The Best of Car Talk - #2680: Men in Minivans

Episode Date: October 6, 2026

Craig needs a minivan for his work but realizes that guys driving minivans have a reputation as, well, eunuchs. Can Click and Clack -both recovered minivan drivers- help Craig ‘man up’ here? Find out on this episode of the Best of Car Talk.Support public media with NPR+ and enjoy perks for over 25 podcasts like this one. Car Talk's perks include full archive access, new call-in bonus episodes with Ray, and sponsor-free listening. Learn more at plus.npr.org.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

Welcome to Car Talk from National Public Radio with us Click and Collect the Tappert Brothers, and we're broadcasting this week from the patient care department here at Carataw Plaza. Yeah, I know this is all true. I mean, it came over the Internet so you know that it's all true. Oh, yeah. And these are sentences that were found in patients' medical charts. Where did you get these from? Bogus.com?

Bogus.com. Right. You know how the doctor always scribbled something on the chart and hangs in front of the door of the hospital room? Evidently, someone's got nothing better to do there than go around and read all those and take out excerpts and put them. A compilation of excerpts. Yeah. Here's one. Patient has chest pain if she lies on her left side for over a year.

You don't have chest pain, too. That's a doctor who forgot to take English. But you can't do everything. The patient is tearful and crying constantly. She also appears to be depressed. I mean, this is a man with great insight. Patient has refused autopsy. Patient seems to be numb from her toes down.

Man has occasional constant infrequent headaches. I have those too. She stated that she had been constipated for most of her life until she got a divorce. There were more. I think that's enough to keep us going. Well, if you have constant infrequent, occasionally infrequent, occasional headaches about your car, you can call us at 888 Car Talk.

That's 888-227-8255. Hello, you're on Car talk. Hi, this is Kara from Philadelphia. Kara with a C? Kara with a K. I knew it. Kara? From Philly.

Yep. All right. I have a 95 neon with a recent scary break problem. It had just been inspected at the dealership, and everything was fine, and I took it out on this drive to New Jersey. And about an hour into the drive, I was out on a highway. I went to hit the brakes, and nothing happened until the brake pedal was about halfway to the floor. And eventually it did break. And this continued intermittently for the rest of that trip.

And so then... So you continued to drive it, even though you would... Sure. Hey, she was in a hurry. She was going to New Jersey. Well, it's a stick shift, and I had a backup plan, like, down-fitting New Jersey. Right, but there's no logical explanation for this, but go ahead. And eventually it would break every time.

And so the whole trip back, it didn't do this at all. That was two days later when I came back, but it started to make this noise. And this noise is like, if I start going, it starts slowly and get faster, like, until I put the break on. Once I put the break on, no more noise. I love it. So after that first time it happened, we took it back to the dealership. They looked at it, they said to my husband, your brakes are fine.

And so then I took it on a trip to West Virginia. The whole way to West Virginia, no problem. The way back from West Virginia, about an hour into the trip, breaks start doing the same thing. And now that noise I told you about what was happening again. And then the break started making a squealing kind of noise too. See, I can't imagine there's anything wrong. When you drove to West Virginia? Yeah.

And it didn't misbehave. The whole way there was fine. Was it cloudy or rainy? It was cloudy and rainy. I was going to ask her if the day it happened in New Jersey if the sun was out. The sun was out the day happened in New Jersey. Yeah, we have not. I have no idea.

Well, what's happening is that you have a hung-up brake and you have either a stuck caliper such that it's not releasing the brace. It's the equivalent. The reason you hear the teat-tee-tee-te-te-te-te-te-te is that you're driving with one of the brakes on all the time. And the brake by staying on eventually overheats the system and causes the fluid to boil. And when it boils, the pedal sinks to the floor. And the reason it didn't happen on the cloudy days is that the ambient temperature wasn't high enough to cause everything to happen as fast.

You know, to have the heating uptake place as much. In other words, the heat was being dissipated more readily by the rain and the cool air temperature. And the reason they didn't find anything is that they didn't drive the car long enough to get the thing to stick. The reason it does it for you when you've been driving the car. It's sustained high speed. Right. So what you need to do is take it out and drive the thing long enough. for it to misbehave.

