Parts directly from China

[Furcurequs]

Well, so far I got my brake cleaner, at least. When I made the note online to put it in my (mail)box if she could, I didn't realize it was going to be such a tight fit! I'd assumed she just couldn't leave it before because there wasn't room with the other small packages.

My mailbox may have a slightly different shape to it now. ...lol It looked like she really had to do some work to get that thing in there. ..haha

Maybe I can bend my mailbox back into shape and tighten it back up later.

Anyway, so far so good. Well, it counts for that in my world.

I have a few more hours until I know if the UPS driver is going to be able to find me today.

ETA:

I finally have my rotors! The person found me! ...well, at least my mailbox.

I knew it was close to time for delivery, so I checked the status online and it said my package was delivered. I looked outside on my doorstep and saw it wasn't there, though, and thought, "Oh, no! They've delivered my package to someone else. ...maybe again."

I walked up to my mailbox and the cardboard box with my rotors inside was in a plastic bag underneath it. ...eh, but what do you expect from temp drivers?! I was kind of expecting to have to carry my own rotors down the hill, anyway.

The individual boxes with my rotors did say "Made in China" on them, though, so we're good, I guess. I sure hope they are the right ones, however. I wouldn't want to have to do this process in reverse. That certainly wouldn't be good.

It's now cool and rainy out, so I don't know if I'll want to do my brake repairs tonight or not. Maybe I'll feel more up for it after I've finished making and eating my stir fry.

[Furcurequs]

...arrghh... ...arrghh... ...arrghh... ...arrghh...

...and the adventures continue.

Okay, well, it was kind of cold this weekend, so I was slow to start my brake repairs. ...but I finally started them last evening and worked off and on throughout the night.

My caliper piston seemed a bit rusty and wouldn't compress all the way the first time I tried doing it, but I cleaned that a bit and it then seemed to move within the cylinder without binding after that. It didn't seem to be leaking or anything, either, so I again used one of the old brake pads and my new 4" C-clamp and was able to compress it fully.

After cleaning some rusty surfaces with my Dremel tool - gently using an emery cutting disk - I put my new brake pads into the caliper body and greased them where they needed greasing and decided that maybe I could get my wheel back together by morning.

I cleaned the little bit of packing grease off of one of my new rotors and placed it onto the wheel hub. I then placed the caliper body with the inserted brake pads over the rotor and was about to bolt it back on.

...but then the bolt holes wouldn't align!! ...arrghh..

It was then that I noticed that my new rotors were about 2 cm larger in diameter than my old one!! What the heck?!!

After a bit of online research I discovered who was at fault!! Me!!! ...arrghh...

There were three different styles of the make and model of car that I have, and I was a bit confused about just which one I had since I had bought it used and the guy who restored it had swapped out quite a few things. I wasn't really expecting there to be a difference in brake rotors anyway, though, so I didn't pay as much attention to that as I should have.

So, I'm trying to decide if it's worth any effort to return them.

The cost of the 2 rotors was $27.30. The shipping cost to me was $16.61. The total I paid was thus $43.91.

Since it was my fault, if I return them they will deduct the original shipping cost, which means I'm already out $16.61. ...plus they will charge $3.50 per item for their trouble, which means I'm out another $7 - or $23.61 total.

...but then I would have to cover the cost of shipping them back to them, too, so if I could get the same rate they did, that would be another $16.61. I'd be out a total of $23.61 + $16.61 or $40.22.

So, I could get back $3.69 if I returned them! ...of my original $43.91! ...maybe... ...again, if I could get the same shipping rate back.

...but I would also have to go to the trouble of contacting them to get an RMA number and then waiting a few days and then having to figure out how to print out their shipping label without a working printer and then I would have to deal with my local UPS people again!!

The chances are good that it would ultimately cost me more to return them.

...arrgghh...

I guess I have some expensive paper weights. Even I don't have enough Dremel tool cutting disks to trim those things down to size, though the way things are going, I couldn't expect the results to be much different than with my other projects. ...lol

Meanwhile, the old rotor I took off my car is so full of deep grooves that I probably shouldn't put it back on, but I probably will just for a few days.

I have found another place online with a pretty good named brand rotor they are selling in a closeout sale for a little over $6 a piece, and they say they can deliver them to me by Friday of this week, so it looks like I'll be paying another $23.13.

...until the next episode...

...of As Everything Turns but my Wheels.

