Sometimes one bad idea can ripple across an entire industry.
In this segment of Drive Radio, the crew kicks off the question of the day by diving into one of the most damaging OEM blunders ever: General Motors’ attempt to convert a gasoline engine into a diesel during the 1970s fuel crisis. What was supposed to save the company instead crippled consumer trust in diesel vehicles for years.
From there, the conversation expands into a broader look at automotive mistakes—why they happen, how innovation sometimes backfires, and how early versions of technology often fail before they succeed.
Listeners also call in with
SPEAKER 16 :
It’s 106 miles to Chicago. We’ve got a full tank of gas. It’s dark, and we’re wearing sunglasses.
SPEAKER 06 :
Hit it. Our lady of blessed acceleration, don’t fail me now.
SPEAKER 17 :
It’s time for Drive Radio, presented by Colorado’s select auto care centers. Whether you need help diagnosing a problem. I want to ask you a bunch of questions, and I want to have them answered immediately. Or just want to learn about all things automotive.
SPEAKER 19 :
Hey, how exactly does a positrack rear end on a Plymouth work?
SPEAKER 17 :
It just does. Then you’ve come to the right place. So start your engines, buckle up, and get ready to ride. Drive Radio starts now on KLZ 560 The Source.
SPEAKER 11 :
And it’s that time, Drive Radio, KLZ 560. Myself, Pat Schneid, Alltech Automotive up in Fort Collins. Welcome, Pat. Hey, thanks, John. Happy to be here. Always a joy to have you. Larry Unger, of course, answering phones. Charlie Grimes, our engineer. And we got a lot in store for you today. Question of the day today. And we’ll get things fired up. I’ll get to Rand here in just a moment. Our first call, 303-477-5600, by the way, is our studio line. You can text us as well, which a lot of folks do. 307-477-5600. 200-82-22. 307-200-82-22. So question of the day today. This came off of Larry sending me an article earlier this week about the Oldsmobile converted gas engine that they put into a diesel form. They converted it into a diesel engine all the way back in the 70s. It was going to be a thing that saved GM during the gas crisis. end of things we had going on under the gas shortage and so on, and that was going to be the thing that saved General Motors. And what it did was it destroyed diesel sales in America for quite some time because it was one of those blunders. I’ll talk a little bit more about that, but that is the question of the day. Give us what you feel is one of the biggest OEM blunders, and here’s what I will ask of you. because some of you will come up with several, to give everybody an opportunity to have one, just give me one. So take the one that you feel is one of the bigger ones and give that to me and we’ll limit it to one because otherwise there’s, I mean, there’s a lot, but not enough for people to rattle off, you know, four or five each and be able to do it that way.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, we can’t steal all the fun.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, thank you. Can’t steal all the fun. Rand, you’re first today. Go ahead.
SPEAKER 03 :
Okay, my question is not regarding the car, but it’s a motorcycle. Sure, no problem. I purchased a 2014 BMW. It has a 1600cc six-cylinder engine. I bought it from a friend. He hadn’t driven it for four years. It sat for four years, although he did drain the gas out of the tank. He didn’t get it out of the fuel lines and the fuel injectors, that kind of thing. It wouldn’t start whatsoever, so I went and got premium gas. I put the right amount of Tecron in the gas, as BMW says to do that. So now I’ve got the bike, and it idles. It takes about 10 times on the starter to get it to fire up. It fires up rough one time. Next time, it fires up and idles perfectly. When I turn the throttle, it will bog a little bit, but then it will go back up. And then I’m actually able to turn the throttle and get all the RPMs up, but I’m not able to ride it. So, yeah, what would you suggest?
SPEAKER 11 :
To me, you’re still suffering from that bad gas that was in there during that amount of time. It’s going to be a matter of time for that Tecron and things to work its way through. It’s too bad you can’t ride it, because riding it would be the best thing you could do to try to get some of that out of there. But the only other thing you can do, Rand, would be to just let it, even if it’ll just sit and idle, let it idle for a little while.
SPEAKER 03 :
See if we can’t get some. Go for 10 minutes. But what I’m noticing is, though, the engine starts to, you know, temperature gauge.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yes, because you’re not driving it. That’s the problem. Yes. Can you put, like, a fan, a box fan or anything in front of it to try to blow some air through it to keep the temperature from rising? Sure.
SPEAKER 03 :
Sure, that’s a great idea. I certainly can.
SPEAKER 11 :
And do that, because again, what we need to do is just run more fuel through it to see if we can’t get things cleaned up.
SPEAKER 10 :
What about a fuel system cleaner like 44K?
SPEAKER 11 :
Well, he put some Tecron in it, which is the same thing, so yeah.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, okay.
SPEAKER 11 :
And I didn’t ask, did you check spark plugs and such as well, Rand? Spark plugs would be a good check.
