A few weeks back we were
on the way home and the muffler fell off the car. It decided to hang on by the
barest of thread and so it dragged all the way home and made a hell of a
racket.

I consider myself a
do-it-yourself guy. Sort of like a modern-day cave man: Even if I can’t do it
well, shouldn’t do it; been warned not to do it, I’m doing it. 

So, I got on-line
found the parts locally: Muffler and tailpipe turn down piece and after nearly
having to take a nitro over the price I looked on Amazon, where I buy
everything, and found the same parts for less than a third of the local
discount auto bargain fix-it-yourself guy’s price. I determined that since I
have Prime and free shipping, I could get the parts in two days and so I ordered
them.

The parts came after
much finger clicking and tapping and cat petting (I didn’t have to pet the cat
the cat just wanted to be petted). I spent two hours on a piece of cardboard
from a shipping box wrestling the parts into submission. Ye-Haw, I thought. I
know, not very caveman like, but I am not sure exactly what a caveman would say
since they didn’t have Chevy’s to work on. I believe back then all they had was
Fords.

Mom drove the car into
town… Well toward town… She made it a mile and then I heard one hell of a
racket out front. I was in the back in my office. It sounded like someone
started a lawn mower: One of those old ones that the muffler had rotted off of.
Well, I was half right, it did have something to do with mufflers. Curiosity
led me to the front of the house where mom informed me the muffler had fallen
off.

If you are a caveman, you
do not believe in this. Things you fix stay fixed. Bears sleep through winter.
Naked bodies should have hair on them… So, I refused to believe this. I went
outside and looked under the car and sure enough the muffler had fallen off. Impossible
I said, yet there was the evidence in front of me. A new muffler all scraped up
from being dragged home by the tailpipe hanger.

This is the part where I
said some cuss words, we have all never used and then I got out my trusty
cardboard and crawled back under the car. Hmmm, I said. And hmmm again, and
then I looked forward to see why the muffler had fallen off as it was obvious
the muffler had been torn loose as the clamp was still attached. That was when
I noticed that the entire exhaust was on the ground. All of it… All the way to
the front of the car at the catalytic convertor.

They pay almost $550.00
scrap for a junk car now and I thought, well, ol’ Chevy you are dead meat. I
had visions of Breaking Bad and Walter and Jessie crushing up the Bounder.
Sigh. But then I went back on-line, skipped the local’s this time and priced
that front section of pipe to the header pipe. I assumed it was two pieces,
maybe three. In the old days it would be, but it was all one piece. I found the
same pipe, called the Resonator pipe because it has a built-in resonator and a
long pipe that joins to the catalytic converter and then extends to the wheel
well and then all the way to the back of the car, for wide variances in the prices:
From a few hundred to fifty bucks. I used a few more carefully chosen
expletives having to do with things I use expletives for and then bought the
pipe, a pair of ramps to drive the car up onto so my fat butt could crawl under
the car, some clamps and some cat treats because the cat was right there and
had seen the treats on my frequently ordered list and meowed. No stupid cat is
my Houdini.

Yesterday I am editing a
story and the last parts arrived and so I went out at noon and dragged out my
now crumpled and smelly cardboard (It was rained on, and I think a neighborhood
dog wizzed on it too) and went to work. Two things here: One; I am out of shape
barely getting back on my feet, so I told myself I would go slowly, ha ha ha.
Two, rotted, rusty pieces of metal are not having any happy thoughts at all,
and this pipe system was no exception. I ended up having to cut the bolts off
of the Catalytic convertor where the resonator pipe joins to get it loose, that
was after an hour of prep work, um, crawling around looking at this and that
and wishing it would fall off. After I cut the pipe loose, I realized there is a
reason they do these things in a garage on a lift. How to get the pipe out? So,
I jacked one side of the car up and gained enough room to get the old pipe out
and the new pipe in. I called that car so many names it turned from silver to
red.

Anyway, in with the new
pipe, back on with the muffler, all new hangers, bolts, clamps and voila a new
system was in place. I went back into my cave with the other cave men and
grunted with satisfaction. Tomorrow we are going hunting… er editing…

Houdini, my cat

Buy my books so I can feed my cat 🙂 

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