Rebuilding the Engine: the Triathlon.

So as you may lovingly recall, we had three days to repair the car by installing both valve cover gaskets. Which are located in the engine. Since day one and two were spent ordering parts and trying to fix the breaks on the truck the only thing we were able to do that evening was pull apart the top layer of shit under the hood, and unhook and label hoses and wires. So when the cold watery winters light crept back over my little farm on day three the clock began.

See, we had to be at work the next day. And when I say that, I mean there was no way we could miss this job. At all ever. It could not happen. But of course we can't drive the car all the way to the big city with it spewing oil all over the back half of the engine and the muffler.

So that morning we got up to be greeted by it being 30 degrees outside and snowing.

Because ha ha of course it was.

So we do our morning chores and gird our loins and I play that fine game called what's the warmest clothes I am willing to get covered in engine cleaner and motor oil and then we head outside into the arctic wasteland driveway pull the hood open and began.

The first thing we had to do was install the new gasket onto the piece we had pulled out and cleaned. This actually went pretty well, to lure us into a false sense of security. We pulled the old dry rotted gasket out and put in the new one, feeling like champions. Then of course, shit got real. Getting to the first gasket was easy, it was right in the front of the engine. All we had to do was unbolt the top plate thing and boom access.

Getting to the second gasket was a motherfucking adventure.

See each gasket lives in these metal rectangles that house the valves. So it get to the gaskets we had to take the cover/lid/whateverit'scalled off. The first one was right smack in front of the engine. That second one was in the very back of the engine under a whole bunch of crap. I mean like a shit ton of crap.

So we had to take off that big metal part on top of the engine that is the part that looks like an engine. Like, if I took a bunch of random parts from the car and laid them out in the driveway and asked you to pick which one went to the engine, you would pick this thing. Of course it had like eleventy billion wires going to it and hoses and bolts that connected it to shit.

So Scott who was labeling everything ever under that hood was busy taking wires and hoses off and writing on them and I took it upon myself to remove the bolts holding this Uber Engine piece to this bracket. Which sucked all the ass ever.

First off I was doing this because I have tiny girl hands* because there was almost no room behind the Uber Engine piece where the firewall is. And of course the firewall is a literal thing that separates you from everything under the hood so if the car explodes into a flaming ball your legs don't get melted off. So needless to say I can't damage the firewall.

Also since the high for the day was 35 motherfucking degrees there was the added adventure of not dropping bolts down into the black abyss that lives under the hood. Which is super fun when your fingers are aching and getting kinda numb.

So once we got this Uber Engine piece off and taped over the holes that do magic things to make the car run that were now exposed, we could then start on getting to that gasket. Which turned into a big shit fest. Since there was still a fuck ton of shit on top of the valve cover.

Okay, have you ever seen one of those movies where the camera speeds alone a tangled path and shows you, the viewer the whole route that the protagonist needs to traverse? So like, it starts with our intrepid heroes and then the camera pulls back and then you see they still need to get past the dark and creepy forest and over the ravine and then across the iron bridge and crawl into a storm drain to get into the castle?

This was just like that, except made out of auto parts.

So we proceeded to unhook a whole bunch of shit and then we tried to unhook the wiring harness and it just laughed at us and we kept having to run back into the house to watch how to repair videos. Which was kinda helpful except all the parts we were having trouble with came off in the video without a hitch while rays of golden light fell upon the mechanic and everything was perfect. Needless to say there was a lot of swearing.

So after what seemed like forever we were finally able to pull the damn valve thing out and clean it. Which of course was super fun because getting your hands covered in cleaning fluid when it is snowing sideways and you are working in your driveway on some sawhorses you are using as a table is just the greatest thing ever.

Of course at this point it was already like 3pm and we are starting to freak out a little because the car is like, really not together at all and it will be dark in like two hours. So we put in the new gasket and then try to shove the thing back into the car and back under the damn wiring harness and then it doesn't want to go and finally we manage to shove it back in there and then we have to take a break because it's fucking cold outside. Like, I walked into an eighty degree house mobile home and it didn't feel hot enough.