SPEAKER 03 :
No, I haven’t done any of that. I have not checked any of that yet. But I’m going to. I’m going to do the air filter. I’ll check the spark plugs. The fuel pump is in the gas tank with the fuel filter. That all has to be removed. But I’m just trying to start at the basics and see where I can get it.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yep, yep. I think that’s a good idea. So you’re basically looking at air, fuel, or spark, and you’ve pretty well addressed the fuel. So a spark plug would not be a bad idea. Air filter would not be a bad idea. But it does sound to me like it’s kind of that gummed-up fuel, too. Maybe in the fuel line itself, maybe not in the gas tank, but maybe in the fuel line.
SPEAKER 03 :
The fact that it does idle properly, what does that tell me regarding the fuel pump or the fuel filter?
SPEAKER 10 :
It’s using less fuel at that time, so it’s not demanding a lot or high pressure.
SPEAKER 11 :
Meaning that if it’ll idle, that doesn’t mean it’s going to run at full throttle, for example, or even on the accelerator side of things because, to Pat’s point, it’s the least amount that it takes to actually sit and idle.
SPEAKER 03 :
Right. Okay. But does that tell me that the fuel filter is good and obviously the fuel pump is good? Not necessarily.
SPEAKER 11 :
Does that eliminate those two things? The pump’s probably good, but that doesn’t mean the filter is. And by the way, everything you’ve done so far, you’re on the right track, Ram. You just got to keep rolling. I hate to say it that way, but you just got to keep going.
SPEAKER 03 :
No problem. Thanks. Thank you very much.
SPEAKER 11 :
You’re very welcome. No, Rand, appreciate it. Great question, by the way, to get us started off. And I got a question of the day came in on the text line, 70s Chrysler digital dash. Yeah, the digital dash is early, and Chrysler wasn’t the only one that had some of those. And quite frankly, yeah, they were not very good at all at that time.
SPEAKER 10 :
So do they have integrity problems, like circuit board problems, and the display would go a wonky?
SPEAKER 11 :
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Just keep rolling on down the line.
SPEAKER 10 :
I know it’s a style thing, but I’ve always been an analog guy with the sweep gauges, and my wife, on the other hand, really loves a digital readout. I just don’t know exactly how fast she is going, but I prefer the analog.
SPEAKER 11 :
All righty, let’s do this. We’ll take a quick break. Biggest blunders from the manufacturers, that is our question of the day. Myself, Patch Knight, we’ll be back here in a moment. Drive Radio, KLZ 560.
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SPEAKER 14 :
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SPEAKER 11 :
Hey, and you’ll hear today two new sponsors, Neat Freak Solutions. You just heard a moment ago where Paula, that’s Larry’s daughter actually, she’ll go in and help you organize. And we’ve talked to her on Fix It Radio in the past and will continue to in the future. But some of you that need help on the organizing end of things, estates and so on, she is there to help you. And then we’ve got a new sponsor down in Colorado Springs, Honest. Accurate Auto Care will have them on here in the next couple of weeks to talk about what they’re doing. But if you’re in the Colorado Springs area looking for a really good shop, there’s two locations to serve you. You’ll see those on the website here, if not today, in the very, very near future. Honest, Accurate Auto Care. If you need their phone number, let me know. You heard the ad, or you will be hearing ads, I should say, each hour for them as well. But if you need anything Colorado Springs, please let me know, and I will send them down to you. So, again, question of the day. biggest oem blunder so josh legacy automotive just sent this in the cadillac four six eight he only made him one year was the first mass-produced displacement on demand engine it only took 25 years but now almost every car with more than four cylinders has some sort of displacement on demand so cadillac started that thanks josh yes you’re right um and with anything And some of what we’re going to talk about today with these blunders, I’ll give the OEM some credit here because some of the blunders were because they were the first ones to bring it to market.
SPEAKER 15 :
Correct.
SPEAKER 11 :
And then, you know, for example, we just talked about digital dashes in the 70s. Well, now every dash is digital. I mean, literally, even if you think your dash is analog. It’s not. It’s simulating analog, but it is most likely a digital dash, and that’s just the way everything works today. And again, at one time, it was very uncommon to have a digital dash, and they had their issues. I mean, and by the way, it wasn’t just Chrysler back then. Ford had some issues. GM had issues. I mean, if there was a digital dash back in the 70s, even 80s, folks, even early 90s, some of the digital dashes that were there were were absolute garbage because the technology just wasn’t quite where it needed to be to make that work. You know, the thing that people forget about in the car world. And this is something that the non-car person doesn’t understand. Cars move. Yep. It’s why, for example, when you do wiring on a car, you can’t use house wiring because it’s solid copper. And over time, with vibration, it’ll break in, too. That’s why you use multi-stranded wire in automotive because if you don’t, every circuit will be broken down over time.
