meet Red

On the telephone, my first question was, “Is it really pink, or is it actually red?  The pictures look sort of pink.”

I wasn’t sure I was ready to drive a pink pickup truck.  Otherwise, the pictures looked good, and the price was right.

For weeks I had combed internet classifieds looking for another old Mercedes diesel to replace my beloved Naidine, only to find that, at 30 years old, these cars have generally not been well cared-for at some point.  Good ones are hard to come by, and I didn’t want to tackle the prospect of getting a neglected one back into shape.  I had thought of going in a different direction and looking for a little pickup like Grandpa had.  I haul more of things than people these days, and I thought a pickup might be useful.

When the title came, it said the color is maroon, but that sounds like “stranded” to me, so I am sticking with Red.

Red_1

When I test-drove Red, I advised the seller that he might look for a white balance setting in his camera so that the color of the cars he was selling would come out closer to the real thing in his pictures.

Red came with less than 100,000 miles, air-conditioning already installed, good tires, alloy wheels, V6, automatic, and 4×4.  The A/C blew hot because it had lost its charge.  It blew especially hot because the blend door was broken and stuck directing all the air through the heater core, no matter the setting.  The radio worked, but the display didn’t, so changing stations was tricky.  Even though the seller did not know his camera settings, he apparently was skilled at resetting the On-Board Diagnostics.  Just after I had paid for the pickup and it was mine, the very next time I turned it on, the check engine light lit up.

I went to get Red titled, and was told that I needed to get emissions tested first.  I went to emissions, and they asked, “Did you know your check engine light is on?”

“Of course I do.”

“Well, you failed because your check engine light is on.”

Based on the error code printed out on my failed test, I replaced a certain sensor, and by disconnecting the battery for a minute, I reset the check engine light.  It stayed off.  I got my emissions test the next day without a problem.  The day after that, the check engine light came back on.

Red_3

About the air conditioning which now works: Mom and Dad are avid garage-salers – mostly Mom.  She found a sale where a box of R-134a refrigerant recharge cans would be sold.  We went to the sale, and found another buyer haggling over one can, only wanting to pay $4 for it.  The seller said “$25 for all six cans, or $5 for one.”  While my competitor was thinking, I handed the seller $25.  I then sold the man one can for $5.  I had my air-conditioning tools with me this first weekend I owned Red, and we set to work pulling a vacuum and testing it the next morning.  Wouldn’t you know, it held the charge.

The radio display was a simple fix, mainly because I repair electronics for a living.  This pickup was made at that transition time between cassette tape and CD, so the stereo has both.  This is very handy because I still have one of those cassette tape adapters from the 90’s, allowing me to play my Issues Etc. podcast from my smartphone, right on the stock stereo through the cassette well.

Red_2

Overall, Red and I are getting along.  Gasoline engines require a complicated electrical system to make the spark that fires the engine, and there is much more to go wrong than with an old diesel engine which only requires fuel and compression, but so far, so good.  The check engine light is still on, but Red runs well, the mileage isn’t bad, and the light can stay on until I am physically able to do more work chasing down the problem.  We’ve had a few chances to use the 4-wheel drive, like after the bed-liner blew out twice during a storm on the way to a funeral.  The first time it lit in an orchard, the second in a corn field.  I had installed the cam-locks that are supposed to hold the liner down, but apparently they were no match for the wind gusts as I was heading South.  After the funeral I stopped to buy some rubber-snubbers.  I think Red will be getting one of those spray-in liners someday.

I had to wait a few weeks for it to come in the mail, but I now have the most important accessory installed.

Red_4

All I need now is to find a maroon red canopy . . . like the white one Grandpa had on his Ranger.