TRP suggested thread...

While driving, very slowly, through a gravel parking lot I bottomed out the back of my IM on a big pot hole.  I didn't think much of it and went on with my afternoon trip to the mountains.

On the way back, just as I exited the freeway, I noticed a lot of smoke coming out of the back of my IM.  With traffic around me and no shoulder to pull off I had to drive another 100 yards until I pull into a parking lot.

The back of the car was still pouring smoke, so I quickly shut the engine off and when back to see what the hell was going on.  When I looked under the engine I saw this:

The engine drain bolt was gone and the last of the engine oil was pouring out onto the gravel parking lot.  Afterwards, I speculated that when I bottom the engine out it had loosened the oil drain bolt and it, over the next sixty or so miles, had worked its way loose and finally fell off as I was exiting the freeway.

Thankfully, it didn't happen while I was driving at 70 mph on the freeway.  That could have been catastrophic.

I called BCAA (AAA in the states) and had the car towed home. 

When home I installed a spare drain bolt, filled the engine up with oil, crossed my fingers and started her up.

She ran fine, with no apparent damage. 

The first, of two times current VS (Irene) has taken a ride in a tow truck was during the fall 2013.  

One fine afternoon, after a chemo treatment  ( I was being treated for thyroid tumor) I decided it would be wise to take the then new car for a spin.  I needed a distraction, I was a bit overwhelmed with life.   Car had less than 500  miles and I was still getting familiar with it.... I needed to do something fun.

after 45 minutes trying to get her started I ran out of things to check... drained the battery, flooded the carbs ... total frustration, nothing worked.  

Hearing my frustration from the house, my wife called  my VW/Porsche mechanic buddy.  He rang me to see if I wanted to play...  I figured, " what great timing".  So I shared my sad story and he suggested I bring the car to his home, with any documents I had on the build/engine and two bottles of wine in hand.

So a called AAA, and documented the moment.

Got to his home garage, corked the bottle, poured a glass, then a second glass while my buddy carefully reviewed the build book ( build sheet, wiring diagrams, VS spec documents and pictures) Kirk had helped me put together during  the build.

after finishing the second glass of wine, he connected the battery to a jumper box,  He then sat in the drivers seat, inserted the key, reached under the dash, flipped the kill switch, and started the car right up.... 

Chemo brain... I had COMPLETELY forgoten about the kill switch,

we laughed... it was not long before we realized wine after chemo was not smart, so wife came to pick me up, and the car spent a couple weeks at my buddy's... he returned it with +1200 miles &running better than when I dropped it off.

.. second tow truck ride was a bit more exciting...  it involved road debris, Mt Hood pass, and a torn/missing gas line. it will save that for another thread.

In ~49k miles my car has never failed to get me home.  There were several times when it was not a sure thing, but the only time it was flat-bedded was when Kevin Hines delivered it to my house on 1 June 2006.  Too bad I didn't have a camera then.

Sorry to hear about your having the big-C, LFEPARDO. I'm glad to hear you seem to have beaten it.

My dad is still fighting pancreatic cancer (diagnosed in Sept. 2015), so I've got a close-up view of what "chemo-brain" (and everything else involved with cancer-treatment) is really like.

My 75 y/o dad is the toughest guy I'll ever know. He's a renaissance man regarding construction-- a licensed plumber, who has built a couple dozen homes, churches, etc. over 60 or so years. He can lay block, pour concrete, frame and trim, hang and finish drywall, and handle all the mechanicals. He can do these things to the highest level, and he's no hack, generally doing better work than the subs he has sometimes hired, then discarded for sloth or ineptitude. He's no good with landscaping, but that's about it. He's been a phenomenal investor as well-- always displaying a good nose for when the right time to buy or sell would be. He's the measuring stick I've found myself wanting against for 53 years. I'm a bit better with electrical and mechanical troubleshooting, but that's about it-- he's my better in every other skill. 

Pop had his giant surgery (a "Whipple"- they core you like an apple and send you home to die with a colostomy bag) in October 2015. He's been on chemo/radiation ever since. His cancer had metastasized by last fall, and I didn't think he was going to make it through the winter. 

He, however, is still going strong. No bag. His oncologist has the chemo dialed in to the point that he's functioning on a pretty high level (given his prognosis), and PET-scan scores are actually improving presently. He's back to swinging a hammer-- this time at a little house I bought (right next door to the home I'm building) for mom to live in when the time comes. He can "only" give it 4-6 hrs a day, but he's doing it for the love of his life (54 years and counting)-- to take care of her after he's shed the mortal coil. That's how Pop rolls. 

