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September 26, 2005

Patina

Patina is not the name of the fanciest Italian restaurant in town; it is the word to describe the faded, dusty finish of an old car. In the old days a car worthy of collecting was worthy of an extensive and expensive restoration that would refinish the car to a lustrous shine that was every bit as good, if not better, than the finish that came from the factory. But today there is an appreciation for an original car with its faded finish. The feeling seems to be that anyone can repaint and recondition an old wreck of a car and breath new life into a hulk, but a car that is untouched yet still in servable condition is rare and special.

Cars that have survived 20 years or more in original condition have lived a charmed life. It is possible for a daily driver to endure with loving care, but the challenges of harsh northern winters and salted roads make such cars rare outside of the sunshine belt of the South Western and South Eastern United States. If you do find a survivor in the Rust Belt, it has been the cherished possession of an eccentric family or in the babied custody of an avid enthusiast who have carefully garaged their cars at the first hint of snow. But out here in warm, dry Southern California it is not uncommon to find cars 40-50 years old being driven by the original owner on a daily basis.

In my neighborhood there is a nice little old lady who drives a 1966 Mustang that seems to be untouched by time except for 40 years worth of parking lot dings and stone chips. In the local mall parking lot there is a 1973 Chevy Nova that has lost some of its chrome trim but otherwise is as it was when sold new. Near my office in Hollywood there is a mid-1950’s Ford Crown Victoria that appears to have never experienced the ravishes of time. At the car wash I met an gentleman in his 70’s who is the proud original owner of an immaculate 1987 Honda CRX Si. And these are hardly the only examples; the streets of Southern California are the automotive version of Valhalla for old cars that seem to live on forever in the comfort of the California sunshine.

My hobby car can be classified as one of the patina-blessed cars of Southern California. A 1987 Honda CRX Si, I rescued this car from a life of abandonment from a suburban driveway where it had been parked when its owner became a mother of two and needed a larger source of transportation. I have bent and shaped this humble grocery getter into my personal interpretation of what a performance car should be. Under the surface, nearly every part and sub-system has been modified to exact the most power, the greatest amount of road holding and the surest brakes. But the exterior has been left untouched, the paint is the same coating that left the factory in Japan. To the casual observer my car is no different from the rest of the compact cars seen on the street.

But recently I changed out the hood of my car for a Carbon Fiber hood. The new hood saves weight off of my car and thus serves to enhance performance, but it also ruins the stealth characteristics of my car. The contrasting color of the Carbon Fiber hood is like a red flag that announces my car’s sporting intentions. My cover is blown, the patina that my car has enjoyed as a cloak of anonymity is no longer enough to insure that my car does not draw unwelcome attention from racer wannabes, thieves and the enforcers of traffic laws.

In the logic of the car hobby, now that my cover has been blown I am compelled to finish the job and perfect the car’s exterior. My buddy’s tell me that it makes no sense to lay claim to Patina when the Carbon Fiber hood cries out that this car has been modified. But I am strong. I will resist the temptation to spend a lot of money to replace the damaged body panels and repaint the entire car. Because at heart I still cling to my automotive motto that Form Follows Function.

Posted by Scott at 9:38 AM | Comments (0)

September 25, 2005

Used Car Radio

In a previous post I wrote about the adventure of tracking down and buying a used car. I also pointed out that a used car can also hide some interesting treasures that are waiting discover under the seats and within the nooks and crannies of the trunk. Hopefully, the used car buyer has enough information to sleuth out any serious mechanical defects and use that information as negotiating leverage. One of the clues to potential electrical problems is if the original factory stereo has been replaced.

I recently purchased a 1990 Honda Prelude for my teenaged son. The car met all of my criteria: it was clean, well care for and never been in an accident. The only fault I could find with the car was that the original factory stereo had been removed and replaced with a Pioneer unit with a detachable face, a CD drive and the ability to drive a separate amplifier, a sub-woofer driver and an equalizer function. Before sale, someone had removed the sub-woofer and amp but had thoughtfully left the wiring behind.

Unfortunately, the extra functions of the Pioneer stereo were buried in a menu tree that requires scrolling through several options in an LCD display. The space let over for the radio station preset buttons was very small and the tiny buttons were hard to stab with clumsy fingers while driving. The fatal blow to the Pioneer stereo was that the AM reception was very poor; after consultation with the car’s primary user (my son) it was decided to replace the Pioneer stereo with an OEM Honda AM/FM/CD unit I had in storage. The OEM Honda units are actually excellent stereos and many people foolishly discard them thinking that an expensive aftermarket stereo must certainly be a better unit. It is possible to buy an OEM Honda unit for next to nothing from a source like eBay and I have upgraded many Hondas with cast off OEM stereos that feature CD players.

The first challenge is to get the old Pioneer stereo out of the dashboard. Honda normally secures their radio with a singe Philips head screw that is easily accessible by reaching under from the passenger foot well. But most aftermarket stereo installer use a sleeve device the wraps around the unit that they are installing and then wedges itself into the dash, defying removal and this was the method employed by the guy who installed the Pioneer. A sleeve is a fast and easy way to install a new stereo and but it is not a sign that the rest of the installation job was done with care or thought.

I managed to pry out the old Pioneer unit with out doing any damage to the stereo being removed or the surrounding dashboard. But what I found behind the stereo within the dash nearly broke my heart. Rather than use an adapter to allow the Pioneer stereo to be easily plugged into the Honda’s wiring harness, the installer had cut away the Honda’s pre-wired plug and cobbled together a splice in every single wire in the 16 wire loom. So the car was left with a Pioneer plug that fits into the back of the Pioneer stereo and I had a Honda stereo with a completely different plug interface. And never the twain shall meet.

Rather than making a long trip to the junkyard to cut a Honda stereo plug out of a wrecked hulk, I ran to my local Best Buy stereo installation shop and bought a “Reverse Harness.” This is a Honda plug that comes with wiring guide and instructions for restoring the car’s wiring to allow an OEM Honda stereo to be installed.

Carefully I cut away the Pioneer plug from the car’s wiring harness and then I patiently rewired each of the leads in the new Reverse Harness so that the OEM stereo could be installed back in the car. I used a set of wiring crimps and a proper crimping tool so that the job went surprisingly fast and smoothly. I finished the rewiring and test the stereo before loading it into the dashboard. Surprisingly, I had managed to get every connection correct and the unit worked on the first try. Insuring that all the connections were solid, I slid the OEM Honda stereo into the dashboard and set all of the radio presets.

With the replacement of the stereo my son’s Prelude is now a solid, dependable and fun car to drive with great sounds. I only hope that as an inexperienced driver that he does not wrap this sweet car around a tree.

Posted by Scott at 6:33 PM | Comments (1)

September 24, 2005

Used Car Treasure Hunting

Acquiring a used car is an adventure; selecting the make and model you want, tracking down just the right car, inspecting it for mechanical defects and then negotiating the price are all part of the used car experience. I enjoy the thrill of the hunt for just the right used car, and I see the task as an exercise in detective work to determine exactly what kind of life a used car lived before it came up for sale.

Is there paint overspray on the trim? That means the car has been repainted and likely in some sort of an accident. Are the tires all the same brand and model? If not, there could have been some wear issues related to the suspension. Has the stereo been replaced? If it has there is a good chance that the car’s wiring harness has been modified to accommodate the new stereo. While this is not always a bad thing, it could signify that a less than tidy installer did a hack job on the car’s electrical system that could manifest itself in electrical gremlins down the road.

My most recent used car purchase is a 1990 Honda Prelude 2.0 Si 5 speed that I bought to be my teenaged son’s first regular daily driver. A very clean, straight and well cared for car; it represented a good value for the price and a solid source of transportation for a young man. The Prelude is not a road burner but it offers a modicum of style with an acceptable balance of economy with snappy performance. At first I was disappointed to discover that this particular generation of the Honda Prelude is not well supported by the performance parts aftermarket. But I figure that this will save my son from spending his limited pocket money on go-fast parts and keep his car within the realm of sanity for street use.