Then you need to dash into the dealership, grab the shop foreman, have him get in the car with you, have him hear the noise, and then if you're lucky, they'll put it right on the lift, and they'll send the car up, and they'll spin the wheels,

and they'll find out that one or more of them is stuck. And that's where your problem is. But you've got to fix it because you're going to die. Is it dangerous? And you could die in New Jersey, of all things. That's what I was scared about. That's what I called you guys. Yeah. Yeah, no, this is dangerous.

It is dangerous. I'm going to send my husband back to this dealership in South Philly where they already think he's crazy. Well, if you do nothing else, buy a good life insurance policy. See you later. Thanks a lot, guys. Do it right away. Don't wait. Okay, thank you. 1-888-8-8-8-2-7-8-25-5.

A lawyer on car talk. This is Dr. Ralph Armstrong in Monroe, Louisiana. Hi, Dr. Ralph. How are you? Very, very well, thank you. I've got a 93-suburban. Wait a minute. What kind of a doctor are you? I'm a gynecologist. Ah, okay.

But I've got a 93 Suburban that about two weeks ago, I turned off the ignition, and a clicking sound started under the dashboard, and it lasted about 20 seconds, and I turned the ignition back on, and it came back on again. I have a recording of it here that I can play for you. And it comes on every time that I turn on the ignition, and it lasts 20 seconds because I've timed it. and then when I stop and turn the ignition off, it comes on for 20 seconds. You can set your watch by it. Yes, yes. Here's the sound.

I've got a recording here. But that's the sound that it does. Got it. I got it, too. Remember that? There's a quiz show that used to be on. We were kids called Beat the Clock. No, no.

But, you know, it's so regular. It sounded at first like maybe there was something alive under the hood, and I looked, but there was nothing there. Yeah, Woodpecker. I mean, it's definitely woodpecker sound. A little slower than a real woodpecker, but very close. Do you listen to the radio? Yes. Do you have a power antenna?

No, no. It's just a regular antenna with... Oh, a bummer! Well, you know, I've turned the air conditioner on and off. It's not affected by that. It doesn't affect the functioning of the car I still drive. Yeah, no. I think it has something to do with the heating and ventilation system.

I like it. Under the dash, there are vacuum motors. Actually, they're not really motors like you would think of a motor in the tradition. sense, but it is a motor and then it moves a door. Right. When you apply some force to it, it moves the door. Like vacuum. Happens to be vacuum.

Oh, I see. And what's happening is you're hearing that flap, flap, flap, flap, flap. Play it again. Let's see if we really believe this story. Let me see if I can turn it out again. Oh, high piss. I'm getting to kind of like it as a matter of fact. Yeah, I mean, why would you want to get rid of it?

No, I mean, you've obviously said that it has no effect. effect on the performance of the car, you know, so why bother? But I think it's one of those doors that's either when you shut the car off, you interrupt the source of vacuum. Uh-huh. So the door, which is being held open by the vacuum keeps going, pip, pip, pip, pip. It'll open close, open close, and it'll pop, pop, blah, blah. Until finally the vacuum, its source is gone completely.

It goes down to zero and the noise goes away. Okay, but you don't think it's dangerous by leaving it unfixed for a little while. Our lawyers have told us not to ever say that. Right. Everything has the potential to be dangerous, Dr. Ralph. I'm familiar with that. You think that you got malpractice insurance. Yeah, you ain't seen nothing. It's killing us.

That's a concept I'm fully aware of. Yeah. But it sure doesn't sound to me like it's dangerous. Okay. So you need to stick your head up under that dashboard, and you'll find it immediately. Okay. I was a little afraid to do that because, you know, I don't want to do anything to hurt my hands. That's the main thing.

That is important. There's nothing up there. They can hurt you. Okay, good. Good luck. Thank you very much. It's a rattlesnick. It could be a rattler.

Louisiana could watermarkets it. It could be under that dashboard. Sounds like a rattlesnick, doesn't it? It does. I wouldn't. Is he still there? He's gone. Don't do anything.

Take it to the deal. See you later. Thanks, Dr. Ralph. Appreciate you guys. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Don't go anywhere because we've got a lot more calls. Well, a few anyway.