Watching the man finish up his life, I've had to stop measuring myself against him. How can someone compare themselves to a force of nature, a giant astride the earth? I just hope he falls off a ladder or electrocutes himself on my job (and that I'm the guy that finds him), rather than the cancer eventually taking him. But, we don't get to choose how we pass from this life into the next, and Pop doesn't give things like that much thought anyhow-- he's too busy trying to get something done.

 Sometimes children exceed their parents sometimes they don't  .... yet every father wants his son to surpass him

Knocking on wood.  The only time the Cafe Macchiato was on a flatbed was when I did the Turbo and Suspension upgrades in in 2015.  Henry had it pickup in Washington and then smuggled over the border.  

Stan:  That is a very heart warming and stirring post. 

I tip my hat to your father.  He reminds me a lot of my own, who I still miss. 

Thanks, Stan.  That is a loving post.  I was very fortunate - both of my parents died at 91, about a year apart and without too much fuss - if you see a broken hip and complications as "not much fuss" - but we had it easier than some families, for sure, with no cancer to deal with.

Anyway,  Knock wood (knock,knock,knock,knock...)  Pearl has never failed to get me home through weird noises, assembler errors, upgrade mechanic errors, just plain mechanic errors  (I'm not going there...) and all sorts of other stuff.

HOWEVER!  There was that time, when we had just finished a Carlisle weekend, loaded Pearl onto my car hauler trailer behind my son's moosey F250 diesel tow vehicle and headed home.  We got as far as just entering I-81 north (still in sight of the hotel) when the tow vehicle simply died - no warning, like you just turned off the ignition.  We had enough steam up that we coasted onto the off ramp of the same exit, went around the loop and ended up stopping under the I-81 overpass on PA Route 11, about a 1/4 mile from the hotel.  We cranked it a lot.  It would sometimes act like it wanted to start, but no dice.  A couple of phone calls back to the motorheads at the hotel and who should come screaming up behind us but Cory Drake in his "Projekt Hoopty", offering to tow us back to the Hotel.  The rest is history.  We used a spare tie-down strap as a tow strap, connected to the Hoopty roll bar (a non-decorative bar, as it turns out) and the other end to one of the tow hooks on the front of the truck.  Here we are back at the hotel, with me schmoozing the cop who showed up just as we parked - Those type 4 engines have a LOT of 'Nads:

Turns out, it was a Cam Position Sensor that died in the truck, necessitating an overnight at la Casa de Merklin, a free ride from 30 West Trucking, a trailer ride from Rocky Cimbrec to la Casa de Merklin and a visit to Alan's favorite (and trusted) Chambersburg, PA, Ford dealer for a $350 sensor replacement.  We had a great breakfast at a café up the street from the dealer and the truck was fixed and ready about half-way through breakfast.  We worried that it was gonna die again for half of the trip home - it never did. 

Ask Gerd for his flat bed experience.  He got a new car out of it!  @GERD

Gerd got tired of flatbeds and switched to a Miata (that little wimp).  Here is his car and his girlfriend.  

Stan, that's quite a thread-drift, and quite a father you have.

I'm sorry he has cancer but more importantly, when he sheds this tent, his real home that Jesus built (probably as well as your dad would've) is waiting for him.

Whitecloud took two trips on a flatbed, most of you know about them so I'll make this short:

Trip 1 happened the day after we purchased her, 5 quarts of oil squirting onto the parking lot from a loose oil filter nipple

Trip 2 was 2 weeks later after she blew-up her oil cooler (failed pressure-relief valve) resulting in my (almost) year-long adventure building (sort-of) and installing a new engine for her

I'm hoping she never rides on the back of a flatbed again...

Car in for tune up / oil change etc. Picked it up and headed towards Stanistan. Stopped at the business end of the on ramp to the bridge over the Illinois River snarling traffic.

Trucked back to the shop and discovered that the fuel gauge that showed full was 180 degrees wrong. Replaced unit on the tank, filled up, and gone!

I still don't get the big whoop about flatbreads.

They've been around for thousands of years and are one of the simplest foods to make. Practically every culture, worldwide, has its own version.

