#2620: Hubby's Fuelishness

0:00This message comes from Intuit TurboTax. With TurboTax expert full service, match with a dedicated expert who will do your taxes for you from start to finish getting you every dollar you deserve. It's that easy. Visit TurboTax.com to match with an expert today. Hello and welcome to Carr Talk from National Public Radio with us clicking clack the Tapper Brothers and we're broadcasting this week from the new products division here at Carr Talk Plaza. And once again, someone has beaten us to a million dollar idea. I mean, what didn't we think of this first? We get in the mail, a little spray bottle. It says reduce road rage on the bottle and all kinds of printed propaganda along with it.

1:01I'll redo the propaganda. Go ahead. Reduce road rage and all natural herbal vitamin spray that is safe and effective. This special formula promotes calmness to reduce stress without losing alertness, which helps reduce road rage. So when you have that feeling that you got to kill somebody, you popped a little top off of this thing and you spray one spray in your mouth. That was reading the thing. It has some interesting ingredients. It has Saint John's warts of a chloroform. It has Siberian Husky or Siberian Jinseng. It has a Rocky Bell Boa and Essence of Dingleberry. It has all the important ingredients. And it's great stuff and I'm going to keep this handy. So if Tommy starts renting during the show, I'll be able to give him a shot. Actually, I was working on a similar product. You were.

2:01Well, yes. How does it work? Not similar, really, quite different. Well, it's a fire I'm involved in. Close. It's a spray. But you spray it in the face of the guy. It is the same effect. You immediately feel better. The trouble with this stuff is that the person who's responsible for the road rage is the person who has to take it. He's the one who's going nuts. And this requires that you recognize that you are a raging type. And they don't. I mean, they don't know what they need is something like the automatic dope slap. No, I mean, how do you know? For example, do you think you're the road rage type? No, I'm not. Well, there you go. Here's the sign. Now, this stuff is made by a company called Creative Health and Spirit Products. Guess where they are. Got to be in Southern California. And guess exactly where? I'll see you on the go boulevard. No, Manhattan Beach. Yeah. Well, yeah. That's a good place for them.

3:01That's. I've been to Manhattan Beach. Yes. They're all there. The anyway, you still live in Manhattan Beach. I'll go talk to them. If you want to talk to us about your car or road rage or anything else, the number to call is 1-888 car talk that's 888-227-8255. If you want to talk to Avogadro, his number is 1.022 times 10 to the 23rd. Hello. You're on car talk. Hi. My name is Carrie. Hi, Carrie. Hey, don't tell us how to smell it. Just tell us where you're from. Okay. I'm from Columbus, Ohio. K-E-R-R-Y. Close. I. K-E-R-R-Y. Oh, you moved from California. You weren't born in Columbus, Ohio with a name like K-E-R-R-R-I. You're right. I was born in Kansas City, Missouri. That doesn't work either. Anyway, what's up, Carrie? Well, I have a 97 Subaru Impreza Outback Sport. My brakes are making sort of a grinding noise. It sounds like metal to metal grinding.

4:02When I first apply the brakes, even on a small incline. Like. Yeah, I mean, it really, it sounds like metal to metal. Like I need my brake pads to change. But you don't. You've had them checked and they've assured you that they're okay. Exactly. They told me there was dust in there and that I was, you know, just being nutty. And that there was no problem at all. And so, you know, I didn't believe them. I thought they were nutty. And so I went ahead and had the brake pads replaced and had them changed to semi-metal. To semi-metallic rather than metallic. So these pads that you put on were not from Subaru? Right. All right. And so you thought that because you were reducing the metal content of the brakes, that you would replace them on metal sound would go away. So it should be about half, right? Yeah. Because they're like semi-metallic. Is it? Makes sense to me. Yeah, is it about half? Yeah, it's about half. No, actually, it didn't change at all. It didn't change at all. No. Well, first of all, I wouldn't worry about it because you know that there's nothing wrong with the brake pads. Well, obviously, there was nothing wrong with the ones you took out. Right.

