Cars

How Was Your Day?

I need to swap the bedroom set to the summer bedroom. I need to clean the pine pollen off the back deck. The garbage disposal in the kitchen has stopped working, so I need to take it apart and see what has jammed it up. I still have 12 days of vacation photos sort through.

So what did I do today? We went geocaching, on a Time Speed Distance Rally with the MMC, watched two episodes of West Wing and I’m listening to the FRS on the internet.

Oh, and I have to order a new battery for the Miata.

We finished a disappointing tied for fifth (out of 6 cars) in the rally this morning. We made one error due to a misleading statement from the rally masters misinterpretation and another because of a missed a clue. We felt that we had kept track of the time and mileage overruns, but even subtracting them from our totals we were still way over and lost big points. The capper was I worked a pounds to kilogram conversion the wrong way and blew the bonus question.

After lunch at the BBQ place one of the Club members had left his lights on and the car wouldn’t start. That is a picture of three of us trying to push start him. After about 4 or 5 attempts we gave up on that and went inside to see about borrowing some jumper cables. The jump start work its magic and off he went.

On the way home Donna and I stopped at a quick stop store in south Augusta to get a bottled water and a Sprite. When we got back in the car I turned the key and was met with silence. Hmm, did I have the clutch all the way in? Tried again and still nothing, but radio display flashed as I went by. The dome light was on, so I figured it wasn”t a dead battery. Funny thing was that with the ignition switch in the ACC position the radio display would flash and there was a clicking sound (like 2 relays) coming from the instrument cluster.

Pulled out the cell phone and called Rudy (AKA Clunk) (or is it Thunk) and his first thought was battery, even after I described the symptoms. He said hold on, I’ll get the truck and come take a look. Thirty minutes later Rudy and Patti pull up. He brought some wrenches so we could remove the battery and (for what I figured was for testing purposes) the battery out of his Mazdaspeed Miata. We swapped batteries and the car started right up. According to Rudy the newer batteries don’t give you any warning, like they used to in the olden days. now they just up and die. We called a couple places to see if they had any batteries for the car and one said we don’t carry ’em, called the dealer and the other had one, but for $90 and he was all the way on the other side of town. Rudy has his truck and Patti just got a new Lexus, so he let me babysit his battery for a while.

It is still going to cost a hundred bucks or so for the battery, but it won’t be a generic replacement from Autozone, it’ll be a quality Westco replacement that is designed for the Miata.

Thanks Rudy.

Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 180

Denver, CO

1344 miles from home.

Today’s road trip consisted entirely of I-70 across Colorado. Normally I consider Interstate driving the epitome of boredom, but this drive was anything but. When you start in Grand Junction the north side of the road is shadowed by 1,000′ mesas and soon that is joined by mesas on the other side. The road slowly rises in altitude and the flat tops turn into peaks. Now you are in a narrow valley twisting between mountains and the road keeps rising. Most of the time the pass is filled only with the Colorado River, I-70 and a set of train tracks.

We had originally intended to take I-70 partway and then dip down south following another route that would take us into Colorado Springs for the night. Try as I might using Google maps I could not change the route to go through Aspen. I checked road conditions and found out why, the road was still closed for the season. We then planned a slightly different route, but as it turned out we didn’t use that either. We only made it to Glenwood Springs (less than halfway) by lunchtime due to our usual late start and bush beating adventures, so the decision was made to just stay on I-70.

Donna decided that she wanted to help out driving, but she picked an inopportune time, soon the climbing got serious, there were numerous spots for trucks to pull over to put on their chains. We think that the road actually had 3 lanes as it wound it way upward, but the lines were worn off and there were deep ruts from said trucks and chains. She found a sort of sweet spot, but the slower trucks and faster cars made her nervous. Ever the trooper she made it to the next place where there was a rest stop and pulled in to let me drive, the top of Vail Pass at 10,600′. We used the restrooms before changing drivers and that in itself was an experience. There was snow piled 5-6′ high from clearing the parking lot and the facilities themselves were cave like as snow still covered almost all of the buildings windows.

From there the road smoothed out and the elevation actually dropped for awhile before starting to climb to the Eisenhower tunnels at over 11,000′. Once through the tunnels the road turned downward dropping to a more civil seven thousand feet or so and then dropping into Denver.

Four for four on caches today. That total might have been a few higher, but the route change removed quite a few from our list.

P.S. Can you tell by the length of this post that I had a bit more time to write about our day tonight than I have had the last couple?

Scottsbluff, NE

1328 miles from home.

Started our day at Mount Rushmore and this time we were more impressed.

Yesterday when we arrived in Keystone and checked into the hotel (mmm…cinnamon buns) it was already past closing time at the park. Restless, after unloading the car we took a drive towards the park to see if we could get a sneak peek on the road up. We followed a couple of cars right to the entrance booths. Stopped for a moment and then drove in. We got to the window and realized there wasn’t anybody in it, so we too drove in and parked. The viewing area was open, but none of the shops or displays were. We and about a dozen other people stood around taking pictures. Maybe it was that we could get so close to Devils Tower and the big heads were so far away that they didn’t seem that grand.

