"Hey, boss,"
Stan Hicks said with somewhat forced breeziness. "I've dug up a new customer
for you!"
Gus Wilson's
expression was noticeably lacking in gratitude as he regarded the Model Garage's
grease monkey and blossoming mechanic. "Well, now, that's just dandy," he told
him sarcastically. "Here I am working four or five evenings a week trying to
keep our regulars happy, and you go out and dig me up a new customer. I'll tell
you what, Stan - get out your shovel and cover him right up again!"
Stan grinned
sheepishly. "Well," he admitted, "maybe I'd ought to have said that this party
is a sort of personal friend of mine, and would you do me a favor and take a
look at - "
"Who is he?"
Gus interrupted.
Stan's face got red under
its habitual coating of grease. "Well," he stammered, "it ain't a he - it's a
she." "Oh," Gus smiled, "so that's it?"
"No, that
ain't it!" Stan protested. "I used to go to high school with this Barbara
Milligen. She's always been car crazy, and ever since she was a kid in freshman
class she's been saving up her dough to get herself one. When she got a job in
a war plant about a month ago she had to have a bus, so she took her coin out of
the bank and bought an old sedan from one of those big used-car dealers down in
the city. She ain't as dumb about cars as most girls, but it looks to me like
they sold her a quince. Can I bring her in? She's outside now."
A minute later a
much-shined-up 12 year-old green sedan was driven into the shop. Gus noticed
that its tires were good and that its engine was running smoothly. Stan got out
on one side and a red-haired girl with a flock of freckles and an expression of
concentrated fury got out on the other. She looked at Gus unsmilingly and
announced. "I wish I'd never set eyes on this junk wagon, and I'll bet you
will, too, after you've worked on it."
"Don't mind
Barbara, boss," Stan put in diplomatically. "She's always been a sourball."
Barbara's
green eyes blasted him. "Keep out of this, jerk!" she snapped. "I'm talking to
Mr. Wilson."
Stan's
feelings were outraged. "Yeah, you're talking to him because I did you a favor
getting him to bother with your broken-down old bus!" he yelled. "And now the
gratitude I get - "
Gus
laughed. "Don't quarrel kids," he advised. "There's no sense in getting sore
at a car, miss - I've done it hundreds of times, and it never did a bit of good.
Suppose you tell me just how yours has been acting up and what you've done about
it."
Barbara's
face crinkled into an attractive smile. "O.K., Mr. Wilson," she agreed.
"Well, I
knew enough about cars - mostly from always wanting to own one - not to expect to
get a super-duper deluxe job for what I paid - and I didn't. I did expect
something I could drive back and forth to the plant without continual
trouble - but I didn't get that either.
"The first
few days, it ran fine. Then the battery got weak, and one morning it didn't
have enough kick to turn the motor over. I had it recharged, but the next week
it ran down again, and the man at the garage said it must be the generator. He
went over it and put in new brushes and everything, and nicked me plenty.
Inside of a week the battery was down again, so I took the car back to the place
where I'd bought it, but they wouldn't do anything - and got fresh about it, too.
"I have to be in a
car pool, of course and every time it's my turn to drive I have a lot of trouble
getting started - and usually we're all late for work. The others in the pool are
sore and say they'll drop me if I don't get my car fixed. Others will hear
about it and won't want me in their pools, and I'll have to give up my job - and,
believe me, Mr. Wilson, those fellows fighting in the Pacific need what I'm
helping to make!
"Well, while
I was wondering what I could do," she went on. "I ran into Stan, and here I
am. I'll have to leave the car here - my shift goes on at four o'clock. I can
take a bus to the plant, and coming back tonight - "
"Never mind
about tonight," Stan told her. "If we can get your car fixed, I'll drive it
over and pick you up at the gate, and you can drop me at my house on your way
home."
"Why, Stan,
that's real nice of you!" Barbara said.
"Oh, well - I
haven't got anything to do tonight," Stan muttered in embarrassment.
Barbara's
green eyes blazed again. "If that isn't just like you!" she cried. "You always
spoil everything by being so - so ungracious!"
"Scram!" Gus
shouted. "You two do your scrapping outside. I'm a busy man."