5:02And you can choose to try to live with the noise. Well, if that's true, we can go back a few steps. The guys at the shop thought she was crazy. She thought they were crazy. So we've just assured her that it was her that it was crazy. Well, I was trying to break it to a gentleman. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So just wanted to make the point clear. Well, you're not crazy. I mean, you're hearing the noise. But I think you were crazy to have changed the brake pads. For no reason. For no reason. And the truth is that some cars just do this. And you can, there are certain chemicals that you can actually immerse the pads in that can cut down this noise. But it's only temporary. And we have some cars where we've never been able to get rid of it. And it's especially bad if the car sits for a day or two. Right. Well, you know, it seems to happen more often when I first pull the car out of the garage. And what's really peculiar, I think, is that I have a friend who has a 99 of the exact same car. And her brakes make the exact same noise. Well, there you go. Yeah. Well, I just initially thought, you know, that one day I was going to be headed down a hill and go corigning into someone's front door.

6:03No, that's not going to happen. Okay. Well, the brakes will work perfectly fine. Okay. And there's nothing to do. And so if you can live with the noise. Even if the pads were worn out, the brakes would still work perfectly fine for a while. They work great. Metal on metal is great. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It beats the foot out the door. It does beat the foot out the door. So don't worry about that. You're not going to go corigning into someone's front living room. And I would recommend that when you get in the car and the morning, the first thing you do to start in the engine is that you turn the radio on. Turn it up really loud. Turn it up really loud. For that first few minutes. Listen to this stuff, my son listens to you. Nuclear explosions could be going on around your car. You wouldn't hear them. Okay. Well, that's a good advice. Thank you very much. See you, Kerry. Don't worry. Everything's fine. Be happy. I will. I will. Bye-bye. Thank you. I'm David Thierry. I'm from Palatine, Virginia. Hi, David. Palatine? Palatine, as in chief Palatine. Yeah. Yeah. VA. Got it. Virginia, what's up, David? Well, I got an 87 Dodge van, unfortunately.

7:06And as I drive it, I go through an area of swamp gas that happens inside the car. through an area of swamp gas that happens inside the car. Software stench, really bad smell. Well, if you go to Taco Bell every day, that's what'll happen. Yeah, it's not the food, luckily I need it home. In my humble opinion, of course. But what kind of, is this a full size van, like a Ram van? One ton Dodge Van 360 motor. So it's a B350 or something like that, right? Yeah, I think so. 350 model. Yeah. Okay. And one guy told me it was the air pump because the bearings in the air pump are bad and it's making a pretty bad sound there that it could be the air pump. So I get about 15 miles into the drive and I reach for a respirator, which I use in my work. And I put that on in order to get where I'm going. It's that bad. And it takes 15 miles before it happens though.

8:08Yeah, it's about 14 or 15 miles in it. I don't know whether it's something to do with the temperature at that point, all of a sudden it's not accepting the exhaust. And how long does it last? Oh, once it kicks in, you're done. Have you tried changing brands of gasoline? Tried that. Has anyone tried anything else like replacing parts like the catalytic converter? Many people have told me it wouldn't run as good as it runs if the catalytic converter was bad. That's not true. That's not true. Another, I went to a Dodge dealership and he said, well, I got to put it on the computer because it might be O2 sensors and it might be some sort of throttle thing that has to do with the choke. Well, it could be a lot of things. I mean, it could be a bad O2 sensor. It could be a bad coolant temp sensor. For example, it's changing the mixture and not accounting for the fact that the engine's warmed up. So it's putting in too much fuel. Well, it's burning very black on the exhaust. That was my next question. Do you have black exhaust?

9:09Yeah, and it says yes. Oh, really? What happens when they put it on the emission tester? Does it pass? Well, he says that it's getting too much gas, but... Here's what can happen. If in fact the carburetor is flooding out and there is therefore... Pouring in way too much gas. Too much gas. What that does is it cools down the combustion mixture. Okay. When the spark plugs explode the gasoline, it doesn't reach the optimum temperature. When that exhaust stream reaches the catalytic converter, it cools it off. And in doing so, it renders the catalytic converter unable to absorb the sulfur that is a byproduct of combustion. Yes, the... And then it's... And then what it's doing is it's allowing oxygen that's present in that mixture to combine with that sulfur and make sulfur dioxide gas, which is what you smell. So there may be nothing wrong with the converter. It's merely malfunctioning because it's running too cool. It's overloaded. And it's overloaded with gas, but it's being cooled down by the very rich mixture.

