I had just crossed into North Carolina when thick smoke
burst onto the Buick’s windshield. 75
miles an hour and nothing but white. I
yelled out loud to no one.
“What’s happening?”
I looked at the temperature gauge on the dashboard and it
was normal. Maybe I’d blown a hose. The engine sounded fine. No check engine light. No warnings of any kind. The smoke thinned a little.
I looked at the semi in front of me, thinking maybe a tire had
caught fire. I couldn’t see the source
of the smoke there. The smoke continued
to thin. I took the first exit I found
and ended up in some small town.
I parked at a convenience store. As I did a wisp of smoke
curled up on the driver’s side between the hood of the Buick and the
windshield. I popped the hood
latch. As I raised the hood a black
woman in the back seat of a faded red Mercury called out to me through her open
window.
“You be careful there sir.
I wouldn’t take off that radiator cap if I were you. You can get burned bad that way.”
“Thanks for the worry, ma’am. But I don’t think it’s the radiator.”
The hoses all looked intact.
The smoke seemed to be coming off the exhaust manifold up by the
firewall. It looked oily. But if there was oil leaking onto it, I
couldn’t tell where it came from. I’m
not good at these things. My big brother
Darwin would know right away.
I walked over to the car where the kind woman concerned for
my safety sat.
“Ma’am, does this town still have a gas station with a
mechanic working there?”
“Yes sir we do, and you are in luck. We have Mr. Scott. He takes care of everybody’s old cars. He a good one, Mr. Scott.”
“How do I find him?”
“Just go on down this street here into town and take a right
at the ice cream stand. Three
blocks. Maybe four. Just go till you see the big ice cream cone
sign and turn right. Go a couple blocks
to the Citgo station.”
“Thanks, ma’am.”
“You welcome. When
you get there tell him Cladie sent you down.”
“I will.”
The Citgo was right where Cladie said it would be. I walked into the small office to find a service
station and not a store. There was a
rack of tires, shelves of motor oil, and bottles of STP. It was a throwback, a
gas station devoted to automobiles rather than snacks. There was a tired Mr. Coffee on the counter offering
free coffee in paper cups. Near it was a
plastic tray of rolled mints put out by the Lions Club and a can with a coin slot
to leave a donation. A young woman
behind the counter was arranging service tickets written by hand.
It was Blaine’s Standard Station in Danvers, Illinois sixty
years ago minus the huge German Shepherd named Tipper with grease on his
coat.
“I was told you have a mechanic here that might be able to
help me with an emergency.”
“We do. You’ll find Mr.
Scott in the back. You may need to wait
a moment, depending on what he’s doing, but I’m sure he’ll be able to help
you.”
I walked through an old door with the paint worn off where
you push it. Apparently, it used to be
green but was most recently, though long ago, painted blue. Both the blue and the green were worn down to
shiny metal where the hands of those passing through that door landed most. I love how age shows itself to us in subtle
ways.
It was a four-bay garage with a vehicle in every bay and all
the doors open. Mr. Scott was standing under a
rusted Ford pickup on a lift removing its oil plug with a rachet. Beside the mechanic, an oversize funnel with
a tall steel hose was clamped to a bucket on casters. He spoke without looking at me.
“I’ll be with you in a minute.”
He made two more turns of the ratchet, turned the oil plug
out by hand, and a thick stream of black oil arced down into that big
funnel. Mr. Scott turned to me, took a
rag from the back pocket of his blue uniform pants, and wiped his hands. His first name was embroidered in orange above
the pocket of his matching blue shirt.
Ray.
“What can I help you with?”
“I’ve got a Buick I’m worried about.”
“What year?”
“2006 Lucerne.”
“Got that big six-cylinder?”
“Yeah, the 3.8 liter.”
”What’s the problem?”
“Back on the interstate it was smoking under the hood but
running fine. Never got hot. All the hoses look OK. I don’t know what happened.“
“Bring it back here, and I’ll take a look. Good engine that 3800.”
“That’s what everybody says.”
I brought the Buick around, popped the hood latch, and
before I could get out of the car Mr. Scott had the hood up and was scoping it
out.
“Look at this. Your
transmission dipstick has popped up. I’m
betting your transmission puked up a little fluid, coughed it onto the
manifold, and that’s what caused the smoke.”
“It was a lot of smoke.”
“Yeah, but it don’t take much transmission fluid to kick up
a big cloud of smoke. I bet it wasn’t more
than a cupful. There’s a relief valve
down below here supposed to take care of that but on high-mileage cars it
sometimes gets stuck. How many miles you
got on this thing?”
“Little over 164,000.”
He reached down with a screwdriver and poked at a gizmo on a
pipe running up to the dipstick.
“This one seems OK though.
That’s curious.”
“What would make a transmission do that?”
“Hard telling. Heat. Too much pressure. They’re sealed units you know. No way of knowing till you open them up. It’s damned expensive to just drop a tranny, open
it up, and look let alone work on it. I don’t
do it anymore. Leave it to the
transmission guys.”
Ray continued to look around.
“You seen this happen before?’
“Yeah. I had an old
customer with a Pontiac Bonneville and lots of miles. Did this three or four times before he
finally stopped driving it. We kinda got
used to it.”
“What happened to the Bonneville?”
“Transmission finally blew.
OK, let’s check your fluid. Start
her up for me, would you? We’ll let her
run a minute.”
I was pretty sure Ray was older than me. Older and knew what he was talking about
too. That’s a combination of qualities that
happens less and less around me. I felt
relieved.
