I woke up much too early the next day. I had done a few 12-hour drives out to my Sister’s house out in Delaware last year. I had even made the trip to Boston once before when I was looking at undergraduate schools. So, a 14-hour drive to Boston didn’t sound too bad.
For its part the Saturn SW2 drove fine this day. We did have a few other traveling problems. First the border agents single us out when we cross the Canadian border. I had neglected to scrounge up my daughters’ birth certificates before we left Grand Rapids. They make some pretence of searching our car, but, evidently, decide that we actually look like a family. They do ask the girls if we are their parents. Luckily, they don’t want to disown us. Back in the car we discover that we have both of their medical cards with us, which we do use to expedite our entrance back into the USA.
Of course the big problem with long road trips with newborns is stopping for feedings. We make a long stop at Niagara Falls to do some sightseeing. Unfortunately, when we leave the falls I follow the local road signs to get back to the Queen Elizabeth Way (QEW). We end up driving quite a while out of our way on local roads and missing our exit, so the sun is setting behind us as we enter New York State. Around 2 in the morning we cross into Massachusetts, but I decide to keep driving. We finally make it to the hotel around 4:30 A.M.
Though I am a little groggy, the business meeting that day goes fine. And we sleep well the next night. The next day we had planned on walking around Boston’s historic sites on the Freedom Trail. After driving around Boston for a couple hours looking for an exit to Old Ironsides we manage to find it and get to go on it. However, it begins to rain we are walking towards Bunker Hill. So we decide to just leave Boston early and head down I-95 towards Delaware.
Probably choosing this single highway route wasn’t the fastest way to get from Boston to Wilmington on a Friday afternoon, but we do get to experience a little bit of New York City traffic and smell in the Bronx before heading across New Jersey in the dark. We even get a glimpse of the Empire State Building lit up as we pass Manhattan.
We spend a nice day in Delaware with my sister before driving back to Michigan. I like to avoid the Pennsylvania Turnpike and instead take US-322 up out of Harrisburg to I-80. This is a nice scenic route, though this time we don’t cut over to I-80 at State College but instead stay on US-322 directly through several small of towns.
My wife Christina had been driving for a while and so we switch at a gas stop after when get on I-80. Merging back into the Interstate traffic I keep the car in 4th gear a little bit longer than normal. Oh, well, a little bit of time at 4,000 rpm is nothing to worry about. Pop. Slap. All the warning lights go on. Great, I pull over on the shoulder and pop the hood to find a split serpentine belt and some puddles of coolant.
The belt itself looks like a picture of all the things they show in the manuals about when you should replace your belt. It is severely dry and cracked. It is a wonder that it had been working fine until then.
Luckily for us there were some nice people who live right next to the highway. The man gives me a ride back to the previous exit where there is a fleet garage that happens to be open on Sunday. Of course they don’t carry car belts, but they know about an Advance Auto Parts in the next town 20 miles down I-80 in the other direction. They even call them up and verify that they have the belt in stock.
So, things are looking up when I get back to the car with a new belt and some borrowed wrenches. I find a State Tropper checking out the car. He runs my license and seems satisfied with my ability to get the car repaired and back on the road. Installing the belt is a little annoying, but I get it on, and hop in the car to start it. It starts but immediately begins smoking. Evidently the belt is just a symptom of a bigger problem. I fear a bad water pump—probably from too much reading about 4 cylinder Porsches.
I decide that this is not something I should try to repair alongside the road. In fact, I am ready for someone else to do it for me. The nice man who had been helping us offers to call a friend in the towing business. An hour and $90 later my car is sitting in front of the Midas shop just behind the Advance Auto Parts we had picked up the belt at.
The Midas shop is definitely closed. My family is 20 miles away back at the person’s house. Okay, I can fix this thing. I open the engine bay and quickly look at the nice belt diagram Saturn printed there. The pulley that is stuck is not the water pump; it is just an idler. Okay, into the store for a new idler pulley and some wrenches.
I get the bolt off the idler pulley, but the pulley itself won’t budge. I get some penetrating oil from the store. I get it to rotate, but it still won’t come loose. Fine, I put the belt back on and start the engine. Besides the familiar grinding noise it runs fine.
Here I am. The car is working. I am twenty miles away from my family and I can’t put a new pulley on, through I have it and all the tools I need to install it. So, I get in the car and head back down I-80 keeping the engine as slow as possible while driving at 45 mph. After about 6 miles I hear a clunk and pull to the shoulder. Well, the pulley had loosened itself, and luckily it had just wedged between the motor and the top motor mount and hadn’t damaged anything besides itself in the process.
The new idler pulley slips on just fine, but there is basically no clearance between the pulley and the motor mount bracket on the subframe. Semi-tractors are rushing past rocking the car. The sun is setting, and my hand is shaking trying to get the pulley bolt between the pulley and the frame. I give up. It isn’t going to happen here.
Even sans bolt the car runs fine. Luckily, there is one of those Authorized Vehicles Only turnarounds. So I take it and head back towards the parts store. I get off at an exit between and inspect the pulley, which seems to be staying put just fine without the bolt. I make it back to the Advance Auto Parts parking lot and try to park in the spot best lit by the light poles.
First I ask the nice part store employees if I can use their restroom to wash up and then for a bucket of cold water to cool the engine. After several more minutes and purchasing some extra tools, I finally discover the trick to the pulley nut. I go inside the store and ask for a piece of tape. I tape the bolt inside the pulley and then wiggle both into position. A few turns starts the bolt and I am able to peel off the tape and then begin tightening the bolt down.
At this time one of the Advance Autoparts employees comes out of the store to tell me that my wife has called. I go in and tell her that I am almost done fixing the car, and I had left the car seats up on the hill above the expressway. She said the family they were staying with could bring them in an hour or so. We had thought about staying at a hotel for a night, but by the time we are all back in the car, we just want to get home, but we do end up stopping latter that night at a cheaper hotel further down I-80 towards Ohio.
After all this I am more ready to get a cell phone and roadside assistance policy, but I still haven’t purchased either. There is something uniquely humbling about relying on the hospitality of others and getting my own hands scarred and dirty. I am not planning on testing God’s providence, however, so I will check the belt and pulleys on the SC2 before going up to Oscoda this weekend.