The Beer Garden

As you can probably guess from the quotation marks, that’s meant in the "Chinese curse" sense.

It started out pretty well, actually; we spent a windier-than-predicted, but still nice, morning out at the flying field.  

The bad part started about 1:30, when we came out of a store and saw a puddle of antifreeze under the car, with a steady drip Mr. E said looked like the water pump.  We got home, he checked it out, and that was indeed the problem, so he called around and found one in stock — in Harrington, for a wonder, since we usually have to go over to Milford.

Back to Harrington, with a stop at an ATM to pick up some cash (I was informed that car parts places do not take checks).  When I got out to use the machine, I could hear water running, and see a puddle growing.  I told Mr. E, and we pulled away from the machine enough that he could open the hood and look.  Added about a gallon of water.  To NAPA, get water pump, open hood to let cool, add another gallon and part of a third.  This left us with about 2/3 of the last gallon we’d brought along.

I see I didn’t give any distances.  We live about 6 miles from the center of Harrington, so it’d gotten much worse in roughly 12 miles of driving, without even having to stop for the road resurfacing being done on the main road. 

Mr. E turned down my offer to find a faucet and refill our containers, and decided to take the "back way" home rather than risk getting stopped by the road work — longer, but we’d be able to keep moving rather than having to idle or shut down and heat-soak an already-hot engine.

I don’t know about him, but I found it a very nerve-wracking drive — as far as we got.  I’d guess we were about 2/3 of the way home, smelling antifreeze and hot metal (open windows and a/c shut down to keep from adding heat), when the overheat light came on.  He instantly shut down the engine, and we coasted till we got to the entrance to a couple of chicken houses and could pull off safely.  

Hood up, flashers on, and I was about ready to start hiking back to a house we’d recently passed to see if I could bum some water.  Before I could, a lady in an SUV asked if we needed help, and when we said we needed water for the car, took the empty jugs to her house, filled them, and brought them back.  In the meantime, Mr. E had removed the reservoir bottle and dumped the hot water from it into the radiator — probably a gallon, and safe to do because the water was hot. Two or three other people had also asked if we needed help.

He very gradually added the cold water the lady had brought — I’d guess 2 gallons over a 20-30 minute period, to avoid damaging the engine — while still more people offered help.  I know for sure that we had far more offers of help stuck on that back road than we have ever had in more "civilized" areas!

Anyway, with the cooling off time and the added water, we made it to the house, and the car is now in the shed, cooling off so he can replace the water pump tomorrow morning.  

Note for any of you who aren’t mechanics: never, never ever add a lot of cold water quickly to a hot engine, unless you want to replace it very soon.  It can crack the block, or do other nasties.  If you must, do it very gradually, in small amounts, and giving your added water time to heat up to engine temp before adding any more. 

Since nobody else seems to be around the Garden, I think I shall have a couple of beers here at home, then think about some supper.