But more than a new-to-you car, getting a used car can also be a treasure hunt. I always look forward to the sense of discovery when I clean under the seats, the glove box and explore the darkest corner of the trunk. Usual finds in a used car can be assorted change, pens, hair clips and bottle caps. Trunks can yield spare parts, extra tools and “personal” items of dubious legality. Many military commands will offer a free inspection with drug sniffing dogs to personnel who have bought a used car so that the new owner does not suffer any surprises if stopped and searched by the cops.

My very favorite find in a used car was in the trunk of a 1968 Triumph Spitfire that I bought while I was in college. There I found a negotiable Cashier’s Check for $150 that I viewed as the previous owner’s repayment for taking that car off of his hands. After only a few days of ownership I came to realize that I was dreadfully underpaid to relieve him of that miserable lemon.

Posted by Scott at 5:35 PM | Comments (2)

September 22, 2005

I love getting readers comments

I enjoy getting comments and suggestions from my legions of readers (both of you) and you have responded quickly to my musings about buying a new car. As I stated in that post, I am tired of my boring, but reliable 2003 Honda Accord LX four door that has served me well for the past three years. My daily driver has been some sort of four-door sedan since I became a parent. But now that my kids are older and more independent it is not necessary for me to drive a bus-like vehicle to haul the entire family and I am considering what kind of car I can buy to replace the Family Truckster.

Dave Darling writes:

I would have a tough time buying any new car, frankly. I'd rather have something that has already experienced the major hit of depreciation, and something I can understand and work on. Which pretty much rules out everything new.

I'm partial to small two-seaters that are lightweight and have phenomenal handling. Most of which are staggeringly impractical (which is why I really like my CRX--it's the practical two-seater!). My vote for a new car would likely be a Lotus Elise. It's pretty much the acme of the "not practical" car, though.

The Lotus Elise is a dream come true, a slick little roadster with world class performance straight off the dealer's lot. I could feature myself carving corners in that car which looks to my eye like a 5/8's scale model of the FORD GT (if you put the hard top on, stand back about 50 feet and squint a bit). But it really small with little room to change your mind let alone a change of clothing for a weekend trip. And there are about 40 thousand good reasons with pictures of dead presidents on them that I will not be buying that car. However, if I match six lucky numbers I would certainly add a Lotus Elise to my stable of dream cars.

Dave also makes a good point about taking a hit of instant depreciation on a new car, losing something like 30% of its value as you drive it off the dealer's lot. The longer you hold a new car, the greater amount of time you have to spread that depreciation out. But I am reaching the crossover point of holding the car any longer will not justify the savings in lost depreciation.

I have been told that the "smartest" play in the auto ownership game is to purchase a one-year-old Mercedes that has come back in on a short-term lease. The first driver of the car has paid for the instant depreciation so there is little risk in holding that one-year old car for a year or so and then selling it before it begins to depreciate rapidly.

Bryce adds:

If you like sedans, and liked previous Accords, the Acura TSX might be good to look at. I'm a fan of it. It's the European and Japanese Accord. It's smaller and lighter than the Accord, while being far nicer to be in. I like the idea of a rev happy 4 cylinder with a 6 speed too.

I'd just about sell a kidney to get a Lotus Elise. It's not practical, but it calls to me like the Sirens to the Argonauts. If I had enough money to get one, I would not be able to resist buying one.

Bryce, I am with you all the way. The Lotus Elise is worthy of a selling a body part for. And it is interesting that you have the same taste in cars as Dave Darling and me. I guess birds of a feather, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But as I said before, it is too expensive and too small to be a daily driver for my purposes.

I like your suggestion of the Acura TSX, it is a more handsome and slightly smaller version of the Accord. Maybe I can find a slightly used version to beat the depreciation penalty. I have a few weeks to mull over the decision, I expect to be car shopping at the car buyer friendly Christmas season (few people buy cars when they are taking on the expenses of the holidays).

Keep those comments and suggestions coming in!

Posted by Scott at 5:24 PM | Comments (0)

Function AND Form

I appreciate the beauty of a highly polished, carefully detailed show car. I admire the dedication it takes to get every seam on a car’s body straight and spaced proportionally. No one is more reverential to a car that has every period correct optional feature added to make a car a complete example of the make and model. I can understand the desire to customize a car with chrome, candy flake paint and cushy upholstery as an artistic expression. But for me, I want my hobby car to be light and fast, pared to the bone, nothing onboard that is not absolutely necessary. If it does not make my car faster or safer, I do not want it on my hobby car. If given the choice between a beautiful car or fast cars… well, that is not a good example because a fast car is automatically beautiful to me.

I prefer that my hobby car, a 1987 Honda CRX Si, run as powerfully and efficiently as possible. In the pursuit of maximum performance I have carefully stripped the car of air conditioning, comfy seats, and some sound deadening. My hobby car is not a comfortable car to ride in; no one in the family suggests that we take it for a short trip to the store, let alone a long leisurely drive in the country. But my hobby car is purpose aimed at being as fast and efficient over the road as possible.

With these goals in mind I have removed much more than I have added to my hobby car. But I have just added a piece to my car that reduces weight and (dare I say it?) adds a measure of beauty to my car. I recently removed the heavy steel hood of my car and replaced it with a beautiful custom-made Carbon Fiber hood. Additionally, this new hood also replaces a section of plastic bodywork that had never fit correctly and had marred the graceful lines of the car's front end. So by adding this Carbon Fiber hood I reap the double benefits of lighter and sleeker.

Carbon Fiber is a miracle product that is one of the collateral benefits of the Space Program, along with Tang, Space Food Sticks and Velcro. Carbon Fiber is similar to fiberglass in that is a cloth fabric that is imbedded in resin, but the resulting materiel is then baked at great heat to harden it. The resulting product is lighter and stronger than regular fiberglass.

But there is also a danger with mounting a Carbon Fiber hood on my hobby car. I run the risk of being associated with the backward ball cap wearing, street racing wannabe,
Sport Compact Car crowd who are so slavishly devoted to the street racing movie The Fast and the Furious. Commonly found hanging out in the parking lot of the local burger joint, the cars of this crowd are decorated in the height in “tuner” fashion with large wings, huge shiny wheels, stickers and stripes. But the single most important feature is the hood on their cars, which is most likely not the same color as the rest of the car’s body. This is the type of "enthusiast" who has most thoroughly embraced the Carbon Fiber hood.

I have found that my heretofore nearly anonymous hobby car has begun to draw the unwanted attention of every Boy Racer in town. They will pull aside my car at stoplights and challenge me to a street race, a very dangerous and stupid thing that I have preached against tirelessly. But I am willing to tolerate the challenges from the mouth breathers and knuckle draggers driving recklessly on the local roads to get the weight savings and sleek style that my new hood gives my car.

Posted by Scott at 4:57 PM | Comments (1)

September 21, 2005

Seen on the Street!

I saw one on the street today! I have seen the TV commercial, read about them in the magazines and even have pressed my nose against the dealer’s window, but until yesterday I have never seen a real live FORD GT being driven on the street. The new FORD GT, a retro reinterpretation of the Ford GT40 that dominated the 24 hours of Le Mans during the late 1960’s, is the stuff of Baby Boomer dreams. And after being released to the public for nearly a year I finally saw one on the street in my hometown.

My home town is pretty typical. Well, typical by Southern California standards. I live on the west side of Los Angles, a fairly affluent neighborhood where you are as much what you drive as where you live or what you do for a living. Around here it is important to many people to announce their perceived place in the social pecking order by the size and shape of their automobile. Intellectual arguments that a monster Mercedes is hardly necessary to transport a single occupant to their office in Century City are lost to those who are constantly measuring their car’s status symbol value against their neighbor’s.

