Back from the Shop

After running another large charge through the ol’ credit card, I got the car back on Monday.

As I suspected, the alternator needed to be replaced, but the surprise issue was that the noise I was hearing was from the supercharger pulley and not the alternator itself.

While they had the car I also had them look at the air conditioning, which wasn’t blowing very cold. Turns out that it only held 0.56 pounds of refrigerant versus the recommended 2+ pounds. There is obviously a slow leak somewhere so they injected some dye as well so we’ll have to wait and see if that shows where it is located.

They also replaced the window regulator for the driver’s side quarter pane window, which wasn’t going up or down completely.

And finally, the dash was telling me it was time for a Service A. These service warnings come up based on mileage or time, as I most certainly hadn’t driven the car very much since the last service, but since I’m getting ready for winter I went ahead and had them do the service.

Most of the expense ($2300) was for the alternator, followed by the window regulator ($1700) and the pulley ($600).

I also needed to get the car inspected. Due to the condition of the supercharger pulley, the car should not be driven until that was fixed, and of course that was the part that showed up last. In North Carolina you have to pay your vehicle property tax when you do your yearly license plate registration, but before you can do that it has to pass a safety inspection.

We missed the cut off by two days, so it was an additional $15 to Caesar.

The car did drive well all the way home and I also took it out the next day.

Of course this car will never be gremlin-free, and now when I start the car I can feel the lumber support in the driver’s seat inflate and deflate. It only does it once, and the “massage” button isn’t pressed, so I’m not going to worry about it.

Also, for the first time in awhile my Distronic kicked out.

This happens on occasion about 15 minutes into a drive. If I stop and restart the car it works again for the rest of the trip.

But at least I should be able to enjoy the car during this nice fall weather. Here’s hoping nothing else goes wrong for awhile.