What a fun day

I WANTED to take some of the new acquisitions out to the range today. Instead I and two of my sons changed the starter on my S-10. I am VERY glad that I only have the 2.4 liter in-line 4 cylinder. If I had the 6 cylinder, I would have been tearing out all of what little hair I have remaining.

First, the boys had taken the jack out of my S-10 and broken the handle. So I had to get jack that USED to belong in my old Dodge Caravan to use it. But IT's handle was missing also. So, I got to show the boys that a 19mm socket would work the jack JUST fine.

We got the truck jacked up, the wheels chocked, the negative battery cable disconnected and were laying down underneath the truck. Then the bolts for the starter were evidently put in too tight the last time the starter was changed.

Considering that "I" changed the starter last time, last year and over 45 thousand miles AGO!! they shouldn't have been. So I told one of the boys to get out my breaker bar or my cheater pipe.

NOPE!

Couldn't be found.

Neither the breaker bar nor the cheater pipe could be found.

::sigh::

"Boys?, Did you happen to see my serpentine belt tool in the toolbox of the truck?"

"Huh?"

"NEVERMIND!!!"

That is what I wound up using instead of my purposely purchased breaker bar OR my purposely purchased cheater pipe.

The bolts came loose then.

And SOMEONE had put marking paint on both of them.

Marking paint?

There was ALSO marking paint on my drain plug in my oil pan. AND the two wires for my reverse lights had been cut.

The LAST persons who had been under my truck, was the oil change place in town, when I had the oil changed before my trip to College Station when my daughter was in the hospital.

Hmmmm, curious.

Anyway, Mitchell, aka Sprog #5 and I got the starter out, but were having issues getting the wires off of the solenoid. The ignition wire terminal bolt in the solenoid actually broke inside the solenoid. So after fighting with THAT for 15 minutes or so, the connector itself actually broke.

::double sigh::

I asked my mother to take Mitchell and the old starter up to the O'reilly's in town to exchange the starter, as it is a "Lifetime" guaranteed starter.

While Mom and Mitchell did that, Malachi aka Sprog #7, and I replaced the eye connector on the ignition wire. All while getting eaten by a fire ant pile, one of us had kicked while under the truck. It took us about 14 minutes to get the new connector in, and I fixed my reverse light wires which WERE cut, and recently, as there wasn't much oxidation on the cut ends of the wires. I also checked my oil filter and it too has marking paint on it.

Hmmm, even more curious.

By that time, mom and Mitchell were back with the new starter.

Mitchell and I got the new starter in, in about 20 minutes, put in a new battery terminal bolt, (I HATE Side Terminal Batteries), on the negative battery terminal, and tested the new starter.

SUCCESS!!

Mitchell cleaned up all of my tools and put them away and jacked the truck down and unchocked the wheels.

A job that SHOULD have taken less than an hour, wound up taking 4 hours.

Things I've found out today.

The boys need to learn to NOT touch my tools unless they are going to put them back. They also need to learn that if they BREAK one of my tools I need to be notified immediately so I can replace it.

I don't know if the oil change place did anything to my starter or the wires for my reverse lights, but the marking paint is extremely suspicious since "I" do NOT use yellow marking paint (I use green or red), but I will NOT be taking my vehicles back there ever again. (I used them because my regular mechanic was backed up and it was an emergency trip).

So instead of going to the range today and doing some shooting, I was working on my truck and tearing out some of my hair while being eaten by fire ants.

What did you do today?