The Best of Car Talk - #2655: Our Proper Roles

Episode Date: July 11, 2026

All of the great duos throughout history like Lewis and Clark, Batman and Robin, Shields and Yarnell… they all had one thing in common: they knew their roles. And when things went south, with any luck they could blame the other guy. Click and Clack are no different and on this episode of the Best of Car Talk they discover what those roles actually might be.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Hello and welcome to Car Talk from National Public Radio with us, Click and Clack's the Tappertr Brothers, and we're broadcasting this week from the Department of Neurological Research here at Car Talk Plaza. There's no end to the research that gets done in this world. Now get this, Reuters, Du-do, do do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do. Dementia is an illness that causes the loss of memory and reasoning. However, Italian researchers,

get ready for this, in the journal Neurology. The Italian investigative report, two cases where patients with frontal temporal dementia suddenly began to enjoy pop music. Really? Yeah. In the first case, a 68-year-old lawyer

developed frontal temporal dementia. Losing, this is what you lose now. You lose abstract thinking. Okay. Judgment. Uh-huh. It's beginning to sound familiar, isn't it? And language skills.

You know what I'm talking about here? But after this diagnosis, he started to develop an obsession for Italian pop music. And then they go on and they list other situations where these people have, they have this problem where they lose abstract thinking, they lose judgment, they lose language skills, but they gain some new appreciation for pop music. In one case, it was an old grandmother who became buddies with her granddaughter, who was 11. Listen to all that crappy music, and the grandmother said, I love it. It's great. This reminded me of, remember foreign accent syndrome? How could I forget it?

For those of you who don't remember are not up on your neurology. This was a situation where people had an accident. Or some traumatic event. Some traumatic thing. and suddenly started speaking with a foreign accent. And it got a name, foreign accent syndrome. Monsieur, I don't know what is wrong. There has been a terrible accident.

Well, there you go. I mean, that's it. That's just news for today. I think it's fascinating that people even think of this stuff. And we know that one of the previously established symptoms of dementia is feeling an urge to call us for advice. Well, that would make sense. Lose, abstract thinking, bad judgment, and language skills.

It all fits together. What's the number? Those of you feel the onset of dementia, our number is 1-888-8-8-8-2-7-8-25. Hello, you're on Car Talk. This is Patricia from Eugene, Oregon. Hi, Patricia. Hey, how are you guys doing? Not too bad.

We're doing great. May we call you? No, I don't want to call you Pat. I don't like Pat. No, don't like Pat. No, I don't like that either. Your name is Patricia, damn it. Your name is Patricia.

You could call me Rucci. Rootie? Yeah. What is Rucci, pray tell? My last name. My name is Marucci, and they shorten it. My buddies call me Rucci. Rucci.

Yeah, Marucci. I'm going to call you Patricia. Nice Italian girl. So what's up, Eugene? Okay. Guys, I have a 1968 rambler American. Oh! Mm-hmm.

Man alive. Yeah, you're looking for a husband? Yeah. Because my brother is available. And I am short, a couple of wives. I've been looking for one all my life. A 68 American, you know, I was for a few minutes, the owner of a 68 American. Don't you love them?

That was such a piece of a time. My brother knows everything about these cars. Oh, that is so great. You might say he's intimate with them. So, but what's wrong with it? Well, it's, you know, it's a love-hate relationship, of course. Yeah. My mechanics, Bill and Moe, they've completely rebuilt it for me.

What? Larry Bill, Mo and who? Bill and Mo. And they put a new engine in it, new ball bearings. You know, I'm just restoring it. But every time I start it, this puff of black soot comes out of the exhaust. And everywhere I park at my job and at my home and any place that I frequent, there's a pile of black soot where I park. I've told them about this and they think I'm crazy.

They just think that I'm nuts. Well, I mean, why do they think you're nuts? Isn't there also, isn't the tailpipe ball black too? I don't know. Probably is. They just can't figure out why it's doing it. Well, the reason it's doing it is that you only drive 0.3 miles a day. You know me, don't.

A little less than points three, maybe. I never go anywhere. Yeah, that's your problem. Yeah, and you do have an engine that's full of carbon. Every time you drive, think about it. When the engine is cold, what happens is the car runs on a very rich mixture, otherwise it will stall. Do you have a hand choke in this, or a, or, or, you have a hand choke in this? an automatic choke.

