|
So last night while I was at work I got a pretty frantic phone call. The 245T died going down I-95 in evening rush-hour traffic.
I was at work for another 2 hours, and the car was half an hour away minimum, on the side of a really busy highway. Triple-A call and it's on its way back home. My wife had a seat in the passenger front seat while waiting- and the cop who arrived almost simultaneously with the wrecker had her immediately get into the cab of the truck for safety. There have been a number of people hit and killed on the sides of I-95 in the last few years around here.
So when I get home, car is here and won't run. I check the battery connections, and voltage- it's 12.4 V, so not likely that it's a dead alternator or battery.
Turns over, won't start. Absolutely no dashboard lights working. Check main junction connection behind battery, everything clean and secure. Fuel pumps aren't running as they normally do. Check fuses. None blown. A couple have a little white corrosion on the ends. Nothing big but worth looking at. And of course something well documented as a problem in 240s here.
Fiddled with fuses, turned the key, and the thing is alive again. Ran like nothing ever happened. Ran fine the rest of the night.
She leaves in the morning, gets to the end of the road, and dead. NO warning, just stopped. I get the phone call, I never have decent cars, I want a reliable car, I hate this old car. (Never tell a Volvo you hate it, they do care.) Ok, well, we get calmed down and go over all the fuse checkouts again. Rotating all the fuses gets the car running again immediately.
With a bit more instruction, I get my wife to go through a complete check of fuses, and with the key on, to note which one makes the lights go out. Turns out it's #13. The fuse crumbles in her hand. New fuses, and clean terminals, and no further evidence of the problems.
I think the weirdest part of it is that we drove the car for a couple of months before the problem surfaced. Could be this old fuse was cracking and failiing for years. I'm sure it won't be the only interesting moment of ownership of this car. With a crappy wiring harness and a 20+ year old turbo, it's going to need things in the future. But once sorted out, it'll be a great car for a long time to come.
I do like the fact that the car is simple enough for me to give my wife instructions on how to fix it, over the phone without seeing the problem. It's too bad I couldn't help more when it was on the side of the highway, but that's not the place for diagnostic work.
I also love the fact that my wife is the kind of woman who's not intimidated by technical work, even odd electrical things like this. She's a good listener and not scared to work on almost anything, or to get dirty. One of these days I oughta buy her a better car....
--
Rob Bareiss, New London CT ::: '87 244DL/M47- 230K, 88 744GLE- 220K, 82 245T-181K Also responsible for the care and feeding of: 88 745GLE, 231K, 87 244DL, 239K, 94 855GLT 189K
|