But it is not the marginally insecure who love their shiny, flashy cars; all Californians have at least a passing interest in their source of personal transportation. At an early age we Californians can learn to tell the difference between a Buick or an Oldsmobile from across six lanes of traffic. Combine this with Californian’s notorious eccentric taste in all things (fashion, politics, cars, you name it we got it) and you will find a broad range of automobiles on our streets from Yugos to Ferraris as a matter of daily course. Square the eccentricity of the city with the dry, temperate climate and it not considered unusual for cars 30-40 years old to be used as a daily driver.

So the streets of Los Angeles are swarming with cool cars, new cars, old cars, fancy cars and sporty cars. It takes a significant car sighting to make a dent in a Los Angelinos consciousness. And my first sighting of a FORD GT on the street made quite an impression on me.

I was driving southbound on Rossmore Avenue in Los Angeles’s tone Hancock Park during slow afternoon rush hour traffic when I saw the FORD GT coming toward me. Shiny red with white racing stripes, there was not mistaking the distinctive lines of that swoopy car. Like a bobbysoxer at a Frank Sinatra concert at the Copa, I nearly swooned when I caught sight of the car. Wishing to salute the car and its lucky driver, I flashed my lights at him hoping that this simple gesture could communicate my respect, envy and desire for that car.

As the car approached my car in the opposite direction, I expected to see a look of bliss upon the face of the lucky driver. But as he got closer I could see his white knuckles gripping the steering the wheel and a look of dismay on his face. It was only then that I noticed that the low slung FORD GT was dwarfed by the towering SUVS surrounding it. Sitting so close to the ground, the occupants of a FORD GT are eye level with the never used the trailer hitches of the Toyota Land Crushers and Ford Exploders that range freely across the LA landscape. The driver of the FORD GT was scared to death that he and his expensive trophy car were in immediate danger of being crushed by a careless turn of the wheel by a latté addled soccer mom who would never see the tiny car in their mirrors if they got off the phone long enough to look into them.

The experience of seeing some other driver driving a FORD GT (the modern fulfillment of all my school boy hopes and dreams of one day owning a Ford GT40) and NOT enjoying the experience was a sobering slap in the face to me. I guess it just goes to show you that the dream car that you have always lusted after is not always the best car for use in the real world. And that is the reason why I will not spend $200,000 to buy a FORD GT and continue to drive a more mundane car.

Posted by Scott at 7:21 PM | Comments (0)

September 20, 2005

Time to move on

The thrill is gone. The bloom is off the rose. It is official, I am tired of my car. My daily driver is a 2003 Honda Accord LX four door, a perfectly fine family automobile. It is quiet, comfortable, spacious and economical. It has never failed to deliver all that it has promised to be, a reliable source of transportation. But familiarity breeds contempt and after nearly three years together it is time to move on.

I am not the promiscuous type, usually I am faithful to my cars and keep them for years. If I have a fault of any kind it is that I hold my cars too long, throwing good money after bad into old cars that need to be retired. I love my cars, I never would have bought them originally if they did not initially appeal to me. They become a member of the family with so many happy memories associated with them that I hate to let them go.

But the current Accord (it is the third Accord we have owned) is playing out its last days with our family. The car is approaching 42,000 miles on the odometer representing a 14,000 mile per year average, a number that is higher than average usage. If I continue to put mileage on this car at the current rate the residual value of the car at resale or trade in plummet in a year’s time. A used car with less than 50,000 miles on it is afar more attractive to potential buyers and will allow a bout more leverage at trade-in.

The car is also coming up on some wear item replacement. I had to replace the brake pads and shoes at 25,000 miles and I expect that I will need to replace them again within the year. I replaced the rear tires about 7,000 miles ago when they both suffered sidewall damage in separate punctures. The original front tires still have tread on them, but they will need replacing within 5,000 miles and I would rather not put any more money into a car that I am not planning on keeping.

This car is the latest generation of the ubiquitous Honda Accord line of family sedans, a line of cars that have always been top sellers. But over the years Honda has made each successive generation of Accord larger than the last until the current car is the size of an E Class Mercedes. Not a large car by American standards, but a larger car than I am used to driving. I prefer something smaller and easier to maneuver in traffic and parking lots.

I have owned four door sedan since I became a parent, it was convenient to load a family in through rear doors rather than having to twist and bend to get into a smaller back seat of a coupe. But my children are growing and more independent and it is no longer necessary to haul a large load of family to every destination. Now is the time to return to driving a coupe.

So the hunt begins. What car will I replace my reliable but boring Honda Accord with? I want something with a power to weight ratio of at least 18:1 or better, I deserve to drive a snappy performer at this advanced age that I have found myself at. And I want the new car to be mechanically and aesthetically pleasing to me, I have to respect the workings under the hood for me to drive a car on a regular basis. Sadly, this eliminates nearly every car made by US manufacturers.

I am open to your suggestions, perhaps someone out there has a good suggestion. Note to Buck: No Mustang convertible suggestions please.

Posted by Scott at 8:18 PM | Comments (2)

September 19, 2005

Oil

An unexpected oil discovery made TV’s most famous hillbilly Jed Clampett a wealthy man, allowing him the money to move away from the backwoods to the Hills of Beverly. But an unexpected oil discovery on the driveway under your car is probably going to make you a bit poorer. But worse than the mess on the ground is the specter of engine damage that looms over an oil leak. Just about the only way to damage a modern engine is to run it without enough oil so it is imperative to keep the oil in the engine and off of your driveway.

The oil in your crankcase is the lifeblood of your engine; with the exception of the bearing between the crankshaft and the piston connecting rods, a thin layer of oil is the only barrier to wear between metal parts in your engine that are pumping and whirling within tight tolerances of each other. With modern advancements in metallurgy and oil formulation, an engine that has been maintained with fresh oil can last nearly indefinitely. But if you neglect the oil, your engine’s useful service life will be severely curtailed.

Chefs and cooking experts tell me that there is a difference in using corn oil, peanut oil, olive oil or palm oil when cooking. It is equally important to your engine that you use the correct type of oil for your car. The engineers who designed your car’s engine have specified the exact viscosity (often called oil weight) for your engine and you should follow those guidelines. Your owner’s manual will give the recommendations for your climate and driving conditions.

Generally, manufacturers recommend a type of variable viscosity oil that is thin when cold and gets thicker as it heats up that is usually designated as being “10-30” or some similar designation. The lower number represents the thinner viscosity of the oil when cold and the higher number tells how thick the oil becomes when the engine has reached operating temperature. In warmer climates, a manufacturer may recommend an oil with a higher set of numbers and conversely they will recommend a lower viscosity in cold climates.

Many manufactures recommend an oil change every 7,500 miles and it is probably OK to follow this schedule. But it is cheap insurance to change your oil more frequently, particularly if your drive in stop and go driving or dusty conditions. I am a firm believer in changing your engine’s oil every 3,000 miles or every six months as old oil loses its effectiveness.

Dusty conditions has an impact on your engine’s oil? Yes, dust and dirt from the atmosphere does work its way into the engine’s oil and that dirt acts like sandpaper on the moving parts, wearing them out.

Synthetic oil and “special oil for older cars” are major profit centers for the oil change industry. The Old Car oil is not much different for regular oil, but tends to be a bit thicker and less resistant to leak from old, dried up gaskets. If you have maintained your older car and run the engine regularly the gaskets will be in good condition and leakage will be less of a problem.

Some high performance engines are specifically designed for synthetic engine oil and I would not suggest ignoring the manufacturers recommendations. But unless your car’s engine requires synthetic oil, I would not bother spending the extra money charged for synthetic oil. One of the key justifications for using synthetic oil is the extended period between mandatory oil changes that synthetic oil enjoys. But as we have discussed, the oil in your car is exposed to atmospheric dirt that will contaminate synthetic oil as easily as regular oil. I prefer to use organic oil and change it regularly to insure that the lubrication system of my car is always filled with fresh, clean oil.

Take good car of your car by keeping current with your engine’s oil level and have the oil and oil filter changed regularly. In turn, your engine will reward you with years of reliable service.