10:10And what you need to do is correct that first. So rebuilding the carburetor might be... I've checked and for $50 you can get a kit to rebuild the carburetor. Yeah, while you can try rebuilding it, it may work. Okay. It's 50 bucks worth versus 500 bucks. Yeah, yeah. That's what I'm saying. It's the word miracle on the rebuild kit. Ha ha ha ha. I mean, it might work, but it might not. Yeah, I mean, the pieces that you need might not be in the rebuild kit. You won't have the, in fact, you won't have the advantage of testing the thing before you put it back on. Whereas when they rebuild the carburetor, they can actually... You might still have to wear the respirator to drive it. You might. But they have a machine they put the carburetor on and they flow tested, the good rebuilders. And they see if, in fact, it's putting out the right fuel air mixture. And if it isn't, they reject it and they go ahead and either discard it or rebuild it again. So if it's not the carburetor, then it could be catalytic. It could be, it could be cataclysmic. Yeah. And, I mean, oh, by this point,

11:11you may have ruined the catalytic converter and you may need both of them. Because of being so thick plugged up or something. Right. Great. Yeah. Ha ha ha ha. Well, they're only about a grand. Well, then that's 550 plus a grand. We're doing good. Yeah, I know what. And then price of gas makes it easy too. But solve the rich running problem and don't assume that it is the carburetor even necessarily. And it could be something like a thermostat that's stuck in the open position. So make sure you have somebody who really is going to check from square one. OK. All right. All right. Well, thanks, guys. See you, David. Good luck, David. Good luck. See you later. Bye. Bye, bye. We'll be right back with the answer to the puzzler right after these messages. This message comes from eBay. The cars found in eBay often come with a story we're sharing, like a 1973 Dodge charger tucked away in an Arizona barn for more than 40 years, just 55,000 miles on it, still in great running order with a rare sunroof.

12:12A car hidden for decades can be delivered through eBay's secure purchase with paperwork handled. There are thousands of cars like this in eBay from unique finds to everyday drivers, eBay. Things, people, love. This message comes from Rinse, who knows that mastering the perfect house party table spread takes time. But so does laundry. So Rinse takes your laundry and hand delivers it to your door, expertly cleaned. And you can take the time once spent sorting and waiting, folding, and queuing to finally pursue your real passion, rolling delicate roses of Capacola alongside meandering ribbons of Amon Serrano, transforming a humble plank of weathered barnwood into a show-stopping charcuterie spread. Rinse, it's time to be great. This message comes from Intuit TurboTax. With TurboTax expert full service, match with a dedicated expert who will do your taxes for you from start to finish getting you every dollar you deserve. It's that easy. Visit TurboTax.com to match with an expert today.

13:16This message comes from designer shoe warehouse. You know that feeling when you find shoes you love at a great price and want to tell everyone about it? Find something to brag about at designer shoe warehouse, like the latest styles from brand you love, the trends, everyone's obsessing over, and shoes that make you feel like you. Head to a DSW store or dsw.com today for shoes that get you at prices that get your budget. DSW, let us surprise you. Hi, we're back. You listening to Car Talk with us, clicking, clack the tap with brothers, and we're here to talk about cars, car repair, and the answer to last week's puzzler. You already remember, I can't remember it. I could barely remember it myself, but it was good. Picture this, it's 1936. You're in your second year of high school. Europe is on the brink of yet another war. Second senior year in high school. In a secret location in Germany, German offices are gathered around the table with the designers and builders of its new personnel carrier.

