Ron Ananian The Car Doctor Aug 30, 2025

Ron Ananian, The Car Doctor - August 30, 2025 - Hour 1 - Diagnostics Isn’t a Guess: Go the Distance - (855)560-9900 - 24/7 Hotline

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Guaranteed human.

The worst part about loving cars might just be buying them and all the parts.

But on eBay, behind every car and part is a story waiting to be shared.

I read about this guy who bought a 2020 Porsche Cayman that was well-loved.

I mean, there are plenty of Caymans in great condition on eBay, but this one needed some work.

This guy buys it and rebuilds the whole thing all with parts he found on eBay,

and now that nearly-scrapped Cayman is out tearing up the track.

From Toyota's to Aston Martin's, eBay has thousands of cars

and the largest online selection of vehicle parts and accessories.

eBay, things, people, love.

Gas prices, screen time, electric bills.

Some things are better, lower, especially bad cholesterol.

Even if you're on statins, dieting, and exercising,

you might need more to get to your goal.

That's where LekVio can help.

LekVio, or Inclisterin, is an injection given by a doctor

to help lower bad cholesterol along with diet and exercise.

LekVio is the only bad cholesterol-lowering medicine

that's two doses a year after two initial doses.

Do not use if you've had an allergic reaction to LekVio or any of its ingredients.

Common side effects were injection site reaction,

including pain, redness, and rash, joint pain, and chest cold.

You've done your part.

Ask if LekVio can take you further.

If your bad cholesterol is still high,

ask your doctor if just two doses of LekVio a year

after two initial doses can help.

Learn more at LekVio.com, or call 1-833-537-8462.

That's L-E-Q-V-I-O.com.

You're listening to Ron Ananian, the car doctor,

nationally recognized auto expert,

trusted by mechanics, weekend renters, and vehicle owners alike.

Ron brings over 40 years of hands-on experience

and deep industry insight to help you understand your vehicle.

Join the conversation live every Saturday

from 2 to 4 p.m. Eastern by calling 855-560-9900.

That's 855-560-9900.

You're a direct line to honest answers and practical advice.

Looking for more?

Visit cardoctorshow.com for past episodes,

repair tips, and Ron's latest insights.

And be sure to subscribe to the Car Doctor YouTube channel

for exclusive videos, real repair footage, and more.

Now, start your engines.

The car doctor is in the garage and ready to take your call.

How good is your relationship with your mechanic,

or a mechanic, any mechanic?

I've been pondering this one for a couple of days now.

It's a real story from the shop this week.

An individual walked into the shop about 3 o'clock Thursday

afternoon, Wednesday afternoon.

I've got a check engine light on.

Can you diagnose my check engine light?

And that's the way the conversation started.

And not a face I recognized.

Definitely not a car I recognized.

06 Acura, 113,000 miles on it.

And the deeper the conversation got, the more I realized

it was a mechanical total.

And I'll tell you why.

It was the approach.

It was what's been going on with this vehicle.

Because I always, when you come in and ask me,

can I fix a car, my answer is, of course.

But I have questions for you.

And that's my job is what I'm about to become

your mechanic on the case.

And I said, how long is the check engine light been on?

It's been on for a while, a couple of years.

And my second question is always,

who's tried to work on it?

And she said a couple of shops.

And most recently, her son-in-law.

And the son-in-law had changed a bunch of ignition parts.

So I said, so this is a misfire problem?

To which she replied, well, it's a cylinder problem.

I said, right, it's a misfire problem.

She goes, yeah, that sounds right.

And her son-in-law had changed a bunch of parts.

And I said, ignition, she said, yes, she verified that.

And I said, injectors, she said, sounds right.

And she said, the problem goes away every once in a while.

And then it comes back.

And so again, she asked, can you fix that?

I said, sure, I can diagnose it, I can fix it.

My question to you is, are you ready for that?

Are you ready to have me go the distance?

Are you ready to have someone apply some diagnostics

to this vehicle and fix it?

Are you ready to go the distance?

I always think about that movie, The Untouchables, right?

Remember the Untouchables, Sean Connery,

when Kevin Costner comes to him.

And Sean Connery initially turns him down

to work with the Untouchables, right,

to do what he has to do.

And to get Capone.

And then Connery takes Kevin Costner to the church

and he turns to him and he says,

they're having their conversation.

He says, are you ready to do what needs to be done?

Are you ready to go all the way?

And that's really how you have to look at diagnostics.

After a couple of years, after a couple of repair attempts,

you've got to ask yourself, are you ready to go all the way?

Are you just poking and hoping?

