Miata Service

Carriage Ride

We were 5 of 7 in geocaching this morning. This afternoon I finally did change the oil and rotate the tires on the Emperor. While I was at it I gave him a bath too. He got quite dirty yesterday when Donna had me drive up and down the local dirt roads trying to catch a glimpse of horse drawn carriages.

Before yesterday’s running of the first “jewel” of Aiken’s Triple Crown (the flat races) there was supposed to be a carriage parade. Seeing as we were not interested in the races and too cheap to spend the $10 a piece to get in and watch the actual parade, we guessed at the start point and cruised the dirt roads looking for it. Alas, there was no external parade, the carriages came to the horse track in there own good time. We stopped near the entrance where Donna jumped out to take a couple photos of the two carriages already inside the grounds and then we drove down a rutty, muddy road looking for more. we did find two more making their way to the track, including these two ladies all dressed in purple.

Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 557

Back Pads

This was our Friday afternoon off and I put it to good use by replacing the back brake pads on the Emperor. Donna put it to good use by having the time to try out a shrimp salad recipe she saw on a Barefoot Contessa cooking show.

I spent the evening plotting out caches along routes for the two statewide challenges we are doing. Now we just have to hope that on Sunday we don’t get the 60% chance of rain, but fall into the 40% no rain range. And she spent the evening watching Food TV looking for other meals to try out in case we fall into the 60%.

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 392

Well, That's Interesting

I bought the Samsung HTIB today and when I got it home it talked to the TV just fine. I can now turn on the surround sound system, leave it on, set it to D-IN and the TV remote controls the volume…apparently this is a standard function of the HDMI interface and each manufacturer calls it something different.

On a slightly different note, when I reset the TV to factory defaults the other day, I let it auto tune in all the channels it could find. It found some digital channels along with the regular ones. Most of the channels come back as “scrambled” and show nothing, but the music channels, they come in just fine. I wonder if Atlantic Broadband knows this?

Changed the Emperor’s oil and rotated his tires today. While I had the back wheels off I relubed the slider pins on the discs brakes. I had been getting a slight moaning sound when backing up right after coming to a stop. The right rear top pin was getting kind of rusty, but it cleaned up good, so I hope i won’t be sounding like I’m running over cats anymore. Oh, and the back pads were getting real thin, gonna have to replace them sooner than I thought.

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 382

When The Going Gets Tough

To Mr. Fletchers RideWe went for a nice little hike in Hitchcock Woods this morning, that is until we were stumped for the second time trying to find the Crazy Creek Cache. We tried three weeks ago and trampled the heck out of the hillside where this thing is located without finding it. Today we were confident that it wouldn’t elude us again, unfortunately all we did was delude ourselves. Also we didn’t know it at the time, but it set the tone for the rest of the morning. We tried two other caches more near downtown Aiken after we exited the woods and were stumped by both of them.

When the going gets tough, the tough go shopping, so we went to Kroger to get our weekly supply of groceries (at least there we found everything.)

I changed the oil and rotated the tires on the Emperor after shopping.

This evening we drove with some friends to Lexington for some deep dish goodness at the Uno Chicago Grill there. This is the very antithesis of last weekend’s pizza in Hendersonville. Donna and I knew better, sensing a large meal, we split a salad and a pizza for one. That was just enough, but regrettably when Rudy and Patti offered me a slice from their large pie, the still lingering great taste in my mouth overruled my common sense and I ate the tendered piece. It tasted great but sat heavy with me for the next couple hours.

Started down, went up, back down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 221

Finally

The correct parts for the Emperor’s brakes arrived at work this morning and within an hour and a half after getting home, major stopping power was returned. The first time I stepped on the pedal during a circuit of the block for testing, it was eerily reminiscent of the first time I drove a car with power brakes, an unexpected demonstration of Newton’s First Law of Motion.

More madcap ways to place a photo of you inside different images – Fun Box Photo.

My favorite:

 
Although this one is more appropriate because the photo I used is from my 1978 passport:
 

Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 156

Maybe I’m Not Ready…

…for baseball season. At least the FRS may not be. Last night I posted that they were tied with the MFY 1 to 1 in the 8th inning, well in the bottom of the inning the Yankees scored 6 runs, unearned runs mind you, to win the game 7-1.

I am ready for tonight’s episode of TDTVS.

I am also ready to get the brakes fixed, but that ain’t happening until at least Friday night now. The parts got to the dealer on Tuesday, but I decided I didn’t want to deal with driving 60 miles with the last 8-10 in hectic capital city traffic, so I had them ship the stuff to me. Parts arrived today and wouldn’t you know it, they were the wrong ones. I called the part’s guy back and he said, “Oh yeah, there are two kinds of brakes for your year car, you must have the hard suspension. I’ll get the right parts and ship them right to you and they should get there Friday.”

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 152

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