Mechanical Repairs

May 4,

It is 5:55 AM Saturday morning. I'm babysitting while Vero is off to choir practice 6-7:30. Jane, Vero and I have been spelling each other off watching Savanna while Don & Karen Davis are in the States.

A construction team of five from Washington state and Bob Ramsey from MFI are staying in the Davis dorm next door this week. It has been fun getting to know each of them. 

Bob is a good friend and mentor mechanic. We really got to know him well a year ago last January when he needed a place to stay while working on his truck that a local mission uses here. He stayed with us along with the Sweatmans. He is a life long mechanic and race engine builder that spent five plus years here doing mechanical work for missions before moving back to Ft. Pirece and doing mechanical work at MFI.

Don Sweatman, Bob and I spent many evenings talking engines boring our wives to death but learning, and sharing life stories about God's goodness. Jane and I now look up Bob and his lovely wife Barb [who works at MFI in shipping & receiving.] We usually share a meal together while passing through Ft. Pierce on our way "in" or "out" to catch up on how things are going. Bob has helped numerous times with technical questions, picking up needed parts, and tools.

Two and one half weeks ago I was following Jane the two miles down here to Davis's, she bringing Sammy to babysit and I was on my way next door to Lifewater to work when our car just died. It had been recently plagued with hard starting and stalling. I ran back to the house and grabbed a gas can thinking that the gauge may be lying but that didn't help. A quick call to Lifewater and one of the guys headed up to tow me while Jane continued with Sammy in friend's loaner car. I spent the rest of the day doing some diagnostics and low and behold it started back up. I babysat from noon until 5PM while Vero and Jane worked. At 5 I started the car but it soon died as I tried to back out of the Davis's carport. Jane came and picked me up with the loaner car. For some reason our car was not getting fuel, all of the fuses and relays seemed to be OK, the diagnostics scanner showed a cam angle sensor fault code. I had caught word that Bob was coming in the next day so called him to bring in his fuel pressure tester. I had written to my daughter Gretchen to send mine a week before thinking that the car would run long enough for it to get here but now it had stopped and Bob was on his way. He said that it was already in his tool box and would see me on Thursday. My gut feeling was that the fuel pump in the gas tank had been failing and had finally died. This would be a rather straight forward fix. After meeting Bob at the airport along with Ray from Limbe, we went and picked up Bob's truck and also swung by the local auto parts. Onel had fuel pumps in stock so things looked pretty good.

On Friday morning I hooked up Bob's tester and found that the fuel pressure was perfect meaning the pump was not the problem, now what? His scanner was also showing a cam angle sensor fault. The sensor tells the computer where the engine is at in rotation and when to fire the fuel injectors [not happening]. The sensor happens to be integrated into the distributor and must be change as a unit. Bob had to return to Fla. To get more tools and fabricate some needed body mount parts. While there he sent me a replacement distributor which fixed our car.

Upon his return a week later I was helping him install the new mounts. I was running the floor jack to lift the truck cab while Bob positioned the new mounts. We had a wooden 2x4 on end atop the jack under the floor of the truck; Bob got his fingers between the cab & the frame when the jack rolled dropping the cab and trapping Bob’s fingers. I was able to get the jack repositioned and released his fingers. After some rest we decided to “chock” the wheels of the jack and after the next attempt and very cautiously the jack kicked out again but this time Bob was in the clear. We came to find out that the truck shifter was not in Park after replacing the instrument cluster and this time the truck actually rolled. After blocking both the truck and jack we were able to finish the job.

The next day Bob’s hands were quite sore but nothing broken. Bob was working in the front of the truck and I was on a creeper checking air in the spare tire under the rear, I rolled out from under the truck, sat up and caught the trailer hitch with my right eyebrow splitting it open and causing a good laugh [after the stars went away]. Jane laughed and said that we are not to play together anymore. We did get a lot accomplished and had a good time in the process before Bob headed back Tuesday May 7.