16. North on Highway 1 - beyond SFO.
So there we were, sitting on the dock of the bay, me and DW and Otis Redding.
When we awoke that Saturday morning - April 7 - the rain had passed through the night, and had apparently moved on inland to parts elsewhere, like Yosemite for instance, that proceeded to receive record flooding, due to the rain and some snow melt.
And as it turns out, Otis wasn't really there - apparently I was dreaming. His whistle turned into the sound of a fog horn, and we laid there listening to the sound of the morning starting up. Traffic on the highway, cars coming and going at the rest stop, and those fog horns - all morning. Very pleasing.
The marine layer and clouds slowly lifted.
The people started coming.
There's Lil' Queeny there, along with the one rental Class C and the Iveco unit.
Here's a closer look.
I think that one was from Germany.
And I think both of these were from France, if my memory serves me correctly.
We moved over here, to pick up the levelers, and to prep for leaving. No breakfast, just some of DW's cookies and stuff to tide us over.
And chatted with the folks on the left, some others from Germany. We all had a big laugh over the party bus. These folks had come across Canada in their unit, then flew back home for a time, then flew back and continued their trip, ending up here most recently.
And we headed out of Vista Point...
Sights set for our time-share at Muir Beach, near the Muir Woods National Monument, between Sausalito and Bodega Bay, up the coast on Highway 1 - for breakfast.
At this time, we still hadn't named our truck. Now DW's little yellow Jeep Cherokee is Smiley (he's a boy), and you know Lil' Queeny. We've had Lil' Willy (another boy) for ages - our classic Blue Willys Jeep CJ3B. And last spring at this time we were building Tow-Mater (boy), a 1964 cab-over canned ham Road Runner for the WY Kids. And there's the other classic TT, a 1957 Leisure Home we plan to build, already named Fairweather June (girl). And the classic utility trailer for Lil' Willy named Lil' Spen (boy). But the truck? No name had presented, so we just call it the Big Truck, because it was bigger than the old truck we used to haul our old camper with.
But the navigation system had a name. I think we already mentioned that, SAL as in Search and Locate (and the saleswoman's name for the truck was Sally), and there's the whole HAL connotation from the computer in 2001 Space Odyssey.
But no real name yet for the truck itself, not even a gender had set in.
So off we went in the Big Truck, Lil' Queeny (of course girl) came right along.
Vista Point is on the Marin Headlands. Next town - Sausalito and then Marin City, and then Highway 1 takes on off'n Highway 101 and heads toward the coast and is now called Shoreline Highway. As you pull out of the business district, you climb narrow winding roads through residential areas. We got about 3 miles in and the Check Engine light came on, the chime went off, and the engine lost all power!
'OOOOHHHHH Fuuuuuudge' I think I said. At least it was a loud thought. 'This is NOT good', and I evaluated quicker than you could say "Jack Robinson", looking for a place to pull over.
There was a side road called California Avenue angling in and I turned there, then back and forth in reverse and drive a couple times to get past its stop sign, and into this little, tiny spot made up between that road and Shoreline Drive, and turned off the key.
And the the dark clouds descended.
I pretty much figured I knew what it was, and as I thought about it, I became less concerned.
The first time this happened, we were in North Dakota, starting a trip from near Canada, to the Gulf of Mexico, The Great River Road with the TT. Jumping on the Dodge Diesel Forums, all advice was pointing to Fuel Injectors, because apparently many others have had this same problem and they always replace injectors. Not just the one that's bad, but all of them, because the advice is that when one goes, they all will soon, so while you're paying labor, you might just as well do it all. And don't forget the wiring harness because apparently, these Dodge harnesses are "weak". This is - depending on locale - a several thousand dollar job. And who you gonna trust? A "whatever" garage? That's why my first calls are to the Dealer.
But on THAT trip (Great River Road) I wasn't buying "worst case" without trying something else first. And because the first time it started - the engine codes were pointing to injectors - but it was a minor symptom, not a full-on failure like today. So all the way across North Dakota and beyond, we did the "injector cleaner" thing at each fuel stop. Went through a large bottle. It was still there, and it was slightly worsening.
Eventually, I decided to continue troubleshooting (a lost art), before handing over the credit card. We stopped at a Walmart and bought some spray electronics cleaner, and a small tube of bulb grease (dielectric grease) and I got under the hood. I found five wire harness connectors associated visually with the fuel system. Two on the head (one for cylinders 1,2,3 and the other for cylinders 4,5,6), one connector at the fuel pump, and two at the fuel filter. (Secret shout-out to my Dad and my High-School Mechanics Teacher for teaching me this kind of thing can be done).
I gently removed each connector, spray cleaned both sides of each and let them dry. Then I added bulb grease to each side of each connector, and snapped things back together.
The rest of the trip was uneventful and even the minor (hesitation/surging at low speeds) symptom was corrected!
That was all along the Mississippi River.
The next time it happened, the engine went into immediate major power loss, just outside our subdivision on the highway segment. We limped home, and I fixed it by simply removing those connectors, and re-seating them. I also kind of narrowed it down to actually being just the two (or one at a time) connectors on the head.
You see the computers use less than the full 12 volts of the battery. Voltages are stepped down, depending on need, and that lightens wiring need, so in lesser voltages, a good connection becomes VERY important.
Now, here we are back at Shoreline Drive and California Ave. - kind of co-inky-dink, wouldn't you say? An intersection name like that on a trip like this?
I got out of the truck, and under the hood, removed those connectors, examined their grease levels, plugged them back in, and tried it. Nada - still a problem. But what was really weird is the code reading trick didn't produce ANY numbers, just blanks and a DONE indicator. Wait What?
This was bad. We called the Tow Service though our Auto Insurance.
Long story short, the service was very helpful, the dealer we prepped with, was very helpful, the tow service wasn't helpful at all. In fact they were kind of nasty, and basically told us to go jump in the lake. They said call your service back and get someone else, we can't help you in that area. (We had shared our type vehicle w/camper and location with the insurance company, but somehow the tow company didn't get the memo).
Now we were already dejected. Facing at LEAST $3000 for a repair near SFO and a week or more in a hotel, this was not good.
So before we called the service back to find another tow truck that wouldn't come up here, I decided to try and drive downhill without power, those 2-3 miles into the business district, and set up tow service there.
DW spoke up and said, "What did you do last time?"
She was right. I better do the same, not just the shortcut I had concluded was enough. So I went back out and removed all connectors, cleaned them good with the spray cleaner (in our Spares and Repairs Bag in the back seat), re-greased the connectors, put it all back together, and tried it. Dang - still messed up. But even so we decided to drive down hill as stated.
And then the magic happened! Of course! The computer needs to reset, relearn. So within a few hundred feet or so, the engine smoothed out, and we were back in business! Down in the business district we called people back and canceled plans (dealer, insurance company).
Until this all happened, we had planned to go as far north as Bodega Bay, then side-trip it, to see the CA kids near Santa Rosa. Then after THAT visit, continue north on HWY 1 from Bodega to Redwood National Park, and see the trees, or perhaps eastbound for home. (Staying with the kids for a week during truck repairs was not an option, in case you were thinking that).
But now, under the circumstances, neither of us felt like tempting fate, in case the problem re-emerged, so we jumped on the 101 and went to see the kids, skipping for now, that portion of Highway 1 north of SFO.
Just me and DW and Big SAL. OMG - we had our truck name! That's how it happens! And once again, Big SAL got us all out of another pickle. Bless her heart!
