🚘 Today on Ron Ananian: The Car Doctor 🔧
Ron tackled myths, misdiagnoses, and the real science of fixing cars:
🔋 Battery Confusion – Cold = weak battery? Yes. But replacing it every 3–4 years “just because” is fear, not fact.
🚗 Toyota Knock – V6 top-end noise? Start simple: belt off, check VVT, use your ears before your wrench.
🛠️ Hyundai Headache – 1 year, $3.5K in parts, still no fix. Might not be the engine—could be the trans starting in 2nd gear.
🧠 The real fix? Science, logic, testing—not guessing.
🗣️ “Cars are physics, math, science. Fix them with facts—not fear.”
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Ron An Aian. You come into my shop as a
as a first time customer, We're gonna look at the
We're gonna look.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
At the car.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
We're gonna look the whole car over. I mean, that's
just policy, and I think it's I think it's a
good mandatory rule to have.
Speaker 3 (00:24):
The car Doctor could.
Speaker 4 (00:26):
Tep one tape on the bolt or I have no
idea how to pick that.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
This is the oil adapter housing at the engine block itself,
where the oil filter used to traditionally go correct.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Welcome to the radio home of ron Ananium, the Car Doctor.
Since nineteen ninety one, this is where car owners the
world overturned to for their definitive opinion on automotive repair.
If your mechanics giving you a busy signal, pick up
the phone and call in.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
The garage doors are open, but I am here to
take your calls at eight five five five, six hundred and.
Speaker 4 (01:03):
Running.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
You know, there are days I just they say to me,
how do you prepare for the show? And I don't know.
I'm not I'm not quite sure how to prepare some days.
Some days I do it more or less. I don't know,
just kind of thinking about it and it's it's hard. Uh,
It's it's really hard. I I just sit there and
(01:29):
I think, sometimes, you know, what do I want to
talk about? And it's it's difficult at best. Some days,
I hum, I just you know, I think I want
to start here. I want to talk about clearing codes
(01:49):
and the dangers of that and uh what that means,
because huh, you know, it's it's interesting. Remember a couple
of weeks ago, I talked to you about the twenty
twelve Cadillac that had set some thermostat faults and it
was having issues where the cooling fan was running and
(02:14):
it was just you know, temperature gage will go down
and the thermostat was kind of goofy and all that.
Remember that car, And I diagnosed it, and I told
the customer what was going on, and they decided that
instead of fixing it, they were going to get rid
of it. They were very excited, right, They were very
proud and happy that they you know, they were they were,
(02:38):
you know, able to drive a car for one hundred
and thirty five thousand miles hundred thirty thousand miles and
not have to spend any money on it, if you
recall that. So you know, they ended up deciding to
scrap the car, and they called this week. I haven't
talked to them in two and a half weeks, and
they called this week and they decided that they're going
(03:03):
to go buy a new car. Okay, And we were
driving it yesterday because we haven't driven it a whole lot,
and the cooling fan came back on and the check
engine light came back on. And you know, when we're
going to go trade it in now, we want to
do it on the last day of the month because
we want to go and get the best deal we can.
This is a real conversation, and we figured that if
(03:24):
we go in the last day of the month, they'll
they'll desperately take our trade. But we just want to
try and get the check engine light out. Is there
any way we can do that? You know, I think
it's a myth, right. I think this nonsense about that.
You know, they they say, let's you know, let's do
this on the last day of the month. I think
(03:46):
all that stuff, I think that's unrealistic. Nowadays, I don't
know that that's really applicable. I don't know that matters.
And frankly, I don't know that any car dealership is
really going to care if your twenty twelve Cadillac is
is a you know, perfect working order. It's got to
hurnd thirty thousand miles on it. It looks like if
it was a horse, we would shoot it because it
(04:09):
just looks like it's tired. It's it's beat up. It's
so I questioned the whole idea in the back of
my head, but I said, you know what, I'm going
to say yes because I'm not going to get paid
for it, which I didn't even ask because why it's
not the shop's obligation to you know, we got paid
(04:30):
for the diagnosis. We're not there to do this, you know,
twenty four to seven hold your hand to the grave
kind of a thing. That's not what a repair shop
is there for. But I decided to trot out my
five thousand dollars scan tool and take two minutes out
of my day and you know, walk outside and clear
the code because I got to make a speech. And
(04:52):
that was the best part of the of the of
the contact. And I explained to Anthony that it it
doesn't matter how this is really nonsense, because as soon
as he leaves the shop in all likelihood the check
engine light's going to come back on again. And I
explain the value of a repair shop's time, and that
(05:13):
you know, in some cases it costs the repair shop
between two and three dollars a minute. That's the value
of a repair shop. Think about what it costs for
a repair shop to be there. If their labor rate
is one hundred and eighty dollars an hour, it's a
sixty minute hour, that's three dollars an hour. In my mind,
that's the way I do math. You know, So where
(05:34):
is and what is the value? I got to say
all that. I don't know if it made any sense.
I don't know if it met And I did it nicely.
I wasn't trying to be insulting, because I think a
lot of times people do what they do because they
just don't have they don't have knowledge, and they don't
have experience, and they're working on either backyard myths or
(05:54):
things their parents taught them, who are judging by Anthony age,
they're long gone. May they rest in peace. But we're
working on things that worked for cars thirty forty, fifty
years ago, twenty years ago, last week. The industry changes weekly,
(06:15):
and it does. The economy changes weekly, and the approach
to repairing automobiles changes weekly. And that's the point of
all this. Clearing codes before you take it to a
dealership doesn't matter. I've known people that were trading cars
into Carvana. Carvana is not stupid. This isn't their first
(06:35):
day at the rodeo. And I've seen dealers do this too,
where they'll trot out a cheap basic scan tool and
they will they will just check for codes and there's
no code, but they'll also look to see, hey, have
the monitors run, and they'll see that the codes are clear,
and they'll see that the monitors haven't run yet because
(06:57):
you just cleared codes. They apply the sign it's in
the physics of OBD two and diagnostics. I don't know
what kind of car Anthony's going to get. I don't
know if he's even going to get a deal. I
know that it would probably be cheaper to do the
five hundred dollars worth of cooling system repairs to this
Cadillac than buy a new one. But he's pretty convinced
(07:19):
that buying a new one is the way to go,
So I'm not going to dissuade him. I don't know
if I'm going to answer the phone the next time,
I might let the answering machine get it. Because I've
said my speech. I've come to peace with it, and
I think that's the whole point of this, that clearing
codes isn't the answer, and that if you do choose
(07:40):
to clear codes, you should consider paying the mechanic because
their time is valuable. Leave it up to the mechanic
to say no, it's okay. But don't just assume. Because
assuming that a repair shop is there to well to
serve you, I don't think so. Repair shops are there
to make money. I always say anytime I engage in
(08:03):
anything professionally and personally, when I find somebody that does
their job, I am so happy to pay them because
I found somebody competent at their job. I found somebody
that knows what they're talking about, that shows up and
does what they're supposed to do. I want them to
be in business for a long time. I want them
to be able to take care of me and solve
(08:24):
my problems. I don't want to make them a slave,
because that is a bad thing. Eight five five five
six zero nine nine zero zero. I'm running inde in
the car, doctor, I'll be cruising back right after this.
Don't go away vehicle not taking you where you want
(08:47):
to go? Well call Ron. He's the expert at making
your vehicle take you where you need it. Eight five
five five six zero nine nine zero zero. And now
back to Rod. Hey, let's get over and talk to
Let's go talk to John and Michigan. John, what's up
here with the card doctor? How can I help?
