Well... that's a year of my life I'll never get back.
First out of the chute, no brakes on the trailer, well, that's not exactly right, no brake LIGHTS on the truck, which means there is no electrical signal to the trailer brakes. The brakes all worked just fine, but I'm not driving 1060 miles manually engaging the trailer brakes, and then the small matter of lights might be a problem as well... Turned around and went back to the barn.
Checked everything I could think of and eventually discovered that the brake light switch took a dump on me. When was the last time anyone has actually had the switch fail??
Down to the auto parts shop, 36 bucks and WAIT for the delivery guy to fetch the piece (made for 25 cents in China no doubt) from the warehouse... I get the part at like 3:00 pm.
Back home, test the switch; It works, get it installed and adjusted. Verify that the lights and trailer brakes actually work. Load Pammie back in the truck and away we go. It's 3:30pm.
OK, we're only six hours behind schedule, but what the heck. Nothing else can go wrong, right?
OK, it's hot has the dickens up here today, and we get maybe 40 miles in and the air conditioner dies! OK, inconvenient, but we roll down the windows and catch some breeze.
It's gonna be a HOT trip, it's something like 110 degrees in Oklahoma right now, but maybe when we get there we have a few days and we can get it fixed for the return trip.
What's next??? Oh, nothing really, just a transmission overtemp indicator, follow soon thereafter by a "Service Engine Soon" lamp blazing on the dash. We haven't made it a hundred miles. Stop in Mansfield OH and catch a shop at ten miutes to closing time. We chck things out and come up with a blown fuse on the A/C fan control, but it's still pumping hot air. The trans overtemp light goes out, I reset the Check Engine light and we staart heading back to the interstate. Before we make it to the interchange the overtemp is back on, and I give up. We turned North and headed back home.
'lil Bit is back in the drive, and I'm not sure what I'm gonna do next. But I'm thinking the OKC trip is pretty well out of the question right now. Damn shame.
Dave
#77
First out of the chute, no brakes on the trailer, well, that's not exactly right, no brake LIGHTS on the truck, which means there is no electrical signal to the trailer brakes. The brakes all worked just fine, but I'm not driving 1060 miles manually engaging the trailer brakes, and then the small matter of lights might be a problem as well... Turned around and went back to the barn.
Checked everything I could think of and eventually discovered that the brake light switch took a dump on me. When was the last time anyone has actually had the switch fail??
Down to the auto parts shop, 36 bucks and WAIT for the delivery guy to fetch the piece (made for 25 cents in China no doubt) from the warehouse... I get the part at like 3:00 pm.
Back home, test the switch; It works, get it installed and adjusted. Verify that the lights and trailer brakes actually work. Load Pammie back in the truck and away we go. It's 3:30pm.
OK, we're only six hours behind schedule, but what the heck. Nothing else can go wrong, right?
OK, it's hot has the dickens up here today, and we get maybe 40 miles in and the air conditioner dies! OK, inconvenient, but we roll down the windows and catch some breeze.
It's gonna be a HOT trip, it's something like 110 degrees in Oklahoma right now, but maybe when we get there we have a few days and we can get it fixed for the return trip.
What's next??? Oh, nothing really, just a transmission overtemp indicator, follow soon thereafter by a "Service Engine Soon" lamp blazing on the dash. We haven't made it a hundred miles. Stop in Mansfield OH and catch a shop at ten miutes to closing time. We chck things out and come up with a blown fuse on the A/C fan control, but it's still pumping hot air. The trans overtemp light goes out, I reset the Check Engine light and we staart heading back to the interstate. Before we make it to the interchange the overtemp is back on, and I give up. We turned North and headed back home.
'lil Bit is back in the drive, and I'm not sure what I'm gonna do next. But I'm thinking the OKC trip is pretty well out of the question right now. Damn shame.
Dave
#77
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