14:17They're going over every little detail and leaving no stone unturned. They want everything to be flawless. One of the offices stands up and says, I have a question about the fan belt, about the longevity of the fan belt. You with me? They spoke English there? Oh yeah. Just like in old movies. I'm reading the subtitles. Just like in old movies, often in London. How come they all spoke English? Well, it's so close to German after all. Yeah, you just add an issue to the end of everything. Anyway, this fan belt looks just like the belt around your waist. It's a flat piece of rubber and it's designed to run around the fan and the generator. So he asks, how long do you expect the belt to last? The engineer says 30 to 40,000 kilometers. The officer says, not good enough. He said how many miles is that? The Colonel says, That's why I never made any money in script writing. Yeah. The Colonel says, not good enough. We need it to last at least 60k. The engineer says, not a problem.

15:20It's just a question of taking off the belt and flipping it over, right, turning it inside out. The officer says, that's unacceptable. Our soldiers will be engaged in battle. We can't ask them to change fan belts in the middle of the battlefield. Well, it's a good point. That's right. I mean, come on. You can't tell the guys to stop shooting your fan belt's gotta be replaced. Exactly, hold your fire. So the engine is huddled together and they come up with a clever design change. And I think I mentioned they do not change the material of the belt in any way, yet they satisfy the new longevity requirement quite easily. What did they do? And what they did was they manufactured the belt with a twisted it. Imagine if you took your own belt and joined the two ends together. So you'd have an inside of the belt and an outside. But imagine before joining them, if you gave one end a twist, it made it into what's called a mobius strip. Of course. Now it's gonna go on both sides all the time.

16:20Exactly. And in essence, you've doubled the length of the belt. Oh, you allowed it to run on the inside and the outside at the start. Do you know about this? Yes. They do. We don't have any mobius strip fan belts on American. Well, it's a little non-fact that the fan belt lobby is very strong in this country. They don't want them to last twice as long. Of course not. Not to we who replace belts. Yes. Anyway, who's our winner, Tommy? Boy, are you gonna be surprised? The winner is Liz Walsh from Lexington, Massachusetts. Get out. Is it one of the chances of that? Wow. And for having her correct answer, select it at random from all the right answers. Liz is gonna get a gift certificate and she can blow 25 bucks at Kotalk Shameless Commerce Division on our website. And with 25 bucks, she can get about one and two thirds Kotalk CDs. Not bad. Not bad. That's what all you can stand.

17:20Actually, if they leave out the middle two thirds there, you can play most of it. Don't worry, Liz. It'll be good. Anyway, we will have a new quasi-automotive puzzler coming up in the third half of today's show. Yes. So stay tuned for that. In the meantime, you can call us and ask questions about your car or anything else you would like. The number is 1-888-Car Talk. It's 888-227-8255, a lawyer on car talk. Hey, this is Whitney calling from Holderness New Hampshire. Holderness? Yeah, Whitney. Holderness. Holderness. It's right. Next to Holderness. It's right across the river from Plymouth, New Hampshire. Ah, that. That's good. That's where the Pilgrims landed, right? Right. Plymouth Rock. Plymouth Rock. The home of Plymouth State College, actually. I knew that. Yeah. Okay. Just give us a rough idea. How far north? It takes about an hour and a half to get to Boston on 93. Oh. Oh, it's close. Yeah, it's not bad at all.

18:21Yeah. It's unfortunate. We've never heard of it. Really? Yeah. Well, we're only kidding. We're boys in Yahoo's. I mean, we don't go killing animals. So why would we go to New Hampshire? So what's up with me? Well, I actually, I'll tell you my problem. I've got like a two-part question for you guys. Good, I love those. Yeah. And it's a kind of a conflict with my husband type thing. I love those two. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, we have a Jeep Cherokee, Laredo. And that's like a 97. And we have a 97 Volvo 850 station wagon. And my husband has this thing with not feeling. He likes to let the lights go on until he gets gas. Yeah. And our, for instance, I'll be like, well, I'm going to run down and pick up the pizza. I'll take the Volvo. And we switch back and forth from time to time. Ooh, we're going to have to get some gas. You know, again in the car and the light will go on. And I'll go back down and go, what are you doing? I'm like, oh, we're just going to get some gas. I'm like, why do you let it go that far? It's not good for the car.