[daxwc]

Look on the brightside… at how much you are learning just in case your Perpetual Motion Wheel needs a brake!

[Furcurequs]

...haha.

Yeah, maybe I should try to be optimistic and order a couple of brake calipers instead to mount on my wheel frame since I'll obviously need both of my spare rotors and the stopping power of two complete brake systems to stop my wheel!

...lol

I went ahead and placed my $23.13 online order a few minutes ago for hopefully the correct sized brake rotors. ...and this time around it will be the third player in the delivery game - Federal Express! I haven't had too many things shipped to me by them, but they've yet to let me down! ...and the shipping was just under $10 for these two rotors.

...fingers crossed. I'm tempted to leave my car wheel off until the new rotors arrive, but I better not.

[Furcurequs]

Well, my latest purchase was apparently not shipped through Federal Express after all. I had assumed that when the website cross referenced my given address with one that was already in the Federal Express database, that perhaps they were actually going to use Federal Express. I guess I was wrong about that.

It seems they instead shipped this package through the United States Postal Service as Priority Mail.

So, according to the USPS online tracking today, my package was scheduled to be delivered today before 8:00 p.m.. Yeah! ...uhhh... ...but something didn't look quite right about the last place it was scanned... ...which meant, of course, that, NO, I didn't get it today!! ...arrghh...

My package apparently arrived at the regional distribution center, which is only about 60 miles from me, last night at around 10 o'clock. ...and then it arrived at another city's post office, that's perhaps slightly closer to me but not really between me and the distribution center, at around 3 a.m. last night!

So, my package apparently spent all day finding its approximately 30 mile way back from that city's post office to the regional distribution center it came from the night before - to hopefully be sent to the right post office tonight!

So, if things go better tonight than they did last night, then my city's post office should have my package by morning!

...and if things go better tomorrow than they did today, then maybe I'll get my package tomorrow!

...though if past experience is any indication, I'll more likely than not be getting a pink slip in my mailbox telling me that I need to pick up my package later at the post office.

...and then I'll have to put my right front brake back together with the old buggered up rotor just so that I can drive over and pick up my new rotors from the post office Saturday (because I won't have time tomorrow), so that I can take it all apart and put it back together again with the new rotor Saturday!

Please, please, just deliver them! ...please, please. Don't make me have to do all that extra work!

It's just 200 feet farther! Please!!

You went around 60 miles round trip out of your way for your blunder, so please make it up to me and go the extra 400 foot round trip for me!

[sleepy]

Furcurequs,
As a non-mechanic who has done all of the work on my own vehicles for decades,I feel we now have a kinship that goes beyond this forum.As I have been reading your vehicle-based posts,my understanding of your situation has gone past words.I laughed,I cried,it was better than "Cats" !

[Furcurequs]

Hey sleepy,

I'm glad you understand. It's nice to have someone to commiserate with, but at the same time, I'm sorry you've had to endure it also.

I've been a regular night owl lately, so I stayed up most of the night and then only slept a few hours this morning. I was afraid to sleep any longer, though, because I was worried I might miss my mail carrier.

I managed to hear her vehicle and walked up my drive to catch her just as she was turning in. It looked like she was actually going to come down into my drive and deliver it to me! ...but I saved her the trouble, and she just handed it to me out of the back of her Jeep or whatever it was she was driving.

I got right to work and slapped one of the new rotors on and put my right wheel back together. That went pretty smoothly, and so I drove out of my drive and circled around testing my new brakes. Seemed to be doing fine.

So, I jacked up the other side of my car and got right to work pulling the left side apart. I knew if I didn't start it right away that I'd end up putting it off and not getting it done.

In trying to get a bolt unstuck, I twisted off the shaft of my 3/8" socket drive. I should have known better and put a regular wrench on the bolt head when I saw how tight it was. Without my socket wrench it'll be a bit slower getting things back together, but thankfully I think I do have enough tools to get it done. ...well, I hope I do.

I noticed that the place I ordered the rotors from upped the price of the brand of rotors I bought this week after my order. The other brand that was on sale for the same price I paid for these had been sued by some company for the alleged low quality of theirs. I guess they will need to keep the price of those lower so they can unload them - or people will do what I did and go for the, hopefully, superior brand. ...though I did notice that these too were made in China! They're supposed to be Bendix, which should be a German brand.

Anyway, I'll probably do some of the cleaning of my calipers inside this evening and hopefully finish with the brakes sometime later in the night.