It's an automatic. Come on. These are modern technology, these cars. But my windshield wipers only work when I press on the gas pedal. Yeah, well, that's another story. So, I mean, the rich mixture that you have never gets a chance to get unrich because you stop by the time it would be ready to warm up and open up that choke. But I just use regular gas.

It doesn't matter. Gas is important. You have to ask Shemp and Mole there. Bill and Moe. I'm sorry. Bill and Moe. Curly. They're nice guys.

I'm sure they are. You have to ask them to lean out the choke. Okay, lean out the choke. Yeah, the choke is adjustable on this car, and they have to lean it out and make it so that maybe it stalled once or twice and you started in the morning, but it opens up faster. And it doesn't close so tightly. Okay, because they've worked on the carburetor a lot because it was stalling a lot today. See, it was stalling a lot, and they probably closed the choke, and that's part of what the problem is. They did something to it.

that now when I'm driving it, I don't have to step on the gas. It just goes. Right. My guess is, as Tommy's guess is, they adjusted the choke too rich, and that's why you have the black. And they up the idle. They up the idol, and they're trying to convince you not to be concerned about it, because they know if they put everything backwards supposed to be, it's going to stall on you. But it's better that it stalls.

Better than it stalls. And once a week, take it out. Do you have any highways there in Eugene, Patricia? No, we only have logging roads here. No, we have highway, we have freeways. There's one from Eugene to Portland, actually. Take a nice ride to Portland and buy a coffee and turn around to go back. No, you don't even have to do that.

If you drove it up 10 miles every week at 50 miles an hour, it would be fine. Okay, great. Also, I was wondering, would you guys happen to know where I could find any leopard print bench seat covers? I got a couple of them. What size you were? Let me see if we have those in stock. Really? I cannot find them anywhere.

only find them in bucket seats and I've contacted ramblers only and they don't have any and well you may have to you may have to buy like uh 15 or 20 leopard skin bathing suits sew them together see it's great thank you thank you thank you a call bye bye bye 68 you know I decided the other day you know what I want I want a 1960 rambler American convertible you had one of those ones I did that's the perfect car because for what it'll Run all year. Not like the MG. The MG can't drive it nine months out of the year.

It's convertible. Has a roof, windows, heater? None of which the MG has. 1-888-88-88-28-8-8-8-25. That's 888-227-8-25. A lawyer-on car talk. Why did you buy the MG? I don't know.

What a stupid... It's a stupid car to own, isn't it? I'll give you a threaded box for it. Hello, you're on Car Talk. Hi, this is Jamie from Millbrook, New York. Hi, Jamie. Jamie. Where's Millbrook?

Millbrook is by Poughkeepsie, east side of the Hudson. Great. Where's Poughkeepsie? Wait, where's New York? I know what Poughkeepsie is. Just upstate. I know where that is. So what can we do for you?

I have the perfect truck. 93 Mazda B-2200 pickup. Really, huh? Oh, yeah. You're easy to please. You don't have the perfect truck. You have the cheapest truck. So this is my problem.

I'm driving home after work on the Taconic, which if you've been on the taconics and up and down kind of road, going up a hill, and all of a sudden I hear this tremendous bang. And I think, number one, either something has caught fire or number two, the entire exhaust system is blown off of the truck. And? Pull over the side of the road, and one of the spark plugs has blown out of the engine. Still attached to its cable, but it's completely out of the engine.

Isn't that a shocker? It's scary. It's not just one bang. I mean, you must have heard lots of bangs. Well, it was one really big bang. One really big bang, and then... So the next morning, I called up the mechanic, and he said, bring it in, and I limped in there. Isn't it amazing, by the way, how much noise can come out of that little hole?

He actually heard me coming before I got there. I mean, everyone, if you wanted a new appreciation for the fact that Midas can sell you a muffler for $15,000, you should hear the noise. And that's only out of one of those holes. It's like a Gatling gun. And for $15, they'll get rid of that for you. So you announce your arrival, several blocks in advance. I did. And your mechanic does?

He says, you drive a Ford. And I said, no. But it's, well, Mazza has Ford make some other parts of the engines. And he said, was it the number three hole? And I said, no, it was the number four. And he said, oh, happens all the time. Yeah. Get to get a helicoil, we'll place it.

