Miles

Last week my sweet Subaru Impreza wagon hit 190k miles. A few days later I passed 16k miles on my BMW 1200GS. Both mileages aren't too impressive and I'm sure everyone can say "I know blah blah who got 295k on their skateboard, or 10-speed, or whatever". But, it's a big deal to me. Well, the motorcycle really isn't impressive AT ALL, but consider this - if you look for used motorcycles, most have well under 10k on the odometer, and when I was helping a family member shop, we saw bikes for sale Used with less than 1000 miles on the dial. So, keep everything in perspective.

Since it's slowly getting warm(er) here in Maryland I will be driving the motorcycle much more often and the Subaru will be used about once a week again. I spent the money to get "heated gear" so I could drive the motorcycle through the Winter, and it was effective at keeping me warm. I wore full heated gear today on the ride in which was 39°, so it wasn't really that bad. I did ride in the 20's this Winter, but I wouldn't be comfortable on an hour ride, my 30 minutes was just fine.

My plan is to get 25k on the bike before 199k on the Subaru. It could happen due to natural causes, but I think the Subaru is good at least through 200k. I'll post a follow up to this post as I get pretty excited about how many years and miles I've had the Subaru.

Ric Ocasek and Gary Numan

The first call of the day was from an employee letting me know that he witnessed a horrific accident on the way to work. The accident is on the main route to work, so he was giving me a heads up to take an alternate route to the office to avoid the backup. He then went on to tell me the details of an MTA bus hitting a Chevy Cavalier and car parts flying from the roadway hitting his vehicle. Yes, he was that close. He pulled over at the scene and was the first to call 911. He said the dispatcher asked the nature of the accident and if police, fire, or ambulance needed to respond - his answer "yes, all of them". When you think about it a public transportation bus can put a real hurtin' on a economy car. My first thought after hanging up the phone was that I should ride my motorcycle to work today. Then I opted for my car because I had a big yellow recycling can that had to make it to the warehouse.

This evening I found out that a close friend's BMW M3 was traded in for something new. When I think about other peoples car history it's always the same thing - I had MY Subaru when they bought that car NEW, and now they have another new car. Sometimes it's two new cars in the time span (Billie Jo). I do have a motorcycle which most people don't, so my cars use in 2010 was like that of a senior citizen.

I often talk about my Subaru because of it's age and mainly because it's never let me down. It's a 1996 Impreza wagon Outback. It's the smaller Outback, 4-cylinder automatic, really nothing fancy. I was happy when I bought it because it had air conditioning AND power windows. Over the cars life thus far I have replaced the battery, starter, tires, oil filters, and air filters, and timing belts. That is it over all these years.

The 1996 Subaru has 188,887 on the odometer tonight. I hope to see 200,000 before I have to let it go, it will be a sad day, but that day isn't here yet.

Spark

I often wonder how large companies get to be the size they are in their particular market place. In many cases the big companies are the very worst to deal with, make an inferior product, et cetera. Microsoft comes to mind with their glitchy software, but it's easy to figure out how they got to be huge. Verizon DSL/Cell/Landlines/Fios - ALL with terrible customer service. Comcast. I'm sure you can think of a few names too. This entry isn't going to be complaining - the opposite in fact.

Today I had a great small company experience. Last week I took my sweet Subaru (with 188k miles) to Foreign Auto Experts in Elkridge, MD. I started the car right after the Thanksgiving holiday and it was running really rough - like a piston wasn't firing, or more correctly a spark plug wasn't firing. The check engine light was flashing, where it normally is just on steady. Drove it up and down the driveway and then had my wife follow me to FAE to drop the car off for repair.

We took my wife's car there for a rotor / brake job the week previous and they got the job turned around quickly and didn't change the rear brakes because they said they didn't need to be done yet. Wow, that was really honest from an auto repair shop. Auto repair facilities don't exactly have a reputation for being honest with the public - FAE seems to be the exception to the rule.

I got a call from Brian telling me that it was an error in cylinder three and that he cleared the error in the computer and that the spark plugs look good. He said he took it for a test drive, and then would take it for another test drive to determine if it needed new wires because the problem occurred again. No such luck, problem went away when he reconnected the wires - maybe a bad connection?

I went to pickup the car today at lunch and was handed the key and told - no charge, nothing wrong with it. WHAT? No charge, not even a shop "fee" or clearing the check engine light error with your computer? No test ride fee? This is why I keep coming back for service at Foreign Auto Experts. If only small businesses like this could be the model that other businesses look up to. It's not the point of giving services and time away for free because I'm a repeat customer, and even more loyalty was won for a cheap price. From looking around the net seeing what other people have to say about them they have a loyal following due to their honest work ethics. Good for them, and me.