Possumblog

Uh-oh

Or, on the bright side, maybe I’m just like Jed Clampett!

I mean, there IS bubbling crude involved.

Although it’s dripping onto the ground instead of up out of it.

And it’s not actually crude oil, but rather refined 10W-40, as produced by the Valvoline Corporation.

And no firearms were involved. Yet.

But it seems that my intemperance while trying to merge into traffic this morning--which caused me to press mightily upon the accelerator pedal of a certain Volvo I own, which in turn caused its swirly-roundy internal combustion producing bits to spin with great vigor--seems to have produced such an extreme amount of oil pressure that it completely blew out all of the accumulated grit, grime, dead animals, and other exotica that lurk inside of an engine with 224,000 miles upon it!

HOWEVER, in blowing all of this accretion out of the way, we learned that the accumulated grit, grim, dead animals and other exotica were actually serving as quite a nice gasket, in lieu of an actual gasket. I surmised this based upon the fact that it seems the front crank seal is now leaking like a…sieve? Well, no--sieves actually retain more liquid. Maybe like the spillway of Hoover Dam.

I got to work and had zero oil pressure. And to make matters worse, I had to get to the bank today at lunch, and then go back to the house to pick up some papers I’d forgotten. Meaning I had to try to nurse it to the closest purveyor of incredibly thick, leak-stopping oily goo in order to nurse it that much further to the house, where I could swap vehicles.

I went back out at lunchtime to see the poor thing sitting in a puddle of its own juice. Cranked it up, and since it had cooled off while parked, it actually had some pressure again, which was very good!

This pressure promptly evaporated once on the Interstate.

I managed to get to the Cowboy’s station at Tallapoosa Street, where I purchased two quarts of rich, life-preserving oil, as well as a pint of STP for extra thickness. After spending fifteen minutes in a line that did not move, I paid for my goods and went outside to pour them in. Managed to get the oil level to the bottom of the dipstick.

WELL SURELY this will be enough to get home!

Surely.

Off again, and this time with a nice healthy 4 atmospheres of oil pressure.

That evaporated close to the Trussville exit. Close, but not quite at.

So, I once again nursed my humble steed to the Chevron station and bought ANOTHER quart of oil to get it home and up the hill. Which it managed to do quite nicely in that it was only about two miles from the house.

Well, now, this is certainly a kick in the shins. Looks like instead of junkyard diving this weekend, I will be tearing off the timing belt cover and putting in a new crank seal (and belt, and idler). And praying there isn’t something ELSE that has let go.

Posted by Terry Oglesby at June 9, 2006 01:51 PM