This is the Truth Network. And so today we have a treat that we're going to have on an ongoing basis now because I'm so excited to actually bring to you, as promised. And now time for the legendary garage of RK88 and still full pro.
So welcome RK. It's so good to have you on the Christian Carguy Show. Good morning. Good morning. And RK is calling from beautiful downtown Kildee, North Carolina.
Yeah. Right? Right, that's right. I didn't think of it that way, but that's correct. Very few people may even have it, but that's it's kind of between Siler City and Ramzur, or if you know North Carolina even better, you know, and poor people in Iowa or Ohio this morning.
You know, it's just kind of central North Carolina. But anyway, R.K., I have to do a little bit of an introduction because this is one of the most amazing men I've ever met. He is in fact 88 years old and His main form of mechanical work is he's a transmission mechanic. And so here he is at 88 years old. Like, and I was over there Christmas Eve or New Year's Eve, and he's working on a transmission on a big old four-wheel drive 4x4 Ford truck.
Now, can you even imagine? And he's in his garage by himself, and to say. But, you know, talk about old school, as I said, when when I was given that model A that we've talked about before on the show. You know, guess who got the Model A running? Because he worked on them and his family had one.
And so everything from that, but now my current car is a hybrid Toyota. the word escape. Prius. Prius, right. And so here's all this technical stuff with this hybrid that you know, all these kinds of batteries and things.
Again, RK didn't necessarily know that much about it, but fascinatingly, He learns still at 88 years old. What he has got to do with this and that and the other. And so. RK, I couldn't be more excited to have you join the Christian Carguy Show. Welcome.
Thank you. Thank you for the invitation. And so I ask you to put together a little idea of something, some wisdom from arcade of what are people missing when it comes to taking care of their cars?
Well, I was I was thinking about it, Robbie, the other day and and and looking at uh cars on the highway. I noticed something Some of the tires seemed to be flat. And It's the radial design of the tire, and it's the low-profile tire looks flat all the time. I want people to remember, check those tires. You know, years ago you used to have the trucker get out with the hammer and hit the tire and when he listened to the sound of the tire, he knew how much air it had in it.
Well, we don't want to do that, but we want to check to ensure those tires are up inflated. And and I wi saw two cars the other day And I know that the right rear on one and the left front on the other one Which is not you're not up to par, but I don't know that people d you can't feel it, you can't hear it, uh I mean, you can't see it sometimes when you're driving, or feel it with the radio tires.
So I want people to remember that. Please. Check those tires. And it goes back to that little indication. On the dash, sometimes it has a little flat tire or a little yellow tire.
Check don't let that go by. Check that dude. make sure you check that. I'll tell you one reason why. Is that I had this problem t happen to me.
I had a 2012 Chevy Sonic. And the I drove the car, it was perfect. I went down the driveway to do something, and the check-in check tire light came on. And I didn't, it's all right, I'll look at it later. I got back in the car and 10 minutes later, I wanted to go somewhere.
and the car went into fail safe mode. And I said, what? And it and I then realized that that tire indicator Send a code send a code to the body control module to the ECM, to the TCM, and told the transmission not to shift.
So that is it. Indicator, please take care of it. If it comes on, don't just say, ah, it's no problem.
Well, One of my friends, and I read it in the Years magazine, which I was called a Transmission Bible. Anyway. They spent $50,000 on the tr $5,000 on a new transmission the dealer did. And two months later, a month later It wasn't working. And they couldn't figure it out.
They spent all that money.
Well, research came down to that attire Indicator. problem. It told the body control module.
So that was a $5,000 flat. Let me slow down the conversation a little bit for those people who may not be familiar with some of the terms that RK used.
So The beauty of the cars today is they have a computer that is going to monitor all sorts of different things in order to keep the car from self-destructing. Right, that they didn't have in the old days. And so when RK said fail-safe mode, what that means is the car says, uh-oh, I have a problem. I'm going to make sure I get the owner's attention. If I won't shift into high gear, they won't be able to go very fast, and they'll probably have to take it somewhere to get it fixed.
That's right. But You know, the idea that, and I didn't know that either, R.K.
So the tire. th that tire light, that yellow light, you know, when that comes on, it's it's it's It's very possible it's going to send that signal. Like you said to the body controller, And that's the ECM T C M It's on the late model cars, Robbie. Not the not the earlier ones. That's not fifteen years, twenty years ago, but the late model.
And a lot of people are driving these late model cars, you know, so Oh yeah, so we gotta know just inquiring minds, but that is a great piece of advice. And for people that don't have that, still critical because if your cars are not well inflated, it changes the the way the tires wear, it hurts your gas mileage, but it also puts additional wear on the axles and things like that, right? RK? Correct, correct. It does it it if if you get a flat tire, then that tire is not going around the same same uh revolution as the other side of the car.
So that's putting wear on that that differential in the back. I I uh people don't realize that in the four-wheel drive cars, you have to have the tires all the same. all the same size. You can't put an odd volt tire on it 'cause it's going to tear up the transmission, tear up the dr drive shafts or the rear ends.
So that's absolutely brilliant.
So inquiring minds need to know.
So at 88 years old, wait a minute, Bill has a question. Yeah, I had my sensor tell me my tires were low, so I went and got them filled, and it beeps when it's got the right pressure in it. But after all four of them beeped, it was two pounds of pressure higher than it was supposed to be. And I've been wondering whether I should release a little bit from them or whether it really made that big a difference. As long as they're all the same, in my opinion, you're it generally speaking, two two pounds is not going to make a difference.
Two pounds is not going to be good. Two pounds low ain't good, but two pounds high. Two pounds high won't hurt as much as two pounds low. Thank you. So, but my question to you, which I've never asked you, but at 88 years old, right, you're going to pull the transmission out on this Ford truck, which I know you've done.
How in the world? I mean, how in the world? By yourself in that shop, right? That transmission has to weigh, what, 300 pounds? Yeah, well I g I have the j I have the jacks to hold it, Robbie, but The problem is that, you know, you get these cars that are fifteen, twenty years old, and you start taking the manifolds off to get the transmission out because it goes underneath the transit.
You can't get it down unless you take that out. And then you have the rusted bolts that you have to either cut off. Take a bulltorch or do something with. I ended up taking the manifold off because I couldn't get the one bolt out to get the jaws down.
So I had to cut it and then take the manifold off and repair it and put it back.
So that's the hard parts about every doing those transmissions. You know, I love to do just the bench work. But sometimes I buy these problems, and I buy the cars with these problems because I love to fix them, Robbie. I know you do, and that's the see RK's hunger. We've been talking about appetite, okay?
And and RK loves t to buy a car That is a what we would call a diamond in the rough. In other words, he knows that, you know, if you at this and at that, and well, I hate we gotta go RK. Uh we'll be back for the rest of the Christian Car guy show, but we're our our segment this week with the legendary RK in his 88. and still on full throttle and it's over for the we'll be back next week.