So we drank tea and looked at the clock and then grimly at each other and I wanted to yell something epic and moving and give an encouraging speech like that one from Braveheart but I was too damn tired and sore and cold so I just swore softly under my breath and then started to freak out a little bit.

Going back outside was like stepping straight into a freezer made out of car parts. So we get back up there and began to put the engine back together. This was a little easier for me because I had seen it come apart so I just stuck stuff back together based on the labels. However I did learn an important lesson called “it's totally possible to take the top half of an engine apart and put it back together without having any idea what the parts do or what they are called.

It's like the worst 3D puzzle ever, basically.

A puzzle that spits coolant and oil all over you.

Anyway by this point we are starting to act like the failure fairy has shown up and blessed us both with her wand of having shit go wrong because all those things we fought and swore and bloodied our hands up to get off now have to go back on and our fingers are freezing and it's still fucking snowing.

This part is what I lovingly referred to as the death march stage.

See at some point it dawned on me, while I was frantically putting bolts back on that everything in the engine compartment is vital to the car running. I realize to someone who knows cars that stating that sounds super stupid. You know like pointing out that the sky is blue and that you can heat food using a microwave. However this simple statement takes on a whole new meaning when you are staring down at the partially dismantled engine of your car and realize that if you don't reconnect everything just right the car will not run and you will be fucked.

So as the light leached out of a gray featureless sky we reconnected hoses and wires and put plates and brackets back on and then we had to pull out a work light and head lamps and it got really really ball shittingly cold and then at last, at long last there was nothing left to connect or clean and we stared back down at a complete engine compartment.

So then Scott got in the drivers seat and turned the key and the car STARTED and ran it was a the most beautiful thing in the world and then he got out and we stood there in the cold and dark with the snowflakes coming down and watched the car running and I felt like this was it, this was the moment I was going to savor that we had done something I thought we could not do, and that our crazy plan had worked and even though I was freezing cold I was going to take this moment right now and appreciate the shit out of that engine.

That is until all that coolant started burning off.

It was a smell, is what I am saying.

But in the end we made it to work, and that's what matters.

I'm probably sure I smelled just lovely when I got there.

*This is a lie.

I Need a Teleporter: Both Vehicles are Broken Now.

So we were driving to work the other day happily unaware that shit was sneaking up on us like a tiny assassin made out of bad luck and car repair. Unfortunately we became aware of it when the check engine light came on. So Scott got out of the car at a gas station and did things under the hood that I did not understand and then he checked the oil level and it was like super dry and then he was all like fuck we have an oil leak. And I was all like that would explain the burning ass smell when we start the car. Because who drives around with there car smelling like burning mechanical ass without doing anything about it?

We do.

So in addition to the truck being up on blocks we now have a problem with the car. Which if you are counting along at home means that the only thing we now have running is the backhoe. Which is not street legal and I'm pretty sure that we can't drive that to work. Fairly sure.

Of course this whole thing got more complicated because this is my life and nothing can ever be simple. Because of our work schedules we had three days off to fix the car. Sounds like plenty of time right?

Ha ha no.

Because Day One of crazy vehicle repair time we had just got home from an overnight job and it was like, 5am. So the only thing we managed to get done was driving our tired zombie asses to the auto parts store where of course they only had parts for the truck and had to order the parts for the car. Also we made the decision to get all of the parts at once for both vehicles because I have come to accept that money isn't a thing I get to have anymore.

Goodbye paycheck, may the wind be ever at your back.

Anyway we got the parts back home and then went and tried to stay awake until bedtime because that is something that adults do for some reason. At this point we decided to work on the truck breaks on Day Two because we had all those parts and it was already sitting there and then when we got the car parts we could work on it later on in the afternoon.

What this really translated to was that we spent most of the day fighting the truck breaks.

So first we got out the parts for the front breaks on the truck. Now these are disc breaks and we have done a bunch of disc break work before and were all like this should go pretty fast. Which if you are familiar with this blog means that everything went to hell in a poop basket.

To explain, the part that we had to replace is this metal shell called the break caliper that holds the break pads. So when you step on the break the caliper squeezes the pads into this round dish called the break rotor. Basically when you break the caliper gives the rotor the biggest hug ever. This also means that when you go to replace the caliper you have to shove the pads into it and then put it over the rotor like a taco. A metal filled taco.

