Never Say Never Again...

Early Sep-Oct 3'97 (Fri)

There I was, pushing my beloved little yellow MGB, *again*. Ignoring the blaring horns and futilely trying to get a firm foothold on the pavement, I stuggle to steer the car out of the way of hundreds of antsy early-morning commuters.

"This is NOT the best time or place for you to take a nap, Goldie," I grumble under my breath. East Palo Alto! What could have caused me to choose this route to go to work in Palo Alto from Berkeley?!

But I knew very well what did--images of similar scenarios that took place in the last month. Each time Goldie had shut down in backed-up traffic, as if to rebel against the high engine temperatures attained during these long waits. I was hoping that, just maybe, this route would prevent us from sitting at stop lights for an eternity. Whoops, I was wrong...

Not the First Time

I got the first taste of the problem on a Thursday night in Concord, just 20 miles to the east of Berkeley. I was taking a rock climbing course at REI, and just 2 miles from the store, the B started to act up in stop-and-go rush-hour traffic. First she was hesitating... then, definitely coughing and spitting! "Come on, Goldie!" I shout, now sweaty not just from the 90 degree weather but also from time-pressure anxiety. I pull out her choke cable half way to increase the idle speed, and stumbling to the parking lot of REI, we make it. *Phew!* Now let's go rock climbing, I think, promptly forgetting about this episode. And any apprehensions I might have had were quickly allayed on the drive back home, when Goldie ran as smoothly as ever before.

Three weeks would pass without incident, until last week. Stuck in stop-and-go traffic again, just a couple of miles from the Dumbarton Bridge, when argh! not again, I hear the dreaded put-put-put. But this time, it ended in kaput!. I pulled off to the side of the road, popped open the hood, and pondered what to do. Hmmm, must be those dreaded points, I thought, recalling how replacing them in West Covina in March seemed to do the trick. Luckily I have quite a few extra sets in the boot. So I replace the points and condenser, and after a few moronic oversights (like not replacing the distributor rotor or hooking up the coil lead back to the distributor cap) and 45 minutes later, I switch on the ignition and tada! she starts right up. I raise my arms in triumph. Woohoo!

"Next time I won't wait so long to replace those points," I think. "Never again!"

So I'm content until Wednesday, October 1st. It was 8:30a, this time in Palo Alto, just a few miles away from work. During this beautiful morning we were cruising down Middlefield with a gorgeous new Jaguar XK8 convertible following behind. Elton John's tribute to Princess Di, "Candle in the Wind" was playing on the radio, and it was a great moment to be an Anglophile. "And your footsteps will always fall here, along England's greenest hills-- Your candle's burned out long before... your legend ever will" Long live the great nation of England!

I get to the Embarcadero intersection when, with school children crossing the streets, the traffic light is red for minutes. And more minutes. My gosh, does this light ever turn green? But finally it does, and you know what happens next.

Whoops! there goes the engine again, right in the middle of the intersection. The adults on the sidewalk holding the stop signs for the school children to cross all stare at my little B, which is now put-putting and then choking. Not again! The Jaguar deftly maneuvers around me and the driver gives a good luck cheer. Er, thanks for the support!

One of the traffic patrolwomen helps push my car to the side of the road, and once again I perform the points-changing ritual. During this time 3 people come up and ask if I need some help. A pleasant reminder of all the good people in our often cynical world.

30 minutes later, she starts right up. No triumphant arm raises this time, gotta get to work! Ah well. In a jiffy I'm at the office, and am about to tell my boss what happened when, noticing my grimy hands, he nods in complete understanding. "But I think you better wash your hands now," he chuckles. Er, right!

But during work I'm thinking, what's the chances of the points going bad twice in a week? Could that actually be the cause of the problem? I'm beginning to think that the problem was actually temperature related, and contrive a plausible-but- totally-sketchy vapor lock hypothesis. I nearly convince myself of it and feel better, but in the back of my mind I'm thinking, is Goldie going to able to take me to work tomorrow or will I be pushing her again?

A Bizarre Turn of Events!

Back to the East Palo Alto scene (Thu, Oct 2). Still believing that vapor lock in the fuel lines was the culprit, I had resolved to keep Goldie's engine cool. So earlier I had topped off her radiator and drove conservatively all morning, including coasting in neutral to traffic lights. It seemingly had worked to control the heat: Goldie's temperature gauge stayed between the "cool" and "normal" marks all morning.

Until a particular traffic light in EPA, that is. Remembering that Goldie had stalled after a long idling period the day before, I had a "brilliant" idea: I'll shut her off to keep her temperature down. Yah, that's the ticket! Er, the ticket to... not being to start her up again!

So much for a brilliant idea. Aware of the awful location I'm in I quickly get out of the car to push, when all of a sudden, a rather corpulent woman comes running out of her car in a nearby parking lot. She's very energetic, though, and waving her arms, she yells, "get in the car... I'll push!"

Stunned, I do just this and she pushes me a good 200 feet, all the way into the McDonald's parking lot as I steer. She then asks me if there's someone I can call, if I'm a Triple A member, etc. until I assure her confidently that I'll be all right. I can't thank her enough, but she hangs around for a few minutes in her car to finish her breakfast.

This time I REFUSE to touch the points and look for the real cause of the problem. I am pulling the fuel line from the carbs when, the woman steps out of her car and says, "I have to leave now but I left something on the front seat for you. Good luck!" I thank her again and a few minutes later I look at what she left. It is... a Book of Mormon! She even wrote a few kind words in it. I'm not religious at all but am so touched... maybe one day I'll even read the rest of the book.

I place a cup under the fuel line, switch on the fuel pump, and confirm that gas is in fact being pumped. I hook the fuel line back up to carbs and attempt to start the car and... she's alive again! Woohoo, back to work!

During the day I think, okay it obviously was not the points the caused the problem, and maybe there was vapor lock in the lines and opening the line up from the carbs and letting gas flow uninhibited helped clear up the problem. Maybe?

Still amazed at the woman's kindness on the drive back home, I am happy and truly enjoying the drive down 101 and through the Bay Bridge when, all of a sudden, a police car is behind me signalling for me to pull over. What is it now?

"I pulled you over because one of your headlights is out," the officer says.

"Er, which one?" I innocently ask. I honestly didn't know!

He points to the right one, and now I'm handing over my license along with my registration and insurance info. We then joke around about British cars and he expresses his appreciation for all the work I did on the car. Then he hands over a citation! "No biggee, just have any law enforcement officer sign it after you fix the headlight," he says. I guess I'll be looking for one at the donut shops in the next few weeks...

He starts to back up and pull away when, oh no! Goldie won't start up again! I'm now out of the car with the hood open when the officer stops again and asks if everything's all right. He's ready to call a tow truck but I insist I can fix it. No prob, I think, just repeat what I did this morning and start her back up. Yeah! So I'm having the officer hold the fuel line on top of a cup when I switch on the fuel pump. "Gas!" he says.

BUT... after I hook up the line to the carbs, she won't start! Now what? The officer is calling a tow truck driver now. Not really knowing what to do I decide to pull the spark plugs to make it look like I'm not entirely clueless! The officer leaves, and I pull the plugs one by one and inspect them. Looks good. As I finish replacing them I see the tow truck driver pulling up. "One more shot," I think. I crank her up, and she's alive yet again! Narrowly averted a tow by just 5 SECONDS!

End of Part 1

Part 2

This page was written in October 1997.