If it's any consolation, I have a 1969 Lincoln Mark III with the Ford 460 motor. When I bought it the AC compressor was in a box in the trunk. I got a new compressor, had it charged, and installed. Still nothing. Turns out the blower motor may be bad. At first we thought it was under the dash. Getting to it would entail removing the dash and would probably cause the breakage of about a million plastic parts which are hard to source. I decided to forgo that and live with no AC. Just had the radiator recored and installed yesterday. The mechanic showed me where the blower motor was bolted to the engine firewall on the passenger side. To get to it the hood, and fender would have to be removed!!! No thanks, I'll leave sleeping dogs alone!!!

quote:

Originally posted by RogueJSK:

quote:

Originally posted by HRK:
Change a headlight bulb on a Caddy CTS

What the actual fuck?!

A long series of designers, engineers, and management at Cadillac signed off on that?

When I was a police officer I worked lots of midnight shifts. I stopped the same Cadillac for a one headlighter about once a week. Just wrote written warnings. Eventually the owner admitted that the dealer wanted over $1,000.00 to replace the headlight!!! I left him alone after that!!!

On a lighter note, I remember working on my old 1972 F100. They actually made the inner fender wells into seats so you could sit in the engine bay! Those were the days!

quote:

Originally posted by Hound Dog:
they do this crap on purpose in order to generate more income for service departments.

Another example, albeit software vs. hardware: Fuel tank cap issues triggering the "Check Engine" light.

Many, if not most, cars have a fairly programmable communications setup, with screens, etc. It would take, being conservative, maybe a half-hour of programming talent and a few minutes of QA work for the programming of those cars to have the fuel tank cap sensor put something sensible on the display screen and no longer light up the "Check Engine" light. You'd see something like "Loose Fuel Cap" and you'd go tighten it up.

But, no. The thinking process in the development lab must go something like this:

"Let's put sensors on the fuel tank cap, and light up "Check Engine" light when it's not happy. That way, we can both

a) get owners in for 'non warranty' work, since resetting the check engine light is not a "covered repair",

and, most profitable of all:

b) we'll train owners that the "Check Engine" light is meaningless, so that when there's a serious issue, they'll ignore the Check Engine light and we'll get more repair business."

Wow, water pumps inside engines. Okay, there needs to be a lower level of hell and eternal suffering for that one.

I remember going to get a 77 Caddy ball joint for a side job, and the auto parts guy asked if I wanted the $40 Caddy part or the $10 pick up part. He only stocked the one Caddy ball joint.

I had a 2004 Nissan Titan. Loved the truck, hated the engineers who designed it.

Had halogen high and low beam bulbs. High beam, ya know, the one you never use, so it never burns out, open hood, remove cap from back of light unit, change bulb. Now, the low beam, the one you leave on all the time as a driving light, and use 99% of the time in the dark, that one you had to pull the front tire and remove the liner from the fender well.

The starter was, as all starters are, located where it could engage the teeth on the flywheel. Except instead of putting it on the bell housing where sensible people put it, these idiots put it in the "V" of the cylinders, so that to change the starter, a $130 part, you had to drain the coolant, pull the fuel injection system, and pull the manifold to get to it. Then fix starter, buy gasket set for intake manifold, reinstall manifold, reinstall fuel injection system, prime fuel system, refill coolant, and presto, you are good to go. 5.5 hours labor, to do a damned starter.

Just finished replacing the hubs and ABS sensors on my '05 Dodge truck.

10 bolts off. 10 bolts on. Took about an hour.

One of the guys I work with has a 2012 Dodge Journey. He had to remove the front driver’s side wheel to replace the battery last week.

quote:

Originally posted by P220 Smudge:
One of the guys I work with has a 2012 Dodge Journey. He had to remove the front driver’s side wheel to replace the battery last week.

Yeah a neighbor bought his son one, it had a defective horn ring, sitting in the sun it would just start honking the horn and you couldn't stop it LOL

He cussed a blue streak when he found out you have to remove the front drivers wheel to disconnect the battery

quote:

Originally posted by RogueJSK:

quote:

Originally posted by HRK:
Change a headlight bulb on a Caddy CTS

What the actual fuck?!

A long series of designers, engineers, and management at Cadillac signed off on that?

I seriously thought about buying a CTS a number of years ago after driving one that an acquaintance had, he was a Cadillac engineer. Well, until the last dealership I worked at, multi line franchise that included Cadillac.

Once I saw the cluster**** that it was to change a headlight bulb added to many other things that I witnessed changed my mind.

BTW, I retired and got out of GM dealerships four years ago. Last time I knew the price for a complete CTS HID headlamp assembly was north of a thousand dollars.

My Wrangler looks better all the time.

And in answer to the question of who signed off on that, the auto companies could care less, especially in today's market where many cars and trucks are leased. They could care less about serviceability, all they are concerned with is ease of production,cost of production, modular assemblies (supplied by the lowest bidder) and the most important of all, taillights, yep. All the manufacturers and dealers want to see it taillights pulling away, a far cry from the days of "Mr.Goodwrench" urging you to have your car or truck serviced at the dealership.