No big deal. Mm-hmm. So he replaces it, right? And then take it out, runs fine. Monday morning, I come back, get out on the Taconic again, go up a hill, and I blew out a different spark plug. Let me guess. Number three? No, number two.

Well, I would say the odds are getting better and better that number three is going to go soon. I've kind of bracketed it now. So I brought it back into him, and he said, you know, huh, you know, haven't seen it where the second one blew out, and he said, you know, do the same thing, we'll replace it. And I said, how long until I replace all of them? You know, is there something else that's going wrong? and he said, I don't know. Do you do your own tune-ups?

I replaced the plugs myself. Mm-hmm. Six thousand miles ago. That's what I thought. Yeah? Yeah. You did it. Not tight enough?

Not tight enough. Not tight enough. Hmm. And what happens little by little, it starts working its way out and pretty soon. What do you do for a living? I'm going to guess. You're not in the construction business. No, he's not computer stuff.

You're a gentle, delicate kind of guy. Not really. What do you do? I teach continuing education. There you go. Teacher, see? The stuff you deal with is paper. You have a gentle touch.

A gentle touch, you deal with paper and once in a while an overhead project. And a spitball. And chalk. And chalk. You know, it's not the same as working on the oil rigs in Texas. Right. Right. You're not a roustabout.

No. No. So I would guess that you just didn't tighten them up enough. I'll tell you, we've worked on these engines since time in memorandum. Memorial, or maybe since 1993 anyway. And I have never seen a spark plug fly out except when the plugs weren't tight enough. And the way he could have verified this was when he replaced number four that blew out. He should have, at the very least, put the wrench on three, two, and one to make sure that they were all tight enough.

Actually, after the number two, he said, well, I don't know, I can tighten them down. And so he did actually go back and tighten those others down. Good. Good. That was smart. And had he done that? The first time you went in, number two wouldn't have blown out. Okay. And I trust that the others are going to be fine from now on. But tighten them up. He did.

Right. Oh, you did? No, he did. Jamie didn't. The mechanic did after the second one blew out. After the second one. I wasn't paying attention to tell you the truth. Yeah, we knew that.

I was reading mail. You had already dismissed, Jamie. I gave him an answer. I gave him a answer. I was actually looking at the details of this frontal lobotomo temporal dementia thing. Yeah, you need that. See it, Jamie. Thanks a lot.

Hey, thanks for calling me. Bye, bye, bye, guys. Okay, Tommy, look, it's the middle of winter. Yeah. There's a cool, refreshing breeze in the air. Yeah. Frostbite on the feet. Do you remember anything about our most recent puzzler?

Let me see. All I see is confusion. I see bafflement. Is there such a word as bafflement? Yes, you're right. It was so totally baffling and confusing that we gave everyone an extra week to work on it. Oh, the magic hat puzzler. Whoa.

The way you asked it, it was kind of baffling. Hi, we're back. You're listening to Car Talk with us. Click and Clack to Tap. brothers and we're here to talk about cars, car repair, and the answer to last week's, and for that matter. Oh, in the week before, the week before, the week before. Well, this was a challenging, abstruse mathematical puzzler. And understanding the question was not the least of the challenges. I think this is going to be as big a puzzler as the behind the doors. Oh, Monti Hall. It's as

counterintuitive and baffling to think that there is an answer, just that there is. is an answer. Never mind what's the answer. Just to believe that there is an answer. All right. Man. Well, imagine there's a magical hat sitting on a table and there are two contestants. You, Tommy, will be one of the contestants and we'll call the other one Vinny. So you're reaching to the hat and you pull out a number and Vinny does the same. And the reason that this hat is magical is that no matter what number you pull out, Vinny will always pull out a number that is either one above or one below your number. You're with me so far? And to make it simple, we'll limit the numbers in the hat to between one and...

A midget. Let's say infinity. Oh, infinity. All right. So each of you pulls out a number. So let's say you pick three and Vinny picks two. I'm the moderator and I asked, do you know what number Vinny has? Tommy looks, you look at your number and you have number three and you say no.