And I told her point blank,

within the first two minutes of our conversation,

I said, listen, diagnostics starts at $275.

And I realized we're not supposed to talk about money

here on radio and I get that, but you know what we're gonna.

And that $275 gets us in the door for about an hour

and a half of some preliminary testing,

maybe some involved testing telling us which way to go.

Because understand, while a diagnostic routine

has a set pattern of issues and tests to be performed,

every diagnosis is not necessarily the same.

And there are varying branches that you have to go down

to get to a diagnostic conclusion.

And I said that $275 may include,

gee, we've gotta replace all the parts that you put in it

because they're of substandard quality.

It may include we have to take those out,

examine them, change something, alter something,

correct something, adjust something that was put in

because it was done of a substandard quality

because all of those repair attempts

and all of those alleged diagnostics led to nothing

because it's still broken.

And she said, but why is it so expensive?

And I said, have the previous three or four repair attempts

has the money you've spent up to this point

yielded any results?

And she said, no.

And I said, that's why it's expensive to you

because you don't recognize the value

of a concerted effort of a diagnostic routine,

of an approach.

I think some of you get stuck into a rut.

I don't think you see the forest for the trees.

I don't think you see what you're asking of the mechanic.

There's a reason why some cars never get fixed

because you have to ask yourself,

are you ready to go the distance?

Are you ready to put in everything

that that vehicle needs?

And if not, as I told her,

this vehicle is mechanically totaled.

Unless somebody hits upon just that right combination

by some dumb luck effort, that vehicle will not get fixed

because there's not much left.

If we make an assumption, which is a dangerous thing

and diagnostics in any other situation,

if we make an assumption that it's not ignition

and it's not an injector,

there's really only three things it can be.

An engine problem, a computer problem

or a wiring harness issue.

For a random misfire, for setting a misfire

on cylinder three, because there's no rule

that says it's ignition,

there's no rule that says it's fuel.

It's a misfire, it's a stutter.

If it was skipping, it misses a step.

She left.

I think she got it.

I don't think she's gonna get it fixed

and I'm sure she's still looking.

But my point is, what's your approach?

Do you ever think about that approach?

And for that matter, and I always come back to this,

I've said for the longest time,

if you're over 21 and you've been driving a car,

who is your regular mechanic?

Who's the doctor in attendance?

Who's the person that you trust

to take care of that vehicle on a regular basis?

And if you're constantly changing mechanics,

maybe it's you, are you looking for the right thing?

There are some people I just,

I listen to how people think when I'm in group gatherings

and nobody knows, I have an anonymity,

nobody knows who I am or what I do.

And I try to tell anybody what I do

because it's interesting to hear the other side,

how mechanics are crooks, how the industry is slanted,

how nobody can get their car fixed,

how everything is so expensive.

But people will keep throwing money down the well

into that same hall without any sequential,

logical, common sense sequence of repair or approach.

Change your thinking, change how you do it,

change what you do.

I encourage you.

I encourage you to sit down and talk to a mechanic

and say, hey, what will this get me?

No, I realize, look, I'll be the first to admit it.

There was a bunch of dopes in my industry.

There really is.

Some of the dumbest people I know

turn screwdrivers all day long.

You know, I talk to training directors

and some of the training people

that put together classes from around the country.

And we talk about different places.

And he said, Ron, some of these guys

are as dumb as a bunch of rocks.

They're still banging on hammers, trying to fix cars.

And it doesn't work.

And I get that.

So part of that's your fault though,

because part of that is you've got to demand better.

You've got to go find that shop and support that shop

and not the guy who's doing it cheaper

because that's what you want to hear.

I wonder if that accurate can be fixed.

Personally, I think it's got a bad cylinder head.

Personally, I think the exhaust valve

is loosened the seat on number three.

And that was just from her description.

But do I tell her that?

Was I obligated to tell her that standing at the counter

without any proof of diagnostic tests to back it up?

I don't think so.

I just know that some people are going to spin

and they're going to go around in circles.

And that's what she's going to do.

And I don't want to see that happen to you.

I want to see you get your car fixed.

I want to see you start to make the approach of

what does it take to keep this car in good running order?

Amanda is a driver for one of our local parts houses.

She's a young single mom.

She's working hard.

She delivers parts and somehow this week,

she figured out who we are and what we do.

She told me this weekend, she must be right.

She said, you're famous.

I said, really?

I said, how can you say that?

She says, well, you're on the radio.

You have a podcast.

You do this, you do that.

I said, yeah, I got three affiliates.

Look at that.

And she started listening to the show.

