| This
weekend, I decided to go to the ranch to attempt, in vain, to fix
Tinky, my nasty suburban. I had no idea just how bad the damage to the
brake system was, so I came up to the ranch with not nearly enough
parts for the job. One of the springs in one of the rear brakes had
broken, and the pieces had bounced around in there, tearing up
everything else. Also, I had a leaky master cylinder and a front caliper
with a blown seal. The rubber portions of the hydraulic lines going to
both front calipers are shot. Basically, the entire brake system has
fallen apart. I arrived this weekend with a new master cylinder, new
shoes and pads, and new rear cylinders, thinking that these would
suffice. WRONG. Further, I could only put in the new master cylinder
and one of the rear cylinders (for lack of the right parts). I guess
I'm going to have to finish the job next time I'm up there. I'll have
to bring a new caliper (or a fixed old caliper), new hydraulic lines,
two new wheel studs (did I mention that two lug nuts twisted off while
I was trying to get the tires off the truck?), and a few parts for the
rear brake system (remember that spring that ruined everything?). If all of that were not enough, the truck is in such desperate need of new tires, that I should really have them put on up there, before I come home. I already have the spare tire on (got a flat on the way up there), and I fould a screw in another tire. All of the tires are bald. | |
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Since
I couldn't do much work on the truck this weekend, I decided to go and
check out the damage that all of the rain we've been having up there
has done to the roads. This sink hole has opened up right in front of
lots 149 and 150 (along the "front way", on the way to my place). |
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Here is a view of that same sink hole, from the other side. Pretty hard to get a car around that. |
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I
walked two miles (one way) to get to where the road crosses the mighty
Carrizo Wash. The road actually crosses it in more than one place. This
is the first place. You can see that someone got a four wheel drive
vehicle through here, but likely it wasn't easy. |
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This
is the second crossing, where you go under the railroad tracks. As you
can see, nobody has gotten a vehicle through here, nor will they, until
the road is fixed. |
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Same crossing, looking the other way. |
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A view of the first crossing. |
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Another
disaster. I had the truck on four jackstands (with all four tires off).
Because of the sand, the jackstands had to be on either railroad ties
or cement blocks. One of the cement blocks was only about an inch and a
half thick. After several hours, the cement crumbled under the
jackstand, the jackstand sank into the sand, resulting in the entire
vehicle crashing into the sand, wrecking two of my jackstands in the
process. |
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Here is the front of the truck, sitting in the sand. |
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See that jackstand crushed under that rotor? |
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I
took this picture right after the front end of the truck had collapsed
into the sand. Right after I took this picture, the rear end collapsed
too. |