Zero cost car repair.

blades

blades

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Joined
29 May 2023
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Location
Indiana, USA
Yesterday my digital screen in the Subaru lit up like a christmas tree with warning lights and it turned off all the features. The best clue I had was the brake warning light. The brakes, however, were working perfectly. I got into my garage and set the electronic parking brake. It wouldn't set. Usually this sort of thing results from an inadequate level of brake fluid. Not the problem because I had changed the fluid and bled the brakes just last month.

So I jacked up the back of the car. I Removed the right rear wheel and went to see if the brake piston was stuck. It wasn't but the electrical connection was loose. So I pushed it back up and secured it to the brake caliper with a large, long cable tie. I went to the other side of the car and repeated the process. That connection was not loose but I added a cable tie to it anyway. Problem solved.

I already had the cable ties so there was no cost. Imagine what would have happened had I had the car towed to the dealer and had the dealer handle it. It would have been pricey. The car is back to normal. A win in what otherwise was an awful week. Yay!!!
 
blades said:
Yesterday my digital screen in the Subaru lit up like a christmas tree with warning lights and it turned off all the features. The best clue I had was the brake warning light. The brakes, however, were working perfectly. I got into my garage and set the electronic parking brake. It wouldn't set. Usually this sort of thing results from an inadequate level of brake fluid. Not the problem because I had changed the fluid and bled the brakes just last month.

So I jacked up the back of the car. I Removed the right rear wheel and went to see if the brake piston was stuck. It wasn't but the electrical connection was loose. So I pushed it back up and secured it to the brake caliper with a large, long cable tie. I went to the other side of the car and repeated the process. That connection was not loose but I added a cable tie to it anyway. Problem solved.

I already had the cable ties so there was no cost. Imagine what would have happened had I had the car towed to the dealer and had the dealer handle it. It would have been pricey. The car is back to normal. A win in what otherwise was an awful week. Yay!!!
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Nice work! I love it when a potential disaster doesn’t happen due to a cheap fix.
Especially if it’s cable ties, duct tape or epoxy resin 😂
 
SandwichShortOfAPicnic said:
Nice work! I love it when a potential disaster doesn’t happen due to a cheap fix.
Especially if it’s cable ties, duct tape or epoxy resin 😂
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My brother range rang me once to tell me he had broken down at the side of the motorway. The accelerator cable had come out of the back of the pedal and did I think he could glue it back in to place.

My response was that if it was meant to have been glued into the back of the pedal it already would have been!
 
SatNavSaysStraightOn said:
My brother range rang me once to tell me he had broken down at the side of the motorway. The accelerator cable had come out of the back of the pedal and did I think he could glue it back in to place.

My response was that if it was meant to have been glued into the back of the pedal it already would have been!
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At least he's looking for advice from the right person.
 
blades said:
At least he's looking for advice from the right person.
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True.

I do remember one vehicle he proudly showed me that he'd just bought. A very old Volvo. I took one look at it and told him to get rid of it. It was a death trap. Rust everywhere, absolutely everywhere. So he took my advice. Even the battery couldn't be changed or secured... it was actually bought by the original a Top Gear team to show what death traps were on the roads with valid MOT certificates etc. They did point out though that the person they'd purchased it from had been honest and said it was very bad and they'd only just bought and been told by a member of their family to get rid of it... it had been an eBay purchase. Thankfully he's a bit better at choosing vehicles now, but not that much! Lol
 
SatNavSaysStraightOn said:
True.

I do remember one vehicle he proudly showed me that he'd just bought. A very old Volvo. I took one look at it and told him to get rid of it. It was a death trap. Rust everywhere, absolutely everywhere. So he took my advice. Even the battery couldn't be changed or secured... it was actually bought by the original a Top Gear team to show what death traps were on the roads with valid MOT certificates etc. They did point out though that the person they'd purchased it from had been honest and said it was very bad and they'd only just bought and been told by a member of their family to get rid of it... it had been an eBay purchase. Thankfully he's a bit better at choosing vehicles now, but not that much! Lol
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I don't see the British Top Gear show on TV here any longer. It was a great show and still might be in the UK. Very funny. I always viewed Volvos as pretty safe cars but any car can become a rust bucket over time.
 
blades said:
I don't see the British Top Gear show on TV here any longer. It was a great show and still might be in the UK. Very funny. I always viewed Volvos as pretty safe cars but any car can become a rust bucket over time.
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That's a problem related to cars on the coast. They get much more salt spray. Plus in the winter UK roads get gritted which is rock salt (salt and sand mix from the cheshire area where they mine it). It was also a very odd Volvo that had spent most of its life very close to the north sea.

Needless to say, here in Australia is only a problem for most of the population (90% off population live in the coast). Inland cars don't have that issue, and roads don't get gritted when it freezes either. You just have to learn to drive on them.
 
blades said:
I don't see the British Top Gear show on TV here any longer. It was a great show and still might be in the UK. Very funny. I always viewed Volvos as pretty safe cars but any car can become a rust bucket over time.
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Top Gear ran into some big-hulking controversy.
I'm very fuzzy on the specifics but it got nasty, and canceled....

there was a follow on show, but it bombed.
 
CookieMonster said:
Top Gear ran into some big-hulking controversy.
I'm very fuzzy on the specifics but it got nasty, and canceled....

there was a follow on show, but it bombed.
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Sorry to hear it. They weren't shy about panning a car if it suited them. Perhaps that was part of the reason. Too bad. It was an excellent show. We have a U.S. version of it here but it doesn't have the talent of the British show. I've watched it on occasion. I had the British version automatically recorded so I didn't miss an episode.
 
Top Gear had plenty of controversies over the years, if I remember correctly.
 
SatNavSaysStraightOn said:
That's a problem related to cars on the coast. They get much more salt spray. Plus in the winter UK roads get gritted which is rock salt (salt and sand mix from the cheshire area where they mine it). It was also a very odd Volvo that had spent most of its life very close to the north sea.

Needless to say, here in Australia is only a problem for most of the population (90% off population live in the coast). Inland cars don't have that issue, and roads don't get gritted when it freezes either. You just have to learn to drive on them.
Click to expand...
Yes Australia has a lot of desert and desert-like territory. I would imagine the water wells are deep.
 
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