Dec 05, 2023
Okay, all, time for the new puzzler. This one is very automotive in nature.
Do you all remember Crusty? He was one of our old mechanics from back in the day. Way back in the day. Crusty used to work for us many years ago, before we were accredited...
Crusty had some unusual techniques which we've described over the years. And one he had that I have never mentioned before was the following interesting thing.
From time to time, people would bring cars into the garage and ask us to check them out because they were thinking of buying this particular car. And Crusty had a particular process he would use to pre-screen these cars.
He would do something rather simple. He would open the hood of the car and fiddle around under there. And then he would look up at the owner and say, "Try to start it now."
The driver would try, but it would not start.
And then Crusty would do duck back under the hood and say, "Okay, try to start it now."
And the owner would turn the key and it would start right up.
So at this point, he would say one of two things. It was either, "Leave it and we'll check it out. But, I think it's a keeper." Or it was "Forget this one. This one is no good. Go look for another car to buy."
What was Crusty doing under the hood? What was that little test all about?
Good luck.
So, what was Crusty doing under the hood? What was that little test all about? What was he up to?
This little test is something he could do with his eyes closed. He didn't even have to look at the engine. In fact, he often did this with his eyes closed so as not to be distracted by anything else.
What he was doing was he was disconnecting the coil wire so the engine would crank, but it wouldn't start. It was a kind of compression test. So he was listening for how the engine would crank and whether or not it would crank evenly. So as every piston came up on its compression stroke, he would hear the cadence of the engine.
Crusty claimed he could hear whether the engine had bad compression or good compression with this little test.
Not sure we believe him! But that is what he said.
