The Perfect Crime!

I think I'm in the perfect situation.  My car insurance and registration is in the States and my driver's license is Canadian.  This seems to cause a lot of confusion for the Canadian police when I get pulled over. Since I've been in Canada I've been pulled over twice.

The first time I was driving down the street and some guy stepped in front of my car from a bus stop.  I saw it was a cop and he held out his hand as if telling me to stop or slow down.  Well instead I drove around him.  First of all I thought what a dumb ass stepping out in front of a speeding vehicle and secondly I saw no patrol car and thought I would be long gone before he called me in and they started looking for me.  Turns out I was wrong and he had a car stashed away. That fact pisses me off a bit because if I would have noticed he was running to his car I would have been VERY gone by the time he got going.  But I didn't notice and he hopped in it and caught up with me.  He asked me what the hell I was doing and I claimed I didn't notice he was a cop and was confused why someone was stepping in front of a moving vehicle.  I don't know if he bought it or not but my ticket was just $45 which was cheaper than any ticket I have ever gotten in my life. So I happily took it.

Then today I was pulled over again.  The officer was in the left turning lane and I was going straight so I thought he was too busy to bother with me.  Again I was wrong and he caught up and pulled me over.  He came up to my window and said, "Do you know you were doing 80km in a 50?"  I said, "Oh okay" rather blankly.  He said, "Well that's speeding."  I chuckled and said, "Yeah, I understand." He asked for license, insurance, and registration which a gave him.  He seemed rather confused by the odd cross country combo and went back to his car.  In just a few minutes he returned and gave it all back to me with a warning to slow down.  I thanked him wished him a good day.  I just got a warning for 30 over!!!

As I drove away I tried to understand what just happened.  The only thing I can think of is they don't keep a record of out of the country violations.  If they did he would have seen that just a few months ago I had been pulled over for speeding in nearly the same area.  Perhaps processing out of the country tickets might be a bigger pain to process. Also I think my tickets in Canada never reach my insurance company in the States because my rates have never changed.

It's the perfect situation!!

DIY Brake Job

So the rear pads were making a terrible metal on metal grinding sound.  Apparently Mustangs don't have the wear warning on the pads so you have to keep an eye on them.  I spoke to the dealer and they quoted a "worst case" scenario of brakes and rotors for $500 per axle.  I thought that was nuts so I decided to give it a try myself. 

I have done pad changes in the past but only on old muscle car drum brakes.  Never tried discs.  But it turns out to be stupid simple.  You do need to rent a tool to compress the brake but as long as you buy the pads from the same part store they don't charge you at all for the rental.

As you can see below the pad was worn clear down to the clip.  The change was super easy.  Taking it to the dealer would have been a huge waste of money so glad I did it myself.

Snow Stang

It seems that spring will never arrive for us car guys.  Here we are in May and the flakes are still flying.  Luckily I put my new brakes on the day before or I'd been freezing my ass off while working on it.