John Charles Ryan always said CARS SUCK

I don’t technically own a car but,

my wife has two.

We had a car I drove so infrequently, I pleaded Nolo contendere at the squirrel’s squatters rights hearing. “Let them have it Judge, cars suck and the squirrels are all frigging nuts anyway”. Enough acorns were stashed in the car’s engine compartment, inside the hollow steel areas of the hood, doors and intake system to survive a rodent Armageddon.

I could care less. I drove the car 3,000 miles a year. I hadn’t changed the oil in at least five years. It was a beater for sure, taught the kids to drive by allowing them to side swipe snow banks and back into concrete barriers in parking lots, just so they could sense how much room they didn’t have.  Unconsciously, I began to add only five bucks worth of gas at each fill-up, knowing it’s life could come to an end at any moment and it would kill me to abandon it in a ditch with forty bucks worth of black gold still in the tank.

Because of temporary Multiple Sclerosis symptoms I experience when my body gets heated up such as extreme fatigue, confusion and weakness, I don’t ride my motorcycle the three miles to the gym for my Sunday morning workouts. I also refuse to ride it to Walmart after witnessing a family taking turns sitting on my bike, playing with all the switches and the stuff in my tank bag. I also take the car to work on those early mornings when my driveway shows signs of black ice or when the morning weather wizards reach breaking news status. Other than that, the second car stays parked under the big oak tree, out of the way. Sure, it had developed into an embarrassing looking shit box, but with a bag of donuts and 4 extra-large coffees, I always managed to get an inspection sticker. It was a 12 year old Kia Spectra, and we talked about replacing it three years ago when both rocker panels had rotted through and all the tires had worn out in impossible patterns. Instead, I screwed some heating vent duct panels in place (because real sheet metal was twice as expensive) and sprayed thick rubberized waterproofing undercoating over the whole thing.  I bought four tires at the junkyard and spooned them on myself.  One new wiper blade refill, three hours of labor and $100 made it through yet another year.

I was all set with squeaking through this winter as well after I fixed just a few developing issues. The ignition was not always engaging when you turn the key, and the driver’s door handle didn’t always sync with the latch. After climbing out the window a few times, I tore the door apart to try and fix the issue. The latch was just worn out and lubricating and adjusting it only helped a little. Not a big deal, I always made sure to slam it hard and NOT to use the lock, because it always got stuck. Although I thought the ignition was just worn out contacts, when I disassembled the steering column I couldn’t locate the issue. Messing around, I found the intermittent issue actually was coming from the switch connected to the floor shifter; not always registering the car was indeed in park. I learned it always could be started in neutral, and just decided that was the fix, and buttoned up all the plastic panels on the steering column. I must not have secured the airbag wiring properly, because the next weekend when I drove the car, as I was taking a turn, the wheel locked up. Out of sheer fright for my life, I cranked the wheel as hard as I could to the left and then the right. CRACK! Whatever obstacle had been keeping the wheel from making the turn had now shattered and rattled around every time I turned the wheel, and the airbag warning light lit up the instrument cluster panel. As I contemplated ways I would hide the glaring light for the upcoming state inspection, I wondered why they called them idiot lights.

I don’t like spending money on something I hardly ever use and definitely don’t care about. “No Honey, this is not the year to replace the crap car, everything is fixed, I’m sure it will make it through the winter. Maybe next year we can start looking.”

It might just have made another season too, except…. well, I will blame everything on my mother-in-law.

My wife’s Mom moved to Oregon about 12 years ago, and has made the trip home a few times during the 9 years I have been with my wife. When she visits, we always let her borrow one of our two cars so she can visit all her old friends and relatives who live on this side of the country.  Unfortunately for this visit, I now had to caution my wife that the crappy car, which my wife would now have to drive, was not quite in as great shape as I might have expressed. After revealing the door sometimes swung open on hard right turns and jiggling the shifter was sometimes needed to get the vehicle to start, I knew this in-law visit had the potential to become very expensive.

