Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Meet Bob. He's a four timetire rotation champion. When he was a
baby, his first words were automatictransmission fluid. Bob's so cool he has
engine coolant running through his veins.And then there's Kyle, also written as
Premium Unleaded. Legend has it thatKyle can change your oil with his toes,
(00:22):
and that he can tell your tiresall pressure just by how you're walking.
He's Bob, He's Kyle, andevery Saturday morning they morphed together to
form the greatest superhero known to man. Mister Mechanic check engine light Stone,
stand a chance. This is theMister Mechanic Show on eleven ten, kfab
(00:45):
great Saturday morning to you. Thisis a mister Mechanic Show. We are
alive call in show for you toYou have the questions, we have the
answers. We'll give you the topcouple two three answers and kindle let you
know what's going on. We areBuchanan Service Centers at fiftieth and Dodge eightieth
and Dodge Guaranteed Breaks, forty ninthAvenue and Dodge. Sitting next to me
(01:06):
this morning as always as Kyle,Kyle, how you doing this morning,
little oily, little oily, littleoily. What are you getting into today?
Well, I got my super Rooseshirt on. Oh so yeah.
Suber Us yep, yep, allright, last two days I've had nothing
but basically all aspects of a superU. Kyle fixes a lot of super
Us. Now we're doing timing chains. We're just talking about that. Cylinder
(01:29):
heads yesterday, cylinder heads yesterday,timing chains today. There's a lot of
super Us out there. Yeah.We like super rus oh yeah, not
just because we repair them, butwe like them overall as a car.
They're an impressive car. Like youget that w RX and six speed transmission
that's a go getter. It isit is. And you know, the
transmission, the CBTs, and we'vetalked a lot about CBTs in the past
(01:51):
and some ct CBT transmissions which they'reall kind of going to that are terrible
and some are great, you know, and Suberw's got a great CBT transmission.
Hardly do any kind of work tothat maintenance maintenance, you know.
And there's other ones who you know, Honda's, Tota's, uh, even
General Motors has pretty good luck withtheir CVTs. Yeah, some people so
(02:14):
much. Nissan no, no,no. In fact, I I'll throw
you a little bit of what wasit I had that. I'll throw your
little psa out here for you.On Nissans, apparently even Nissan has announced
that there's an issue to warning tostop driving certain vehicles O two to six
(02:34):
centers, O two to four Pathfindersand O two to three Infinity q X
fours. The reason being is there'sa lot of these cars driving around.
They haven't fixed the airbags. ThoseYeah, they had the Tacata airbags and
I guess yeah, and a lotof people got them done. A lot
of people didn't get them done.The chances that you having one of these
(02:59):
go off and and die is youknow, kind of a little bit low.
But boy, do you want totake that chance when they're coming at
you at a million miles an hour. Yeah, it's not fun. Even
the manufacturer kind of said, hey, guys, let's get in and get
that done. So if you ownone of those cars, they're just call
the dealership. They're more doing it. They'll come do it. It's even
(03:20):
in the articles said that they will. They're so serious about doing it that
they'll make an appointment. They'll comeget the car. They'll either send somebody
out maybe to do it mobile inyour driveway because it's not a tough repair.
It just needs to be done.So again, if you've got one
of those, let's get it done. We don't see a whole lot of
twenty year old Nissans around, No, that's because of the CBT problem.
(03:42):
Yeah, but we do that.So that's what led into that for sure
is by the time you have aCBT transmission go bad in one of those,
and it's five thousand dollars because nobodyhas one rebuilt anywhere else that can,
and we make it happen all theway up to like nine thousand dollars
to replace a transmitter. I meanat that rate, I mean you're sitting
on an eight to ten year oldcar that you paid fifteen for. Most
(04:04):
of these things have been beat upterribly and they're worth four and it takes
six to put a transmission in it. You don't have to do the math
very hard to realize that ain't worthit unless it's a sentimental car that grandma
owned, you know, and yougot it for free, and maybe that's
a different deal. I don't eventhink the salvage jars are seldom used,
(04:25):
no, I just because they don'twant the risk of Okay, we got
to warranty this. We got tofind fifteen of them to get one good
one. Yeah, yeah, it'sinteresting how that's just you know, take
one that's bad and a lot ofother manufacturers. It's good. It's complicated.
That's the reason. It's not thatit's they just can't find it.
It's just a complicated. Let's adda few more gears, a few more
(04:46):
things, and a few more ofthis to it, and let's just see
if we can make it as complicatedas we can. Yeah, you know,
let's head over our first callar.We got Bob on the line,
two thousand Buick Century. Is thisgood, old Bob? Yeah, miss
me? Hey, what's up,Bob? What's going on with the car?
I have a two thousand and threeBuick Century that'll start up at home,
(05:09):
drive it for a while, gointo the store, come out,
and it won't crank and uh uh. Every once in a while I'll use
my use my free hand to reachover and grab the shifter and it'll start.
I don't know if that has anythingto do with it. It might
just be uh do with it.Yeah, I think you've got a neutral
(05:32):
safety switch that might be out ofrange. Yeah, that's what that's what
I was thinking. I actually wentdown to the store and bought one,
and I took out the air cleanerto put one in. And there's never
been one in there. I canI can see the mounting studs where it's
supposed to go on the on thebolt that comes out of the transmission from
(05:58):
the shifter table. But and there'sno wires anywhere in the vicinity that would
have gone to it. There's onein there somewhere. Yeah, there has
to be something in this system,because I would I would think so too.
It may be internal, Yes,you know there's something on the mounted
on the valve body. So first, before we go there, have you
(06:24):
tried, i know, lifting upon the gear shift seems to get it
started. Have you tried to dothe same thing in neutral, like drop
it to neutral to see if itstarts? Yeah, I've actually gone through
all the gears. Okay, wellwhat but if I sit there in the
parking lot and I keep on trying, and then after about twenty tries,
Italy eventually crank and then it startsright up and runs smoothly. Like it
(06:49):
should m It's also this has thishas passlock two or three, cow past
lock two and be pastlocked too,because it this has just a regular kind
of looking key. There's no pelletin the key itself. Yeah. I
don't think there's any pellets in thekey. It's just this is a straight
barbed key, isn't it. HuhNo, it's it's not that that little
(07:13):
thing that looks like a bug.It's got that. Yeah, it has
that. So when it doesn't start, does your security light flash or do
anything weird or does it just comeon for a second and then go off.
I've had the security like come on, open on when I'm driving or
okay, or if I start thecar, I got the security light on.
I think it's kind of in thatera. It could be a pellet.
(07:35):
It's switching from one system to oneto toe. If it does have
that pellet in the key, thosecan be a huge issue, and I
mean we've gone around plenty of them. Yeah. But so there's a pellet
in the key, and that keyhas to when you stick it in the
ignition lock and tumblr there is tworisters you know, say resistors or contactors
(08:01):
in the lock and tumblr and ithas to touch those two and then it
completes the circuit and then it goesdown. So the fact that you're wiggling
the gear shift makes me think thatyou're internally wiggling that lock and tumbler making
the connection, making it work ajar to it right, right, So
(08:22):
I'd be able to rectify that bybuying a new locker and a lock assembly
essentially. Yeah, yeah, Well, and it gets kind of pricey and
expensive only because you got to pullthe steering wheel off. You got to
go down in there and you kindof you do all that kind of stuff
to it, and that's fine,and and then you got to relearn it.
And then then a lot of timeswhat we would do is go around
(08:45):
it down below. You can goaround it and find the wire and go
down find the correct resistor. Youown out that resistor, find out if
it's like AO point nine home orone point two oh, and then you
find the wires down at the endand you put a resistor in that and
you're you just trick it to goaround it. And I don't even I
remember what we did. I don'tknow. I'd have to get out the
(09:07):
book to remember how we did itbecause I spent a long time since we
did it. I did one abouta month ago. Okay, so Kyle
knows how to do it. Theone thing you can do to diagnose that
it is this problem when it doesn'tdrank, leave your key in the on
position. Just leave it in theon position for fifteen minutes. You know,
hook a jump box up to it, or you know, even jumper
(09:28):
cables from another car. Just leavethe key on. Don't try to crank
it for fifteen minutes. If itstarts after that fifteen minutes, you know
you have a security problem. FIfifteen minutes is the time out keyon to
where it'll allow the car to start. Okay, yeah, don't tell anybody.
