Car Problems

Well phooey.

I had started this post last night, saved because of dinner, and never went back. Went to finish it this morning, and it was gone. Been blogging now for several months, and this is the first post I've lost.

Anyway.
I woke up Wednesday morning, all excited about the space walk that was going on. I got around and headed to work so I could start listening to as much as I could while I was doing my work.

I went out to the car, and it wouldn't start. I knew this was coming. I had taken the car to the shop almost a year ago probably because of a power loss I was sometimes seeing (usually when it was cold). What I was told is these cars (Oldsmobile Intrigue) pull lots of juice to run all the electronics, and because of some of this, can cause heavy corrosion. I would probably have to replace the battery, and the battery cable. It would probably cost between $100 and $250 to do these repairs. Not having the cash, I passed. Well, it finally caught up to me, and the car wont start.

Well, I got the battery cable off of the batter, but in the process, it took a good chunk of the battery with is. So the battery was just sitting there leaking battery acid. oh, and I couldn't remove the chunk from the battery cable from that chunk of battery.

My wife needed to get some errands ran in Tulsa, so she took me to work while she and our boy did the errands. They came and picked me up when they were done which allowed me to get some work done, so I could now go work on the car without thinking about stuff I needed to do at work.

When we got home, I was able to under one of the connections, and get the cable out of all the holders it was in. But my hands were to big to get the connections at the starter and the alternator. I thought I was going to have to take the start off to get that cable off. But my wonderful wife came out and helped me get those wires off. She is so great!

Well, we have this crazy wire off now! Yea! This cable was crazy. The cable connected to the battery, then one side went to one of the fuse boxes, and then on to the alternator. The other side of this cable went to the starter.

So, off to the store to get a new one.
I stopped at the local auto parts store. Took it in and put it on the counter. I need a new battery cable. He said. "hmmm, never seen one like this before."

He told me I didn't need to get a new cable, He took this one to the back, and fixed the part that the battery was still attached to, came out and picked up a little bolt and said, this is all ya need.
Also told me to soak the end in some Dr Pepper, or any carbonated drink, but to him, DP works the best, and that will eat off the rest of the corrosion.

We got home after going to Walmart, got the cable on, again, thanks to my wife's small hands, and got it started. We were very happy. But I understand why it was going to cost so much. The labor was a pain!

So all in all, not too bad. Total cost for us was about $75 for the part and the new battery.