The Best of Car Talk - #2509: Undressed for Success

Episode Date: February 1, 2025

The list of innovations that Car Talk has brought to the 'radio call-in' genre is long: unpreparedness, lack of focus and a unique inability to take anything seriously top the list. On this episode of the Best of Car Talk we discuss 'proper attire'. Get access to hundreds of episodes in the Car Talk archive when you sign up for Car Talk+ at plus.npr.org/cartalkLearn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

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Hello and welcome to Car Talk from National Public Radio with us clicking clack the Tappet Brothers, and we're broadcasting this week from Murky Research here at Car Talk Plaza. Now, Murky Research division, we gave him an entire division. Well, we did, but he's not a War Battalion now. But... Well, Paul Murky of Murky Research has presented us with poll results. You may remember a few weeks ago, we introduced the Car talk opinion poll. Yeah the weekly car talk opinion poll. Every time we come up with something that we think is going to be weekly it ends up being bi-weekly or monthly. We can't seem to do anything.

Well, bi-weekly we mean this W-E-A. Anyway our first poll question here was should a 16 year old kid have his or her own car? Yeah. First of all, the vote was overwhelmingly against a 16 year old kid having his own car. It was two to one. Like 67%, almost exactly two to one. 67% answered no. And I bet you something like 33 said yeah.

30, yeah. How'd you know that and we also knowing our little cross tabs here we did a few cross tabs and we we can answer the following questions like did women answer differently than men I mean I have to say that my expectation was that more men would be in favor of a 16 year old kid having his own car than women. Most men that weren't hypocrites because they had a car when they were 16 or they lusted after a car when they were 16.

They lusted after a car and they would understand what it was like to have a car. They could empathize. Empathize, that's a good word. And women being more sane, I would have guessed would have said absolutely not. But the truth is, it was almost exactly the same males and females. That was curious. Interesting. And it was again, 67-33 or 32.

32 and a half. Yeah. What about people with kids and without kids uh... people with kids were more opposed to the idea than people without but it was close it was like seventy one percent for people with kids said no and and sixty something percent with kids of get right to the aberrations the aberrations interesting part part of it was an aberration

what about age what about it and obviously it was an aberration. What about age? What about age? And obviously everyone under 20 was strongly in favor. It was like 81% said, yes, of course a 16-year-old kid should have his or her own car. And only 20% said no. But we don't count them. I mean, because they're biased about this whole thing. But everyone who who was a real person in the interest of fairness. We didn't count No, we we encountered them. Of course you know we just we discount them right there. They you three for dollar We hear they can't know it real people people are 20 to 45 all about the same about 65 percent said no they shouldn't and 33 percent said yes, they should

then for people who are 45 to 64 And I think this is the group where all the parents of the 16 year old are the no response went up to about 75% not unexpected and here's the curious thing. Yes I thought so too people who were 65 and older were split almost even, half and half saying yes and no. My brother has a theory about this, but I don't know what the theory is. Yeah, no, I just think that old people realize that you're going to have fun when you're young, and maybe they didn't, and maybe they're having some regrets about that. Sure. Well, more importantly, what's this week's question?

This week's question is this, should the country, that's the United States of America that we live in, remain on daylight saving time year-round? That is abolish what we call standard time and it will soon become, so that daylight saving time will soon become the standard time. Should we stay on daylight saving time? I don't want to influence the answer to this, but when do you need more daylight than in the winter? Exactly.

And that's just the time when we decide not to save it. And what happens to all those hours that we save anyway? Where are they well we had some so that's the question so you can go to the website uh... car talk dot msn dot com and you can vote should the country remain on daylight saving time year-round thank you so much it's been nice being a guest on your show and i'll see you later

great thank god if you'd like to call us about your car or anything else for that matter, our number is 1-800-332-9287. Hello, you're on Car Talk. Hi, my name is Laurie. I'm from Binghamton, New York. Laurie? L-A-U-R-I-E. Very good. Most people want to shorten that right down. To L-O-R-I. Anyway.

