[s-cars] Thanksgiving Misadventure

[Keith Franchetti]

Hey Tom-

Thanks. Luckily only 92 miles, as we were just about exactly 1/2 way to turkey dinner.  Might look into towing tomorrow. I hear I can join AAA and request roadside assistance at the same time. 

I have a call in to Chris Semple. But I might like bring it north rather than further south (away from me). I do like the boroscope idea a lot. Thanks for the line on a cheap one. I'm hoping NOT to have to tear down obviously. We'll see. 

Keith
 

On Nov 24, 2011, at 10:12 PM, Tom Green <trgreen at comcast.net> wrote:

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> Keith,
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> Sorry to hear your family Thanksgiving trip was ruined and hope the repairs are not too extensive.  I guess one issue is the car is now 200 miles from home.  If you don't have the resources or contacts to get the car to the place of repair, my suggestion is to contact Chris Semple at  <http://www.force5auto.com/>.   He should be positioned to be a good choice for transport if not parts and repair as well.
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> Old fogie Fred  : ) recommended borescope but I suspect you will tear down anyway.  I just saw in the Harbor Freight ad for black friday this little inspection camera for that kind of job with a much better picture of what you are looking at for $69.  I was thinking of picking one up to have in the tool box.
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> Wireless Inspection Camera - Great Deals on Wireless Inspection Cameras at Harbor Freight
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> I hope all goes well.
> 
> Tom '95 S6  
>          '95.5 S6 avant
> Knoxville, TN
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> On Thursday  November 24, 2011, at 4:17 PM, Keith Franchetti <skidfranc at gmail.com> wrote:
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>> Wow. This is a doozy. Thanksgiving Day.  We are generally keeping our sense of humor about this, but it's requiring some effort. I guess you'd say this was a kind of inaugural family trip in the new (to us) car. (This is Bill Perron's former car, the '95.5 Silver Avant, which we just bought in September.) I've put a few thousand miles on it for my work, but nothing too far from home. Today, wife and daughter and I were all loaded up and heading from Burlington,VT to W. Boxford, MA--about 210 miles. Car ran strong first 90 miles. I had just been telling my wife how nice it is that we were giving this car a little more use than it had been getting with Abe (the car's most recent owner, my friend and neighbor, and a member of this list), who only had a three mile commute and who favored his Passatt for family driving. "This car begs to be DRIVEN," I was saying to my wife. Which to her was, "Blah, blah, blah, Audi, blah, blah, Audi, blah." 
>> 
>> About 10 or 12 miles into NH, I suddenly noticed a strong steady vibration. Coasting, it disappeared, reappearing anytime I got back on the gas.  Seemed pretty clear it was only hitting on 4 cylinders. I limped downhill, fortunately, to the exit. Got out to take a look-see, car idling, but not smoothly. First I thought I'd blown a gasket, as there was visible blown oily mist on the firewall, and more was coming. When I pulled the coil cover, the problem was clear. The rear-most spark plug came right up hanging from the melted, FUBAR coil. A look down in confirmed disaster. The spark plug receptacle wasn't even round anymore. And who knows how much debris from the wrecked plug and coil went down and bounced around on top of the piston?
>> 
>> No rental cars or service stations open today. Cancelled on family. So here we've been sitting, eating the salad and drinking the beer we were bringing to dinner, in the car, waiting for the bus to take us back to Burlington, VT. 
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