For as long as I can remember, I have saved little bolts, nuts, springs, and stuff like that in a small, beat up, toy safe I got when I was a kid. To the untrained eye it’s quite a mess of odd junk. Okay, trained or not, it’s a mess. But for 25 years or more, through a couple remodels and many a move, I have always kept track of the little box – and often gone to it in a pinch. I can only think right now of one thing I’ve had since I was very young. Hard to believe, but it’s this beat up old box full of screws and stuff.
This hasn’t always been the home for all the loose metal bolts and things; it used to be a sweet Fort Knox coin bank with a change slot in the top. It even had a working dial on the front like a real safe. It must have been one of my brothers that broke that feature off. When it was no longer secure for money, I converted it to the bolt box. And that’s what it’s been called ever since.
The way this works is I’m working on a project and need just the right nut or tiny bolt. I go to the box and pour all the contents out on a large flat space and start to digging and sorting. Nine times out of ten, I find exactly something that will work.
Yesterday I took my car to the dealer to get the heater worked on. The heater itself works fine but a few weeks ago I was moving the lever from cold to hot and, POP, something inside there broke. I thought I could just deal with it all winter but after a few cold and scary hours yesterday of steamed up windows in a freezing cold car, I decided I was done with being a mountain man this winter.
You can probably tell where this is going, but the story is worth it so hang on.
I used to be able to fix anything: alarm clocks, turntables, cars, whatever. But now I’m too busy or lazy or terrified by all the computers they put in things these days, so I don’t touch anything in my car other than the gas tank lid and the radio buttons.
Well, I dropped my car off at the dealer, where I was told it would be $109 to diagnose the problem. Okay, that’s a ton to just figure out what’s wrong, but I figured it wouldn’t be more than that to fix the actual problem. Boy was I wrong. A few hours later I got the call. I’m just glad I was sitting at my desk at the time. $570.66, I was told, to replace the HVAC control panel which had gone bad.
After a few deep breaths and a little pep talk to myself on why I shouldn’t cry on the phone, I told the guy to go ahead. Can you believe he had the nerve at that point to also describe about six other issues wrong with my car? We aren’t talking about the sweetest ride on the lot, and he already got a ton out of me for the HVAC thinger, so let me alone already, will ya?
He said he would have to ship the part in and it would take a couple days. Okay, I can live without the car until then, but no way can I live without the soccer bag. I am the assistant coach, you know. People depend on me to bring the bag to practice. So I told him I might be by later to get some stuff out. Okay, he said.
In the mean time its FREEZING here this week. And from my desk I could see my neighborhood a few miles away was being trounced by some freak storm that had settled in that corner of the valley. I emailed the coach and asked if he was planning on practicing tonight.
While I waited for his reply, I decided there was no way we were having practice, but I better get the bag anyway, just in case the head coach thinks otherwise. Nancy took me to the shop after work and I noticed the dash was all pulled apart so I took a look. While I’m checking it out, I saw how the whole thing fit together and pushed a little cable to heard the flap that switches the air to the heater. I started up the car and the heat worked fine. I looked around some more and saw that it’s like the easiest thing in the world to fix this problem. Even without the heater, my temperature was now on the rise and stormed in to talk to the mechanic about this little HVAC dealie.
He explained that I must not have seen the broken piece of plastic that holds the back of the hot/cold lever in place. We talked for a minute more and then I went back out to figure out what he was talking about. Okay, I saw it then, a tiny worthless piece of plastic that broke off of a much larger and more expensive part.
Nancy was driving us home and I was fuming about this terrible design. I was also thinking about how bad I hate working on cars. I was also thinking about the $570.66 that will have to go on my credit card.
I was also thinking about my lifelong friend Shane, who taught me a thing or two about “Southern Engineering” as we used to call it. (Oh the stories I could tell . . . he once built a three wheeled motorized machine out of two bikes and an old lawn mower engine. He was a master at controlling the thing. I only rode on it one time and have a huge scar on my side from the electric barbed wire fence I ran into. But that’s a story for another time.)
Shane would laugh at me if I paid the $570.66 for such a dumb little thin, and rightfully so. I’m sure I can do it, I just didn’t want to.
By the time we got home, I had figured out what I would do. The first thing I did was grab the trusty bolt box. I poured it out and found about 30 possible solutions. I then grabbed some good glue, a piece of sandpaper, and a few other small tools before driving back to the dealer.
It was dark by the time I got there but the gate was still open. I didn’t want to talk to anyone so I drove around back, parked next to my car, and got in. I set up a flashlight under the dashboard and got to work. I’m sure if anyone saw me they would have been alarmed by someone working under the dashboard of one of the cars, lit from below by a flashlight. I looked up every minute or so, just to make sure I wasn’t going to be surprised by the Sheriff when he came. 20 minutes later, no sign of the police, I was headed home with a $570.66 smile on my face.
I thought about calling Shane in Texas but figured he‘d just laugh at me for even taking the car to the shop in the first place. I’ll bet he’d remember the old safe, though, full of miscellaneous hardware. It had saved my bacon again.
This morning I called the shop to tell them what I had done. Later I went in later to pay my bill. On the receipt it says, “customer came last night and rigged it himself.” Maybe I will give Shane a call.
How about you? Who should you be calling just because you need to reminisce about the old days for a few minutes?
Clark
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