I waved good day to my wife as she headed out of the driveway, and just as it began to sprinkle, I remembered another issue.  The right wiper didn’t always cooperate with the left, and sometimes would even wrap around to the side window and get stuck. With that really heavy sinking gut feeling, I rode my bike to work. There were only two short messages on my cell phone when I arrived at work.  The first one was slightly incoherent and evidence suited for a criminal conviction, and the second was a simple demand that the crap car needed to go, like today.

Of course I knew she was right, I’m just not going to tell her.

The time had indeed come, and searching for days for a reasonable used car was filled with ridiculously high mileage vehicles priced at three times what they should be. I hated wasting valuable time even thinking about something I didn’t care about. I just needed to get a car, and move on with more important stuff. I think it was fear of a nasty winter that got me to actually consider just buying a brand new car, with no issues or worries; and because of the amount of miles I actually would use it, it would probably out last my children.  After wasting thirty or so hours exploring online, I decided to head to a dealership and drive a few models that interested me.

I’m a fan of really small cars, standards with good gas mileage. As we already had a 4-wheel drive SUV for larger duty, I wanted a small commuter car that my wife would enjoy using as well. She prefers an automatic and really wanted a sunroof. We figured she would use the car all summer and I would use it for snow days and the gym. We finally decided to purchase a fun looking 2013 Hyundai Veloster, an automatic with a panoramic roof.

Instead of the guilt I would have of privately selling the old car, I planned to just leave it at the dealership for scrap.  I was silent when they told me $500. I thought I owed them the money.

We picked up the brand new car a couple days later and Elin got to drive it home. She thought something was wrong with the speakers, they sounded like crap. Although the car was advertised as a sound system powerhouse, I had never even turned on the stereo during the test drive.

Sure enough, it sounded like the front left speaker was blown! The dealer was kind enough to give me a ride to work, and ended up replacing two blown speakers. I thought it was odd they had them in stock.

I picked up the car and on the ride home, cranked the stereo to test it out, and the now the right speaker started to vibrate! I thought I was crazy, but my wife agreed. Seriously?

Another appointment and trip back to the dealer, this time they replaced the two speakers on the right. Not very convincing, as I started to read online how lots of folks were having issues with the speakers as well. A week later, I noticed the clock had reset itself to April 1^st, 2006. At first I though my employee had messed with my car and it was just a joke; April Fools Day. Ha ha.

Unfortunately, it did it again two more times. The joke was on me.

A few weeks later, while clearing snow off the hood, I found the front bumper had snapped off the car where it attaches to the fender, on both sides. I also found that the passenger wheel well liner was cracked and shattered into pieces. I really had no idea why or how this happened, but needless to say I was extremely pissed. I looked over the car with a magnifying glass and found no signs of a parking lot hit and run or any trauma or scratched paint or anything!  I had driven it in some snow and very cold temperatures, and the only thing I could figure out was maybe my kicking the chunks of ice build up in the wheel well had split the plastic in the extreme cold. In any case, there had been no accident or damage strong enough to cause anything of this caliber of damage. I had also received notice there was now a recall on the speakers and needed to make an appointment for that, so I made a visit to the service department to report the defective bumper, make an appointment for the first oil change and take care of the speaker recall. The service manager e-mailed the factory district service manager about the bumper, and the following Monday when I dropped my keys off for the appointment and before ANYONE had looked at my car, I was informed that the regional service manager determined it was NOT a warranty issue and that Hyundai would not pay to repair my bumper.  I expressed that I felt they needed to look at the car because it was not in any type of accident. After the car was looked at, the service manager agreed with me that it did not have any signs of abuse or trauma to the plastic parts that were broken and cracked, but surprisingly reiterated that the District manager had the final say and he had already denied the claim. Hyundai would not be covering the damage. I was not very happy leaving the dealership and for the first time, began to have buyer’s remorse. The honeymoon of buying my first brand new car in 22 years was indeed over.

