It had to happen sooner or later. In fact, it’s been way too long, really, given my ’66 F-100’s age and benign neglect (from me). But rather oddly, the last decade has been a lot more trouble free than the previous two decades. As in zero breakdowns or repairs for over ten years. And I use it regularly, although annual mileage is no more than maybe a couple of thousand miles. Still, that’s some 20-25k miles driven without a breakdown or repair in a 50 year old truck that only gets absolutely minimal attention. Is it getting better with old age?
But a couple of days ago, as I was moving a couple of extra washers in my fleet of preferred Whirlpool direct drives (more on that subject to come) into my storage shed located where I have eight rentals in a cluster. And yes, loading a washer or two into the low bed is one of the reasons I keep it. So as I went to leave, suddenly wouldn’t start; just a feeble clicking of the solenoid. It had started instantly just earlier, when it was cold. And now it was somewhat warm? The battery couldn’t have croaked spontaneously.
Fortunately, one of my tenants was home, and she even had jumper cables in her car! When I attached the ground jumper, I noticed my ground cable was very loose on its battery post.
A closer look showed that it had broken, spontaneously. Aha; that explains. And it was a very easy and cheap fix. And now we’ll see how long the lucky streak lasts until the next issue. Oh wait; I just remembered. The radiator has a little crack where the top tank meets the core (the discoloration is quite evident in the top picture). I tried to find someone to fix it; all the old timers who used to do that for me for peanuts in the past (it’s happened before) apparently have all retired. They all want to sell me a new radiator. One of these days…
So what’s the last thing that’s broken on your car?
My merc has developed an appetite for not changing gear when it should do. , not a massive problem though. Other than that, it needed an alternator about two years ago…. and that’s it. Not bad for a car that I got from the breakers yard three years ago!!:)
Mike. Change your gearbox oil and filter immediately. That should sort you out. Trust me, I’ve had to do this twice now when the box started ‘klunking’ through the gears and both times, the gearbox returned to it’s sweet nature. I now change the oil and filter every 30K……at least.
Paul, I’m glad you were able to easily fix the two problems. Had the truck been a 2016, you’d probably have to replace the engine, if not the whole truck just to fix a small part that fail. (I’m being facetious, of course.)
Here’s my unforgettable history:
1968 GMC with 292 inline 6: One day I was driving when I heard a loud bang under the hood and noticed a trail of white smoke from the tailpipe. Turned out a screw that held the air cleaner to the carburetor fell through the throat and into the engine, damaging a piston, valve and cylinder. Expensive repair and engine never really ran right after the rebuild. Would hear a piston slap whenever the engine was under load.
1988 Ford Taurus with 3.8L V-6: (1) Battery died (original battery 5 years old) while at a AAA Club office. Took TWO towtrucks to jump start it. Bought new battery at a nearby Sears. Turned out battery for the Taurus was a “special application” type (read: expensive) due to the high cranking amp rating.
(2) Another time, found big puddle of fluid under the car. Turned out heat from the exhaust manifold burned a hole in the power steering hose and power steering fluid leaked out all over place. Expensive repair. The second time it happened I found out about a TSB that had a heat shield kit installed between the exhaust manifold and power steering hose.
1997 Toyota Camry with 2.2L inline4: It was late evening around 10pm after finishing a project at work. Started the engine. Starter motor kept running after engine started. I managed to shut down the engine, but the starter continue to run. Couldn’t yank the battery cable as I had no tools. Finally battery died out and starter stopped but not without a strong electrical burning smell indicating starter motor burned out. Fortunately no fire. I was stranded for four hours before a AAA truck towed me back home.
2003 Buick Century with 3.1L V-6: Engine temperature gage kept running into the hot range despite having the radiator flushed and thermostat replaced. Turned out the intake manifold gasket was leaking coolant. I heard about this notorious problem. Buick dealer was still using the plastic gaskets. (Isn’t it odd that some dealers don’t pay attention to TSBs?) Local auto shop was familiar with problem and used the updated gaskets instead of the OEM plastic gasket. Engine runs fine now.