Okay? And I ask Vinny what number you have and he looks at his number and he says yes. Now, I stated that no matter what the numbers, assuming that both contestants answer truthfully and logically. If I keep asking the question of each of them, so I go from you to Vinny, to you again, to Vinny, as many times as it takes, eventually one of them will know without a doubt

the other contestant's number. Is that possible? No. It's absolutely not possible. Well, let's look at the example. I thought this was not possible until you gave me the solution to it. Okay, here's what I want our contestants at home to do.

Take your pencil and paper and draw on your piece of paper five boxes, starting at the top. Five, good-sized boxes. Maybe an inch by an inch. Yeah, or two inches by two inches, whatever. All right, I got my boxes. Okay. I got five of them.

All right. And in the first box, on the upper left, put the number one. Yeah. Upper right, number two. Yeah. And then right below that reverse the digits, two and one. So lower left two. In the next box.

Oh, right. In the same box. Two and one. Okay. So then the box below is going to be two and three, upper left two. Upper right three. Yeah. Lower left three, lower right two.

The next box is three and four left to right. And then four three. And then four three left to right on the bottom. I've got that. And then four, five, five, four. You see the trend. I got the trend here. Okay.

So if you read from top to bottom on the left side, you'll get one, two, two, three, three, four, four, five. Yep. Okay. You know, five, six. Got it, got it. And the right hand column is two, one, three, two, four, three, five, four. I have that. Okay.

All right. So let's see you're the left-hand column here. You're on the left. I'm going to put a tee above that for Tommy and a V above the other one for that. So let's say you have three and Vinny has four. I ask you, do you know what number Vinny has? No. I mean, no.

I just told you, you have three and Vinny has four. What are you stupid? Yeah, I know all of them. All right. No, but if you asked me, if I had a three, I'd say I don't know. Right, because Vinny could. have either a two or a four. And I don't know.

Okay. Now I ask Vinny, do you know what number Tommy has? He also answers no. Mm-hmm. Then I come back to you. Because I could have a, he says I could have a three or a five. Right. So Tommy could have three or a five when Vinny has a four.

Right. I come back and I ask you again. Mm-hmm. Do you know what number of Vinny has? And you answer, yes. I do? Yes. How do you know?

Well, let's go to the previous example. Yeah. Which is one up. You have three and Vinny has two. I ask you, do you know what number Vinny has? Just like the previous example that I gave, you have to say no. Yeah. But when I ask Vinny, what number, if he knows your number, he answers yes.

Because if he has two, you either have one or you have three. Is that right? If you had one, you would have known right off what number he had. Right. He didn't have two. He would have two. And because you didn't answer yes, he answers. He answers yes.

Because he knows. Now, let's go to the first example I gave. Yeah. When you answered no the first time. Yeah. And Vinny answered no. Right. You knew he couldn't have two.

Yeah. Because if he had it two, he would have said yes. Exactly. And because he didn't answer yes, he must have four. So when I asked you the second time, do you know what number of Vinny has? You answer yes. And if you go to the next example, four or five, where you have four and Vinny has five, believe in an audit, goes, no, no, no, no.

No, comes back to you. Yes. So depending on how many times you ask the question, and assuming no one says, hey, you already asked me that question. Asked me that. You already asked me that question. Assuming no one says that but just says, no, I still don't know. Yeah.

Now, if you're thoroughly confused by this, which everyone may be. Everyone is. You can go to the website and get confused again. We go to the Car Talk section of Cars.com, go to the puzzler, and you will see a complete analysis. So is our winner.

Who cares? What a question. The winner is John Peterson from Groton, Connecticut. And for having his answer, picked that random. From the three correct answers that we got this way, we didn't get any correct answers. We just pick anyone.

Anyone who submitted an answer. But John is going to get a $25. certificate to the shameless commerce division at the car talk section of cars.com. And with that 25 bucks, he can get, in time for Valentine's Day, maybe a copy of our best-selling CD, men are from GM, and women are from Ford, calls about couples and cars. It has done wonders for my marriage, certainly. Marriages. Marriages.

