Well, last weekend me and a buddy left Fargo to drive up to Devil's lake for an SCCA ice rallycross event. About 130 miles into the trip (just 30 miles from Devil's lake) my car starts to studder a little bit. I was in cruise control going roughly 75mph when this happened and when I put the car into neutral it died instantly. After rolling to a stop on the side of US-2 I got our and checked things over. The belts were all tight and the oil looked clean and the level was fine. When we went to start the car all that happens is the starter clicking and the crank not able to turn over. Well we called AAA and while waiting for over an hour we decided to do a little rallying around the city of Lacota in my buddies Brighton. We then decided to kill a little time in a local hick bar where we made friends with the old ladies and grandpas from the town. Finally, the tow truck shows up around 12:00am and gets the car loaded up. Well, Jeff (the tow truck driver) starts going and we quickly pass him in the Brighton and take the following turn around. Jeff thought a different car must have past him and assumed the headlights behind him were from us. So, he goes to take a U-turn and head back towards Grand Forks when he's suddenly hit by a mail truck. Unfortunately, non of us actually saw the crash happen, but we quickly observed 2 big trucks in the ditch as we approached. After getting out and checking out the accident we see that the bed of the tow truck is totaled, the mail truck looks dead and Jeff is bleeding from the head a little bit. Fortunately, my car was untouched in the crash. Fast forward a bit...cop shows up, takes a big report and Jeff says he's fine to drive the rest of the way to Grand Forks. It's about 1:00am at this point and I'm amazed that this old guy still wants to tow my car a couple hours even though he has no window and his door is busted up. Luckily we made it back to Grand Forks alright at 3:00am and unloaded the car. We showed up at the dealership the next morning and look over the car. After trying to manually turn over the crank we find that the motor is locked up. We called yet another tow truck driver and got the car towed back to Fargo where I live. So right now all I know is my motor is locked up and most likely toast. I don't have a nice warm garage to do any big swap in, so it looks like the car might be out of commission till summer hits. Shucks I guess. Anyways, I practically video taped the whole thing, but I'll just leave you with a few pics of my weekend adventure. After the tow truck managed to get out of the ditch: Aftermath of the mail truck: Getting to the dealership at 3:00am: Right before the second tow truck brought the car back to fargo: At this point I would really love to swap in a wrx/sti motor and go to town, but at the same time I'm really contemplating swapping in another 2.5rs motor and driving with that until I'm done with school in a year or so and get my own place. My main thought is that it'd sure be nice to have the car running again soon, and swapping in a $500 motor would be quick and simple vs spending $5000 on a new motor/tranny and then not have a car for a good chunk of my summer. Any and all input/comments would be much appreciated. Thanks. -Brian
i say do what you got to do to get your car running. it would suck to be with out a car for a long period of time! and you left out the good part about how my car help the 2nd tow truck get unstuck when the STi could! lol
I'm glad nobody was hurt, however that tow truck better have had dollies under the rear wheels...... Not happening in the DSM, your are right, it wouldnt have even started to begin the trip to begin with
haha probably true lol. And yea, there were dollies under the rear wheels. I took that pic when he dropped off the car at the dealership. He had already taken em off.
heck yea he was! He had to have been in his upper 50's or so and had a good amount of blood drippin down his face. He was pretty badass in his full carheart suit and pretty determined to get that car to the dealership even if it meant driving his truck through the cold and snow for over an hour! He got a nice tip
like brian said, he is a trooper. we asked if he wanted us to call an ambulance and he straight up told us he is the ambulance! lol he said he was an off duty paramedic from New Rockford! lol guy was most def a good guy, he did end up getting a ticket for the accident and we all felt kinda bad and tipped him enough to pay his ticket off!
Sorry just nm I couldnt see you giving any more money then the tow was lol. Since u like doing things on the cheap haha wrx swap that bitch dont be a puss
I have AAA, so the tow was free. I like doing things cheap, but if somebody goes above and beyond what is expected I'll pay them for it.
Well I finally got the motor out and had a chance to look at things a little closer... Can't wait to rip this thing open and get some good carnage pics!
Well when I drained the oil there was a steady stream of coolant for like 5 seconds so I assuming that my hgs went. What really sucks is I just had em done about 10k ago when I bought the car. The guy I bought the car from is a mechanic so he did the hgs when I bought the car. Nothin I can really do now though but find a new motor
Wow. So some how you have coolant/oil goo on top of one valve, and what looks like piston shrapnel above two other valves along with one valve that is bent in a really interesting way that would look nice at the edge of my desk, lol. I'm interested in the results of tearing the shortblock down.
I finally got around to taking the heads off. Yea I know, it's taken me forever. The carnage is pretty sweet though lol.