Today for some reason they seemed to be more, well, monumental. There is a trail that takes you closer to the mountain, but we could only get halfway around before we ran into a trail closed sign. It was still too icy. Because the place was practically deserted, we spent 20 minutes or more talking with one of the Rangers about the monument. Turns out she is originally from this area and after a 25 year career teaching, she returned to Mount Rushmore to become the head of Educational Services. She has an interesting connection to the monument, her grandfather was one of the four speakers at the mountain’s precarving dedication back in 1927.

Too much more to talk about, Crazy Horse Memorial, Custer State Park (where the buffalo roam and the dear and the antelope play), Carhenge, 4 geocaches with not enough time to write about them.

Disappointing

We rode the tandem in to work today, and with Wednesday’s trip on it as well, this is the first time we have commuted by bike twice in one week in a looong time.

That bike ride was the highlight of my day. I managed to only finish half of the front brake job I had planned for the Emperor this afternoon. The left front went fairly easy. I say fairly because after 6-1/2 years and nearly 90,000 miles the brake rotor and wheel hub become very fast friends. The folks who make cars know this and they put a nice threaded hole through the disc so you can separate them by cranking down on a bolt screwed in there. But, it takes a scary lot of torque on that bolt before you hear that satisfying pop when the two pieces of metal finally separate. Also one of the caliper slider pins took a bit of coaxing to go back in because with the lube spread on it, the little noise abating rubber sleeve tended to slide out of it’s groove, preventing the pin from fitting in the hole.

On the driver’s side I got the pads off, pulled the caliper and then the bracket off, the second rotor came off easier than first, but then I hit a snag. The top caliper pin was frozen solid in the bracket with corrosion. I sprayed some penetrating fluid on it. Cleaned and lubed the other pin while I waited for the magic. I hammered on the pin and tried backing it out with a 17mm wrench with as much force as I felt comfortable with to no avail. I might have upped the force level by 50% or more, but I didn’t want to break the pin or bracket because we are a one car family and I needed to at least be able to put the car back together and have it operational.

Calls to the Augusta Mazda place, a Miata.net sponsor dealer and Advanced Auto asking about a replacement caliper netted me quotes of from “Can’t Get It” to $185 and we can order it. I then tried the Mazda dealer in Columbia where they still have to order it, but they will sell me just the bracket and pin for less than half the other guys wanted for a re-manufactured caliper and bracket.

I reinstalled the old parts back on the right side and took a drive around the neighborhood to set in the new stuff on the left. The car stops fine, but there is about 4″ more pedal travel. I’m attributing this to the increased travel the left caliper needs to make up for the nearly worn out pads on that side. Still I’ll be taking it easy though until I can get the new bracket and pin on Tuesday.

If that wasn’t bad enough, the motion sensing light quit working again. 🙁

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 147

Daufuskie Island

The main reason for ferrying over to this small barrier island off the South Carolina coast was to take a picture of the Post Office, we also wanted to enjoy a place that the primary mode of transportation is a golf cart. There are cars & trucks on the island, but only the full time residents, of which there are only around 200, are allowed to keep one. We also wanted to try and find the one and only cache there, Life of Leisure. It is a micro, which we aren’t having too much luck with, but listed as “not at all hard to find.”

I’m sure we were right on it and with the clue given as eye level, it should have been easy, but we couldn’t find it. The location is right near the 18th fairway of one of the Daufuskie Island Resort’s golf courses, so we had to dodge golfers and balls. There was a dead tree right on the spot that looked like it was a woodpecker buffet line with lots of holes that a micro could have fit in, but I didn’t see one, nor did I find one hidden under all the chips. Dang.

We were now 0 for 3 on micro caches this trip with the two failure to finds in Beaufort yesterday. Not only didn’t we find this cache, but we didn’t find a full size one on Hilton Head that we tried before boarding the ferry. We suck at this. But we aren’t about to give this up yet, instead of being discouraged by the failures we are now more set in our resolve not to be defeated.

The round trip ferry ride is $23 a person and a 3 hour rental of a golf cart is $50, so we crammed quite a bit of traveling into our day. The boat arrived on the island at 11:00 AM and we covered a bunch of ground before heading back to the landing for lunch at the Old Daufuskie Crab company. After lunch with not much time left until our return trip, we decided to stay until the 5:15 ferry, if we could keep the golf cart. We I asked if it was alright if we kept it over the 3 hour limit the fellow told me usually they charge an additional twenty bucks, but he said don’t worry about it, just be back by 4:00 PM. I’m sure his answer would have been different had it been high season, but I thanked him and we set back out to poke around in some places we hadn’t been yet.