Coming up right after this. Hi, we're back. You're listening to Car Talk with us, Click and Clack the Tapper Brothers. And we're here to talk about cars, car repair, and hey, watch this. Remember a couple weeks ago, we read a list of famous last words, I think.

And the very last one on the list, I still remember it was, Hey, watch this. Which I thought was kind of interesting. And I think we may have the beginnings of something that people have been sending us examples. Oh, really? Hey, watch this.

Here we are. A Bixby, Missouri man died after trying to swallow a live fish he had grabbed from a creek. No, that I don't think I should mention his name. Todd, 45, was apparently drinking with friends when he yelled, Hey, watch this. Grab the five-inch perch from the creek and dropped it headfirst into his mouth. The fish got lodged in his throat and he choked to death, which is not funny. No.

But it is certainly an example of, hey, watch this. Yeah. And I would like to ask people to send us more examples of Hey, Watch This. Yeah, perfectly not resulting in anyone's demise. Yeah. Maybe hospitalization. Hospitalization would be better. Yeah.

But, I mean, for famous last words, what's better than Hey, Watch This? Boom! Well, I can think of a lot of words. ways to go. I can't, too. With a perched on your go on it. So just send your news items or any, you may have personal experiences.

If you could just send them to, Hey, Watch this, Car Talk Plaza, Box, 3,500, Cambridge. Our Fair City! Ma. 02238. Or you can email us from the Car Talk section of Cars.com.

Hey, watch this. Look, if you have a question about your car. Have you ever done that? Hey, watch this? I'm trying to remember. I mean, I know I must have. Oh, yeah. No, if I, if you think about it enough, you'll think of something.

Well, I can think of a few things that I wouldn't want anyone to know about. Teen-H boys are big on Hey, Watchdust. Yeah, I'm sure I'll think of a few if I really put my mind to it. Anyway, if you have a question about your car, and you have to call us right now. The number's 8888-8-8-2-27-8-25. Hello, you're on Car Talk. Hey, this is Chip McDonald in Magnolia, Arkansas. Chip?

Yes. From Magnolia? Magnolia, Arkansas. Great. All right. I've got a 93 Cavalier, and it just broke 145,000 miles on it. That's a bad word to you as an association with the car just broke. Well, it goes well with this car.

And for a while now, well over probably two or three months now, when I start the car, I get this really bad shot at gas fumes through the air conditioning vents. I mean, it's so bad like my friends don't want to smoke in my car, which is good because I don't want to smoke in anyway. That's good, yeah. But anyway, it's not good when I'm like going out because the girlfriend's like, oh, what is that? What is that? What is that? You say, sorry. Well, wait a minute. You have a 93 cavalier and you have a girlfriend?

You can get a date driving around and a 93 cabalels. That smells of gas? Well, that's... That's not good, is it? No, it's not. And there's some more stuff, too. Go ahead. Okay.

When I'm also turning the key, here lately, especially, it's been, I haven't like it wants to start, and then you get this really bad, like, scraping sound, and then it fires off. I mean, boom, when they're ready to go. And then the smell of gas. And then you get the smell of gas from the vent. This is great fun. Yeah.

And then when you back it out, put it in drive, if I have to step on the gas, pretty good, and sit there until we get up the speed a little bit, and then we're fine. Then it's okay. Yeah. All right. Man. I think you qualify for the three questions for a dollar. Three questions for a dollar.

Yeah. Sheesh. Well, but. I had some engine work. You want to know about it, too? Go ahead. Okay. A couple about, oh, man, this was probably about two or three months ago.

I had to, I had a blown head gasket and a warped engine head. Oh. So I had to have the whole thing, had to have a new gasket put on, they had to take the warp out of the engine head. It cost me almost $800 and the whole nine yards. I'm still paying it off. So they didn't put a new head on. They used the old head.