She came in two days later.

She said, I've got to tell you,

I listened to a couple of episodes.

You've changed how I've looked at my car

and you've made me change and made me think about

how I want to get my car repaired.

I used to hate my car.

Now I like my car,

but I don't think so much of my car anymore

is just it's transportation

and that's all it's supposed to be to keep me safe

and get me back and forth to work.

And that I shouldn't get a car beyond my lifestyle.

She said, you really made me think about it.

You know what?

That's part of what I'm supposed to do.

And that's the fact that I did that with Amanda

is why I'm doing the opening conversation today about,

you know, do you approach your mechanic the right way?

I'm trying to get everybody to think here.

You know, it's that opening comments.

It's that first date that decides

how long the relationship is going to go on for

and will everyone benefit from it?

855-560-9900.

I'm Ron Naney in the car doctor.

I'll be back right after this.

Don't go away.

Lately, car buying has become a pretty dull experience.

But on eBay, behind every car and part

is a story waiting to be shared.

Like this guy I read about who bought a 2020 Porsche Cayman GT4

on eBay.

It was well loved.

I mean, there are plenty of Caymans

in great condition on eBay,

but this one needed some work.

That's just the start of the story.

So after this guy gets a great deal on his dream car,

he rebuilds the whole thing with all these parts

he found on eBay.

Performance brakes, suspension, body panels, the works.

Guaranteed to fit.

Next thing you know, this nearly scrapped Cayman

was out there on the track as a full blown race car.

You're ready to go daily driver, your next resto mod.

Hello, Lotus Elon, and the parts to finish it.

eBay has thousands of cars

and is the largest online selection

of vehicle parts and accessories.

eBay, things, people, love.

Have heart disease and diet and exercise

are not enough to lower bad cholesterol?

Ask your doctor if Lekveo and glycerin can help.

Prescription Lekveo is the only

bad cholesterol lowering medication

that's two doses a year after two initial doses.

Do not use if you've had an allergic reaction

to Lekveo or any of its ingredients.

Common side effects were injection site reaction,

including pain, redness and rash,

joint pain and chest cold.

Call 1-833-537-8462 or visit Lekveo.com.

Hey, before we go to the phones,

I have a question for Tom.

Tom, you realize that we are one week away

from opening day.

I know.

So for the next seven days, the giants are super,

the giants are Super Bowl contenders

and it could change at the moment of kickoff.

Oh, it'll change before the moment of kickoff.

You know that, we do this every year.

Every year we go through this.

Now, their first four games

are with all first place teams, right?

Yep.

So they have to win,

I just wanna put it here on public record,

they have to win the first,

they have to win at least two of the four.

Right.

Okay, so you heard it here first,

I'm not being negative,

but what are the odds that they lose three quarterbacks

in the first four games

and they lose all four games?

Yeah, that's entirely possible.

However, my son and I did go to the pre-season game

and they looked pretty good all pre-season.

Now granted, that's pre-season.

Right.

But all three strings for a second and third string,

all looked pretty good.

My son's Jets, however.

Well, we won't talk about that.

We won't talk about that, so.

But I just, listen, I wish us the best,

I hope for the best.

I tried it on ChatGPT, by the way.

I went to AI and I asked it,

what will the Giants record be this year?

ChatGPT is predicting six and 11,

so we'll see how smart artificial intelligence really is.

You mean ChatGPT actually didn't overload the computer

and drop it offline?

No, and he didn't say anything really bad,

but he kind of agreed with me

that they've got to win the first two of four,

so I'm basing what I'm saying

on some sort of computer calculation.

But anyway, that's the last we'll talk about it

until next week, all right, I promise.

So let's go talk to Micah in Maine.

Micah, my main man, what's going on, brother?

Well, first I needed to wish you a belated birthday,

happy birthday, because I missed it this year,

I was kind of busy with other things,

and usually I send you a card,

but we were born within seven days of one another,

right to the same year, and I-

And back at you, brother, but yes, thank you very much.

So what's going on?

But I'm calling about really what your monologue was about,

and it's about developing relationship

and trusting the people that work on your car.

I got a 2015 Subaru Legacy that I keep in great shape,

and I always maintain it, and my dealership knows that,

and I've got a great relationship with a dealership.

When I go down there for my regular service,

usually I'll bring cookies or cupcakes or something.

In fact, we celebrated 10-year-old,

my 10-year anniversary of buying the car from them,

and I brought them three dozen cupcakes

to celebrate with the whole crew

for maintaining it as well as they did.

Now, let me ask you something, Micah,

why do you look at it like that?