Five minutes
later Stan came back grinning and found Gus checking each cell of the battery of
Barbara's car with a battery voltmeter.
"They're all
run down a bit, but they test even, so there can't be anything much wrong with
the battery," Gus commented when he had finished. "Guess we'd better take a
look at the cutout."
Finding
nothing wrong there, he turned to the generator. So far as looks told, it was
in excellent condition, but when he checked it he found that it wouldn't charge
the battery properly until the engine was turning over at a speed rate of 40
miles an hour.
"There it
is," he told Stan. "Your friend Barbara's battery runs down because the
generator doesn't charge it while she's driving. The juice that's drained out
isn't replaced. Well, we've found the cause of the trouble; now we've got to
find the cause of the cause. Take the generator out and put it on the test
bench."
Stan did as he
was told. Gus put in 10 minutes going over the generator carefully, looking for
mechanical defects which he didn't find. Then he hooked it up with the
test-bench drive motor for an electrical check. When the tachometer showed that
the generator was being driven at a speed of about 600 r.p.m. - corresponding to a
car speed of about 10 miles an hour - it began to charge, and as Gus gradually
increased the drive-motor speed to 1,400 and then 1,800 r.p.m., the ammeter hand
moved over to 10 and then to 12 amp. Gus looked puzzled as he switched off the
drive motor.
"There's
nothing the matter with this generator," he told Stan. "It works perfectly when
it's driven by the test-bench motor, so there's no reason why it shouldn't work
perfectly in the car. But it doesn't! Well, we'll try again."
They
reinstalled the generator in Barbara's car. Then Stan stepped on the starter
and gradually increased the engine speed as Gus checked the generator output.
"Switch her
off," Gus directed after half a minute. "It's exactly the same as it was
before. The generator doesn't start to charge the battery until the engine is
running at almost 40. There's something screwy here - and maybe it's me!"
Staring at
the generator, he slowly filled and lighted his pipe. After a couple of puffs,
he snapped his fingers loudly.
"That might
be it," he muttered. He copied the generator serial number on the back of an
envelope, went over to his workbench, and reached down his service manual from
the shelf above. Then he checked the serial number against the generator
numbers in the manual. Stan was peering over his shoulder.
"It's the
right generator for that model car, all right," Gus said. "The same generator
is used on several other makes, too - but look here! A lot of the parts of this
generator are interchangeable with the parts of other generators made by the
same manufacturer. Maybe that's it!"
"Maybe
what's it?" Stan demanded.
Gus didn't
answer. He went back to Barbara's car and again examined the generator.
Suddenly he laughed.
"There's the
cause of Barbara's grief," he told Stan, pointing to the generator pulley. "And
maybe I'm dumb not to have spotted it half an hour ago - especially since I ran up
against the same thing just last year. I must be slipping."
"Huh?" Stan
grunted.
"I don' t
get you. What's the matter with the pulley? It looks O.K. to me."
"There's
nothing the matter with the pulley," Gus told him, "except that it's much larger
than the one called for by the specifications for this car.
Naturally,
the larger the pulley, the slower the generator is driven and the more engine
speed is necessary to make the generator charge the battery. This pulley is so
large that this generator doesn't start to charge until the car is being driven
close to 40 m.p.h. Your friend Barbara probably never drives fast, so her
battery never gets recharged."
"I get you,"
Stan said. "But what I don't get is how this oversize pulley got there."
Like a lot
of other headaches," Gus explained, "that's a result of war shortages.
Auto
electrical concerns are reconditioning all types of generators these days, and
when you send in one for service or exchange you run the risk of getting back
the right type of generator with a pulley of the wrong size on it unless you are
careful to specify the car it's to be used in. Evidently when Barbara's car was
reconditioned for sale, the right generator was picked up, but the man doing the
assembly didn't notice the size of the pulley. That's an easy mistake to make.
On a secondhand job the fan belt usually is old and stretched so much that it
will easily slip over an oversize pulley before the generator is tightened.
"I'll find a
pulley of the right size in my junk box. You put it on, Stan, and then take the
car over to Barbara and tell her about it. That'll give you something to talk
about while you're driving home."
"O.K.," Stan
grinned. "You can depend on me to take all the credit."
END