What's up? I have a 1987 Subaru GL with about, I guess now about 136,000 miles on it. And for the last two years I've been plagued with this problem of losing antifreeze. You know, the radiator has been replaced and several times I've taken it to people who have done that thing where they flush, you know, water through it to check for leaks. And there are no visible leaks but here's the worst thing about this is that it's getting it's on the engine somehow so the fumes come back at me of hot antifreeze you can smell it yes I can smell it well how come these morons that you brought it to can't find the leak I

don't know I don't know did I answer my You may have. No, I mean if you can smell it obviously it's leaking onto something and if they were there at that moment and opened up the hood they would be able to see exactly where it was coming from. Because it's green, right? It's bright green. Yeah and it's wet. Yeah. And steam would be coming off of it. But my temperature gauge never changes. Well the temperature gauge wouldn't change unless you were genuinely overheating on the other hand if you lose a little bit of coolant under high pressure it will make a lot of steam yeah

because half of what's in there is water right now it steams up pretty easily you can do this yourself if you can't trust any of these bozo mechanics that you've been to then next time this happens very gingerly open the hood and see if you can tell. Don't open the hood. Don't open the hood? No. Gingerly.

The hood should only be opened by a trained professional wearing the proper combat gear. Yeah. Which consists of what? A baseball hat on backwards. Oh, God. Yeah, you'll be able to, able to open the hood because it's not Pssst, pouring out. Just be careful that there isn't any steam really coming out of it.

So open it, when I say gingerly, sort of open it a crack and make sure there's no Psssssss going on. Well the other problem area on these cars is the water pump. So you could have a leaky water pump, a leaky water pump gasket, or you could have a leaky hose somewhere else in the system. And it should be very easily found with a pressure test. What we would do if we had this car is we would find a nice dry spot on which to park it, run the engine with the pressure tester on it and get the engine red hot, and then

if it hadn't built up its own pressure, we would build it up to perhaps 15 or 20 pounds of pressure which is five pounds over operating pressure. This is just a little pump that goes on in place of the radiator cap and you can actually pump it up like a bicycle pump. Exactly. So you can pressurize the whole cooling system. And then you shut the car off and you let it sit there and you watch what happens. Now it's very likely that the same steam that you see is gonna work here for the mechanic Mm-hmm, and he's gonna be able then using this Instrument that he has called the eye

Yeah, I mean this ain't rocket science You have a little pinhole in a hole someplace. Yeah. Or you have a blown head gasket. Oh, oh. No, I don't see a head gasket in Laurie's future. Oh, thank you. I see. I mean, I'm going to just, I have to go into a little trance here for a moment, but I'm getting a very, very strong water pump message.

Ah. Yeah. And I'm also getting a number. $161.50. That's it. You did great. Yeah it just happened to me and I that's what I see. You are an ideal candidate to be on Stump the Chumps in a few weeks. Stay by the phone. We'll call you but get it fixed before you're over again. I mean, you might not have too many brain cells left. I mean, after all, you even called us, which is an indication that something isn't right.

And I listen to you every week, so what does that say? In that little brain, yeah. Right. Good luck. Thank you. Bye-bye. Hey, we've got more calls in the puzzler answer coming up right after this. This message comes from eBay. Picture this. You're halfway through a DIY car fix, tools scattered everywhere and boom! You realize you're missing a part. It's okay because you

know whatever it is, it's on eBay. They've got everything. Brakes, headlights, cold air intakes, whatever you need and it's guaranteed to fit, which means no more crossing your fingers and hoping you ordered the right thing. All the parts you need, at prices you'll love, guaranteed to fit every time. eBay. Things. People. Love.

This message comes from Wyze, the app for doing things in other currencies. Sending or spending money abroad? Hidden fees may be taking a cut. With WISE, you can convert between up to 40 currencies at the mid-market exchange rate. Visit WISE.com. TNCs apply. Here's some news that really stinks.

Garbage is responsible for 20% of planet-warming methane emissions. That's why all week, here and now, is looking at ways people are cutting back on waste. Robot dogs hiking landfills, textile recyclers melting down old clothes, dumpster divers scoring big, and builders deconstructing homes instead of demolishing them. You can hear all that by following our podcast. It's called Here and Now, Anytime. Okay, it is time once again to provide America with the answer to last week's puzzler, which was historic, folkloric, not very challenging because you've got the answer and not terribly interesting. I got the answer.

But hey, 248-4 ain't bad, right? I don't even know the question. You didn't need it. I didn't need the question and I got the answer but they taught a for ain't bad right don't even know the question I didn't need the question that I got the answer anyway well at the time you needed the question ah I remember some time ago I used a puzzle regarding the man who was responsible for introducing to America the car radio that's right his name was Lear yeah Norman Lear he later went on to write the famous show all in the family with Archie Bunker.