That's the way it sounds. I think they took out the warp and put the old head on. Well, in doing so, they had to remove the fuel lines. Mm-hmm. And I believe the smell is coming from a loose fuel line. that's dripping gasoline. When you first turn the key, the first thing that roars into action

is the fuel pump. Yeah. And it supplies pretty high pressure to the injector. I think this has one injector this. Maybe it has four. I don't know. So when you turn that key,

that pump is pumping out some serious gas. Yeah. And it doesn't take much of a leak to make a lot of smell. Uh-huh. So if you got one little drop of gas onto the manifold, for example,

once your ventilation system started working, that is the blow, where you start the car, you get the blower working, you're going to suck those vapors right into the passenger compartment. It's going to smell awful. Okay. Now, let me ask a question here.

Okay. My brother said you will qualify for the three questions for a dollar. Right. Now, are you going to attempt to use this one answer to answer all three questions? Uh. I hadn't decided. Well, I didn't know the opportunity was there, but if you see something that I don't see, I mean. Well, I thought you might be able to weave.

Okay. Now, I guess I'd say, this gas mill has been happened since before I had the get the gasket changed. Oh, what a rotten piece of information that is. Bad connection. Well, I mean. You're static on the line. It doesn't mean that you don't have a gas. No, you can have a leaky fuel injector, too.

Okay. A leaky fuel injector will cause the same thing to happen. See, now you're getting to the possibility. here. Okay. You probably have the answer to two of his questions. I do. You got, you know, if we have a leaky injector. It could explain the hesitation and the stumbling and the stumbling. When it's cold. When it's cold. Yeah. Yeah. And when the thing warms up, a warm engine is more forgiving of an injector that isn't spraying properly. What was the third

symptom? The noise. The third symptom is the bad flywheel that you have. The bad, oh, that doesn't sound like fun. That's the, the, the noise you get is the kind of noise you would get if the engine were already running and you tried to start it. No, it's more of a, it's like something's kicking real good and just hitting off because it's bigger, you turn the key, and then you're good. Oh, it could be that the starter is just gone, the starter motor. The starter's starting to go? Yeah, so you should probably take it to your repair shop.

They'll throw it up on the lift and pop the starter out and they'll look at the flywheel. Okay. And see if it's chewed up. They'll see if it's chewed up or broken. Oh. And if they can't determine. that, then they'll just put a new starter in and hopefully the noise will go away. Okay.

So you may get out of this for a few hundred bucks, man. Oh, well, that'll be good. Tack it on to the other payments. See it, Chip. Thanks, bud. See it. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.

Hey, do you know what time it is? Time to sell our technology stocks and buy hog futures? No, it's a little too late for that. Time to play. Stump the Chumps! This is the part of the show where we tracked down a caller from a previous show to see if we like struck painter. Or struck out.

Actually, we've been on quite a role lately. So, anyway, who's our lucky contestant this week? No idea. Rich from Brussels, Belgium? Do you remember him? I don't even remember Belgium. Well, according to the little card here, Rich called us a couple of months ago

because he was having a problem with his 97 Passat. I went out the other morning, and I turned the key, and nothing happened. The car was completely dead. Really? Really? So I didn't know what to do, so I cleaned the garage. There's a method to my madness here.

The car was near the bottom of my driveway, which is kind of shaped like a clip. Oh, I got it. You want to drive into the garage and pop the clutch. Exactly. I had about 30 to 35 feet. And it worked. It did. Oh, absolutely.

You know, I was quick with that break. Oh, man, that's great. Well, I was pretty worried. You know, I was, that back wall of the garage was coming. pretty quick. Oh, man. Either way, he's out of his misery. So what do we tell him what's wrong with the Pasad?

I don't remember. We narrowed it down to either the starter motor or the ignition switch. But since the lights and the radio still worked, we settled on the starter motor, I think. No, I did we're wrong. Anyway, let's see how we did. Rich, are you there? Yes, I'm here. All right, look, before we find out whether the starter motor was on the fritz,

or our deductive reasoning was on the fritz. We need to verify that the answer you're about to give here and stump the chumps, has not been influenced by our staff or the staff of National Public Radio or NATO commanders we sent in to intimidate you. Is that true? That's true. All right.

Break us the news. Was it the starter motor? No, it was not. Oh, I didn't think so. How could we have a... It was his battery. No, no, the ignition switch. It was.