SPEAKER 10 :
So to your point, manufacturers go through things. They talk about environmental testing, which is shake, vibration, heat-cold cycles. That’s right. All these things happen. Cars oftentimes get stored indoors. Good for them. Sometimes it gets stored outdoors. It gets really, really cold. They drive down dirt roads. They drive down paved roads. They hit potholes. They vibrate. They shake.
SPEAKER 11 :
And, yeah, stuff comes apart. To Pat’s point, the natural harmonics that are going through the vehicle as you’re driving there’s a certain amount of just normal vibrations that are happening in the car. You may not feel it because of the way things are done with body mounts and suspension and so on. But trust me, those things are there. And my point is, some of the blunders and things that we’ll talk about today, while they were, we’re not going to give these guys a free pass, but… Remember that some of the things that we consider today to be a blunder back then was the manufacturers figuring out ways to do things innovatively speaking. And some of that took some time for that to actually come to fruition in the marketplace, I guess is how I should say that, Pat.
SPEAKER 10 :
Oh, 100%. It starts with that vision. And thank God someone’s got the chutzpah to put that to the market, right? Because it takes that trial and error and that iteration over time improving on the design. We all benefit from it further down the road. Sometimes it’s a little expensive for the first iteration.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, and again, the digital dash, by the way, thank you. That’s a great example of how they were really bad to begin with. And yet today, I don’t think you’ll buy a car that doesn’t have something digitized and or completely digital in that end of things just because that’s the way it is today. And yes, I can attest to back in the day, oh man, even me growing up in a Buick dealership, Buick GMC dealership, Some of the early Rivieras had digital dashes and such in them. Some of the other high-end cars did as well. And, oh, man, it was nothing to have a vehicle come in, have to pull the dash out, send it in. At that time, there was a company in town called Downtown Radio. They did a lot of the fixing of those sorts of things, and you’d get it back. And, I mean, they were just junk. I don’t know any other way to say it. John and Loveland, you’re next. Go ahead.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, I had the thought that for the modern blunder, it’s the engine shutdown on the modern cars that come to it. Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER 11 :
And you know what? And that’s another one where, you know, some of these blunders, by the way, let me let me also say this. Some of these blunders are the manufacturer responding to what government wanted them to do. Start stop, by the way, John, is one of those examples. It was that was more governmentally speaking than I think the manufacturers wanting to do it. Trust me, if they would have had their way, they wouldn’t have done it at all. Correct.
SPEAKER 07 :
Have they offered a means of getting that disconnected?
SPEAKER 11 :
I’m glad you asked. There are some vehicles where there are aftermarket kits available where it’s a harness adaption where you can put the device in between the start-stop button and the harness assembly itself, I should say, that will eliminate the start-stop, although it’s not every vehicle. Correct.
SPEAKER 07 :
And is that acceptable legally by the government? Oh, sure.
SPEAKER 11 :
Sure, yeah. I mean, it’s your car at that point. Do whatever you want to with it.
SPEAKER 07 :
Well… Not necessarily.
SPEAKER 11 :
Well, I mean, you cannot remove emissions devices and things like that, to your point. You can’t take the cat off and all of that. But in this case, you’re not harming anything along those lines. You’re not changing the emissions of the vehicle or anything like that, John. So, yeah, no, there’s nothing wrong with that.
SPEAKER 10 :
With the auto start-stop, it’s just when the car is turned off, it’s not emitting anything, right? So it is designed to reduce emissions, but it’s not tampering with that system.
SPEAKER 11 :
It’s more fuel economy than anything. Fuel economy, yeah. That was one of their ways to get to the CAFE rating. That’s why I say it was more mandated by government than anything. Yep.
SPEAKER 07 :
Has anybody sued because of an accident that was caused by the vehicle not being able to get out of the way and got rear-ended?
SPEAKER 10 :
That I have no idea. I am also not aware of that. I have not heard of that. Me neither.
SPEAKER 07 :
All right, I just got my two cents in. No, that’s a good one.
SPEAKER 11 :
By the way, that’s the kind of thing that we’re asking. And again, that’s one where, is it a blunder? Yes. Was it all the manufacturer’s responsibility in that? No. I think that one, you can go back to Uncle Sam and blame that on Uncle Sam.
SPEAKER 10 :
I think that’s really true. And if you look at across the board, auto manufacturers, we’ve been doing this a long time now, over 100 years, right? So it’s like we’ve learned a few things and we’ve made some vehicles very, very reliable. But we are continually pushed by the government for both fuel economy and emission standards. And it’s causing us to do some things that are a little less than natural. But it is pushing the envelope in design. But, yeah, we might have passed that sweet spot for ultimate manufacturers. engines running smooth and longevity because of these extra requirements that are being put on us as an industry.
