Didn’t You Check That?

Last night on the way home in the loaner Tribute, about 5 miles out, the low fuel light came on. I had just jumped in and didn’t think to look at the gas gage, it still read about an 1/8 of a tank, but nNot knowing which one of these indicators were more correct, I decided to put $5 worth of gas in it. The 3 gallons approximate, sent the needle to just below a 1/4 tank and ought to be enough to get to work and then to Rader the next day. The car/truck is filthy too, I think the last person to borrow it was testing it’s off road capabilities. Not only do they not check to see if there is gas in it, they don’t even take enough pride to wash it off or vacuum it out before some else gets in it.

About 8:15 AM this morning Kelly, my service “advisor”, called to say the car was done. Seems as if the technician finished up just before going home yesterday. I told her I’d be over as soon as I got off work and mentioned she should get five bucks from petty cash to reimburse me for the petrol. I made it over to Rader a little after 5 to get my car. Kelly went off to get someone to bring it around. While we waited I popped upstairs to run the Master’s Miata Club newsletters through the postage meter. When I came back down the car was there, but she didn’t have neither the $5 nor the paperwork. She couldn’t find the paperwork because the tech who did my work was not in today (no wonder he finished up yesterday, he knew he wasn’t coming in.) She also said she would have to talk to the service manager on Monday about getting the money to me. We ran through this routine when I wanted to get reimbursed for the tow charges on the 95 when the timing belt broke. I wonder if it will take nearly two weeks again? Walked over and chatted with Scott, my salesman, for a bit, he’s planning a membership drive for the Club to be held at the dealership in November. He is writing a letter to mail to the 30 or so Miata buyers in the last year and a half at Rader and invite them over to meet the crew.

It was finally time to go, so I got in the Miata, dropped the top and crept out of the dealership lot, the clutch felt real smooth. Hung a right onto busy Washington Road and sped off the 1/2 mile before turning off. A short stretch and then right on Riverwatch Parkway to head home. As I got up to speed and shifted into 5th I looked down to check my speed and discovered I was going ZERO MPH! The speedometer cable is hooked to the transmission, I bet my just finishing up in time to go home technician had forgotten to hook up the cable correctly (or not at all.) Hang a right and then another and pull back into the service area. It is 5:35, they go home at 6, so I figure we can get this done and I’ll be on my way. Wrong. The advisors stay until 6, the techs go home at 5:30, so there is no one there to fix my speedometer. Luckily, they work on Saturday morning, so it should be solved tomorrow. I put the top back up on the Miata and Kelly gives me the keys to the Dark Teal Metallic Tribute, again.

I get 5 miles from home and the low fuel light comes on, again…

Comet Incubation Period: 7 days

Sad Day

And such a waste. Donna and I attended the wake/viewing of a co-worker tonight. He was more than an acquaintance, not really a friend, but only because we traveled in different circles. He was that way, friendly to everyone and I bet that if you needed help he would do it without regard. Wayne was in the wrong place at the wrong time. On the Fourth of July weekend he was riding his trike (a chopper with a VW bug engine) down a main commercial street in town when a woman jumped her red light and pushed him into a ditch and ran over him. After a hospital stay he returned home to start recovery. He needed skin grafts for his arm that was burnt on his hot exhaust when the trike rolled over him and lots of physical therapy. We thought all was well, but a short while ago he started having seizures. Unsure what was causing them he was readmitted to the hospital, where died from a reported blood clot in his lung. I apologize if I’m hazy and maybe wrong on some of the details, but I’d ask about how Wayne was doing every other week or so and mostly got the positive side of things. Because we are a decent sized company in a small town, where Donna and I worked with Wayne also employed his wife, his brother, an aunt and his sister-in-law. His other brother was who I entrusted some of the Miata maintenance to when the warranty expired. In a weird twist of fate, the woman who hit him is the niece of some one else who works at the plant too.

You hug the crying wife and squeeze the shoulder of the red-eyed brothers, but the hardest part of the whole evening was seeing 6′-6″, 250 lb, Robert Turner, a Vietnam Vet who still has a limp from a shrapnel wound and tough as nails, reduced to blubbering at the loss of someone he has worked side by side with for the last 27 years.

So long Wayne, the world is a much worse place now that you are not in it.

Dark Teal Metallic

I guess I was wrong about this being a money making proposition for the Dealer. They told me 6 hours, yet they had the car all day and it was still not finished when I went to pick it up. Seeing as I went into this with low expectations, this just reinforces my bad feelings. I’m sure the optimist would say that the extra time is a good thing because the technician wants to get it right. I’m sure this means that he doesn’t know what the heck he is doing so it is going to take twice as long as specified.