Anyway, we'll have a new puzzle coming up in the third half of today's show, so be sure to stay tuned for that. It's going to be, I think, an automotive puzzler. Good. In the meantime, we'd be delighted to hear from you and try to answer your car question. The number is 888-car talk. That's 888-227-825. Hello, you're on car talk. Hi, this is Larry from Brooklyn, New York. Hi, Larry from Brooklyn. What's happening, man? Well, we've got a 93 Subaru legacy wagon, which up until recently, we'd been quite fond of. Most people who have them are very fond of their legacy wagon. Well, I sense a little change in now. Yeah, I know.

That's why I wanted to preface this, but I know that Larry's going to come now. Larry's feelings. He hates it. Yeah. Go ahead. Well, the change is that recently, while it drives well in town, when we have taken it out on a longer drive, after just about

an hour, it begins to vibrate. And the first time that happened, I was on I-95 going up to New Haven, and I thought, well, it must be some wheel balance thing. No big deal. I slowed down. And it didn't go away. In fact, it got much worse.

What was the slowest speed at which you detected it? Well, all the way to stopping. I don't recall whether it shuttered when it was idling. I don't believe so. Oh, that would be important to know that. The truly mysterious part of this is that at about 40 minutes after it starts, it just stops, which has everybody who we've talked to stumped. Yeah, you're right about that.

Gee, I was hoping you wouldn't say that. You was, huh? Well, we did take it to our local mechanic. Who did not find anything that could create the symptoms I was describing. But he did say that he heard a sound from the right inner axle area and that both boots over the CV joints were ripped. The right front. The right front.

The right front. Well, I would go ahead and replace that axle, because it's possible that that's causing it. And it may be that when the thing heats up, the axle is no longer able to flex the way it should as the thing goes down the row. But I would think you would notice some change in the amplitude of the vibration as you slow down.

And also the frequency. In other words, if the vibration were being caused by the axle's inability to flex, at high speed it would go boob-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b. But at lower speeds, it would go, as each time that Axel made a revolution. Right. And you encountered that tough spot.

Well, that may be. And Larry may not have really... It may be. I mean, part of the problem is that we don't go on long trips that often. So it's a bit of a memory task as well. Yeah. And you may not be completely honest with us. And we're used to that.

Okay, now the next thing that's coming to mind is viscous coupling. Well, Well, think about it. Think about it. You like it? No. No. Well...

Have you noticed that it's more pronounced on turns? Well, it's hard to say since on the highway you're kind of going pretty pretty straight. So you didn't notice, for example, when you got off the highway and you were using the exit ramp that it got much worse? No. And I didn't think so. Well, let me mention before the first time I experienced this, there had been some breakwork. done on the car, which I dismissed because it didn't seem wheel-related, but who knows? It probably isn't.

Although there is the possibility. There is the possibility that he's got a collapsed brake line. Boy, that's awfully boss. Unlike. I think it's more likely as a collapsed lung. Oh, I'm struggling here. There is a possibility that you do have a hung-up break. I don't like it.

I don't like it either. I don't like it myself. I'm sticking with the axle. And you know, at the very least, you have to replace the right front axle because both boots are torn. So I would go ahead and do that. And we'll expect to hear from you in about what, two and a half weeks? Oh, about 40 minutes. Next trip to New Haven.

All right. We'll be in touch. Good luck, Larry. See you, Larry. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. 1-8-8-8. We should have asked him.

What does he do when this happens? He just sits by the side of the road. waits for an hour? What makes it go away? It's temperature related, man. I know it is. What didn't you say that? When I said viscous coupling. Yeah, but you failed to elaborate.

You were supposed to jump in and say, uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh. The viscosity changes with the temperature that seizes up. I don't know how a viscous coupling works. That's your business, man. All right. My job is to just come up with the ideas. You're the idea, guys. Oh, no.

Really? Why didn't you say so? Because don't forget, I operate unencumbered by the thought process. So these things just like come to me. So as they float by, they're pulled into your gravitation field? Is that what happens?

And I just toss them out to you and you're supposed to do something with it. Not sit there like a mama. Okay. All right. Now that I know what my role is, we'll be back in a minute. We're back.

You're listening to Car Talk. with us, click and collect the Tappert Brothers, and we're here to discuss, of course, cars, car repair, and the new, I'd have to call it automotive puzzler. You remember my neighbor, Frank, lived across the street. Frank. What a guy. Frank was an interesting guy. And one morning, I'm out for my morning constitutional, and I noticed that Frank is in the driveway

working on his car. He's got the thing jacked up, and I'm assuming that he's changing the oil or some such thing. I don't know. He was always working on his car. The Lincoln? The Lincoln. And, of course, I always made myself scarce whenever Frank was working on his car. Yeah.