19:22He thinks that I'm completely wrong. But my question is, like, isn't it bad for cars that are few injected if we run out of gas? No, it isn't bad to run out of gas. It's always bad to run out of gas in general. Not because it's detrimental, necessarily. But we are of the belief, however, that it is not good for the fuel pump, which in both of these cars resides inside the gas tank to run with the tank close to empty, because the fuel actually cools the pump. Let me close the empty. This is what he does. I'll get in the Jeep. And it's got one of those computer consoles at the top. Oh, miles to empty, it tells you. All right, so I'll get in there. We'll have two and a half miles up on top of this hill. Thank God. And we did it. I'll get in the Jeep. And it'll say, OK, miles to empty. Zero. All right. And he'll look at me. And he'll be like, we can make it. All right. It's like that episode of Seinfeld. It's like the whole thing is. You know, as we close into the gas station.

20:23Woo! Has he ever explained to you why he does this? I don't know. Adventure? I don't know. Is that it? Is there not enough excitement in his life? I'm going to try to be in September. I think there would be. No, evidently not enough. You know, he clearly, there's no question. This guy does not have enough excitement in his life. He needs to take a bungee jumping. Spolinkering. I mean, this guy needs to do it. You've got to get him help right away. You think? Yeah. The next thing you know, he's going to be calling you from Nepal. He's going to be studying yak husbandry. But if we're coasting downhill on fumes quite often. Is that bad for the environment? No. No, no, that doesn't. The first part of your question, does it harm the engine? Yeah. No, it doesn't. It might harm the fuel pump. It might harm the fuel pump. That's my brother's theory. Unsubstantiated by anybody. But it might be true because we know he's a genius. I just have empirical evidence.

21:23And he owes me money. But it's the second thing. I mean, this is not very mature behavior. I know. He needs help. He doesn't need help. He's crying out. Don't ignore him. Don't ignore him. I think it's only when you're vacation. He needs more than a vacation. He's like parachuting. There you go. Yeah. He needs something. Yeah, maybe he needs to work on the bomb squad or something. He needs more excitement. What does he do for a living? He works for the Holderness School. He's in development. Oh, not good enough. Oh, yeah. Well, he needs a little development himself. See, I would be careful here, Whitney, because how long have you been married? A little over three years. Yeah, I'd be careful because I think he's having a little bit of an adjustment problem. I can see it that he's yearning for his carefree days.

22:27Well, I said to him the other day, like someone who's a big lottery thing, and I said, honey, I said, what would you do if you won the lottery? And he goes... You don't want to know. Do you go back and go buy a... He likes to... He wants a convertible Mustang with a 56 Mustang or something like that. Why are we not surprised? And I said, he goes, I said, you'll be in Hellen and I, and you take off in this fast car, and he goes, no, I come back and get Hellen. There you go. Oh, man. Well, good luck. I hope you can nip this in the bud, but it's going to take something creative. I'll take it something. Fast. Yeah. Thank you so much. See you with me. Bye. We'll be right back with more calls and the new puzzle right after these important messages. This message comes from LinkedIn, who knows every higher matters when you're running a small business. That's why LinkedIn Hiring Pro uses real-time professional data and insights, not just resumes, to find you the best candidates. In fact, businesses hiring with LinkedIn are 24% less likely to reopen a role within a year

23:29compared to the leading competitor. Hire right the first time. Post your first job and get $100 off at LinkedIn.com slash NPR offer, terms and conditions apply. This message comes from duck.ai. Chat privately with popular AIs now. Go to duck.ai slash NPR. Your information is protected. It's free and no account is required. By duck.go, or AI is always optional. This message comes from NPR sponsor Paramount Plus and the new original series, The Madison. Taylor Sheridan's most intimate story yet. The Madison follows a family raised in a world of digital distraction, forced by tragedy to truly see one another and come together. Starring Michelle Pfeiffer and Kurt Russell. The Madison. New series streaming now only on Paramount Plus. This message comes from LinkedIn, who knows small businesses need a hiring partner to help. LinkedIn Hiring Pro helps you focus on meaningful conversations

