Ever have one of those days?

[Rob Mayercik]

Am having a day here:

Last night I got ambitious and replaced the bushings in my swaybar links. Went smoothly.

Too smoothly, it seems.

Woke up this morning with pain in my right arm, went to doctor. Turns out I sprained it.

Went home, then headed to work. Had a car honk at me and point at the car, so I pulled over and hopped out.

Left rear caliper is ON FIRE.

No extinguisher on board, this is the DD. Fortunately I did have a bottle of glass cleaner in the trunk, which got the fire out. Called AAA, got dragged to mechanic.

Got home, called work. Boss suggested "why don't you just call it a day?"

So I did. Did run out with other car and get a fire extinguisher, though.

Ugh. Hope tomorrow goes better...

 

[Rock2pus]

...wait a minute, Spanky. You should have had an extinguisher in your XJ already, goofball! That's one of the requirements on our runs!
All kidding aside, sticky calipers can be a fact of life when you don't drive your stuff every day. All 4 corners of my f350 are wrecked for that very reason, I need to set a schedule to move it around more. Just ordered ebc setup for it and it cost me dearly....lesson learned? Probably not.
Get some ice cream tonight and relax, sorry to hear about your day. At least it wasn't like Lavern's...perspective, my friend.
See you at York!
Rich

 

[old_man]

You know it is one of those days when you wake up from a night mare and then figure out you weren't asleep.

 

[ehall]

caliper fire? grease on the rotor?

 

[Rob Mayercik]

Um, the XJ hasn't been my DD in about 15 years - this happened to my VW. (besides, it'd be kinda hard to have a rear caliper fire on the XJ when it's still got drums out back...)


Actual fire - flames and everything. Mechanic said the caliper locked up and the grease in the back of it was what was burning, so the soft line to the caliper wasn't harmed, which meant he didn't have to order in the long, soft-hard-soft hose/line assembly that would have taken a couple days to get; instead, he got it fixed this afternoon and I picked it up about an hour and a half ago, ready to rumble again.

Wasn't until I'd gotten the fire out that it occurred to me just how close I might have come to watching the whole thing burn to the ground in front of me - thank goodness I tossed that bottle of glass cleaner (the Strauss Auto version of Windex) in the trunk a few months back... :wow:

What really burned about this (if you'll excuse the gratuitous pun) was that the caliper was installed the beginning of May, so it's only been on the car 2 months. (had both done at the time, the right rear one only lasted a week before failing, though that one only smoked). His parts supplier must have had a bad batch - another one of these he worked on recently has been through a couple more rear calipers than I have.

Still, while I have a sore arm I still have myself and my DD. Could have been a lot worse...

 

[MrSimon]

Wow dude, that's quite a day. Glad things worked out in the end.

But at least you have nice new bushings in your links ... so that's good!

 

[Rob Mayercik]

Yep, another item in the "well the week hasn't been THAT bad" list...

 

[Rock2pus]

I got hit by a huge moving van while coming home from work last week if that makes you feel any better. Forgot to mention that at York we were in get home mode. Glad you made it out it was good to see you. Keep your calendar open in the fall.
Rich

 

[Rob Mayercik]

Oh, geez, glad you're OK.

Will keep an eye peeled for the fall.