They seemed to start showing up on the menus of trendy restaurants about 10 years ago as a somehow 'healthier' version of pizza - just like kale is supposed to be a snootier version of real lettuce.

Well, I've had enough of this hipster pretension. I say, if you want pizza, order pizza, dammit!

Oh wait, now I see that this thread isn't about flatbreads at all, but something very different.

Never mind.

Thank you Emily Littela! 

" just like kale is supposed to be a snootier version of real lettuce."

Ok, Mitch, I just about snorted up my orange juice!

Stan- I'm jealous; my dad died 38 years ago, just as we were becoming really good friends. I still talk to him occasionally. Your family's been blessed to have him around that long.

Stan, that's a great story about your Dad, it deserves to be heard among friends over a good adult beverage of your choice. We're struggling a bit with that right now as my Dad is 93 and losing mobility and a lot of freedoms over the last year and a bit of dementia/anger setting in. These are hard times.

However, THIS is a great picture, made me smile  just thinking about how that must have looked....and the cop....

Broken clutch cable lead to this ride...

Very quick, 9 times on a flat bed. 3 times over 100 miles. 

Having owned a CMC, a VS, Coupe and a Beck. Maggie's coupe was the only one that spent time on a flat bed. It fact it got so bad that the dispatcher at AAA would ask when we called " is it the dark blue Porsche Coupe" ?

First speedster broken clutch cable in my 2nd month of ownership no idea what the hell happened. Upgraded to hydraulic clutch that winter. Current speedster had a nut that stripped off the end of the slave cylinder making the clutch inoperable. So yea I'm two for two. 

Cheap mechanical pump of indeterminate manufacture led to symptoms easily confused with vapor-lock.I chased that one for a long time before finally replacing the pump (which was only a few years old) with a brosol "bomba."   

Why do e do this to ourselves?

Panhandle Bob posted:

Why do we do this to ourselves?

If it was easy, anybody could do it.

Panhandle Bob posted:

Why do e do this to ourselves?

Because.....Speedsters! 

And, Spyders!

Mine took a trip on a flatbed when I blew the oil filter gasket and deposited about 4 quarts onto the gravel parking lot, one 40 degree night out in the sticks, with no cell service.

Trying to remember flatbed. Never with Bridget, 7 years in, with regular 300-mile jaunts to VA Beach and/or Pittsburgh, not yet. but...

1. Spring, 2010. Shortly after I got her I tried to drive her to work. She sputtered and died about two miles from home and I coasted into a parking lot, popped the hood. Two dudes rolled in behind me with a big diesel truck. "What's the problem?" "No idea." "Need a lift home?" etc. They ended up fetching their own personal car carrier about a mile away, rolling Bridget home on that and pushing her into the garage. Turned out to be a rust-clogged fuel filter.

2. Sept., 2011. 100 miles from home, about 15 miles from BugOut show in NoVA. She dies on the highway. First time I manage to restart after a few minutes. 2nd time, no dice. Call the knuckleheads at the show and Wolfgang dispatches himself with his SUV and a tow bar, drags me to the show and (as I recall) gives me a new coil. And we're good to go.

3. Late summer, 2014, after first Suby install. I drove to my wife's boss's house (AKA Boss's) and overheated on the way home because I had neglected to put now head gaskets in the engine before installing. My wife was following in her 'yota, so I pulled into an Assisted Living place, got permission to leave B there for an hour, came home, loaded the tow bar and lights in the truck, drove back and towed Bridget home, then pulled the engine out. 

HA! This is hilarious. I guess I had better add my own. 

4 weeks ago I took the speedster down to Martin Ranch Winery to pick up or winter and spring shipments. I was really enjoying the drive through the wine country. While traveling at a pretty good clip I came over a rise and felt the car settle pretty hard and bottomed out. About 10 minutes later I pulled into the gravel driveway of the winery and bottomed out again! This time I was going maybe 5mph. I bottomed out so hard that i cringed. I don't like driving on gravel so I was going pretty slowly. I drove another 200 feet or so and looked in the rear view mirror to see if I was holding up traffic.  I noticed a fresh black stripe behind my car. Looked forward.. didn't see anything. Beind me... still a black stripe.

Pulled over about 600 feet up the driveway. Killed the motor. Looked under the car. Oil was pouring out of the bottom of the motor.