See, you're different than a lot of people.

A lot of people look at a repair shop

as an adversarial situation, but yet you embrace it.

Was it something in your family upbringing?

Was your dad a mechanic?

No, but my dad treated people with respect for what they did,

and he always knew, and my dad was a psychologist.

That may say something about it, too,

but he knew that you treat people for who they are,

and you expect people to be who they are,

and that's all you can expect from people.

And the people that I work with,

whether they're doctors, whether they're lawyers,

whether they're mechanics, whatever,

I respect them for the work that they do,

and if they're working for me,

they're doing their best to take care of me,

or at least I hope they're doing their best to take care of me,

and I need to trust them just like I want them to trust me,

and I want to let them know

that I appreciate what they're doing for me,

and it's not that I expect something back and forth

from them, I'm not doing this

because I expect something better from them,

but they know that I appreciate them.

I know that they appreciate me as a customer.

They know that I maintain my car,

and therefore they treat me,

I don't know, with more respect,

but they know that there is the respect

that I have for my vehicle and for what they do,

so they do what they can for me

just like I do what I can for them.

True or false statement, Micah,

you're counting on them to solve your problem

if and when you have one,

and that's a luxury that you treat yourself to.

Fair statement.

Absolutely is, and I had a problem,

and I had a major problem.

There was a mistake that was made,

and it's not the question that a mistake is made,

it's how do you solve the problem?

So what happened?

My brakes were making all sorts of noise.

I was getting that grunting sound

right when you come to the full stop,

and I knew that I was due for brakes,

or I was coming close to being due for brakes,

I was told me, told that, I don't know,

six months ago, they said,

you don't need it now,

we're gonna keep an eye on it,

but we're coming close,

and I maintain the car regularly,

so I trust them to tell me.

So I was making this noise,

I said, well, now's the time,

I made an appointment to get my brakes taken care of,

and I made the appointment on a Thursday,

I brought the car down,

they offered me a loaner,

and they called me about two hours later

and said, Micah, I know you use something

to take care of the rust,

and I do, I use Rust Check,

which is a great product.

It's the number one rust control organization in Canada,

I've been using it for four or five years.

They said, there's this goo all over the brakes

and all over the struts that's run down,

and we're pretty sure that's what it is,

and we can't work on the brakes,

and you should probably get in touch with Rust Check.

So I did, and I've been using them for a while

and I know the owner and I know the manager,

called them right away,

it's about eight o'clock in the morning,

and the manager said, well, the owner's not here,

let me give him a call,

and 10 minutes later, the owner called me at home,

and he said, I'm going right down to the dealership,

but let me take a look at it,

and he went down to the dealership,

and he looked at it,

and in the next minute, I'm getting a call,

because I know the service writers,

but I also know the service director,

and the service director calls me and says,

Mike, I've got the owner of Rust Check here,

he wants to take the car,

is it okay for me to give it to him to clean up?

Do you want him to clean it up?

And I said, Paul, it's a name of the service director,

do you want to clean it up,

or should I have him do it?

He says, I think you should have him do it,

but I just want permission for him

to be able to take the car from me.

I said, fine, he took the car back to his shop,

cleaned it up within an hour,

had it back at my Subaru dealership,

everything was taken care of,

and we needed the brakes,

and we did the brakes anyway.

And that's the moral there, right?

That there's always a solution to the problem,

it's how you approach it.

Exactly, and I told when I called,

when I spoke with the owner of Rust Check,

I said, look, I'm not angry at you,

these things happen,

must have been some kind of overspray,

it takes place.

He said, he understood that,

he knew I wasn't yelling at him,

I just wanted to get the problem resolved,

and he took care of it right away,

and I'm gonna go back to him next year,

when it's time to do the undercoding again.

You know where else that problem occurs, Micah,

and then I'll let you go is,

you take your car of a car wash,

and I'm not saying all car washes are like this,

but we've seen cases where people go to a car wash,

and they, what do you do?

You go through, you get the A platinum service,

you roll through the line, they wash the car,

they clean everything,

and then when they come out,

they do tire shine on the outside of the tires.

If they're aggressive,

and they put too much tire shine on,

well, incorrect tire shine or too much tire shine,

we've got cases of it where it's documented,

it will actually cause wear,

degradation of the tire itself,

but if it gets on the brake assemblies,

it will cause a similar problem to that,

so you always have to be aware of that.

Always a pleasure to talk to you, Micah,

you keep them coming,

and you be safe up there in Maine.

Micah, my main man, I love that.

I'm Ron Aine in the car doctor,

I'll be back right after this, don't go away.