He pulled out that long transmission dipstick, checked it,
wiped it off, did it again.
“You can shut it off now.”
It got quiet. I got
out of the Buick and walked up to where Ray was standing.
“You got plenty of transmission fluid. Has it been shifting all right?”
“Nothing’s changed that I notice. But I just drive this car. I don’t study it. Don’t go by me.”
“You’d know, I think.
But we can take a short drive and find out.”
“I don’t want to take you away from your work.”
“This won’t take long.
I got a hill past a creek just outside of town I test transmissions
on. I want to get out of here
anyway. Let me just tell Ruth.”
He went into the station and said something to the woman
behind the counter.
“You mind if I drive?”
“Not at all.”
“What’s your name by the way?”
“Dave.”
He shook my hand.
“I’m Ray. Where you from Dave?”
“Illinois. About 90
miles Southwest of Chicago. On Route 80.”
“Oh. You’re a long
way from home. You’re out there in black
dirt farm country.”
Ray slid into the driver’s seat, and I got in the passenger
side.
“I love these old Buicks.
Got some room in ‘em, and they ride great.”
He made a few turns, and we were quickly out of town. We were among tall trees. Below us was a winding creek.
“It’s pretty out here Ray.”
“Yeah. Too steep to farm. I like it.”
Ray turned the radio off.
“Engine sounds good,” Ray said. “It’s a great engine, that 3.8 liter. Looks like it will outlive your transmission
though.”
We crossed a little bridge and headed up the hill.
“Good you got a tach in here. We can see how much the engine surges, if it
does, between gears, rather than just guess it.”
As we climbed up the hill the Buick downshifted. Ray put his foot into it, and it downshifted
again. At the top of the hill, the road
leveled off. Ray brought us to a
complete stop and then accelerated quickly.
“Seems fine now. We
can go back.”
When we turned around we got another view of that sweet valley.
“You live in a nice place Ray.”
“Yeah, I don’t get out here often enough. Always in that damned garage. You know though, I’ve always wanted to get up
there to your part of the country to see those big flat corn fields you have.”
“They’ll be there when you’re ready.”
We were just re-entering town again.
“A woman named Cladie said to tell you she sent me. She thinks a lot of you.”
“Cladie raised six kids pretty much on her own. I’ve worked on all their cars I think.”
“You thought of retiring?”
“I have.”
We stopped talking and then we were back at the Citgo
station. Ray parked my car in front and
turned to me.
“So, let me ask you, are you the kind of guy that can live
with a certain amount of uncertainty? Do
people see you as a guy that takes risks from time to time?”
“Actually Ray, that’s something I’m good at. Too much so, my wife thinks.”
“So, you can drive a while with the check engine light on?”
“Yeah. A long
while. You know what I find? That light goes off sometimes. And even when it doesn’t, it’s often things
that don’t matter. I used to get that
light when my gas cap wasn’t tight. What
does that do to damage a car?”
“Practically nothing.
As a mechanic, I hate those lights.
Especially the old ones. They’ve
gotten better. But you can’t talk people
out of fixing something, and I mean right now, if they’re the kind can’t stand
having that check engine light on.”
“So, what about my transmission Ray?”
“Well, there’s something going on with it. After 164,000 miles it wouldn’t surprise
me. And it will probably act up
again. Like my buddy’s Bonneville. Thing is, you don’t know when. Could be ten miles from my station or it
could be a year from now.”
“What happens when it goes?
When it can’t be driven?”
“Well, they don’t blow up.
It’s not like a big bang and a trail of car parts on the pavement. Trannies just fail. Maybe you pull into a parking place and can’t
back out. Reverse fails. Or you go down the road and the engine revs wild
between shifts, or you hear a big clunk when it changes gears. It’s obvious, but not necessarily
dangerous. When that happens just be careful,
get yourself to the side of the road, or even better drive slowly and sensibly
and get to a transmission shop. It’s not
till trannies fail that you know what you’re dealing with. With luck, you could make it back to
Illinois. With even more luck you could
drive this thing another 5,000 miles. So,
there’s something going on, but the future is uncertain.”
“I see.”
“What is certain is when it goes, it’s going to cost you a
lot of money to fix it. But worse, it’s
going to take nearly a week to get anything done, whether you rebuild it or buy
used. It would be great to get it home.”
“It sure would.”
“So, I can’t fix it and I can’t tell you what to do. But if I were you, I’d drive it and see what
happens. You sound like to me like the
kind of person might could do that. Some
people can’t. You know best what kind of
person you are.”
“Thanks a lot, Ray. What
do I owe you?”
“Nothing. I didn’t do
anything. I charge for parts and labor,
and I didn’t give you either one.”
“But you gave me great advice. Surely, I owe you something for that.”
“Nope, advice is free.
You got me out of town and that’s plenty. ”
Post Script: Two weeks after I met Ray, after reuniting with
my wife who flew to Florida one way, we were on our way from Tampa to her
sister’s house in Sarasota when the Buick’s engine raced wildly before shifting
into second. Long story short, the Buick
ended up in an AAMCO Transmission Garage in Sarasota and we stayed much longer
at her sister’s home than anticipated.
The Buick’s transmission was rebuilt and is in my garage as we
speak. I’m taking my wife’s car to
Florida this year, a 2018 Chevy Equinox with 38,000 miles, and repeating that same
trip. I don’t anticipate any
problems. But then, I rarely do.
