After all the pain and the money handed to the mechanic, Cedric came home on its own wheels. It drove. Just not the way I wanted. Under load it lost power, and somewhere deep down I could hear a light miss. Misfire. I decided to swing by Pete's and dig into it. Especially since we had been meaning to install that famous resonator Pete designed and had made at some Chinese factory. How it would sound on my car I had no idea. On Pete's X5 it sounds like a Ferrari.

Put the car up on the jack. First we thought about mounting the resonator where it usually goes. Then we decided right before the can. It would sound different, no exhaust past it on the back side, but I didn't want to torture the whole system, so I put it at the very end of the pipe. Cut a piece off the famous resonator, welded it onto the tail quick. Yeah, I know a resonator goes at the front, not the back. Even so the sound got deeper, the highs came off, the tone settled a little more flat. But not raspy. A noble note, and I liked it right away.

Started off well and fast. And since it was all going so smooth, we figured we'd take a look at the jumping RPM while we were at it.

If I had known it would be three weeks in the driveway.

It started easy. Blew cleaner through the MAF sensor. Seemed a little better. The jumping tach needle went nowhere. Alright, time for spark plugs. And that is where it started.

We got into unbolting the top of the engine, and it all came apart. A bolt strips off its threads, a hose that had been sitting for decades cracks apart in your hands from old age. Started the car and realized one line was spraying fuel left and right. All of it had to be fixed. Drove to the nearest parts store, loaded up on lines and hoses, came back home. I had picked the plugs out ahead of time and was threading them in by hand. Even though they were supposed to be torqued to spec, full number. Torque wrench. You know, that tool that tells you how tight you cranked it. Pete had some old one lying around for exactly this. Fine, cranked them as is. Next day we buttoned it all back up. Car started and, horror, sounded worse than before.

Pete said, here's what we do. Change the plugs again, even though I just put new ones in. The plugs I bought were Bosch, and Bosch on these engines gets ragged on a lot, people run NGK instead. That is exactly what Pete suggested. Change the coils. Go through all the vacuum lines. Swapping plugs I just paid for was the last thing I wanted. But for the sake of a clean experiment we decided to do it right. The MAF was on the list too, except on my Cedric that sensor is almost impossible to find. I'm not sure it even exists in Japan, and if something does turn up it's probably off a different car.

Took a day off. That evening after work we decided to test the vacuum first. Had to run to Harbor Freight for a smoke machine. No cheap one in stock, only the expensive one, but what can you do. And surprise. Right where we had saved on gasket maker, smoke was going up to the rockers. A serious reason to tear it all down again. We tore it down.

After that I fought the bolts for a long time. The right ones I couldn't find: what I had was too short, had to drive it back to the dealer. The smartest move in our case was to order the bolts from a shop that makes them custom. And lo and behold, 3 days later the bolts were ready and sat perfect.

Back under the hood. Stripped it down to the block. Grabbed the gasket maker, this time not cheaping out, knowing how serious it was. High temp, of course. Laid it on, cranked it back together. On the side we grabbed NGK. And good news: on that Cedric we dragged out from behind the office a few days back, there were noticeably fresher coils. So we were ready.

When I pulled the old plugs, I think I found why the car was shaking so bad. One plug was broken in two. Either I overtightened it, or it came cracked already. Either way, in two. Pulled everything, put the new ones in, this time with the torque, 14 foot pounds. Then the coils, then the covers. Cranked it all down and left it overnight. I wanted to fire it up that same evening so bad it hurt, but it was clear: do it now and the pressure squeezes the fresh gasket out. We waited.

From the new Cedric I also dragged over a MAF sensor, and we swapped that in too.

Next evening I put the key in. The engine cranked but wouldn't catch. Well. Here we go again.

By that point we had soaked Pete's whole driveway in fuel, peeling off the tar or whatever he's got smeared over the concrete. I figured the pressure in the system hadn't built back up yet, give it a chance. Held it on key on for a few seconds, turned the key to ignition, and after a couple of coughs it finally caught. RPM a little higher than I wanted, but no power loss, no vacuum leak. Ran like new. Just high. Went back under the hood, and turned out the idle wire was pinched a bit. Freed it, the RPM dropped. Not perfect, but down to a decent idle. In drive and reverse it holds like normal, in neutral it sits a touch high. What that's from, no idea yet. But the main thing: no needle jumping. Great. I'm ready.

Drove it to the house and got such a kick out of it that I knew right away: tonight I'm running Cedric until midnight.

Grandma's Sonic had been sitting at Pete's this whole time. We took two cars to my place. Pete got lost somewhere at a light, either he wasn't in a hurry or I got too into Cedric, which was pulling like it should. Dropped my car at the house, went back for the Sonic on his truck, the two of us. And since the day was going so well, we grabbed a can of 134a that had been rolling around Pete's back seat and recharged grandma's AC. And lo and behold, an arctic wind came out of the vents. I drove back fully content, already picturing myself carving up the highway in my beloved Cedric.

And it was a good day.