Lately, car buying has become a pretty dull experience,

but on eBay, behind every car and part

is a story waiting to be shared.

Like this guy I read about,

who bought a 2020 Porsche Cayman GT4 on eBay.

It was well-loved.

I mean, there are plenty of Caymans

in great condition on eBay,

but this one needed some work.

That's just the start of the story.

So after this guy gets a great deal on his dream car,

he rebuilds the whole thing

with all these parts he found on eBay.

Performance brakes, suspension, body panels, the works,

guaranteed to fit.

Next thing you know,

this nearly scrapped Cayman

was out there on the track as a full-blown race car.

You're ready to go daily driver, your next Resto mod,

Hello Lotus Elon, and the parts to finish it.

eBay has thousands of cars

and is the largest online selection

of vehicle parts and accessories.

eBay, things, people, love.

Gas prices, screen time, electric bills.

Some things are better lower, especially bad cholesterol.

Even if you're on statins, dieting, and exercising,

you might need more to get to your goal.

That's where Lekvio can help.

Lekvio, or Euclizarin, is an injection given by a doctor

to help lower bad cholesterol along with diet and exercise.

Lekvio is the only bad cholesterol-lowering medicine

that's two doses a year after two initial doses.

Do not use if you've had an allergic reaction

to Lekvio or any of its ingredients.

Common side effects were injection site reaction,

including pain, redness, and rash,

joint pain, and chest cold.

You've done your part.

Ask if Lekvio can take you further.

If your bad cholesterol is still high,

ask your doctor if just two doses of Lekvio a year

after two initial doses can help.

Learn more at Lekvio.com

or call 1-833-537-8462.

That's L-E-Q-V-I-O dot com.

Oh, let's see what this button does.

Oh, it turns me on, look at that, I'm on the air.

Let's go over to Rocky and me.

I have to make Tom nervous today.

Let's go over to Rocky and me.

Yuck, yuck, yuck, yuck.

How are you, sir?

What's going on?

I'm good around you, though.

Not bad.

What's cooking?

Hey, I've got a 92-G Brangler

with a 2.5-4 cylinder in it.

And about six months ago or so,

a little more than that,

I had the whole clutch and slave cylinder,

a flywheel, the whole nine yards replaced.

And I told the mechanic, I says,

check that rear main while you've got it

to fire it and make sure that's okay.

And he did.

And about a month after I got it back,

that started leaking.

Of course.

That's Murphy's law.

What, you said women, you're surprised at that?

Well, I was kind of of the opinion

if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

But I guess I got beat on this one.

I just didn't know.

I know you have a lot of sponsors

of different chemicals and whatnot

that do wonderful things.

And I was just wondering if there was anything

you would recommend to maybe put off changing that seal?

No, I, you know, there's,

listen, for all my sponsors

and understand the greater majority,

I think just about every one of my sponsors

is a product I've either used

and that's sort of what's led them to us

or it's something that I've seen used

and that's what's sort of led them to us.

So I have great faith in many of the products.

The rear main seal stuff,

nothing comes to mind

because frankly, it's probably just tired.

Now you could try, all right,

how many miles are on this little GM forebanger?

133,000.

Right, so is this a case of excessive crankcase pressure

pushing oil out the rear main?

You know, what is the PCV valve?

What does the crankcase ventilation system look like?

And or, you know, if you were to pop the dipstick up,

you know, a quarter of an inch so it can case

and drive it around, does that slow down the leak?

And what that would in all likelihood prove to us

is that we have, you know, a moderate amount of blow by

and you know, relieving crankcase pressure

may help the problem.

My comment in the back of my head goes though,

but you know, this is a four cylinder GM.

That's 492,000.

What are we, 35 years old?

Do I have rings that are stuck in the grooves

and it's just, it's just time.

Does this consume oil?

Has this got an oil burning issue, Rock?

No, it doesn't consume a drop.

I've owned this thing for 25 years.

And you know, I just use it,

I put about 1,000 miles a year on it

as a hunting vehicle up in northern Maine.

And you know.

I'm surprised they didn't do the rear main

because they were looking right at it.

It's a one piece seal.

And that was probably my fault.

I should have just told them to replace it, but.

That was the moment.

That really was the moment.

Yeah, you kind of goofed on that one, brother.

So, but you know.

You know, I've never had a rear main replaced before.

Is that something where you can get into big trouble

if things don't go right doing it?

I, you know, it's like any other automotive repair.

You can get into big trouble

if things don't go right, period.

Tell me, tell me an auto repair.

That if things don't go right,

you're not going to get into trouble, right?