Speaker 5 (09:03):
Okay? Ron, I talked to your screener, and there are
two issues that you brought to mind last week. And
one you spoke favorably of a brand that I had
always used, a brand of battery I had always used.
I won't mention it unless you ask me to.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Go ahead, listen, I am listen John. I gotta tell you, babe.
In my thirty something years on radio, I talk about
everybody good, better, and different. And if you've had a
bad experience with something I like, and I've had a
bad experience with something you like, let's figure out why,
because there's always a reason. And it's so I am
not afraid to mention brands good, better, and different. So
(09:38):
go ahead, what do you got.
Speaker 5 (09:39):
There's another show I listened to and I won't mention
that either. That they say replace your battery every three
or four years, no matter, no matter if you think
you need it or not. And I always followed that,
and my starters and the alternators lasted forever. I never
had a no start problem. And this scar, I've had
that brand. And they make it hard to figure out
(10:02):
the data manufacture because these other guys say it's aging,
it's sulfating when they put it on the shelf, and
you go by that date, not the date you bought it.
And that's why some batteries are sold into discount. So anyway,
I had intermittent problems and the car started fine, and
one time a service writer said change your battery, and
(10:23):
sure enough it took care of the problem. That was
an intermittent hard steering on the electronic steering, and it
took care of it for a long time, and that
kept happening. I got and sometimes I discovered, oh yeah,
and an instrument cluster went bad on me, and sometimes
the getting a new battery took care of it for
several months. And then I discovered when I disconnected the
(10:44):
battery and reconnected it, it would the things that start working again.
The speedometer, gas gauge, et cetera. And anyway, these guys
say something about the relays need to see X number
of vaults or they'll start acting funny. They call them gremlins,
but I won't and sometimes Intermit artificial intelligence told me
(11:05):
try changing the battery for different problems. I won't winto
all of them, and it worked, and even disconnecting the
battery would work. But I never had a no start problem.
And so I replaced some of these batteries before their
warranty period was up, which was two years. And I
found out that brand is apparently all re manufactured, and
(11:26):
they're not like they used to be. I can tell
you that I don't think i'll buy them again.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
What brand is that?
Speaker 5 (11:30):
John ac Delco? Okay, no maintenance and what is it?
What's I can say? Oh, and I'll probably forgetting sting.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
But now you're doing.
Speaker 5 (11:44):
Great about getting cleanings. These guys on that other show
recommend getting an induction system cleaning and throttle body cleaning
every fifty thousand whatever. I never did it. And I
had two hundred and twenty something thousand miles and I
heard a whistling with I took for a tire noise
on the highway, and then I got a message right
where my odometer is telling me low power, and it
(12:08):
was Friday. I took it to the dealer and they
next day they replaced the throttle body. And I wonder
if they may have could have just cleaned it. But uh,
that cost me six hundred bucks. And I figure I
I broke even because getting all those cleanings these the
other guy recommended would have cost me the six hundred Maybe.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
Well, how about we think of it like this, all right,
when you do a fuel system cleaning, I think it
sort of depends on how you do it, all right,
When you go to the dentist for a cleaning, when
you go for any medical procedure where they do something
to you know, take care of you, an eyesight check up,
(12:44):
you know, a skin inspection, all that stuff, it just
depends on how the attending physician does it. And I
guess the American Medical Association has standards that maybe the
uder repair industry should look at when we do a
fuel system cleaning. I know, I know a few shops
that do it this way. We tend to do it
one of a couple of ways. If it's a newer
vehicle not so much. But if it's an older vehicle,
(13:06):
I will drive that car, get it warm. I will
look at fuel trim and graph the numbers, and then
afterwards I'll do a fuel system cleaning. And when I
do a fuel system cleaning, regardless of ag or mileage,
I will always do it a certain specific way. It's
so much at idle, it's so much at part throttle.
You know, we'll sit in the car. We'll sit with
(13:28):
the car and run the numbers, run the throttle so
that we're varying the load on the engine. Because what
I'm concerned about is, and I'm doing this with a
scan tool hooked up, I'm looking at catalytic converter temperature.
I want to know that the cat's lit off so
that I'm getting maximum efficiency of combustion inside the cat,
so to speak. Because a lot of fuel system cleaning
(13:48):
benefit extends beyond the engine, beyond intake valves. It extends
top of pistons, sure, but it also gets down into
the exhausted you know, how clean can you get the cat?
Because that's part of what a good fuel system cleaning does.
To your point, all right, to your comment, could they
have just gotten away without having to replace the throttle body.
(14:09):
The advantage of doing fuel system cleaning, the way I
describe it to you, is I can see a change
in fuel trim numbers and I usually get a report
back that because of improved fuel trim numbers, your heart
rates better, your your blood pressure is better. Right, You're
more agile, the car performs better, the car gets better mileage.
(14:29):
So it's not the idea. And here's my point, and
I appreciate you letting me take them minute to explain it.
It's not that doing the fuel system cleaning will just
give you longevity alone. It's how well you enjoy the
ride along the way. You know what I'm saying. Like,
I know people that live to ninety years old and
(14:50):
they go to the gym every day of their life
from the time they're thirty till they're ninety and then
but I also know people that never go to the
gym and they struggle to get to ninety. I go
to the jim because I want to get to ninety
and just fall over. I want to be done, but
I want to have a good time getting there. You
understand what I'm talking about. And and a fuel system cleaning.
You'll do that. Now, had they cleaned the throttle body
(15:11):
along the way, you know, you don't know, you don't
know how dirty it was. Was it carbon impacted such
that the housing was distorted. It doesn't take much to
annoy a throttle body. It's kind of like the cranky
old man on the car, and it will it will
react in different ways. So you know that's that's that's
(15:34):
my thoughts on that. Can I talk about your battery comments?
Speaker 5 (15:37):
Well, first I could define fuel trimmed to sateurs.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
Well, fuel trim is you have a heart rate and
blood pressure, right, that's your that's your vital signs. Fuel
trim is the computer's digital representation. It's a number on
a scan tool that shows how efficient or in what
range the engine is from its base fuel trim. Every
(16:02):
engine starts at zero. Remember high school. I always go
back to this. Remember high school, I think was geometry
or algebra one where they showed us number lines and
they showed us zero and then positive numbers and negative numbers.
Do you remember that? Okay, zero is base fuel trim.
So what are you driving a twenty eleven Malibu? So
(16:23):
a twenty eleven Malibu has a different base fuel trim
than a two thousand and six Toyota Solara, then a
two thousand and four Chevy Suburban, and so on, But
every one of them starts at zero, all right. That
base number is calculated by the engineers and the vehicle manufacturers,
and they say, here's the idealic position of how much
(16:44):
fuel to how much air we want to give the
engine across a graph in order for it to operate properly.
Now something changes, John's air filter gets a little dirty,
or John steps on the guests harder than we anticipated,
or the car comes to a stop, or the vehicle
is aging gonna We're gonna add a little more fuel.
That would be a positive number, or we're gonna take
(17:07):
fuel away that would be a negative number. But we're
trying to maintain that base fuel trim. So fuel trim
is often referred to in two ways. Short term instantaneous,
now today, what's going on right this second? And long
term three minutes ago, five minutes ago, yesterday. I always
equate it to people. I always say, what did you
(17:28):
have for lunch yesterday? That's long term, that's history, And
what are you gonna have for lunch today? That's short term.
