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I'm here with Bernie Pawlik, Pawlik Automotive in Vancouver, Vancouver's best auto service
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25 times voted best auto repair in Vancouver by their customers.
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And we're talking cars.
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How are you doing, Bernie?
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So today's guest is a 2017 Volvo S90.
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This is a bit of a luxury car.
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What was going on with this vehicle?
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Yeah, it was a beautiful car.
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The owner called up, I've got some coolant leaking out of my engine I needed fixed.
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So brought the vehicle to us, I believe on a tow truck, and we proceeded to do a diagnostic
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to find out where the coolant was leaking.
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So was there any particular reason why it was towed in?
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The car didn't run anymore or it just was scared?
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It was worried it was overheat, which is smart.
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It was a pretty active drip.
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And when we did our diagnosis, a cooling system pressure test is what we do to find
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But in this case, no pressure test was needed because as you poured the coolant
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in, it would just pour out pretty much just as fast.
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There's a big hole somewhere.
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Yeah, there's a big hole, a very active leak.
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All right, let's have a look at our vehicle here.
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Our guest, beautiful 2017 Volvo.
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So we're going to jump here.
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Well, this is the engine compartment with the beautiful plastic engine cover on top.
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It's a two liter turbo.
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Four cylinder, yeah.
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That seems to be very common in Volvo's over the last maybe decade, I guess we're
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The six cylinders and five cylinders that were common in the past seem to be disappearing
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into the four cylinder turbo models, which is good, more efficient use of power for sure.
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And this arrow is pointing to our hose that was the culprit of the coolant.
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Like this is a plastic coolant pipe.
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It's called a bypass pipe or a bleed pipe.
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It basically bleeds air, excess air out of the cooling system into the overflow bottle.
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And it makes a bunch of twists and turns through the engine compartment, connects
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up to another little plastic pipe that runs under the cowl.
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And basically the pipe just broke apart where it was joined in one spot.
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So was it leaking right where the arrow was showing?
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It was leaking actually further up, but where you're moving your most pointer
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kind of actually underneath, yeah, beyond what you can see there is where it was leaking.
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I didn't take a picture of the actual broken pipe afterwards, but that's usually
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kind of a view of the pipe and from a different angle.
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And it runs under that air duct, which is a big round rubber piece thing here
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runs underneath there, wraps around a bunch of different spots
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and then goes to where your most pointer here goes right there.
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It's got nice little twists and curves.
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These things are highly manufactured.
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You know, they're just molded and shaped to fit all the little nuances
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of the engine compartment.
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But you know, the story for me around the stuff is it's overly complicated,
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And when you go to change it, they're snapped together clips,
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but they don't come apart very easily.
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Putting it together is easy.
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You just click snap, but taking it apart.
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A lot of times the plastic will break off or it'll get stuck
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and you have to be very careful
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so you don't break the other end of the pipe as you take it apart.
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So they tend to kind of sort of glue themselves together over time.
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So was this a fairly complicated repair?
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Took a couple hours at least, you know, maybe a little longer.
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There was a lot of things to remove just to get at the pipe.
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And then the pipe as we took it off of one end,
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it actually broke off inside another coolant pipe.
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So we had to change two pipes.
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And this is very typical.
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And is that a result of the plastic or the design or both?
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Yeah, there's a bit of a result of both.
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But I don't know if there's a way, you know,
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that you can use things like on metal like never sees
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when you put bolts or assemble parts where over time
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as it rusts and corrodes, you could take that thing apart
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because the never sees provides a barrier.
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But with plastic, there's not much you can do,
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nor would they even bother at the factory.
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They just want to snap it together
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and blast it out the door as fast as they can.
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You know, they're in the business to make money,
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manufacturing cars and selling them.
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Well, there is a design and engineering issue
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as far as, hey, is this repairable or not?
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And I think a lot of companies make the decision
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that we don't care.
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And, you know, the thing that's disappointing
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that I find is over the years at some point,
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this hose will break, this pipe will break.
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And if you call up the Volvo dealer,
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it's where we get the pipe obsolete.
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And then what do you do with, you know,
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a car that's perfectly functional in every other way?
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It's like you have an obsolete pipe.
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There's probably things you could do to workarounds,
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but they're going to be like at some point,
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it just gets to like scrap the car, right?
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Hopefully they'll keep the parts going for 20 years.
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I mean, to me, a 20-year-old car is a pretty good run.
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But you're not going to see someone restoring this car
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in, you know, 50 years from now.
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I'll see one of these cars driving up.
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It'll be customized in some way and eliminate this part
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or change it or make something else.
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But, you know, it's just a general complexity of cars.
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They work fantastic.
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But, you know, there's a certain shelf life to them.
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If you're looking for service for your Volvo
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in Vancouver, BC, Canada, the guys
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to see are Pawlik Automotive.
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You can reach them online at pawlikautomotive.com.
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We have hundreds of videos on there,
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all makes and models and types of repairs.
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Or you can call 604-327-7112 to book your appointment.
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You have to book ahead.
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They're always busy.
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Pawlik Automotive in Vancouver.
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Thanks so much for watching and listening.
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And thanks, Bernie.
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Thanks for watching and listening.