SPEAKER 11 :
Thankfully, and this goes back to, John, your call just a moment ago, the current administration has eliminated those things and no longer going to be required. So you’re going to see us actually probably go not backwards, but go back to where things were, and those will no longer be a requirement. So with each administration comes different rules and regulations. Correct. Unfortunately, the manufacturers, they’re sort of stuck in the middle, if you will. They’ve got a consumer that wants one thing. They’ve got government demanding something else. And somehow, in their defense, they’re trying to find the sweet spot where they can actually make everybody happy at the end of the day and still sell cars and make money. Yes.
SPEAKER 10 :
And at some point, there’s a little bit of common sense involved. And sometimes we go too far in the pursuit of our goals, and we have to dial back a little bit. But ultimately, it does get to a better place.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yep. And again, so the blunders, that is the question of the day. Give us some of the biggest OEM manufacturing blunders. 307-200-8222 is our phone number, our text line, I should say, our phone number to the studio, 303-477-5600. Somebody said… Dry turbos, Chrysler lean burn, carbs with mixture control, solenoids, and by the way, soybean wiring. Yeah, that’s still an issue that’s out there right now. That’s one that hasn’t gone away. The lean burn, yeah. And again, going back to this again, the carbs with the mixture control, the feedback carburetor is what we called them back in the day. Again, was that the manufacturer itself? Or was that government forcing things on the manufacturer to improve economy, emissions, and so on? And I would tell you that it’s the latter. And the problem is we didn’t have, going back to what Pat and I were talking about a moment ago, knowing that a car drives and there’s vibration and so on. Remember, that even applies to the computerization of the car, meaning that a computer in a car is far more robust than than any other computer that you’ll find out there. And it has to be. I mean, think of, you know, back in the day, there were the Panasonic Toughbooks that people would use out in the field, construction and so on, because they were tougher than a standard laptop. Well, think of that only 10 times more so in what has to be in your car, because to Pat’s point, you know, if you took your regular laptop, and try to operate it at 40 below or at 130 or 40 degrees yep it’s not going to not going to work well where your car does so think about that in terms of electronics and things that are in the car and how much more robust they are than what it is in other areas and those are the things that a lot of non-automotive people forget because it’s not one and the same by the way it’s one of the things that tesla even went through and had some struggle with early on with some of their displays as they were using some pads and displays and things that I’m not sure the people building them understood the things that I just said a moment ago. Let’s do this. I want to give everybody plenty of time. Let’s take a break. Jeff from Montana, you’ve got a blunder response. We’ll come back and take that. Plus, Larry’s taking some calls as we speak. I put somebody on hold. Hang tight. Larry, I’ll get to you here in a moment. Drive Radio, KLZ 560.
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SPEAKER 11 :
Okay, we are back. Myself, Pat Schneid, Alltech Automotive up in Fort Collins. Of course, Charlie Grimes, our engineer, and Larry Unger answering phones. Jeff in western Montana. Question of the day is, give us some OEM blunders, and I think you have an answer.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, before I do that, you were talking about the vibration. Yes. For a while, I was with the RC-135 reconnaissance program. The big aircraft, when they had what they called a Block 5 upgrade, where they went all digital, and part of the digital upgrade was those huge 14-inch hard drives. Can you imagine those suckers spinning in an airplane at 30,000 feet? The vibration.
SPEAKER 10 :
Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 10 :
That’s a little scary.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, we had a… A good relationship. We’re at the place where they first brought them out of the factory. They weren’t really operational. They were trying to operationalize them, so they would put them in the rotation, in the mix. Yeah.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah. No, that’s another one where people forget that it’s even the same there, that automotive and aircraft alike, Jeff, the robustness of things, it’s not like any other industries. That’s right.
SPEAKER 05 :
No, no. But I don’t know if it’s really a blunder. I think it’s just something that the industry kind of dropped, but it’s the Wankel rotary engine.
SPEAKER 11 :
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Good point.
SPEAKER 05 :
It’s a powerhouse, I mean, for the size and the weight. It generates phenomenal amounts of power, but I think it was nitrous dioxide or nitrogen dioxide or something for the pollution, and then seals were hard to maintain, too.
SPEAKER 10 :
The NOx, yeah. Yeah, the seals were hard to maintain. It came down to maintenance, and it was a little bit expensive to maintain it, and so people didn’t, and yeah. They were fun to drive, though. It was good performance in the package.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, and there’s probably no incentive to go back to that.
SPEAKER 11 :
GM even did some work on trying to come up with their own, and the biggest problem that they have is the way that they seal, the way the cylinder seals, I guess you could say. It’s very inefficient, doesn’t last very long. Once they wear in a little bit, that’s where the emission starts to grow. And you remember back in the day, even, Jeff, on those Mazdas, you’d see them running around, and 90% of them smoked. I mean, very, very few of those did not smoke.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yep, you’re right.