That's now, that's in. That's in the know. They typically
take the two numbers and they work against each other
as modifiers. They'll look at long term. Hey, when he
did this, I know the car did that. When the
O two center did this, the map center did this,
(17:49):
the mess airflow center did that. I was looking at
this and it looks at fuel trim and it's always
using it as a base calculation number. And it's just
that important to it. So I'll tell you what, John,
sitting tight, I want to finish up the rest of
our conversation. I don't want to rush at baby. Let
me let me pull over to take this pause. When
I come back, we'll finish up. I'm running any and
(18:10):
the car doctor. We're coming back to you right after this.
(18:46):
And we are back. Let's go back with John. John,
you're still there, sir Michigan.
Speaker 5 (18:51):
John.
Speaker 1 (18:52):
Yes, So did that make sense to your regarding fuel trim?
Speaker 5 (18:57):
Well, yes, but I have to say that I have
we monitor the gaugeous fuel economy that the instant one
on the average, and it was fine before and after.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Okay, Well again, you don't you don't know if it
would have gotten better if you never had a fuel
system cleaning done though, did you?
Speaker 5 (19:17):
That's right? But it was it was well, it was
acceptable on the highway anyway, Well.
Speaker 1 (19:24):
It was acceptable. What right? But I'm saying, could a
fuel system cleaning have improved that? Listen, it's conjecture. You
won't know at this point.
Speaker 5 (19:30):
Well, right, if I'm pure highway driving for cylinder car,
I was doing better than I did with my Cobal
It was like sometimes its highest thirty.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
Four and uh and who's to say it couldn't have
gotten better?
Speaker 5 (19:46):
Well, I guess, well, I mean, we.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
Can agree to disagree, but you know, it's it's it's
either it does or it doesn't. The point of the
conversation is you were asking about fuel system cleaning, and
I told you the value of it, and that's and
that's the point. Whether you do it or not, that's
completely up to you.
Speaker 5 (20:04):
I find some places don't want to do chemicals because
I guess, you know, a card of customer as a
problem's going to blame it on the clean and.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Well, some places don't want to do transmissions either. Some
guys don't want to go back to school and understand
the theory and the technology that's you know, facing with
modern cars. I still know guys that are waiting for
carburetors to come back. I don't think any of it's
going to happen, So you know, there's a ridiculousness to
it too. But now regarding batteries, I commend you, and
(20:33):
I understand where you're coming from, but I've got to
tell you we now we sell ac Delco. They're available,
they're a good product, we have good distribution, and we
have very few problems with them, and we've had an
excellent warranty relationship. The ones that do go bad, you
know with them? Is ac Delco or re manufactured battery.
I've never heard that term before.
Speaker 5 (20:55):
That's what someone told me. I hope it's not a lot.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
Well, I don't see how it could be. I I
really don't. I would think that would be complete, completely
misleading to the public. And the way that with the
way everybody jumps up and down today with everything going
on in the world, how everybody knows everything about everything
and they point fingers at everybody for every little thing
they do. I would think if ac Delka was committing
fraud of a remanufactured battery, I would think that we
(21:19):
would know about it.
Speaker 5 (21:21):
Who told me that. Say that again, I said, don't
quote me, but it may have been the dealer who
told me that. The service writer.
Speaker 1 (21:28):
Well, listen, I know a lot of service writers and
dealerships who shouldn't be there. So it's it's it's misinformation.
And also was he trying to sell you a battery
or sell you a different battery?
Speaker 5 (21:40):
Oh? Actually I went in because someone suggested, well, that's
one thing you do it change the battery. See if
the steering problem got better. And it did, wow, And
the cluster got better for a while, And that's another issue.
I could go and do another call about the instrument
cluster problem and they don't make it anymore, and finally
someone who could repair it.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
You know, John, I see no connection.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
Are you?
Speaker 1 (22:03):
Are you saying that you're putting a battery in the
car made the instrument cluster operate better?
Speaker 5 (22:10):
Yeah? And it was temperature related for somehow.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
But did you happen to measure did you happen to
measure voltage of both batteries before you changed it? Before
and after?
Speaker 5 (22:19):
I just know that it got better for several months, got.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
Better, how John, that's the test, John, got better?
Speaker 5 (22:27):
How it started? The speedometer and the gas gauge, et cetera.
They all started working again consistently. Previous to that, it
was intermittent and seemed to be temperature related. Well, and
and then I have no I can't explain it. That
electricity is baffling to me. But there were times when
disconnecting the battery and reconnecting it the problem resolved until
(22:50):
the next time I it was cold in the morning.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
I would think it's more the act of disconnecting the
battery and resetting a module or changing something. I don't
I don't see the difference of the battery itself having
an effect on the dashboard module or the way the
vehicle operates, not on a twenty eleven. If this was
an older, much older vehicle, and we can have a
conversation about electrical reserve and what it's doing.
Speaker 5 (23:15):
That was that that passed the test until the temperature
was really cold the problem.
Speaker 1 (23:21):
Yeah, But John, when a battery gets cold, it's gonna die.
I mean, that's just that's just normal physics. So why
is that a surprise?
Speaker 5 (23:31):
The battery would always start the car, That's what I'm
That's what's baffling to me. Certain things would now function,
but it would start fine and you would never know.
And anyway, Oh and about changing the battery, these other
guys say that if if you don't follow their advice
about changing the getting a new battery every three or
four years, no matter what, that, you're going to strain
your alternator. And my alternators have been lasting for a
(23:54):
long time until oh it finally wanted to.
Speaker 1 (23:58):
You know, John, I'm gonna leave it here. There's two
ways to fix a car. You can either apply physics
and science, or you can do it by fear. I
think blindly changing a battery on every car every three
years is living in fear. A lot of cars go
one hundred, one hundred and fifty thousand miles without ever
replacing walternators, or starters or a lot of things. I
(24:21):
think that doing what you're doing is cautious and if
it's working for you, but I think you got to
apply the science of or to repair to the automobile
in order to get a proper way to go about it.
Let's pull over to take a pause. Eight five five
five six zero nine nine zero zero. I'm back right
after this. Hey, we're back. Let's get over and talk
(24:53):
to Bill and Colorado. Wait, and they're very patiently, Billy,
I appreciate it. What's going on today?
Speaker 2 (24:58):
Hey, Ron, good to talk to you. So I have
recently had a friend's car over for a couple of
minor unrelated things. And while it's here, I noticed that
it has a nasty sounding top end knock which is
easily noticeable in neutral at two thousand rpm. Or also
(25:22):
if you're at idle and you put the car in gear,
you can hear it under that load. And did some googling,
look for tsb's and so this is the three point
three leader V six, the two G sorry, the three
mz f E. And everything I found online was for
the for the four cylinder two g r f E,
(25:43):
the the chain driven six cylinder. I couldn't find any
stuff about this for the belt driven six cylinders.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
Okay, you know, so if you take all the just
just starting at the beginning higher mileage, how many miles
are on.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
This I think like one sixty Yeah, not a lot
of miles.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
So when it when it makes this noise, well, first
of all, what does the oil look like? Brown? Beat
up looks great? Okay, yeah, you take the belt, you
take the serpentine belt off and the noise is still there.
Speaker 2 (26:19):
I haven't had a chance to really do my diligence
on this, but the noise does sound like it's coming
from like dead center of the block on the top.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Okay, And how long has it been doing this?
Speaker 2 (26:30):
I don't know, right, I think she knows either, right?
Speaker 1 (26:33):
And does does she hear it? Is she complaining about it?