That guy. Bill Lear was his name. Yeah. From Lear Jet fame. Yeah. Sure. And the radio was called the Motorola. Motor-ola. Great name. Vict name. Yeah. Bill Lear, as it turns out, invented many things, but he also invented another car related device that was popular in the 70s. In fact, the car I owned had one, and it was something you would find in the dashboard of cars of that ilk, but you'd hardly ever find one on a car anymore. Yeah. Unless it was from that era, I suppose. Hmm. The question very simply was, what was it? And you immediately... Yeah, jumped right in. Jumped right in and figured out the very simply was what was it and you immediately Yeah jumped right in. Jumped right in and figured out the answer and what was it man? Can't remember. It was an 8-track player. There you go an 8-track tape player. For those of you that don't know we have a lot of young

listeners and a lot of real old listeners. I mean it's easy to have never seen an eight track player. Yeah, the eight track was a continuous loop of tapes. It would just keep playing over and over and over again. Yeah. And there were eight tracks on it so you could switch from it was brilliant. I don't understand what happened to that. That was a great technology. There was something wrong. They jammed up all the time. I threw away more tapes. You never knew what was on any of those tracks. You never knew what was actually happening when you pressed the button. Oh, no. Because if you were trying to find something you had just listened to, take your week.

Oh, yeah. Hahaha! Yeah, geez. Hey, that's good. Actually, I want to say that I willed all my eight tracks to John Sebastian Lawler. Who now has them all. He has them all, because he is the only one around. He has almost Paul Moriart tapes. Maria Moldor was big in those days.

OK. Do we have a winner? Come on, man. Come on, between the poll thing and this one. We're not going to take any calls today. The show's already half over. The winner this week is Ed Mazurek. Mazurek.

Mazurek. Mazurek. M-A-Z-U-R-E-K. From Mibane. M-Eurek. Mazurek. Mazurek. Mazurek. M-A-Z-U-R-E-K. From Mebane. M-E-B- Mebane. M-E-B-A-N-E.

I think Mebane. Mebane or Mebane or Mabane. Mabane. Mabane. North Carolina. Isn't that the state that Jesse, and Ed for having the correct answer chosen at random from those thousands of correct

Oh, and they were our pal Ed is gonna win one of our car talk sistine wrench t-shirts this is just like the one that Michelangelo painted except there is a strategically placed adjustable wrench and God is handing it to my brother Saying go forward my son and fix those boat payments. Well, congratulations Ed. We'll have a puzzler coming up in the second half of today's show. Notice I didn't say no because it may be a use-on, but you'll see why.

So don't touch that dial. In the meantime, we'll take your calls at 1-800-332-9287. Hello, you're on Car Talk. Hi guys, how you doing? Good, who's this? This is Marisha calling from Colorado Springs. Who? Marisha. Marisha.

M-A-R-I-S-C-H-A. Oh, so close. No C. M-A-R-I-S-H-A. Yes, just like it sounds. Like Marisha and Marisha put together yeah I don't know why I threw that C in there I was I was thinking of Eastern Europe what is this name you named after st. Marisha you know I have no idea my grandmother

named me she heard it in a restaurant I'm probably It's a good thing she wasn't getting her oil changed. Maybe a side dish. Your name might have been Jiffy. Where are you from Marisha? Colorado Springs. Colorado. Okay, we're ready. Okay, here's the problem. I have a 93 Subaru Legacy wagon. And for some reason, my left rear tire is making this really strange sound

It kind of sounds like Let's see. How would I describe it? Like if you have a rock in your tire, you know But it doesn't do a tick it doesn't wash wish so when you go slow goes whoosh whoosh Which and then as you go faster goes whoosh whoosh was and then when you get going really fast it goes So it kind of uh... and higher-pitched sound then you know when you're driving on the highway up to about seventy five it does that and then at seventy five the kind of

smooth out and doesn't really make too much of a pound and i don't plan to get that point that we'll have to touch the ground anymore now i know it's been a grand because it's making the whole car vibrate. Yeah, you have a bad tire. A bad tire? Yeah, you have a tire which is a classic case of tread separation. Huh.

Yeah, if you were to lift up that corner of the car and spin that tire and watch as it spins watch the tread, you will notice a perturbation in the tread. You'll notice a deviation, a lump. You'll notice some place where the tread doesn't look the same, doesn't look parallel to the other tread. You have like five treads going across, five grooves going across the tire.