Posted by Scott at 7:35 PM | Comments (0)

September 18, 2005

Check Engine Light #2

In a previous post we discussed the Check Engine light and the associated electronics that are attached to that light. Basically, the modern automobile engine is controlled by a central computer system that monitors and regulates fuel, ignition and in some cars cam timing to make your engine as powerful, fuel efficient and clean burning as possible. And this type of central computerization makes your modern car smooth and efficient to drive.

We also talked about how the Check Engine light is a warning signal that there is a problem with one of the many systems of the car’s engine. When the light comes on, the informed owner should not panic and run blindly to a service facility, but rather he should first look at the car’s central computer’s display to see exactly what the problem is. On many cars, the central computer will display a binary number code that will give the exact nature of the problem. Your owner’s manual or a service manual for your car (available for about $10 at your local auto parts store) may contain the information to decode the computer’s code. On some cars, a relatively inexpensive dongle available at specialized parts and tool stores plugs into the car’s central computer to read the information. And in the case of a few models, the information can only be read by an expensive piece of equipment that is only available at the dealership or specialized service center.

Once the information has been decoded, the warning signal coming from the engine’s central computer must be cleared and the Check Engine light extinguished. The Dealership will charge you a lot of money to turn this light off, on BMW’s it requires a special tool to reset the computer (guaranteeing that you will have to visit the dealer’s service department). Considering that the dealership makes their most money not from selling cars but from insuring that their service bays are filled with customer’s cars.

The secret that the dealership does not want you to know is that the signal from the Check Engine light can be a false alarm. Yes! It is true; a car’s central computer can make a mistake. Ask Dave the Astronaut from 2001: A Space Odyssey about a vehicle’s central computer making a mistake, it can happen. To test if your Check Engine light is a mistake or not, all you need to do is to reset the computer (sort of like rebooting a Windows computer when it gets stupid). Again, in your Owner’s manual there may be the information needed to reboot or reset your car’s central computer. If not, the best way for the At Home Mechanic to reset the computer is to simply remove electrical power to the central processor and then restore power to it. In most cases, it is as simple as removing and replacing the fuse that supplies power to the computer. Check your Owner’s manual for the fuse location.

The Check Engine coming on is not a death knell for your car’s engine, most times when it comes on it is warning of a relatively minor fault or in some cases not fault at all. Before you get excited when that light comes on, take some time to read the information that comes in your owner’s manual to be an informed and empowered car owner before you take it to the service center.

Posted by Scott at 2:57 PM | Comments (0)

September 17, 2005

Check Engine Light

Perhaps the scariest event in a car owner’s life is when the “Check Engine” light comes on. What does it mean? Should I get the car to a repair facility as soon as possible? Is the car safe to drive? Is my engine about to fall apart? That light does not come on randomly for no apparent reason, there is something going on with your car. But most times it is a relatively minor problem and your car is safe to drive until you have the problem fixed.

The Check Engine light is a relatively new development in automobiles; they are a direct result of the use of computers to control the operation of the car’s engine. This light is part of the federally mandated engine control systems that keep modern automobiles clean and efficient. By law the Check Engine light must function properly, if the light bulb burns out or becomes disconnected for some reason your car will not pass any state’s smog inspection. And as an automobile owner, you want the Check Engine light to work.

The basic function of the automobile gasoline engine has not changed since the first Daimler wheezed down a German strasse over one hundred years ago. The engine mixes a bit of gasoline with some air, passes the mixture into a cylinder, ignites that mixture with an electrical spark, the resulting explosion causes the pistons to go up and down with the resulting exhaust passing out of the cylinder. Engines then and today have cylinders, pistons, crankshafts valves and cams. Outside of the increasingly better and stronger materials to make these parts out of, the single greatest difference between your modern chariot and a horseless carriage are the regulatory mechanisms of fuel, air and ignition. In the old days these things were regulated by manual adjustments made by the driver and in later years a series of crudely automated mechanical regulators. Today precise measurements made by computerized systems regulate those functions, plus in the newest cars cam timing is also adjusted by the computer. All that precise computerized regulation allows your engine to be as clean and as powerful as it can be.

Those computerized systems are all interconnected to a single central computer (cleverly hidden in some unexpected spot under the dash typically, check your owner’s manual for your car’s computer location) that balances the car’s engine needs for fuel air and ignition timing based upon atmospheric conditions, grade of gasoline and load on the engine. The central computer receives data from sensors through out the engine system and balances that data input to control the engine. When one of those sensors receives information that is out of strictly defined parameters, the computer gets an alert and in turn ignites the Check Engine light.

So now the Check Engine light is on, now what? If you are a panicked car owner you rush down to you favorite service center and throw yourself at the mercy of the Service Writer. “Oh please sir, interpret this sign and make it go away.” And like Snidely Whiplash collecting on the overdue mortgage payment, the Service Writer will curl his lip into a snear and tell you, “Leave it with us over night and we will see what we can find. There will be a minimum three-hour labor charge at $100 per hour to diagnose the problem. Once the car is diagnosed we will discuss the cost of fixing the problem.”

If you are a smart car owner you will reach into the glove compartment for the owner’s manual. Searching the index under “Check Engine Light” you will turn to the page indicated and read that the car’s central computer has detected a problem and that the car’s computer can tell you what the exact problem is. If you car is of an enlightened design, like Honda, the computer will visually display easily read code numbers that can be checked against a list of codes (usually available in the owner’s manual, but sometimes found in a $10 service manual available at your local auto parts store) that will tell you the owner EXACTLY what the car’s problem is.

Thus armed, you can repair the problem yourself or you can look the Service Writer right in the eye and say, “The Computer is throwing an Oxygen Sensor code. Fix it.” And the Service Writer will be so impressed by your knowledge and strength of conviction that he will forget to try to sell you a transmission flush or a set of engine mounts that you do not need.

Posted by Scott at 3:12 PM | Comments (1)

I respond to comments

I get comments and I do not often get the chance to respond directly to them. Being the lazy sort and not motivated to think up a whole new blog topic on my own I will respond to your many kind comments.

Recently I wrote about my recent engagement and the impact a new marriage will have on the fleet of cars in our soon to be combined families. My Lovely Intended who goes by the Nom De Internet of
little leadfoot writes:

Honey, I promise I will never tell you need an automotive upgrade, as
long as you promise you will smile and nod approvingly when I bring home my next impractical, zippy little sports car with manual transmission. Just be glad most of the kids have their own cars now.

I am glad that 75% of our progeny will be driving their own cars and the need to operate a family taxi service will be gone. Only the youngest one in curls will need to be driven on a regular basis and now maybe I can consider buying a fun and impractical car for a daily driver. But the practical side of me whispers that there will still be a need for some sort of hauler. Hmmmm, maybe I can justify getting that beater pick up truck I have always wanted?

I have also gotten some warm wishes from regular readers regarding my impending nuptials, Dave Darling writes:

Scott, you got yourself a winner there! Congratulations to the both of you.

Thank you Dave, I think so too. Not only is my Bride To Be sweet and loving, but also she has a need for automotive speed. One of the very first gifts I gave her was a day at the Jim Hall Cart Racing School in Oxnard, which she thoroughly enjoyed.

Resident Gadfly Buck writes:

Congratulations, Scott and Little Leadfoot!!!

I happen to agree that your Accord is boring. Well, you agree and accept that. I drive similar LA roads as you and do find that a little extra power can help at time and even be fun. Those rare occasions that I get to drive Mulholland (which will increase for a year as we move up there temporarily next year) make it worthwhile to have a fun car. Plus, the road (even freeways) do open up.

Little Leadfoot, good for you! But I do think that the G35 sedan is a little more practical with kids. (Yes, I think that is what I have settled on, finally.)

Scott, I look forward to getting a ride with you in your shiny new Mustang convertible!
The last comment is directed at my less than enthusiastic response to Buck’s love affair with the new Mustang convertible. I think I broke Buck’s heart when I told him that his attraction to the new Mustang’s is more of a physical relationship than one based upon love and respect.

