Photography by Yoav Gilad and courtesy of FCA
Some of you may have heard that our local Cars & Coffee, the one that started them all, shut down last week. It's a sad fate for a Southern California institution, but we're not too worried as there are a couple of other regular, local meets that have become quite popular such as Supercar Sunday, Morning Octane, and an upstart Cars & Coffee located in Malibu (about seventy miles away from the original, located in Irvine). It was as I pulled into the first Cars & Coffee Malibu that the upper radiator hose in my first-year Dodge Viper GTS finally gave up the ghost. I made quite an entrance as the blue Viper billowed steam like a nineteenth-century locomotive. I backed into a spot, steam escaping through the wheel wells, lower grill, and NACA duct and shut the engine down. There was a trail of coolant from the parking lot apron to my car, and little yellow-green droplets all over the Viper.
Another attendee happily offered "repair" tape and once the car cooled sufficiently, we wrapped the hose back up. It held for about six miles. Then I had to call a flatbed as there are no auto-parts stores remotely close to this part of the Pacific Coast Highway. Well, at least I wasn't in the middle of the desert somewhere.
I've never replaced any of the Viper's hoses and frankly they're getting to the age where this should have been expected. So for 2015 I have resolved to be more pro-active about my cars' maintenance. I change the oil, do the brakes, etc… regularly, but there are other wear-and-tear items that need to be inspected as well. Lesson learned. It isn't earth-shattering but will hopefully help avoid a couple of headaches.
So have you made any automotive resolutions for the coming year?