One of them or two of them is gonna be screwed up. And you're gonna say, wow, look at that! How many miles on these tires? Um, you know, I have no idea. I got them used. You got them used? You bought used tires? Yes. How much did you pay for these here used tires? Oh, I think 25 bucks a pair.

A pair? Mm-hmm. Double occupancy. Excellent. How long have you had them uh... there's no probably had a lot three or four months i mean i looked at the time it looks fine yeah you can't tell you have to spin it i think you need to do this soon

like i like now okay i'm so you know have you created damage to my car mean no no but it can create damage to your car if you have like a blowout and crash into a tree. This tire is getting ready to self-destruct. Were these used tires and not retreads? They were used tires and not retreads. Well, chances are the other three are okay. Okay.

So you need to buy one. Cool. Cool. Good luck. Thanks guys. See you Marisha. Bye bye. Bye bye. 1-800-332-9287. Hello, you're on Car Talk.

Hi there, this is Dan in Atlanta. Hey, Dan, how are you? I'm well, how are you? Uh, pretty good. We're having a hard time today. Yes. We are. I don't know what's going on. My brother just took his pants off. Look at this multi-million dollar studio here. It's a hundred degrees in here.

You sweating? Yeah, I'm dying. But, uh, it's not like we're drinking hot chocolate. What's up, Dan? Alright, uh, my situation, first of all, my car is a 1992 Acura Integra. Yeah. And, this, I have to give you a little background on the situation to uh... help explain i live in a duplex and a gentleman has been living in the basement of this house

yeah and this gentleman in the mechanic and it's just a small tiny little dungeon of an apartment that he lived down in the basement and for the most part most mechanics live in little dungeons okay he rises very early in the morning and basement and for the most part most mechanics live in little dungeons okay he rises very early in the morning and

uh... in his doorway and read this paper and so every morning as i go out and get in my car and start it up and drive off he's there hearing me start this car haha and probably about two months ago i drove home one day got out of my car was just proceeding into my house when he said came out you better adjust those valves Sonny exactly

he well first he just started inquiring about have I had my oil changed recently have I put in a new filter am I leaking oil yeah and he continued to ask me these questions on occasion when I'd come home and I would for the most part disregard his inquiry yeah yeah just a strange old peezer. Because he was just an annoying little troll. Troll under the bridge. And it was probably two weeks ago I came home one time and he said, I really think you have a problem.

He said, I believe that your car is not building up oil pressure. Really? I mean, is this guy currently employed art he's just sits there with the paper all day now he is employed he he works in a small garage not too far from where we live uh... about two minutes later there's a knock on the door and it's this gentleman and he's written out for me

everything that i should have checked uh... in regards to this problem that he thinks exist really what a wonderful and nice and i consider it it's all i can read you the things that you wrote out that i thought the oil pump was not producing pressure and he could tell that because he could hear the valves clacking away exactly so i had to take my car to my mechanic for unrelated problems but you're

well while i have it in there all mention this to them and give their opinion on it took the car and they let it sit overnight and did a cold start. And when I went back to pick it up the next day, they said, we don't think you have a problem. And their explanation was this. They said that the engine for the Acura,

like the engine for, I think this is the Honda Prelude, the clearance on the valves is so small and so close that when it's cold and you start the car up, you're going to hear rattling and it's just a noisy engine. But that once it warms up, that noise should go away and there really is nothing to be worried about and no problems. Well, it's interesting. The one piece of information that you mentioned was that one day when you were coming home from work, he stopped you and evidently having heard your engine when it was warmed up, he still felt you had the problem. See, here's the thing with oil pressure.

When you start the engine in the morning, the engine is cold. You get lots of oil pressure because the engine's cold. And the engine's revving. And the oil is viscous. And if the story they have about the clearances is true, and I don't know that it is or not, then maybe that would cause engine noise when it first is started,

but it's not because of oil pressure. Later, when the engine warms up, like when you're on your way back home at night, and when you get home, the engine is all warmed up, and that's when the oil pressure is the lowest. So when you pull into the driveway, you now have the oil which is at its hottest and you're idling so the engine revs are down and therefore the oil pressure is at its very lowest. If you have the noise then, then these guys are not right. See, unfortunately these guys didn't really do anything

because all they did was start it up and listen to it. What they should have really done is measure the oil pressure when the engine was hot if they really cared about you. Like this guy does. Well, let me throw in this factor as well. Uh oh. Our landlady, she has known this mechanic, known this gentleman longer than I have. I mentioned this to her and she said don't let him anywhere near your car. Boy. Oh, oh. So maybe I need a third party to take this to yeah, so you gotta I think you have to go to a neutral party