I noticed I had some worn out suspension bushings on the other side. There was lots of play at both 12 and 6 and 9 and 3. I'll need to replace those as soon as I can get to it. This side seems fine, thankfully.

I think I need upper control arm bushings and maybe the inner tie rod end which connects with the rack and pinion. The connection with the rack and pinion and the rack and pinion itself seemed fine on this side, so I assume it's just the connection that's the problem on the other side.

A bit of car trivia. One of the versions of the car make and model I have had four wheel steering, and when it was tested the prior year by one of the car magazines, it supposedly outperformed every other car they tested that year when it came to handling on a slalom course - including Ferrari, Porsche and Corvette. Though they are now near 30 years old, young people like to get them since they are pretty cheap and soup them up.

Anyway, mine just has the two wheel steering, but even it handles really well, which is good for these curvy east Tennessee roads.

Well... ...hopefully the rest of my brake repair will go smoothly and the adventures are over for now.

[Fletcher]

I gotta smile too. Your vehicle adventures are pretty much a replay of what I used to regularly go thru with my Mazda Twin cab in Fiji. Before the main road (then potholed gravel) was black topped. Every 6 months or so, new master clutch kit, suspension bushings and upper and lower plate bushings in the front, replace tie rods, and unseize brake calipers and replace pads. I took it to a cheap but good mechanic most of the time because he'd only charge me $10-20 for most jobs, and get mostly imported parts locally a third of the price of brand parts. Anyways hearing your step by step fix brought back clear memories of the same. Learned a lot from him especially when had to do road side fixes (like busted suspension) and had to find a hack to get me to town.

A trick for getting tight screws and nuts undone. First some CRC then tap quite hard with a hammer (flat to the head). Sometimes I use a punch to get more force. Just to break any rust hold etc. Last resort apply some heat and then tap etc.

[daxwc]

If you have the time on a rusted seized bolt, before you get too rough with it, try spraying it with wd40 then soak it in vinegar a few hours. The vinegar it works surprisingly good.

[Furcurequs]

Hey daxwc,

Thanks for the tip. It's been so long since I've used my can of WD-40, though, I'm not even sure if I still have any. If I can't find mine, I better get some more soon, especially the way things have been going for me lately.

I'll also try to remember the vinegar thing. Maybe it will help if I remind myself that if I use vinegar I'll get a several hour break!

I dozed off for a few hours earlier this evening and then finished the brake job after I woke back up. I probably finished around 11:30 p.m.. It's really nice to have brakes again, too, and since not only do I have new rotors and pads, but they also got lubed up right this time, they're probably functioning as well as they ever have. The old pads were seized up in the rusted calipers when I removed them.

With one of the pads I replaced, half of the surface area had totally worn away and so it was metal digging into metal. I had put off the repair for so long that the wear indicators had stopped chirping quite some time ago.

Anyway, that's finally done...

Fletcher,

With the choices I've made to pursue my own creative projects, I've never really found the money to have a new car, so I've always driven something used that I've for the most part had to fix myself.

I know a couple of decent mechanics for the big repairs, but fortunately I haven't had too many of those. Some of my childhood/young adult friends were really into cars and always had something apart that they were working on, and they were usually more than happy to help me with something if I needed help. My own philosophy, though, was to do as little car work as possible.

It might not be too bad if one had all the tools he needed and a fully equipped garage to work in, but unfortunately most of my experience has involved wallowing on the ground in the dirt while getting covered in grease and grime and being eaten by bugs. ...lol

Actually, this brake repair may have been one of the easiest jobs yet. ...though I was kind of grimy and some bees were buzzing my head, the mosquitoes weren't out yet to bite me!

I've not done any suspension work, though, so I'm a bit reluctant to tackle that. The bushings I need to replace look like they are fairly easy to get to, however. The piece with the two worn out bushings is bolted to the frame near the top of the fender well, and the nuts are inside the engine compartment.

I'm actually thinking about buying that piece used with the bushings already pressed in and then just swapping it out with the old piece rather than having to risk problems with pressing in new bushings.

Apparently bushings can be pressed in using a threaded rod and nuts and wrench sockets, but normally people use a special tool for that.

I've spent the week online trying to familiarize myself with all the pieces of the suspension and looking for bushings. I'm not really sure if I would want to tackle the tie rod by myself, either. I have a feeling that might be a little hard to get to with my car just jacked up on one side and supported by a stack of rocks - a nice stack of broad rocks, mind you - but still rocks. I don't want to be up under that thing like that.