^ Guy on another forum I'm on has a couple year old BMW M5, got backed into by a MB GLS & needs a new passenger headlight assembly. Est $4k, adaptive LED + BMW

2008 Ford F-150 starter yesterday. The owner tried it himself but couldn't get to the top bolt (there are three). I took out the inner wheel house liner, unfastened the fan shroud so the fan wouldn't hit it, unfastened the right side engine mount and lifted the engine up so I could get my hands and tools between the exhaust manifold and frame. Aaaand … there was no top bolt. Apparently someone had replaced the starter before and left it out. Don't worry, I scrounged a third bolt so it wouldn't leave missing.

quote:

Originally posted by RogueJSK:

quote:

Originally posted by HRK:
Change a headlight bulb on a Caddy CTS

What the actual fuck?!

A long series of designers, engineers, and management at Cadillac signed off on that?

What, you actually want the senior management to actually Supervise their employees? THAT AINT GONNA HAPPEN. Because they are all about gaining a Political advantage instead of actually doing their jobs.

BTW, I'm an Engineer on the automotive supply side and "designs" coming from the big 3 are getting worse every year. Just got a new design for an exhaust tube on a new Volvo. Every single bend has a radius that is 80% of the tube diameter. That will cost Volvo somewhere between 150 to 200 dollars PER BEND. All because some unsupervised "engineer" likes sharp cornered bends. Note, if the radius is 2X the tube diameter it's duck soup to bend and cost is about 6 dollars a bend. I'll also note that in the 1980's the GM Engineering Standard was anything less that 2X bend radii required a Senior VP sign off on that radius.

quote:

Originally posted by P250UA5:
. Est $4k, adaptive LED + BMW

Yeah, that scares me. My '18 and '19 BMWs have the LED assemblies and I'm glad I have insurance.

quote:

Originally posted by Plugugly:
Mom's car, 2017 Chevy Cruze. Some size large asshat of an engineer put the battery under the floor of the trunk, just aft of the back seat.

Chevy engineers took a page from the MG playbook. My 1968 MGB-GT had the batteries under the rear "seat". Well, until the PA road salt rusted the battery compartment. Excellence in Engineering.

I worked on a project in an automobile factory for a year and a half, on the design team for a computer system for the final assembly line. Another member of the team was a retired VP engineering, Ford (he was the guy responsible for the GT-40 program).

The factory was more interested in saving a nickel in the manufacturing process, than they were in thinking about service problems for the future owners of the vehicles.

quote:

Originally posted by HRK:
GM's LT1 Opti Spark wasn't a great engineering idea. Put an electronic ignition under a water pump, down by the crank in the area of road salt, snow, water...

I had one of those and yup, the Opti-Spark Distributor is under, as in sandwiched between the Water Pump and the Engine Block! The Water Pump is shaft driven, which was kinda' cool from an engineering standpoint, but don't get me started on the 'Orange, turns to mud' Dex-Cool Antifreeze!

When the Water Pump fails in the LT1, you replace the Cap & Rotor for the Distributor regardless. The same goes if the Opti-Spark fails...Just vice versa!

OK, so I got started on Dex-Cool...

WTF - GM changed over to Dex-Cool Antifreeze in the LT1 in 1995, supposedly due to the 'long life' benefits of this new coolant compared to the 'Green Stuff', which had worked just fine, since forever. The problem was the Dex-Cool turned to mud and need to be replaced sooner than the 'Green Stuff' anyway....Plus it caused problems with numerous components in the cooling system and ultimately had a detrimental effect on cooling! Curiously, the ONLY part # that changed in the cooling system as a result of the change over to Dex-Cool, was the one for the coolant....EVERYTHING else was the same as previous!

I changed my 1996 LT1 back to the 'Green Stuff' when I had to replace the failed Water Pump (AND the Opti-Spark Cap & Rotor obviously). Reverting back to the 'Green Stuff' required SIGNIFICANT flushing to get the 'Orange mud' out of the Engine Block, Radiator, Coolant Tank, Heater Core, and Hoses. Once completed, I never had another cooling related problem in that car!

As I used to say when I encountered a stupid, hard to hard to repair design...

"The fucktard that designed that should have to change one out every day before breakfast"

Do not get me started on those two piece covered lug nuts like on the daughters Dodge truck... ...especially after the gorilla at the tire shop torques them to a billion pounds. At least I could replace them with regular ones once off.

But you can't loose them all...
Wife took her GMC Envoy by the parts house for a new headlamp bulb and free install. They tried but could not figure out how to do the swap! Great I thought, must be a real PIA. Nope! Much to my delight it was super easy. Tool-less, and maybe one minute to do. Pull up a tab and the whole headlight assembly pulls out... I was amazed!

However... last I looked a replacement headlight assembly... because fogged and yellowed... was over 600 bucks! I polished them. I see somewhat cheaper ones now.

A number of V6 engines make you remove the upper intake manifold (aka plenum) to change one, sometimes both, banks of spark plugs. Some, like Ford and Chrysler, aren't terrible - and get easier with practice - but Nissans and older Hyundais and Kias are needlessly difficult.

Spark plugs have been an issue on Ford "Triton" truck engines, either from blowing out of the head because there are only three threads, or (2005-08 5.4) the plug tips remaining in the head when you remove them and having to be extracted with a special tool.