Except one of the calipers didn't want to go on. At all. Ever. So we fought with it. We pried and swore and used the hammer. We took turns swearing at it while we beat on it with various things in the vicinity. About then Scott got fed up and we put the other side which went on perfectly just to make us think we were crazy.

It was about then that we discovered what the problem was. The thingajig the caliper bolts onto was bent. I don't just mean a little bent, like oh we could straighten this up with a hammer, no I mean like bent to shit to the point that when we gave up and went to get the car parts the guys at the AutoZone told us our best bet outside of going to a junk yard was to heat it up with a torch and bend it back. Of course this would mean that we would be weakening the metal so when the fucker breaks it is going to break right at that point and then I pointed out that I was a terribly unlucky person and the auto guys who had watched us buy parts for two cars at the same time kinda had to agree.

Of course it was like too damn late in the day when we went to the auto parts store because breaks are assholes like that. So then we got all the parts we needed for the car and drove home, and then we noticed it was getting dark. We also noticed that we had one day left to do this. So we strapped on headlamps, got out a work light and began to take the engine apart.

Did I mention we have to replace the gaskets in the engine? And that we have to take the engine apart to do it?

We had to take the engine apart.

So this involved us standing in the driveway with a work light and headlamps, labeling every wire, tube and hose on the damn thing in order to get it back together the next day. Of course it was windy as fuck too. So we get all our shit together and I ask what I can do to help and then Scott tells me to get a rag and to pull off some such hose and then I get some pliers and take the little metal thing that holds the tube on and pull it down the tube and then I grab the rubber firmly and pull and instantly a whole shit motherfucking ton of fluid comes out of there like a goddamned fire hose and I freak out and shove the whole thing back in and then I am like what do I do?

And then Scott is like, just take it off and then I pull it out again and this fucking liquid goes fucking EVERYWHERE and Scott is all like holy shit that was overfilled and then we freak out and stuff paper towels in the hole in a dim attempt to stop the deluge and then I look down into the car and everything is dripping and then Scott is all like, we'll have to clean that tomorrow and I'm like fuck this is gonna make the car smell great when we start it up again.

So then we go back to unhooking things and labeling them and I don't have any more hoses spew gunk all over me and then it gets windy as fuck because ha ha the weather hates my guts. Finally we are getting pretty tired and my knees are trying to murder me and I am limping around because leaning way over the front of the car is something they don't like to do, apparently and then finally, finally we can pull off one of things we need to replace and clean.

At this point we are joined by Tom Tom Tiger our kitty. He proceeded to demand attention. We try to explain that we are covered in black gunk from the motor we are scrubbing down and that he will have to wait. He stalks off.

So there I am busy scrubbing down the inside of this integral car thing, wondering if it is possible for my fingers to get any colder, when I hear a squeak. I look down, and in the weak beam of my shitty Wal-mart headlamp I see Tommy has caught a mouse. Which is alive. Which he lovingly gave to me.

By putting it on my foot.

We quit pretty much right after that.

So tomorrow we have to install the new gaskets and then put the freakin engine back together and then get ready for work the next day. Should be a piece of cake right?

Right?

Fuck.

The Struts are Done. It is Over.

Today. Sweet Jesus God, today. It started off bright and early when I rolled over in bed and my body started to demand answers. Mainly it wanted to know why I had thought that opening the liquor cabinet and mixing what ever mixers we had with peach brandy was a good idea. It wanted to know why I thought drunkenly eating wheat crackers at 11pm was a super sweet idea. It wanted to know why I hate my fucking liver.

Because car repair, that's why.

Anyway.

We got up, did things, my innards screamed about shit, and then we fired up the truck and drove off to the promised auto parts store clutching the broken sway bar control link Patrick Swayze bar. We get there, and I try not to make eye contact with their display of air fresheners that are really just pictures of half dressed B reel porn stars printed on scented cardboard. The guy behind the counter looks at the part, asks those questions the car people ask that I never have an answer to which is why I got married, taps some shit out on his plastic covered keyboard, and tells us that he doesn't have the part in stock and that whomever said they did on the phone last night was wrong.