Don't tell anybody else that. Yeah, it's a secret. I'll yeah,
(09:54):
I'll try that. Then it sucka set of the battery cables in
the trunk. If this happens again, I'll I'll jump off sol ANOI Yeah,
sure, yeah, there you go. There you go, try it,
and if not, you know,give us a call, bring it
down. Leave it those for awhile. Kyle will figure out or we'll
(10:16):
just go around it for you.Solve your problem. If it gets to
be uh, more than you wantto deal with. No big deal,
a lot of fun. Oh yeah, yeah, they're just we went through
a lot of fun with these aboutten years ago all the time. So
yeah, all right, Bob,appreciate the call. Thanks a lot,
you bet. All right. Yeah, those were crazy and they've improved that
(10:37):
considerably up till what we got goingon now. So that's in the in
the past, and I'm kind ofglad that some of those. We were
just talking about that how the carsjust die out in this area. They
get so rusty that they just goaway. It's a lifesaver. We did
that. Old technology just goes away, and we love it sometimes. So
all right, we're gonna take aquick break on the Mister Mechanics Show five,
(10:58):
five, eight to eleven tens thenumbers to get in, and we'll
be back in a bit. Fromthe makers though, Siri the iPhone Assistant
comes, Siri the Mechanic here tohelp you with all your automotive beads by
simply saying, Hey, Siri theMechanic, Hey Siri the Mechanic, hemy
I help you. How does misterMechanic, the critically acclaimed radio show host
(11:18):
know so much about cars. Oh, that's easy. It's because he used
to be a car. Very funny, Siri, I'm serious. Wait,
mister mechanic used to be a car. Yes, he was a nineteen sixty
five Shelby GT. Five hundred,one of a kind. He was beautiful.
We were lovers, Hi, Youand mister mechanic used to date.
(11:41):
Yes, back when he was acar. Okay, wait a minute,
No one put the pedal to themetal like mister mechanic. All right,
this is getting weird. Tell mistermechanic, I miss our talks. I
don't want to do that. Andthe way he used to kiss me softly
on the dashboard, No, Iwon't do it. Tell when I will
find you and suppose all of yoursecrets. All right, I'll tell them.
(12:03):
Have car questions, just ask Sirithe mechanic, or, better yet,
call into the Mister Mechanic Show andtalk to mister mcgannick himself, who
apparently used to be a car.I don't know if you heard this,
Mart, it's true. We areback on the Mister Mechanic Show. Five
five, eight to eleven, tensand numbers to get in. Give us
(12:24):
a call. We'll see if wecan help you out, Kyle. Here's
I noticed an article he had here. The sedans are just going away.
We know this for a while,you know, no more four door sedans
are just kind of going away.I was surprised at Malibu. This is
a in twenty three ins the ChevyMalibu. So if you love that car,
(12:45):
you better go get one and keepit for twelve years. Yeah.
The average life of you know,keeping a car is twelve years somewhere that
range. Mine's a lot longer.Yeah, yours is a lot longer.
Yeah. We subscribe to the theoryof by it one to take care of
it and keep it forever. Yeah. I mean, my truck might not
look like it, but it's wellmaintained. But here's the way. And
Subaru legacy is kind of discontinued.There's after twenty five, so you're talking
(13:11):
about subrus. If you want oneof those, you better get one.
But the Toda Camray, the HondaCord, Nissan Ultima, the Kia K
five, I don't know what that. I don't know what that is.
But in a Hondai Sonata, whichare roughly the same car, yeah,
Hondi. They're all staying with sedansand Tota TDA says they're going to stick
with it. They love it back. Yeah, they're popular cars. Back
(13:33):
in twenty thirteen fourteen, they hadabout four hundred thousand of those built,
and now we're down to the pointwhere we're just under nine but nine it
is not nine thousand, nine thousand, four million built. Excuse me,
Now, we're just under about fourhundred thousand. So, you know,
(13:56):
and they don't produce what don't sell. That's just part of what's going on.
Yeah, everything's kind of I mean, all you see is SUV's,
Yeah, big suv, small SUVs, and everybody goes with SUVs. Yep,
yep. We just kind of shiftedit all around. We're gonna head
over to Pat. Pat's got atwenty eighteen. Kiya, Pat, what's
going on today? Good morning.This is a question that that's come from
(14:20):
driver education. And we show avideo and it's hard to believe, but
this video lasts for about three minutesand this lady, probably in her I
don't know, mid forties, maybemid fifties, is driving what I think
is a Kia and her gas pedalsticks and she's driving down the interstate and
(14:43):
she's just hysteric and crying. Andthis goes on for about a minute,
maybe a minute and a half,and then all of a sudden, the
highway patrolman is following her down theinterstate. I think she's going in,
going in and out of traffic,and I mean it's all captured on video,
and they're telling her that, youknow, the things that you would
normally, you know, hit thehandbrake, hit that brake pedal, and
(15:07):
triyle missed up with your foot insomehow some way. She was told that
if she hits the gas pedal,she hits the gas pedal and the brake
pedal at the same time, thatwould disengage the transmission. And you know,
I've always told my students the bestthing to do would be simply to
(15:28):
put it in the neutral in theneutral position. Yeah, but not so
with this car. Well, andI've seen that there, and then I've
seen another video kind of like thatwas somebody overseas I think it was,
and they just kind of followed thisguy until he ran out of fuel.
But you know, the gas pedalstuck down. I don't know why you
wouldn't. I would if it wasme, I would flip it into neutral.
(15:52):
Flip it in neutral and shut offthe engine. Yeah, or you
know, if the autumn, Yeah, if you can't shut off the engine,
or it's got a push button whereyou can't shut off the engine,
I would still flip it into neutralor downship the transmission. But if you
flip it in the neutral, it'sjust going to go to you know,
eight eight, nine, ten thousandrpm and it's going to go boom and
then you come to a stop.But who cares as long as you come
(16:15):
to a stop and safely. Sothe best thing, the best advice,
is simply to put it in theneutral, in the neutral position. Well,
you know, and I have Ihave done this a handful of times.
But I've been in the passenger seatwhere somebody and something gets away.
The first thing I do is reachfor the key. But that's when you
have a key to turn off,and everything just shuts off. Some vehicles
(16:37):
out there, when you touch thethe push button start, they're off immediately.
Yeah. I mean I have acar like that. When you touch
it, it's off immediately. Butfor example a range Rover, when you
touch it, you have to touchit and hold it before it shuts down.
And if you just touch it.It won't do anything. It's still
live. So a lot of timesand a lot of people don't know this
(17:00):
too, but if you take apush button and you sit and hold it,
the lights after about was it fifteentwenty seconds will all light up on
the car. That's your key on. That's your key on. Most people
just keep hitting it and they wantthe instantaneous thing. So that's what I
would do. If I was inthe situation I'm turning the key off.
I'm either pressing and holding that buttononce. If it doesn't do it,
(17:22):
I'm holding it for a extended periodof time. Or if I'm in a
panic situation, yeah, I'm flippingin a neutral and stomping on the brakes.
That's if you turn the key off, So that does that shut down
your lower steering, yep, shutdown everything and it's just going to be
manual steering, just going to behard tractor steering to where you you know,
angine shut down and then turn thekey back to the on position.
(17:44):
If you have that much time togather your thoughts come back. Usually you're
a little bit more when you you'remore in a panic situation. For the
most part, if it's accelerating,yeah, and one other questions. You
know, just about two weeks ago, I couldn't start the car. This
was a twenty twenty sixteen g Patriot. So I called Triple A. Triple
(18:08):
A came out and then he testedthe battery and he said, yeah,
no doubt. He said, yourbattery's bad. I'll call the tow truck.
