It became apparent to me relatively quickly that I had gotten off way too soon. But being afraid of getting lost, I stayed on it. It was beautiful country and the sun was just starting to rise. I quickly realized that the speed limit was more of a suggestion than anything, so I picked up the pace a little bit and started making up time. On of the confusing things was that trucks were limited to 20MPH in certain hilly areas, but cars were not. Once I got to State College, 322 open up to 4 lanes, divided, It was still allegedly 55 MPH, but the flow of traffic was about 65. It still took awhile to get to Dillsburg from there, but I ended up at the shop around 9:15AM. The guys had bunch of stuff going on; there was still a Mustang on the dyno from Wednesday, and people were calling for advice on what parts to buy. We finally got my car on around 10AM and started tuning. Random people started showing up as soon as they heard a car on the dyno. Most were locals, but Hal, a Focus owner had shown up from Fredrick, MD. We made 19 dyno pulls and ended up with 150HP and 134TQ.
It was a little bit lower than I had hoped for, but I'm more than pleased with the results. The torque curve is beautiful and really long for these cams. The engine screams all the way to 7400 RPM and is buttery smooth.
We finalized everything a little after 2PM and I headed out for home. I had initially planned on taking the toll road back home, but didn't have enough cash on me to pay the toll, so I decided to go home the way I had come. Traffic seemed a little bit lighter than it had when I showed up (right at the tail end of rush hour when everyone was about 5 minutes late for work) and I had a pretty good idea of where I was going. I got out of the Harrisburg area as quickly as I could and hopped onto US322. Along the river, the car seemed to be running pretty strong, but I kept hearing a ticking sound that I thought sounded like bolts backing out of the water pump pulley, but put it off as the timing belt tensioner, since we had heard it earlier on the dyno. About 12 miles east of State College, everything kind of happened at once. I heard a slapping sound, the steering got heavy, and the battery light came on in the dash. Its kind of funny, I never pay too much attention to the lights on my dash (since the door ajar light flickers when I go over bumps and my airbag light flashes, since I don't have the OEM seats anymore), but at the first sign of trouble, you can pretty much see everything immediately...that's good. I knew pretty much right away that the serpentine pulley had let go, so my next concern was to get the car shut off and off the road (in that order) before the car overheated and blew out the headgasket. Of course, I had been driving on the 2 lane stretch of 322 along a state park, so the area was very sparsely populated and there was no good place to turn off. Fortunately, within about 10 seconds, I came up on a little place with 3 houses that had a pull off in front of them. I shut the car off and coasted into the pull off just as the temperature gauge started moving to the red.
Break-downs are never good. Break-downs are never fully anticipated, either. I kind of sat there in a state of stupor for about 2 minutes, in total disbelief. At this point, I had been on the road (from home) for about 13 hours, I was tired. I hadn't (despite my wife's prodding) eaten anything aside from a granola bar (at 4AM) and 2 cans of Red Bull at some point throughout the journey. I didn't really feel like being broken down (does anyone?). I popped the hood and could see that the serpentine belt had come loose and was shredded. Further, the pulley on the water pump was at a 30° angle compared to the rest of the pulleys. I could hear coolant boiling through the hoses, but like an idiot, I reached my hand down to try to pull the belt out of the pulleys. The aluminum motor mount was pretty hot to the touch, so I screwed around with it for a few minutes, then gave up. I decided to assess my situation instead. I had no map, so I had no clue where I was at. It looked like there were greater odds that someone was at the second house, so I walked over and mumbled something about my water pump pulley coming loose and needing to find a parts store so I could go buy a belt. I don't know if I was delirious or what, but I expected the guy to be super excited and willing to drive me to his favorite parts store. He didn't, he said something along the lines of, "I'll get you the phone number for a shop that's down the road (the way you came) a few miles". I asked if he had a jack and he said no. I realized that not everyone is as interested in cars and things mechanical as I...that was shocking.
I called the shop that he had given me the number for and he said, "Yeah, I think I've got a Focus in right now, I'll go out and have a look at it. Go ahead and call AAA and get the car towed in. I'll see if I can take care of you tonight, but you might have to find a hotel somewhere." This didn't sound too promising. Changing a serpentine belt on a Focus is not rocket science, you shouldn't need to look at the one out front to see if its doable. I called AAA (fortunately, we're Gold Members...not really sure what that means, but I think this just made being a AAA member worth it), they took my information, then transferred it to the agent responsible for the area in which I was broken down. She then asked if I had a shop that I preferred...I kind of thought that we had gone over the whole out-of-state, don't really know where I am, want to get home tonight thing. Did she recommend a place? Graham's Exxon in State College it is. A tow truck is on its way. What this means is, the towing company knows that AAA is going to cover the bill, so "lets wait until the driver is on over-time, so we can bill AAA more and make this worth it for us". In the mean time, completely irritating an already irritated stranded motorist. The tow truck showed up at 5:15PM (about an hour and 15 minutes after I was told he was in-route). The tow truck is a 1983 Chevy with a 4 speed + overdrive. The company name had been painted on the side of the truck, but 26 years of being parked outside made the paint look more like sidewalk chalk. Old faded paint like that just reminds me of the whole fingernails on a chalkboard thing...don't know why. Meet Chuck. They can't get me in until next Tuesday for an appointment (okay, Pennsylvania is seeming less and less hospitable by the minute), what did I want to do? I'm the out-of-town person, can you please give me some options? I can have this car up and running in 15 minutes if someone can sell me a freaking serpentine belt!!! Chuck says, "Well, I can take you to Pep Boys, but I can't guarantee anything." I know that as soon as he unhooks, I'm stuck wherever he drops me, unless I actually pay for the next tow. "Okay, take me to Pep Boys." I figure I'll rent/buy some tools, buy a new belt (and a couple of bolts, two of them worked loose, hence the reason for this disaster) and fix it in the parking lot. We don't have any Pep Boys locally, but apparently, they have bays in the back of their building where they work on your car. "Okay, that's cool, I'll just let them fix it and save myself the hassle." [Is the quoted commentary driving you nuts yet?]