Have you guys been on the Internet long enough to have seen one of those images where someone has photoshopped out the background in a picture of themselves into a massive mushroom cloud explosion to signify anger?

That happened. To me. In real life.

At an auto parts store.

I would not have guessed that either.

So we get back in our truck and we drive to the junk yard where Jim Bubba Country Face tells us that no one here drives dem foreign cars and that he is real sorry but maybe we should buy a Subaru or a Chevy or something.

Alright.

So we get in the gas guzzling truck and start looking for additional auto parts stores. In the middle of nowhere. On the way we passed a hardware store and Scott said grimly that if we couldn't find one he was going to make some goddamned motherfucking sway bar control links. I said that if they didn't have it I was going to make them get out every Patrick Swayze bar they had and compare them and buy the ones that looked the closest.

Well as luck would have it we found a store. It had no cars in the parking lot, and it looked like the 70s had called and wanted their building back. We pulled into the parking lot, not even bothering to pretend there were lines on the faded blacktop that constituted the parking lot. (There were none.)

The inside smelled like mold someone had poured bleach on. We approached the counter, clutching our damned sway bar control link like it was some sort of magic wand. A younger bearded guy with a belly and a T shirt that was tight in all the wrong places asked if he could help us. We asked if he any sway bar control links -rear- for our car. Or anything close to it.

Him and Scott spoke for a moment in the ancient and beautiful mechanics language. He typed things into the computer. Then he looked up and told us that he had the parts. At first I didn't even hear him. I had already opened my mouth to tell him to bring us anything that might fit. He whisked himself off into the dusty labyrinthine storeroom. I crossed my fingers. After a moment Scott crossed his too.

I don't know what he thought, coming out of the storeroom to find both of us with our fingers crossed staring at the boxes like they were priceless relics from an ancient world, but he opened one box and held the part up to the part Scott had.

They. Were. The. Exact. Same. Part.

At that point I told him he was my hero.*

I paid for my overpriced (probably) sway bar control whateverthefuckatleastIhaveitnows and got the hell out. We drove home, I tried to pretend I was not hungover, and then we went to install them.

Ha ha.

You know the reason that we had to cut the old ones off? They are lock tight nuts. Meaning when you put them on they will never, ever come off. Also meaning they are a damn bitch to get on. Especially on this part because the whole center piece will just spin along with the bolt like it's a goddamned teacup ride up in my car. Which meant we had to hold the back end of this thing with vice grips. Except of course the vice grips didn't really fit. So Scott took it upon himself to grind a pair into something resembling working.

Which is when the shed floor caught fire.

Apparently one of us had left one of those cheap flimsy disposable blue plastic chemical gloves on the floor, and a spark hit it and BAM. Being me I yelled “THE FLOOR IS ON FIRE” and then Scott did that Russian dance on the glove and everything was okay.

Needless to say, getting the parts on was pretty easy after that.

So, all in all, this job, which according to the repair guide should have taken an hour, at 30 minutes a side, took us four days, cost us two broken deep well impact sockets, a broken allen key, about a third of my liver, Scott's sanity, vice grips, the right side trim off the drivers side, all of the original parts we had to sawzall and it caused a fire.

So, all in all, I'd call this a win.

* I actually said this to him. He laughed.

Repairing the Struts: The Bitter Taste of Defeat.

After recovering from the previous evening of getting trashed and yelling at the movie Thor, plus the countless drunken reenactions of said movie, we drug ourselves back out to the car with the same motivation and energy as Frodo crawling up mount doom.

Except this time I can't get Sam to carry me.

While waiting for our parts to show from within the ancient and tumultuous world of the Fedex truck, we decided to replace one of our motor mounts. Which went about as well as anything else we have done recently.

Meaning that we had to use the angle grinder to remove a bolt because apparently when they built my car they used grade F bolts. Ha ha. Luckily we had already anticipated this move and bought a replacement bolt, because when life just keeps raining shit on you, you learn to buy an umbrella.

I'm still a little bitter.

So we fight the motor mount out and fight the new one in, and then we give each other the saddest slowest most painful high fives while sarcastically saying go team with dead sounding voices and then I went in to eat a goddamned sandwich.