So I was waiting fifteen twenty minutes, and I just, for the
heck of it, I just wentto the key and I tried turning it
on and boom, it started rightup. So I took it down to
(18:29):
the down to the mechanic, whichhe's only down on thirteenth to Pacific,
and come to find out, itwas the battery that was bad. So
I couldn't. I couldn't understand that. How the you know, with all
the technology and it available from TripleA, and they tell me that the
battery's bad, and well, thebattery's perfect, and it ends up being
(18:51):
the battery. So what you're doinganyway, what you're doing when you when
you look at that, you're takinga snapshot in time. That snapshot in
time says that's okay, And thenyou could take the next snapshot in time
five minutes from now, and thatbattery can fail a lot of times.
The negative and positive plates on theinside will touch together, and once you
try to jump start it, it'slike jump start in your heart. All
(19:14):
of a sudden, everything comes backinto alignment and it works. The other
thing that will happen, too,is that if you let the batteries sit
for a while, it'll regenerate itspower just enough a lot of times to
get you started and get you going. That's happened more than a few times.
So that's why we always kind ofrun the rule of thumb of average
life of a batteries three and ahalf to four years old. If it's
(19:37):
not anything beyond that or anything inthat timeframe with all the electronics we have
on car, just not if it'sgoing to go bad, it's when it's
going to go bad. And thenyou have to say, well, where
do you want to be when thiscar goes bad? You want to be
on vacation? Where do you wantto do it in a controlled setting while
you're changing the oil and let's justget it done a good Yeah, it's
just thegether happens at midnight and you'reat the bar and you shouldn't be there.
(20:02):
Yeah, you know who you're gonnacall. So all that comes really
appreciate it. Thank you, appreciatethe call. Thank you. Yeah.
The other thing with testing batteries thatI've noticed, you know, I know,
Triple A and a bunch of otherbattery testing people, they use electronic
handheld battery testers. And half thetime, you know, I've compared various
(20:27):
different brands of electronic battery and ifwe have those, we have the electronic
testers, and in some instances aregreat, you know, if you just
want to get a quick read onsomething, maybe, But as far as
a lead acid battery and testing it, I mean, nothing is better than
the carbon pile that we use.Yeah, we still use the old technology
(20:47):
from the seventies a little bits asa as a dual backup. You're putting
batteries actual current load on the battery. That handheld can't do that. Nope,
it's just trying to take it's doingall its wizards w do wiz re
inside that box. Can't say thatword today, Yeah, and it's saying
that battery is bad. But you'reright, there's no substitute for footing for
(21:07):
putting the actual carbon piled to it, putting a load on it as you
would when you're turning the air conditioningon all the lights. Yeah, you're
simulating a starter or an air conditioningcompressor or anything like that. Yeah.
So yeah, that's that's the onlyway that I recommend doing it. I
mean, those handhelds, they're greatin their own application, you know.
And batteries are weird. There's tendifferent ways for a battery to die,
(21:30):
and it's all sorts of weirdness toit. So, oh yeah, all
right, we're gonna take quick breakon the Mister Mechanics Show. Five five,
eight, eleven, tens and numbersto get in and we'll be back
in a bit. We are backon the Mister Mechanic Show. We are
Buchanan Service Centers fifieth and Dodge eightiethand Dodge Guaranteed Breaks forty ninth Avenue and
Dodge Stop and see us help youget you back on the road. We're
(21:51):
gonna head right back into a fullbank of calls. Mike. Mike's got
a ninety five f two fifty DSo, Mike, thanks for holding on.
What's going on? Well, I'mjust curious. I've been thinking about
getting an older car that doesn't havethe computer chips in it. And I
didn't realize you had to go backso far. I've got this ninety five
(22:11):
Ford up to fifty. Just howmany computer chips does that machine have?
Maybe one? Yeah, it's prettyprimitive. It doesn't need much at all.
I mean diesel, it needs tolast. That's what a seven three
it is. Yeah, I gotI got it. We got to know
one toe truck with a with aseven three in it, and uh,
(22:33):
I've been I had more than afew people want to buy it from me,
and I said, uh no,I'm keeping that it's not going anywhere.
Well, now where is the computerchip? And what well the computer
distor well now now it's just it'sjust it's kind of primitive, especially on
a diesel. But it's just anormal computer that it'll be underneath the dash.
(22:56):
Yeah, it'll probably be underneath thedash on that age of car.
I think it's probably over the driverscider. Yeah, you can follow your
wire hardness. There'll be a bigbulkhead connector Yeah, it's up where close
to where the clutch pedal assembly wouldbe. Is that something that the autoparts
store hasn't stocked. I no doubtit. Not for that age. You'll
(23:18):
probably have to get one with thatspecific. What kind of issues are you
having? Yeah, Oh, I'mnot having any issues. I just I'm
one of those preppers. God,I would like to have something that would
run after the after the right.So what you want to do, You're
gonna you're gonna on a ford.You're gonna want to be specific with the
(23:40):
numbers on that computer. So you'regonna want to pull that computer down,
look and see what the numbers are, write those down, and then you
could probably go search the internet andprobably find that maybe a used one.
Uh. You could go you couldgo to a place called car dash Parts
dot com look up computers and thatsearches the country nation wide. And as
(24:00):
long as you keep those numbers andthey match those numbers, providing they didn't
have a problem before, you couldget a good use one. That way.
M h all right, you betappreciate the call. We hadn't two
next go top, All right,we'll go there. We'll head up to
(24:22):
Kevin. Kevin's got an old sevenhummer. Kevin, what's up? Uh?
I get no seven? Homer?Yeah, he will not go back
past the stry it stays or thelocked it just stays in the part.
You know it drained the battery everytime. Okay, So go to your
shifter. So there's a button onyour shifter that you have to pull to
(24:45):
uh put it in reverse neutral drive? Is that button functioning properly? Can
you pull it out? Does thekey go back? And if all that's
working fine, then there there's ad tent that shifter has to be all
the way in park in order torelease the key. So there's a system
(25:07):
involved in that. You can crawlkind of take your steering column apart a
little bit and you'll see either somewires like a small two wire kind of
guy on the side of that ignitionlock housing and it takes sometimes you can
unplug that. You take the clamshellapart in order to see that, and
there may be a button next toit also that will release the key.
(25:30):
But if you climb underneath there andlook at that clamshell kind of right around
where the key cylinder goes through it, there's usually a blank hole, just
a hole that you could put likea paper clip or something in that'll release
your key. Ok And if youdo that, then you know that that
neutral interlock system isn't working properly,either the switch and the shifter or the
(25:55):
switch in the steering column, ormaybe a broken wire in between whether if
I don't know if that has awire or a cable that operates it.
But okay, yeah, yeah,there's various other things that can cause of
what he's trying to do is juststart off with the easy stuff and kind
of go back and usually that uh, that wire just doesn't get broken or
(26:18):
freight or something like that and doesn'tallow it to come all the way back
to come out. Okay, andthen and then you're moving towards the lock
and tumblr and then you're moving towardsthe housing, and then you're moving towards
the rack system that kind of goesdown. It's it progressively kind of heads
down the steering column. But uh, that's the that's what Kyle's mentioning is
the most common things. Okay,Well that's my answers my question. Get
(26:44):
to pulled apart a little bit andtake some pictures. Yeah, that way,
that way, if something happens,you know what what to put back
together. That's right. Appreciate thecall, yep, I appreciate appreciate the
call. Kevin, all right,we're gonna head over to Doug. Doug's
got a twenty fifteen explorer. Doug, what's going on today? Hey,
thanks for taking my call. Icalled in two months ago. I was
(27:06):
having the air conditioner was just makingsuch a terrible noise, and I explained
that we we had replaced the compressorand that we had replaced the tensioner twice.
And you guys talked about maybe wellyou said it probably wasn't a harmonic
balancer, and you thought might theremight be air in the system. But
(27:27):
anyway, I figured out what theproblem was and it was the tensioner.