2009 Toyota Venza with 2.7L 4-cyl: So far no major mechanical problems…..but one morning starter went “click-click-click.” No doubt battery was dead. Called AAA and they came out, replaced the battery and I was on my way to work.
A dreaded hole in my muffler on my W124, just a day before it was due for the dreaded annual safety inspection that would have failed it. Used a 1/4″ copper gauze from a ‘pipe’ of mine, a slap of bondo and quick spray with a dying can of silver paint and everything sorted!
Payed nearly 250 dollars US for that rear exhaust box nine years ago. Not giving up on it yet.
Last thing that “broke” . My 1999 Mazda B3000 2wd p/u
Speedometer stopped working and the ”ABS” light came on.
I think I read the codes, I don’t recall? Anyhow it was a 10 minute fix & a $20/part.
Replace ABS/Speed sensor on differential.
I searched Google & Youtube for “Speedometer not working 1999 Mazda B3000” and found this quick fix tutorial. What did we do before the internet? We flipped through our Haymes manual for 1/2 hour to figure it out.
My Saturday morning ritual: Pop the hood, check all fluid levels, top up as necessary, take my utility light and do a quick check for leaks underneath, check the tire pressures. I do this every week, it takes 5 minutes.
Paul,
you mentioned the rad leak in your truck. Is there not someone in the area who can re-core the rad? I just had my original and untouched 45 year old rad re-cored and even had it upgraded to more rows and to the high efficiency core (more fins per inch). Only one guy locally does re-cores anymore, and he’s been in the business about 45 years. Even though he now mostly sells aftermarket rads because they are cheaper he much prefers to do re-cores and believe the quality is much better.
The last breakdown for my DD truck was also it’s only breakdown. It was about 2 years ago, the OEM battery died on me (it was about 7 years old). I drove the truck about 20 minutes, got out for 5 then it was dead as a doornail. I knew it was on it’s way out by how slow the starter turned over that morning, didn’t expect it to die so suddenly afterwards. I ended getting a boost and driving to parts store to install a new battery in the -20 weather.
As for long times without breakdowns, I know my brother’s old ’76 Malibu which was my dad’s daily driver for many years, has had 13 or 14 years (possibly more, I’d have to double check) since it’s last breakdown. It is still driven regularly, but left DD status in 2007. Now it only sees a couple thousand miles per year. Through it’s life, the only had two breakdowns, both alternator failures. Over 45 years my Torino has only had a handful of breakdowns too, but almost all were related to the voltage regulator failing (gone through 3 or 4, I would have to pull the records), and the most recent was 3 years ago when the original alternator finally died. Obviously for both cars there has been numerous other items replaced as part of maintenance.
Honda Fit, dead battery. When the voltage gets too low, the whole dash lights up like a Christmas tree, warning lights randomly blinking on and off. Honda uses undersized batteries in most of its cars, vs Toyota. Still, I got six years out of the Japanese OE battery. The oddball size, 151R made it a little harder to find and more expensive than average at most places. NAPA, however had an $89 one in stock.
It does speak to modern quality. The only two times in the last 10 years that any DD vehicle of ours to be towed (due to non-collision events) was when my wife burned the clutch out on my ’05 Legacy and when the oil pickup tube fell off the block in her ’99 Cirrus.
The ’66 Chrysler did strand me once due to a faulty fuel gauge / sender, still need to sort that out…
Battery just last week. Hadn’t needed a repair on the 10-year old car in 2.5 years. Not driving it much anymore let the battery drain (I guess)—every 7-10 days it would need a jump after sitting outside. It probably would be fine with summer coming, but I’m not much into risk these days. It tested out at 640 CCA, but factory requires 840. Looked brand new since it sat under the back seat!
HYBRID BATTERY NO CHARGE FAILURE
appeared on my 2006 Highlander Hybrid dashboard last summer.
