the engine light, oil light and others came on too, and the dash began beeping. As we pulled over onto an exit ramp, we lost power steering. As quickly as possible, we stopped on the shoulder of the ramp and killed the engine.

It's a 2006 Grand Caravan with 175,000 miles on it, so we were prepared for the worst, but after some consideration, we came to our own conclusion that the tensioner for the serpentine belt had broken. With such slackness in the belt, the alternator and other devices weren't functioning as they should.

AAA summoned us a tow truck and we were able to rent a Pacifica to get us and our equipment & luggage home while the PrincessMobile stayed at the garage.

Monday morning, our suspicions about the tensioner were confirmed. And this morning, Kent drove to Aberdeen to return the Pacifica and collect the PrincessMobile. The car repairs were about $320, the car rental $290. In all, it was better than going shopping for a new minivan.

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New Year's Non-Resolutions Check-in

2014-01-23T20:43:33Z

We're only three weeks into the new year but my non-resolutions for 2014 already have a mixed record.

Good: The gym stuff continues. I'm stepping up the program a bit: instead of my usual three sets of 12 reps per exercise, I'm finishing each set with an additional set to exhaustion at 75% weight, then another set to exhaustion at 50%. So far, so good.

Good: Body fat has dropped from 20.6% to 18.3%. Yay! I miss carbs & sugar but the cravings aren't as bad as they were for the first five days or so.

Good: New glasses have been ordered. Yes, they are progressive lenses. I should have them in the next few days.

Good: I'm now transferring $200/paycheck, up from $150/paycheck, into a savings account.

In Progress: We tried to purchase a new laundry sink for the basement but haven't found a model we liked. On the good side, we scored two tall used bookcases for $20 each so our book piles are much neater.

Very Bad: My credit card balance went from $0 January 1 to $4400 as of today. That's $1800 for a new dental crown, $800 for new glasses and $3000 for a new transmission for my car, less interim payments. At least I've received reimbursements from medical insurance for the dental work & glasses and will recoup the rest from my medical flex spending account, and that $3k for the transmission is after a 10% discount. I plan to have this nearly zeroed again by the end of February.

Good: The tax returns are looking good again for this year so the updates to wills and medical powers-of-attorney will be created in March per our original schedule.

All other items are still a work in progress. More news as it develops.

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Car Review: Volkswagen Beetle

2012-08-07T23:21:32Z

The nice thing about traveling is that it’s the perfect opportunity to test drive cars you might not have previously considered. Even better, when they suck out loud, you can return them with no shame.

This trip, I had a Volkswagen Beetle. I give it a so-so rating.

On the good side, the seats were comfortable, the engine had great acceleration and the fuel consumption wasn’t horrid. It had a nice feel while driving in both city and highway conditions and handled very well. And who could resist its iconic profile?

On the bad side, it made me constantly and uncomfortably paranoid about my surroundings because nearly all of my lines of sight were blocked in some fashion. The rear view mirror was much too small to show what was happening behind me IMHO, although perhaps a larger one wouldn’t have been utterly defeated anyway by the four headrests. Even when I swiveled in the driver seat to look behind me while reversing, my field of vision was limited on both sides by the rear headrests. The roof struts on each side created enormous blind spots which scared the hell out of me while changing lanes and parallel parking. Even the windshield was less than it could be as my seat sat physically so high in the chassis that I was looking through the top two inches of the windshield rather than a preferred 1/3 vertical down the height of the windshield.

The steering wheel seemed designed to block my view of the dashboard. I could find no position which didn’t obscure some portion of the dash or controls. I had a choice of aggravating my carpal tunnel syndrome or seeing the speedometer and ultimately chose the speedometer for fear of local speed traps and radar cameras.

Trunk storage was OK. The two passenger rear seats were a token effort at best: only the smallest of people could get into & out of those without acrobatics or sit with comfortable foot & leg space.

My ultimately love/hate metric for a rental car is whether or not I'd swap my 2001 Honda Civic for the car I'm test driving. In this match-up, my Civic wins in nearly every category which matters to me. Your mileage may literally vary.

In short, it was a cute & snappy little beastie, but I couldn’t drive one for more than a few days without going insane. Road rage is supposed to come from other people on the road, not inflicted by your own vehicle.

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Car Maintenance Makes Me Cry, Phase 3 Follow-Up

2011-09-26T19:50:48Z

I collected my car from the garage this afternoon. Finally, it drives, sounds & smells like it should. And considering how much it cost, it damn well better!

Alternator $315.25
Alternator bracket $85.65
Alternator bolt $5
Manifold converter assembly $793.24 (inc. $128.05 labor)
Oxygen sensor (front) $114.91 (inc. $29.55 labor)
Oxygen sensor (back) $119.79 (inc. $29.25 labor)

In all, parts cost me $1,246.69, Labor $187.15, shop supplies $39.99 and sales tax $77.20 for a total of $1,551.03.

On the good side, I'm confident I'll get another five years of reliable use out of this car. As expensive as the maintenance has been this summer, it's still cheaper than buying a replacement car.

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Car Maintenance Makes Me Cry, Phase 3

2011-09-22T20:36:42Z

My saga of car maintenance continues...

After the timing belt replacement last month, I noticed my car was distinctly louder than it should be. Indeed, much louder than any car should be without the custom look-at-me!-look-at-me! hyper-bass I-have-a-small-dick-and-must-compensate mufflers. After discussing this back at the shop that same day, I was informed that the exhaust system near the manifold was corroding and a hole had developed: the entire system would have to be replaced. Having just dropped $1k that month for a timing belt and water pump, I opted to hold off for a short while to let my bank account recover slightly.

Yesterday morning, I bit the bullet and took my Civic back to the shop for the exhaust work. Initial estimate: $1100.

Yesterday afternoon, they called me to say the exhaust work was complete but now that the engine was quiet enough, they could hear something else not quite right in the proximity of the timing belt which had been replaced last month and asked if they could keep the car another day to investigate to ensure their prior work was solid. I like people who are willing to admit a mistake or seek improvement and I didn't need the car so I agreed.

This afternoon, I got another call: the sound wasn't anything to do with the timing belt or such. It was the alternator. More specifically, a bold & bracket attached to the alternator had corroded --did I mention the car is 10 years old?-- and allowed the alternator to slip a few degrees out of alignment, thus causing excess wear & tear on its bearings. If they could hold onto the car another day, they're over-nighting a replacement alternator, bracket & bolt to replace the dying one and, because I've been a good customer and exceedingly patient through this ordeal, they're waiving labor costs. Still, my bill this visit will top $1550.

sigh I didn't really need to eat anyway.

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Car Maintenance Makes Me Cry, Phase 2

2011-08-22T13:26:07Z

Last June, I started catching up on a lot of neglected car maintenance. This past week, I finished the second half: replacing the timing belt and water pump (long overdue), along with the normal oil change.

As expected, it wasn't cheap:
Parts: $460.89
Labor: 447.40
Shop Supplies: 39.99

With taxes, it came to $978.33. Ouch.

Still, if one is to believe the owner's manual, the timing belt replacement is some 60,000 miles overdue so I was really pushing the envelope and a failure while driving could cause catastrophic damage as well as severe inconvenience.

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