And so when we got that secondtensioner off that we've already replaced twice,
and went down to the autoparts store, they had what they called the Gold
variety, and it didn't really lookmuch like the ones that I had gotten
(27:48):
before. It was like a lotheavier duty. So my question is is
it common for there to be thatmuch different in the quality of the parts,
And do you guys normally just gofor the most expensive parts now the
cars just running great new tension orit just seems like it's a whole different
(28:12):
kind of. Yeah, I wouldhave thought they just got a tensionary.
You got a tensionary, You know, I didn't know there was such a
Generally that is the case. Yeah, generally you don't have that problem.
But it all depends on where it'smade and uh, just how much they
want to cheapen up that particular part. My guess is the tension is going
to be a tension or it's thespring inside that that makes a tensionery either
(28:33):
tight or loose, and that springmay have just been bad to begin with,
or that's how they cheapened up thatparticular part. Are there more expensive
parts and cheaper parts of just aboutevery variety? Absolutely? Can you get
away And this is this is hardfor you to know, it's easy for
us to know because we do itall to day. Can you get away
(28:56):
with using a cheaper part and makethe quality of repair or do you have
to go to the more expensive partall the time to make that quality repair.
There are just certain things that wedon't use any kind of aftermarket with
because we know we're just going tobe doing it again and we don't want
to do it twice. So,yeah, you think on that old one,
(29:18):
do you think is it possible itis like a rebuilt one. No,
now, I doubt I don't rebuildthem now. There's just a big
coiled up spring in there. Anduh when they made that spring, either
that wasn't tensioned right, or itwas at the end of a long run
and the metal inside there wasn't verygood and it unsprung a little bit,
or it just there's a lot oftimes we pull parts out of boxes that
(29:44):
are bad. We diagnose something,pull a part out of a box.
I think we've solved the problem,and it doesn't fix it. So it
throws us into left field for alittle while, and then we come back
and say, well, no,we're not wrong. Let's do what we
did. Let's let's back up asecond and say this is so we go
get another part and it fixes aproblem. And that's exactly what you did.
And that's kind of what I probablyspent money on a new compressor I
(30:08):
didn't need. Well, and it'suh, yeah, yeah, it's uh.
Sometimes new with stands for us wasnever yeah, that's that's what that
what's that? What new means?New means never ever worked? So but
that it depends on the part.It really does is not Everything is the
same, you know, you justit's trial and error and we've just been
(30:30):
through it a lot. So well, good, I'm glad. I'm glad
we were able to kind of atleast narrow it down for you and you
you did the hard work and wegot the problem solved. So that's good.
Yeah, all right, Well,all right, appreciate the call.
All right, take a quick breakon the Mister Mechanics Show. Then we'll
come back and quickly answer the rest. All right, we are back on
the Mister Mechanics Show. We're gonnashoot right back into the calls and go
(30:52):
to Michael. Michael's got a dodge, Ram Michael, what's up today?
I have this? So my mydaughter borrowed my my van. It's a
it's a conversion van, pretty heavyvan. Well, when she brought it
back, the upper ball joint onthe driver side was broken. And my
(31:14):
question, my question to you iswhen I get that one fixed? Like
I said in nineteen ninety three,should I get all four done? Because
they do have upper and bottom?Is that correct? Yep? Upper and
lower? You know, if you'reyou know how many miles are I mean,
how many miles were on it.I didn't hear have they ever been
(31:38):
done? No, sir, buythem all. Yeah. I only want
to go in there once. Andthis isn't going to be a fun job.
Yeah. No, And you're gonnaas long as the rest of the
truck is worth doing it, youknow, yes, do it two hundred
and some odd thousand. It's nota matter if another one's going to go
bad. It's a win. It'sgoing to go bad. And as we
(32:00):
spoke about earlier about the battery,it just really depends on where you want
to be and how far away fromhome, and how big a tow bill
you want to pay. I woulddo it all one time. That's great
advice. Hey, thank you somuch. You guys. You bet all
right. We're going to head overto Jason. Jason's got a twenty thirteen
Ford Raptor. Jason. What's goingon today? As you've helped me out
(32:23):
in the past before, Yeah,twenty thirteen forourd draft. Took along road
trip recently, and once on theway there and once on the way back,
I had a check engine light comeup, service braking system and then
the brake pedal was very stiff totouch. The first time then it worked,
pulled over, shut off, thetruck checked everything. Fluid levels are
(32:43):
fine, no brake calipers were hot, everything seemed normal. Shut the truck
off, started again, no morelight, and I'm droving another thousand miles
back home from the way back ortoo there. And then on the way
back he did the same exact thing, same symptoms, checked it, nothing
wrong, check engine light went away. Okay, So this raptor what has
a five O coyote in it?I suppose that's yeah, And I'd imagine
(33:13):
I haven't seen a lot of theseparticular trucks, but I imagine it's still
got a vacuum pump that's helped runningthe brakes over on the right hand side,
it's there's a vacuum pump. That'sto be the first place I would
go to if it have hard breaks. Then the light comes on. The
braking is only because of the computertelling it to check the braking system.
(33:35):
Just the very first time you touchit, the brake pedals dip as a
rock and then it's totally normal.So I assume that there must be a
sensor on the breke booster. Yeah, I mean it's part of your ABS
control module. You know, anybreaking assists like that. The first thing
that I would do is I wantto get into this computer. I want
to see if there's any code storedin history. No code stored. I
(33:57):
have a code reader. There's nothingthat comes up at all. Okay,
but I'm gonna go a little bitfurther than that and go into mode six
and that's gonna tell you the readinessmonitors Ford users mode six. Nowadays,
it's implemented that every vehicle has Modeten, which what they do is a
store. It's like a freeze frame. Any failure that you're gonna get is
(34:21):
going to stay in there for acertain amount of time. So how big
a how good a computer do yougot? Does it just get PO codes
and that's it, or we'll getinto the breaking. I've got an access
for it. It doesn't do asmuch as what some of the high level
stuff will do, but it willdo that. Okay, I could any
(34:42):
stored codes at all. So well, and a lot of times we'll get
into a system and we have aquick, you know scanner for PO codes,
but we also have a bigger scannerthat allows us to get deeper into
you know, breaks and transmissions andthings like that, so there might be
something in there. You just don'thave a scanner allows you to be able
to get deep into it. Allright, Well, I'll take it into
(35:02):
the shop and if it happened again, it just seems real strange, But
I appreciate the advice. Yeah.And then the other thing that we most
commonly repair on those is, likeI said, the vacuum pumps over on
the right hand side, they justwe've had them be there and then not
there and uh, with the overlappingvalve timing that they have, the engine
can't produce enough vacuum corrects. Yeah, and then it may see that,
(35:27):
Yes, it's strange because there's nomechanical issue with it. There's no faulty
breaking, there's no bad there's there'snothing an issue. I mean, there's
there's nothing. So it's just frommy knowledge, it's just that a computer
correct. But but the but thesensor may have seen a drop in pressure
on vacuum and that may be touchyour light on. Okay, go over
(35:47):
on that right hand side and justsee if it's leak and oil because it
may be trailing down that back sideof the head. If it is,
the vacuum pump's bad because it's leakingoil out through the seal. So it's
a quick, easy digital check.Okay, thanks buddy, you appreciate it.
All right, We're gonna head overto John John's Gonda ninety seven Grand
Prix. John, what's going ontoday? Real quick? Like? Gentlemen,
(36:09):
thank you for being on the radioand everything over the years. You
bet I got a Grand Prix,has got the three eight supercharge motor at
it. I've talked to you before, over and over and over about this
problem, child. And anyway,it's reading twenty two degrees in vance and
idol that it clients as you readthe motor that that's supposed to. But
(36:31):
it is supposed to be on twentytwo degrees. I keep burning spark plugs
up. What's wrong with this thing? Check the timing? Well I have
to. The scanner is reading twentytwo degrees and my red brick scanner my
SNEP on EMPT twenty five hundred andI'm not familiar, but what should base
(36:51):
timing be on it? It's notgoing to be zero. It should be
about ten degrees, ten to thirteendegrees. As GM's
Meet Bob. He's a four timetire rotation champion. When he was a
baby, his first words were automatictransmission fluid. Bob's so cool he has
engine coolant running through his veins.And then there's Kyle, also written as
Premium Unleaded. Legend has it thatKyle can change your oil with his toes,
(00:22):
and that he can tell your tiresall pressure just by how you're walking.
