Bumped into a friend and neighbor this morning who told me a funny/sad story involving his 16 year-old son. My friend has worked as a mechanic most of his life so has a huge shop, tons of tools and stuff. However, he has been operating a very different business for about the past 10 years and only works on his own stuff these days. His son isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer but he is an excellent guitar player and song writer. Dad found a very restorable 1950 Plymouth and the son drives it regularly.
One day Dad hops in the old Plymouth to move it out of his way and notices the oil guage is indicating the engine must be very low on oil. He tells the son that he needs to put oil in his car. The next day the son takes the car to practice with the band he plays with for a round trip of about 60 miles. Dad tells the son it was a good thing he put oil in the car or he might not have made it back. Son tells Dad he hadn't put oil in it. Dad about goes nuts. Tells his son to put oil in it NOW! Son says, "What oil?" Dad tells him there is a 5 gallon container at a specific spot in the shop. Son heads to the shop.
The next day Dad is riding with the son. They are less than three miles down the road when Dad notices blue/black smoke trailing behind them. They stop, raise the hood and Dad discovers oil all over the place and a trail along their path behind them. He asks the son how much oil he put in the car. Son says he did what Dad told him to do. Dad asks him what that was. Son says, "You told me to put the oil in that container in the car." Dad says, "You put all of it in, didn't you?" Son says, "That's what you told me to do.."
Some people's lack of mechanical aptitude is laughable. I bet that old flathead was a mess...
In a former life my wife at the time had a 1962 Volkswagen. One morning, with babies in tow and headed to the daycare, her VW wouldn't start...low battery. The crew (MY ride to work) had just shown up and everybody was in a hurry to get gone. Three surveyors pushed that VW up and down the hill several times in a effort to get it to start with my wife behind the wheel with no results. Winded, we all gave up and decided to park it and look at it later. My wife had one suggestion, "Let's try it one more time and I'll turn on the key to see if that helps..."
What father gives son a collectible car without teaching him basic maintenance like checking fluids?
paden cash, post: 389991, member: 20 wrote: "Let's try it one more time and I'll turn on the key to see if that helps..."
Did you say: Here's your sign?:smarty:
Holy Cow, post: 389981, member: 50 wrote: Dad says, "You put all of it in, didn't you?" Son says, "That's what you told me to do.."
Thats as bad as the teenager changing the oil in his girlfriends car and putting two quarts of oil in it. It was a 2.0 liter engine so he googled it and there really wasn't much difference between a quart and a liter.
Read that on a car site a few days ago. Luckily the girls dad started asking questions before anything bad happened.
James
Bill93, post: 389995, member: 87 wrote: What father gives son a collectible car without teaching him basic maintenance like checking fluids?
I was wondering the same thing, especially of a mechanic who has worked on cars professionally. If his son doesn't "get it", he should know that as well I would think. (but, of course, I don't know them, their family dynamics, or anything else. Those were just thoughts running through my head).
I was wondering where got off to after we let him go.
Neglected to mention that Dad isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer, either. The apple didn't fall too far from the tree.
Dad is a great mechanic. He can jerk out an engine, tear it down to it's basic parts, rebuild it completely, stick it back in and it will purr like a kitten. He has done it several thousand times. On most everything else, he's not too bright.
You know, we technophiles need to grant grace to those who may not be similarly blessed with the know how some of us have. The story is not unlike this one:
After numerous computer problems, a friend of my wife's (who runs a clothing store) was having, I installed a UPS, and plugged all of her sensitive computer equipment into it via a plug strip, explaining what it would do in the case of power surges, sags or failures.
A week after the install I got a series of urgent texts: Everything is out! It's beeping and buzzing! The computer, the phone, the CCard swiper...They're all DEAD! What do I do?
After a number of back and forth texts, I finally got out of her this: "All I was doing was vacuuming the store and I heard a loud POP and everything went dead!"...
Where did you have the vacuum plugged into? I asked.
"Well, the plug strip you just installed".....
Truth be told, though, I never really explained to her that nothing should go in those outlets except what was already in them.
For a second there I thought you were going to tell us she was using whiteout on the flatscreen to correct typographical errors.
Or plugged the UPS back into itself! That would get them electrons dizzy.
I have to do a little bragging about my kid, a girl. She called me one day giggling from her college dorm. She asked her boyfriend to change a light bulb in a newer model VW beetle. Her boyfriend came back to the dorm room to say he did not know how to get to the burnt out bulb. She merely said, "Do I have to tell my dad that you canÛªt fix a light bulb?" He went back down and was trying for next 2 hours when she called giggling. I would like to think I had my part in her picking a pretty good husband. 🙂 Jp, Ps. those newer VW's Beatles were a hell of a lot more complicated than the older ones I soon learned afterwards.
We had an engineer that owned a fairly new jeep Wrangler. He drove that thing for about 3 years, never checked the oil or had it changed. I drug him into the parking lot one day with a tow rope, it had no oil in it. He said the oil pressure gauge had been acting funny for a couple of days. My first thought was someone had drained all his oil some night. He bought the jeep at a Chrysler dealer but said he had the oil changed on a regular basis at Walmart. It had a Mopar filter on it, which Walmart isn't likely to use. He called Walmart and they had no record of any oil changes for that vehicle. So he had driven the thing for 30,000 or 40,000 miles without changing or checking the oil. The engine was toast. He was upside down on the loan also. He also paid for the killer extened warranty but I guess they are kind of funny about those warranties, they expect you to maintain it also.
Wait. We are supposed to check the oil in our engine!?!?!?!? When did they come up with that silly idea? It's all sealed up. Where's it going to go?
(a string of sentences probably uttered by far too many people)
Holy Cow, post: 390029, member: 50 wrote: Wait. We are supposed to check the oil in our engine!?..
Yes, and remember to use the proper type of crankcase lubricant also. Some manufacturers are nice enough to placard this info right on the filler cap.
In this example it is the exotic "710" mixture:
Jp7191, post: 390023, member: 1617 wrote: He went back down and was trying for next 2 hours when she called giggling.
Apparently he doesn't know about Google or Youtube; there are videos on how to fix EVERYTHING!
David Livingstone, post: 390026, member: 431 wrote: He said the oil pressure gauge had been acting funny for a couple of days.
He was waiting for the bells and whistles to go off? Here's your sign.....
Jp7191, post: 390023, member: 1617 wrote: She asked her boyfriend to change a light bulb in a newer model VW beetle
[MEDIA=youtube]JO-aZB731lU[/MEDIA]
I know a few people who are so mechanically inept it truly surprises me they can remember how to start their cars. Or roll down the windows. How they remember how to breath can be a wonder as well.
John, post: 390040, member: 791 wrote: I know a few people who are so mechanically inept it truly surprises me they can remember how to start their cars. Or roll down the windows. How they remember how to breath can be a wonder as well.
Years ago when I was a lowly hourly employee with a consulting firm I chose to work the counter at night for a local auto parts store to make ends meet. I really lost my faith in humanity while I was there...
Just remember what George Carlin told us:
"Think about how dumb the average Joe really is....now consider the fact half of the remaining people are dumber than that!
My solution to the auto parts dilemma is to walk in with fifty pounds of oily-nasty-rusty-bent stuff, pointing to a key part thereof and saying, "I need one just like that, but, new." They are so eager to get me back out the door before anyone else notices how effective this is that normally they fix me up in record time.