All we were... I thought so. It really was the switch? Yeah. No kidding. kidding. Don't we get partial credit? Well, you know, Tom, you were right, and then you let your lovable brother overrule you. Oh, that always happens. So he suggested the ignition switch?

Yeah, and you said, do the lights and the radio work? And I said, yes. And then you said, oh, absolutely the starter motor. Oh, the radio works whether the switch is on and not, man. No, I won't do that anymore. Jeez. I'm never listening to you again. Well, anyway, thanks for playing stump the chumps, Rich. Hey, it was really nice talking to you, Rich. Thanks for letting us call you back.

Okay, no problem. Thanks. Take care. Okay, bye, bye, bye. Okay, Tommy, it's time for us to take a little break. A break? That would be when the listeners go away and, like, we stay here, is that it? Well, not from their point of view. From their point of view, we go away and they stay put.

This is an interesting philosophical issue, isn't it? Yeah, well, why don't you ponder all the rest of us taking a break? Somehow, we'll all be back in about a minute. We're back. You're listening to Car Talk with us, Click and Clack to Tappard Brothers, and we're here to discuss cars, car repair, and, in the absence of the puzzler, tons of puns. Tons of puns.

I'll just read you a couple from this magnificent list that I got from Kathy Marshall. Okay. Okay, here you go. Two vultures get on an airplane, each carrying two dead raccoons. The flight attendant looks at them and says, What? Carry-on luggage.

Only one carry-on allowed per passenger. Good, that's good. Okay, how about this one? Did you hear that NASA recently put a bunch of holsteins into low Earth orbit? They called it the herd shot around the world. I love this one. Do you hear about the Buddhist monk who refused Novakain during the world? a root canal. He said he wanted to transcend dental medication.

I've heard that one before. Let's see how many more I got here. A group of, this is YARL, chess. A group of chess enthusiasts checked into a hotel and was standing in the lobby discussing their recent tournament victories. After an hour, the manager came out of the office, asked them to disperse. But why, they said, as they moved off, because he, He said, I can't stand chess nuts, boasting in an open foyer. Isn't this good?

This is painful. We can take one more. Actually, I think we use this once before, but it's so good I'm going to use it again. You may get it. A woman has twins, and she gives both of them up for adoption. One of them goes to a family in Egypt and is named Amal. The other goes to a family in Spain and they name him Juan. Years later, Juan sends a picture of himself to his birth mother.

When she gets the picture, she tells her husband that she wishes that she also had a picture of Amal. The husband says, but they're twins. If you've seen one, you've seen Amal. I love it. If you've seen one, you've seen... It doesn't get better. It doesn't get better. That's pretty sad.

See, this is the kind of stuff that deserves Pulitzer's. And this is the kind of stuff that made them separate you from all the other kids in school, right? Yes, it is. By the way, if you're tuned in expecting a brilliant new puzzler, then you obviously tuned into the wrong show. Actually, the puzzler is on break. Summer. summer break summer fall break

but you can always try your hand at one of our classic puzzles which will post every week classic old which will post every week on our website the car talk section of cars.com in the meantime if you have a question

about your car or anything else you can give us a call at 1-88888 car talk that's 888-227-8255 hello you're on car talk hi guys this is Craig and San Pedro California San Pedro California

Where are you really from, Craig? Tell us the truth, man. Chicago originally. Aha! Okay. But I also spend time in Philadelphia, so maybe it's my Philadelphia accent. It's Philadelphia that I'm here. Oh, you're someone who's one of them, Philadelphia lawyers.

So what's up, man? Well, I recently moved to Southern California, and by, I don't know, dint of necessity, I wanted to combine a passenger car comfort and, you know, creature comforts with the utility of a work truck. So I bought a minivan. So my question for you is, how do I make this thing more sexy? Give it up and join a monastery, dude. Well, I mean, you're in California. Yeah, I know.

So, I mean, I suppose you could, like, paint flowers all over it. Well, that's what I do for a living. You're a painter? Yeah, I paint murals and... No. I rest my case. You can do this for nothing. Yeah.

