A quick update for those readers who might not have seen my intermittent car updates on my Twitter or Facebook pages.
My car is once again broken.
On Thursday evening, the car failed to start. Similar to the drama back in March, when I turned the key in the ignition, I got no response other than a single faint “click” from inside the engine block. No starter revving, nothing.
On Friday morning, I had the car towed to my usual repair shop. They reported the starter was “locked up” and I had basically received a poorly-made part when I replaced the starter back in March. I took the starter to AutoZone to exchange it under warranty, and AutoZone attempted to give me the run-around rather than exchange it. Since the starter tested as working well in the test environment, the employee had a hard time believing my claims of an “intermittent problem.” We both noticed that one of the posts on the starter was completely stripped halfway down, which would cause the starter to malfunction whenever the connection wasn’t solid.
Having retrieved a replacement starter, I took it back to the repair shop where they installed it for a very reasonable price.
The car started and ran fine for a few trips that afternoon, but was broken down again by Friday evening.
Beth and I had stopped by the Home Depot to buy a saw on the way to meet some friends at a coffee shop and when we came out, saw in hand, the car failed to start. Again.
Thanks to helpful friends, we got to the coffee shop (and later dinner) and returned to Beth’s house where her car is completely intact.
Beth drove me back to my car today and we tried – unsuccessfully – to start it again. The current plan is to give it another try tomorrow and attempt to get the car to the shop for when they open on Monday. Failing that, I’ll probably have to get another tow on Monday morning.
I’m thinking it may be a fault in the ignition system, rather than the starter, but I can’t be sure.
It all boils down to the fact that the car is more than ten years old and I need to start shopping for a new car a little sooner than I thought I would.