You know, it's, it's, there is a little bit of finesse there.

There's a little bit of experience that's, you know,

this isn't, you know, doing a rear main seal

is not something you want somebody to do

for the first time as a practice step.

You know, it's, it's, I've done more than a few of those.

One of the things I like for seal removal is

I will take a small drill bit, drill into the seal.

I will put a self tapping screw

and that becomes my pride point.

And this way I'm not taking a chance of touching the seal.

So I don't nick the seal, but more importantly,

I don't nick the crankshaft, right?

Okay.

So, you know, hopefully your guy knows this.

If he's old school, I'm sure he does.

It's not something I invented.

I picked it up from the guy in front of me.

You know, so just, just know

that that's one way to look at it.

You know, at this stage, at a thousand miles a year,

how much of a leak is it?

My real concern, and this is what's kind of got me

scratching my head is the guy that put the clutch in,

you know, and he, I guess it wasn't leaking at that point,

but you know, is this a case of,

is the oil leak going to, you know,

somehow damage the clutch as oil continues to come out?

Yeah, I thought of that.

The one thing I want to mention,

and I don't want to mention this

because now I'm going to throw darts

and it's going to put doubt in the back of your mind.

I've seen this twice in my lifetime career as a mechanic.

Flywheel bolts get over-torqued

and they warp, you know, they distort the end of the crank.

And what does the seal ride against?

Right?

You know, is that possible?

Man, it takes a lot.

I've never seen a,

I've never seen a four cylinder GM product do that,

but I don't, I don't base a lot of my beliefs on,

well, I've never seen it do it, so it can't be bad.

You know, but it's always in the back of my mind.

Yeah, it's coincidental.

It's probably just 35 years old and 100,000 plus miles

and it's just tired, you know?

So I say, count your losses, pull the trans,

pull the flywheel, put a seal in it, drive it,

do a PCV valve, drive it, let's see where we go.

Either that or if it's 1,000 mile a year

hunting vehicle, you know what?

It's going to be out in the woods

and covered in snow and rust and water and everything else.

If we get a nice,

if we get a nice coating of oil underneath it,

it'll never rot out.

So.

Yeah, I just, I just redid the whole frame

and recoded it inside and out.

You know, it just, just did a major upgrade on it.

You know, it's always that last part

that you don't change.

You ever notice that?

It's always that, it's always that,

well, I don't want to do this because,

and I, you know, it's, look,

it gives you something to laugh at.

If you can't laugh at life, then what's the point?

So, best dancer I got.

I think I'm going to let it leak this fall

and then see what happens and then deal with it

before another season.

Yeah, pull, like I said, pull the dipstick up a little bit

just so it's going to breathe out the crankcase that way.

See if that, see if that makes a difference.

And if it does, then that tells you

the PCV is restricted

and it'll give you another direction to go.

All right.

Okay.

So.

Very good.

Enjoyed the conversation.

Good luck to you, kiddo.

Thanks a lot, I appreciate it.

You're very welcome.

Let's, let's pull over, take a pause.

When we come back, we'll go to Ted.

I'm Ronanini and the car doctor.

I'll be right back right after this.

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Hey, let's go to Ted at Illinois, 17 Silverado.

Ted, welcome to the car doctor, sir.

How can I help?

Ron, thanks a lot for taking my call.

You're welcome.

I enjoy your show and I value your advice.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you, what's going on?

I've got a 2017 Chevy truck,

Silverado four-wheel drive, 5.3 motor,

and the right front brake was hanging up the caliper.

And you'd take off and it'd be fine.

And after about maybe 20 minutes and several stops,

it would start hanging up and it would get hot.

And so I thought, well, the caliper

must be stuck or something.

And so I pulled the caliper off and rebuilt it,

put new seals in it and a dust seal too.

And put it back on and...

Same thing.

Nope, nope, yeah, it wasn't.

And if I, like if I stop after it does it,

if I pull over and either break the brake line,

unloosen the brake line, the caliper line,

or do the bleeder and let a little flood out of it.

And it doesn't really squirt out of there real,

harder or anything.

It's a dribble.

But it does come out.

Right, it's a dribble.

And let me ask you a couple of questions, Ted.

Simple as they may seem,

how do you know the right front is getting hot?

It gets hot.

I mean, you go around and you can smell it

and you can, the left front,

you can grab with your hand and know, you know,

I mean, it's warm, but not hot.

But the right front, you can't touch.

But you don't know it from behind the wheel.

You get out of the truck,

you drive 20 minutes to your destination,

you get out of the truck and that's when you get

the sensation that the brake is hot.

