Friends, I have found myself telling this story many times lately. Maybe it's time I put it all in writing, with photos. :-)
Part I: Out with the Old... In December of 2019, my 2005 Dodge Sprinter 2500 began to consistently idle roughly. I noticed it as I was driving back to Colorado Springs from the Dallas area, where I had been visiting family for the holidays. As I sat in the rest area near Childress, TX, listening to the funky beat of my five cylinder chugging sporadically, I found myself awkwardly wobbling along. I puzzled. "A misfire would cause a check engine light," I hypothesized to myself. Moments later, my well-used check engine light lit up. A quick OBDII scan (via my iPhone scantool) revealed that I was misfiring on cylinder number 1. Long story short, I ended up getting towed about one-hundred miles to Amarillo, where we eventually discovered that I had less than half the compression on cylinder one that I did on my other cylinders. After eliminating all other possible causes, we concluded that I most likely had melted a hole through my piston.* This would cost upwards of $10,000 to address in a way that I would feel good about. My previous vansion was a dead man walking, so to speak. Or... a dead van...running. I decided the best course of action was to drive it towards the Springs until something failed catastrophically. After driving about 500 miles, I blew out all of my engine oil just south of Colorado Springs. As my engine oil indicator began flashing "2.5 quarts low" and the dash beeped urgently, I called my specialty shop. They told me that when oil levels exceed 2.5 quarts low, it just flashes, exactly as mine. They confirmed, in real time, that my engine would seize up any moment as the components heated up and melted together due to excess friction. I pulled over and called AAA. The tow truck driver indicated that he was not allowed to drop disabled vehicles at park and rides for obvious reasons. I offered him some extra money and we made it happen anyway. Thus began Part 2: the Twilight Zone. Part 2: the Twilight Zone There were lots of alternatives to consider, but I was committed to considering my next move carefully. The stakes were high. A wrong move could result in another "lemon" van situation, or worse, an undesirable lease. So I lived out of my defunct van (wouldn't even crank) in the park-and-ride. I drove a rental car for day-to-day work and errands. It was barely functional and I was overwhelmed. There was one night in particular I remember laying there rocking back and forth with the winter wind. Normally I would just park in the wind-shadow of a taller building, but I was stuck there in my disabled vehicle. I just stared at my ceiling that Cody and I had painstakingly built years earlier, and listened as dirt, sand, and trash flew into the side of my home-on-wheels. Despite all of my belongings around me, it seemed to echo. This is where I wrote the tune, "Like a Stranger:" I feel the wind, it carries me to far off places I feel the pull, it calls my name Could it be God or maybe just some premonition Why, oh Lord, it makes me feel Like a stranger Like a stranger Like a stranger ...Anyway, it took me a week to make my decision- I was going to buy another van. Part 3: In with the new (then out with the new, then in with the new again) My ideal Sprinter was an Ex FedEx (is that a pun or just confusing?) van out of San Diego. It came with a promise of being "rust-free," which is a big deal for these '02- '06 Sprinters. It also had a lot of preemptive maintenance done. Most importantly, it came with a 45 day warranty. I figured this was especially important since I was buying a vehicle with 190,xxx miles. So I got a one-way plane ticket to California. My Uber dropped me off at the Sprinter place I had scoped out and after three hours of inspection, I drove away in my 2006 Sprinter 2500. I was elated. One thousand miles later, I was back in Colorado Springs. Here I faced a conundrum. I needed to get this defunct van out of the park and ride where it was illegally parked. I also needed a home that I could move when the wind picked up. So I asked my buddy Chris if he would help me switch my Espar D2 Diesel Heater from the old van to the new van. We worked on-location: in the middle of the park and ride. Four hours later, the job was complete. Chris and I were both soaked in diesel. It was 30F. I ended up throwing away my entire outfit from that day. The final necessity for a working heater was a reliable power source. McKabe helped me drill some holes in the new van and transfer the solar panel from the previous build. Again, we worked in the park-and-ride. Finally, my heater would power on! This FedEx van, however, did not come insulated, so I could only get the van up to about 40F. My quick fix- I used spring clamps to fasten comforters to the walls and ceiling of the van. This "blanket fort" phase lasted for a few months. For light I used a headlamp. I slept on a $50 Wal-Mart cot. The inside temperature was around 60F. From the day I bought the van in San Diego, it took me on week to reach this stage. All-the-while, I was working full-time at Martinez. "Why didn't you stay with a friend," you ask? I think I stayed with a friend for a night or two during this phase, but I really try to avoid over-extending my relationships or pushing boundaries. Hypothetically, I could have stayed at a hotel if things had gotten worse, but this setup was good enough for me. Barely. The next day I had the old van towed to a field near Peyton, CO, where I could store it for $10/month. Shortly after, my good friend Robert drove down from Denver to help me install the insulation and vinyl flooring in the new van. The next week I had the new van inspected by the Sprinter Specialist shop in Golden- LinDen Automotive. I trust these people to the moon and back, and the van was still under warranty, so I considered this to be part of my due diligence. Based on my experiences driving the vehicle, I did not expect them to find anything major. They did report several potentially expensive issues with the van, however, including a leaking head gasket and several oil leaks directly above the alternator. When I called the seller, he quickly offered to honor the warranty. "Just drop it by anytime," he said. sigh... Soon after this fateful inspection, oil leaks caused the alternator to fail, which left me stranded several times. (This was one year that I am 100 percent confident I got my money's worth from my AAA membership.) I resolved to pay $1,500 to ship my Sprinter back to San Diego. I met the shipper at the AutoZone where my Sprinter had been stranded most recently. I watched my home-on-wheels begin its long journey back to San Diego. At this point, I was very lucky to have some saintly friends, James and Kate, offer to let me live with them while the new van was worked on. Three weeks later I bought another one-way plane ticket to San Diego. When I arrived, every issue appeared to be addressed, so I drove 1,000 miles, again, back to Colorado Springs. After my experience with the previous van, I had learned my lesson. Fuel injectors should be preemptively replaced and then maintained meticulously. They cost over $400 each, and my engine required five, but I was resolute. After a great deal of reading descriptions, studying photos, and listening to the mistakes of others, I replaced all five of them myself in the AutoZone parking lot. Spoiler alert: at the time of writing, they are still performing well, 30,000 miles later. We've made it to March. That's right, March 2020. I think we all know where this is going... When we found out that we had one extra week of Spring Break, my family had already made plans for a cruise. We were holding onto that idea (hysterical, right?), but Mom and Dad's church activities had already been cancelled. As retirees, they are extremely involved with the church, so they were trying to figure out how to spend the extra time. Meanwhile, I was still living in a blanket fort on wheels, using a headlamp to see at night, and listening to all my belongings slide around the back of the van at every traffic light. The solution was obvious: I would drive fifteen-hundred miles to North Carolina. Together, we would build a better van. Part 4: Turning the Corner Living with Mom and Dad changed my whole life. I found a lot of clarity from the full nights of sleep that were afforded by a real bed, real food, real lights., etc.... We found time to build in between my strange new virtual workdays. I think the van build warrants its own post, so I'll save that one for another time. * - After this happened to me, I learned that it is happening more and more often to other Sprinter owners like me. Typically this is caused by failing fuel injectors. While fuel injectors can and do fail due to old age (they can last well over 100,000 miles), they often fail as a result of inadequate servicing of the diesel fuel filter over time.
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