SPEAKER 11 :
Because of what I just said.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, actually, the second generation was better, but they didn’t last very long.
SPEAKER 11 :
To your point, very powerful for what they were as far as horsepower to cubic inch, as far as the displacement and that is concerned. Very, very powerful, but it just didn’t last.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, they’d wind up pretty fast, too. So, I don’t know. Maybe we’ll see them again down the road. Who knows?
SPEAKER 11 :
You never know.
SPEAKER 05 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 11 :
Good one.
SPEAKER 08 :
Good answer, John.
SPEAKER 11 :
No, good one, Jeff. Appreciate it very much. John is up next. John, you’re next. Go ahead.
SPEAKER 08 :
Hello, John. This is John.
SPEAKER 11 :
How are you, sir?
SPEAKER 08 :
I’m doing pretty good. Thank you. Good. Hey, in this segment of Ride Radio, my question references motorcycle as well, but it’s a general question.
SPEAKER 11 :
That’s fine.
SPEAKER 08 :
Sure. I’m as well bringing back a vintage motorcycle. back to life, and master cylinder is in need of replacement. I have found a replica Wagner Lockheed master cylinder. In the description of it, it states .5 compatible. Now, my system, and according to the manual, runs .3, and it’s always had .3 in it. I’ve tried to find out through AI and through the suppliers, you know, is it backward compatible? And nobody can give me that answer.
SPEAKER 10 :
It is. It is, yes. So you should be able to run DOT3.
SPEAKER 08 :
It wouldn’t have a problem if the master cylinder is clean, brand new. I throw it in at .3, I’m not going to have a problem.
SPEAKER 10 :
No. Right. That’s correct.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, I think… AI kept telling me, you know, you can’t mix them, you can’t mix them. I know that.
SPEAKER 10 :
Right. You don’t want to mix them. And I think, you know, whatever the properties are in .5, not all seals, not all master cylinders will be .5 compatible. You have one that is, but it will also support .3 just fine. And the important part is once you install it, use .3 and don’t mix the two fluids.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, and the reason you can’t mix them is because… DOT-5 is silicone-based, and DOT-3 is just regular old glycol-based brake fluid. That’s why you cannot mix them. By the way, if it were me, personally, I would run DOT-5. It’s a better fluid. It’s a better fluid. Yeah.
SPEAKER 08 :
And it doesn’t attract the moisture. I’ve got rubber hoses, steel lines.
SPEAKER 11 :
And the .5 will be fine for that. I mean, back in the old days, a lot of the car guys would convert even an old car to .5 because it’s also not corrosive. The silicone won’t take paint off, which is why a lot of old car guys will run a silicone, or in this case .5, because it’s more forgiving on frame rails and things like that where you may actually get some spillover from the brake fluid. So if it were me, John, I wouldn’t run .38. Anyways, I had run DOT 5.
SPEAKER 08 :
Okay, so I do like that idea because it breaks and it’s pretty sad.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, and the DOT 5 is better with temperature and all of that. The reason why the manufacturers now across the board are using it is because it’s better fluid.
SPEAKER 08 :
So let’s run all the way through the system. Correct. So I got the wheel cylinder on that brake drum in the back.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, you’re going to want to flush everything out really good with the .5, meaning buy enough to where you can flush everything out, but go ahead and do that, and that’s exactly what I would do.
SPEAKER 08 :
And the wheel cylinder replacement states .3 to .3, .4.
SPEAKER 11 :
You can run .5 and it’d be just fine. Again, not going to hurt anything at all. As long as it’s clean. That’s right. As long as you get it flushed out good enough.
SPEAKER 08 :
How would I go about flushing out the brake system?
SPEAKER 11 :
Just run, you know, just like you would a vehicle. There are power flushers you could use, or if you do it the old-fashioned way, you just fill it and continue to pump it, you know, open it, pump it, open it, pump it. And you just want to run, you know, I’d run, oh, gosh, at least a full bottle through it, John. A large bottle, not one of the small bottles, but a large bottle.
SPEAKER 10 :
It’s a one-way flush from the master cylinder down to the wheel, and then it comes out of the valve at the wheel, right? So once it’s out, it’s out, and you just put enough of the fluid through.
SPEAKER 11 :
And the way to check that, you know, the old-fashioned way, there’s now kits that guys make. But back in the day, we used to take, and this is what I did, is you take a piece of mechanics wire. And you take a glass bottle that you have like orange juice or whatever in with the metal cap. You poke a hole in the top. You run a rubber hose down, a clear rubber hose down through the top of that. The same size hose that would fit on top of the bleeder. So when you open the bleeder up, you can watch the fluid run down into the bottle. You can see when the color starts to change and when you’ve got the good clean fluid going in, then you know you’re done. It’ll go from dark to light color. That’s right.
