2023 What I did today.

[siteunseen]

Mowed mine and my neighbors yards.

Let the 2 sleeping Zs idle in the garage for an hour, accidentally too! I forgot about them until I got my blower. 

 

[Racer X]

I put a new battery in a 2010 Malibu today (kinda weird family sorta thing).

I swear, US auto manufacturers should be ashamed of the poor quality cars they produce. The only good thing about this car is the Delco Bose stereo.

You couldn’t pay me enough to own one of these things, even with the great audio.

 

 

Edited February 23, 2023 by Racer X

[Reptoid Overlords]

Not today, but last Saturday and Sunday removed the stock single cam 1.6L from my Civic and installed a dual cam 2.0L from a Japanese market CRV with a '90 Acura integra 5 speed.

It currently runs I just have to finish up the exhaust. Next weekend maybe.

[Racer X]

2 minutes ago, Reptoid Overlords said:

Not today, but last Saturday and Sunday removed the stock single cam 1.6L from my Civic and installed a dual cam 2.0L from a Japanese market CRV with a '90 Acura integra 5 speed.

It currently runs I just have to finish up the exhaust. Next weekend maybe.

Upgrade!

[Racer X]

12 hours ago, Racer X said:

I put a new battery in a 2010 Malibu today (kinda weird family sorta thing).

I swear, US auto manufacturers should be ashamed of the poor quality cars they produce. The only good thing about this car is the Delco Bose stereo.

You couldn’t pay me enough to own one of these things, even with the great audio.

 

 

A bit more background on the Malibu.

Mrs. Racer picked this thing up from the estate of the husband of a friend of her daughter’s. She wanted to give it to her oldest granddaughter who is a single mom and struggling to become established as an adult, and a young mother.

She paid $3,000 for it.

At the time she got it, the granddaughter was crossed up a bit, had another car, no driver’s license, no insurance. She had been involved in an accident, and because of no license, no insurance, and living on welfare, she wound up with a lien against her potential driver’s license (until she satisfies the judgement for the accident, she can’t get a driver’s license).

Meanwhile, this car was sitting at our place.

Oh, and my daily driver had a timing belt break, and I was driving Eddie, which at the time had his own issues, and had become undrivable.

So Mrs. Racer told me to drive the Malibu.

So I drove the Malibu to The Big Shed and back for work.

Then one day the transmission went legs up. Apparently these things are known for transmission failures, an issue that caused GM to extend the warranty and time.

But wait, it gets better.

That extension of the warranty has expired, so no relief there.

And given the electronic wizardry that modern automatic transmissions operate under these days, I would need to buy an expensive scan and programming tool if I was inclined to replace the transmission. Besides, I really dislike working on front wheel drive cars, and my Legacy is on the lift in my shop, so a transmission swap was out of the question, at least at that point in time.

So I was driving Mrs. Racer’s Corolla, and getting Eddie drivable again. One day I came home from work and the Malibu was gone.

Mrs. Racer decided to have AAMCO fix it.

Um, OK, fine with me, I did mention my disdain for working on front wheel drive cars, right?

That was last October.

When we picked up the car, I drove it home. Immediately I noticed problems, the thing vibrated vigorously in gear at idle, it shifted randomly at the wrong time, refusing to downshift when needed, downshift when it shouldn’t, upshifting too soon or too late, shifting very hard, and also really soft. I immediately returned to the repair shop and complained.

The kid said it has to relearn, and to give it a few hundred miles.

Not wanting to be an arse I left, telling him I would be back.

Our oldest grandson was killed November 13 when a guy got on the interstate going the wrong way and hit his car head on. The funeral was just after Thanksgiving. His father and stepmother came from Hawaii and we let them drive this POS Malibu . The vibrations never went way, the shifting did settle down, but the vibrations, not so much.

So we took it back to AAMCO, and they fussed with it for a week, then called to say it needed a transmission, but it had to be ordered, and for the interim we needed to come get it so there wouldn’t be an issue with storage.

Meanwhile, the TPMS sensors in the wheels died. So now the information display pesters us every time the car is started (and the buttons on the steering wheel work when they want to, not when they are pressed by one of us).

So after a couple of weeks the transmission shop calls, the tranny is in, and we need to bring the car in. When driving the car in, Mrs. Racer notices a brief error message about the power steering. I do some research, and of course, the electric power steering unit has known issues.

After a couple of weeks the calls and says the car would be ready, but when they try to start it a fuse keeps blowing. A few days go by, then they call and say the car is ready.

We picked it up Monday, and the guy says the reason the fuse kept blowing is because the battery needs replacing. Really? I’ve been working on cars for a very long time, and never once experienced a vehicle blowing fuses because the battery is in poor condition.

I asked what they did to fix the fuse blowing, and the guy said they had to replace the ECM.

Again, really? Well, no charge for the ECM, or the fuses, and the transmission was replaced under warranty. Better not cost anything, the replacement transmission cost $6,000.

So it appears that the transmission is working as expected now, but the TPMS sensors, the power steering unit, and now the system is unhappy with the airbags and displays a persistent “service airbag” nag.

This car is such a pile of fecal matter.

But hey, it has a killer stereo.

[Mark Maras]

Keep the stereo, get rid of the car.

[Racer X]

1 hour ago, Mark Maras said:

Keep the stereo, get rid of the car.

The car will be getting sold soon, providing nothing else major goes wrong with it. The granddaughter isn’t getting her poop in a group, so she won’t be getting it.

[Reptoid Overlords]

I like how they have the audacity to call that a Malibu. I drive a 2019 International medium duty commercial truck for work, and about every 3 months a fuse in the battery box blows. The fix: carry extra fuses and a box wrench.

I'll bet you could buy an old Malibu from our beloved Beverly Hills auto club and it would be more reliable haha.

[Racer X]

4 hours ago, Reptoid Overlords said:

I like how they have the audacity to call that a Malibu. I drive a 2019 International medium duty commercial truck for work, and about every 3 months a fuse in the battery box blows. The fix: carry extra fuses and a box wrench.

I'll bet you could buy an old Malibu from our beloved Beverly Hills auto club and it would be more reliable haha.

While not a Malibu, my 95 F150, Eddie, has cost me less than this Malibu cost Mrs. Racer, and I’m happy to drive it anywhere, anytime.