Today was such an interesting day.

First was some more brake work on the Safari van. Year one took the brake system back apart and discovered the reason why the brakes didn't appear to be working. Turns out the cannabilized brake booster didn't have a master cylinder push rod, thus meaning we weren't even pushing on the master cylinder and were doing virtually nothing.

But although they told my teacher that they bled the brakes (your brakes don't work if there's air in the system), I pushed on the pedal and found they had not brought the brakes up a sasifactory level. Hell I wouldn't even dare move a vehicle with brakes like that, the pedal went all the way to the floor with just my hand.

So I ended up spending about an hour bringing the brakes up to a point I felt safe enough to start the van up and put it in gear to test if the brakes would hold. I say test if they hold since it felt like there was still some air in the system.

It can be quite scary at times to be a mechanic when you're dealing a vehicle with a safety concern like this. In this instance, my first backup plan was the parking brake. On the off chance that they didn't work, I had a bunch of tool boxes in front of me that would hopefully stop me without causing too much damage... I was also positioned over a dynometer and even with the safety engaged, it takes quite a bit of power to get over it so hopefully the van would get stuck on it before it hit a toolbox.

Anyway that all went fine and dandy and I moved onto my next assignment, a 1999 Chrysler 300M. I was told we were going to scrap this vehicle and so to drain it of fluids. But first I had to bring it up to the shop from the bottom of the lot. I took a jumper box down to the vehicle, hoping it would start and run. Turns out the battery was completely dead.

Popped the hood and found to my dismay that the battery was hidden rather deep within the car's fenders, but Chrysler was nice enough to add connection points that allowed me to jump the car and it seems to idle alright. Now once again I became a test driver as I didn't know what was wrong with this vehicle. Thankfully there was no drama, apart from rusty brakes that did still work.

The next interesting thing of the day occured while I was bringing the car up to the shop. A maiteance man was backing his work truck up the shop so he could work on a lift in the shop. I kept back a very respectable distance while he backed up. This truck is an F-450 with a large utility shell on the back so he had every right to go nice and slow. However he still hit the fence pretty good and left very large scrapes down the side of the truck and even punched a hole in a toolbox door.

Also earlier when my teacher was moving that same truck since it was in the way of me getting the van out, I learned something very important about heavy-duty trucks. DO NOT STAND BEHIND A WARM TRUCK BEING STARTED. The fan will most likely kick up all the dirt and debris around and under the truck into your face.

After I get the car in the shop I learned that the value of scrap metal is actually very low right now. So much so that a full-sized car like a 300M is worth only $150 at most. So my teacher decided to see if we could fix the car up and sell it for $700 to $1500.

Initally I said I wouldn't want it despite the fact I am looking for a car, mostly due to the rusty brakes causing unpleaset pedal feedback and the high milage (202,000 miles). Still I went through checking the functions of the car and I've found that so far the radio doesn't work, the passenger side power mirror doesn't work side to side, most of the power windows don't work, and the drivers side seat heater doesn't work, but aside from that the car appears to be in very good condition.

I know that the car has had at least two owners judging from the DMV paperwork on the dash and the high milage means there's not much life left in the car. However it's the best offer I've seen yet and I'm now reconsidering purchasing the car, especially now that I know it's rather highly awarded too. A quick check online appears to give good life expantency for the car. I'll reserve a bit more judgement though until I can do some further testing on the engine.

Otherwise I will offer to buy the car without repairing the seat and the radio, items that my teacher probably doesn't want to touch anyway. I can always get a portable speaker for my iPod and play my music that way, not that I need music during driving. I'm used to driving with the radio off to help minimize distraction. Some other guys have complained that the car smells, but I don't mind it.

I think I'll send an e-mail off to my teacher shortly telling him that I'm now much more interested in the car. And I'll send one off to my uncle so he can get a more accurate quote on car insurance.

And now back to interesting moments. So during lunch today a girl put a sandwich or something into the microwave. Only it was wrapped in foil as quickly revealed by the arcing, but she had walked away and so hadn't noticed this. I had though and was watching the pretty light show when the food actually caught fire. I was chewing food at the time, but managed to rise the alarm despite a mouthful of food. And I'm not talking about a little bit of fire, there was at least one long flame several inches long. By some miracle when the mircowave was opened, the fire went out almost immediately.

And one last moment. The club presidant put a flyer on a friend's laptop and then quickly ran off. He wasn't really supposed to do that so I quickly hatched a plan to get back at him. I took the flier out to the parking lot and tucked it under his van's windshield wiper. Although he didn't say much about it, he was quite evident that he was suprised even if it wasn't written all over his face.