24:30with the right talent by streamlining the hiring process. From shortlisting candidates to offering AI-powered interview screenings, Hiring Pro saves hires up to six hours a week. Hire right the first time. Post your first job and get $100 off at LinkedIn.com. Slash in PR offer. Terms and conditions apply. This message comes from Mint Mobile. If you're tired of spending hundreds on big wireless bills, bogus fees and free perks, Mint Mobile is for you. Shop plans at MintMobile.com SlashSwitch. Taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details. Ha! We're back. You'll just leave the card talk with us clicking collect the tapet brothers and we here to discuss cars, car repair and other new puzzlers. Yeah. Okay. Oh, here it is. A few weeks ago, Tommy calls me up one day at work and he says, our sister will seal us sick and she needs, she needs some care. And he says,

25:31I'll make her some chicken soup if you will deliver it to her. So after work, I show up at his house and he's pouring chicken soup into this plastic container and he's mumbling something about not being able to find the right cover for it. So we try to cover it pops off. We put another cover on it pops off and he says, well, do your best. I try to put tape on it. The tape won't stick to the plastic and he says, be careful because you could make a mess with this thing. So I carefully carry it out to the car. My cold vista. And I, and I, this is the automotive part. And I put it on the floor of the, of the, in the front, on the passenger side. And with great trepidation, I pull away from the curb. You're with me so far. I'm with you. Yeah. Worried that the slightest little abrupt stop or turnage too sharp is going to spill this stuff all over the place. Yeah. Now I realize as I'm driving that my house is between his house and her house. And I should stop off at home and, you know, maybe

26:33see the wife and kids and the hounds and maybe have supper. Are you married? Well, so in fact, I, I do that. I, I stop at home. I go to the house. How you doing, huh? We hugging kiss. Sun and I hugging kiss exchange pleasantries. The dogs come and we, we pet the dogs. And I have supper. Yeah. And I sit in front of the TV. And I fall asleep watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I was later, I wake up remembering that my sister is probably at the front door, clawing at the door, waiting for the chicken. Waiting for her soup. So at like midnight, I say, oh, the soup. And you go back to sleep. I go back to sleep. I wake up again at 130. Yeah. And I grab, I hardly grab a few old National Geographic magazines and some fruit that we were going to throw away. And I jump in the car and I drive to her house, which is several miles from my house. Yeah. Never once concerned that I'm going to spill the soup.

27:33In fact, I don't spill a drop of it. Although you were concerned when you left my house. I was very concerned. In fact, I drive like a maniac. Yeah. And there's nothing to do with the National Geographic magazines or the rotten fruit. Now, if you think you know the answer, would you probably? The answer to what? What's the question? Why didn't this happen? Why wasn't I concerned? Why weren't you concerned? So that's the question. You know, sometimes we say things like send your answer on the back of a piece of overripe fruit or an old two by four. Yeah. Actually, do it. Yeah. In fact, in the last couple of weeks, we received correct answers on a half-eaten apple and a frosted pop tart. Shlass roofing shingle. And given our success, I thought I'd try something a little different this week. So if you think you know the answer, write it on a postcard or a 47-inch high definition TV set. I mean, nice. There's always one cool food that does it, right? Or two tickets to Honolulu. Yeah. That's next week. I like it. I like it. Excellent idea.

28:33And send that answer to Puzzle Tower, Car Talk Plaza, Box 3500, Harvard Square, Cambridge. Our fair city. Matt 0223-8. 47-inch. Of course, you can email your answer from the Car Talk section of cars.com. If you'd like to call us, the number is 1-888 Car Talk. That's 888-227-8255. Hello, you're on Car Talk. Hi, this is Kim von Miller from Austin, Texas. Kim. Austin, what are my favorite towns in the whole world? Oh, you guys are celebrities here. We are? Yeah. Yeah, would they put us up? So what's cooking? I called you all because nobody can answer my question. Oh, OK. There's absolutely nothing wrong with my car. Cool. Well, thanks for calling, Kim. It's been a lot of fun. Listen. You're going to laugh. Yeah. I have this curiosity that's eating me up. You drive down the road and you see these model letters on the cars.

