golovachfamily.com

I’ve been chastised for not blogging lately - it seems that I’ve fallen into the black hole of Facebook.  It’s a really great place to catch up w/old friends from high school, college and beyond, but it has become quite the time sieve.  I hope to still take the time to write about useless stuff.  If you don’t have a Facebook account, go check it out.

J

A storm rolled through here over the last few days.  The wind and rain are gone, but the storm’s  ocean swell is still making waves for the North Shore.  It’s too choppy for any surfing but offers spectatular views nonetheless.  It’s hard to believe that Shark’s Cove is one of our favorite places to snorkel on the island.  Summertime offers calm, clear waters.  Wintertime…not so much.

J

My wife and I were discussing the other day…of my 4 dedicated readers, 2 of them are named “Don.”  What are the chances of that?  Now, before you say 1 in 2, remember you have to calculate the odds that 4 people are even interested enough to read this drivel.

J

I find that when walking through a parking lot, street, whatever and will be crossing over some type of drainage grate, I will purposely wait until I’m past it before taking the keys out of my pocket for fear of dropping them down there to an irretrievable place.  In fact, if I’ve already reached into my pocket for the keys and then see the grate coming up, I get a death grip on the keys…just in case my hand uncontrollably comes out of my pocket - maybe I won’t lose a grip on the keys and send them spiralling into the abyss.

Yes - pretty weird, but it’s so irrational that it’s perfect BLOG material.

J

No - I’m not talking about a way to avoid paying too much for gas.  For the longest time, I’ve been plagued by the inability to get the nozzle out of the car’s receptacle without dripping gas down the side of the car.  Perhaps you have the same problem.  No matter how long you wait to pull out the nozzle, somehow gas drips off and creates a mess.

Well, I’ve discovered that if you wait until you think all the gas dripped off (just like normal) and then turn the nozzle 90 degrees just before you pull it out, you avoid the drip.  Or, if you get a drip, it’s delayed enough that it doesn’t land on the side of the car.  I’m not sure why it works…it might be the small hole at the bottom edge of some of the nozzles was causing the gas to drip and by turning the nozzle away from the hole, you get drip avoidance.  It might be that enough gas is left pooling at the bottom of the nozzle and the backward motion is enough to cause it to come free - thereby turning it 90 degrees displaces the gas enough that it has not re-pooled in time to cause problems when the nozzle is pulled back.  Who knows - I just know it’s been working for me.  Maybe it will work for you.

 J

We bought a copy of Kung Fu Panda the other day.  I don’t exactly know what it is, but the movie is hilarious.  Here are a few of my favorite quotes:

“Legend tells of a legendary warrior, whose Kung Fu skills were the stuff of legend.”

“He’s too awesome.  And attractive.  How can we repay you?”  “There’s no charge for awesomeness…or attractivenes.”

“Yesterday is history.  Tomorrow is a mystery.  But today, is a gift.  That’s why they call it the present.”

Get your own copy and try it for yourself.

J

I haven’t written anything in a long time.  Kind of funny (ironic, not ha ha) when you look at the last post I put in 2 months ago.  I think of useless topics to BLOG about all the time, but I never seem to make the time to do it…I apologize to the 2 readers who periodically check in w/me.  I think it’s just a phase I’m going through.

 J

I was disappointed to go to all of my usual BLOG reads only to find that nobody has updated their stuff in a while.  You click on your favorite links and think, “I hope they have something new,” only to be disappointed by the same story that’s been stuck on top for a week now. 

I’m not sure if I’m on anyone’s favorites list, but if you happen by anyway, I offer a glimmer of hope to those in search of new material.  It’s not much, but it’s new.

J

After much delay, I finally have all the old BLOG entries up on this “new” site.  Thanks to John for his patience.

Also, there may have been some confusion for a bit as the top BLOG entry said we had moved.  Don’t worry…we’re still here.  I didn’t update the date of that entry when I transferred it over.  So, the computer thought it was current.  All is back to normal.