SPEAKER 08 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 11 :
It’s easy.
SPEAKER 08 :
I don’t need any kind of neutralizing or cleaning agent.
SPEAKER 11 :
You do not. Just flush it out with a dot five.
SPEAKER 08 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 11 :
The good fluid will push the bad fluid right out of the way. That’s exactly right. You’ll have no issues.
SPEAKER 08 :
And you can gravity that to begin with, but then eventually power it, John. You know what? I could pump it out. I could be inside the master cylinder. Yeah, you’re close enough there where that’s easy.
SPEAKER 11 :
On a car, it’s a little harder because you need two people. But in your case, yeah, one person’s easy.
SPEAKER 08 :
Okay. Let me ask another question about that replica master cylinder, if I may. Sure. It’s a replica, so it’s not the real thing. It’s a Wagner Lockheed master cylinder on my bike. It’s the original master cylinder. What is, maybe not the quality, but what’s… Why is it a replica? I know why, because the original’s not being made. Correct. Are they any good? Are they worth it? Well, I don’t know.
SPEAKER 11 :
In this case, I’m not sure. Unless you go find old stock parts someplace, I don’t know that you have a choice.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah. And the old stock’s no better than what I have.
SPEAKER 11 :
Probably not.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah. Great. Thank you. No, you’re very welcome.
SPEAKER 11 :
Great question, by the way, John. No, thank you. Very good. Very good question. John and Centennial, go ahead. You’re next.
SPEAKER 06 :
Hey, good morning, guys. Good show. I’ve got two comments. Number one comment about the topic of the day. My brother bought new in the early 80s a Cadillac, and they had the V864. That never worked well, where it was a V8, then go down to six cylinders, and then four cylinders. The technology was old then. The newer one is a lot better. My second comment was I bought a brand-new 2025 Buick Envision yesterday. What’s really weird about it is I know the Envision is made in China. Of all the Buicks, that one’s made in China. But, John, up at the top by the rearview mirror, you have a place for opening up your automatic garage door opener type of stuff.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yes.
SPEAKER 06 :
But this one doesn’t have a sunglass holder. My old 2000 car had a sunglass holder. There’s no little door up there to put sunglasses in. And that is really weird. I know.
SPEAKER 11 :
There’s a lot of them that have gone that way where there’s no longer that glasses, quote-unquote, glasses holder. Yeah. You are correct, John. Yes.
SPEAKER 06 :
That’s really weird. But that InVision, I’ve had it one day. I like it. Like I said, it’s made in China, and that doesn’t mean anything. But anyway, I like it, and it’s a good car. It’s a good car. It’s got kind of the same dash layout with that big screen as a Cadillac does.
SPEAKER 11 :
Very cool. Sure, sure. What color did you buy?
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay, but what do you think about that V864?
SPEAKER 11 :
The old ones, when they first came out, you mean? Yeah. Josh from Legacy talked about that one a little bit ago that he texted. Yeah, they were junk. Now, and as I said, it was the precursor to what we have today across the board, but yeah, they were not very good.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER 11 :
They actually were awful.
SPEAKER 10 :
The later ones, the newer ones, they’re fine so long as you maintain them properly, keep up on your oil changes, right? They’re good. Yeah.
SPEAKER 06 :
Now, the other thing about, one last thing about this Envision, and I was kind of surprised, and I don’t know if I want to run it. It says it’ll run, it’s a turbo with a small engine, but it’ll run on E85. It will. I don’t know about that. What do you think?
SPEAKER 11 :
It will. Yeah. I mean, that’s more of the design of the fuel system itself, and if it says it will, it will. You won’t, unless there’s a dollar difference in price, there’s no gain there.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay. I always like to burn the mid-grade in my cars.
SPEAKER 11 :
That’s fine. Sure. Nothing wrong with that. 87 octane or something. Yeah, nothing wrong with that at all. Okay, okay. Well, that sounds good. You’re on the right track. Thanks. You betcha, John. Appreciate you. We’ll take a break. We’ll come right back. Drive Radio, KLZ 560.
