The most unusual thing I've ever done is replace the PCV valve on the crankcase. Never heard of it before. Had to study YouTube videos. Then I learned they can do this routinely when they change the oil, if you tell them to. The hardest was to replace headlight bulb on the '86 Ranger. It was easy on the previous vehicle, I forget which one it was. Not so on the Ranger. I'll never try that again.
In olden days like the 50s and beyond they had no PCV valves. Instead they used a formed steel tube that was either bolted into the block or just pressed in. It just dumped crankcase fumes out into the air or on the streets. The little PCV valve is spring loaded and opens with vacuum and engine rpm increase and it takes the dirty fumes and burns the bad dirty crankcase air in the compression stroke. I have never ever seen a bad one, and you probably would see a bad one if an engine is just worn completely out and has a lot of carbon built up in the little valve, then of course it couldn't work and you certainly wouldn't need to buy one because it is too late ha. One of the first emission devices ever voluntarily made by manufacturers. 40 years ago our oils were all wax based and those oils were known to cause a lot of sludge and carbon build up. Today these synthetic oils don't do that and make no carbon build up. I still use heavy oil for my old truck, it does not like those thin light oils. The older valve trains need a heavy oil to keep the lifters adjusted. I have one lazy lifter after replacing all last year, the light oil is the culprit. I noticed after adding a quart of heavy oil that the noise level improved. I need to readjust the valves one more time and use all 30 weight and it should be much quieter and run better.
The vehicle I replaced it on was 20 years old, and it looked like the original Ford part. I remember you could blow on it to test it. Sometimes it passed, sometimes it didn't.
A friend has a truck (I don't know year/model), and when he needs to replace one of the headlight bulbs, he either has to drop the bumper or remove some other significant body part. It's ridiculous.
Just minor stuff. On my first new car, I did tune up, adjusting timing, etc. I also did other minor things, changed oil, replaced defective lamps. I removed the front fender on my little hot rod roadster for repair when some idiot ran over it at a stop sign. I’m interested in cars, always liked quick, agile cars, but I don’t really enjoy working on them.
A spring loaded marble inside and closes off the crankcase emissions while idling. I think I have bought 1 over the past 57 years, but not because I had a bad one, I just did a full maintenance on my engine.
Having to take on the maintenance of the Jeep which Johnny had always done is a real learning experience. I'm getting to know 'My Girl' much better than putting in gas and taking her in for an oil change. It can be daunting when using Google and Youtube though to get a better understanding of what does what and where 'what' is located. I too realized at some point that I can't always depend on my dear friend and mechanic as I have been in the past for he may decide to retire or something. It tickles him how I get so giddy when talking about her but he explains to me until I understand. Just a note he was just one of my bosses of a very well known dealership here and where I fell in love with and purchased my first Jeep. I was so, so excited. Oh the adventures I had with that little girl.
I got up early this morning had coffee then went outside into that thick humidity and lay on the ground to fix that transmission leak on the old Truck. It only took about 10 minutes and 5 of it was getting back upright again. I drove to the gas station and put 10 dollars in or right around 3 gallons which is plenty for the monthly driving I do. I had to drive pretty slow because the trans fluid was pretty low and when I turned into the gas station pump isle it just stopped pulling, probably due to a huge height difference coming into the isle from the rough driveway. I bought the old F style oil that was at 75 cent a quart back when people were not so greedy, today it was 8.99 a quart plus tax. All totaled with 3 gallons of gas and 3 quarts of trans oil it was 39 bucks and some change. I drove to the store and then home and it was still low of oil. I have no idea where it all went because it pulled fine even when I finally saw the leak at the store. I have a one ton flat bed turbo 400 using a deep pan and that is the setup I have. Problem was when I installed the transmission I did not have the taller plastic filter tube that stuffs up into the front pump. I had to place some nuts as spacers to keep the filter up and not fall out. It works fine and has been in since 2005. I did find a long reach plastic one I had planned on installing it the first filter change. I got old and the oil still looks like it was poured yesterday so I am in no hurry to spend a 100 dollars just to change the oil and filter in a transmission that is still like it came out of the box. Now if I had that proper plastic tube installed it would probably stop not pulling so soon. Oh well I can just add another two quarts and see how it is. No damage and that's a good thing. With the cheapest transmission fluid now at 9 bucks a quart I would hate to see a transmission service cost. Honestly our country has gone straight to hell after that stupid half wit unleashed the devil on our economy and it brought out the worst people in American corporate that are so greedy they should all be in prison for theft. Never has there ever been so much open stealing of the citizens money. I just buy what I absolutely need or use and I cannot manufacture transmission oil. In the future I will order any oil by the gallon from amazon and save a ton of money. It is nice to have a couple gallons in my big bed tool box, I sure could have used it today.