I made a snide remark about young men who have a challenged social life, regular reader Bryce writes:

Young car geeks often have trouble getting dates. And since they spend much of their disposable income on cars, and car related magazines, they have no money to buy Jugs and thus the auto magazines have been kind enough to add some T&A to the mix.

I will be the first person to admit that my grammar, spelling and sentence construction is less than perfect and that I really could benefit from a copy editor to fix my obvious mistakes. Fortunately I have Dave Darling who found this error:

I think the word you wanted was "decimated", not "disseminated".

Decimate: To lay waste to, or ravage. Comes from the Roman practice of
killing one person out of every ten from a large group that had pissed them off.

Disseminate: To spread widely.

Thanks Dave, I fixed that error. This is what happiness when you rely upon Spell Check. And I am partially dyslexic. Plus the Dain Bramage I suffered as a child makes it hard to recognize obvious errors. And did I mention that I suffer from being educated in Public Schools. So you see it is not my fault.

Posted by Scott at 3:10 PM | Comments (0)

September 15, 2005

Serendipity

A serendipitous event is the happy result of one good thing that comes equipped with an even better thing attached. We can not count on something so good happening all the time; in fact we are lucky if we experience serendipity once in our lifetime. But there is one place that can usually be counted upon for a regular series of serendipitous moments and nearly every middle-sized town in America has at least one of these magic playgrounds. Could this be the store that sells beer AND lottery tickets? Could this be the United States Postal Service that loses bills but delivers large checks in a timely manner? While those are both wonderful, the answer I am seeking is.... Your local junkyard.

Call them the bone yard, the rubbish heap, the scrap yard, the breakers or what ever, the place you go to salvage parts from cars no longer in service is a wonderful place for the At Home Mechanic to frolic. Well maybe I over state my case, but in any event the junkyard is my favorite source for parts great and small for my current project car. But more than that, the junkyard can occasionally yield a true gem that will reward the finder with a bounty and eventually make some desperate car enthusiast happy. Allow me to elaborate.

I had some spare time on my hands today with no pressing need to be anywhere at any particular time. Idle hands are the Devil's tools so I engaged myself in a jaunt down to my favorite local junkyard, just to keep myself out of mischief. I needed some minor parts for my hobby car; there is a car show coming up and I wanted to finish off a couple of niggling details before the event. And a trip to the junkyard would allow me to stroll the grounds and see what is currently available.

You have to visit the junkyard on a regular basis and get lucky with your visit. The selection of old cars available for dismantling is constantly being turned over as the cars longest in inventory get picked over and removed for new stock coming in every day. On any given day you could find nearly a dozen cars that will yield parts you need, and on the very next day they can be all gone and you will get stiffed. But in my local junkyard the supply is large, the turnover relatively slow and there are just enough exotic cars to make the visit interesting.

My hobby car is a 1987 Honda CRX Si, not terribly unusual by the standards of Southern California where I live, but not as common on the streets as it once was. Where the junkyard would often have 6 or 7 such cars from which to pick parts in the past, these days the chances are good that maybe only one or two are available. Today I was luck enough to have three old CRX's to choose from and I was able to snag some small rubber parts that will I was looking for. So this was a good day in the junkyard, but not that magical type of day. Or so I thought.

I spied a Second-Generation Z28 Camaro over in the side of the junkyard reserved for General Motors cars. Normally, "high interest" cars like the high performance Z28 Camaro would never have made it to a common junkyard. Usually, this car would have gone to a yard that specializes in Camaros, Corvettes and the like with prices jacked up to soak the poor souls who are slavishly devoted to those old cars. The Z28 Camaro sitting in my friendly local junkyard was like a jewel glimmering amongst the dirt, a rose amongst weeds, a shining beacon luring me toward it.

My future stepson has just turned 16 and has purchased a 1978 Z28. His Camaro is in excellent condition; the previous owner had run out of patience with the restoration project and had sold the car at a bargain price. But the boy's Z28 is missing some minor plastic piece under the hood and the junkyard car gave up the parts that were needed. So this was the serendipity that I was speaking of, right?

Well it could have been the end of a happy story, but not quite. Because, as I was walking out of the junkyard an obscure emblem on a dusty car caught my eye. Parts of the emblem were actually broken away, but enough remained for me to see that it said, "...gen pow..." with distinctive Japanese writing just below it. This emblem was the remains of a genuine "Mugen Power" emblem attached to a genuine Mugen part, in this case a pristine Mugen rear spoiler for the 1986-89 Acura Integra. For those who do not know, Mugen is the in-house performance arm of the Honda Company (think AMG for Mercedes) and their parts are highly prized for their function and their handsome features. Rare when new, Mugen parts for a car that is nearly 20 years old are essentially impossible to find today. I have hit the Motherlode, the El Dorado, the Lost Dutchman's Mine of rare car parts in finding an example in such good condition.

I snapped up the Mugen rear spoiler along with all my other junkyard booty and nearly danced all the way home with the wealth of my finds. I got the parts for my car, my step-son gets the parts he needs, I have a very rare Mugen part that I will sell for a minor profit and some lucky Integra owner who has been searching for a genuine Mugen rear spoiler for his car will get what he has been looking for. Truly a serendipitous day.

Posted by Scott at 4:44 PM | Comments (1)

September 13, 2005

Marriage and cars

Over the course of the last couple of weeks my girlfriend has become my fiancee. Along with the happiness and excitement of an impending wedding come the adjustments to one's life when you go from being a solo to a member of a pair (In my situation neither my fiancee or I are truly "solo" as this is a second marriage for both of us and we both bring two children to the marriage). The adjustments from your previous "single" life to "married" life includes domestic issues like where will you live as a couple, how to deal with household bills or who does the dishes after dinner. But the one issue that may be unique to the At Home Mechanic has to do with cars in the family.

I am a hardcore Car Guy; I love them all with a special interest in high performance vehicles. I have been modifying and racing street cars (in a safe and controlled environment) since the Nixon Presidency. I revel in my garage full of tools and I count the time spent with grease up to my elbows as quality therapy time. I have very high expectations of my vehicles and I will not tolerate less than perfect function from my cars. So you would expect that my daily driver of choice would be some sort of fire breathing road warrior.

My lovely fiancee is a petite and demur lady. She is the consummate professional in a high profile industry who has managed to successfully balance a terrific career with all the duties of Motherhood. A talented and creative artist, my Lovely Intended is brilliant with a paintbrush and cooks like a dream. Although she can hammer and nail like a professional carpenter and is proud to have her own cordless drill for home improvements, she is completely at sea when it comes to the workings of her cars and has absolutely no interest in the hands-on realities of automobile maintenance. Your first impression would be that she is driving a practical Soccer Mom vehicle or maybe a foreign luxury sedan that befits a successful professional in her station in life.

To recap: I am a knuckle dragging Car Guy and my Future Bride is the stylish professional. The expectation is that I drive something sporty and she drives something practical.

Wrong! I drive boring, practical economy sedans since I became a father 16 years ago and my Dearly Beloved has crammed her kids into the tiny confines of series of sport coupes since Day One.

While I know and love all things fast on four wheels, I also know that the overwhelming majority of my time in a car is spent in Los Angeles' slow commuter traffic all by myself. A sporty car would be great fun on those very rare times when the road opens up, but I know that hauling kids to school and groceries home from the Mega Box store is my basic domain. The practical streak that runs a mile wide through my sole will not allow me to consider anything more exotic than a Honda Civic as my regular ride to work.

The Woman I Love started driving in a 5 speed Toyota Celica as a teen and has never looked back. Her daily drivers have included a Porsche 924 turbo, a Honda Prelude Si and a Mitsubishi GT3000. Currently she makes the rounds of Los Angeles in a pristine Infiniti G35 Sport Coupe. Just as she sees nothing immoral about spending $400 dollars for a pair of tiny Italian slippers, she sees it as her divine right to burn rubber in a sport coupe that requires her children to bend themselves more times than an origami swan to fit into the back seat of her car.

