Thursday, March 13, 2008

Automotive Mysteries

My truck is acting strangely and it's taken me months to even figure out a work around to the problem and I don't understand the solution at all.

For months my truck has been sometimes difficult to shift into first when it's sitting still. I tried a whole bevvy of supersticious things like: trying other gears (fine if it would let me), holding the gearshift against the gear (rarely would work, double (and more) clutching, and changing the transmission lubricant.

A couple of days back I by accident found a solution and I really don't get it and need to spend some quality time with my mechanic. The plus side is that it may well be cheaper than a transmission rebuild to fix.

If it won't go in gear, I press on the brake pedal and 9 of 10 times it will then allow me to smoothly shift into first. Say what? How could brakes have anything to do with a transmission? That question will surely be answered by my mechanic, but I just save myself a bunch of money by knowing what fixes it rather than pay them to puzzle it out. It's probably some hydraulic problem and stepping on the brake increases the pressure enough, though I have no problem with the brakes so it's something deeper down.

Odd. I suppose chanting might help.

[followup]

Now stepping on the brake is no longer working. It pretty much has to be in motion. To the shop it goes today.

1 comment:

Elizabeth J. Neal said...
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