Quirk du jour

[Mike Arman]

And the quirk du jour is . . .  actually two of them, totally unrelated.
(1986 type 44)

Quirk #1. I've been having a problem with the battery going dead because
the radio refuses to turn off. It's a Blaupunkt 9400 (?) CD player with a
removable faceplate. Power to the radio is from the ignition switch, so
turning off the ignition switch shuts off the radio. Or at least that's the
plan. On three instances, the radio has played merrily on even with the
faceplate removed. Replacing the faceplate gives a blank display, and the
radio keeps on keeping on. Pulling fuse 4 shuts it off, which I discovered
after killing the battery dead one night.

Anyway, it pulled the trick again today, and this time, I poked the end of
a paper clip into the "reset" hole, and it promptly and properly shut down.
Yes!

Questions: Is there a replaceable mechanical power relay (which might be
sticking) in this radio, or is there perhaps a shorted diode, which
probably means it is radio upgrade time. According to the literature, the
radio is "microprocessor controlled" - fine, does it control said possibly
sticking relay? Any ideas where I should start looking, or should I simply
not fool around with this and get something else? The radio sounds and
works fine, just a little too enthusiastically sometimes.

Quirk #2. Autocheck is complaining about low brake pressure. Everything
checks OK, sufficient pentosin, good bomb, sufficient power steering
assist, etc. I seem to have traced the problem to a leak in the hose from
the reservoir to the intake side of the pump. It's very wet there, as
though green gold is leaking out, and I suspect that when the engine is
running and there is negative pressure on that hose (suction from the pump)
air is leaking in and foaming the pentosin. Is this likely to be wishful
thinking?


Best Regards,

Mike Arman