[Today’s run: 5 miles]
We’ve re-watched all of the Lord of the rings movies recently. They were the not-extended-edition versions. The Ents are my favorites. “Break the dam! Release the river!”
But now back to our regularly scheduled program which is the ancient cheap Aerostar minivan…
This week I finished up work on the intake pipe which runs from the air filter box to the throttle body intake. The pipe is made of molded plastic. The end toward the engine had some problems: two places where rubbing had caused holes and some severe issues with the connection to the intake.
The end turned out to be covered with a fold-over rubber piece. Under that the round molded pipe had degraded almost completely; it was in lots of little pieces. I trimmed it back to solid material. I found a plastic adapter for dryer exhaust at Lowes which was for going from 3″ to 4″. I was able to use some self sealing tape (I already had for antenna waterproofing) and some rubbery-glue stuff (also from Lowes) to get everything stuck together. I put some slots under the rubber fold-over piece so the hose clamp could clamp down on it.
Getting the intake pipe repaired and installed seemed to satisfy the Check Engine light. It is now not on.
Today I drove it into town to a muffler shop where the guy installed a new catalytic converter. When I arrived back at home my wife said, “Oh you’re here. I didn’t hear you come back.”
I’ve driven it a bit. We took a ride down to the river. I drove it to our storage unit (which is not by the river). It has some trouble shifting at the right time. I have some theories about that. It does shift, but usually it is late and goes with a bit of a jerk. I have visited all of the gears and they all work, but it would be better if it were smooth.
Also today I vacuumed it out.
I’m happy with what I have for what I’ve invested.