The car, she’s fixed!…almost
April 2nd, 2008 • chatter
I finally got to finish fixing the Focus last night after my neighbor Steve managed to score the thermostat housing for cost at Maroone. As the day went on, I started to freak out because my window for getting the part, if he could not, was quickly closing but he came through. Way to go, Steve! What I thought was going to be a quick 10 to 20 minute job turned into over 2 hours which sucked up my entire night. The worst part of it was the fact that it took longer to actually get the thermostat housing back where it belongs than it did to do everything else I had to do (refill the radiator…twice, change valve cover gasket, replace windshield wipers). Stupid thing just didn’t want to go back in so I could bolt it on. Ford must’ve had some idiot design the layout for the engine bay to save space or something, it’s insanely cramped. I was going to remove the cam gear cover except there’s two other parts blocking one of the bolts so how you’re supposed to do anything other than change oil/battery/radiator fluid without spending an hour is beyond me. I can’t ever remember having this much trouble doing anything on my Saturn or my old Buick but this thing is just a pain.
After I managed to get the stupid housing back in place and hoses put back on, everything was OK for about 10 minutes until it started to gush fluid from a hose that I didn’t check earlier. Turns out the cheap hose clamps car makers use cut through the hose as well. Then one of the spark plugs misfired but that was my fault for not checking the spark plug boot properly. All said and done, the car’s running tip top now and all I need to do is change the oil in the next two weeks and replace a non-working door handle. Of course, I still have to do a laundry list of things to my car now 
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I cannot wait until I can replace my dying car with a non-dying motorcycle.