And I did this time, too. He was under the car, and I see him working away, and I'm hiding behind the bushes. And after a few minutes, he rolls out on his creeper, and the next thing I know, he bends over and he picks something up off the ground. And he holds it up. It's about the size of a quarter. And he has a look of, I would say, disappointment on his face. Oh, yeah. So he stands there, puzzled for a minute.

Of course, I'm behind the bushes. I don't move. No. I'm still. Like a rattlesnake. Ready to strike. He enters the house. Comes back a few minutes later with his vacuum cleaner.

They figured he's going to vacuum out the car. Hmm. Which point, he attaches the vacuum. vacuum cleaner, there's something under the hood. Attaches the vacuum cleaner? Yeah, the business end of the vacuum cleaner, not the plug. The hose. The hose.

Plugs the vacuum cleaner in, starts it up. Yeah. Gets under the car with this little thing in his hand. The size of a quarter. Does something. Emerges from underneath the car. And with a satisfied grin on his face, he turns off the vacuum cleaner. Yeah.

And the question is, what the hell did he? Now let me get this straight. The thing that he had in his hand, did he have it in his hand as he rolled out with the creeper or did he get it? No, no, he rolled out on the creeper and then he bent over. So this thing was not underneath the car when he picked it up. Oh yeah, it was underneath the car when he picked it up and he looked at it and he said, oh. Yeah, okay. And that's when he went in to get the vacuum cleaner.

Got it. Okay, so you got the whole scenario? Got the whole thing. Now, if you think you know the answer, because I still don't. Write it on a postcard or make it into a screen saver and install it onto a 500 megahertz titanium power book with DVD ROM and send it to Puzzler Tower, Car Talk Plaza, Box 3500, Harvard Square, Cambridge. Our Fair City.

Matt 02238. Or you can email your answer from the Car Talk section of Cars.com. If you'd like to call us, as always, the number is 1-888 Car Talk. that's 8-8-2-782-55. Hello, you're on Car Talk. Hello? Who's this? Randy?

Randy, with an eye at the end? With an eye at the end. Great. Where are you from? I'm in Burlingame, California. Do you know where that is? No, I don't. It's about 15 miles south of San Francisco.

I've been there. Oh, good. It must have been really memorable, huh? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Is there anything there that I would remember? We saw the Burling Game Giants played. What's up, Brandon?

Well, I have a 94-850 Volvo, and I have a golf ball stuck in the frame of the car, I guess. It just kind of rolls around when I drive, and it's pretty loud, and I've taken it to mechanic, actually, a couple, and they can't figure out where it is or how to get it out. Oh, man. What do you mean you have a golf ball? I think, well, we stopped short one time. I think the golf ball was in the trunk, and it just sort of shot up through the car somehow. Do we have any other evidence that it's a golf ball?

Oh, I know it's a golf ball. It sounds just like a golf ball. And it was in the trunk, and you think it somehow got up into something, or down into something from the trunk. Right. Huh. But you step on the break, and you hear, rollo. Yeah, yeah.

And when you start up rapidly, you hear br-ro-bl-bl-bl-and it goes back. Just like that. You do a good impression of the call. And have you looked in the obvious places? Yeah. Like where the spare tire is? No, we didn't look at it. You didn't?

That's where it is. You think? I think. But it sounds like it's covering more distance than that. But sounds can be very difficult to track down in the car. Our imagination is to something. Why else would I have strapped my brother? To the hood.

All those years. At great personal risk. Yes. To whose person? Mine. There's no way for anything that was in the trunk of that car to have gotten into the framework of the car. Okay. And there's no way for anything to get anywhere near your feet, anywhere near your seat.

If it's in the trunk, it's in the trunk, unless, unless. Now, see, don't start clouding. Wait a minute. No, it's possible. is possible to get to the backseat. Yeah, but then it would be in the... That's what it sounds like. It would then be...

It's possible that it's under the back seat. Okay. Yeah, but I would be confident in saying that if you would have rip apart the trunk, including taking out the spare tire... Right. And also taking down the, you know, that felt material that lines both sides of the trunk. If it isn't in the spare tire, well, then you've got to find if that fails, I will ship you, my border collie scout.

