The Mad Madder's Blog

Madeleine Bonneville: Auto Mechanic. | November 21, 2009

In my family, it’s basically a given that when something is broken or work needs to be done we do it ourselves.  My father at various points in his life worked in the realms of construction and auto repair and therefore has the knowledge necessary to complete all but the most complicated of home and car jobs.

 

Over the years, my brother, my sister, and I have been roped in as free labour on a million of DIY projects. I have sheetrocked, sheetrocked and sheetrocked some more. I have scraped wallpaper until I believed the cider vinegar would remove my fingerprints.   I’ve spackled, painted, dug holes and lifted anything that needed to be lifted.

 

I am, I fear, my father’s personal living deadman.  Luckily, this particular job comes with the not-so-fringe benefit of free food.  I’ll do just about anything for food. I have, however, become somewhat suspicious whenever I’m invited to dinner since half the time dinner really means please come over and hold up this bay window while I install it. But the food is always tasty and in the long run you end up with a repertoire of skills that come in rather handy when you are as perpetually broke as I tend to be.

So why, Maddie, are you bringing this particular subject up now, you may ask. Because I have branched out from amateur contractor/house painter extraordinaire.  You may now call me: Madeleine Bonneville: Auto Mechanic!

 

I have fixed small things on my car before. I’ve reattached my sagging bumper, jury-rigged my exhaust system with bailing twine, cleaned spark plugs, and, of course, fixed flats. But this week, I, for the first time, replaced a part of my engine. Whee!

 

The story begins, as all my car related tales do, in inclement weather.  My cars are equipped with a fail-proof sensor that can detect the worst weather conditions in order to coordinate with any imminent mechanical failure.  My muffler fell 90% off my car and wedged itself under the frame to require jacking in a sleet storm.  My transmission died in the middle of nowhere Vermont at precisely the frigid moment when Fahrenheit met Celsius. And this last Saturday, with my back seat full of party gear, the rain pelting down, my car stopped starting. As Groucho Marx once said: Nothing. Not even ice cream.

 

Great. Just f#$@ing great.  I have almost thirty people coming to my apartment in a handful of hours and I’m listening to the delightful click and nothing that is means I’m not making it home any time soon.  So, like self-sufficient girls everywhere before have done, I called my father.

 

“Hey, Papa, So….My car won’t start.”  And to my rescue he comes.

 

Parked inconveniently facing in and surrounded by cars on all sides, we struggled to find the optimal angle for a jump.  And got a whole lot of nothing.  So we waited to see if a charge would take.  And nothing.  So we attempted to bypass the battery.  And nothing. Grr.

 

Luckily, I drive a manual. So, with the help of a friendly passing stranger, we managed to push start the car and get it back to my apartment in time to salvage my cooking plans.  But there went my racing plans for Sunday.  A fabulous way to finish a tanking season!

 

A new battery then.  My old one was incapable of being jumped and could barely open my automatic windows. Fine.  I can change a battery in my sleep.

 

So a day or so later, a new battery in hand, I opened the hood.  Wielding my trusty bike multi-tool’s 10mm wrench, I made quick work of that simple task.  Good. I’m back on the road.  So I seat myself behind the wheel, depress the clutch and turn the key. Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

 

Another call to the repository of automotive knowledge later, I had tried to jump the new battery with no luck and I was jacking up the car to clean the wires off the battery that looked a little corroded.  Having no tool up to the job, my available wrench set being ever so conveniently not metric, I wandered over to Elevate Cycles to borrow a socket wrench and wire brush.  (Thanks Chris!)

 

But, after an hour spent under the car, much to the amusement of my neighbours who are fully and logically convinced that I’m insane, the contacts were cleaned and I was dirty.  Oh and the car still wouldn’t start. ARGH!

 

What now?!!!

 

So now it turns out my starter needs to be replaced.  So I returned Chris his wrenches and started making phone calls.  I drew a big blank at the junkyards but Advanced Auto Parts had just what I needed.  I gave them my name and waited a day or two to gather the money for the part.

 

So, Thursday, when the temp finally seemed high enough for me to get to work, I popped the hood and got down to business.  Namely finding the starter, which I had read online was located generally under the car slightly to the left side of center.  Fine.  So, having detached the battery to avoid a delightful shock, I jacked Mister Honda up again and crawled back under.

 

And found out that my starter is not, in fact, under my car.  Woo hoo!

 

Nope.  The starter on a ’92 Accord sits conveniently accessible just to the right of the battery, somewhat blocked by the air conditioner line but not requiring feats of acrobatics to remove.  It does however require large wrenches and leverage that is far from easy to accomplish in such a cramped area.  So, my brilliant plan to solo this job was shot.  I jacked the car back down and made another call to my Papa.

 

So, not entirely unlike Captain Planet, by our powers combined that starter had no chance!  One wire disconnected with a flick of the wrist. The line to the battery barely bothered fighting.  The upper bolt ceded with white flag flying.  Then the lower bolt, chuckling to itself with glee, said: Heck No! I won’t go!

 

So the heavy weight battle of the year ensued:

A nicely messy 17mm bolt, well entrenched vs. Francois and Madeleine Bonneville.

 

Oh, it tried.  It really tried.  It resisted the first assault.  It resisted the socket wrench. It resisted a wrench hammered onto the socket wrench for more leverage.  But finally, pliers clamped onto the socket wrench started the bolt a moving.  And once it gave up, the starter was free.

 

Hands turned a super sexy shade of grease black, I walked up to the counter of Advanced Auto Parts, handed over the old starter and claimed my prize: a shiny refurbished starter!

Putting the starter back in was a whole lot of no trouble at all.  Pop it in and reattach everything in reverse order.  And voila!

 

I sat my nervous butt down behind the wheel and turned the key.  Sweet success!  That’s right baby.  My car starts!

 

I know I didn’t do it all by my lonesome, but I was grinning like I had invented beer.  It feels so damn good knowing you have saved yourself money and gained a skill for life.  Every time I turn that key now I can say: Yeah, I did that.

 

So, next up, the blower motor! Sounds like a job for: Madeleine Bonneville: Auto Mechanic! (Don’t be surprised if I design myself a super hero suit and you never see me grease free again!)

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