Rev. Erudite Redneck, B.S., B.S., M.A., M.Div.

Totally empathizing w/ you on the truck problems. Just got mine back from the shop... diagnosed with (best case scenario) blown head gasket and bad ball joints. After 11 years and 200,000 miles (they just don't make them like they used to, eh?) the repairs would cost more than the Blue Book value.

Glad I was on the phone when they told me that.
*sniff* b b b b b b but ... I wuv my truck! *blubber*

I'm just going to drive it until it explodes.
 

Um, just how much for the head gasket work?? I'm sitting down.
 

I didn't ask them to break it down...but the head gastket & balls joints combined (along with trying to figure out a short in the right turn signal) was $2500.

Now that's a Ford shop. I assume a private mechanic would be much lower, but for me, even if it were half, it would still be more than my truck is worth.

But it could be a cracked cylinder, which would be even more money, obviously. Basically when they use air to pressurize one of the cylinders, they get bubbles in the radiator.

I know nothing about cars, BTW. That's what Dads are for. :)
 

um...woops.

Ball joints. Not "balls joints."

Heh. I'm 12 years old, and that makes me giggle.
 

Ugh. I think I'm prepared to go $1,000.
 

LOLOL. Maybe you mean the plural of ball joint.

Balls joint.

:-) LOL that's even gigglier!
 

Like attorneys general?

Not nearly as funny.

"balls joint"

Too ... Many ... Jokes.
 

$1000 isn't horrible, but it's more than a '97 F150 with 205,000 miles is worth.
 

What does your book say?
 

Hi ER,

Good luck on the job hunting...

I had my annual pay review on Friday, and they more or less gave me a pay-cut. Not good, but I cannot complain right? (No, but I can look for another job in office time)

Lee
 

The book leads me to believe it's a head gasket, or a warped or busted cylinder head. But not a thrown rod, since the engine didn't quit. I haven't check to see if there is water in the oil, but there definitately was majorly excessive water in the exhaust.
 

Two words: Jiffy. Lube.
-Steve
 

Well, I can't figure out anything that they might have done, or not done, to cause this exact problem. ... It was missing before I went there. Nothing they did could have directly caused the fourth cylinder to quit firing. And I found out the radiator was leaking when I went for a flush-and-fill and they told me it was leaking and showed me the crack.

I've looked for a cause and can't find one at Jiffy Lube.
 

ER-

thanks for the blog plug. As far as the truck goes, I'd recommend getting the exhaust system checked as well. All that water won't do it a lot of good.
 

I've got a shade tree mechanic who might drop in a rebuilt engine for around $2500 to $3000. Want his name?
 

E-mail it to me. ... That beats the $4,000 to $5,000 a dealer just quoted me.

I've got a shop acropss town t6hat my neighbor, who I trust, recommended. But I might need yer guy's name.
 

Get up off those knees!
Say, your young, relitively speaking, how about a Harley?
Maybe for Boulder it shoulld be a BMW Bike. Three wheeler maybe. Or maybe that new Segway like self balancing Motor Unicycle that's in the new Polpular Science. Think about sitting down on top a tire and just whizzing a round the place.
Talk about the fun of tooling along through the mountains of Colorado on something like that.

As for work?
Why?

Unemployment is almost $600 a month in Oklahoma, I'll bet it is more in Colorado and will probably be extended to 9 months during this election year. Scrap metal is selling at an all time high. The manager of a local spiffey restraunt I know, is making $3,000 a month spending 3 hours a day tooling around town picking up metal out of peoples big junk trash that is set out every Wednesday somewhere all over town.
That's Cash ER,

Hell you could work the tourist stuff in the mountains in Summer and short order cook somewhere in Winter, or bartender all year long, all the while writting all your stuff, going to school, prospecting for gold once a week, and ripping around the mountains on your Harley.

What the Hell are you waiting for?
 

Say when you finally blow that F-150. Limp it down to NW 10th and Villa and sell it for scrap. Seriously, they'll pay a whole lot more than a car dealer.
 

What I'm waiting for is to want to fricking go bad enough to go.

What part of bills is hard to understand? What part of being tangled up in two damned mortgages is hard to understand? What part of I have a damn good gig here where I am, and in light of the ongoing firestorm in the mass media, to quit this job without another one in hand is to END MY GD CAREER is hard to understand. Pardon my French.

If this is God's way of getting me to Iliff, or to grad school, fine. But I AM kicking and screaming all the way.

And now I'm going to go test-drive a Jeep, and maybe a Toyota pickup.
 

A. Toyota. Pickup?!?

I think I just puked a little in my mouth. Is nothing sacred?!

Anyway, after much thinking, I've decided simply to drive my truck until it explodes. I'm unable to find a used care for less than about ~$15K around here and that's just not going to work. (Anything less expensive than that already has 150,000 miles, which in my mind goes beyond "used" all the way to "trollop".)

So, I threw some Leak Stop in the radiator and that seems to have fixed the engine problem/head gasket/whatever problem for now, for a mere $12. It doesn't fix the ball joint problem, but I figure I'll have at least 1000 to 2000 feet of teeth-rattling shaking to warn me before those are about to go. Should be plenty of time to pull off the highway.
 

Ball joints = baling wire for a fix.