Timelines!

I'm putting the 2002 Impala timeline on here so that I don't forget it

Otter started driving that car as her main transportation after she moved out of our house, that was October 2014.  She and Bill basically shared it, I picked her up and took her to work a few times depending on her schedule mostly.  Winter hit early and Bill really did not want to drive the El Camino because it is basically a giant sled on icy roads so Otter and I managed to get her to work on the days when he needed the car.  After we got through the bulk of the winter, we basically just left the car at her place and she drove it on a mostly daily basis.  (She didn't actually become the owner of record until April of 2015.)

February 2015 is when we put the two front tires on it and had the front end alignment done.  Both were necessary, the tires were bad but the front end needed to be aligned very badly and especially when we put the new tires on it so they didn't wear in spots.  Sometime after that, the "check engine" light came on.  I'm not sure exactly when but I think it was before the title was transferred to her name.  We had it checked at the auto parts store that does that for free, they thought maybe it was the sensor so Bill replaced it.  It went off but then it came back on again after a little while.  They checked it again and thought that maybe the new sensor was not good so they exchanged it.  It was off for a while then it came back on.  We had it checked at the local repair shop when they did an oil change, they couldn't find anything but they did reset the light.  After a while, it came back on.  At that point, the car was  still not titled in Otter's name.  I was driving it one day, I think maybe my car was getting something done and Otter let me borrow it.  The "check engine" light was still on and then it had another warning about checking the engine but it was a different warning and potentially very serious.  We took it to Chevy then.  And that was the last time we went to that particular dealership because they lied to me about a lot of things but they did at least say that they checked and the engine was ok so they thought the sensor was just bad and that unless it did specific things, the car was safe to drive.  So Otter had the title transferred into her name in early April.

The car seemed to be fine, the engine light stayed on but it never did anything else.  When the oil was changed, the repair shop would reset the light but it would come back on after a while.  She drove it through the spring, summer and early fall with no problems.  There were a couple of times when she went out of town and left it with us since she didn't want to leave it at her apartment complex and Bill drove it then.  It acted fine.

The first part of August, I don't remember but it was within the first couple of days of the month, she and J were at our house and it was parked in our driveway.  Bill noticed that the radiator seemed to have sprung a leak.  Bill told her when she got the car that we would take care of any repairs for her for the first year - at least "normal usage" repairs but Otter always takes care of things so we weren't worried!  He replaced the radiator and it seemed to be fine.

Then on November 1st (or maybe 2nd?), she was on her way home from the not-quite-next-door little town that J lives in and it was about 9:00 at night.  That's when the temperature gauge suddenly shot up to the dangerously high reading and she pulled over so she could call us.  We got there and Bill checked it, it did not look like it was overheating but it was still warm.  He drove it home and she rode with me.  He had to pull over a time or two, on the turnpike where there are no lights!  She took my car home and we kept the 2002.  I took it to the local repair shop the next morning.  They decided that it still had air from the radiator being replaced, which was a logical thing to think.

It drove fine for a couple of weeks, then the temp gauge started to run hot again and the "low coolant" light came on.  At the time, Bill (and the neighbor who is a mechanic plus the mechanics at the local shop) all thought that it was probably just more air working it's way out of the system because Bill was able to get more air out of.  It kept doing it and he kept "burping" it.  But when it didn't stop and the temp gauge sometimes went all the way up, Bill thought it might be the thermostat.  Again, so did all the mechanics!

We had been discussing buying Bill a used car to drive so that the El Camino could be parked over the winter like we usually did with it.  But then he was afraid that we would be buying somebody else's problem so we decided to buy me a new car and then he would drive the 2008.  Except that Otter's car was still acting up and we decided to offer her the 2008 in trade for the 2002.  She decided to take us up on the offer so we went back to the title agency.  She had the 2008 transferred to her and we had the 2002 transferred back to us.  We bought my new car and Bill drove the 2002.  It worked fine for a while, but then it started acting up again and each time it was worse.  Everyone agreed that it sounded like the thermostat so he decided to have another chevy dealership look at it when he got the next oil change and they were also able to do the ignition recall issue that the first chevy dealership said couldn't be done.  That was a couple of weeks ago, the last Friday in January.  That is when they determined that it was a cracked head gasket - something that the first chevy dealership probably should have seen and that just convinced us even more that we were right to not use them anymore.  Especially since they claimed to have checked the car over and the problem would have been evident!  In hindsight, we probably should have just gone to the 2nd chevy dealership at that time.  Since the repair was going to cost just under $3,000.00, we decided the car was not worth that much.  Which it really wasn't.

When the "check engine" light came on might not be when the head gasket cracked, but it was probably at least beginning to leak at that point.  When it actually cracked is probably when the radiator leak happened, because of the air/coolant being forced through it under pressure and at high heat.  It basically cascaded from one problem to another and none of it was "textbook" for a cracked head gasket which is why everyone thought it was the thermostat.  We were pretty surprised when it turned out to be the actual problem with the head gasket.  The car itself would only be worth $1,500.00 on a good day and in better shape.

It went to an auction last Thursday.  It did sell, for more than we thought but not for very much.  Which is fine, it's out of our way now and we don't have to worry that Bill (or Otter) will be stranded on the side of the road again.  I think the buyer probably bought it for parts.  It's an older car with over 150,000 miles on it after all.  I still see several of that body style on the road, it was one of chevy's best selling vehicles.  They did get it right with that car.  It just wore out, basically.  But when we bought it, we intended to drive it until it wasn't driveable anymore and that's pretty much what we did and for many years.  With regular maintenance, cars can last a long time and we certainly feel like we got our money's worth out of it.  Otter is very happy with the 2008, she said she actually likes it better than the 2002.  I'm very pleased with the 2015 and Bill does like to drive the El Camino but he is also thinking about selling it and then getting another car to drive.  That probably won't be anytime soon, if he actually decides to do that.   But then again there are still times when we need a truck, so he really doesn't know what he wants to do.  I just wish we had realized much earlier that there was a serious problem and what it was.