14 July 2020

A Serious Conversation with the Cougar: Late last night, the Cougar and I had a serious talk. It went something like this...

        Me: You ate 2 quarts of Amsoil in 1 tank??

        Cougar: ...

        Me: This is ridiculous, do you know how much that stuff costs?! 

        Cougar: ...

        Me: That's it, if you're going to act like that, it's Rotella for you!

        Cougar ...

        Me *Adds 2 quarts of Rotella and starts walking away*

        Cougar: ...

        Me: *turning back to Cougar* Don't be such a brat, you did this to yourself!

    So anyway, now due to the Cougar's delusions that she is, in fact, a two-stroke, I've got this 2.5 gallon jug sitting behind me for use at every gas stop. I didn't know you could buy a bottle this big without a CDL! 

    My running theory with my seemingly random fluctuations in oil consumption is that the valve guides are worn out, allowing a significant amount of oil into the combustion chamber under deceleration/downhill-low/no throttle conditions. This makes the most sense to me since climbing the continental divide (which took about a tank of gas) burned barely 1/3 of a quart, while coasting down it in fourth gear while using very little throttle burned almost 2 quarts when I still had about 1/3 a tank of gas left. 

    Either way, the oil is certainly being burned by the engine because there are no noticeable drips on the ground when the car is parked overnight. As of now, I just check the oil level every gas stop and add till full. With the high speed limits of the last few states, consumption has been about 1/2 a quart per 3/4 of a tank of gas, which is when I generally fill up. While annoying, it is certainly manageable as long as I am using Shell Rotella T4 15w40, which can be purchased at almost all gas stations, truck stops, farmer's markets, yard sales, and the occasional GoodWill. This is in stark contrast to Amsoil, which is seemingly stocked almost nowhere conveniently along my route up until this point. I bought all the stock that was available from the stores that I did find it in, but the Cougar was eating it faster than I could buy it. I had been using Amsoil10w40 Premium Protection, but would have used the 20w50 if I had found it anywhere.

    While most of yesterday was spent driving, I did make a quick stop to watch the sunset on Coeur d'Alene lake, and take some more pictures of the Cougar. I figured that if I was going to be taking her off the good stuff, I should probably try to flatter her a little so she doesn't get upset and breakdown again! 

You spend enough time with these cars, and they really do start to take on their own personalities.

    So I've made it to Portland, OR. After making sure that I was pronouncing his home state's name  correctly (Or-eh-gen instead of Or-eh-gone), the friend who I'm staying with for today and tomorrow took me down to the Willamette River to do some paddle boarding and mild cliff jumping. 

    Portland-are Oregon drivers are something else. For example, take the driver of a blue Beetle who, under my direct observation, managed to:

    

-Move at exactly the same speed as the semi next to it for almost 10 minutes while being completely oblivious to the rest of the world around them

-Almost swerve into that semi

-Then almost swerve into the guard rail 

-Then somehow finally center themselves just in time for the semi to pull off to a rest stop, giving 5.8 previously pent-up liters of American combustion volume a traffic-free space to turn gasoline (and a not insignificant quantity of oil) into sound, thermal, and kinetic energy in a well earned (and deserved) WOT pass that was somehow still not enough to distract the Beetle's from the text she was writing while she camped in the left lane................................................Rant Complete. 

BONUS CONTENT

Here are some of the Badlands pic that I was able to recover from my corrupted SD card.

    Thanks for continuing to follow along!

    Ken