What's the Fuss All About?

 

How many of you remember HAL?  The computer that decided that Dave was a bit of a threat to his mission.  Indeed, HAL had no compunction about killing his "crewmates" when he saw it necessary.  And, now, I drive one of HAL's grandchildren.

This is a picture of one of my car's cousins eating.  Note, if you would, where its mouth is and understand that it eats energy (as do all of us, of course), but its energy comes in the form of electric current.  So, we have the main player in the drama set before you.

On Thursday late morning in the Pacific Time Zone in America, each week I write my blog for the week.  This week, the topic was suggested by Maria.  But, before I began writing it this week, we needed to get the ash from all the fires off of our cars before it ate away the paint.   Below is a picture of that ash gathered on our trash can (normally solid brown) so you can see how insidious it is.  It clings like glue and then begins acid corrosion of vulnerable surfaces like a car finish, so, it behooves you to get it off pretty quickly.

So, we began scrubbing, quite an arduous task with this ash, let me tell you.  Then, Carol used the hose to wash away the suds and ash slurry.  Unfortunately, as you will see, the pressure was a bit high and it was used a bit too close to the charging port.  Where electricity goes in.  Blew past the seals.  Guess where this is heading and begin humming Daisy if you know the reference.

After the cars were cleaned, we got notice that a grocery order, which would be delivered to our car in the parking lot, was ready.  Our habit is to use my car for this task, so I hopped in ... and the fuss began!

First, diagnostics started popping up on the dash viewport that shows speed and auto status.  The power steering module needed servicing.  I thought restarting might give it a better chance, so I restarted (which is really rebooting, since it is a computer with a car chassis wrapped around it).  This time, other modules like the Positrac braking needed servicing.  Then the charging port showed problems, then the radio went out, and then it started rebooting itself, trying to initialize everything.  I now suspected we had shorted HAL Jr. out!

I tried to shut it off and to my horror found it no longer would respond to anything and just kept recycling.  I could still put it in neutral, which I knew would be necessary for towing to the dealer and the doors could still be locked, so I left it to call AAA, the American Automobile Association, to tow it the 13 miles to the dealer.  I informed them that it could indeed be put in neutral.

In the 15 minutes it took them to arrive, the car had totally drained its battery - it has a regular, albeit expensive, 12-volt battery to start it, etc., like another car, a battery totally separate from the main power system.  I have a key that can allow me to manually open the door, which was now necessary, and we found that with the power drained, it could no longer be put in neutral.  This necessitated jumping the 12-volt battery and, low and behold, the car could now be started and the viewport I mentioned showed no diagnostic problems.  The only issue was that the console showed nothing and the radio would not go on.  So, onto the road and off to the dealer I went.

Long story short, they discovered that the 12-volt battery was fried as was the radio and the console.  They are on order and will arrive mid-week.  At that point, as they replace parts, they will know if anything else has been damaged and we definitely hope not.  It is already a $1700 hit!

So ... that's what all the fuss is about.  Among other things.  Locally.  Only looking locally ...

Please check out my other blog mates' takes on the same topic brought to us by Maria at their blogs: 

Maria

Padmum
Raju
Ramana
Sanjana
Shackman

Srinivas