Two weekends ago, McBride held its Pioneer Days celebration. Our Jam was set to play for a couple of hours. In preparation for the performance, I loaded up my pickup truck with the music stands, mic stands, PA system, and instruments, to haul down to the park to set up.
Once I got everything loaded in the back of the truck and it was time for me to go, I climbed into the cab, and turned the ignition key to start the truck---NOTHING.
In a panic, I tried again, and again, and each time the results were the same: NOTHING. The engine wouldn’t start or even turn over.
I scrambled to get the car and took everything out of the truck and stuffed it all into the car, then drove down to McBride to set up.
About a week before my failed attempt to start the truck, a friend had been telling me about a carpenter she had employed to do some work on her house. When it was time for him to leave, his truck wouldn’t start, and it was the truck’s starter that had failed and had to be fixed.
I hadn’t thought about broken starters for many decades. Back when I was in university, I owned a MG that had a starter that was always unpredictable and problematic.
After Pioneer Days was over, I tried several times to start the truck, but it failed each time. The lights on the dashboard always came on, so I knew it wasn’t the truck battery, and then remembered Ingrid’s story about her carpenter, and decided that it must be my truck’s starter that was causing the problem.
Yesterday, I decided to do something about getting my truck fixed. I called a towing company to make arrangements to get my pickup towed down to a local garage to get a new starter. I called the garage to make sure everything was set at their end.
As I waited to hear that the tow truck was on its way, I had a thought: Maybe it was the sloppy transmission shift lever in my truck that was causing the problem. It always seems pretty loose about getting into the right spot when I shift the gears.
I got into the truck, which seemed to indicate that that the truck was in was in PARK, I tried to move the shift lever a bit more to the left, and sure enough, it moved a bit more to the left, where it clicked more solidly in place for PARK. I then turned the ignition key, and sure enough, the truck engine immediately started.
I felt a fool. I quickly called the towing company and the garage to cancel all the appointments I had made.
Looking back at the incident, I realized that it could have been a lot worse. I could have had my truck towed in to the garage, and then had the mechanic discover that the starter was fine, so I guess in the long run, while I was embarrassed, I was fortunate to discover the problem when I did.
View my paintings: davidmarchant2.ca
No comments:
Post a Comment