My 1991 Red Jeep Wrangler, otherwise known as The RB (Red B****), should serve as a warning to anyone who sees a Jeep drive by and says to themselves, “Jeeps are cute, I want one.” Let me put it this way: People at my work have begun calling me “Red Jeep” because they hear me calling the garage and saying, “Hi, I’m calling about the Red Jeep” so often. I am sure that anyone who read my previous article on the subject has already been scared away, so perhaps this column is unnecessary, but I feel that the story must be told.
About two months ago, I noticed that the Jeep was running a little rougher than usual. I’m not sure how I noticed this over the constant RAP RAP RAP of the engine (due to the previous replacement of the engine lifters), but once I noticed, the fact that the engine was laboring was unmistakable. The RB had no “getup” (it never had much, but this was worse), the engine always seemed like it was about to stall, and things just did not seem good. My suspicions were confirmed one day at lunch when the RB seriously overheated, but did not stall, on a hill on Route 2.
I exited the highway and parked the smoking Jeep in a strip mall. I let the engine cool down, filled the radiator (which was bone dry) with water, and then drove The RB to Smiling V’s Auto Repair. The mechanic, Smiling V, who I am convinced has purchased a plane named “Tim’s Red Jeep”, promised to investigate and test the cooling system for me.
The next day, Smiling V told me that he couldn’t find any problems with the cooling system, nor with the engine in general. I am always suspicious when mechanics can’t find anything to fix, but he refilled the radiator and I asked him to do a tune-up on the engine, in hopes that this would help the overall performance and attitude of the vehicle. With tune-up, the entire process of finding nothing wrong cost me $170 worth of gas for Smiling V’s plane.
The next day, to the surprise of no one, The RB overheated again on my way to work. I drove The RB directly to Smiling V, who popped the hood and immediately declared that I had a blown head gasket, which would cost over $1000 to repair. He suggested replacing the engine, and when I asked him what the cost of a new (used) engine would be, and he agreed to check it out for me.
I also began to suspect (yes, it took this long) that Smiling V was either leading me down the garden path, or he was an incompetent boob. He wouldn’t charge me $170 for a tune-up on a car with a blown head gasket, would he? Is it possible that he didn’t KNOW that the head gasket was blown on one day, then immediately detected it the second day? I suppose that there is a slight possibility that the head gasket blew, due to the overheating, between my first and second visits to the shop, but then what was causing the overheating? Smiling V certainly didn’t know. I was leaning towards, “boob”.
It turns out that an engine from a 1994 Jeep with 70,000 miles on it was going to cost $1500. After thinking about it, I went against the advice of everyone I know and decided to have the engine put in . I also asked Smiling V to put a new clutch in, since the engine would be out of The RB and there would be no additional labor involved. I knew that if I didn’t put in a new clutch, the chances were 100% that the clutch would fail the first time I drove The RB with the new engine. All told, the bill came to $1650 worth of landing gear for Smiling V.
I was excited to get The RB back. The new engine didn’t make the RAP RAP RAP sound, and The RB actually accelerated when I pressed on the gas pedal. It was almost like having a new car. My euphoria lasted until the first Saturday after the engine was replaced.
I was exiting the Mass Pike on my way to a softball tournament 60 miles from Boston, when I suddenly couldn’t put The RB into gear. If I tried to put it into gear, a loud grinding noise would be produced, and the top of the shifter would transform into a big middle finger. Luckily for me, the exit ramp broke into two lanes, so I coasted into the right lane and came to a stop. I shut off the engine and started it again. More grinding. I will neither confirm nor deny the rumor that it was at this point that a fist shaped dent appeared in the dashboard of The RB.
As the ramp traffic whizzed by us, we called the State Police on the Megger’s cell phone. After we told them exactly where we were, the State Police promised to show up to protect us from the traffic, and to call a tow truck for us. Neither the State Police, nor their tow truck, ever showed up. I’m sure that there was a good reason for their no-show; for example, the South Boston Police might have needed help handing out street cleaning parking tickets. We waited for them for about a half hour before calling AAA (yes, I know we should have called them first).