I worked on a lot of Jeeps over the decades. While living in Pahrump NV I replaced the clutch of our good family friend while they were out of town. I did it inside his garage on a cement floor but it was pretty tight in there. I always tried to plan ahead and I kept these high tinsel bolts that were long enough to slide a transmission back without having to drop it to the floor or move it from under a vehicle. You just place a long bolt both sides on the lowest bolt hole and take the driveshaft down or just the rear ujoint. You can take your time to unbolt the clutch and pressure plate and drop them without too much effort. Today I would not be able to do that since I eat a lot of Bunny Bread and butter I never had to do this but I once read that if you were out on the road and needed to remove your automatic transmission it could be done pretty simple using a couple square cut pieces of 1/4 inch plywood and two 14 inch tire tubes and of course a small 12 volt air pump that can reach the cigar lighter for power and you can slowly raise the transmission and slide it back and just bleed the air out of the tubes one at a time. Now of course most people would never do that but I would have if I were in my prime and out in nowhere-ville and since I always had my tools on long road trips plus a 3 and a 1/2 ton floor jack plus jack stands. I always traveled with what I needed to repair my own vehicle. A mechanic never ever thinks about actually paying another stranger to do repairs. I did that one time just two years ago here where I live and I got robbed and finally had to spend 600 more dollars to fix my engine problem. I learned a good lesson that I already knew but due to that covid the couple little shops in my area were totally booked.
Yup. Toolbox with an assortment of tools, plus a distributor cap, rotor, points, condenser, belts, etc.
The belts for sure. I remember in the mid 70s having a meet me date way out past Humble Tx one Saturday evening. I lived in Houston so I left in plenty of time to get to the 59 Club the other side of Humble. I about three miles outside Humble and ran over something on the highway that cut my alt / fan belt. Noticed the alt not working and the temp slowly starting to rise so I pulled off on the feeder road and popped the hood. I saw I had no belt so I had no spare belt and did have a piece of rope and I tried tying the rope around the alt and fan pulley....... just a hint it don't work !!! After that it was beginning to get darker and I was desperate so I drove into Humble without the belt and could not find a parts house open, they had all closed for the day. I was pretty bummed out because in that time there were not a lot of commercial places in Humble. It was just an old Oil field town where my Grandmother would drive us kids out to a place in the country and have a blanket to sit on while we ate doughnuts and drank cold milk. I came to the intersection of the freeway leaving Humble and I noticed a department store across the freeway with the lights still on. I drove over there fast as I could and went inside and they had an automotive parts section so I just guessed the belt size and bought a handful of belts a little shorter each, I couldn't go wrong. Made my trip to the club and had a great time but first I had to go to the bathroom and wash my greasy hands. Some things in life you just never forget, at least I don't. Oh and I had a quart of Wild Turkey to cry in my beer. That club still had set ups and you could bring your own drinks. I drove past that club in 2005 and it had been closed down for years and was falling apart, much like myself. You can guess what I thought about as I drove past the place.
My brother and my mother were driving her Chevelle from Virginia to New Jersey when the fuel pump went out in the middle of nowhere. A guy who lived on a farm nearby stopped to help them, and happened to have an old Chevelle up on blocks in his yard. He drove them to his place, helped remove the fuel pump from his old car, took them back, and helped put it on my mother's car.
Brother and his best friend were moving back from Ohio to San Diego and had an old 50s model cruiser that had that 6 volt system and they had the generator go south in Arizona. They found a group of old cars out in a field and all were the old 6 volt style, he said they found one identical to theirs and they pulled it and left their bad one. It worked great. It was in the middle of nowhere so I'm sure no one missed the generator. I thought I had found a great treasure in Nevada while living there, it was an old Chrysler that still had a Hemi. I was really happy to find that thing but after I started looking at some information for the Hemi I found that those old Chrysler s used a different model than the newer high performance. They were identical in every way except for the internals I suppose. The drag racing crowd had long since bought up all those high performance models. I'll tell you about two unknown engines that are power houses but you probably can't find any longer. The Ford Truck engine a 410cid, it is strong and a high performance engine, it was only found in the heavier commercial trucks. The other is a simple GM 425 nail head found in all the GM bodies around the 60s. One model in the Buick could be bought or ordered with two factory 4 barrels and manifold. Both were pretty much sleepers in the early 70s and only started being popular in the late 80s when all the newer engines were beginning to get hard to find in the bone yards. For some reason those truck engines survived a lot longer due to the salvage yards not being in any hurry to have them scrapped. There were a lot of those 425 engines and still are sitting out there in some old unloved GM bodies in a junk yard that eats no cars.
Ok, was going to put this under the rant column but. I lost my hubby's key fob.--His ONLY key fob for an older Volvo. Not only that, I live in a cheap town and there is no Volvo dealership around here. So, to get a new fob that has to be programmed, one would have to tow the car to a big city about 60 miles away or more. On top of a few hundred dollars for the new fob. Two would be out of the question, by then. And now I will have to keep listening to my hubby questioning me if I have the key and did I put it back. We have been married 50 years and he asked me if I had the key to MY car (because he locked his key in the trunk once before we were married) for the first 40 years. I have NEVER locked my key in the car. And now they have idiot cars that make that impossible. This could be a lonnnnnnngggg story but, it turns out that my daughter found the fob. And As soon as she did, I remembered why it was where it was. But it will be another 40 years...
I don't think I could adjust to driving a car or a truck that locks me out, it was only done to keep the insurance companies from paying for what we paid to replace or repair.