Or is it because I know how sensitive your ears.
Speaker 2 (26:38):
Are A bill, Yeah, she wasn't. She hadn't noticed it,
and I didn't really have time to get into it.
Speaker 1 (26:44):
So do us both a favor. Take the belt off first,
see if the noise goes away. If the noise doesn't
go away, because there's there's not a lot that really
goes wrong with the time with the belt driven V six,
they work until they don't. It's a pretty durable motor.
Speaker 2 (26:59):
And so I was wondering, is there a typical VVT
issue with these that I should be looking for? Like
I know on some of the VVT systems you get
a bolt that comes off.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
No, I haven't seen that. I mean, if it's got
a VVT solenoid and you unplug it and rev it up,
does the noise change? That's another thing I should try, right, Yeah,
you know, let's see if we hold if we hold
timing fixed, does that Obviously we're going to set some codes,
but we don't care, right, you know, start start to
break it down. The problem is you're trying to diagnose
(27:29):
an almost twenty year old vehicle with higher mileage, and
you're working within the confines of trying not to take
the engine apart. So get creative. How would you approach it?
You know, if you were to pull a valve cover,
you won't see anything. So you know, I have had
some toyotas and I don't remember if this engine has them,
(27:49):
but some of the some of the toyotas with the
balance shafts, and I think that's the four cylinders that
I'm thinking of. They make an awful racket down low
that you would find out that the balance scheft set
up was falling apart. But at that point the engines
had so many miles on them you ended up rebuilding
the engine anyway because these were three hundred thousand miles.
So you know, I think you've got to start with
(28:11):
basics before you start doing a deeper dive. I think,
before you start taking anything apart, you know, just to
see where we go. Does it change with temperature? Is
it just as loud cold as it is warm?
Speaker 2 (28:25):
Yeah, it didn't seem to change.
Speaker 1 (28:26):
Okay, take the belt off. Let's start there. All right,
Let's let's look for a constant and work our way out.
Call me back next week or the week after. Let
me know what you're find.
Speaker 5 (28:35):
We can talk.
Speaker 1 (28:37):
We'll do all right, kittle be Well, let's get on
over and talk to Chris and Florida. Seventeen hunday, Tucson
and what's going on here? Hey, Chris, welcome to the
car doctor. How can I help?
Speaker 5 (28:46):
Hey? Ron?
Speaker 4 (28:47):
Hey, yeah, I got a seventeen day Tucson and this
thing has been driving me nuts. I've had this thing
for over almost a year now, trying to get this
thing to run. It started out with throwing some code,
some mass airflow sensor codes, some oxygen codes, and then
it was still on turbo codes. So we of course
(29:08):
eliminated all that, put a turbo on it. It's still
doing it. Well. What it's doing is it'll crank up
and it'll run. But when you go to take off,
pull out into traffic, the car falls flat on its
fate it's a one point six liter turbo and so
so we went ahead and I gave up. I got
(29:30):
tired of throwing money at parts, swapping parts out. I
took it to the Hyundaid dealership. They diagnosed it. They
first they tell me they need extra time to diagnose it,
and then they come back and they tell me it
needs a high pressure fuel pump and it needs a
flex type. So I'm like, okay, that's and they said, well,
(29:50):
for thirty five hundred dollars, will make your problems go away. Well,
I said, no, that's okay.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
Thanks.
Speaker 4 (29:55):
Anyway, so I went and got the high fuel pressure
pump for a couple hundred bucks. Me and my son
installed it in like ten minutes, and then we put
the flex pipe on there and it didn't do anything whatsoever.
So they totally misdiagnosed that. I went to take my
four hundred dollars flexpipe back, they wouldn't return it. So anyways,
(30:15):
took it another shop and they put it in the
air and they noticed that the catalytic converter was glowing. Said, man,
you need to change the cats in this thing. It's
only got eighty eight thousand miles. Okay, Well, I changed
one cat, the main cat one on top, put another
It didn't fix the problem. Put another turbo in, it
didn't fix the problem. It still falls flat on his
face like it was day one, Chris.
Speaker 1 (30:37):
Has anybody you know what sort of dis I'm hearing
parts being changed? I have two questions. Has anybody done
any real diagnosis? And has any of the codes that
you started out with gone away?
Speaker 4 (30:50):
Yeah, that's the funny thing. Right now, there's there's no codes,
no codes on the car right now?
Speaker 1 (30:55):
All right, so codes of so, codes of so have
been corrected. I'll say whether that's a true statement or not,
I'm not sure, but codes of codes have sort of
been corrected. But nobody. Has anybody hooked up a vacuum gauge,
looked at exhaust back pressure? Has anybody done something like
a volumetric efficiency test which isn't as scary as it sounds.
(31:17):
I'm not going to stand on trying to confuse you here,
but has anybody done any basic testing beyond beyond what
you think the dealer has done? And could you have
misinterpreted what the dealer said and changed the wrong pipe.
I'm not picking on you, I'm just trying to be
objective from the sideline.
Speaker 4 (31:35):
No, I was straight off there they're.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
Tiking, so you know my comment would be, and I
have I have one other question. Are we starting out
in first gear?
Speaker 4 (31:47):
You know that's a good question.
Speaker 5 (31:49):
I really don't know the answer to that. It almost
acts like.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Right, is it starting off in second gear? So yeah,
could you? Could you have had a pile of problems
that took you down the path of oh, it's engine, engine, engine,
and you've solved them, but you also have a transmission problem.
Speaker 4 (32:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (32:09):
No, I haven't even went down a transmission road with it.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
Right, So let's figure out how many speeds the transmission
is supposed to shift through, and let's go out for
a simple road test, and do we have all those?
You know, if it's a five speed and you only
get four and you only get four speeds, well we're
starting out in the wrong gear. Can you manually pull
it down into first and improve the acceleration?
Speaker 4 (32:33):
Yeah, you know, I guess I'll have to try that.
I don't think we tried after all this time.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
All right? And then the other thing is if you can,
if you can, if you can do it, if you
can do the test, I want you to go and
do a volumetric efficiency test. Go google volumetric efficiency. Just
like I describe it. You'll come to a website for
the Automotive Training Group ATG and they'll talk about volumetric
efficiency test and using a scan tool, your right foot
(32:59):
and the open road. It's real simple and easy to do.
Do those couple of things. Call me back, but let's
go take a look at that. Let's start to diagnose,
because I haven't heard that's happened yet. Eight five five
five six zero nine nine zero zero running naming the
car doctor. I'm back right after this. You know, repairing
(33:28):
cars and doing a radio show about repairing cars is
exactly alike. You have to stay calm under fire, you
have to return fire, you have to think your way
through the problems. I want to give kudos to my
chief engineer, Tom Ray this hour because, whether you guys
caught it or not, what goes on behind the background.
I almost wish I had the camera on him. When
(33:48):
the internet dropped out on his side of the studio.
I was still on air, but I couldn't talk to
Tom for about a minute there. We lost touch with
each other. It was kind of like flying around the
back side of the moon. And I'm sure Tom as
busy as he came back and he returned fire, and
he did a great job. And it reminded me of
some of the calls this hour. Some of the calls
were like returning fire. We have to diagnose by some
(34:13):
logical sequential sequence. And this isn't directed at anybody in particular,
It was just the general theme today. We have to
get away from wives tales, we have to get away
from backyard myths. We have to get away from well
I did this and it did that. But I have
no reason or explanation of to why we have to
understand what's going on. Automobiles are numbers, their math, their physics,
(34:35):
their science. There's a reason why there's an action and
a reaction to everything you do to them and they
do to us. Trust me, I've been there. I've been
doing this a while until the next time. I'm not
an ad in the car.
