Every car should have a story

My first car was a Renault 4. That's like a 2CV, with backbone. One of its more entertaining features was that the engine could keep chugging on at reduced power, sometimes for up to 10 seconds, after you turned it off. Eventually there would a pfft as all the stray gases running around the system blew out a hose that was plugged on just below the air filter. All you had to do was plug it back in again when you wanted the car to start, and you were fine.

My next car was a Ford Escort. Oh, the delight of being able to turn up at KwikFit with a blowing exhaust and have them just take a new one off the shelf! But then this car also developed an idiosyncrasy in that the engine would not restart, if you turned it off and left it for more than about a minute, until it had cooled down for about half an hour or so. On occasions where I had no choice but to turn it off, with a chance of restarting within half an hour, I had to open the hood to let it cool. This was eventually traced to a faulty ignition coil.

The present vehicle was doing fine in the idiosyncrasy stakes until last night when, approahcing 11pm, I tried to turn it on and got -- nothing. Zilch. Not even that whirring turning over noise a car makes when the battery is flat. Nothing. And I was miles from home, and it was raining. Thank the Lord and all his little angels for the AA.

Turned out one of the battery terminals had eroded right off the battery. It was still securely held by the cables that connected to it -- but not to the battery. My Knight of the Road (or is that the RAC?) had never seen anything like it. But he soon put a new battery in and that was fine.

Except that now the electronics need rekeying or something. He warned me this would be the case. The radio and tape player won't work.

Which brings me back to a rant of a few days ago. Modern electronic devices in cars. Why?!?