WHAT? 18 months earlier a similar message had appeared just as I was about to drive to the York, PA Studebaker Swap Meet. Instead, I dropped it off that time at the Toyota Dealer (who else can deal with something like this?) who charged me $600 to find and ‘repair’ what was vaguely called a ‘bad wire’ at lower left kick panel.
This time, rather than go to Toyota, I removed that left kick panel and discovered ……. water. A clog in the sunroof drain had allowed water to spill from the sunroof down into the body. The water found a path where it dripped directly onto a connector that links the dash-charging gauge/warning system, and disrupt its function. Thankfully, the rest of the system works just fine without a good connection to the dashboard. After airing out the connector to let it dry, everything starting working normally. I don’t think the Toyota guy did anything more than let it dry, as I found no evidence of a wire repair…. but it might have taken him five hours of testing to find the wet connector…
I blew out the drain with compressed air, applied some plastic sheeting to the connector box, got out some flexible insulating foam I no longer needed for a window A/C unit in my house and pressed that into the spaces above the box to try and absorb any future leaks and used the kick panel to hold everything in place. So far, no return of the water drip/ FAILURE warning.
Took me a few days to think about this one. My older cars have all had problems (some spectacular), but Paul did ask for the most recent.
Last year while my wife was running late for work our ’00 Diamante coasted to a stop just around the corner from home. Prodding the accelerator had no effect. After 340,000km the transmission had let go; just plain worn out inside, according to the mechanic. As we’ve owned the car from new we know the rest of it’s in good condition, and know of these going 450,000-500,000km without problems, so we figured it was worth the cost of a replacement tranny. The mechanic got one in from the junkyard, checked it out, and installed it. Back in business again!
Then last month a trunk spring let go. Ever had this happen? Like me, you probably never spare them a thought. They’re these cranked torsion bars under the rear parcel shelf. One of them broke just as we were pulling out of a parking space. Made an awesome noise! My wife wondered what she’d hit! We could see there was no damage to the car, so we drove on. Went to open the trunk at the next shop and it was immediately obvious what had gone wrong – the thing was so heavy!
No problem, said our son. He’ll take it to the welder at work who owes him a favour. Looked like a real quality job, too. We found out the hard way that you can’t weld trunk springs. Well, you CAN weld the part, but it will snap again as soon as you install it and put it under tension. Junkyard to the rescue again!
My last breakdown was Friday the 24th at about 11:30 pm. I was on my way home in the ’02 Buick Regal when I heard that unmistakable flup-flup-flup noise made by a flat tire (coming from the left rear).
I pulled into the parking lot of a Speedway station, by the air pump. I tried a can of fix-a-flat that was in the trunk. It didn’t work. So I wasted $7 on a can from the station. THAT one failed as well, other than spewing white foam everywhere.
At that point, I thought about calling AAA, since the lugs had last been tightened by an air wrench. But I didn’t want to wait forever, I wanted to get home.
So I pulled out the jack (which had never been used) and the donut spare (also never used). To my surprise, I had no trouble getting the jack in the correct place, and the lugs were not too tight for me to take the wheel off the car.
It’s been so long I honestly can’t remember what was most recent. Probably one of several VW’s or my BMW 528; breakdowns were pretty common on those. About as bad as my Vega. I’ve never had a true breakdown with any of the Japanese cars that I’ve owned since 1993. But I did come out to my 2 or 3 year old 1981 Honda CB900F after picking up some small item at the hardware store, and it wouldn’t crank or maybe cranked slowly (can’t remember exactly, after all this was almost 35 years ago). Anyway, some quick troubleshooting showed it too was a broken clamp on the battery ground cable. I went back in the HW store and found a short heavy gauge ground strap that fit perfectly, and even the cheesy Honda tool kit was sufficient for me to hook it up.