Which is of course when our new sway control bar links Patrick Swayze bars would arrive. Because sitting down and eating is for losers. So we rip open the package and discover that the bars did not come with nuts like the pictures would have us believe.

Remember the old nuts? The old nuts that we sawed off? The nuts that are laying in three and four pieces in a coffee can in the shed? Those nuts.

What followed was the saddest montage ever, where we went to sheds and got every bin, coffee can, peanut butter jar, and plastic organizer of bolts and nuts and dumped them all out on the kitchen table and proceeded to go through them.*

None of them fit. Not a goddamned one.

We also noticed at this juncture of despair and anger, that these parts looked suspiciously like not the right part. But, we knew these were the generic part, made to fit several different cars so we armed ourselves with the part and some nuts that almost but not quite threaded and marched on up to the car.

We pulled the tire off, assembled our tools, and realized that these were not just the wrong part, that these were totally super not the right part in the history of ever. For one thing, they were about three inches too short. For another, the bolts were not even facing the right way.

At this point I had to talk Scott out of fashioning a working Patrick Swayze bars out of the parts we had. Citing such compelling arguments, as in, it won't work, it's not safe, no really this will not work, and it's getting dark.

So Scott left to call the place we ordered them from. It turns out that they were the right part.

They were just the right part for a MERCEDES.

Which is so far from what my car is, you can't even see it from here. Needless to say they are giving us our money back, because if they didn't I think I would have to get on a plane to whereeverthefuck and murder them in person.

Anyway.

We called every auto parts store ever and found one that had the part. Which we would have picked up that evening except our truck, aka the only fucking vehicle we own that runs, has no headlights to speak of.

Which means that we will be going to the auto parts store bright and early to pick up the bars, and the motherfucking nuts, drive home and finally repair the damn car.

So if anyone needs me, I think I'll be drinking while cursing the cold uncaring universe that drove me to this point.

Pray for me.

Pray for us all.

*I cleaned it afterward, stop looking at me like that. Although that sandwich was damn gritty.

The Second Strut, or Why I Started Drinking Again.

So we woke up this morning feeling like we had been pummeled by invisible dream donkeys during the night. It was a very specific kind of pain, is what I am saying. So after completing our morning chores, shoveling the three inches of snow off the car, we put on all the thermals ever, girded our loins, and crawled out of the damn house to tackle that second wheel strut.

Well after having all that practice the first time* the second time seemed to be going better. Until we hit that damn sway bar control link Patrick Swayze bar again. After a few token attempts to remove the bar, in which we learned the bolts were so rusted on that they had become one with the universe, we just sawzalled the damn part off again.

This is not the recommended solution, we were just all out of fucks to give.

Also Scott had ordered two Patrick Swayze bars on the internet, because we are capable of learning from our mistakes and also have learned to assume the worse is going to happen. So we cut the bar off like fucking wizards, took the strut out, and shove the new strut up into the wheel well. Then we reattached the break assembly high fiveing, about how much faster this attempt is going. Then we go to take the clamp off the spring and discover that the spring has become unseated and we have to take the damn thing off again. Completely. Which we had to do TWO MORE TIMES.

Did I mention that the repair manual states that this a 30 minute job?

I didn't?

This was supposed to be a 30 minute job. A 30 minute job that we were into day two of. A 30 minute job that was going to run into day three because we had just taking a power saw to a crucial part of the car and weren't going to get the part until tomorrow.

So using the power of team work, and the power of heart and swearing, we got the goddamned, motherfucking bitch ass strut into the fucking wheel well and locked down. I repeated yesterdays performance a THIRD time, and shoved the bolts back into the break assembly and then we put the tire back on went inside and started drinking.

Halfway through dinner, I looked Scott full in the face and said, I want to crank the wood stove up to eighty, get naked, get drunk and watch some stupid, mindless Hollywood blockbuster on my laptop in bed for the remainder of the evening.

Which is how I ended up getting totally wasted to Thor.

And it was awesome.

Replacing Wheel Struts is the Worst Thing Ever.