I feed my need for speed with a hobby car, a 1987 Honda CRX Si that I have modified heavily for autocross and "open track" events in my local region. Faster than a speeding bullet, it is low, loud and stiff; I love this car for what I have built it to be. But I would never consider using it as a daily driver because I need my regular ride to be practical so I commute and haul the kids in my boring 2003 Honda Accord sedan.

It is said that women look at men the same way a real estate developer looks at a run-down old house; they both make a decision based upon potential for improvement rather than current condition. I can tell that my fiancee is tolerant of my current daily driver, but that she sees an automotive upgrade in my future.

Posted by Scott at 7:12 PM | Comments (4)

September 8, 2005

Honda Tuning Magazine

As you may remember, I published a warning about the car enthusiast magazine trade. I pointed out that the car magazines are not in the business of telling their readers the best information, but rather the information that will help sell their advertiser's products. In many instances, a magazine will shamelessly feature an advertiser's product in an article on the pages facing the very advertiser's ad. Rather than truthfully helping readers by suggesting less cost effective ways to solve a performance problem, the article will lead the gullible reader to believe that the ONLY solution to the problem is to buy that advertiser product.

The basis of the Magazine Business is to attract readers to the advertising. Readers base their selection of which magazine to buy upon the lifestyle that the magazine promises to deliver. Guys who daydream about a life of daring and adventure read Solider of Fortune magazine. Guys who can not get a date, and who may never get a date, read Jugs magazine. And guys who like sport compact cars read Super Street magazine. I do not mean to pick on any one sport compact magazine, the list seems to be endless, Super Street is the largest of the genre. But there is one magazine that is aimed directly at the sport compact car market, and the Honda fanciers in particular, that is different from the crowd. Honda Tuning magazine is the best of the "import tuner" magazines because they emphasize the actual hands-on technical stuff with true advise of how the work should be done.

Before I go any farther, I must disclose that Honda Tuning had the good taste to feature me and my car in the July 2004 issue in a quarter page sidebar to their story about the 2004 gathering of CRX enthusiasts called "Las Vegas CRXPO 2004." Because my model of CRX (it is the 1987 "1st Generation" of the Honda CRX model line) is so old and is not often modified for show or track, my car stood out as a curiosity amongst all the much newer and shinier CRXs. I am sure that my car was added to the story only because it was so strange to see an old car like mine as an ugly duckling amongst the swans.

But regardless of their reasons for including my car, Honda Tuning gets my praise as the only sport compact car magazine worth reading. Yes, they make a bow to attending to the hormonal interests of teenage boys by including a few gratuitous pictures of shapely young ladies in revealing garb. And tucked at the end of the magazine is a tiny review of current video games. But those concessions aside, Honda Tuning makes a point of delving into the technical fine points of specific engine and suspension jobs with step by step instructions and informative illustrations. Additionally, they make an effort to report upon the various professional racing series that concern Honda automobiles, although the magazines lead time make their reportage less than timely.

If you are a fan of performance Hondas and are serious about attempting to perform some of the work yourself, I can not recommend the magazine Honda Tuning enough.

Posted by Scott at 1:54 PM | Comments (1)

September 7, 2005

Made in Japan

The words, “Made in Japan” does not mean the same today as it once did. Today we associate Japanese designed and manufactured products with the highest quality and the ultimate in desirability. But back in the 1950’s and 1960’s Americans treated products from Japan and the rest of Asia with distain; it was conventional wisdom of the time that products imported from the Far East were cheap, inferior imitations of quality American or European originals.

The tiny Transistor Radio imported from various Japanese manufacturers was probably the product that first began to change American perceptions about Japanese products. Prior to Ipods or Walkmans, portable entertainment in the 1950’s came from AM radios that could fit in a shirt-pocket. Just as the Ipod recently created a revolution in portable personal entertainment, the Transistor Radio (so named because they could be miniaturized through the use of the integrated circuit’s precursor, the transistor, which was so much smaller than the tubes used in previous radios) became a sensation across the nation and consumers snapped them up regardless of their origin in Japan. American electronics manufacturers were concentrating on the higher profit margin they could make per unit on TV and ignored the low margin market for radios, which were supposed to be made obsolete and supplanted by Television. American companies abandoned the transistor radio market to the Japanese who exploited the niche.

Building upon the goodwill created by the success of the Transistor Radio, the Japanese swiftly came to market with an expanding line of inexpensive electronic products that also delivered good quality and attractive features. By the early 1970’s, the American consumer electronic industry was decimated by Asian competition.

The American automobile industry made the same mistake as the American consumer electronics industry. The US Big made only token efforts to meet the small, economical cars coming from Europe and Japan in the 1960’s, but they preferred to concentrate upon the higher profit margin large cars that represented the majority of the US market. Although the first Japanese cars imported to the US were tiny and not very good, by the late 1960’s Datsun and Toyota had created cars that Americans could embrace. The American manufacturers tossed some Pintos, Vegas and Gremlins at that end of the market, but did not seriously consider that Americans would want or need quality smaller cars.

With the Oil Embargos of the 1970’s, American consumers were clamoring for good quality fuel efficient cars and the Japanese car makers were best suited to supply that demand. Every rise in gasoline prices in the US caused American automobile manufacturer’s market share to decline at a similar pace.

Just as the Japanese consumer electronic industry cleverly leveraged their advantage in a niche of the market to eventually dominate it, the Japanese automobile industry has also wedged itself into the hearts and minds of the American consumer. And the American consumer now considers “Made in Japan” to far superior to than anything American made.

Posted by Scott at 8:04 AM | Comments (2)

September 6, 2005

Cars in Movies

If movies are a reflection of our culture at any given time in history, then the cars in movies are also a reflection of the times when the movie was made. Just as style of dress, manner of speaking and social interaction in the story lines of movies are an indication of what is important to the American culture at the time that the movie was made, the cars that the propels the hero on his quest to resolve the story’s conflict are an equally important indication of how the car relates to the American culture at that time.

In the 1930’s America was in a period of economic turmoil as the country’s economy was ripped asunder by the Stock Market Crash of 1929 and the resulting Great Depression. Millions of Americans lost their former livelihood of the family farm and were forced to seek new opportunities away from their homes. No movie told this sad story better than the adaptation of John Steinbeck’s novel “The Grapes of Wrath” starring Henry Fonda as the hero, Tom Joad. The central conflict of the movie is the Joad family’s journey from Oklahoma to California from their failed farm to a new life as itinerant farm workers. Their mode of transport was a battered and creaky truck upon which the family has piled all of their materiel possessions. Throughout the movie the characters are dependant upon the questionable reliability of the truck to deliver the family from starvation in Oklahoma. But in the end, the truck survives the journey that becomes a metaphor for the optimism that the American journey through the Great Depression is perilous, but in the end we will emerge alive if not better off than before we started the journey.

World War II brought a new type of peril from abroad and the iconic transportation movie of the period is a Humphrey Bogart picture called “Sahara,” the story of an American tank and its crew who has been separated from Allied forces in the North African desert and who must now survive the harsh environment and the numerically superior German enemy. The tank is a solid example of American strength and ability, becoming the foundation that holds the disparate crew of arch-types and ethnicities together as they learn to overcome difficult odds.

The post-war Cold War of the 1950’s was a time of enforced social conformity as America looked inward for hidden enemies. Individuality was frowned upon; it was the time of idealized suburban living and the concern that Teenage Delinquency would be the ruin of American Society. James Dean’s starring vehicle “Rebel Without A Cause” reflected the youthful angst and discontent that roiled American families at the time. The Dean character’s chopped and channeled ’48 Mercury Hot Rod is a classic example of the creative outlet and rebellious statement young people were making as they struggled against the repressively narrow confines of societal conformity of the times.

By the 1960’s the yokes of conformity were being thrown off and Authority Figures were being challenged. The Anti-Hero, a non-conformist whose ends justified the means, became a favorite movie theme. Steve McQueen’s “Bullitt” is remembered best for the spectacular car chase through the streets of San Francisco featuring the Bad Guy’s dark green Dodge Charger versus the Good Guy’s dark green Mustang. Cinematically the filmmakers are telling us that there is very little difference between the Good Guys and the Bad Guys with only a subtle difference in the make and model.

