Sunday, Debtember 19, 2010
Them ol' Lake Lumina Blues
Last night I said I'd drive to the movies.
Only I didn't end up driving. Jeff did.
And therein lies a tale.
As I was pulling out of the driveway, turning the steering wheel suddenly
felt a lot like pulling on a brick wall. Obviously the power steering was
no longer power steering and there was no way I was driving to the theater
(even if it was about two miles away). I was barely able to shove the
brick wall steering wheel the other way to get the car back up
into the driveway.
Anyway, today being The Game Day™, my friends and I huddled around Lake Lumina, looking into the engine block for reasons why the power steering wasn't.
“That doesn't look good,” said Tom. I looked to where he was pointing.
[Actually, in the graphic above, where it says “flywheel” it should say “pully” as that's what the mechanic called it—Sean]
One of the many flywheels driven by the one large serpentine belt winding its way along the side of the engine had shifted a few inches away from the belt. “No, that doesn't look good,” I said.
I pushed on the flywheel pully, seeing if it would push back into position, but
it wasn't budging, much like the steering wheel wasn't budging. After
looking up the
Blue Book value for my car, the consensus was I might want to
drag Lake Lumina behind the shed (or in this case, it might be eaiser to
drag the shed in front of Lake Lumina), put it out of its misery and start
visiting some automobile dealerships.
Sigh.