Well, when it gets after, you know,

when you let up on it, you can tell,

you're slowing down quicker.

I'm used to the truck.

I've had the truck since it was new.

Right.

So, you know, you can tell it's slowing down a little bit.

It's not as free.

And so I can tell that it's tightening up.

And then I get a vibration if I just keep driving it.

Okay, that's the answer I'm looking for.

So, we've clearly got something going on right front.

You've done a caliper.

How about the left front brake hose?

And here's the reason why, okay?

Believe it or not, and I've seen this both ways.

I've seen it where the right front gets hot

and it's the right front hose.

I've seen it where the right front gets hot

and it's the left hose

because the left hose peels internally

and acts like a check valve

and it constantly applies pressure to the right front.

It doesn't allow it to release.

I would never have guessed that.

But I did get two brake lines.

Right.

And they're dormant.

I assume they ought to be pretty good.

Yeah, they'll be fine.

And for the right and left,

and I was getting ready to go ahead

and replace the one that's getting hot.

But I thought, I'm just gonna get both of them.

I would do both.

It's gonna eliminate a lot of questions.

How many miles are on this truck?

90,000, 95,000.

It's a little early, but it's right on the fuzzy edge of,

yeah, okay, 100,000 miles.

It's possible.

Anything's possible.

Hard use, highway use, construction use.

What do you do with the truck?

Well, I actually just drive it back and forth to the farm

and I go hunting with it.

But it doesn't get a whole lot of really hard use.

I barely ever use the four-wheel drive.

All right.

And I think the two rubber brake hoses

are the next step, Ted.

And just pay attention to when you bleed it.

Does it bleed equally right and left?

And in the rear.

Okay?

Okay.

Do any of the bleed give you a sense

that there's a restriction elsewhere in the system?

But the most common cause

is one of the front brake hoses is bad.

Does the truck pull to the right

when the brake gets hot?

Not really.

I mean, not really hard or anything.

I mean, you can just feel it in the steering wheel.

Just feel the vibration and you know it's happening.

Right.

Have you had the occasion?

It would be interesting to see.

And it takes some work and you have to be quick

but you get it to happen.

The way we found it in the shop,

I'll say it like this,

the way we find things in the shop sometimes,

we'll drive the vehicle, we'll replicate the problem.

Yeah, the right front's starting to drag.

We'll bring it in, get it up in the air real quick

and we'll crack the left front bleeder

while somebody's spinning the wheel.

While they're spinning the wheel, the wheel is tight.

We crack the left front, the wheel spins free.

It's weird.

It's weird but it proves to us that it's the hose

even though it shouldn't be the hose

because, well it isn't, it isn't.

It's because when the hose goes bad,

when a hose goes bad internally,

it's kind of like a backwards banana peel.

It folds upwards and acts like a check valve.

So the apply still stays.

So when we burp the side that's got the bad hose,

we dump pressure, that allows the banana peel

to fall forward and pulls the pressure off the other side.

That's the theory.

If we went to a break class

and we talked to a break instructor,

that is the verbatim textbook theory

that they would spout to us.

I don't disagree and the theory seems to hold water

because I've fixed more than a few

by doing that test and looking at it.

I've cut break hoses open.

I think in all the break hoses I've ever cut open

in my career, I think I found two bad ones, legitimate.

But I'd also have to cut it at the right moment.

I'm not in the habit of slicing break hoses for the length.

And it comes back to where I originally

finished our conversation.

It's cheaper at 100,000 miles and eight years old.

Put two hoses on it, move on.

See what you get.

So.

All right.

If you need more, you know where to find me.

You were gonna say something.

I just gonna tell you, thanks a lot.

I really appreciate the help.

You're very welcome, sir.

I'm here if you need more.

You be well.

Bye bye.

855-560-9900, run a name in the car doctor.

I'll be back right after this.

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Like this guy I read about who bought a 2020 Porsche Cayman GT4

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I mean, there are plenty of Caymans

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That's just the start of the story.

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Performance brakes, suspension, body panels, the works,

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Next thing you know, this nearly scrapped Cayman

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You know, I started the hour talking about diagnostics.

I wanna end the hour talking about diagnostics.

This comes to us from Jacob regarding

his 2011 Buick Enclave.

Ron, my car started out with a leaking number

of six injector diagnosed from a shop.

I replaced all six injectors.

I continued to have a leak.

I continued focusing on leaking injectors

till I checked fuel pressure on the fuel line.

It's always at 20 PSI and the fuel rail was 58.