Speaker 5 (34:47):
Doctor.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
Good mechanics aren't expensive, they're priceless. See y
Ron An Aian. You come into my shop as a
as a first time customer, We're gonna look at the
We're gonna look.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
At the car.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
We're gonna look the whole car over. I mean, that's
just policy, and I think it's I think it's a
good mandatory rule to have.
Speaker 3 (00:24):
The car Doctor could.
Speaker 4 (00:26):
Tep one tape on the bolt or I have no
idea how to pick that.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
This is the oil adapter housing at the engine block itself,
where the oil filter used to traditionally go correct.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Welcome to the radio home of ron Ananium, the Car Doctor.
Since nineteen ninety one, this is where car owners the
world overturned to for their definitive opinion on automotive repair.
If your mechanics giving you a busy signal, pick up
the phone and call in.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
The garage doors are open, but I am here to
take your calls at eight five five five, six hundred and.
Speaker 4 (01:03):
Running.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
You know, there are days I just they say to me,
how do you prepare for the show? And I don't know.
I'm not I'm not quite sure how to prepare some days.
Some days I do it more or less. I don't know,
just kind of thinking about it and it's it's hard. Uh,
It's it's really hard. I I just sit there and
(01:29):
I think, sometimes, you know, what do I want to
talk about? And it's it's difficult at best. Some days,
I hum, I just you know, I think I want
to start here. I want to talk about clearing codes
(01:49):
and the dangers of that and uh what that means,
because huh, you know, it's it's interesting. Remember a couple
of weeks ago, I talked to you about the twenty
twelve Cadillac that had set some thermostat faults and it
was having issues where the cooling fan was running and
(02:14):
it was just you know, temperature gage will go down
and the thermostat was kind of goofy and all that.
Remember that car, And I diagnosed it, and I told
the customer what was going on, and they decided that
instead of fixing it, they were going to get rid
of it. They were very excited, right, They were very
proud and happy that they you know, they were they were,
(02:38):
you know, able to drive a car for one hundred
and thirty five thousand miles hundred thirty thousand miles and
not have to spend any money on it, if you
recall that. So you know, they ended up deciding to
scrap the car, and they called this week. I haven't
talked to them in two and a half weeks, and
they called this week and they decided that they're going
(03:03):
to go buy a new car. Okay, And we were
driving it yesterday because we haven't driven it a whole lot,
and the cooling fan came back on and the check
engine light came back on. And you know, when we're
going to go trade it in now, we want to
do it on the last day of the month because
we want to go and get the best deal we can.
This is a real conversation, and we figured that if
(03:24):
we go in the last day of the month, they'll
they'll desperately take our trade. But we just want to
try and get the check engine light out. Is there
any way we can do that? You know, I think
it's a myth, right. I think this nonsense about that.
You know, they they say, let's you know, let's do
this on the last day of the month. I think
(03:46):
all that stuff, I think that's unrealistic. Nowadays, I don't
know that that's really applicable. I don't know that matters.
And frankly, I don't know that any car dealership is
really going to care if your twenty twelve Cadillac is
is a you know, perfect working order. It's got to
hurnd thirty thousand miles on it. It looks like if
it was a horse, we would shoot it because it
(04:09):
just looks like it's tired. It's it's beat up. It's
so I questioned the whole idea in the back of
my head, but I said, you know what, I'm going
to say yes because I'm not going to get paid
for it, which I didn't even ask because why it's
not the shop's obligation to you know, we got paid
(04:30):
for the diagnosis. We're not there to do this, you know,
twenty four to seven hold your hand to the grave
kind of a thing. That's not what a repair shop
is there for. But I decided to trot out my
five thousand dollars scan tool and take two minutes out
of my day and you know, walk outside and clear
the code because I got to make a speech. And
(04:52):
that was the best part of the of the of
the contact. And I explained to Anthony that it it
doesn't matter how this is really nonsense, because as soon
as he leaves the shop in all likelihood the check
engine light's going to come back on again. And I
explain the value of a repair shop's time, and that
(05:13):
you know, in some cases it costs the repair shop
between two and three dollars a minute. That's the value
of a repair shop. Think about what it costs for
a repair shop to be there. If their labor rate
is one hundred and eighty dollars an hour, it's a
sixty minute hour, that's three dollars an hour. In my mind,
that's the way I do math. You know, So where
(05:34):
is and what is the value? I got to say
all that. I don't know if it made any sense.
I don't know if it met And I did it nicely.
I wasn't trying to be insulting, because I think a
lot of times people do what they do because they
just don't have they don't have knowledge, and they don't
have experience, and they're working on either backyard myths or
(05:54):
things their parents taught them, who are judging by Anthony age,
they're long gone. May they rest in peace. But we're
working on things that worked for cars thirty forty, fifty
years ago, twenty years ago, last week. The industry changes weekly,
(06:15):
and it does. The economy changes weekly, and the approach
to repairing automobiles changes weekly. And that's the point of
all this. Clearing codes before you take it to a
dealership doesn't matter. I've known people that were trading cars
into Carvana. Carvana is not stupid. This isn't their first
(06:35):
day at the rodeo. And I've seen dealers do this too,
where they'll trot out a cheap basic scan tool and
they will they will just check for codes and there's
no code, but they'll also look to see, hey, have
the monitors run, and they'll see that the codes are clear,
and they'll see that the monitors haven't run yet because
(06:57):
you just cleared codes. They apply the sign it's in
the physics of OBD two and diagnostics. I don't know
what kind of car Anthony's going to get. I don't
know if he's even going to get a deal. I
know that it would probably be cheaper to do the
five hundred dollars worth of cooling system repairs to this
Cadillac than buy a new one. But he's pretty convinced
(07:19):
that buying a new one is the way to go,
So I'm not going to dissuade him. I don't know
if I'm going to answer the phone the next time,
I might let the answering machine get it. Because I've
said my speech. I've come to peace with it, and
I think that's the whole point of this, that clearing
codes isn't the answer, and that if you do choose
(07:40):
to clear codes, you should consider paying the mechanic because
their time is valuable. Leave it up to the mechanic
to say no, it's okay. But don't just assume. Because
assuming that a repair shop is there to well to
serve you, I don't think so. Repair shops are there
to make money. I always say anytime I engage in
(08:03):
anything professionally and personally, when I find somebody that does
their job, I am so happy to pay them because
I found somebody competent at their job. I found somebody
that knows what they're talking about, that shows up and
does what they're supposed to do. I want them to
be in business for a long time. I want them
to be able to take care of me and solve
(08:24):
my problems. I don't want to make them a slave,
because that is a bad thing. Eight five five five
six zero nine nine zero zero. I'm running inde in
the car, doctor, I'll be cruising back right after this.
Don't go away vehicle not taking you where you want
(08:47):
to go? Well call Ron. He's the expert at making
your vehicle take you where you need it. Eight five
five five six zero nine nine zero zero. And now
back to Rod. Hey, let's get over and talk to
Let's go talk to John and Michigan. John, what's up
here with the card doctor? How can I help?
Speaker 5 (09:03):
Okay? Ron, I talked to your screener, and there are
two issues that you brought to mind last week. And
one you spoke favorably of a brand that I had
always used, a brand of battery I had always used.
I won't mention it unless you ask me to.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Go ahead, listen, I am listen John. I gotta tell you, babe.