If there's a ball... within a thousand yards of her. She'll find it. You put her in that trunk for a minute, and I guarantee you she'll come up with the ball. Okay, I'll hold you to that. All right. She flies first class.

Only. Good luck, Randy. Well, thanks a lot, guys. All right. Okay, bye. I had this problem in my sleek black beauty. When the car was made, someone left somewhere inside the body of the car,

nuts and bolts. and for the entire time that I had that car, every time I hit the brakes, that thing would ro-la-l-l-l-bl-bl-blum. And that's what caused much of the brain damage that I have today. My fronto-temporal dementia. And nothing to do with the glue you were sniffing with.

1-8-88-car talk. That's 888-2-78-255. Hello, you're on Car Talk. Yeah, this is Ken in Bluffton, Indiefton. Indiana. Hi, Ken. Bluffton. Close to Fort Wayne. Okay. Fort Wayne. Gotcha. Where the Pistons used to be from.

Oh, right. Yeah. Fort Wayne Pistons before they became the Detroit Pistons. Right. The basketball team. Oh. Oh, yeah. Is Detroit also in Indiana? No. Used to be.

Used to be. My continental drift is taking care of that. Anyway, what's up, Ken? Well, we have a 1995 Ford Contour. it's a manual transmission, and when you come up to a stop sign or a stoplight or a parking place or something and have it the car idling, it will occasionally make a funny sound and stall. This is with the clutch out or with it out of gear, and it never does it when it's just sitting there idling and never does it going down the road. But when it's idling coming up to a stop, it makes the noise, and the noise is like this, it goes, ooh.

Where's the noise coming from? Well, that's hard to tell. You can hear it throughout the car, and you can't tell where it's coming from. It's not from somebody in the back seat. It's not somebody with a piece of tissue paper and a comb. No. And it's a funny sound.

It sounds like a cow mooing. So it happens if you're coming to a stop, and it stalls before you even get to stop. But then I'm going to guess that it starts right up again. Oh, yeah. Yeah, it'll always start right up again and run normally. I've asked two mechanics about it. One Ford mechanic said he'd never heard of it before,

and another mechanic suggested that the throttle body might be dirty or the mass sensor, and I checked that out, and I found a sign on the throttle body, which said, do not clean this throttle body. Right. So I didn't. You qualify, Ken, for the cockamamie answer of the way. Okay.

Great. Well, I mean, it's an unusual situation. It is. It is. It calls for drastic. It calls for draconian measures. Dramatic measures. Good.

I can hardly wait, man. I mean, did this just come to you? Or have you been developing it as Ken was giving us the details? Before I even knew he was from bluffing. I was working on the answer. You were working on the bluffing them. All right, see if you'll go for this. There is a tube that connects the throttle body to the airflow sensor.

Yeah. Okay, and that tube conveys the air that's been sensed. Yeah. Okay, so what happens is the engine uses the air to combust the fuel, but that air has to pass through the airflow sensor first, and then it travels through this tube, which is, I don't know, how long, a foot or so long, Yeah. Whereupon it goes through the throttle body and into the cylinders.

Yeah. If there were a crack in that tube. I love it already. Okay. That would account for two things. The noise. The moom. Yeah.

And the stalling out. Uh-huh. Now, I know you're going to say that you examine this thing carefully. No, I really haven't examined that tube, no. Thank God. Well, I do like it. And it would also account for the reason that it starts right up again, too. Now, it doesn't take much of a crack to create a leak so that air, what does is it leans out the mixture so that air is going in through this crack and not passing through the airflow sensor.

So it upsets the mixture and the thing will stall because the mixture's all screwed up. You got a huge amount of air and not enough gas called a lean mixture. Right. It would stall out just like any vacuum leak would cause stalling, and then it could start right back up again. until the next time it decided to do it. But I would examine that thing, and if that's not it, don't ever call back. Okay, that sounds good to me. See you, Ken.

Good luck. Thank you. That was very good, Frank. Very good. I had to get rid of him. I knew that we'd have him one for half an hour. Well, it's happened again. You've wasted another perfectly good hour listening to Car Talk.

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