Robert,
I enjoyed your story and believe that confession is good for the soul. I had a bit of frustrating troubleshooting of my own a couple weeks ago. A friend gave me a Toro snow thrower that was in good shape but had always been hard to start. The price was right so I hauled it home, filled the tank with fresh winter gas, set the choke and started the thing on the first pull. It didn't run perfectly but I adjusted the mixture until it ran well without the choke being full on. Satisfied with my work I shut the machine down. It was 9 PM and I didn't want to further annoy the neighbors. A couple nights later I went out to the garage, set the choke and pulled the starter cord. It didn't fire. More pulling, choking, no chokeing, full throttle, no throttle, you name it, no fire. I pulled the plug out and turned off the lights. I pull again and there indeed was no spark. I started thinking about the tools necessary to get to the points when I noticed the ignition switch in the OFF position. Yes, I had used that switch to shut down the engine. Switch on, pull the cord and it fires right up.
Mark

: I have a story to relate, one that might inspire a few belly laughs to help
: y'all stay warm.

: I was driving home prior to heading off to work today and noticed a large
: puddle of liquid on the passenger-side floor mat. I groaned, thinking that
: my heater core, recently rebuilt and installed, had either blown a hose or
: sprung a leak inside the car. I had seen a puddle form there before: that
: happened a few months ago so I did the necessary work to repair it. When I
: got home I tasted the liquid and found it sweet, not quite like ethylene
: glycol (antifreeze) but because of where the puddle formed my mind tasted
: antifreeze. I worked myself up into a tizzy thinking that I would have to
: pull the underside of the dash again, thought of how tough that was the
: first time. When I did the last repair it took me two days to pull and
: replace the dash (I was repairing other stuff as well). I tensed up at the
: thought of the cold weather coming this weekend (predicted to hit a high
: of -23 C) and here I was, driving a car without heat again. Did that last
: winter, didn't want to do it again. Ever since buying my 1982 Toyota
: Tercel the heater never really put out much heat. I knew there was some
: kind of problem and guessed that it was a blocked heater core. Turned out
: that the core was in bad shape but also the valve that opens and closes to
: let hot coolant into the core was also not working and the controls cables
: were very sticky.

: Oddly enough today, the engine was still running cool but I attributed that
: to the fact that the lines for the heater core were higher than the
: engine, so the cooling system would not loose all of the coolant and the
: car could still be driven - I have run it like that in the past. I drove
: to work all tense, monitored the engine temperature closely, ready to stop
: if it began to overheat. I drive with a gallon of premixed coolant stored
: in the trunk in case of emergency. Well, the engine stayed well within
: proper operating temperature. Interesting no?

: I got to work and lamented to the guys about my ensuing misery, that I would
: have to pull the dash again and sort out the problem. They felt awful for
: me because they knew how tough it was for me to repair the car when I
: replaced the original core. We all peeked under the hood to see if a hose
: was leaking, talked sympathetically about our trials and tribulations with
: older cars and tried to figure out where the problem was. Hmm...we saw no
: visible leaks throughout the cooling system. We theorized that if I topped
: up the antifreeze and ran the engine hot, then perhaps we could see where
: the leak was. Bear in mind that if the heater core hoses leak, the coolant
: can run along the copper fittings of the core and into the cabin of the
: car because of the design. We went back into the lab to get on with our
: work day, still talking about what needed to be done.

: I carried my lunch into the lab and readied myself for work. I set my lunch
: bag (a grocery store sac) and began my work. At one point in time, I had
: to move my lunch to a different spot so I picked it somewhat differently
: than when I did earlier and wouldn't you know it, there was coolant in the
: bag and it was leaking through a hole in the bag and spilling all over the
: floor. I opened the bag and sonofabitch, my jar of mango slices was
: leaking its juice. Well, the guys saw this so there was no escaping the
: next hour of mango juice jokes. I was immediately labelled the Mango Man,
: my car was called a mangomobile and the guys (all chemistry oriented)
: offered up all kinds of suggestions for using mango juice as engine
: coolant, biofuel, etc, etc, etc. For one solid hour I had to listen to
: their jokes. They weren't satisfied with keeping this knowledge to
: themselves so they had to get the boss involved and others. How does a man
: live down a reputation for misjudging his mangos? Sigh! Just another day
: in Mangoville.

: Robert (Ma)N(go) Pruden