In my thirty something years on radio, I talk about
everybody good, better, and different. And if you've had a
bad experience with something I like, and I've had a
bad experience with something you like, let's figure out why,
because there's always a reason. And it's so I am
not afraid to mention brands good, better, and different. So
(09:38):
go ahead, what do you got.
Speaker 5 (09:39):
There's another show I listened to and I won't mention
that either. That they say replace your battery every three
or four years, no matter, no matter if you think
you need it or not. And I always followed that,
and my starters and the alternators lasted forever. I never
had a no start problem. And this scar, I've had
that brand. And they make it hard to figure out
(10:02):
the data manufacture because these other guys say it's aging,
it's sulfating when they put it on the shelf, and
you go by that date, not the date you bought it.
And that's why some batteries are sold into discount. So anyway,
I had intermittent problems and the car started fine, and
one time a service writer said change your battery, and
(10:23):
sure enough it took care of the problem. That was
an intermittent hard steering on the electronic steering, and it
took care of it for a long time, and that
kept happening. I got and sometimes I discovered, oh yeah,
and an instrument cluster went bad on me, and sometimes
the getting a new battery took care of it for
several months. And then I discovered when I disconnected the
(10:44):
battery and reconnected it, it would the things that start working again.
The speedometer, gas gauge, et cetera. And anyway, these guys
say something about the relays need to see X number
of vaults or they'll start acting funny. They call them gremlins,
but I won't and sometimes Intermit artificial intelligence told me
(11:05):
try changing the battery for different problems. I won't winto
all of them, and it worked, and even disconnecting the
battery would work. But I never had a no start problem.
And so I replaced some of these batteries before their
warranty period was up, which was two years. And I
found out that brand is apparently all re manufactured, and
(11:26):
they're not like they used to be. I can tell
you that I don't think i'll buy them again.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
What brand is that?
Speaker 5 (11:30):
John ac Delco? Okay, no maintenance and what is it?
What's I can say? Oh, and I'll probably forgetting sting.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
But now you're doing.
Speaker 5 (11:44):
Great about getting cleanings. These guys on that other show
recommend getting an induction system cleaning and throttle body cleaning
every fifty thousand whatever. I never did it. And I
had two hundred and twenty something thousand miles and I
heard a whistling with I took for a tire noise
on the highway, and then I got a message right
where my odometer is telling me low power, and it
(12:08):
was Friday. I took it to the dealer and they
next day they replaced the throttle body. And I wonder
if they may have could have just cleaned it. But uh,
that cost me six hundred bucks. And I figure I
I broke even because getting all those cleanings these the
other guy recommended would have cost me the six hundred Maybe.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
Well, how about we think of it like this, all right,
when you do a fuel system cleaning, I think it
sort of depends on how you do it, all right,
When you go to the dentist for a cleaning, when
you go for any medical procedure where they do something
to you know, take care of you, an eyesight check up,
(12:44):
you know, a skin inspection, all that stuff, it just
depends on how the attending physician does it. And I
guess the American Medical Association has standards that maybe the
uder repair industry should look at when we do a
fuel system cleaning. I know, I know a few shops
that do it this way. We tend to do it
one of a couple of ways. If it's a newer
vehicle not so much. But if it's an older vehicle,
(13:06):
I will drive that car, get it warm. I will
look at fuel trim and graph the numbers, and then
afterwards I'll do a fuel system cleaning. And when I
do a fuel system cleaning, regardless of ag or mileage,
I will always do it a certain specific way. It's
so much at idle, it's so much at part throttle.
You know, we'll sit in the car. We'll sit with
(13:28):
the car and run the numbers, run the throttle so
that we're varying the load on the engine. Because what
I'm concerned about is, and I'm doing this with a
scan tool hooked up, I'm looking at catalytic converter temperature.
I want to know that the cat's lit off so
that I'm getting maximum efficiency of combustion inside the cat,
so to speak. Because a lot of fuel system cleaning
(13:48):
benefit extends beyond the engine, beyond intake valves. It extends
top of pistons, sure, but it also gets down into
the exhausted you know, how clean can you get the cat?
Because that's part of what a good fuel system cleaning does.
To your point, all right, to your comment, could they
have just gotten away without having to replace the throttle body.
(14:09):
The advantage of doing fuel system cleaning, the way I
describe it to you, is I can see a change
in fuel trim numbers and I usually get a report
back that because of improved fuel trim numbers, your heart
rates better, your your blood pressure is better. Right, You're
more agile, the car performs better, the car gets better mileage.
(14:29):
So it's not the idea. And here's my point, and
I appreciate you letting me take them minute to explain it.
It's not that doing the fuel system cleaning will just
give you longevity alone. It's how well you enjoy the
ride along the way. You know what I'm saying. Like,
I know people that live to ninety years old and
(14:50):
they go to the gym every day of their life
from the time they're thirty till they're ninety and then
but I also know people that never go to the
gym and they struggle to get to ninety. I go
to the jim because I want to get to ninety
and just fall over. I want to be done, but
I want to have a good time getting there. You
understand what I'm talking about. And and a fuel system cleaning.
You'll do that. Now, had they cleaned the throttle body
(15:11):
along the way, you know, you don't know, you don't
know how dirty it was. Was it carbon impacted such
that the housing was distorted. It doesn't take much to
annoy a throttle body. It's kind of like the cranky
old man on the car, and it will it will
react in different ways. So you know that's that's that's
(15:34):
my thoughts on that. Can I talk about your battery comments?
Speaker 5 (15:37):
Well, first I could define fuel trimmed to sateurs.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
Well, fuel trim is you have a heart rate and
blood pressure, right, that's your that's your vital signs. Fuel
trim is the computer's digital representation. It's a number on
a scan tool that shows how efficient or in what
range the engine is from its base fuel trim. Every
(16:02):
engine starts at zero. Remember high school. I always go
back to this. Remember high school, I think was geometry
or algebra one where they showed us number lines and
they showed us zero and then positive numbers and negative numbers.
Do you remember that? Okay, zero is base fuel trim.
So what are you driving a twenty eleven Malibu? So
(16:23):
a twenty eleven Malibu has a different base fuel trim
than a two thousand and six Toyota Solara, then a
two thousand and four Chevy Suburban, and so on, But
every one of them starts at zero, all right. That
base number is calculated by the engineers and the vehicle manufacturers,
and they say, here's the idealic position of how much
(16:44):
fuel to how much air we want to give the
engine across a graph in order for it to operate properly.
Now something changes, John's air filter gets a little dirty,
or John steps on the guests harder than we anticipated,
or the car comes to a stop, or the vehicle
is aging gonna We're gonna add a little more fuel.
That would be a positive number, or we're gonna take
(17:07):
fuel away that would be a negative number. But we're
trying to maintain that base fuel trim. So fuel trim
is often referred to in two ways. Short term instantaneous,
now today, what's going on right this second? And long
term three minutes ago, five minutes ago, yesterday. I always
equate it to people. I always say, what did you
(17:28):
have for lunch yesterday? That's long term, that's history, And
what are you gonna have for lunch today? That's short term.
That's now, that's in. That's in the know. They typically
take the two numbers and they work against each other
as modifiers. They'll look at long term. Hey, when he
did this, I know the car did that. When the
O two center did this, the map center did this,
(17:49):
the mess airflow center did that. I was looking at
this and it looks at fuel trim and it's always
using it as a base calculation number. And it's just
that important to it. So I'll tell you what, John,
sitting tight, I want to finish up the rest of
our conversation. I don't want to rush at baby. Let
me let me pull over to take this pause. When
I come back, we'll finish up. I'm running any and
(18:10):
the car doctor. We're coming back to you right after this.
