[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index] [New Search]
I've been off list for 2 days because my mom was celebrating her 80th birthday and she had pretty much expected me to be there. The trip is 400 miles each way and I had planned to get up early sunday morning and be at my Uncle's house (300 miles away) by noon sunday. Of course I was taking my 73 AT/FI squareback. Things started off poorly when I got in the car at 5:30 AM and found the battery dead. Actually I have 2 batteries in there in parallel, because they were both pretty old, but I'd had some trouble with them this winter and I figured they were dead just because I hadn't driven them much. Anyway I put the charger on them and in 20 minutes there was enough juice in there to start, so I added the charger to the tools that I had already loaded in and started off, figuring that a few hours of driving was just what they needed to charge up. A voltmeter confirmed that the charging voltage was fine, so there was no charging system problem. Drove for ~3 hours and stopped for breakfast. Came out to a dead battery. Accousted any number of strangers until I found a helpful soul with jumper cables and started right up. Drove 1/2 block to a gas station and filled up the ~empty tank. Battery dead again. Walked around the gas station until I found an electrical outlet, plugged in the charger and waited. Started after ~10 minutes. Drove on to Indianapolis knowing that it would be okay to turn off the engine once I reached the celebration, as I could always charge up again at my Uncle's house. I don't know Indianapolis well, so I pulled over to the side of the Interstate to check the map. Got my directions, shifted back into D and promptly killed the engine!!!!!!!!!!!!! Dash lights are dim; turn the key to START and they're even dimmer. Not a sound from the starter or solenoid. Now I'm in a fix. There's no help anywhere close. I lock the car, walk 3/4 mile to an exit and a phone. Call the celebration and get a ride there. Later, my cousin Judy took me battery shopping, looped back onto the interstate, and I installed the new K-Mart battery. Started right up and ran like a champ for the rest of the trip. Sure wish we would have just a few warm dry days so I could get some of my preventative maintenance done. The interesting thing was that the car ran fine with just a tiny amount of battery there to help keep the voltage even. Whew! - ******************************* Jim Adney, jadney@vwtype3.org Madison, Wisconsin, USA ******************************* ------------------------------------------------------------------- List info at http://www.vwtype3.org/list or mailto:help@vwtype3.org