Auto repair: the neverending story
It seems as if I’m always..
Well, anyway, I put new tires on the truck, which quietedm it the old girl down a great deal. The problem is, it then uncovered some noises that had been quieter than the tire rumble. SO tonight i put a new Ujoint in the front driveshaft- including removing the upper end (a CV joint) and repacking it.
By the way: if you’re inclined to do auto repairs, and you value your sanity at ALL, buy a new driveshaft rather than repack. THis was a huge pain in the ass. The bearings popped out and I had to shoehorn the whole thing back together, which takes more than four hands.
And one more noise settled. So now I’m down to the manifold leak and the heat riser gasket. Hell, in a month it might be back to normal.
Not bad for a vehicle with 280,000 miles.
Good luck. My Escort seems to have
developed a transmission fluid leak. I’m hoping it’s not a serious problem, just a leaky hose or something. It’s way overdue for a fluid+filter change anyway, so I’ll try to get the car into the shop this week. I don’t have the tools right now to try to fix it myself.
My 97F150 rolled up 280000 last week. 1 alternator, 2 belts, lower front ball joints, 2 sets plugs and wires, 1 EGR cleaning(intake holes), 2 batteries, and all the other normal maint. things. If you look after your ride it will last a long time. Everyone should learn to at least understand how a vehicle works so they don’t get robbed when it needs some repair.
Blind, Rick, that’s dead on. Take care of it, it’ll take care of you.
Me, I’m trying to figure out why Isuzu says that the whole front drive assembly – half-shafts, cvj’s, bearings, everything that moves – on my 4X4 Rodeo has to be replaced when the front CVJ boots go bad. On a seven year old SUV with ~50K miles(and probably less then 200 miles using the 4wd.
My mechanic pretty much said that’s stupid. There’s no noise or grabbing from the front end at all.
Emdfl, you might look hard at that. THey probably sell the stuf as balanced matched units.
The wifey’s Manger has half the miles your Exploder does, but its still going strong.
The thing a lot of people don’t seem to understand is if you keep them in repair they’ll last practically forever, and be able to limp home (more often than not) when they do break.