Must be a good day for bad days! :-)
Yesterday I spent much of the day trying to rehang a used liftgate I'd picked
up the previous weekend for my rusty '91 Ford Explorer. We'd thrown it on at
the junkyard that Saturday and gotten it to close, but that was about as good
as it got. I figured I could do better.
Wrong.
Essentially, it kept getting worse to the point where it stuck up and out a
good inch or more and (obviously) would no longer close or latch.
So this afternoon I let my local bodyshop crew have at it (owner/operator is
an old school chum). After 45 minutes of struggling, we all realized that the
top of the liftgate, where the hinges mount, was badly sprung. Part of it was
from the liftgate's PO, since one of the hinges was badly bent. The other
part of it was likely my doing in feeble efforts to fix it myself. Off it
came, bash, bash, bash with the body hammer until all was reasonably aligned
again, then back on, and Bob's your uncle.
Mind you this is NOT a Concours-ready Explorer. After 12 years next Monday,
and 211,700 miles, it's beginning to "powder coat" the landscape with flakes
of green paint and bits of severly oxidized sheet metal. But it still runs
and tows, so....
Anyway, I left the body shop only slightly poorer than when I'd arrived (nice
to have "friends" in the business) and drove seven miles to the supermarket,
whereupon I noticed the heat was blowing cold and the temp. gauge was showing
HOT. Not good. With steam a'risin' from under the hood, I decided to drive
back the 1/4 mile to another school chum's repair shop. (It pays to live
where you grew up and keep in touch with your old classmates.)
Everyone was gone but the receptionist, who was just locking up. (Oh, she's
another old friend.) She kept filling a small flower watering can with water
until I discovered an almost used up gallon of Rain-X windshield washer fluid
(can't recommend that stuff too highly -- it's great). Then she found a
couple of empty Pepsi bottles so I could save what was left of the Rain-X,
filled the jug for me with water, and once again I was on my way. Apparently,
I'd just slowly lost enough water somewhere over the recent months to cause
overheating; all now seems fine again.
Oh, and it's been cold and very rainy all day; hopefully that's the "third"
thing.
But at least I haven't lost power...yet....
These things never happen to my Triumphs, btw.
--Andy Mace
*Mrs Irrelevant: Oh, is it a jet?
*Man: Well, no ... It's not so much of a jet, it's more your, er,
Triumph Herald engine with wings.
-- Cut-price Airlines Sketch, Monty Python's Flying Circus (22)
/// triumphs@autox.team.net mailing list
/// or try http://www.team.net/cgi-bin/majorcool
/// Archives at http://www.team.net/archive
|