NEW OR USED

There are only two things I know of that will keep a diesel engine from starting, short of total mechanical failure that is.  One is a fuel problem such as a plugged fuel filter or a leaking fuel line which lets air get into the fuel pump.  The other is glow-plugs.  These little plugs are a lot like gas engine spark plugs, but they are only needed to get things warmed up enough to start the engine, and then they are turned off.

 

I went out to the car on Monday to go to class and found it had been smitten by a bad glow plug.  It would not start.  The last time this happened, I messed around with it most of an afternoon and into the evening.  Dad finally came over and gave me some tips, and a replacement (used) glow plug to swap out with the bad one.  This system is not the best design either.  Five glow plugs are wired one after the other so when just one goes bad the circuit is broken and none of them work!  But this time I was ready for it!  I had been mindful of the fact that I was depending on a miss-matched group of aged plugs, but also of the fact that I did not know how to work on them.  When I was searching for some small diesel fuel line, I was directed to a foreign auto parts store that has a lot more that I'd like to buy! Trust me on that one.  While there, I picked up a repair manual and five brand new glow plus.  I just hadn't had the time or maybe the incentive to install them.

 

Here in Idaho, I think the mentality of most people is to spend as little as possible on repairs.  For example, find which one went bad, get a good one (used if possible, they cost less) and just replace the one that went bad.  This saves you a lot of money on repairs, right?  But does it?  Sure the cost of the parts is less out of pocket, but isn't there a lot more to consider?  In my case, if I just replaced the one, how long would it last?  Winter is approaching and the glow plugged are working harder in the mornings than they have all summer.  More heat is needed to start a freezing cold engine than is needed when it's about 70 degrees out.  By changing out all five, I should avoid having to do this again anytime soon, especially in the bite of winters weather.  But I was talking about costs here.  It took me about three hours to swap them all out.  If it had been done in a shop, the final bill might have come to about 4 or 5 hundred dollars.  In addition I lost a day of classes... I paid for those too!  If all I had accomplished was to replace one that was blown with a plug that is just as likely to fail soon anyhow, how many more times this winter would I be missing classes and spending several hours under the hood searching for a bad glow plug?

 

With some things, it doesn't make sense to buy new when used parts are available.  With some things that wear out or burn out over time, it just doesn't make sense to buy used when new parts are available.  Obvious examples are tiers, brake pads, clutch plates, ignition parts, starters, alternators and such.  These things fail eventually and replacing them with another used part is perhaps a stop gad measure, at best. It ensures that at some near future date, it will have to be fixed all over again.  So the cost out of pocket is soon exceeded by the "down-time" and by the "shop-time".  By that I mean the cost of not having a working vehicle (in my case it was the loss of classes that I pay to attend) and the cost of labor to make repairs, which in a shop is above 100 dollars an hour now?  So the cost of new plugs over used is cheaper if I don't have to put it in the shop just one extra time.

 

Still I thank God for his grace.  If this car had not started one time earlier... things would have been quite different.  You see, at home here, I had the parts and tools and manual.  Everything I needed to make the repairs.  The last time I started this car was Thursday, leaving school.  (I stayed home sick Friday (flu) didn't go anywhere Saturday, and Sunday we used the wife's car to go to church.) So if the car had failed to start just one use earlier it would have left me stranded at school, in Boise (25 miles away from home) mid-day, ill with the flu, no tools, no parts, no one to call for a couple hours...  that would have been the Murphy's Law moment! You know, the guy who says that things always go wrong at the worst possible moment.  Well, in my case it didn't.  That is something to be grateful for!

 

2 UP & 1 BACK

All week, my mom and I debated about what to do for labor day.  My sister had made plans for the family to go camping, but those fell through because the camp grounds closed.  (Wildland fires were in the area, and they were shut down.)  A few other ideas were bounced around, but in the end it looked like everyone would be going in different directions.

 

Friday came and we still were not decided, but mom had gotten news that her brother (my uncle) was in the hospital, and not doing well.  They were going to try him on dialysis, if it went well, he might live to see the new year, if not, well, they gave him up to two weeks.  With that in mind, I told mom we should use this opportunity to get out of town and go see him while he is still among the living.  It would mean more to him and I to actually talk a bit than to pay respects at  a funeral.  Dad has been working near there, and had hoped we would all get to come se him, so she finally agreed to the idea and we all packed for a short trip to Yuba City California on Friday night.

 

Saturday morning we left early.  Two hours into the trip, mom got a call.  Dad had drove down from Eureka and was in the hospital with uncle Doyle already.  Dialysis that morning had gone okay, Doyle was looking a bit better.  Then we got another call.  Doyle had taken a turn for the worst, he might live long enough for us to see him.  Then another call Doyle had passed away.  The trip suddenly changed from one where we were going to visit Doyle, to one where we needed to take his sister  (mom) down, and we all needed to be with the family.  Then she got another call.  My sisters nephew, Carl, had been hurt in an accident.  No details.  Latter we got more.  Carl had passed away.  The young man had been out riding motorcycles with some friends, two of them had gotten tangled up, Carl was injured and died soon after, the other man was still in a critical condition.

 

We arrived late Saturday in Yuba City.  We were able to connect with Sterly, Brandon, Steven and their families... we also paid a visit to Bert, Doyle's wife.  I was glad we had made the effort and taken the time, in spite of the sad circumstances.  Monday came and it was time for us to head back to Idaho.  I had promised my daughters something of a camping trip, so we took in a short detour off the main roads and climbed around a mountain for a couple of hours before continuing on home.

 

Out on HWY 395, Nadya started asking for a pit-stop.  We skated through the small town of "Likely" without seeing any place we wanted to stop, so we pushed on another 20 miles and pulled into a Rite Aid parking lot.  Upon getting out I looked down and saw that the front tire was almost down to the rim.  It was FLAT!  We had everything onboard that we needed to change it except a lug wrench!  And while there were a surprising number of small businesses open on the labor day in the small town of Alturas, not one of them sold anything like a lug wrench.  I found a station with air, and got the rim off the ground, but the tire's side wall was already damaged and the tire a complete loss.  Then I found an engine shop with one door cracked open.  The mechanic was there on personal business, but he helped me swap out the flat for the spare.  I thanked him with a 20.  Least I could do for saving us from being stuck overnight in Alturas!

 

So we lost two on the way up.  We lost one on the way back.  The loss on the trip back pales in comparison to the promise of young life taken by tragedy.  It pales in comparison to the loss of a good man, though elderly, in failing health, Doyle was one of the good guys, and this old world just doesn't seem to have as many of those as it used too.  We grieve the loss of one more.  Our grief is tempered by the sincere hope and faith that both these men, young and old though they were, had both found the saving grace of our Lord Jesus, and that today they are both in a better place.  Our prayers go out to their families and friends.  May God's peace be with you all.