I have this little 95 escort - 5sp, 120K, 1.9L. This morning I was driving it on my paper route with the AC on, and I noticed that it was making an odd noise when I shifted - similar to the whining you hear from a manual when you're in reverse. I soon saw a little smoke and smelled something similar too, but not quite like burning rubber. It took me a minute, but I realized that the noise, smoke, and smell went away when I turned off the AC. I drove it a little bit to have a friend look at it, and it put some (too much) water in it. I then went back to my route, and it quickly overheated. I tried cooling it down a little several times - I was getting into a panic by that point because I was a half an hour late getting finished. Finally I got the papers done and sat for a half hour or so to let it really cool off. I was then able to drive it 8 miles back home without incident and the temp gauge in the low-normal range. Any ideas about this? I don't think I can fix it myself - whatever it is - but I'm wondering if I can hope that it will be ok as long as I leave off the AC. Right this moment I can't take it anywhere - when this all happened I was wondering how I was going to pay for enough gas in it to do my route over the weekend.
- posted
20 years ago