Experience Project 07

Backing UP
11 June 2010
My usual work car is an old Kia Spectra. For anyone wondering, KIA is Korean for "Let's Screw America." I've had this car for a long, long time. One day, I let my son borrow this car. He called me from a convenience store to let me know he could not back up out of the parking spot. I suggested a few things, but eventually gave up and told him to stick tight. The store was barely a mile away, I could run there in ten minutes. Before I got there, my son came barrelling down the road toward the house. Turns out, he simply decided that the KIA needed some off-road time.

So, he drove my car through the grass immediately in front of the vehicle, beside the telephone pole, under the diagonal wire supports, off the curb and sidewalk and onto the street. Then he drove home.

I'm typically really good with cars. Well, let me be specific. I'm good with engines. I was that greasy covered kid in coveralls beside my dad and his soldiers, watching them work on their vehicles "helping" by not getting underfoot. I didn't help much. So, I understand engines and what different car symptoms often mean. A car that won't go into reverse??? Bad news, cause that's the trans. Shit.

So, I run the car through a few paces. Park is still Park. Reverse is nothing at all, Neutral sends the car forward as does all the other gears. At first I thought, well, not so bad. Then I read the chilton on it,... very very bad. VERY VERY BAD!!! I called the transmission guy and confirmed my fear.

Inside the trans, is a sort of locking mechanism that prevents the car from going into reverse in all the other gears. EXCEPT reverse,.. in reverse, the locking pin is held away, and the engine will engage in backward motion. The locking pin is not being held away, ergo, the clamp that holds it back is broken. Great. Well, this part is on the innermost section of the trans so the whole damned thing has to be taken apart to fix. Funny thing about trans,.. when you take it apart, pieces that were functioning fine HAVE to be replaced cause they don't go back together. For a crap car that isn't worth five hundred bucks, the trans alone will cost nineteen hundred bucks to fix. YIKES!!! Holy Hell Hounds Of Antioch...So, believe it or not, I have been trying to find a new crap car.

Anyone want a KIA Spectra that 'runs great' (just not in reverse)???