He's Bob, He's Kyle, andevery Saturday morning they morphed together to
form the greatest superhero known to man. Mister Mechanic check engine light Stone,
stand a chance. This is theMister Mechanic Show on eleven ten, kfab
(00:45):
great Saturday morning to you. Thisis a mister Mechanic Show. We are
alive call in show for you toYou have the questions, we have the
answers. We'll give you the topcouple two three answers and kindle let you
know what's going on. We areBuchanan Service Centers at fiftieth and Dodge eightieth
and Dodge Guaranteed Breaks, forty ninthAvenue and Dodge. Sitting next to me
(01:06):
this morning as always as Kyle,Kyle, how you doing this morning,
little oily, little oily, littleoily. What are you getting into today?
Well, I got my super Rooseshirt on. Oh so yeah.
Suber Us yep, yep, allright, last two days I've had nothing
but basically all aspects of a superU. Kyle fixes a lot of super
Us. Now we're doing timing chains. We're just talking about that. Cylinder
(01:29):
heads yesterday, cylinder heads yesterday,timing chains today. There's a lot of
super Us out there. Yeah.We like super rus oh yeah, not
just because we repair them, butwe like them overall as a car.
They're an impressive car. Like youget that w RX and six speed transmission
that's a go getter. It isit is. And you know, the
transmission, the CBTs, and we'vetalked a lot about CBTs in the past
(01:51):
and some ct CBT transmissions which they'reall kind of going to that are terrible
and some are great, you know, and Suberw's got a great CBT transmission.
Hardly do any kind of work tothat maintenance maintenance, you know.
And there's other ones who you know, Honda's, Tota's, uh, even
General Motors has pretty good luck withtheir CVTs. Yeah, some people so
(02:14):
much. Nissan no, no,no. In fact, I I'll throw
you a little bit of what wasit I had that. I'll throw your
little psa out here for you.On Nissans, apparently even Nissan has announced
that there's an issue to warning tostop driving certain vehicles O two to six
(02:34):
centers, O two to four Pathfindersand O two to three Infinity q X
fours. The reason being is there'sa lot of these cars driving around.
They haven't fixed the airbags. ThoseYeah, they had the Tacata airbags and
I guess yeah, and a lotof people got them done. A lot
of people didn't get them done.The chances that you having one of these
(02:59):
go off and and die is youknow, kind of a little bit low.
But boy, do you want totake that chance when they're coming at
you at a million miles an hour. Yeah, it's not fun. Even
the manufacturer kind of said, hey, guys, let's get in and get
that done. So if you ownone of those cars, they're just call
the dealership. They're more doing it. They'll come do it. It's even
(03:20):
in the articles said that they will. They're so serious about doing it that
they'll make an appointment. They'll comeget the car. They'll either send somebody
out maybe to do it mobile inyour driveway because it's not a tough repair.
It just needs to be done.So again, if you've got one
of those, let's get it done. We don't see a whole lot of
twenty year old Nissans around, No, that's because of the CBT problem.
(03:42):
Yeah, but we do that.So that's what led into that for sure
is by the time you have aCBT transmission go bad in one of those,
and it's five thousand dollars because nobodyhas one rebuilt anywhere else that can,
and we make it happen all theway up to like nine thousand dollars
to replace a transmitter. I meanat that rate, I mean you're sitting
on an eight to ten year oldcar that you paid fifteen for. Most
(04:04):
of these things have been beat upterribly and they're worth four and it takes
six to put a transmission in it. You don't have to do the math
very hard to realize that ain't worthit unless it's a sentimental car that grandma
owned, you know, and yougot it for free, and maybe that's
a different deal. I don't eventhink the salvage jars are seldom used,
(04:25):
no, I just because they don'twant the risk of Okay, we got
to warranty this. We got tofind fifteen of them to get one good
one. Yeah, yeah, it'sinteresting how that's just you know, take
one that's bad and a lot ofother manufacturers. It's good. It's complicated.
That's the reason. It's not thatit's they just can't find it.
It's just a complicated. Let's adda few more gears, a few more
(04:46):
things, and a few more ofthis to it, and let's just see
if we can make it as complicatedas we can. Yeah, you know,
let's head over our first callar.We got Bob on the line,
two thousand Buick Century. Is thisgood, old Bob? Yeah, miss
me? Hey, what's up,Bob? What's going on with the car?
I have a two thousand and threeBuick Century that'll start up at home,
(05:09):
drive it for a while, gointo the store, come out,
and it won't crank and uh uh. Every once in a while I'll use
my use my free hand to reachover and grab the shifter and it'll start.
I don't know if that has anythingto do with it. It might
just be uh do with it.Yeah, I think you've got a neutral
(05:32):
safety switch that might be out ofrange. Yeah, that's what that's what
I was thinking. I actually wentdown to the store and bought one,
and I took out the air cleanerto put one in. And there's never
been one in there. I canI can see the mounting studs where it's
supposed to go on the on thebolt that comes out of the transmission from
(05:58):
the shifter table. But and there'sno wires anywhere in the vicinity that would
have gone to it. There's onein there somewhere. Yeah, there has
to be something in this system,because I would I would think so too.
It may be internal, Yes,you know there's something on the mounted
on the valve body. So first, before we go there, have you
(06:24):
tried, i know, lifting upon the gear shift seems to get it
started. Have you tried to dothe same thing in neutral, like drop
it to neutral to see if itstarts? Yeah, I've actually gone through
all the gears. Okay, wellwhat but if I sit there in the
parking lot and I keep on trying, and then after about twenty tries,
Italy eventually crank and then it startsright up and runs smoothly. Like it
(06:49):
should m It's also this has thishas passlock two or three, cow past
lock two and be pastlocked too,because it this has just a regular kind
of looking key. There's no pelletin the key itself. Yeah. I
don't think there's any pellets in thekey. It's just this is a straight
barbed key, isn't it. HuhNo, it's it's not that that little
(07:13):
thing that looks like a bug.It's got that. Yeah, it has
that. So when it doesn't start, does your security light flash or do
anything weird or does it just comeon for a second and then go off.
I've had the security like come on, open on when I'm driving or
okay, or if I start thecar, I got the security light on.
I think it's kind of in thatera. It could be a pellet.
(07:35):
It's switching from one system to oneto toe. If it does have
that pellet in the key, thosecan be a huge issue, and I
mean we've gone around plenty of them. Yeah. But so there's a pellet
in the key, and that keyhas to when you stick it in the
ignition lock and tumblr there is tworisters you know, say resistors or contactors
(08:01):
in the lock and tumblr and ithas to touch those two and then it
completes the circuit and then it goesdown. So the fact that you're wiggling
the gear shift makes me think thatyou're internally wiggling that lock and tumbler making
the connection, making it work ajar to it right, right, So
(08:22):
I'd be able to rectify that bybuying a new locker and a lock assembly
essentially. Yeah, yeah, Well, and it gets kind of pricey and
expensive only because you got to pullthe steering wheel off. You got to
go down in there and you kindof you do all that kind of stuff
to it, and that's fine,and and then you got to relearn it.
And then then a lot of timeswhat we would do is go around
(08:45):
it down below. You can goaround it and find the wire and go
down find the correct resistor. Youown out that resistor, find out if
it's like AO point nine home orone point two oh, and then you
find the wires down at the endand you put a resistor in that and
you're you just trick it to goaround it. And I don't even I
remember what we did. I don'tknow. I'd have to get out the
(09:07):
book to remember how we did itbecause I spent a long time since we
did it. I did one abouta month ago. Okay, so Kyle
knows how to do it. Theone thing you can do to diagnose that
it is this problem when it doesn'tdrank, leave your key in the on
position. Just leave it in theon position for fifteen minutes. You know,
hook a jump box up to it, or you know, even jumper
(09:28):
cables from another car. Just leavethe key on. Don't try to crank
it for fifteen minutes. If itstarts after that fifteen minutes, you know
you have a security problem. FIfifteen minutes is the time out keyon to
where it'll allow the car to start. Okay, yeah, don't tell anybody.