I may have 3 major problems on that one side, worn out upper control arm bushings, a bad inner tie rod end (if it's not the rack and pinion itself), and maybe also the constant velocity axle for the wheel. It's been making noises for a while when I have the wheels turned fairly sharp and am accelerating - like when pulling out of a parking space or something.

Eh, I do need to get a new muffler and exhaust system too, though, so maybe I'll find one of my mechanics and have him fix both problems. ...or I could soon be in need of a roadside fix and some hacks myself. Luckily, and though they are quite winding, my local roads aren't rough like the ones you had to deal with.

Oh, I didn't need to use the impact screwdriver I purchased though ebay. The screws on one rotor were totally missing, and the ones on the rotor I replaced tonight were loose and only about halfway screwed in. Their heads were all messed up, so whoever worked on it last didn't even bother to try to tighten them, apparently. I just left them off the new rotor.

I hadn't thought to hammer on the head of my bolt tonight before I broke my 3/8" drive. ...nor had I sprayed any of my CRC brake cleaner on it, either. I guess I was just in a hurry and not thinking. I actually did heat one of the bolts on the other caliper with my propane torch before taking it off the other day.

My 3/8" ratchet was sort of cheap, anyway. That rugged looking and feeling Stanley that I saw at Walmart last week may be what I need now! ;)

[daxwc]

The difference between fixing things today compared to 30 years ago is it is amazing how much information is on youtube or internet. Nothing like a video to guide you through the job; you are never alone no matter the subject.

[Furcurequs]

It's certainly nice being able to know beforehand just what is involved so that you can have all the new parts on hand and ready to go when you start the job. In the past I was usually able to figure things out myself, but sometimes that was only after I had already taken everything apart.

[Art]

Quote "...……..I hope this system is not too good to last ! Our government is hoping to get us to pay Goods and Services Tax on internet purchases already. Then I presume they will try and get us to pay higher postage and after that maybe an extra tax to protect local manufacturing and then maybe a surcharge to cover extra handling because of the need to check for contra band and bombs and then maybe the goods should be quarantined for a few months
because they are coming from overseas and then... and then .. . --Hmmm is this optimism or realism ?

I really do want to be Optimistic and hope that the situation stays like it is but realistically I know that it won't...….

---


Pessimism wins out ! .

As of July first 2018 the Australian Government has made effective that all internet purchases by Australians will be up for a 10 % Goods and Services Tax - collectable for the Australian Government by the vendor !

Some of the immediate consequences :- Amazon says NO . Collect your own taxes ! . We no longer supply to Australians !

Goodness knows how many other vendors are going to say the same thing .

Sum total , - Australians are now at a disadvantage again for doing anything commercially constructive for the country due to the Australian Government wanting to be one of the first to enter a trade war with whomever is available .


Well Done Government Monkeys , - never miss an Unconstructive action wherever possible !

[Furcurequs]

I live in one of the two (I think) U.S. states that doesn't have a state income tax, so our local sales tax may be a bit higher than that of some. I think it's right at 10%, too.

There's been some talk of taxing internet sales, also, but so far that hasn't happened. I think if the internet seller is actually in my state, technically they are supposed to collect a sales tax anyway, just like with local brick and mortar stores, but I'm not sure that happened the few times I've bought from sellers in my state.

Anyway, I hope things get sorted out for you. I suspect that Amazon will eventually figure out a way to accommodate you.

[Art]

.

"I suspect that Amazon will eventually figure out a way to accommodate you."


----

I doubt it somehow . Amazon has a few monkeys as well I suspect .


Trade is one of those areas where Monkeyism is rampant IMO


What the Australian Government is doing to one of the Biggest Beneficial Innovations to World Wide Trade (BBIWWW - to coin an acronym for Fletcher :) ) is real Monkey behaviour ! : -


"Monkey Want Banana , --- Give Monkey Banana ! "



I wonder what would have happened in the Bessler saga if his local government body had not imposed the Taxes that so annoyed him for exhibiting his wheel ?


Suppose they had encouraged him to build and sell more of them ! , -- It's anybody's guess ! - Would he have packed up and left with his knowledge and technology like he did ?


I guess the people of his town had the Government they elected and probably didn't even know they had missed the opportunity .


Monkeys never feel they have to justify their behaviour for wanting other peoples bananas because they don't know how to think beyond bananas :)