(18:46):
And we are back. Let's go back with John. John,
you're still there, sir Michigan.
Speaker 5 (18:51):
John.
Speaker 1 (18:52):
Yes, So did that make sense to your regarding fuel trim?
Speaker 5 (18:57):
Well, yes, but I have to say that I have
we monitor the gaugeous fuel economy that the instant one
on the average, and it was fine before and after.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Okay, Well again, you don't you don't know if it
would have gotten better if you never had a fuel
system cleaning done though, did you?
Speaker 5 (19:17):
That's right? But it was it was well, it was
acceptable on the highway anyway, Well.
Speaker 1 (19:24):
It was acceptable. What right? But I'm saying, could a
fuel system cleaning have improved that? Listen, it's conjecture. You
won't know at this point.
Speaker 5 (19:30):
Well, right, if I'm pure highway driving for cylinder car,
I was doing better than I did with my Cobal
It was like sometimes its highest thirty.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
Four and uh and who's to say it couldn't have
gotten better?
Speaker 5 (19:46):
Well, I guess, well, I mean, we.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
Can agree to disagree, but you know, it's it's it's
either it does or it doesn't. The point of the
conversation is you were asking about fuel system cleaning, and
I told you the value of it, and that's and
that's the point. Whether you do it or not, that's
completely up to you.
Speaker 5 (20:04):
I find some places don't want to do chemicals because
I guess, you know, a card of customer as a
problem's going to blame it on the clean and.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Well, some places don't want to do transmissions either. Some
guys don't want to go back to school and understand
the theory and the technology that's you know, facing with
modern cars. I still know guys that are waiting for
carburetors to come back. I don't think any of it's
going to happen, So you know, there's a ridiculousness to
it too. But now regarding batteries, I commend you, and
(20:33):
I understand where you're coming from, but I've got to
tell you we now we sell ac Delco. They're available,
they're a good product, we have good distribution, and we
have very few problems with them, and we've had an
excellent warranty relationship. The ones that do go bad, you
know with them? Is ac Delco or re manufactured battery.
I've never heard that term before.
Speaker 5 (20:55):
That's what someone told me. I hope it's not a lot.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
Well, I don't see how it could be. I I
really don't. I would think that would be complete, completely
misleading to the public. And the way that with the
way everybody jumps up and down today with everything going
on in the world, how everybody knows everything about everything
and they point fingers at everybody for every little thing
they do. I would think if ac Delka was committing
fraud of a remanufactured battery, I would think that we
(21:19):
would know about it.
Speaker 5 (21:21):
Who told me that. Say that again, I said, don't
quote me, but it may have been the dealer who
told me that. The service writer.
Speaker 1 (21:28):
Well, listen, I know a lot of service writers and
dealerships who shouldn't be there. So it's it's it's misinformation.
And also was he trying to sell you a battery
or sell you a different battery?
Speaker 5 (21:40):
Oh? Actually I went in because someone suggested, well, that's
one thing you do it change the battery. See if
the steering problem got better. And it did, wow, And
the cluster got better for a while, And that's another issue.
I could go and do another call about the instrument
cluster problem and they don't make it anymore, and finally
someone who could repair it.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
You know, John, I see no connection.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
Are you?
Speaker 1 (22:03):
Are you saying that you're putting a battery in the
car made the instrument cluster operate better?
Speaker 5 (22:10):
Yeah? And it was temperature related for somehow.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
But did you happen to measure did you happen to
measure voltage of both batteries before you changed it? Before
and after?
Speaker 5 (22:19):
I just know that it got better for several months, got.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
Better, how John, that's the test, John, got better?
Speaker 5 (22:27):
How it started? The speedometer and the gas gauge, et cetera.
They all started working again consistently. Previous to that, it
was intermittent and seemed to be temperature related. Well, and
and then I have no I can't explain it. That
electricity is baffling to me. But there were times when
disconnecting the battery and reconnecting it the problem resolved until
(22:50):
the next time I it was cold in the morning.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
I would think it's more the act of disconnecting the
battery and resetting a module or changing something. I don't
I don't see the difference of the battery itself having
an effect on the dashboard module or the way the
vehicle operates, not on a twenty eleven. If this was
an older, much older vehicle, and we can have a
conversation about electrical reserve and what it's doing.
Speaker 5 (23:15):
That was that that passed the test until the temperature
was really cold the problem.
Speaker 1 (23:21):
Yeah, But John, when a battery gets cold, it's gonna die.
I mean, that's just that's just normal physics. So why
is that a surprise?
Speaker 5 (23:31):
The battery would always start the car, That's what I'm
That's what's baffling to me. Certain things would now function,
but it would start fine and you would never know.
And anyway, Oh and about changing the battery, these other
guys say that if if you don't follow their advice
about changing the getting a new battery every three or
four years, no matter what, that, you're going to strain
your alternator. And my alternators have been lasting for a
(23:54):
long time until oh it finally wanted to.
Speaker 1 (23:58):
You know, John, I'm gonna leave it here. There's two
ways to fix a car. You can either apply physics
and science, or you can do it by fear. I
think blindly changing a battery on every car every three
years is living in fear. A lot of cars go
one hundred, one hundred and fifty thousand miles without ever
replacing walternators, or starters or a lot of things. I
(24:21):
think that doing what you're doing is cautious and if
it's working for you, but I think you got to
apply the science of or to repair to the automobile
in order to get a proper way to go about it.
Let's pull over to take a pause. Eight five five
five six zero nine nine zero zero. I'm back right
after this. Hey, we're back. Let's get over and talk
(24:53):
to Bill and Colorado. Wait, and they're very patiently, Billy,
I appreciate it. What's going on today?
Speaker 2 (24:58):
Hey, Ron, good to talk to you. So I have
recently had a friend's car over for a couple of
minor unrelated things. And while it's here, I noticed that
it has a nasty sounding top end knock which is
easily noticeable in neutral at two thousand rpm. Or also
(25:22):
if you're at idle and you put the car in gear,
you can hear it under that load. And did some googling,
look for tsb's and so this is the three point
three leader V six, the two G sorry, the three
mz f E. And everything I found online was for
the for the four cylinder two g r f E,
(25:43):
the the chain driven six cylinder. I couldn't find any
stuff about this for the belt driven six cylinders.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
Okay, you know, so if you take all the just
just starting at the beginning higher mileage, how many miles
are on.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
This I think like one sixty Yeah, not a lot
of miles.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
So when it when it makes this noise, well, first
of all, what does the oil look like? Brown? Beat
up looks great? Okay, yeah, you take the belt, you
take the serpentine belt off and the noise is still there.
Speaker 2 (26:19):
I haven't had a chance to really do my diligence
on this, but the noise does sound like it's coming
from like dead center of the block on the top.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Okay, And how long has it been doing this?
Speaker 2 (26:30):
I don't know, right, I think she knows either, right?
Speaker 1 (26:33):
And does does she hear it? Is she complaining about it?
Or is it because I know how sensitive your ears.
Speaker 2 (26:38):
Are A bill, Yeah, she wasn't. She hadn't noticed it,
and I didn't really have time to get into it.
Speaker 1 (26:44):
So do us both a favor. Take the belt off first,
see if the noise goes away. If the noise doesn't
go away, because there's there's not a lot that really
goes wrong with the time with the belt driven V six,
they work until they don't. It's a pretty durable motor.