Best I can tell.. it's virtually the same story as Ron.  I walked the driveway and found where the oil started. Right there next to the first splash... I found the drain plug in the driveway. It was pretty skinned up with two distinct marks on it.  Once home I looked at the sump plate. Looking at the drain plug hole was clear the plug knocked out and tore out the threads / turned the hole into an oval.  .Best I can figure is that the first time I bottomed out it was on the drain plug. That must have loosened the drain plug or something. The bolt then worked it's way out as i drove the next 10 minutes. The drain plug was finally ripped out of the FabTec drain sump when I hit the second bump.  

Towed it home. Called Anthony, Gary Berg, Ken Jansen, and my mom. They all said to suck it up. I replaced the sump plate with one from CB. (No exposed drain plug!)  

6 quarts of oil. Fired it up. Drove it around for a good 30 minutes. All good so far.

Ted.... supposed vapor lock for me was a failing fuel pump, another symptom was starvation at 70mph.... replaced with a rotary and voila solved. 

Oh, Yeah!  I also had my clutch cable tube let go right at the front behind the pedal cluster.  When that happened, the clutch simply didn't work (it's also pretty surprising when it let go).

Started it up in 2'nd gear and got home by gingerly feeling and waiting for the transmission gears to line up when shifting (Merklin is probably a pro at this - at least before he got his truck with an automatic).  It was all back roads home, about 20 miles and no lights or stop signs (well, one stop sign but I kinda ran it - just a little bit...)

TRP:

That is like a tutorial for new drivers, superb.

"Now kids, if you see something similar behind your vehicle as in photo A, ..............

In the first year of ownership Penny was on a flatbed or a trailer at least seven times. The JPS Break In, or "Break Down", period lasted about two years, or 8,000 miles. The first time was approximately 60 miles into my maiden voyage from JPS to my home in NorCal. Those first few times I saw Penny on that flatbed I was smiling like a new dad. After that I picked up my wife's favorite moniker for the car: "bitch". As my abilities to wrench improved, my needs for outside services dwindled and I can get Penny on the road after most mechanical malfunctions. "Bitch" has been replaced with "bastard" whenever I come across some shoddy original workmanship on Penny.

Sacto Mitch posted:

 

I still don't get the big whoop about flatbreads.

They've been around for thousands of years and are one of the simplest foods to make. Practically every culture, worldwide, has its own version.

They seemed to start showing up on the menus of trendy restaurants about 10 years ago as a somehow 'healthier' version of pizza - just like kale is supposed to be a snootier version of real lettuce.

Well, I've had enough of this hipster pretension. I say, if you want pizza, order pizza, dammit!

Oh wait, now I see that this thread isn't about flatbreads at all, but something very different.

Never mind.

 

Ha! that gave me a good chuckle...

In all the years I've been driving I've only had one other vehicle, besides my IM, that had to be towed because of a breakdown and that was my 1990 Monster (V8) Miata.

I should have realized the car was going to be trouble when I broke the 'U' joint on the drive shaft while doing a quarter mile run at our local drag strip.  Kinda scary to have the drive shaft drop out of the bottom of the car at 90 mph.

Over the next 2 years I had to have that beast towed 4 more times (3 for overheating and 1 for breaking an axle after doing a smokey burnout)

My 1970 Porsche powered VW pickup never broke down, but my wife had to push the truck three times so I could jump start it (damn wonky fuel injection)

She REALLY hated that truck.

No driveshaft loop??!

edsnova posted:

No driveshaft loop??!

I'm ashamed to say it didn't have one, but it sure did after a new 'U' joint was installed.

I'm surprised they let you run without it. Growing up I was told the driveshaft safety loop was the one thing everyone needed to run the 1/4 mile track. I think they'd make exceptions for like a stock Ford Festiva on "Run-What-Ya-Brung" night, but a V8 Miata with no diveshaft loop would not have passed tech in Colchester CT even back in the day. 

Glad you weren't hurt.

I'm REALLY lucky the front 'U' joint didn't break and drop the front end of the drive shaft down.  It would have been spectacular to watch the Miata roll head over heels down the track, but not so much fun to be in the driver's seat.

• off to replace clutch cable at 2114 miles is this unusual?  Do I need a heftier cable, Hyralic conversion?

If you "rode the clutch" (foot always on it) that could do it.  Or main seal oil leak, misadjusted clutch cable (maybe it just needs adjustment?), Bowden tube loop wrong, or cable broke or cable tube broke loose from tunnel.