J

I’ve had a problem with the Jeep for about a year and a half now.  I would venture to guess I’ve had this problem since I bought it 3 years ago…I just didn’t know it.

One day I went to drive it and the battery was dead.  Electrical problems are sometimes hard to figure out.  In a case of a dead battery, it’s usually the battery or the alternator - 50/50 shot, but my first guess was that the battery finally died.  I had owned it for a while and had no idea how old it was when I bought it.  So, I bought a new one.  At first everything seemed good, so I thought I had guessed correctly.

Sure enough, a little while later, I started having the same problem.  Next, I pulled the alternator.  I took it to Checkers to put it on their “machine.”  Of course, it checked out OK.  Although too coincidental, I thought maybe the “new” battery was bad as well.  I took it back to the store.  The recharged it and assured me it was fine. 

Now I’m treading in unfamiliar water.  The battery is “good” and so is the alternator.  I seem to only have the problem after the Jeep “sits” for a few days without being driven - I figure something is just shorting/draining the battery while it sits.  That would make sense because I drove it almost every day when we first bought it.  Also, the battery and the alternator checked good.  I have no idea how to diagnose the problem, so I took it to the same place I got the battery and ask if they can figure it out.  They seem competent and confident, so I left it in their hands.  They call me later in the day and explain that I need a new alternator…this one isn’t putting out enough charge.  I don’t exactly remember all the details, but it seemed fishy.  I do know that it was putting out more than 12 volts.  I asked how much it was supposed to put out.  They said they didn’t know, but it should be more and for only $360, they could help me out.

I summarily said “No thanks” and picked it up.  So, I’ve been living with this problem for a long time now.  I just had to make sure that I drove it like every other day.  If the battery was weak, I could just drive it and the alternator would charge it back up - seemingly confirming my theory that the repair shop was full of cr@p.

Fast forward to about a week ago.  My neighbor across the alley likes to work on cars.  He has a “project” El Camino that he tinkers with.  I asked him if he knew how to diagnose electrical drains.  He said that you just have to hook a multimeter between one of the posts of the battery and its cable.  The current draw (assuming you have a clock or radio with a clock) should be about .02 amps.  If it’s more, you pull fuses until you isolate the circuit.

He helped me with the process.  We hooked up the meter and sure enough, it was drawing .2 amps (enough to drain the battery after a few days).  We pulled fuse after fuse and finally the next to the last one did the trick.  As soon as we pulled it, the current dropped down to .02 amps. 

I don’t have an owner’s manual to see what is on that circuit, but after some searching online, I figured out that the dome lights, panel lights and radio are all on that circuit.  I immediately thought it might be a short on the radio wiring - it’s not the original radio.  After about 30 minutes of panel pulling, I had the radio out.  The radio seemed to have been professionally installed.  All the wiring was well wrapped and bundled.  I pulled the harness out of the radio and we shot the system with the multimeter again.  This time…no short.  I plugged the radio in again and it jumped up to .2 amps.  Something was shorting inside the radio itself. 

I found a ”newer” version of my Pioneer radio for $99.  The good news is that since it’s the same brand and close to the same model, it uses the same wiring harness.  All I had to do was plug the new radio into the harness, put the panels back on and I was done!  I checked the current and it is virtually nil.  I parked the Jeep when I got home from work Thursday afternoon.  As of Sunday afternoon, the battery was holding steady at 12.4 volts.  Case Closed!

Sorry that this is so long, but I thought you should experience at least some level of pain and appreciation for what I’ve had to go through for a long, long time. 

Lessons learned:  

1)  Auto repair shops don’t really care what you say when you take the car in…they’ll still try to bleed you for a couple hundred bucks if you give them the chance.

2)  Electrical problems are a little easier to diagnose now.

3)  I’m not crazy.

4)  Jeep ownership is not easy (this is just one of several problems I’ve fixed).

Thanks for hanging in there!  See you next time.

J