I mean, how else you're going to do? I'm doing. I mean, a minivan is the most sexless vehicle there is. Yeah, I know. Like, a guy in a minivan, you just assumed that his voice is already high. No, we wanted to have our cat neutered. We didn't even take him to the vet. We took him around the minivan for a couple of blocks and they was all done. Took two blocks, huh? Wow. I couldn't wait to get out.

But I agree with my brother. I think you should paint your own truck. Let's figure out what to paint on it. Yeah. What kind of a woman you tried? How about a big sign that says, I'm desperate. Lack subtlety. Black subtlety? Yeah.

Yeah. Something like beautiful, sexy woman or best offer. What kind of a baby you're trying to land? Well, like you said, you know, I'm not being that particular. An artistic type? Yeah, of course. Long walks on the beach? Well, if need be.

Pina collars. He's in California. I mean, I don't think it would happen. I know. I should paint it to look like a red Ferrari. You think that would be good. That's not a bad idea, actually. Remember in the old days when VW bugs were around,

people used to make a hood that you could put on it that looked like a Rolls-Royce. So it looked like you were driving around in a 10-foot-long Rolls-Royce. Is it what happened to you? You can't ride the garage door close too quick. I don't know. But it really is a role. Trust me. I mean, it's an interesting question, and I don't feel qualified to answer it,

never having been a woman, or at least not until the weekend. But I... I thought you weren't getting revealed that. I wasn't. So did I. It just slipped out. Well, now the secrets out, now what are you going to do? I mean, I like it.

I mean, I think we need to get the advice of the target market, as we used to say in the marketing business. Yeah, we need advice only from women. Okay. Here's what we're going to do. We're going to ask our female listeners to make recommendations as to what you could do to a minivan to make it more interesting to women. Okay. Yeah. Make the driver of a sexless minivan more interesting to women.

So if you're a woman and you have some ideas on how to do this. either write to us or go to our website, the cartalk section of cars.com. Okay. So send it to us. Stay tuned and we'll have results for you any day now. Thanks, Craig. We'll try to help you, man. We fear your pain.

All right, thanks, guys. We'll do our best. Thanks for calling. Thank you. Hi, bye. Why is it that we were reluctant to give him advice? And yet when the guy called about the cattle trailer with the electric brakes, we dove right in. Well, because we thought we knew something about the electric brake.

No, we said we have never heard of electric brakes. We have never seen electric brakes. We don't know what a cattle trailer is. These questions of the heart are much more difficult. We should be experts at this. Yeah. One of us should be. I should be expert at it.

It's true. You failed again. Tom Gooddale should be expert at it. 1-8-8-5 wives. Testimony that he wasn't expert at it. The other four would be interested to know. 888-227-8-8-25-5. Hello, you're on Car Talk.

Hi, this is Karen from Gloucester. Gloucester, Mass, or England? Karen. Yeah, what's up, Karen? Well, first of all, I just want to comment on Craig's call. Yeah. Maybe he should take his saws-all and cut the top off the van and turn it into convertible. Oh.

Oh, he could do that. That's good. That's good. Or he could paint it to look like a motorcycle. Harley. Harley. You could do that, couldn't you? You could do anything.

Use the wheels that are there, right? Right. And then you can have somebody sitting, if I put a picture of himself, sitting on the seat. He's all set. Okay, we'll shut the website. You're a genius. I am a genius.

That would immediately make you interested. No, she'd say, what, a jerk. No, it would make me look twice. Make you look twice. And then you might say that guy must be an interesting guy. That's right. That's right. But if he wasn't good-looking.

That doesn't matter. What looks got to do with that? Come on. Come on. Man of the 21st century, you should know that. That's right. I mean, would looks make any difference to you if you were trying to choose a woman? Not that you were because you've already chosen a woman, but looks had nothing to do with it.

We all know that. I mean, a bag full of chisels. Oh, man, are we in trouble now? Well, that's why I'm beginning to become a proponent of the arranged marriage. Really? Yes. And who would do the arranging? Well, I would do it all.

For everybody. Well, I've arranged all mine. Yeah, well, you've done a lousy job. You need a professional arranger. I think most people don't know how to arrange their own marriages. You know, you have like floral arrangers? Yeah. I don't do marriage arranging.