29:35Yeah. Now, I have 98 Mazda Pro2J LX. But, I've also seen a car that looks just like mine that's LX. And so, I start looking. And I'm thinking, well, is my car nicer than the others? Or is my car left? Is it an ascending order or a descending order? LXX is way down the end of the alphabet. Or is this maybe Roman numerals? Right. I can't. It doesn't make sense. Yeah. Can you answer my question? Well. Can you give me any specific information? We're going to try to help you as much as we can, Kim. We wrote a newspaper column on this subject. It's very subject for one thing. And to be perfectly frank with you, I don't remember a thing that we said about it. Well, I don't remember that there was any specific rhyme or reason to it. Oh, we know that. You can't assume that one manufacturer's LS, if that means, for example, if the LS is the top of the line for your car, then you can't assume that if you go to a Toyota,

30:38that an LS is going to be the top of the line for their car. Of course. I mean, first of all, you have to realize that these letters mean absolutely nothing, except what the manufacturer decides that they will mean. That was my idea. And what they mean, for example, the LX subliminally suggests luxury. We think that they're working on subliminal things completely with all of these letters. And it's obvious, for example, like the SX, we know what that means. But more importantly, all of these letters are designed to trick and fool the buying public, which is what advertising people are very good at in my humble opinion. That was my idea. It's the only thing that they're good at in my humble opinion. And making you think you're buying something that you ain't really buying. Yeah. Like, for example, you live in Austin TX. Now, is that good or bad? Right. I mean, we don't know. I mean, is that better than D.E.?

31:39No. Or D.C. How about MA? How about ourselves? I mean, we don't know. No. There's no way to know. Yeah. Yeah. I think the deeper you go into the alphabet, the more the more creature comforts you're getting. Yeah. But stay away from D.C. Whatever. You do. Because. What does D.C.? Evil. It's evil. Washington D.C. Why, anyway, kid, I'm sure that we helped you. And you have certainly raised another question worthy of a doctoral dissertation. I will thank you. So there's some kid in Northwestern right now who's dying to get a doctoral dissertation topic in the marketing department. And you have just given him an idea that's going to get him through. Get him his doctorate so he can teach somewhere and perpetuate all this BS that is going around. I don't be an interesting model. The BS. The BS. Yeah, BS is good. Well, guys, it's been fun. Thanks very much. See you later. Bye. Okay.

32:40Bye-bye. David Carr talked. That's 888-227-82-55. Hello, you're on Carr Talk. Hi, guys. This is Dennis in Louisville, Kentucky. With one in a two. With two ends. Two ends. I don't know if there are any ends in Louisville. Just horses and bourbon, basically. So what in that order? What's happening, Dennis? Okay. My wife has a ninety-five niece on Altima. And occasionally, I like to try to do nice things and wash it, clean up the car. The last two times I've done this over the course of the last six months. Lots of fallen off. I've been cold. I break the car. I break the car. What'd you break? I mean, what are you used to wash it with? Like a stick. I don't know. A prince said maybe it was too much fluoride in a water, I don't know. But here's what happens. I'm back it out of my garage, wash it in my driveway, crank it up, pull it back into the garage. The next morning, she goes out to go to work. Car won't start.

33:40Car won't do it. Car won't start. Ah, that kind of breaking of the car. I got that. First time it happened, called Triple A. They put it on a flat truck and they hauled off to the niece on dealership. We went back in that evening and the niece on guy said, nothing wrong with this car? Can't figure it out. Happened again a couple of weeks ago. Pulled in, we go out in the morning. Nothing happens. I love it. So I say, there's something wrong with this car. I'm not going to take it back to the niece on guys. I'm going to take it to my gas station. The guys know what's going on. Yeah, they know and love you. Exactly. They tell me basically the same thing. They call me at work. They say, hey, car starts. What's wrong? I said, car didn't start this morning. They said, okay, let us work around on it. So they replaced the distributor rotor, fuel filter and the spark plug. Car started good for them when they started this. Car started great for them when they finished this. What am I doing wrong? You've washed the car since then. I'm afraid too, guys.

