further thoughts on spark plugs, coolant sensors and engine starting

hi all,

I've been doing some further thinking about it, and I'm just having some thoughts about how engines work.....

Mechanic #4, the one who did the work, told me that the problem with the bad spark plugs was what was causing the engine to be flooded with gas, which caused the rings to become washed. When I heard that, I wasn't so sure it made sense, because the spark plugs basically just provide the "spark", right?

When I heard that If the sensor tells the computer the engine is the wrong temperature then it gets the wrong amount of gas at startup, I thought that was probably what caused it, not the bad spark plugs.

So mechanic #4 told me he had to clean the gasoline out of the engine (isn't that weird - engines are supposed to have gasoline in them), but that the rings were still ok. But then I looked at the invoice, and they don;t have any such kind of labor work listed on there. All it says is: replace ignition cable set, replace all six spark plugs. That's in addition to the diagnosis. So: what if that is all they did - what if that was what it needed to be able to get it to start again, even though it still doesn't start without problems?

Hmm..maybe a better to put it would be: could the coolant temp sensor cause the engine to become so flooded that it doesn't start? Or could the spark plugs cause that, though I don;t see how? Or was the mechanic just telling me something he thought I would buy?

I'm wondering, because I'm working on formulating my complaint against this guy.

TIA!

PS the car is working gingerly. I am trying to be real easy on it until the part & book arrive.

Reply to
kohlrabi_croce
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Hm, this makes sense to me actually, because if they had done more than just blow some air in there, they sure would have charge me a bunch of money for that, and they would have listed it as a separate labor service on the invoice.

makes a lot of sense.

Thanks very much for the info!

Reply to
kohlrabi_croce

FYI, there really isn't anything else a mechanic can do to dry out the cylinder if it was flooded with gasoline.

You're welcome.

bear in mind, i haven't seen the parts in question but you need to understand that when faced with a driveability problem, the mechanic needs to restore certain wear items to 'as new' condition in order to rule them out as a cause of the problem. If your spark plugs and ignition wires were aged, it often costs less money and represents a better value to replace them anyway than it does to perform a battery of test procedures to determine their condition.

Reply to
aarcuda69062

Thank you, obviously that confirms it even more.

Well......I don;t have a problem with him replacing that stuff, I do have a problem with him charging me as much as he did, and then going : ok, problem solved! and taking 3 days for the the "diagnosis," and two more days on top of that to do it, , and charging me 30% more than even the dealership did just for the diagnosis, and then not even figuring out that there was more going on than just the spark plugs and cables, all the while having the attitude that he could figure it out better than any other mechanic that came before him.

I don't think so.

I had been telling everyone I took it to the spark plugs most likely needed to be replaced anyway.

I udnerstand where you're coming from, but I don;t think I got a good value for my money. Since I am now out of it, I am reduced to trying to do it myself.

If I took it back to him, maybe he could diagnose it right without charging me for it because he should have in the first place, but I'd still have to pay him for further repairs because it's not his fault other stuff is broke as well. It's just his fault he didn;t find it, and let me go out of there with a half-fixed car.

So I will try to learn how to do it and if it works it will be great, and then I'll understand the joys of relying on myself :).

Hey....I already learned how to build my own computer a few times, so why not.....hehe.

Reply to
kohlrabi_croce

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