Because they were keeping the car overnight, they gave me a loaner vehicle. A 2005 Tribute in Dark Teal Metallic which kind of brought back memories of Splash Green Metallic. It took about 15 miles before the feeling of being on stilts subsided enough that I just felt too high up. The drivers foot well seems narrower than the Miata’s so I never got my left foot comfortable. In typical Mazda (and maybe all Japanese car) fashion the seat bottom is too short for my thighs, leaving me feeling unsupported even with the more upright position. Remember me whining about the cheap plasticy feel of the Mini’s interior? Well the inside of this is worse. It is silver (really more gray) I guess to simulate aluminum, but it comes off more like a plastic scale model of a navy battleship. The only good feeling was from the steering wheel, a little from the way it handled (not really zoom-zoom worthy) and a little from the texture, hard to describe, but felt very grippy and comfortable.

Brian returned with is estimate from the folks who painted his car, $200, that is painted and mounted. They felt that they would want to add some pop rivets to go along with the silicone adhesive. This is all well and good, but they have not seen the spoiler. I’m having a hard time explaining that the construction of this thing just doesn’t allow for adding anything else for securing it to the car. I’ve tried to take a picture of it, but can’t get one that will convey the shape right.

Comet Incubation Period: 6 days

TSB 05-001/03

Just dropped off the Miata at Rader so that tomorrow they can fix the clutch shudder issue per TSB 05-001/03. Cross your fingers for me and/or pray to the deity of your choice that they don’t screw up more than they fix while doing this. I’m hopeful that things will be swell, seeing as for the 15K service I didn’t have to get out the breaker bar to loosen the lug nuts and I only had to use touch up paint on one little spot near the hood opening.

Comet Incubation Period: 5 days

25F

Got my first estimate for painting the spoiler today. Kelly Paint and Body is right down the street from where I work, so it is convenient, but also they did some painting for me on the ’95 Miata and I was pleased with their work. $63 bucks to paint it. For grins I asked about installation, $76. Total would be $139 for the whole works. I’m considering it. I’m not the most mechanical person in the world and I probably could install it, but if they put it on and it falls off with out me hitting anything, I might have some recourse. My co-worker Brian is getting the folks that painted his truck to give me an estimate as well. I get the feeling I’m about a week off from getting the spoiler on the car.

I’m a little closer to getting the new tires on the car. According to the FedEx site they are due to arrive on next Monday the 4th.

Comet Incubation Period: 5 days

Lipitor Here I Come?

Last week our company had a Health Fair. One of the local hospitals was offering a free Lipid Profile, AKA Cholesterol Check. What the heck, I’m in. The results were mailed to the house and it seems as if I am totally out of the “normal” ranges for most all of them.

Total Cholesterol was 209, less than 200 is the goal
Triglycerides were 271, less than 200 is normal
My HDL was 24, 35or greater is what you are supposed to have of this “good” cholesterol
My LDL was 131, less than 130 is what you are supposed to have of this “bad” cholesterol
My Factor was 1.82, instead of less than .50, I guess this is some sort of mathematical combination of these other numbers.

Wie ist Ihr Deutscher?

Or, How is your German?

The Comet Spoiler comes from Germany, so the instructions that were included are in that language. There are a half dozen somewhat informative pictures, but there might be something important in the text. So today I scanned the sheet and ran it through an OCR program. I then plugged the results into Babel Fish where I got about 1/2 of the total verbiage in an understandable form. Then I went back and fixed the OCR errors and added all the umlauts onto their vowels. The second time through was a whole lot better:

1. Clean first the front in later edition range of the spoiler thoroughly with silicone remover.

2. In order to avoid a contaminating of the vehicle by positioning the spoiler with adhesive already laid on, the later seat of the part is marked by first provisional fixing at the vehicle.
You found the assembly position if the spoiler rests optimally against the outline of the vehicle.
Fixing and marking know vehicle outline with sticking and/or Krepp volume take place-taking place that.

3. Grind the spoiler within the range of the sticking klebesicke with sandpaper of the granulation 100 and clean you the sharpening places. Here must be removed for a later, optimal gluing, all lacquer and priming arrears.

4. Lay on like illustrated the adhesive in full bulge.
The spoiler can now set on the vehicle in accordance with the position marked before.
Note: in the marked place “X” no adhesive is laid on, so that the wheel arches can be further if necessary opened!

5. The spoiler can be set now on the vehicle in accordance with the position marked before. Examine again the accurate position us fix the spoiler for draining the adhesive as shown with tape.
Impurities by the adhesive remove you please immediately with silicone remover!

Please you consider before processing the adhesive:
For draining the adhesive the vehicle in a dry, area if necessary kept at a moderate temperature should remains (18 – 25 degrees).
The vehicle may not be driven in the first 12 hours to the gluing. (wash road at the earliest after 48 hours).

Comet Incubation Period: 4 days