While waiting for AAA, I called Smiling V and explained to him that I was more than slightly unhappy with the quality of his workmanship. He actually managed to sound apologetic, and excitedly began to give me detailed instructions about how to fix the problem. With his foreign accent, the static on the cell phone, and the passing traffic, I think he was telling me to that the first thing I needed to do was to rape a fire hydrant. I didn’t see any fire hydrants nearby, so I thanked him for the help, told him I would drop by for a visit on Monday, and hung up.
INTERMISSION. I realize that this article is getting seriously long, so please feel free to get up, stretch your legs, go to the bathroom, watch Mexican Cat Juggling, sing “Take Me Out to the Ballgame”, whatever. ………………………………..Oops, the lights are blinking.
After a short while, the AAA guy, let’s call him Earl, showed up in an ordinary tow truck. Earl explained to me that he couldn’t tow The RB with his ordinary tow truck because The RB is a 4-wheel drive vehicle, which would require a flatbed truck. Being something of an expert where the towing of The RB is concerned, I know that what Earl said is complete horsepucky, and I told him so, but he just didn’t feel like working, so we waited for the flatbed.
Once The RB was on the flatbed, the flatbed driver, we’ll call him Merle, tried to convince me to have The RB towed to his garage, about 20 miles away, which would cost me $$ because it was well outside the range of my free AAA tow, and where they MIGHT be able to work on it Monday. I thanked him for his suggestion, and suggested that we could find a garage just off of the highway. Merle thought about this for a minute, scratched his chin, ran his tongue over both of his teeth, adjusted his cap, and agreed.
The first place we went was a Sunoco station with a garage. I asked the kid behind the counter if the garage was open, and he explained to me that they didn’t operate the garage any more. He directed me to a garage down the road.
When I went back to the flatbed to tell this to Merle, he was quite agitated. It seemed that Earl has found another broken down vehicle which was he was “unable” to tow. I told Merle that I appreciated his situation, but that I needed him to take me to the next station, since my car wouldn’t drive there by itself. Merle was not excited about the possibility of upsetting Earl, but agreed to take The RB to the next garage.
The mechanic at the next garage told me that he did not work on clutches, but explained that the Firestone garage down the street might be able to look at it. Merle apparently had been receiving quite an earful from Earl over the radio, because he became extremely agitated and began attempting to unload The RB while advising me to call a different towing company. The mechanic (bless him) began shouting at Merle and telling me to call AAA to complain. I played the role of Switzerland and convinced Merle to take The RB to Firestone.
Before I could even speak to the mechanics at Firestone, Merle had unloaded The RB in the Firestone parking lot and rushed off to do Earl’s work. Luckily, the people at Firestone were very nice and agreed to work on The RB that very day.
They were able to fix the problem, which turned out to be an empty slave cylinder, which, in their words, “should have been replaced when the clutch was replaced”. Their work cost me $100, but I was relieved that it wasn’t more.
On Monday, I drove The RB to Smiling V and presented him with the bill. Smiling V promised to give me a “credit” for future work instead of giving me the $100 cash. He also explained that he shouldn’t have to pay because if I had simply raped the fire hydrant as he had suggested, The RB would have lasted the weekend and I could have had him fix it.
I told Smiling V that I was not planning to need $100 worth of work done, and that I would prefer the cash. This caused him to begin shouting at me, but I set my jaw and basically told him that if he stood behind his work, he would shut up and give me the money. I also explained that a number my work friends brought their cars to Smiling V’s Auto Repair. This comment brought out his alter ego, Frowning V, who told me to come back the next day so that he could, “take care of this.”
When I went to the shop the next day, Smiling V had returned. He handed me the cash and apologized for the misunderstanding. Apparently, he felt bad about our disagreement, because he then told me to bring The RB back in about 1500 miles for a “free oil change”. I’m afraid that in Smiling V’s native language, “free oil change” means “a chance to get even”, so I thanked him and left, vowing never to allow him to touch The RB again.
Since then, The RB has done its best to lull me into a sense of security. It has been running well, and has more “getup” than it has had in years. The heat began working for the very first time, and the passenger side speaker, which had been silent for more than a year, suddenly came to life. So, for now, for the first time in years, I actually have a working Jeep. My friend Matt has suggested that, before it is too late, I should take this opportunity to paint The RB green. It’s an intriguing idea, but I just don’t think that The GB has the same ring to it.