SPEAKER 19 :
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SPEAKER 11 :
Okay, we are Backdrive Radio, KLZ 560. Thanks for listening. Pat Schneid, Alltech Automotive with us today. And you guys crack me up, the text line especially. You guys come up with things that even I tend to not think about as blunders. And one of you said you remember T-Tops. From back in the day, because most of you knew I grew up in a car dealership, a Buick dealership, a GMC truck. And we had T-tops on a lot of the… Because back then, the Regals were big, and they had the turbocharged engines, and that was kind of Buick’s big thing. And again, that was another one. Was that a blunder? Well… I don’t want to call it a blunder because the performance cars of today had Buick not have done a lot of the research and development on turbo engines back in the day. And I get it. I understand there were foreign cars that had turbos and so on. But really, Buick did a lot to further the whole development of… that turbo engine program throughout all lines. And, by the way, did a great job of really doing that, but taking a lot of hits back in the day. But, yeah, those cars had T-tops. I was telling Pat a moment ago that some of you that worked in the industry might even remember this. The T-tops originally were meant for the car they came on, but they leaked. Like a sieve sometimes. And I can remember there were times where you literally, we would go out on the lot and find another car if we had one in stock that actually had a T-top. And sometimes you’d pull a T-top off of a new one to go put on the one that was in for warranty to see if it fit any better than the other one. And again, you had to make sure that the one you were taking and putting back on the new car, everything would swap in color and all that. But if you could do that, sometimes you actually could get a win that way because getting them to seal up was a chore because they were garbage.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yep, they’re rigid. They have the soft vinyl, not vinyl, but the rubber door seals, right? And they get compressed, and they leak. Oh, they’re crap. Yeah. They were garbage. Whistle air, and most importantly, leak water. They were terrible.
SPEAKER 11 :
They looked cool, but that was about the extent of it.
SPEAKER 10 :
They did look cool.
SPEAKER 11 :
So, yeah, thank you, guys. I mean, again, your questions of the day, your answers are awesome, as always. Joe and Littleton, go ahead.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, I have a question. Every time I’ve gotten brakes on my car done… I never hear a squeak or anything.
SPEAKER 09 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 04 :
But this time when I got them done, I still hear a squeak. I don’t do it like highway driving and, you know, where I slam on the brakes or anything. But it’s usually when I come to a real slow stop. And I took it back twice and didn’t say they’re fine.
SPEAKER 11 :
Okay. And what are we driving, Jo? What kind of vehicle?
SPEAKER 04 :
It’s an older Honda.
SPEAKER 11 :
Okay. And it should be squeakless, by the way, so you shouldn’t have any squeak. At one time, this is another one of those things that we’re talking about. Question of the day, and going back in time and so on, at one time it was hard to get brakes to not squeak. Today’s world, if they’re done correctly and they’re put on the way that they’re supposed to and you’re using the right brake pads and so on, we are in a day of having squeakless brakes. Rarely do you come up to a stoplight and hear anybody around you even having brakes squeak, Joe. So, no, you should not have any squeaks there at all, and they need to address that because it should be squeakless.
SPEAKER 04 :
Okay, now they put, and I’m not good at this. I hope I got the right word. Is it rotors or routers? Rotors. That’s right. That’s the brake rotor.
SPEAKER 11 :
That’s what the pad squeezes against to stop the car.
SPEAKER 04 :
Okay, they put all brand new ones on the front.
SPEAKER 11 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 04 :
And I’ve taken it back, and they tell me it’s just fine.
SPEAKER 11 :
Do they hear the squeak, or have you ridden with them to where they can hear it as well?
SPEAKER 04 :
They actually drove the car and didn’t hear it. And I don’t hear it like if I stop abruptly, but if I come slowly to a stop sign, then I hear it.
SPEAKER 11 :
Okay. What I would do next is make sure that you can replicate the squeak when they’re riding with you, a service advisor, technician, whoever they decide to have go with you. But if you’re hearing and you can replicate it, they should be able to hear it and fix it. Correct.
SPEAKER 04 :
Okay, because I keep thinking, I’ve never had this happen before, and it’s a very reputable company, which I love a lot.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, and I would give them a chance to hear it and get it fixed, and they need to hear it so they know exactly when it’s happening. And there’s fixes for this, so they can fix it. It should not squeak.
SPEAKER 04 :
Thank you so very much.
SPEAKER 11 :
You’re welcome, Joe. And for those of you listening, those types of problems to where you hear it or you sense it or smell it or feel it and the shop doesn’t, this is one of those situations where have that either advisor or technician, preferably the technician if at all possible, ride with you to duplicate what you have because maybe you’re doing something a little bit differently that that other driver, that other technician or advisor. Yes. Whoever else is driving the car isn’t doing it the same way because I’ve ridden with people before where they replicated a problem that I never would have found because I don’t drive the same way. That’s very correct.
SPEAKER 10 :
Does that make sense? In fact, the shop will be happy to ride along with you. In our industry, this is called noise, vibration, and harshness, or NVH. And these are the hardest test inspections to go through because, to John’s point, the technician does not drive the car the same way as the customer does. and we may or may not hear the same noise. And we might hear a different noise and go after that noise, and that’s not even the problem. So riding along with the technician so you both identify and hear the same noise gives us a solid path to go after.