EDIT: after reading other comments, I see several mentions of dead batteries and flat tires. I didn’t consider those breakdowns, but yes, even my late model Japanese cars have succumbed in that way. Most recent was our 2008 Prius 12V battery.and in fact two flats with that Prius too.
probably my most memorable fix was during my first long distance trip alone (from PA to FLA) in my first car (68 Galaxie XL). i was just 18 and what little mechanical knowledge i possessed was gifted to me a little bit at a time from my uncle who worked as an airline mechanic. my 2nd day on the road and the 302 in the car started missing a cylinder. not really stranded but not wanting destroy my pride n joy trying to keep up with 80MPH interstate traffic i exited onto the shoulder. it was common practice, at least in my family, to have on hand a basic tool kit for long trips. as my other pride n joy was a shiny Craftsman Mechanics starter tool set, i was covered for anything down to a head replacement. not that i could do that yet. especially on an interstate shoulder.
fortunately, after checking up on the plug wires i started pulling plugs. at about the 5th or 6th plug the culprit was obvious as a solid chunk of something was lodged between the tip and electrode. easy, fast, free fix.
Some people have responded about the most recent repair, but my reading was actual “breakdown”: the car won’t start or go (or, worse, won’t stop and crashes).
For me that was November 2015. I had just had the ’75 Oldsmobile painted its original Horizon Blue over a not very good repaint from the previous owner. I had proudly driven the gleaming behemoth to the tony center of town of a New York suburb for a celebratory lunch, and had received a few compliments. But when I returned to the car, it wouldn’t start. Perfect timing–the ignition module had failed. I certainly had to eat my pride as the shiny and new looking Oldsmobile, still smelling of paint, was loaded onto the flatbed.
In general (fingers crossed) my old GM cars don’t break down. Like the old adage, they just have periods where they suddenly and without warning run poorly until I make, or have someone else make, a necessary repair. And then, off they go again.
My last breakdown was some time in the mid-late 90’s in my 1987 Subaru Leone turbo wagon. Partly my own fault, I ignored a sticky throttle cable for too long, and the mounting flange broke off the accelerator pedal. Luckily I wasn’t going anywhere important, I was close to home, and my brother was there with a tow rope in minutes. As a poor student, I had the old parts welded back together and they held perfectly until I sold the car about a year later.
My last “breakdown” was at a gas station in rural Alabama at 7:00 am on a autumn morning. Out of the blue, the battery went “dead” for no reason. All I got was the clicking sound of the starter attempting to engage. Fortunately, a farmer who heard me cussing and cursing was kind enough to give me a jump and let me know that a Walmart was just right down the road and they sold batteries. I was never more thankful to the gentleman.
Since then, I carry a set of jumper cables and I make it a practice to return the favor to others.
last show-stopper breakdown was a few years ago in my 77 Chevelle, in Biloxi MS as we were coming back from the 2013 Powertour, decided to detour through the Gulf coast rather than cannonballing back down I-40/30 to DFW. Stopped at the lighthouse and took in the sights and sounds of the beach, got back in the car, after it performed flawlessly for the whole duration of the Tour from Dallas to Charlotte NC other than drinking 5 quarts of oil.
We get in the car to head for lunch stop in New Orleans, and nothing, not a click from the starter, got strong lights, and accessories so it had good power, and nothing dimmed when turned to start. crawl under it and whack the starter a few times with a hammer (brought all my tools) and still no love from the starter. look up where the closest parts store is and its 3 miles away – no biggie, I can hoof it while the gf soaks up the beach some more. Fortuneately a good samaritan from Indiana gave me a lift to the store and brought me back, even hung around while I changed it out to make sure itd start.
Started right up, and worked for two weeks where it died in the garage when I was getting ready to take it to a car show. Fixed it a week later.
Lessee… my last breakdown was in ’07 IIRC. Had a ’95 Grand Marquis at the time. Driving home one day the steering just disappeared, as in I turned the wheel and the front wheels didn’t. Quite fun at 35 mph. Stood on the brakes and rode it out. Came to a stop in a gentle left turn with the right front wheel on the edge of a ditch. Turns out a bolt at the joint between the steering column and the intermediate steering shaft had backed out and became disconnected. My guess is that someone had the column out for some reason (probably clock spring replacement) and had forgotten to tighten that one last bolt.