Don't tell anybody else that. Yeah, it's a secret. I'll yeah,
(09:54):
I'll try that. Then it sucka set of the battery cables in
the trunk. If this happens again, I'll I'll jump off sol ANOI Yeah,
sure, yeah, there you go. There you go, try it,
and if not, you know,give us a call, bring it
down. Leave it those for awhile. Kyle will figure out or we'll
(10:16):
just go around it for you.Solve your problem. If it gets to
be uh, more than you wantto deal with. No big deal,
a lot of fun. Oh yeah, yeah, they're just we went through
a lot of fun with these aboutten years ago all the time. So
yeah, all right, Bob,appreciate the call. Thanks a lot,
you bet. All right. Yeah, those were crazy and they've improved that
(10:37):
considerably up till what we got goingon now. So that's in the in
the past, and I'm kind ofglad that some of those. We were
just talking about that how the carsjust die out in this area. They
get so rusty that they just goaway. It's a lifesaver. We did
that. Old technology just goes away, and we love it sometimes. So
all right, we're gonna take aquick break on the Mister Mechanics Show five,
(10:58):
five, eight to eleven tens thenumbers to get in, and we'll
be back in a bit. Fromthe makers though, Siri the iPhone Assistant
comes, Siri the Mechanic here tohelp you with all your automotive beads by
simply saying, Hey, Siri theMechanic, Hey Siri the Mechanic, hemy
I help you. How does misterMechanic, the critically acclaimed radio show host
(11:18):
know so much about cars. Oh, that's easy. It's because he used
to be a car. Very funny, Siri, I'm serious. Wait,
mister mechanic used to be a car. Yes, he was a nineteen sixty
five Shelby GT. Five hundred,one of a kind. He was beautiful.
We were lovers, Hi, Youand mister mechanic used to date.
(11:41):
Yes, back when he was acar. Okay, wait a minute,
No one put the pedal to themetal like mister mechanic. All right,
this is getting weird. Tell mistermechanic, I miss our talks. I
don't want to do that. Andthe way he used to kiss me softly
on the dashboard, No, Iwon't do it. Tell when I will
find you and suppose all of yoursecrets. All right, I'll tell them.
(12:03):
Have car questions, just ask Sirithe mechanic, or, better yet,
call into the Mister Mechanic Show andtalk to mister mcgannick himself, who
apparently used to be a car.I don't know if you heard this,
Mart, it's true. We areback on the Mister Mechanic Show. Five
five, eight to eleven, tensand numbers to get in. Give us
(12:24):
a call. We'll see if wecan help you out, Kyle. Here's
I noticed an article he had here. The sedans are just going away.
We know this for a while,you know, no more four door sedans
are just kind of going away.I was surprised at Malibu. This is
a in twenty three ins the ChevyMalibu. So if you love that car,
(12:45):
you better go get one and keepit for twelve years. Yeah.
The average life of you know,keeping a car is twelve years somewhere that
range. Mine's a lot longer.Yeah, yours is a lot longer.
Yeah. We subscribe to the theoryof by it one to take care of
it and keep it forever. Yeah. I mean, my truck might not
look like it, but it's wellmaintained. But here's the way. And
Subaru legacy is kind of discontinued.There's after twenty five, so you're talking
(13:11):
about subrus. If you want oneof those, you better get one.
But the Toda Camray, the HondaCord, Nissan Ultima, the Kia K
five, I don't know what that. I don't know what that is.
But in a Hondai Sonata, whichare roughly the same car, yeah,
Hondi. They're all staying with sedansand Tota TDA says they're going to stick
with it. They love it back. Yeah, they're popular cars. Back
(13:33):
in twenty thirteen fourteen, they hadabout four hundred thousand of those built,
and now we're down to the pointwhere we're just under nine but nine it
is not nine thousand, nine thousand, four million built. Excuse me,
Now, we're just under about fourhundred thousand. So, you know,
(13:56):
and they don't produce what don't sell. That's just part of what's going on.
Yeah, everything's kind of I mean, all you see is SUV's,
Yeah, big suv, small SUVs, and everybody goes with SUVs. Yep,
yep. We just kind of shiftedit all around. We're gonna head
over to Pat. Pat's got atwenty eighteen. Kiya, Pat, what's
going on today? Good morning.This is a question that that's come from
(14:20):
driver education. And we show avideo and it's hard to believe, but
this video lasts for about three minutesand this lady, probably in her I
don't know, mid forties, maybemid fifties, is driving what I think
is a Kia and her gas pedalsticks and she's driving down the interstate and
(14:43):
she's just hysteric and crying. Andthis goes on for about a minute,
maybe a minute and a half,and then all of a sudden, the
highway patrolman is following her down theinterstate. I think she's going in,
going in and out of traffic,and I mean it's all captured on video,
and they're telling her that, youknow, the things that you would
normally, you know, hit thehandbrake, hit that brake pedal, and
(15:07):
triyle missed up with your foot insomehow some way. She was told that
if she hits the gas pedal,she hits the gas pedal and the brake
pedal at the same time, thatwould disengage the transmission. And you know,
I've always told my students the bestthing to do would be simply to
(15:28):
put it in the neutral in theneutral position. Yeah, but not so
with this car. Well, andI've seen that there, and then I've
seen another video kind of like thatwas somebody overseas I think it was,
and they just kind of followed thisguy until he ran out of fuel.
But you know, the gas pedalstuck down. I don't know why you
wouldn't. I would if it wasme, I would flip it into neutral.
(15:52):
Flip it in neutral and shut offthe engine. Yeah, or you
know, if the autumn, Yeah, if you can't shut off the engine,
or it's got a push button whereyou can't shut off the engine,
I would still flip it into neutralor downship the transmission. But if you
flip it in the neutral, it'sjust going to go to you know,
eight eight, nine, ten thousandrpm and it's going to go boom and
then you come to a stop.But who cares as long as you come
(16:15):
to a stop and safely. Sothe best thing, the best advice,
is simply to put it in theneutral, in the neutral position. Well,
you know, and I have Ihave done this a handful of times.
But I've been in the passenger seatwhere somebody and something gets away.
The first thing I do is reachfor the key. But that's when you
have a key to turn off,and everything just shuts off. Some vehicles
(16:37):
out there, when you touch thethe push button start, they're off immediately.
Yeah. I mean I have acar like that. When you touch
it, it's off immediately. Butfor example a range Rover, when you
touch it, you have to touchit and hold it before it shuts down.
And if you just touch it.It won't do anything. It's still
live. So a lot of timesand a lot of people don't know this
(17:00):
too, but if you take apush button and you sit and hold it,
the lights after about was it fifteentwenty seconds will all light up on
the car. That's your key on. That's your key on. Most people
just keep hitting it and they wantthe instantaneous thing. So that's what I
would do. If I was inthe situation I'm turning the key off.
I'm either pressing and holding that buttononce. If it doesn't do it,
(17:22):
I'm holding it for a extended periodof time. Or if I'm in a
panic situation, yeah, I'm flippingin a neutral and stomping on the brakes.
That's if you turn the key off, So that does that shut down
your lower steering, yep, shutdown everything and it's just going to be
manual steering, just going to behard tractor steering to where you you know,
angine shut down and then turn thekey back to the on position.
(17:44):
If you have that much time togather your thoughts come back. Usually you're
a little bit more when you you'remore in a panic situation. For the
most part, if it's accelerating,yeah, and one other questions. You
know, just about two weeks ago, I couldn't start the car. This
was a twenty twenty sixteen g Patriot. So I called Triple A. Triple
(18:08):
A came out and then he testedthe battery and he said, yeah,
no doubt. He said, yourbattery's bad. I'll call the tow truck.