The turmoil of the 1960’s gave way to the cynicism of the 1970’s and the Bad Guy had become the hero, as typified by Burt Reynold’s “Smokey and the Bandit” series of car chase movies. The Bandit out maneuvered and outsmarted the police in their dull and conservative sedans with his loud and flashy Pontiac Trans Am.

Oil Embargo’s, Embassy Take-Overs and Lowered Expectations placed America in a deep funk by the early 1980’s. Looking backwards wistfully for happier days, the regret for the mistakes made in the past and hope for better times to come spawned Robert Zemeckis’ “Back to the Future” series of movies. The Fusion Energy–powered Delorean of the movie that travels back in time to correct the errors of the past to insure a brighter future is the embodiment of all that Americans could hope for at the time.

The 1990’s did not produce an iconic car movie unless you count the Keanu Reeves action picture “Speed.” The plot of the movie revolves around the need to maintain velocity in a variety of vehicles because dire consequences would occur if the hero and imperiled heroine should slow down. The movie can be viewed as a metaphor for the feverish stock trading that was driving the nation’s economy during the craze for Technology stocks and the economic crash that occurred when the Internet Bubble burst.

The new millennium dawned with a cautious attitude. Worries about the “Y2K Bug,” the growing revelations of corporate malfeasance, the near collapse of the stock market and the tragic events of September 11th, 2001 put Americans on edge. Suspicion greeted all foreign things, and in the movies the Bad Guys drove foreign cars in “The Fast and The Furious.” Ludicrously inaccurate in every detail, the less said the better about this lousy movie that launched a tide of backwards cap wearing, wannabe street racers in hopped up Japanese cars upon the streets of America.

Hopefully the first decade of the 21st Century will give us a better movie than "F&F" as an example of the movie’s use of the automobile. It would be a great disappointment if future generations will remember our current decade by a movie that glorifies illegal street racing in cars festooned with stripes, stickers and wings.

Posted by Scott at 7:05 AM | Comments (1)

I stand corrected

I like to think that I am a better driver than writer. Writing requires thought and thinking has never been my long suit. It also occurs to me that driving requires thoguht so I am totally out of luck. Regular reader Dave Darling corrects my article about car control:

Scott, you have the effects of power on over/understeer exactly backwards.

Lift off the throttle in mid-corner, and the weight shifts forward, true. This unweights the rear wheels, which decreases their traction. That leads to oversteer.

Similarly, getting on the throttle more than you should will transfer weight aft, unloading the front wheels. The front wheels lose some traction, and underseer results.

--DD

Posted by Scott at 7:02 AM | Comments (1)

September 5, 2005

I am planning

It is time to start planning my next project for my hobby car, a1987 Honda CRX Si. Right now the car is at the very peak of performance, it is running better now than it has ever run before. I am not one to leave well enough alone, like Tim Allen’s character on the old TV show “Home Improvement” I believe that batter is… well, better. And I will not rest until I have made another improvement to my hobby car.

I have already had my engine tested and tuned on a dynamometer after I finished all of the engine modifications that I plan to do to the car. The adjusted flywheel horsepower registers just above 130 hp from a stock output of 91 hp, an improvement of 42%. Not bad for a backyard hobbyist with nothing more than hand tools and a little effort. Since that test I have lightened the flywheel, cleaned and rebalanced the fuel injectors and recurved the distributor for faster ignition advance. I am willing to bet that I if I were to retest the engine on the dyno I could get the engine to touch 140 hp as an adjusted measurement at the crank. So I think there is very little room for improvement in the engine as it is currently configured. I could add a turbo to the engine, but homemade turbo engines live short but exciting lives. I prefer my engine to live longer and not live such an exciting life.

I could lighten my car some more if there were some lightweight body parts available. Newer, more popular cars have a wide variety of carbon fiber and fiberglass parts commercially available to reduce weight. But for an old car like mine, the aftermarket does not support it with a huge variety of light body parts. I am waiting and hoping for one manufacturer to resume its limited run of light carbon fiber hoods that would take 20-30 pounds off the already too heavy nose of my car. But he has raw materiel supply problems and I will not see any hoods from him in a while.

There is another guy who promises to make a fiberglass plug to replace my car’s sunroof, which will save about 50 pounds. But it seems he has not made much progress on the design and has proposed to his girlfriend so his attention is not focused on car parts right now. I am not holding my breath waiting for the sunroof plug.

I have already removed the air conditioning system and that saves about 50 pounds off of the car. I could strip the interior of the car for a few pounds of weight savings. But I like my car’s interior and the relatively few pounds that could be saved would not make a major impact on the car’s handling.

The car’s body is in decent shape although the plastic front fenders (the car came from the factory with plastic fenders. It was an experiment that Honda performed on the 1984-1987 CRX and then chose not to implement on any other car) are cracked and could be replaced. But replacement fenders would need to be painted so I will wait until I get the carbon fiber hood before I tackle any body issues.

The brakes are fine, I have added larger disks and calipers in the front and I sourced a set of aluminum drums for the rear brakes. High performance Porterfield brake pads and shoes make stopping safe and secure.

That leaves the suspension. I have added a rear sway bar, better shocks and I have replaced most of the suspension bushings. Most, but not all of the suspension bushings. The front bushings on my car are easy to change and following the path of least resistance I have done that job. But the rear bushings are a major challenge change and I have never gotten around to that part of the job. But I have reached the point where there are no other jobs to be done and so I must prepare for this one.

The bushings in a car’s suspension look like a bunch of hard rubber do-nuts that insulate the various bits of your car’s suspension. Over time, the bits breakdown and do a less effective job of keeping your car traveling in a straight line. Manufacturers use the rubber bits in your car’s suspension to keep the noise vibration and harness of the road isolated from the passenger compartment. It is worth the compromise of a less than infinite life for the bushings to keep the car’s ride smooth and silent when you drive off the dealer’s lot.

On my car there is only one large bushing on each of the rear trailing arms. To replace them, the entire rear axle and everything attached to the axle (wheels, hubs, bearings, brakes, etc.) must be removed. Fro a pro mechanic using a lift and pneumatic tolls, the job should take a couple of hours. I do not have a lift or pneumatic tools or even any experience with this job. So it should take me a couple of days.

For an old, fat guy like me, the prospect of wiggling on the ground as I figure out how to get the darn thing apart is not as appealing as it once was. A stiff back, sore muscles and the nagging suspicion that a man of my age and station in life could be using his spare time in a more meaningful manner.

But knowing that my hobby car is at less than 100% efficiency gets under my skin. And so like Sisyphus from Greek Mythology, I will start rolling that giant bolder up the steep mountain. Or in this case, I will put the hobby car up on jack stands and begin my next project.

Posted by Scott at 2:38 PM | Comments (1)

September 4, 2005

Get Control

Get control of yourself, or at the very least get control of your car. So many times I see postings on auto enthusiast web forums blaming a car’s poor handling for traffic accidents. But with a little examination of the relevant facts, we find that excessive speed for the condition of the road is the main culprit.

It is not to say that cars do not come from the factory predetermined to behave in a particular manner in a given situation. Nearly every new car that is sold in the United States comes from the factory designed to under steer (under steer is the phenomenon where you turn the front wheels and the car continues to go straight) under extreme limits of traction on dry streets. While this may seem counterintuitive (I want my car to turn when I move the steering wheel, but I am funny that way) but the justification is that the understeer only happens when the limits of adhesion had been exceeded. The alternative is to have cars that over steer (the tail end tends to swing out as traction limits are exceeded.

