Last planned stop on the Australia tour... Sydney!
I have arrived bright and early in Sydney to see my friend Oscar off to Tasmania. I offer to give Oscar a ride to the airport, should Peaches the Mitsubishi Pajero decide she wants to start... but she politely declines. Despite my many attempts to convince her, she sits quietly, resolutely, obviously tired from her long adventure and pleased to be home.
In a way, I feel fortunate. In the entire 31,000km trip, there has been no better place for a breakdown than Sydney. And had I not broken down, I would never have got my money's worth out of my roadside assistance coverage.
Enter Chris, NRMA roadside assistance technician. After exhausting almost every one of his alternatives, he busts out a fancy trick. Connecting a spare battery directly to the starter motor bypasses the ignition and the inhibitor switches, effectively hot-wiring Peaches back to life. Nice move Chris.
Being back in Sydney feels a little like a mini-homecoming. I am so happy to see everyone again.
My plans from here are to:
a) fix Peaches
b) sell Peaches (or give her away if required)
c) find a great way to spend the next 3 weeks. Bali perhaps?
I'm off to visit the mechanic to see how much it costs to repair an inhibitor switch!
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Hmm, based purely on the name of the part and a total lack of mechanical knowledge, I would say that you you should simply remove the "inhibitor switch". Or at least turn it off. Problem solved! Sounds like a part that is a mechanic's idea of a pratical joke.
ReplyDelete"Yeah Chuck, seriously. We'll add this switch to their engines that we can just turn on at any time to make them come and pay us money to "fix" the car. We'll even call it an Inhibitor Switch, and they STILL won't suspect a thing - HA, HA.."
I sure hope Peaches makes it!
Haha... nice one :)
ReplyDeleteIt is such a common problem the mechanic had to call 30 wreckers to find one that was off a similar model car. My crack squad of mechanics took that switch apart and used components to fix my switch. I am going to miss Steve and Craig at Midas... After 4 days of working on it, they only charged me $80 for labour... That said, I have spent more with them in the last 4 months than I paid for my first year of University tuition.
In new news - Peaches was officially sold yesterday to a lovely Kiwi couple in the parking lot at the airport!