I replaced both in tank and high pressure fuel pump.

Now I have 60 PSI in the line,

700 PSI on the rail,

the leaking injector problem is gone.

So just to point out the obvious,

you know that there was some sort of

misdiagnosis done there, Jacob, right?

That they told you it was an injector, it was not.

It was probably in the high pressure fuel pump itself,

you know, or one of the other injectors.

I'm not sure why we're firing the parts cannon here,

but it seemed like a better diagnosis

could have been done for that particular problem.

That isn't why I'm reading this.

After that, I had a bog shutter problem

when I got up to around 1700 RPM,

but it's idle as smooth as can be.

When I take it for a test drive at that time,

it would hesitate very obviously,

but then would start to throw check engine light

with codes of misfire on cylinders two and three.

I was suggested to check out the catalytic converters.

I took the two off,

I took the two cats off the exhaust manifolds

and hollowed them out,

but I left the third one alone.

I have checked for vacuum leaks with starting fluid.

I've tried a new mass air flow sensor.

I took back since the readings were the same

as the old one, new spark plugs,

moved coils around to make sure

it wasn't a coil check from the ECM plug

to every coil in the injector continuity

for the injector connector for continuity

to rule out wiring harness.

Replace the purge solenoid on the intake

and just today replace the vent solenoid

on the charcoal canister.

Now after the vent solenoid driving,

it hesitates at first,

but I can get it up to speed with small hiccups.

You can feel however no codes at all.

I am borrowing a top down air diagnostic pro scan tool

and doing an electric throttle relearn

as I typed this out.

Jacob, first of all,

you need to put cats back on the car

because it's gonna affect how you diagnose it.

You can't look at fuel trim,

you can't do any sort of measurements

for diagnostics at this point

because it's gonna, at some point,

it's gonna set a catalytic converter fault.

And, you know, is that real?

Is it not?

I would wanna know where's manifold vacuum

and all of this is going on.

I'd wanna know if you think this is related

to those two cylinders,

if you've done all your ignition,

can you do a flow rate test on the injectors?

If the problem wasn't there

till the injectors were replaced,

how do you know you've got good injectors?

Where did they come from?

Firing a parts cannon is a risk

and you're now gonna face the problems

associated with that,

but do some further testing like I suggested

and give me a call.

I'm Ronan Aine in the car doctor

till the next time.

Mechanics aren't expensive, they're priceless.

This is an iHeart podcast.

Guaranteed human.

About this episode

Ron Ananian dives into the intricacies of automotive diagnostics, emphasizing the importance of a thorough approach when dealing with persistent vehicle issues. He shares a real-life case of a customer with a misfiring Acura, illustrating how previous repair attempts can complicate the diagnosis. The episode also highlights the significance of building a trusting relationship with your mechanic and understanding the value of proper diagnostics over guesswork. Listeners gain insights into common pitfalls and the importance of clear communication with their automotive professionals.

Buick Enclave Chevrolet Silverado Ford Edge Porsche Cayman

Original notes

Diagnostics Isn’t a Guess: Go the Distance

Ron opens with the truth about diagnostics: commitment, not guessing, gets cars fixed. A stubborn ’06 Acura misfire sets the stage, then real calls highlight trust, process, and the dangers of shortcuts—from a Subaru owner who celebrates his shop, to a Jeep with a rear main leak, a Silverado with a dragging brake, and a Buick Enclave that turned into a parts-cannon case study.

Chapter Markers & Highlights

00:00 – Monologue: The Relationship & The Process

Story of an ’06 Acura with years of failed repairs.
Point: diagnostics require commitment (“go the distance”), not poking and hoping.

12:05 – Micah in Maine: Subaru Legacy

Example of a strong shop–customer relationship.
Rustproofing mishap solved because both shop and supplier worked together.
Lesson: trust and respect pay off.

17:45 – Rocky in Maine: ’92 Jeep Wrangler

Rear main seal leaking after clutch job.
No miracle fixes; check PCV/blowby.
Seal job takes finesse; plan proper repair when practical.

24:45 – Ted in Illinois: ’17 Chevy Silverado

RF brake drags after driving.
Internal hose failure can act like a check valve—sometimes on the other side.
At ~100k miles, replace both front hoses and bleed system.

31:00 – Jacob: ’11 Buick Enclave

Replaced injectors, pumps, cats removed, still bogging/misfiring.
Lesson: stop the parts cannon.
Next steps: restore cats, check manifold vacuum, test injectors properly.

Close – Ron’s Reminder
Mechanics aren’t expensive. They’re priceless—when you let them follow the process.

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