Most of the roads in the resorts and planned to be resorts were paved, but all of the internal main island roads are dirt. Donna, who is normally driving averse, actually loved driving the golf cart around the island because with traffic being almost non existent and with a top speed of 14 MPH down hill, piloting the cart is a blast. We will definitely be visiting again, may not be for another year, but a return trip is going to happen sometime. There are lots of little stories to tell, but my fingers are getting tired from typing, so maybe another time. The island is only 2.5 miles wide by 5 miles long, so just look up at the attached picture and note the green line, that is our track from the GPS and some of those routes we traveled more than once. We covered some ground.

Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 142

Mother, Jugs & Speed

Every time the MMC goes out for a breakfast run I take a few pictures, usually shots of the cars in the parking lot, people at the tables, the place we are eating at, what we might be eating, etc. While standing outside the restaurant lining up one more photograph of a row of Miatas I decided no more generic photos. This picture is the result. Fresh & New? Or Lame & Amateurish?

Stumbled on the last half of M, J & S on Fox Movie Channel tonight and instead of watching the news we opted for classic cheese. The cast included a Battle of Network Stars Dream Team: Raquel Welch, Bill Cosby, Dick Butkus & Larry Hagman. The soundtrack listing was fun too, the only mid-seventies band missing was Geronimo Jackson.

Started up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 128

A 35mm Film Canister Well Intigrated Into The Enviorment

The MMC had a breakfast rally to Waynesboro, Georgia. We went, ate and instead of driving back with the group, we went, that’s right, geocaching.

There were four located in and around downtown, three were listed as easy and one was a difficult, rating 4 out of 5 stars. Based on our results those ratings were pretty much dead on.

Donna was really interested in the difficult one because we had to solve a puzzle, which looked like fun, to get the final coordinates and that was our first planned stop, but when after breakfast the group made a short drive to a local Mennonite bakery we passed right by the location of an easy one. Because it was on our way to the puzzle one, we stopped at the Confederate Cemetery first.

Being recent converts and flush with excitement for our new endeavor we did what any other neophyte might, convert others to our way of life and managed to get two other couples to join us down the rabbit hole. This cache is actually rated 1.5, but we had read the logs (which often contain spoilers) so we had a pretty good idea of what and where it was, so it turned into a 1. Neither Donna nor I found the cache, Rita did. It was literally, the title of this post, and all there was room for was the rolled up paper log. Because we are still novices at this we learned one of the hard and fast rules of geocaching, bring a pen. The only person who had one was Rita’s husband Larry, but it has been traveling, unused, for several years in the pocket of the jacket he was wearing, so was not the best, but we skipped our names and date on the paper. After re-hiding the cache Rudy and Patti (couple #2) had time constraints, so they hightailed it back to Augusta.

Larry & Rita had no other real plans, so they came along with us to tackle the hard one, Historic Fob. Because of the description we knew we needed to visit the courthouse, so we ignored the coordinates for the parking and just found a spot on the street right there. There were 8 questions that the answers to made up the places after the decimal point in the minutes of the coordinates. A couple were head scratchers and one must have been interpreted differently than the four of us did, but an educated guess as to the misinterpretation and we headed to the hiding place of the cache (right across the street from the courthouse.) That’s went it went from bad to worse. The GPS lead us right to one side of the park right near where the Public Works department was working on a water meter or something, a hole in the ground that looked like it had been there awhile. We were there awhile too looking and poking and poking and looking, but with no success. We were disappointed, but shrugged it off because right there at the top of the directions it mentioned that you possibly might not find it.

There was another cache less than a quarter mile away, the Brown Fob, so the four us started walking. We cut through an alley and with about 500 feet to go came to an empty lot and when we looked through it and across the street all four of us simultaneously knew exactly where to find it.

Plugging in the numbers for the fourth, and last cache in Waynesboro, turns out it was 1.17 miles to the south of where we were standing. It was a nice day, so we opted to take a walk. We walked and walked and walked and I checked the GPS, .56 miles left. We walked some more and some more and I checked the GPS and it said .53 miles left. Walk, walk, walk, .49 miles left. The group told me to stop checking or we’d never get there. We walked and walked and walked and we walked so far that we came across the restaurant the Miata Club had had breakfast in. I checked the GPS and it said .36 miles, now we are getting closer. There was some bad news though, the directional arrow was now pointed perpendicular to our southerly route and it was aiming right at the lake the Lakeview Restaurant sits on.

I checked the map and sure enough we in the same situation Donna and I were in last week in the woods, a really long walk to get to the cache after we had already been on a really long walk. The four of us agreed the best thing to do would be turn around, walk the 3/4 mile back the cars and drive to find the the Red Fob. It turned out to be an easy find, only one u-turn required, and because it is still winter so the patch of woods it is hidden in was still barren of leaves.

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 127