SPEAKER 11 :
Answer the question of the day, 70s, 80s Buick V8s with all of the V-belts pulling on one side of the aluminum water pump would actually wipe the water pump out in about 30,000 miles. Yep, and that was before we had serpentine belts and things that, you know, eliminated all of the V-belts. I will just tell you straight up, I mean, back in the day, and this is when I grew up in the industry, just some of the vehicles that had, oh gosh. In some cases, you’d have five V-belts. Right. And, you know, it never failed. The one that you had to replace was the most inward one, so all four other ones had to come off to get to the one you had to replace. Those were… I hated those. That’s kind of Murphy’s Law right there. Literally, I hated those. For me, maybe this is the reason why you end up being a good technician, but the time I grew up in the industry and the things we had to struggle with, young technicians today don’t know how good they actually have it.
SPEAKER 10 :
Well, that’s true, John, but I would also say if you had a car with five V-belts, that just means that you had the fancy car with too many accessories. You had a lot of stuff going on.
SPEAKER 11 :
Two-door cutlass with T-tops. Oh, my goodness. You had to get weather stripping from the hardware store to attempt to stop them from leaking. Now I’m having flashbacks. That’s awesome. Yeah, I am, too, because I remember fixing those things back in the day. And you’re right. Sometimes you had to go and add things to the T-tops to actually get them to fully seal because, again, they were just junk. They just weren’t any good. Yeah. Somebody said dome lights stayed on for a bit afterwards or after the door was closed. That was embarrassing at Drive-In Movies. Yeah, that’s another one where, again, today all of that’s built into the latch mechanism. But back in the day, you had the little plungers that made the dome lights come on and off. And sometimes they would not. And yet anyways, great questions of the day. Which are, what are, sorry, I’m answering text messages at the same time. It’s hard for me to talk in type. Question of the day, biggest OEM blunders. Now, I went ahead and stuck that into AI just to get some answers out of AI to see what they’d say. Now, AI came up with, which I would say this is probably towards the top of this. I don’t know if this is the number one blunder, although… given what it caused in damage and what it cost ford motor company the pinto is probably the biggest oem blunder of all time my very first car yes and it was in response to foreign cars infiltrating fuel economy and so on and ford released that thing away and there was even some there’s been some stories released in some short movies and so on along these lines reality is they released that car long before they should have they were pushed to get it out uh there was some how do i want to say this pat they knew internally that they were going to have issues and they decided um which was not the right decision on their part but they decided that we feel like we can cover the cost air quotes around that right of some of the things that we know will come out of this and let’s release it anyways well that’s exactly right one of the the
SPEAKER 10 :
very serious flaws in those pintos in the 1970s was the location of the gas tank right which uh in in the back and if the car was rear-ended could potentially cause a fire and it did and it could kill people right if not seriously well there was internal memos uh this is right in my notes showing cost benefit analysis on deaths versus recall costs results were lawsuits criminal
SPEAKER 11 :
charges, massive PR damage. And by the way, it changed from that point forward. It changed how automakers approached safety engineering and liability.
SPEAKER 10 :
Thank goodness. But to your point, these are business decisions for the manufacturer. And a lot of times they take a lot of emotions out of it. They look at the numbers, they run the statistics, the actuary, right? And they run those numbers and they make a business decision, not saying it’s right or wrong, but that is how things are done in the manufacturing world.
SPEAKER 11 :
The next one that’s listed on AI anyways was General Motors’ ignition switch recall. They had a small, cheap ignition switch defect like the Chevy, Cobalt, and others. The airbags disabled during shutdown. It was linked to 100-plus deaths. GM delayed that recall for years. They finally did and had to replace those. Folks, there’s many of those that we can talk about and probably will go through today on some of the OEM blunders. And again, unfortunately, a lot of cases, the legal counsel for some of these companies would come in and say, well, here’s your options. Here’s what this is actually going to cost at the end of the day. And they’d run a cost-benefit analysis and decide to go ahead and still release that particular product, knowing at the end of the day it wasn’t going to be good for the public.
SPEAKER 10 :
That’s right, and not always the best business decision either in hindsight. That’s what they did. That’s what they did.
SPEAKER 11 :
All right, that’s the first hour of Drive Radio. Two more hours coming your way. Myself, Pat Schneid, Alltech Automotive. We’ll be back in a moment. This is Drive Radio, KLZ 560.
SPEAKER 12 :
Still haven’t had enough? Go to drive-radio.com. Email your questions and comments. Download previous programs and find lots of useful information, including your nearest Colorado Select Auto Care Center. That’s drive-radio.com. Thanks for listening to Drive Radio, sponsored by the member shops of Colorado Select Auto Care Centers. On KLZ 560.
