Drama of last week’s accident from pulling out the car from garage in a quick got the side mirror broken – and first treatment – thanks to Amazon’s delivery – arrived. Now I need to do it again once the paint arrives
Finally the new chain & chain replacement tools have arrived so had a fun time playing with the bike. Now I wonder whether I should invest 100 for tuning the bicycle of 400 or not or DIY.. ๐
One more – maybe & hopefully the last DIY I am doing with my retiring-soon Odyssey – replacing the ‘pressure rod’ which holds the tailgate door open. (still don’t know how officially it is called) but beauty of YouTube search function and Amazon’s search function give me enough information to order and teach me how to replace.
Now, my odyssey has super power only at the tailgate door from $25+little bit of labor.. ๐
Trying to be back to casual cycling ๐ but now I have a family to go along with it…vs me simply getting one bike and ride..
This journey has been killing my wallet and research time for mini DIYs (Hitch, Car Rack, in Home Rack, Stand, PSI enabled pump, other accessories, and -most importantly- Bike Assembly etc) – didn’t realize this in past but bicycles are becoming more like a car ๐ฆ so many things to install, know and be careful to treat.
Now my butt pain is asking me to do something and I am yelling back at it like “Deal with it”.. ๐
Actually, part of the reason went thru the journey of DIYing was also because of this drill – Installing Trailer Hitch. Again, did the huge amount of search the web and youtube video to know what hitch fits odyssey, how to install, and ordered the ramp, hitch at Amazon and tried to install it.
As usual, everything was smooth in YouTube, while there are so many dumb challenges at my end. All the video suggested me doing with 2 or more people, but I don’t have that luxury – no one in my house can help – so brought out home various size of boxes and used those to balance and attached one hole after another hole. Also, used Ratchet Socket Wrench to installed it but it only went into few rounds and half tightened. ๐ฆ
So used my own ‘impact’ drill with socket but no luck -it was so weak only to make few more twists/advances, then learned that I need Impact Wrench ๐ฆ
As it was already evening, I had to leave the hitch as ‘not to fall off’ level and Amazoned overnight delivery ๐ – This must be the Copang experience I hardly ever had ๐ and magically package arrived at next day morning 6AM.
However, when Impact Wrench arrived tried to use the Ratchet socket but learned this doesn’t fit Impact Wrench and actually it is not recommended to be used with Impact Wrench anyhow ๐ฆ haha – so had to order another long Impact Socket set for Impact Wrench with same day delivery – ha ๐
Finally, all the bolt and nuts are 100% tightened – so wondered a bit on setting the Torque but as the car is old and I suspected some of miss-treading is there during install, thought this is good enough for me ๐
At the end dirty hands with some scratches, series of Amazon orders, and crazy searches on YouTube and Bing (Yes I work for Microsoft haha) mission complished ~80%: Now I need to unbox and install the ordered bike rack ๐
Since very end of last trip to Redwoods National Park/Oregon Coast, I felt some metal is clicking when vehicle’s speed is increased, but immediately disappear after the speed is up and more painfully irregularly.
So much of our freak-o-meter went up, the unlimited search on youtube was on. Metal Noise (when speed is up), Metal scratching when speed is increasted etc.. , then every different ones were suggesting break pad problem, transmission problem etc,.
Data science kicked in with extremely mental hypothesis testing ‘Does it make noise when it is uphill or downhill’, ‘Does it make noise when road surface is not bumpy or not’, then one great clue I landed was ‘It always sounds at 20MPH -40MPH. However, that theory was broken when I was testing on freeway it made a noise again around 60 MPH as well. Ah…
At the end of lengthy period of hypothesis testing, came to conclusion this mostly happens when RPM is passing thru 2,000-2,500 and less in the morning; especially when engine works one more step. Then I searched the web and youtube to learn this is more likely the problem of heat reflection metals around the exhaust system getting aging and loose and the vibration from the engine is making it “rattle” – glad it was not a break nor transmission problem ๐
Went to auto repair shop, and the mechanic simply screwed in one screw piece in the gap at the surrounding cover parts near the engine (Catalyst) and it was fine. His suggestion was using this as molding is the ultimate solution but it will be costly and time consuming ๐
However, that patch didn’t last long, and about a week later started to hear the rattling again. So decided to go more permanent solution.
So crazy DIY kicked in –
Ordered a ‘ramp’ as I don’t have the jack (and I have been in the need of something to put my car up for other reasons)
Looked at the area where the screw-patch was on – clearly gone ๐ฆ
So followed one of the videos suggesting using the metal clamp to hold the covering tight – some suggested zips but clearly got to know that won’t last at here as it was extremely hot with simple driving.
At the end, when the ramp and metal round clamp arrived, put the car on the ramp, dig thru under the car (first time using the back to move around after highschool’s military training class) put two clamps with painful arms with the hope at least one will resolve.
At the end – perfect solution. The rattle is gone now, (although hurt my eyes as particle dust from the car hit my right eye; continuously pumping tears for few hours. (+ countless attempt to wash out with tons of water :))
Thanks to this endless Pandemic and magical YouTube algorithm, I have came to try unusual things I hardly done before… (and Amazon wins as I end up ordering some tools….)
Starting with one floor mat deep cleaning per day at shower time while waiting for handy steamer to arrive..:)
You break it, we fix it – lived the life of ‘Bob the Builder’ today
– PC reinstall with USB media : found no USB thumb drive at the world of Cloud, so had to order Amazon’s same day delivery and made the USB repair/installation media and recovered a PC which turned to black screen upon every boot
As our gentleman in the house -who never sits straight while putting more weights on chairs- have more time at home with various chairs because of Pandemic, this meant my chair repairing skill goes beyond the wood chair repair
– Plastic chair with broken back: after failed attempt with Super glue, went to epoxy glue. As the broken part was highly visible part of chair, had to go with multiple sanding after the glue and spraying paint and coating with Polyurethane.
– Bent Steel folding chair with disjointed horizon bar: so after using hammer and bring back the bent part, the question was whether I am willing to go into welding (which I don’t have any tools…) so settled with steel epoxy…
– Office chair: This is the still one of the mystery need to solve – how can you rock the rolling office chair?! But our gentleman must have showed that skill before he broke the chair. Similarly my first attempt with Super glue didn’t last long, so attempted with epoxy glue, but as this doesn’t have much visibility I am not willing to go into sanding/coloring part..
All in all, total four items in my household got the treatment, Home Depot and Amazon was the winner and I enjoyed smells from various chemicals (and now I understand why they check the birth date when I purchased the spray can..)
hello27.net 