As I have mentioned before, last year we bought a rebuilt 1979 Nissan Patrol. This car is at the same time well beyond the scope of my understanding of mechanics as well as being a marvel of simple machinery perfected in the last century.
This has obligated me to learn and keep learning. My main skill has been to listen to the car itself, and learn what all the noises mean. Unlike popular modern electric vehicles, which operate silently and are beyond repair without a team of computer analysts, our Nissan Patrol tells me exactly whats going on with it, as long as I learn how to translate properly.
Luckily I have quickly found a mechanic of confidence. A jolly 70 year old man and his son operate independantly out of a local machine shop, and do custom and general repair work on the classic Samurai, Suzuki, Wheelix, and other models used locally for the rugged access trails. As a sociological phenomenon, it has not escaped my notice how beloved these rural drivers are within the communities they serve, and as such these specialized mechanics must surely be seen as saviors of angels.
They treat me well and help me learn about how the car works. Its complicated, but previous century tech. I strive to understand the wisdom and collective innovation of our ancestors.
One of the first things I detected by sound, before even buying the car, is that after warming up one of the pistons would reliably stop firing. I could tell because the rhythm of the motor changed, with a misfire/rest note misplacing the in-line six steady beat.
With this knowledge, and the basic idea that a motor only needs 3 things (fuel, air and spark), that I was able to find the wet spark plug that was leaking oil. The seller had to open up the motor and replace the rings before we could make a deal.
Now after 9 months of ownership, any problems discovered are my own to deal with.
This new ding in the bumper, achieved while doing road work yesterday, is a non-urgent fix, but will cost a few dollars to get hammered out.
But my current fix is focusing on the charmelas.
To show how the bilingual brain works, which I sometimes perceive as specific type of mental illness, take the following anecdote:
After noticing an unusual sound, and connecting it with a few other data points, I told the mechanics that I had a problem, and asked if they could help me figure out what it was.
After discussion they assured me that the problem was with the charmelas, but they could fix it. They showed me the charmelas, explained what they would do to fix the problem, and everything connected up in my mind.
I returned to my community to explain that I could resume hauling rocks just as soon as we get the charmela problem fixed. Others who presumably knew something about cars, nodded their heads. Charmelas, those are important, they seemed to say.
One lady in the community turned to me and asked, 'Don Alex, how do you say charmela in english?'. To which I responded, I have no idea.
Front left charmela
One of my first repairs was a piece in the drive shaft that should have been greased, but wasn't. I determined to learn more about grease and greasing, and talked to my father, among other people, about the process.
My father told me to get under the car with the grease jockey and find all the grease joints, and make sure that the grease went all the way through and came out the other side.
The guy at the greasing station was more than happy to explain all the intricacies of his job to me from under the car. Before knowing the word charmela, he pointed to them and told me, some cars have grease joints here, but it doesn't look like yours have any.
Well, they should. The charmelas contain the mechanism for controlling the front wheels in 4 wheel drive mode. These mechanical forces include metal on metal operations and need grease to lubricate these force transactions.
The mechanics concluded for me the following things: 1) The can dissesemble, grease and reassemble the charmelas, and can add a grease joint for future use and 2) Driving without 4 wheel drive mechanism activated does not use the charmelas, and thus is safe to do until we get the repair done.
Since I still have not gone through the trouble of finding an english word for charmela, I will offer an undisclosed prize to the first person who can identify the right word for me.