CARS SUCK

I started to really look at the car and pick it apart. Whatever they did to the speakers, seemed to lowered the output volume by about 25% and I soon realized the subwoofer doesn’t work at all until the car has warmed up to about 70 degrees.  Great feature for  winter car!

A call to the Hyundai customer satisfaction number about the body damage created a ticket which went absolutely nowhere, 48 hours later it was closed with the finding that the dealer had determined it was caused by “Customer Abuse.”

The next week, on a heavy snow day, driving to work, I realize the right wiper consistently iced up because it stops way outside the area of the windshield where the defroster can reach. This had happened before in the snow, but I thought it was maybe just a fluke. It wasn’t. This defect results in about 25% of the windshield being unclean every time it snows, and it has snowed a lot this winter!

The second gripe I have with the windshield wiper system is that the washer fluid tank has no low fluid indicator! This may not be a big deal in other parts of the country, but in just three months I have had to add two gallons of fluid, and running out while driving on the freeway on the melting day after a snowstorm means in about two swipes of the blades; the entire windshield becomes smeared with a mix of salted dirty brine and completely blocks the driver’s vision.  The bottle is not visible under the hood; it tucks away in the fender wheel well. Apparently, half way through the 2013 model year, they removed the electronic switch in the tank after having issues with it.  A great way to address an issue for Hyundai; but unacceptable for a car sold in New England.  Not being aware of the level of washer fluid can be just as dangerous as getting a blowout!

Speaking of blowouts………..

Legalization of POT HOLES have become the norm this winter and with the new car’s low profile sporty tires, I hit one, a small one at that, but enough to feel the car start to drift  to the right, and the low tire pressure warning light indicated  a sudden loss of air pressure. I wasn’t pissed as I knew it was a road hazard issue and I certainly could not blame it on the car this time. Or, could I?

I pulled over to have a look at the tire. There was a small slice in the side wall, but no visible damage to the rim. It was a Sunday morning and I knew would be able to get a tire at one of the 50 tire shops in the area. I opened the trunk to get out the spare and to my astonishment, found a can of fix a flat, an air compressor, a 10 mm open end wrench and a flat screwdriver.  No donut spare, no jack, not even a lug wrench for the car!

Are you frigging kidding me?

CARS SUCK

I drove the car with a flat the mile or so to my house and put it up on a jack stand.

I kept thinking about how a week earlier I had been driving home on Interstate 95 in New Jersey in the middle of the night, in the rain. What if this had happened there?

I called a couple of tire shops for a replacement tire. I called a few more. I called all of them.  I called dealerships that were opened, I looked online, I searched the internet. I spent three hours searching for a tire size that apparently doesn’t exist.

Yes, a car that is sold without a spare has a tire size that NOBODY within 300 miles of my home has or stocks, not even dealers who sell the car. I wasn’t even able to find mismatched tires to fit my rims, or anyone who had a set of two or four different brand tires to put on my car’s wheels! The Hyundai dealer recommended I purchase the donut spare sold in the accessory department for $350 dollars, but cautioned it should not to be used at highway speeds. I bit my tongue and suddenly realized why there was not a tire iron in my trunk. It surely would have been smeared with someone’s DNA.

Being stranded for three days because of a simple flat tire on a new car while the dealer hopes UPS delivers a tire from Tire Rack is unacceptable and quite absurd.

The car has also developed a nasty suspension groan every time I come to a stop, and the passenger window sometimes does absolutely nothing when you flick the switch. Apparently, issues others have had with the same model as well. Oh, how I miss my window cranks and my $500 winter beater.

But hell, it’s not all doom and gloom! Looking on the bright side, I only have 57 monthly payments left and in a week or two, the squirrels get a shiny new place to rest their nuts.

John Ryan, you were absolutely correct.

CARS SUCK!

Thank GOD we have motorcycles.

Don’t forget to sign up for the MS5000!

Any Day You Can Ride is a Good Day!

 

Longhaulpaul