Oversteer was a problem for early rear engines cars with a simple rear swing axle design. Ralph Nader made a name for himself by pointing out the potential for disaster of the Chevrolet Corvair’s rear engine/swing axle design in the hands of unaware consumers. Rather than suggest that the consumers were at fault for driving their Corvairs beyond the limits of the design’s intention, Mr.Nader persuaded Congress that tail-heavy, over steering designs were unsafe at any speed. Congress responded by passing a comprehensive series of laws regulating automobile safety. While there is an argument to be made on both sides of the debate the car companies have since chosen to build cars with a bit of built-in under steer in the design.

I like to drive my hobby car at speed on racecourses where the conditions are controlled and there are as many provisions for safety as possible. To get the most speed out of my car on the racetrack, I prefer that my car have neutral handling, neither under nor over steering. Knowing that my Honda CRX Si came from the factory with built-in under steer, I attacked that problem (detailing how I eliminated under steer is the subject of another posting that will come shortly) and my car now is very neutral and gets the most grip from both ends of the car.

Mechanical considerations aside, the driver still has the primary responsibility for the car’s behavior on the road. The driver’s right foot has a tremendous amount of influence upon whether a car under or over steers. “Weight shifting” is the name of the technique of changing the balance of a car as it swings through a turn.

Adding or subtracting power while making a speedy turn (speedy for the conditions, your actual speed make me relatively low) shifts the weight of the car forward and backwards. Imagine that a car is going around a turn and that the weight of the car is loaded equally between the front or rear tires. By adding power while turning, the car’s weight is thrown towards the rear of the car. The extra weight on the rear tires will cause them to overload and begin to lose traction. Conversely, by letting off power while turning shifts the car’s weight forward which overloads the front tires causing under steer.

These effects are magnifies by extreme weight imbalance; front wheel drive cars have the majority of their weight over the front wheels. These cars are particularly prone to understeer and are extra sensitive to adding or subtracting power while turning at the limits of traction (this is another way of saying, “They are going too damn fast for the turn.”)

The best rule of thumb is to brake in a straight line before you need to turn the steering wheel. If you find yourself in a turn and feel you have entered with too much speed... you are screwed.

Posted by Scott at 2:35 PM | Comments (1)

September 3, 2005

Size Matters

Size matters. Now take your mind out of the gutter because I am talking about something entirely different from what you are thinking about. I am talking about the size of your car and the effect size and weight has upon performance. As we all know from Physics 101, a body at rest tends to stay at rest and a body in motion tends to stay in motion. It requires energy to make a car go and stop; the less mass that needs to be moved into action or stopped from rolling the easier it is to perform those tasks.

American Muscle car owners love to crow about making four or five hundred horsepower in their cars, but the size and weight of their land yachts limits the performance potential of the cars. Sure, they can burn rubber and make deep-throated vroom-vroom sounds, but when asked to move all of that chrome, vinyl and shiny paint the inertia of two tons is difficult to overcome. And once that hulk is moving it is difficult to drag it to a stop, let alone making it dodge around a curve. The smaller and lighter car does not need as much raw horsepower to do the same job; a 200hp engine in a 2000 lbs. car does the same job as 400 horsepower in a 4,000lbs. Car.

Early on, the original Hot Rodders knew that a small light car was going to be faster than a heavy car. That is why the Ford Model A was a popular choice for dropping a large modern V8 into in the 1950’s. When European cars became more widely available in the US after World War II, American Drag racers embraced the tiny FIAT Topolino for its slim size and petite features.

Japanese cars currently imported to the US have grown in size to accommodate American tastes in large cars. But 35 years ago, the Japanese sent us some pretty small sedans and coupes. Light and cheap these cars served well and then were discarded and crushed at the end of their servable economic life. Which is a shame because the Datsun 1200’s, the Dodge Colts (imported from Mitsubishi) and the Toyota 1600’s of the early 1970’s would be the ideal basis to build a truly fast car. They were all front-engine, rear wheel drive coupes of small dimensions; dropping any thing from a Mazda rotary engine up to a small block Chevy into them would be a snap.

I got to thinking about old Japanese cars because I saw a fairly rare example on the street the other day. The Datsun 1200 (also known as the Sunny in Japan and most foreign markets) was the bottom of the product line that was sold as a coupe, sedan, and as a pick-up truck. Using an Overhead Valve inline four, it chugged along American highways making about 60 horsepower and then disappeared from the Datsun (later Nissan) product line in the early 1980’s. I am sure that I have not seen a running example of one of these cars in over 15 years. But as I was driving east on the Santa Monica Freeway and fairly clean version passed me by.

The owner appeared to be a young man; maybe this car was a family heirloom that got passed down to him. He had added a set of shiny wheels and fat tires, the ride height had been lowered and the exhaust note suggested that the engine was not as it came from the factory. The throwback styling of the fastback coupe struck just the right note of irony with me and the “sleeper” potential to surprise some stop light racers is an attractive lure.

It would be a kick to find a car like this, add a hot modern motor and strengthen the brakes, suspension and chassis for spirited driving. But the tricky part is to find a suitable car to start with, by now all the cheap light Japanese cars of the early 1970’s have been recycled into rebar.

Posted by Scott at 2:34 PM | Comments (1)

September 2, 2005

Torque Wrench

Only a very few species create and use tools. Chimpanzees strip the bark from a twig and stick it down a hole to scoop out termites for eating. Egyptian Vultures use a rock to smash open Ostrich eggs and Green Herons will toss a pebble into a pond to lure fish to the surface. But the all time champion of tool usage is the human species; if Stanley Kubrick’s movie “2001: A Space Odyssey” basic premise is correct, the assent of modern man is a direct result of our primeval ancestors discovering the use of tools. Nearly everything we touch in our life can be considered a tool and we use them without much thought about the process. The At Home Mechanic knows just how important tools are for enjoying our automobile hobby and has a large investment in a wide variety of hand and power tools.

It is not necessary to have a huge collection of tools to begin working on cars, a generic set of wrenches, sockets and screw drivers will get you thorough most jobs you will tackle in the beginning. And although you can “get by” with the basic hand tools for nearly every job, there is one specialized tool that has no replacement and should be included in your basic tool set. Very soon in your journey through the automobile hobby, you will be faced with the need for a Torque Wrench.

A Torque Wrench is a ratchet handle with a device built into it for precisely measuring the amount of torque (or twist) you are applying to a nut or bolt. In many situations it is necessary to put just the right amount of twist on a fastener; too little torque will not secure the part properly and too much torque can cause damage or binding of rotating parts. A Torque Wrench of dubious precision can be bought inexpensively at discount stores, and highly accurate versions with digital read-outs can cost as much as $1,000. Cheap tools seem like a bargain, but in the long run it is always best to spend a little extra money to buy quality tools the first time.
There are two basic designs for a Torque Wrenches: A bar/dial design that has a pointer parallel to the main shaft of the wrench and crudely indicates that amount of torque being applied in foot-pounds or metric measurements. And an internal spring-loaded version that will allow on the amount of specified torque to be applied and then will make a clicking sound to indicate that the right value has been reached.

A Torque Wrench is a precision tool that has been calibrated at the manufacturer to deliver exactly the correct value. To maintain that precision it is necessary to use them and maintain them carefully. When you are tightening a fastener (never use them to undo bolts), keep an even turning speed. Do not stop mid stroke and ratchet the wrench a little bit. The force needed to overcome friction will give you an incorrect torque. When you are done using a spring loaded Torque Wrench, return the wrench to the lowest setting on the handle and relax the tension on the internal spring. If you do not relax the internal spring you are effectively stretching it out of calibration. And use care to not drop a Torque Wrench, it can break and/or need to be recalibrated. Professional mechanics that earn their livings with Torque Wrenches have them recalibrated on a regular basis.

Invest wisely in your Torque Wrench and then take good care of it.

Posted by Scott at 7:10 AM | Comments (0)

September 1, 2005

Katrina was a bitch

Just a quick note today to suggest that we all make a donation of money (even a small amount can help) to the Red Cross or similar charity organization to help our fellow Americans in their time of need.

Back to car stuff tomorrow.

Scott

Posted by Scott at 9:34 AM | Comments (0)