Greetings from Texas

[infinity5]

Ah well I made it to Dallas in once piece.

In the middle of Mississippi the coolant hose from the aux. pump to the heater valve blew off and emptied my engine of coolant. A nice guy in a '90 xj6(or whatever) pulled over and gave me a lift to a filling station for coolant. I was almost tempted to ask if he could take me to the nearest dealer for some blue coolant and then to publix for some distilled water, but i decided that might be pushing it.

I by-passed the water valve totally to get the car running again. the plastic fitting on the pump had broken off so there was no way to just tighten the hose back down. If anyone wants a working aux water pump with a broken fitting tell me I think i'm going to leave it off forever. its not like florida gets cold anyway. Heat works fine without it too.. useless thing.

Going to run to the dealer here and flush the coolant before i head back. The worst part of it all was the fact that the Texaco gas station charged me 11$ a gallon for generic stupid coolant!! only a few more bucks and i would be paying dealer price!! They wanted 2$ a gallon for water too! bastards!!

Then At one point, in louisiana i think, someones U-haul Trailier broke off the hitch and flew across the highway at 80-ish mph. that was kinda cool actually.

Got a good 26MPG at 75MPH constant speed. took me freakin 16 hours too. On the way back i think i'm going to be forced to speed, for times sake.

Oh, i did something extrodinarily stupid today. I washed my car to get all the nasty bug guts off the front grill/hood. The stupid part is that i figured one of those green brillow pad things Scotch makes wouldn't do any harm. Wrong. The clear coat is pretty much gone anywhere i touched the Scotchbrite pad. damn i'm dumb. it felt so soft i didn't think it could do any harm, and it took the bug-guts off really well. oh well. the swirl marks are awful. if you run you hand over the hood its all smooth and glossy till you hit the parts i cleaned and its rough and dry, like semi-gloss paint vs flat. d'oh

Heading to houston monday probably. Then back to Florida maybe wednesday or thursday.

I changed over from whateverthehell the PO had in the engine to mobil one 0w40 right before i left. so far so good. no leaks, no problems. 1100 mile drive.

just thought i'd share, hope everyone is doing well.

[bimmerd00d]

welcome to dallas, what part of it are you in?

[632 Regal]

sounds like a trip of trips at least. you have learned and also enjoyed (the trailer hitch). too bad for the simple problems but you can never tell I guess. Hope you have a less problematic second half and look forward to hearing from you all safe and sound from home.

[winfred]

unless you really beared down on the brillo pad it can probably be buffed out with mild compound and a wool buff

[Kalevera]

HHmmm....This makes me wish that, earlier today, I didn't *give away* the old upper radiator hose that I had in my trunk. OH well.

Glad to hear you made it in one piece. 26mpg is great. Wish I got that -- I was happy to get 22mpg on my ~500 mile trip yesterday.

Best, whit

Ah well I made it to Dallas in once piece.

In the middle of Mississippi the coolant hose from the aux. pump to the heater valve blew off and emptied my engine of coolant. A nice guy in a '90 xj6(or whatever) pulled over and gave me a lift to a filling station for coolant. I was almost tempted to ask if he could take me to the nearest dealer for some blue coolant and then to publix for some distilled water, but i decided that might be pushing it.

I by-passed the water valve totally to get the car running again. the plastic fitting on the pump had broken off so there was no way to just tighten the hose back down. If anyone wants a working aux water pump with a broken fitting tell me I think i'm going to leave it off forever. its not like florida gets cold anyway. Heat works fine without it too.. useless thing.

Going to run to the dealer here and flush the coolant before i head back. The worst part of it all was the fact that the Texaco gas station charged me 11$ a gallon for generic stupid coolant!! only a few more bucks and i would be paying dealer price!! They wanted 2$ a gallon for water too! bastards!!

Then At one point, in louisiana i think, someones U-haul Trailier broke off the hitch and flew across the highway at 80-ish mph. that was kinda cool actually.

Got a good 26MPG at 75MPH constant speed. took me freakin 16 hours too. On the way back i think i'm going to be forced to speed, for times sake.

Oh, i did something extrodinarily stupid today. I washed my car to get all the nasty bug guts off the front grill/hood. The stupid part is that i figured one of those green brillow pad things Scotch makes wouldn't do any harm. Wrong. The clear coat is pretty much gone anywhere i touched the Scotchbrite pad. damn i'm dumb. it felt so soft i didn't think it could do any harm, and it took the bug-guts off really well. oh well. the swirl marks are awful. if you run you hand over the hood its all smooth and glossy till you hit the parts i cleaned and its rough and dry, like semi-gloss paint vs flat. d'oh

Heading to houston monday probably. Then back to Florida maybe wednesday or thursday.

I changed over from whateverthehell the PO had in the engine to mobil one 0w40 right before i left. so far so good. no leaks, no problems. 1100 mile drive.

just thought i'd share, hope everyone is doing well.

[uscharalph]

I hope the rest of your trip goes well. I've got a couple of shorter trips the next 2 weekends in my 525i: L.A. to Palm Springs next weekend and L.A. to Laughlin the following weekend. I think I'll pack a few auto supplies in the trunk.

[brodee]

Shoot me a PM while you're here in Houston.

[1992 BMW 535i]

Good Lord, it's been a year since I was in this forum. Glad to see that it's still up and around. Update - sold the 535i, bought an Audi A4. Sold it. Bought a brand new M3 and then had to take it back under the California Lemon Law. Moved from Montreal to Newport Beach California....looking for a new car....

[632 Regal]

mann a lot happened in a year Marc!!!!

Good to see you again.

[infinity5]

heh. yeah i'm sure the way back will be fine. I actually had fun knowing enough about my cooling system to beable to fix it on the side of the road. I had brought a gallon of pre-mixed coolant just in case, so if a little less had boiled out i could have done it all without assistance.

I'm in Plano, off campbell road. at the intersection offff.. somewhere. frankford? theres a school near that corner.

Yeah at 26mpg i get a good 500miles out of the gas tank, its awesome.

Damn its hot here...