Or alternatively, replacing the struts in the cold is like that one scene in Star Wars where Luke learns that he has to go to the Dagobah system only I learned that the air compressor scares me because it's kind of a dick. So today we decided that we were going to replace the rear wheel struts on the car. This job was something that we had wanted to began yesterday, but then the auto shop gave us the wrong part and then we had to drive to town to get another one because ha ha ha life. Did I mention the high today was 37?

The high today was 37. Degrees. That was it.

Anyway, so we get the strut out of the box, optimistically, and then we jack up the car and get the tire off and then everything went to hell in a poop basket. Now what you have to understand, is the strut is that part with the giant-ass-holy-motherfuck-that's-huge spring on it. It is connected to the rotor which is the bit that makes the car stop. So the strut connects to the break. That's all you need to know.

Except there was one other piece. One other traitorous low down bitch faced part. And that part is the part I can never remember the name of. Scott told me it was the sway bar control link. I spent the day referring to it as the Patrick Swayze bar.

Because I am adult and no one can tell me to stop acting like a 10 year old.

So the first problem is some other fucking idiot mechanic had placed the bolts into the strut in such a way that we could not remove the strut from the car without taking out the break caliper- also known as that part I never want to touch again after that time we replaced the break pads. After we did that, we discover that the bolt on the Patrick Swayze bar was stuck. Like super really a lot stuck. Like it took 45 minutes, a broken allen key, and two broken sockets before we gave up and sawzalled the piece off.

Which pretty much meant that we were ordering more parts.

Because who doesn't love pouring additional money and time into a project you didn't feel like doing in the first place? Anyway, about that point we discovered that getting the new strut in was god awful.

One person had to lift the strut up, deep into the wheel well, keep everything perfectly lined up, fight the damn break system out of the way, while the second person had to lean way into the trunk and verbally guide the piece into the bolt hole and then bolt it in place. This took two attempts. Oh and clamps that we placed on the spring to allow us to work with it kept hitting the wheel well. Ha ha. Annddd also at this point it started snowing.

Because fuck spring that's why.

Anywho, we got the damn thing in place, lined up and bolted in place up top. Then all we had to do was bolt it at the bottom. Seeing that Scott, who had been doing the bulk of the lifting, was tired enough to turn into the undead at any moment, I sent him inside, saying that I would put the last two bolts in.

Childbirth probably would have been easier.

Also, I pulled an ass muscle.

Okay.

So the problem now was that the break assembly was just sort of hanging there, so to get the bottom bolt in, I had to lift it. This was not so bad, and I was able to slide the bolt in rather painlessly. The only problem now was that I had turned the bottom into a fulcrum point, meaning that the top was still leaning out and down. Which would mean I was going to have to use my 145 pound ass to shove the break rotor up with one hand, while putting the bolt in with the other.

It took everything I had and then some. At one point, I had my right shoulder resting on my right hand, with only the palm on the rotor because I didn't want to put pressure on that rotor plate guard thingy, with my legs doing that thing where you shove them into the ground and push hard so it looks like you are trying to run in place while you are half laying down.

Which is how I pulled that ass muscle.

I remember sitting there, in my half mud, half ice driveway, breathing hard, thinking that I had given this fucking thing everything I had, and I still couldn't do it. Snow flakes, the light fluffy, lazy kind, the kind that zig zag to the ground, were falling around me, catching on my hat and landing soundlessly on my gloves. The sun was slipping behind our ridge, painting the sky with crazy blues and purples and leaving the heavens lit while the earth slipped into cold shadow. My hands were stinging and my feet, even through three socks and insulated boots, were throbbing to the beat of my heart. The wind whipped past making my cheeks sting, bringing me back from that tired fugue to the world where I was facing off against my car, kneeling on a wet soggy board.

And I summoned my anger.

I thought about everything that had ever pissed me off. Every single person that gave fuel to that terrible voice in my head that tells me that I am not good enough. That tells me I am weak and pathetic and stupid and makes fun of me for being afraid of the air compressor.

And I told that voice to go fuck itself. To go fuck itself so hard. And then I shoved that goddamned motherfucking, son of bitch break rotor up and crammed the bolt in place.

Because I am awesome. Then I walked the victory limp pulled ass muscle walk back to the house to tell Scott that I was the queen of the strut assembly.

At least until we have to do the other side.

Fuck.