That throws a wrench into the gears

The car is apart in pieces, and we finally figure out that the way it is all situated underneath the car is not that great. We had to disassemble pretty much everything since the A/C and power steering where an after thought, so those had to come lose and hang down so we could get to the two bolts on the water pump.

Casey is taking care of it, and I am grateful for that, so now I can go to Vegas and have my fun, go to DefCon and other such fun activities. I wanted to drive up in my car so I would not be dependent on Steve to drive me around, but I guess that kind of luck was not in the cards.

"It is the challenges in life that grow character. It is in growing character that we become wiser. It is through becoming wiser we find out we really don't know anything" - Unknown

I am pretty sure I butchered that quote. It was in one of those rip off calendars. I love quotes!

I Thought I was Done

Off course my car has to break again. This time with a part that is VERY hard to replace. The water pump. It means I need to take almost the entire engine apart:

1. Valve head cover
2. Timing belt cover
3. Pulleys
4. Timing Belt
5. Other belts (2)
6. Alternator (since the bracket is screwed into the water pump)
7. Water pump

This is going to be a heavy job, and I am not looking forward to it. But it will mean the timing belt will be finally replaced, something I was not looking forward to doing, it has to be replaced every 60k, and it is at 90k+ and the previous owner was not all to nice to the car, so I doubt it has ever been done. At the same time I am replacing the lower and upper hoses, the clamps on those, and the thermostat, since I was planning on doing that anyway.

$person->sweat();
$car->remove($car->parts->type("Waterpump"));
$person->sweat();
$car->add(new $parts->type("Waterpump"));
$person->sweat();

$person->sleep(); // Required! :P

Dumb drivers

I unfortunately live in the state with the worst drivers ever. The amount of crap I see on the roads daily is not even funny, and I can't even begin to explain!

So the last few days it has been really dusty outside, sand storms and all that jazz. Now, for anyone that has not had that happen to them, it is just like fog, visibility is near zero, and it has one more downside, sand tastes bad. There are however these dumb drivers who decide that it is best for the world, and especially themselves to turn on their bright lights. Yes, if you are thinking of how that is an bad idea while driving in fog, it is the same concept in dust. Turning on their bright lights causes the light be reflected off the sand particles so visibility is further reduced, and at the same time you are being an major pain in the ass for people coming from the other direction, since bright lights are bright sand or no sand. People who do this on major highways should be shot, since when you are driving next to such an ignorant fool you are blinded as well from all the whiteness of their lights. Best thing to do, turn on fog lights, they shine low and are amber coloured and thus let you see further and at the same time not blind other people on the road.

Then there are those people that don't know how to use a blinker. So while you are driving along, and you properly signal that you are going to move into a the left lane for example, some guy in the far lane may decide he wants to move over to the right, and does not turn on his blinker. So as you make your move, some huge truck or SUV comes hurling at you sideways.

Coming back to the bright lights, apparently people find that if they turn em on at night, they are able to see better, not understanding that when someone approaches them they are blind as a bat and could make a bee line for their car. Same goes for people that are in the middle of a long row of cars, and they have their bright lights on shining directly into the car in front of theirs mirror. Learn how to drive, bright lights are only allowed to be used on unlit streets, and where there is no on-coming traffic that could be blinded.

Other dumb crap I have seen people pull: Figure out how a car looks wedged underneath a FedEx truck. I have to sit in traffic because some 18 year old in a Honda Civic lost control of his car and got stuck underneath a huge FedEx truck. Thanks, now my already long drive is even longer because everyone has to see what happened. The kid is okay, now hurry it up. Beat that orange just that last second instead of stopping and waiting, and off course getting hit by the driver who was waiting for it to turn orange so he could make his left hand turn (for you people driving on the wrong side of the road, that would be a right turn).

Coming back to stand storms, there are normally huge gusts of wind associated with these. A small car like mine will get tossed around quite a bit, but I can feel it and correct, some of these people have apparently never had a gust of wind hit their car, as you see them swerve, over-correct, almost hit the guard rail, over-correct into the other direction and end up in a different lane.

My all time favourite dumb thing to do is inch up at the traffic light. Slowly but surely roll your car over the line until it turns green, and then when it turns green? Well off course, we not in a hurry anymore, we slowly accelerate and do 5 Mph's BELOW the speed limit. Come on grandma, hit the gas pedal, if you were in such a rush to not be able to have your car properly stopped at a traffic light, please for the love of whoever you love, HIT THE GAS PEDAL.

No more leaking!

My car has been leak free, and has not had it's oil level drop, and I have driven almost 1000 miles on it, since we replaced the gasket, so that worked really well!

Now, I just need to get a new compressor, Receiver dryer, and an expansion valve to replace those, and then I will have an A/C compressor that is under warrantee which would be great, since in Arizona one really does need A/C, even-though I am getting quite used to driving in 42 C weather. It will also come in handy when I drive up to DefCon at the end of July, beginning of August. Looking forward to that.

So far I have an average Miles per Gallon of about 30, which is absolutely not bad considering I drive it like Roger Ramjet :P. Gas prices have also been going down, which means it is becoming a bit easier to afford the gasoline to drive places, which is nice. It really is false hope though, gas prices will be around $5 by the end of this year, just wait for it. Unless something drastically changes, it will happen.

On a better note, the US government is considering upping the requirement for car manufacturers as to the MPG they need to be able to get. All the way up to 35 Mpg, which would be awesome, means the US should finally see more fuel efficient cars, so that when I update my car to something newer after I drive the wheels off of my Sephia, I can buy a car that can get at least 40 Mpg. America should take a look at European cars (Renault, Opel and others).

Working on my Kia Sephia

Yesterday I took my time, got a new valve head cover gasket, so I replaced that, and while I was at it I replaced my spark plugs. There were some american spark plugs in there, something one just does not put in a korean car. So I got some DENSO spark plugs:

Also, as I was removing the old spark plugs, my friend and I noticed that the spark plugs were in the engine VERY loose, which would have meant I would not have been getting such great compression. So after we got the new ones in, we went for a test ride. And WOW that made a difference. Ive got more power on the lower RPM's, it is guzzling down less fuel, and on the highway it is doing almost 500 RPM's less at the same speed. More MPG is better!

We also painted the Valve head cover, but we have to sand it down and redo it again some other time, as last night we did not have the time for it. It does not yet look as good as it could, so I am not going to be posting pictures yet.