I agree and ask them simply Warm up the car and tell me the oil pressure cold and hot You want an office with inspect? Okay, if it is don't worry Okay, Danny, baby. Thanks so much guys. See ya. Take care. Bye. Bye Don't go anywhere. Stick around for more calls and the new puzzler coming right up. Hi, we're back. You're listening to Car Talk from National Public Radio with us, Click and Clack the Tappet Brothers, and we're here, of course, as always, to discuss cars, which we seldom do, car repair, which we seldom do, and some interesting signage. Now, I had a signage block the other day.

Did you use a nasal spray for that? How long have we been doing this show? 20 years. So I'll do and some interesting signage now. I had a signage block Use a nasal spray for that. How long we've been doing this show 20 years, you know what? I just figured out When the microphones are on that little light comes on Oh Wow, and when that light is off the microphones are off get out of town 20 years well, it took me 20 years and 2 minutes. It never occurred to me that... Here's the interesting sign. It's sent to us by John Tegler from God knows where.

It's in Arizona, isn't it? These are presumably some actual signs that people have seen in various places. For example, at a Santa Fe gas station is a sign, we will sell gasoline to anyone in a glass container on a long established New Mexico dry cleaning establishment. Thirty-eight years on the same spot. I mean and talk about uh... that choice of words in the office of a loan company

ask about our plans for owning your home uh... on a main shop our motto is to give our customers the lowest possible prices and workmanship uh... our motto is to give our customers the lowest possible prices and workmanship well whoever only stores thought when they were in the eighth grade the grammar was not going to be important in their lives yes

what's even sad about these is that after posting the size they didn't in all i have realized i had and because why because most of the people who came to and saw the signs didn't notice there was anything wrong either. Yes. It was just a general dumbing down of the entire American population. 38 years on the same spot. I mean, you know, when I was a kid, I was below average in intelligence.

And now I'm considered a genius. Because everyone else has gotten so stupid. I think it's great. OK, now here's the puzzler for this week. Now I've thought about this a lot, and I have a whole bunch of puzzles, but I have to revisit this puzzler from yesteryear for a variety of reasons.

Number one, it was very... I know one of them. You found out the right answer. All right. Number of reasons plus one. Plus one. Number one, it was perhaps, it is perhaps, one of the best puzzlers of all time, I think. Monty Hall?

Number two, we haven't used it in so long that the people that heard it then, are dead. Oh, they forgot. Here it is in its simplest form. You may remember the game show. What was that game show? Let's make a deal. Let's make a deal. Yeah.

Where the contestant was presented with three doors. Door number one, door number two, and door number three. Behind one of the doors was a wonderful prize, and behind the other two doors were crummy prizes known as zonks. Yeah. And very simple. Like a couple of candy bars or some such thing. Exactly.

Something not worth much. Exactly. 63 dodge dart, anything like that. Here's the deal. You are the contestant. I'm the contestant. Monty Hall says pick a door. Your chances of picking a Zonk are two and three, and your chances of picking the winner

are one and three. Right. He says, okay, you picked door number two. I'm going to show you what's behind one of the doors that you didn't pick. Now, because there are two zonks and one winner, and he knows where the winners and the zonks are, he shows you one of the doors that you didn't pick that's clearly a zonk. So he says, I'm going to show you what's behind door number one. And he looks behind door number one.

And it's six candy bars. Six candy bars. He then says to you, would you like to keep door number one. And he looks behind door number one. And it's six candy bars. Six candy bars. He then says to you, would you like to keep door number two which you've chosen, or would you like to switch to door number three? That's the question. Should you switch or not switch? Now, if you think you know the answer,

or just feel sorry for the post office in this age of email, and you want to give them something to do Send your answer to puzzler tower car talk Plaza box 3500 Harvard Square, Cambridge our fair city man 02238 or if you prefer you can email us your answer from our website car talk MSN calm Just click on the talk to car talk section. Now if we choose your correct answer at random from among all of the correct answers that we receive,

you will get a Car Talk Sistine Wrench T-shirt. Car Talk's first attempt and probably last at fine art. And we don't say when you'll get it, you will get it. You shall get it, you might. At some time. You probably will. In the future. Our number if you'd like to call us is 1-800-332-9287.