So I was waiting fifteen twenty minutes, and I just, for the
heck of it, I just wentto the key and I tried turning it
on and boom, it started rightup. So I took it down to
(18:29):
the down to the mechanic, whichhe's only down on thirteenth to Pacific,
and come to find out, itwas the battery that was bad. So
I couldn't. I couldn't understand that. How the you know, with all
the technology and it available from TripleA, and they tell me that the
battery's bad, and well, thebattery's perfect, and it ends up being
(18:51):
the battery. So what you're doinganyway, what you're doing when you when
you look at that, you're takinga snapshot in time. That snapshot in
time says that's okay, And thenyou could take the next snapshot in time
five minutes from now, and thatbattery can fail a lot of times.
The negative and positive plates on theinside will touch together, and once you
try to jump start it, it'slike jump start in your heart. All
(19:14):
of a sudden, everything comes backinto alignment and it works. The other
thing that will happen, too,is that if you let the batteries sit
for a while, it'll regenerate itspower just enough a lot of times to
get you started and get you going. That's happened more than a few times.
So that's why we always kind ofrun the rule of thumb of average
life of a batteries three and ahalf to four years old. If it's
(19:37):
not anything beyond that or anything inthat timeframe with all the electronics we have
on car, just not if it'sgoing to go bad, it's when it's
going to go bad. And thenyou have to say, well, where
do you want to be when thiscar goes bad? You want to be
on vacation? Where do you wantto do it in a controlled setting while
you're changing the oil and let's justget it done a good Yeah, it's
just thegether happens at midnight and you'reat the bar and you shouldn't be there.
(20:02):
Yeah, you know who you're gonnacall. So all that comes really
appreciate it. Thank you, appreciatethe call. Thank you. Yeah.
The other thing with testing batteries thatI've noticed, you know, I know,
Triple A and a bunch of otherbattery testing people, they use electronic
handheld battery testers. And half thetime, you know, I've compared various
(20:27):
different brands of electronic battery and ifwe have those, we have the electronic
testers, and in some instances aregreat, you know, if you just
want to get a quick read onsomething, maybe, But as far as
a lead acid battery and testing it, I mean, nothing is better than
the carbon pile that we use.Yeah, we still use the old technology
(20:47):
from the seventies a little bits asa as a dual backup. You're putting
batteries actual current load on the battery. That handheld can't do that. Nope,
it's just trying to take it's doingall its wizards w do wiz re
inside that box. Can't say thatword today, Yeah, and it's saying
that battery is bad. But you'reright, there's no substitute for footing for
(21:07):
putting the actual carbon piled to it, putting a load on it as you
would when you're turning the air conditioningon all the lights. Yeah, you're
simulating a starter or an air conditioningcompressor or anything like that. Yeah.
So yeah, that's that's the onlyway that I recommend doing it. I
mean, those handhelds, they're greatin their own application, you know.
And batteries are weird. There's tendifferent ways for a battery to die,
(21:30):
and it's all sorts of weirdness toit. So, oh yeah, all
right, we're gonna take quick breakon the Mister Mechanics Show. Five five,
eight, eleven, tens and numbersto get in and we'll be back
in a bit. We are backon the Mister Mechanic Show. We are
Buchanan Service Centers fifieth and Dodge eightiethand Dodge Guaranteed Breaks forty ninth Avenue and
Dodge Stop and see us help youget you back on the road. We're
(21:51):
gonna head right back into a fullbank of calls. Mike. Mike's got
a ninety five f two fifty DSo, Mike, thanks for holding on.
What's going on? Well, I'mjust curious. I've been thinking about
getting an older car that doesn't havethe computer chips in it. And I
didn't realize you had to go backso far. I've got this ninety five
(22:11):
Ford up to fifty. Just howmany computer chips does that machine have?
Maybe one? Yeah, it's prettyprimitive. It doesn't need much at all.
I mean diesel, it needs tolast. That's what a seven three
it is. Yeah, I gotI got it. We got to know
one toe truck with a with aseven three in it, and uh,
(22:33):
I've been I had more than afew people want to buy it from me,
and I said, uh no,I'm keeping that it's not going anywhere.
Well, now where is the computerchip? And what well the computer
distor well now now it's just it'sjust it's kind of primitive, especially on
a diesel. But it's just anormal computer that it'll be underneath the dash.
(22:56):
Yeah, it'll probably be underneath thedash on that age of car.
I think it's probably over the driverscider. Yeah, you can follow your
wire hardness. There'll be a bigbulkhead connector Yeah, it's up where close
to where the clutch pedal assembly wouldbe. Is that something that the autoparts
store hasn't stocked. I no doubtit. Not for that age. You'll
(23:18):
probably have to get one with thatspecific. What kind of issues are you
having? Yeah, Oh, I'mnot having any issues. I just I'm
one of those preppers. God,I would like to have something that would
run after the after the right.So what you want to do, You're
gonna you're gonna on a ford.You're gonna want to be specific with the
(23:40):
numbers on that computer. So you'regonna want to pull that computer down,
look and see what the numbers are, write those down, and then you
could probably go search the internet andprobably find that maybe a used one.
Uh. You could go you couldgo to a place called car dash Parts
dot com look up computers and thatsearches the country nation wide. And as
(24:00):
long as you keep those numbers andthey match those numbers, providing they didn't
have a problem before, you couldget a good use one. That way.
M h all right, you betappreciate the call. We hadn't two
next go top, All right,we'll go there. We'll head up to
(24:22):
Kevin. Kevin's got an old sevenhummer. Kevin, what's up? Uh?
I get no seven? Homer?Yeah, he will not go back
past the stry it stays or thelocked it just stays in the part.
You know it drained the battery everytime. Okay, So go to your
shifter. So there's a button onyour shifter that you have to pull to
(24:45):
uh put it in reverse neutral drive? Is that button functioning properly? Can
you pull it out? Does thekey go back? And if all that's
working fine, then there there's ad tent that shifter has to be all
the way in park in order torelease the key. So there's a system
(25:07):
involved in that. You can crawlkind of take your steering column apart a
little bit and you'll see either somewires like a small two wire kind of
guy on the side of that ignitionlock housing and it takes sometimes you can
unplug that. You take the clamshellapart in order to see that, and
there may be a button next toit also that will release the key.
(25:30):
But if you climb underneath there andlook at that clamshell kind of right around
where the key cylinder goes through it, there's usually a blank hole, just
a hole that you could put likea paper clip or something in that'll release
your key. Ok And if youdo that, then you know that that
neutral interlock system isn't working properly,either the switch and the shifter or the
(25:55):
switch in the steering column, ormaybe a broken wire in between whether if
I don't know if that has awire or a cable that operates it.
But okay, yeah, yeah,there's various other things that can cause of
what he's trying to do is juststart off with the easy stuff and kind
of go back and usually that uh, that wire just doesn't get broken or
(26:18):
freight or something like that and doesn'tallow it to come all the way back
to come out. Okay, andthen and then you're moving towards the lock
and tumblr and then you're moving towardsthe housing, and then you're moving towards
the rack system that kind of goesdown. It's it progressively kind of heads
down the steering column. But uh, that's the that's what Kyle's mentioning is
the most common things. Okay,Well that's my answers my question. Get
(26:44):
to pulled apart a little bit andtake some pictures. Yeah, that way,
that way, if something happens,you know what what to put back
together. That's right. Appreciate thecall, yep, I appreciate appreciate the
call. Kevin, all right,we're gonna head over to Doug. Doug's
got a twenty fifteen explorer. Doug, what's going on today? Hey,
thanks for taking my call. Icalled in two months ago. I was
(27:06):
having the air conditioner was just makingsuch a terrible noise, and I explained
that we we had replaced the compressorand that we had replaced the tensioner twice.
And you guys talked about maybe wellyou said it probably wasn't a harmonic
balancer, and you thought might theremight be air in the system. But
(27:27):
anyway, I figured out what theproblem was and it was the tensioner.