Anyway, Karen, what do you want? Why did you call us? Well. I have this bold plan to cover a car with a beach glass. Oh, wait a minute. Really? Is this just a coincidence that you're calling right after Craig? It is a coincidence.

Beach glass. Beach glass. Do you know Jerry Orlandella? I don't. Well, you ought to meet him. Okay. He used to work for us, and he covered his car with beach sand. Little did he know how heavy sand is.

Blow out all four tires. That's kind of my question. Yeah. If I do this, my number one concern is, is this going to be a safety hazard in any way? What is a beach glass? Oh, no. Broken glass? I don't think so. You never give me that idea?

Yeah. How about razor blades, like standing on edge? Those are glint in the sunlight. No, what is beach glass? It's glass that you find on the beach that's been worn down so that has no sharp edges. Exactly. Oh, so it is safe. It's frosted, too, so there's no glare.

Right. But until you hit somebody and the glass brakes and the, well, okay, that's why the sand was such a good idea. You want to cover the entire car in this stuff? I do. I do. Go for it. Okay. Yeah, what are we doing here?

What can the registry of motor vehicles do besides I throw you in the Turkish prison for the rest of your life? You might want to start with a section of the car first, just to see how it flies. The interior. Try the interior. Well, you're going to have to glue the stuff on. Right, right. and what kind of adhesive would you suggest? Well, I would call Jerry.

I don't know. What did Jerry use? You could use, I would use Gorilla Glue, probably. It's a urethane glue. Okay, is this a brand name? Gorilla glue is a brand name. It's a polyurethane glue, but I believe, and you can get it. There are other companies that make it.

It usually comes in a half-ounce tube, but you can get the 55-gallon drum. Oh, yeah, they'll put a pipeline right to your house, but you might want to start. in the small area to see if you have the knack for this. Okay. But I'd like the idea. So beach glass, huh? What is the car that you hate so much that you want to cover it up like this? Well, funny, you should ask.

I'm kind of in the market for probably a VW bug. A new one? No. Well, it could be. And you're going to cover a new car with beach glass? Sure. Sure. I don't know what this is.

He's speechless. He is. He's flummox. I am flummox, yeah. I wish you the very best. And next time I'm in Gloucester, Massachusetts, I will look around for you. See you, Karen. Oh, thank you very much.

Take care. Bye-bye. Beach glass isn't easy to come by. She must be making the stuff in the basement. Well, it's happened again. You've squandered one of your precious few hours of summer listening to Car Talk. Our esteemed producer is Doug the subway fugitive Bongo Boy Berman. Boy, Berman.

Boy, Berman. Our associate producers are Louis Cronin, the Barbarian, and David Gibraltar, Green. Our engineer is Tad Masamon Kari. Our senior web lackey is Doug Sheep Boy Mayor and our technical, spiritual and menu advisor just back from his triumph at the 21st annual Twin Cities, twin lobster, Twizzle Sal and Twilight Twist Away is John Bugsy Lawler. Our public opinion pollster is Paul Merkey of Mercury Research,

assisted by statistician Margin Overa. Our customer care representative is Hayward Jabuzov. Our director of allergy research is Teresa Pollinating. Our director of roadway resurfacing is Sylvia Potholy. The driver of our moving van is Carried the sofa. Our mortgage loan consultant is Nora Lenderby. Our director of Three Stooges Studies is Lee Ayapoka. Our meteorologist from the New Delhi office is look out of window.

Our Russian chauffeur is peak off and drop off, and our seat cushion tester is Mike Easter. Our chief counsel from the law firm of Dewey Cheatheman, how is you, Lewis Dewey, known to the burnt-out 60s radicals doing puppet shows to open board shoppers' minds to the evils of consumer capitalism. in Harvard Square is Ui, Louis Dewey. Thanks so much for listening. We're clicking and clack the Tappert Brothers. Don't drive like my brother. Don't drive like my brother.

Don't drive like my brother. Don't drive like my brother. I'll be back next week. Bye-bye. Car Talk is a production of Dewey Cheaterman Howe and WB.B.R. in Boston. And even though public radio listeners swear they would rather listen to an emergency broadcast system test, whatever they hear us say it, this is NPR, National Public Radio.