Next Door Neighbors by Pat Sandy for November 04, 2023

It’s a wiggler!

I once had a car where the lock was worn out. You had to wiggle the key to get it started, but once it ran it was extremely reliable. Until the engine blew about three years after I bought it, but by then it was approaching 20 years.

Some people like to say it is a defect. But we know it to be a bit of character.

I had a car once, you had to turn on the left turn signal to start it……

I took a test drive in a Vega. Couldn’t go faster than 25 which was good as the brakes barely worked. Sales guy said it only needed a little work!! Nope, but not being too bright, I bought another used Vega, the bane of my life for 3 years.

All Norm has to do, to get the car moving, is to stick his feet through the hole in the car floor and move his feet, fast.

My 2012 Ram 1500 has an ignition switch problem. I don’t have a lot of keys on the fob but enough that a good bump will spoof the switch into thinking the key was removed and shut down. Easy fix, two or three screws for a $300 part that has to be reprogrammed at nearest dealer, 100 km over in next province

I see it’s one of those crank-free models, very nice.

For another $150, you get the “taillight warranty”. When the dealer can no longer see your taillights, your warranty has expired.

Ah, yes. Reminds me of my first car… a Bobcat Runabout (a lesser version of the Pinto). You basically had to hot wire it to start it. The tape deck would only rewind. Then it stopped working so I had to plug a boom box into my cigarette lighter. Those were simpler times.

“Needs some bodywork but very reliable” sounds like me!