Hello, you're on Car Talk. This is Daniel from Falmouth, Maine. Daniel, look, before we start, we spent a lot of time on just a couple of calls here, so we're going to have to really hustle. So we're going to give you the bum's rush. You don't mind, do you? I don't mind. Okay.

I'll try to be fast. Ask us something like with a yes or no answer. Yeah. What? I won't. I could ask a lot of you. You do whatever you want. Okay.

Here we go. I have a 91 Stanza, Nissan Stanza. It had a lot of transmission problems. Basically the thing had to be rebuilt and it took them three or four times to get it right eventually medical manual automatic yeah uh... and they got the transmission square away pretty well shortly after finally getting it fixed

i began to have uh... the following problem overheating the no okay no don't go but what does one of the taken up more time iraq i thought i was going to be faster yeah i'm sorry if i uh... after driving this car for a few miles if i turn the wheel sharply for

example like pulling into a a parking lot ninety degrees from the direction of the house there is a very loud, very forceful vibration from the front end, like that. And the noise occurs from the same side whether you're turning left or right or is it? The whole front end seems to shake hard. If I'm partway through the turn and straighten the wheel out, it goes away. And it has never happened like if you were coming off of the highway and taking an exit and taking a pretty sharp turn to come off an exit or it would

i've never had it happen uh... under those circumstances okay my brother's sorry i asked that question you know i'm not sorry no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no So I had I I had him I took it back to the transmission place had him put it up on the rack Their opinion was that actually it had nothing to do with the transmission. They were sick of seeing me obviously But but they thought that that there was some issue going on with the brakes where the where a break or both breaks We're sort of heating up and grabbing brake or both brakes were sort of heating up and grabbing. I don't think so. You can get this to happen making your tight turns without stepping on the brake. Absolutely correct. I don't have to step on the brake. Well, I think they're right that it has nothing to do with the transmission,

but I think they're wrong that it has something to do with the brakes. Okay. I mean, the thing that comes immediately to mind is that you have a bad axle, a bad constant velocity joint. That's the thing that comes to mind immediately. You know, I asked them if it could be the CV joint and they said, oh no, no, no, it's not that. Well, but this was a transmission place. Yeah. So they wouldn't know. Really? No. Do you have a regular shop?

A regular doctor, so to speak. Right, who's your primary care mechanic? Who's your primary care mechanic? My gatekeeper. Yeah, not really. But I could take it to the dealer. Well, you could. See, the problem is because you don't have a primary care person, you have no one that's going to go out of his way for you. The transmission guys we know hate you. Right. They do.

Very, very badly. So you really can't, I mean, they don't want to see you anymore. They don't care, quite honestly, if the wheels fall off and you die. Matter of fact, they don't want to see you anymore. They don't care quite honestly if the wheels fall off and you die. Matter of fact, they may be hoping that happens. So I was going to suggest if you had somebody that was willing to quote work with you a little bit, you could ask that person to replace one of the axles or maybe both of them and see if the noise goes away.

I suspect that that's going to solve it. Okay. Let me ask you this. If it is the CV joint or the axle, am I in danger here of something not yet happening? No. As a matter of fact, the best way to approach this, if it were my car, if I were you, is I would let it go until it gets worse, until in fact it begins making the noise under the circumstances that my brother explained 25 minutes ago. Yeah. So a more gentle curve. Yes, exactly. Exiting a highway on a ramp of constant radius of curvature.

You get the... But when that happens, you'll know you have a bad axle. So now the next question is going to be, you know, how much money and is it worth even doing it or should I just get rid of the car? It's a few hundred bucks an axle at the very least. All right. I will do that. Do we answer any of your questions. No Actually, it was very it's very helpful because I doubted this brake diagnosis

Hey, that was the yes or no part of the yeah Here you go. I have a question for you. Is it the brakes no, okay? Well it's happened again you have wasted another hour listening to Car Talk. Our esteemed producer is Doug the Subway Fugitive, not a slave to Fashion Berman. Our associate producer and Dean of the College of Autobusiness College is Ken Babyface Rogers. Ken is due for a new name. He is. Yeah, he needs something bad.

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