Chuck tells me about the twin turbo LT1 TranAm he's building. Sounds like fun. But he was going to send his computer away to some company over near Pittsburgh to re-tune it. It was going to cost $150. I don't know about LT1s, but with a Focus, if I wanted to do a twin-turbo setup, I don't think I'd send the computer to someone to tune it. Then he goes on to tell me about the guy just down the road who has a dyno, so the next time that I needed one, I wouldn't have to go quite as far as Dillsburg. "Thanks Chuck, but I came over because the guy is a good Focus tuner, not because he has a dyno. I have guys within an hour of my house who have a dyno." He's a nice guy, just seemed a little sheltered, probably in his late 20s, early 30s. We had some good conversation on the trip into State College.
I walked around the front of the Pep Boys as Chuck unhooked me. I walked up to the service desk and told the "Service Writer" (who was actually a high school student) what was going on. It went something like this:
Me: I need a new 75.5" serpentine belt and two new 1/2" M8x1.25 bolts.
SW: What is the year, make and model of the car?
Me: 2003 Ford Focus with a 2.0L DOHC 3 code Zetec Engine without A/C in it. But the serpentine belt is a 75.5" belt, because there is an underdrive crank pulley on it.
SW: Okay...that's going to be $105.42.
Me: WHAT? What's the break down on that?
SW: $36 to remove/reinstall Serpentine belt, $52 for a new Dayco belt, plus disposal fees and tax.
Me: That's robbery. I only paid $28 for my Goodyear Gatorback belt that was on the car. I could almost buy 2 of those for the cost of your crappy Dayco. Don't you have any other belts.
SW: No, sorry, that's all we have.
Me: Okay, I guess let's just get this over with, then.
I wandered around for a little while. I started by grabbing the tools that I knew I would need to install the belt and hunting around for parts. I went back to the service desk and said, Can I get the belt, I'll just go do it myself. "Oh, we just pulled the car in, so you'll be ready to go here shortly." Fine...
There was a grocery just down the strip from the Pep Boys, so I thought I would go get some food and an anniversary card for Rachel (since it was, afterall, our anniversary). I walked to the back of the store, hoping there was a deli where I could procure a submarine sandwich of some sort. Instead, I got accosted by a middle-aged women of oriental descent, trying to sell me some chinese food. I would have to find a bathroom facility before I got home and I didn't really want to make that kind of pit stop. So I found a pack of Cherry Pop-tarts. Those would go well with my last Red Bull.
I wandered back up to Pep Boys, where the "service writer" informed me that the technician working on the car had told him that the tensioner was loose. He had one in stock, and the total would be $202. "Can I go out and have a look?" This is starting to sound like monkey business... The tech was cool (he grew up in Cleveland and almost went to Wooster College). The tensioner was just fine, the two bolts that held it to the block had come loose, so he tightened them up. Okay, I'll head back in and wait some more. I started BSing with the service writer...why was I out in State College? What all did I have done to the car? He had rebuilt a 2004 Acura RSX-S that he had bought for $3700 a few years back. Okay, that's cool...I had seen it out in the parking lot, so that seemed legit. He had a Honda CRX before that with an Integra GSR swap. He sold it to a buddy who promptly put the largest GT series turbo he could on it (sounds like a typical Honda story). He had a picture on his phone. The turbo was about 3/4th of the length of the engine. It was grotesquely fascinating...We were then interrupted by the technician who said, "Hey, this belt doesn't fit!" Yeah...I told you within the first 30 seconds of standing at your counter, that you needed to pull a 75.5" belt, not the 77.5" belt that your computer tells you that a non-A/C Focus gets.
SW: I'm not sure I can look up a non-spec size in the computer.
Me: See the last 3 digits on the part number? That is the length of the belt. If you go pull a 5036755 instead of a 5036775, it'll fit.
SW: Types 5036755 into the computer. Hey, we have one of those, its only $48.
Me: Yay, I saved $4.
7:22PM August 6th - I called Rachel and told her that I was finally back on the road. My best guess was that I'd be home sometime between 11 and 12PM. Instead of making the wrong turn out into the boonies, like I had coming into PA, I decided I was going to take 322 to 99, which would take me right to 80. So, I ended up 20 miles further east on 80 that I had initially intended (rather than the 50 miles west I had done in the morning), but it was much easier driving. Once on 80, I put the hammer down. I wanted to be home. I was a little bit tired of dealing with automotive things. I hadn't seen a whole lot of PHP on my way out, so I figured I'd be okay on the way home. I punched it up to about 75MPH and chased the sun as best I could. Fortunately, most of the other traffic on the road was doing the same thing, so I made quick work of the trip across PA. I found myself stabbing the throttle in 5th gear and feeling the awesome torque (its not a lot, but its a lot more than it was) pull me out towards 85MPH for passing when needed (I kept the speed reasonable). I stopped for gas in Youngstown again, along side a Hummer that was packed to the gills with what I remember as stuffed animals and trinkets. I still can't get over those things...
I must have zoned out going through Akron on 76, because I remember driving by the Rt.18 exit and had a sinking feeling that I had missed 21 South. But I couldn't remember for certain...the next exit was 57 at Wadsworth, so I took it down to 585 and still couldn't remember until I got to 585 whether or not I had missed the 21 exit (I think it was a combination of being very tired and not being overly familiar with the 76 exits past Akron). I finally pulled into the house at 11:18PM and promptly fell asleep. The trash in the car could wait until Friday...
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