34:42I'm not too picky about the dirt. Well, here's what's happening. Okay. Do you close the garage block? Yeah, he does. Yes, you do. And we knew that. You are loading up the car with moisture. And then you are driving the wet car into the garage and closing the door and leaving. That's it. It's like taking an apple and sticking it in a plastic bag, a ziplock. Okay. I got that vision. What's going to happen is the water is going to, can't really leave the garage. And what it's doing is it's permeating, in my opinion, the faulty or worn out spark plug wires that you have on this car. Which they didn't replace. We were listening carefully for that on the list. They replaced the plug, but not the wire. Yeah. Not the wires. And you are right at the time when you probably need wires in the five years old. And the reason that it started when the dealer got it is that the ride between your house and the dealership was enough to dry everything off. In fact, had you just opened the garage door or left the car outside after you washed it?

35:45They would have started the next thing. Yeah. So you got a choice here. You can either have the spark plug wires replaced or you can stop washing the car or you can wash the car and not put it in the garage or shut off the engine. Leave the engine running while you're washing the car. You can put it in the garage and leave the door open or leave the engine running. Okay. You got a choice. You got a lot of choices. A lot of things you can do. Okay, guys. But I'm going to suggest that if you don't change the wires, the first day it gets left outside in the rain. It's not going to start either. Oh. You got to replace the wires, your cheap skate. See you, Dennis. They've already put $100 bucks. Okay. Thanks a lot, guys. Good luck, man. Good luck. Bye. Well, it's happened again. You vaporized yet another hour listening to car talk. Our steam producer has dug the subway fugitive, not a slave to fashion, punk and lips bourbon. Our social producers are Frau Catherine Fennelosa. Thank you. And Louis Cronin, the barbarian. Our engineer is Dennis, the men is Foley.

36:47Our senior weblackie is Doug, the old gray mayor and our technical spiritual and menu advisor is the bugster, John Bugsie, free lunch, Twinkle Toes. Twinkle Toes. Lawler. Our public opinion pollster is Paul Murky of Murky Research, assisted by statistician Margin Overa. Our customer care representative is Haywood, Jebusov. Our director of new product repair is Warren T. Myfoot. Our official spokesperson is Lou Scannon, and our shop format is Luke Bizzy. Our staff snow cloud driver is Frazier Tushoff. Frazier Tushoff. Frazier Tushoff. We'll get it. Our pseudonym consultant is Norm DePoulme. Our divorce attorney is Carmine Not Yours. Our criminal justice expert is Lauren Order. Our appeal specialist is Bud Your Honor. Bud Your Honor. And our Russian chauffeur is beat golf and drop off. Our chief counsel from the law firm of Dewey Cheedermenha was your Louis Dewey, known to the feral cats in Harvard Square as you and Louis Dewey thanks so much listening we're clicking collect a tap at brothers and above all don't drive like Tommy.

37:48And don't drive like Raymond. We'll be back next week, bye bye. It is all a pleasure to have an exclusive studio today, Car Talk Plaza's Chief Mechanic Mr. Vinny Gombats. Vinny? A thank you very much now. If you want a copy of this year's show, which happens to be show number 13, you can get one on the web. Just head on over to the Car Talk section of www.cars.com and click on the Shameless Commerce Division. And what if I wanted something else like a best of Car Talk CD, I mean would I go to the same site Vinny? No, you go to www.flame and farm animals.com, you'll dope, of course you go to the same site. It's the Shameless Commerce Division at the Car Talk section of www.cars.com or you'll order the old fashioned way by calling 888, Car Junk. Thank you Vinny, that was very revealing. Hey, I got your reveal right here. Car Talk is a production of Dewey Cheedermenha and WBWR in Boston.

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