Speaker 2 (26:59):
And so I was wondering, is there a typical VVT
issue with these that I should be looking for? Like
I know on some of the VVT systems you get
a bolt that comes off.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
No, I haven't seen that. I mean, if it's got
a VVT solenoid and you unplug it and rev it up,
does the noise change? That's another thing I should try, right, Yeah,
you know, let's see if we hold if we hold
timing fixed, does that Obviously we're going to set some codes,
but we don't care, right, you know, start start to
break it down. The problem is you're trying to diagnose
(27:29):
an almost twenty year old vehicle with higher mileage, and
you're working within the confines of trying not to take
the engine apart. So get creative. How would you approach it?
You know, if you were to pull a valve cover,
you won't see anything. So you know, I have had
some toyotas and I don't remember if this engine has them,
(27:49):
but some of the some of the toyotas with the
balance shafts, and I think that's the four cylinders that
I'm thinking of. They make an awful racket down low
that you would find out that the balance scheft set
up was falling apart. But at that point the engines
had so many miles on them you ended up rebuilding
the engine anyway because these were three hundred thousand miles.
So you know, I think you've got to start with
(28:11):
basics before you start doing a deeper dive. I think,
before you start taking anything apart, you know, just to
see where we go. Does it change with temperature? Is
it just as loud cold as it is warm?
Speaker 2 (28:25):
Yeah, it didn't seem to change.
Speaker 1 (28:26):
Okay, take the belt off. Let's start there. All right,
Let's let's look for a constant and work our way out.
Call me back next week or the week after. Let
me know what you're find.
Speaker 5 (28:35):
We can talk.
Speaker 1 (28:37):
We'll do all right, kittle be Well, let's get on
over and talk to Chris and Florida. Seventeen hunday, Tucson
and what's going on here? Hey, Chris, welcome to the
car doctor. How can I help?
Speaker 5 (28:46):
Hey? Ron?
Speaker 4 (28:47):
Hey, yeah, I got a seventeen day Tucson and this
thing has been driving me nuts. I've had this thing
for over almost a year now, trying to get this
thing to run. It started out with throwing some code,
some mass airflow sensor codes, some oxygen codes, and then
it was still on turbo codes. So we of course
(29:08):
eliminated all that, put a turbo on it. It's still
doing it. Well. What it's doing is it'll crank up
and it'll run. But when you go to take off,
pull out into traffic, the car falls flat on its
fate it's a one point six liter turbo and so
so we went ahead and I gave up. I got
(29:30):
tired of throwing money at parts, swapping parts out. I
took it to the Hyundaid dealership. They diagnosed it. They
first they tell me they need extra time to diagnose it,
and then they come back and they tell me it
needs a high pressure fuel pump and it needs a
flex type. So I'm like, okay, that's and they said, well,
(29:50):
for thirty five hundred dollars, will make your problems go away. Well,
I said, no, that's okay.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
Thanks.
Speaker 4 (29:55):
Anyway, so I went and got the high fuel pressure
pump for a couple hundred bucks. Me and my son
installed it in like ten minutes, and then we put
the flex pipe on there and it didn't do anything whatsoever.
So they totally misdiagnosed that. I went to take my
four hundred dollars flexpipe back, they wouldn't return it. So anyways,
(30:15):
took it another shop and they put it in the
air and they noticed that the catalytic converter was glowing. Said, man,
you need to change the cats in this thing. It's
only got eighty eight thousand miles. Okay, Well, I changed
one cat, the main cat one on top, put another
It didn't fix the problem. Put another turbo in, it
didn't fix the problem. It still falls flat on his
face like it was day one, Chris.
Speaker 1 (30:37):
Has anybody you know what sort of dis I'm hearing
parts being changed? I have two questions. Has anybody done
any real diagnosis? And has any of the codes that
you started out with gone away?
Speaker 4 (30:50):
Yeah, that's the funny thing. Right now, there's there's no codes,
no codes on the car right now?
Speaker 1 (30:55):
All right, so codes of so, codes of so have
been corrected. I'll say whether that's a true statement or not,
I'm not sure, but codes of codes have sort of
been corrected. But nobody. Has anybody hooked up a vacuum gauge,
looked at exhaust back pressure? Has anybody done something like
a volumetric efficiency test which isn't as scary as it sounds.
(31:17):
I'm not going to stand on trying to confuse you here,
but has anybody done any basic testing beyond beyond what
you think the dealer has done? And could you have
misinterpreted what the dealer said and changed the wrong pipe.
I'm not picking on you, I'm just trying to be
objective from the sideline.
Speaker 4 (31:35):
No, I was straight off there they're.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
Tiking, so you know my comment would be, and I
have I have one other question. Are we starting out
in first gear?
Speaker 4 (31:47):
You know that's a good question.
Speaker 5 (31:49):
I really don't know the answer to that. It almost
acts like.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Right, is it starting off in second gear? So yeah,
could you? Could you have had a pile of problems
that took you down the path of oh, it's engine, engine, engine,
and you've solved them, but you also have a transmission problem.
Speaker 4 (32:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (32:09):
No, I haven't even went down a transmission road with it.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
Right, So let's figure out how many speeds the transmission
is supposed to shift through, and let's go out for
a simple road test, and do we have all those?
You know, if it's a five speed and you only
get four and you only get four speeds, well we're
starting out in the wrong gear. Can you manually pull
it down into first and improve the acceleration?
Speaker 4 (32:33):
Yeah, you know, I guess I'll have to try that.
I don't think we tried after all this time.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
All right? And then the other thing is if you can,
if you can, if you can do it, if you
can do the test, I want you to go and
do a volumetric efficiency test. Go google volumetric efficiency. Just
like I describe it. You'll come to a website for
the Automotive Training Group ATG and they'll talk about volumetric
efficiency test and using a scan tool, your right foot
(32:59):
and the open road. It's real simple and easy to do.
Do those couple of things. Call me back, but let's
go take a look at that. Let's start to diagnose,
because I haven't heard that's happened yet. Eight five five
five six zero nine nine zero zero running naming the
car doctor. I'm back right after this. You know, repairing
(33:28):
cars and doing a radio show about repairing cars is
exactly alike. You have to stay calm under fire, you
have to return fire, you have to think your way
through the problems. I want to give kudos to my
chief engineer, Tom Ray this hour because, whether you guys
caught it or not, what goes on behind the background.
I almost wish I had the camera on him. When
(33:48):
the internet dropped out on his side of the studio.
I was still on air, but I couldn't talk to
Tom for about a minute there. We lost touch with
each other. It was kind of like flying around the
back side of the moon. And I'm sure Tom as
busy as he came back and he returned fire, and
he did a great job. And it reminded me of
some of the calls this hour. Some of the calls
were like returning fire. We have to diagnose by some
(34:13):
logical sequential sequence. And this isn't directed at anybody in particular,
It was just the general theme today. We have to
get away from wives tales, we have to get away
from backyard myths. We have to get away from well
I did this and it did that. But I have
no reason or explanation of to why we have to
understand what's going on. Automobiles are numbers, their math, their physics,
(34:35):
their science. There's a reason why there's an action and
a reaction to everything you do to them and they
do to us. Trust me, I've been there. I've been
doing this a while until the next time. I'm not
an ad in the car.
Speaker 5 (34:47):
Doctor.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
Good mechanics aren't expensive, they're priceless. See y
Host
Ron Ananian
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