Teaching My Mom To Change A Starter - A Photo Journey...

"J. Drew Silvers" (drewcoustic) 01/08/2014 at 09:03 • Filed to: funny, car repair, starter, honda, mom, terminology

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About two years ago, my mom paid over $700 for a brake job covering all four corners of her Honda Accord. This made me mad because I could have done it for the cost of parts. When her starter gave out last year, she did call me and I went over to my parents' house to change it out for her, which was more of a process than I had anticipated. So, I took pictures of every step and wrote her out a photo blog of everything I had done, displayed in terminology and process which she would understand. Maybe...

!!! UNSUPPORTED LINE BREAK IN HEADER !!!

*I tried to put this on Kinja, but I can't center everything to caption the images like I can on my other blog. I researched for an hour and not even HTML helped me. If anyone knows how to do so and would give me a crash course, please email me and I'll take this down and put the whole thing up on Kinja, where it belongs. drewcoustic@gmail.com

JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! > J. Drew Silvers 01/07/2014 at 20:47

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This made me crack up! Think the best line was "It was in that empty hole on the right side, but you must put the new one in quickly because that goes straight to the third realm of hell. The demons cannot escape, but they will reach out the hole and try to steal your tools."

I love it because it is so true!

J. Drew Silvers > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 01/07/2014 at 20:57

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Happy you enjoyed it. :)

leicester > J. Drew Silvers 01/07/2014 at 21:04

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"Whew! The tornadoes did not escape:"

hhahhahaha

Timmy - MINI With a Big Blower > J. Drew Silvers 01/07/2014 at 21:15

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After a bad day working in the negative temps, that made my day! I thank you for that good laugh, sir.

J. Drew Silvers > Timmy - MINI With a Big Blower 01/07/2014 at 21:38

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I happy you enjoyed it, sir!

Big Bubba Ray > J. Drew Silvers 01/07/2014 at 21:59

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Hilarious write up!

J. Drew Silvers > Big Bubba Ray 01/07/2014 at 22:01

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Thanks!

André - Volvo4Life > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 09:07

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Nice write-up! That's a K20A3 motor, correct? I am saving this if my starter goes!

J. Drew Silvers > André - Volvo4Life 01/08/2014 at 09:10

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2005 Accord. I'm not sure on the factory designation. Grab an intake gasket if yours goes. Its a stamped metal piece and comes with an exhaust manifold gasket in the box as well.

RacinBob > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 09:10

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What you didn't mention is here is the battery "tesla box". and its snakes that are biting it. If you don't remove the snakes and carefully set them aside, you will let the smoke out.

The Ghost of Oppo > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 09:11

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Another great write up Drew

timateo81 > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 09:13

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I've given up trying to "teach" people in my life about the things that interest me. For example, my wife has zero interest in learning how to use a sewing machine, despite it's limitless practical potential. I got some minor jollies imagining teaching her to replace the starter motor on her car.

nice blog post.

RazoE > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 09:30

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What is this orange thing on K-series engines? They usually have a spring, don't they?

Stupidru > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 09:33

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Good write-up for an early morning chuckle!

I had a scare last week and thought my starter was on its way out so I gave it a good whack with a hammer and a breaker bar to put it back in line

CalzoneGolem > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 09:45

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The demons cannot escape, but they will reach out the hole and try to steal your tools.

That's where they keep going!

Great write up made me lol and explain to my coworkers that I wasn't actually doing any work.

oldirtybootz > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 09:56

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This was excellent. Someone help this man post it on Kinja!

BoumboQC > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 10:13

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haha, wow! nice one I laughed

J. Drew Silvers > RazoE 01/08/2014 at 10:17

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It's a dummy-proof dipstick for the crankcase. They make it orange so anyone can figure out where it is.

Agrajag > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 10:18

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We shall mourn for the dead tornadoes.

desertdog5051 > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 11:29

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That was funny. Well done.

Depressoiscool > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 12:08

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Awesome write up! Forwarded it to the go, still trying to get her into cars so these things help! Thanks

JEM > CalzoneGolem 01/08/2014 at 13:21

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That was by far, my favorite bit of the whole article, and most likely the funniest thing I will read today. Well done.

J. Drew Silvers > JEM 01/08/2014 at 13:50

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Thank you! I appreciate that.

J. Drew Silvers > Stupidru 01/08/2014 at 13:52

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Haha. I've done that on other cars, but Honda put this one under the intake. I guess it makes sense relative to the flywheel, but still.

J. Drew Silvers > oldirtybootz 01/08/2014 at 13:56

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I hope someone does or at least tells me if its possible to format it properly on here. Linking to my other blog is fine, but I would rather keep them separate.

J. Drew Silvers > Depressoiscool 01/08/2014 at 14:00

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My thing is I will help any of my friends or relatives work on their cars under the condition of them staying with me the whole time so I can explain everything I'm doing. You'd be surprised at how eager people are to learn something when you cut their repair bill down to 1/4 of what it would have cost at a shop.

Good luck. I hope she comes around the the greasy world of skinned knuckles tasting petroleum products.

oldirtybootz > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 14:20

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They wont be centered, but you can post the links from a Photobucket to basically do what you want.

J. Drew Silvers > oldirtybootz 01/08/2014 at 14:25

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Thanks, I'll try that out later. I guess it would make sense for that to work as a URL link instead of a direct upload.

oldirtybootz > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 14:32

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Just remember to use the direct link and not the IMG code like you would on other forums.

Stupidru > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 14:38

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haha yes, sometimes car manufacturers do things that make you go "... huh?"

Take, for instance, the oil filter location on my wife's Forester.

The flanges on the exhaust heat shield are sharp and cut your hand. The exhaust is hot and cooks the oil in the filter when you shut the car off. Go to change the filter and there's no way to get ANY torque on the filter if you're old fashioned like I am and still use your hands. It's about 6" up there so even when you screw the filter off you get hot oil dripping on your hands from the tube and more hot oil on your hands from the filter if you don't drop that down perfectly straight.

Don't even get me started on changing spark plugs on a Subaru lol!

J. Drew Silvers > oldirtybootz 01/08/2014 at 15:43

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Awesome. Much appreciated.

Stef Schrader > J. Drew Silvers 01/08/2014 at 18:31

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Haha, that's awesome.

DasWauto > J. Drew Silvers 01/16/2014 at 14:37

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You can get it to work properly if you use the enlarged images available by clicking the smaller ones on your blog. Then Kinja work try to wrap the text around the images.

J. Drew Silvers > DasWauto 01/16/2014 at 19:08

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So, pull the full-resolution pictures from my other blog via their existing link and post them into my text where I want them in the Kinja editor that way?

DasWauto > J. Drew Silvers 01/16/2014 at 19:15

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Yeah, that should work fine. Issues arise when images are less than 640 pixels wide and Kinja starts wrapping text; this makes it difficult to keep the text/image spacing the way you want it. When images are more than 640 pixels wide you won't have this problem.

J. Drew Silvers > DasWauto 01/16/2014 at 19:44

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Awesome. Thanks for the direction. I enjoy reading your stuff, by the way.

DasWauto > J. Drew Silvers 01/16/2014 at 19:48

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No worries and thanks. I'm here to help.