And so when we got that secondtensioner off that we've already replaced twice,
and went down to the autoparts store, they had what they called the Gold
variety, and it didn't really lookmuch like the ones that I had gotten
(27:48):
before. It was like a lotheavier duty. So my question is is
it common for there to be thatmuch different in the quality of the parts,
And do you guys normally just gofor the most expensive parts now the
cars just running great new tension orit just seems like it's a whole different
(28:12):
kind of. Yeah, I wouldhave thought they just got a tensionary.
You got a tensionary, You know, I didn't know there was such a
Generally that is the case. Yeah, generally you don't have that problem.
But it all depends on where it'smade and uh, just how much they
want to cheapen up that particular part. My guess is the tension is going
to be a tension or it's thespring inside that that makes a tensionery either
(28:33):
tight or loose, and that springmay have just been bad to begin with,
or that's how they cheapened up thatparticular part. Are there more expensive
parts and cheaper parts of just aboutevery variety? Absolutely? Can you get
away And this is this is hardfor you to know, it's easy for
us to know because we do itall to day. Can you get away
(28:56):
with using a cheaper part and makethe quality of repair or do you have
to go to the more expensive partall the time to make that quality repair.
There are just certain things that wedon't use any kind of aftermarket with
because we know we're just going tobe doing it again and we don't want
to do it twice. So,yeah, you think on that old one,
(29:18):
do you think is it possible itis like a rebuilt one. No,
now, I doubt I don't rebuildthem now. There's just a big
coiled up spring in there. Anduh when they made that spring, either
that wasn't tensioned right, or itwas at the end of a long run
and the metal inside there wasn't verygood and it unsprung a little bit,
or it just there's a lot oftimes we pull parts out of boxes that
(29:44):
are bad. We diagnose something,pull a part out of a box.
I think we've solved the problem,and it doesn't fix it. So it
throws us into left field for alittle while, and then we come back
and say, well, no,we're not wrong. Let's do what we
did. Let's let's back up asecond and say this is so we go
get another part and it fixes aproblem. And that's exactly what you did.
And that's kind of what I probablyspent money on a new compressor I
(30:08):
didn't need. Well, and it'suh, yeah, yeah, it's uh.
Sometimes new with stands for us wasnever yeah, that's that's what that
what's that? What new means?New means never ever worked? So but
that it depends on the part.It really does is not Everything is the
same, you know, you justit's trial and error and we've just been
(30:30):
through it a lot. So well, good, I'm glad. I'm glad
we were able to kind of atleast narrow it down for you and you
you did the hard work and wegot the problem solved. So that's good.
Yeah, all right, Well,all right, appreciate the call.
All right, take a quick breakon the Mister Mechanics Show. Then we'll
come back and quickly answer the rest. All right, we are back on
the Mister Mechanics Show. We're gonnashoot right back into the calls and go
(30:52):
to Michael. Michael's got a dodge, Ram Michael, what's up today?
I have this? So my mydaughter borrowed my my van. It's a
it's a conversion van, pretty heavyvan. Well, when she brought it
back, the upper ball joint onthe driver side was broken. And my
(31:14):
question, my question to you iswhen I get that one fixed? Like
I said in nineteen ninety three,should I get all four done? Because
they do have upper and bottom?Is that correct? Yep? Upper and
lower? You know, if you'reyou know how many miles are I mean,
how many miles were on it.I didn't hear have they ever been
(31:38):
done? No, sir, buythem all. Yeah. I only want
to go in there once. Andthis isn't going to be a fun job.
Yeah. No, And you're gonnaas long as the rest of the
truck is worth doing it, youknow, yes, do it two hundred
and some odd thousand. It's nota matter if another one's going to go
bad. It's a win. It'sgoing to go bad. And as we
(32:00):
spoke about earlier about the battery,it just really depends on where you want
to be and how far away fromhome, and how big a tow bill
you want to pay. I woulddo it all one time. That's great
advice. Hey, thank you somuch. You guys. You bet all
right. We're going to head overto Jason. Jason's got a twenty thirteen
Ford Raptor. Jason. What's goingon today? As you've helped me out
(32:23):
in the past before, Yeah,twenty thirteen forourd draft. Took along road
trip recently, and once on theway there and once on the way back,
I had a check engine light comeup, service braking system and then
the brake pedal was very stiff totouch. The first time then it worked,
pulled over, shut off, thetruck checked everything. Fluid levels are
(32:43):
fine, no brake calipers were hot, everything seemed normal. Shut the truck
off, started again, no morelight, and I'm droving another thousand miles
back home from the way back ortoo there. And then on the way
back he did the same exact thing, same symptoms, checked it, nothing
wrong, check engine light went away. Okay, So this raptor what has
a five O coyote in it?I suppose that's yeah, And I'd imagine
(33:13):
I haven't seen a lot of theseparticular trucks, but I imagine it's still
got a vacuum pump that's helped runningthe brakes over on the right hand side,
it's there's a vacuum pump. That'sto be the first place I would
go to if it have hard breaks. Then the light comes on. The
braking is only because of the computertelling it to check the braking system.
(33:35):
Just the very first time you touchit, the brake pedals dip as a
rock and then it's totally normal.So I assume that there must be a
sensor on the breke booster. Yeah, I mean it's part of your ABS
control module. You know, anybreaking assists like that. The first thing
that I would do is I wantto get into this computer. I want
to see if there's any code storedin history. No code stored. I
(33:57):
have a code reader. There's nothingthat comes up at all. Okay,
but I'm gonna go a little bitfurther than that and go into mode six
and that's gonna tell you the readinessmonitors Ford users mode six. Nowadays,
it's implemented that every vehicle has Modeten, which what they do is a
store. It's like a freeze frame. Any failure that you're gonna get is
(34:21):
going to stay in there for acertain amount of time. So how big
a how good a computer do yougot? Does it just get PO codes
and that's it, or we'll getinto the breaking. I've got an access
for it. It doesn't do asmuch as what some of the high level
stuff will do, but it willdo that. Okay, I could any
(34:42):
stored codes at all. So well, and a lot of times we'll get
into a system and we have aquick, you know scanner for PO codes,
but we also have a bigger scannerthat allows us to get deeper into
you know, breaks and transmissions andthings like that, so there might be
something in there. You just don'thave a scanner allows you to be able
to get deep into it. Allright, Well, I'll take it into
(35:02):
the shop and if it happened again, it just seems real strange, But
I appreciate the advice. Yeah.And then the other thing that we most
commonly repair on those is, likeI said, the vacuum pumps over on
the right hand side, they justwe've had them be there and then not
there and uh, with the overlappingvalve timing that they have, the engine
can't produce enough vacuum corrects. Yeah, and then it may see that,
(35:27):
Yes, it's strange because there's nomechanical issue with it. There's no faulty
breaking, there's no bad there's there'snothing an issue. I mean, there's
there's nothing. So it's just frommy knowledge, it's just that a computer
correct. But but the but thesensor may have seen a drop in pressure
on vacuum and that may be touchyour light on. Okay, go over
(35:47):
on that right hand side and justsee if it's leak and oil because it
may be trailing down that back sideof the head. If it is,
the vacuum pump's bad because it's leakingoil out through the seal. So it's
a quick, easy digital check.Okay, thanks buddy, you appreciate it.
All right, We're gonna head overto John John's Gonda ninety seven Grand
Prix. John, what's going ontoday? Real quick? Like? Gentlemen,
(36:09):
thank you for being on the radioand everything over the years. You
bet I got a Grand Prix,has got the three eight supercharge motor at
it. I've talked to you before, over and over and over about this
problem, child. And anyway,it's reading twenty two degrees in vance and
idol that it clients as you readthe motor that that's supposed to. But
(36:31):
it is supposed to be on twentytwo degrees. I keep burning spark plugs
up. What's wrong with this thing? Check the timing? Well I have
to. The scanner is reading twentytwo degrees and my red brick scanner my
SNEP on EMPT twenty five hundred andI'm not familiar, but what should base
(36:51):
timing be on it? It's notgoing to be zero. It should be
about ten degrees, ten to thirteendegrees. As GM's
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