a few more good shots

These are some good ones.

On my way home on Friday I stopped at Estes Park (very cool if you ever get a chance). Anyways, on my way to Denver from Estes Park, I passed this sign. I never knew such a place existed (Just ask Kiri).

Yesterday Kiri and I were driving around in Ogden looking at houses and we passed this truck. Can anyone honestly think rooster stickers are cool? There's a proud wife out there somewhere. At any rate, if this guy ever gets arrested on suspicion of cockfighting, I think he's sunk.

pictures on the road

I'm out of town on work again. This time I brought my camera. These are some of the pictures I took today.

I passed this sign today and had to turn around to get a picture. Maybe they don't fix roads here. They just put up signs when they get bad.

I'd never seen a spider like this before. This thing was huge.

A storm was rolling in on my way home.

The sun was shining through the clouds on this row of trees.

There are wind farms all over the place out here.

I thought the light on this road contrasted well with the dark sky.

sonata vehicle speed sensor

I was driving Kiri's car (an '02 Sonata) not too long ago and, suddenly, the speedometer dropped to zero. A few seconds later the check engine light came on. The car also started idling at very low rpm, but I'm not sure if that was related. I had taken the car to the dealer with the airbag issue and immediately suspected them of accidentally screwing it up or giving themselves a little job security. Either way, I didn't want to take it back. I began searching online and found that there are actually three speed sensors on a Hyundai Sonata.

Conveniently, Sonatas do not have repair manuals. Instead, Hyundai provides a cryptic website for diagnostic and repair info. Anyways, the input and output sensors are located on the transmission and help your vehicle know when to shift. Much information regarding these two sensors can be found in online forums and even on the crappy Hyundai service website. Little to no information, however, can be found for the third sensor: the vehicle speed sensor. Fortunately for me, I had a vehicle speed sensor problem. I'm writing this post to maybe save somebody the headache of trying to figure it out on their own. Most of the information I received from conversations with dealer service department people and one particularly helpful dealer mechanic who walked out to my car with me and showed me where the sensor was and described how to fix it. I have a 2002 Sonata and I imagine this applies to all automatic Sonatas with the same body style.

The vehicle speed sensor is located on top of the transmission as shown in the picture below:

Click on the image for a larger view. The sensor is circled in yellow. I began by disconnecting the air filter hose and removing the top of the air filter housing. This gave me better access to the sensor. A close view of the sensor can be seen below:

To remove the speed sensor, I disconnected the electrical plug from the sensor using a flat head screw driver, taking care to not damage the plug. The plug came off easily. If the terminals on the plug look corroded, it's a good idea to clean them and reseat the plug, as a bad connection may have been the only problem. If that doesn't work, keep reading.

Because the sensor plugs into the top of the transmission, it is a good idea to clean the area around the sensor to prevent dirt from entering the transmission when the sensor is removed. Next, I removed the bolt which holds the sensor in place.

The speed sensor assembly is comprised of the speed sensor and a plastic gear. The plastic gear is turned by the transmission. The sensor measures the speed of the shaft on the plastic gear which is held in place by a retaining ring. I purchased both the sensor and the gear for good measure. The new speed sensor assembly is shown below:

The white helical gear can be seen on the right and, just to the left of it, the retaining ring which holds the small gear shaft on the sensor.

After removing the bolt from the transmission, I removed the sensor assembly by gently prying it upward with a flat head screw driver. When I removed the retaining ring and gear from the sensor, small pieces of broken plastic fell out of the sensor. I guess that was my problem (it's good to know the dealer probably wasn't pulling a fast one). The disassembled speed sensor assembly removed from the car is shown below:

The old speed sensor was covered in transmission fluid. So, for good measure, I applied fresh transmission fluid to the o-ring on the new sensor, gear shaft and helical gear. I then inserted the shaft in the speed sensor, installed the keeper ring and installed the assembly by reversing the removal procedure. When the car was put back together, I started the engine, the check engine light turned off and the speedometer worked perfectly!

For those unfortunate enough to own a Sonata, I hope this tutorial helps.

i bought a jeep

I know I said I would write more often. I'm out of town on business and decided I should catch up a bit. It's been kind boring here, raining like crazy and I miss my wife. I'm gone until next Monday. I thought traveling would be so fun, but it's not so great.

In other news, I bought a Jeep Grand Cherokee the other day and am pleased to announce my return to the four-wheel-drive world.

I got to romp around a bit in it on Saturday. I'd forgotten how fun that is.

Friday evening, Kiri, Adalyn and I drove to Heber where my sister lives. I was out and about that night and topped off my gas tank for good measure. The next morning we were driving to the lake to go fishing and my brother-in-law noticed my gas gage. Apparently someone had stolen my gas during the night. I estimate they got away with about 10 gallons. I can hardly imagine the kind of loser that would steal gas from a car parked in a driveway on a corner lot under a street light. Anyways, with today's gas prices, I'd recommend a locking gas cap to anyone who hasn't got one. I hate it when people steal!

That about wraps it up for this post. I've got a ton of things I want to blog, but I just haven't found the motivation yet. I'll get to it eventually.

i'm alive

For those who don't know, I took a job in Utah and we moved last week. It is so amazing to not have school hanging over my head all the time, but I still feel just as stressed. We rented a small, smelly duplex in Layton (I'm sure Kiri will vent on her blog about all the nasty details). I started work last Monday and just got the internet set up yesterday. I have been crazy busy for the past few weeks and haven't had time to post. I have been making a list of things to write about and, now that school is out of the way and we are kind of settled in, I'll be writing regularly.

craigslist losers

Let me start this post by saying I love craigslist. I do have a problem, however, with the people that browse the "free" section and have no shame. I'll explain. Right after we bought our car, I was doing the brakes and needed brake cleaner. So, I hopped on my bike and headed to Checker. On the way home, brake cleaner in hand, I got plowed by a car, bending my rims so badly that I had to carry the bike home. The bike was a piece of junk to begin with. It was my ASU bike. Well, that was November, and the bike has been sitting on our patio ever since. Last night (or rather this morning at 1:05 am... don't judge me) I got sick of seeing it and decided to post it on craigslist.
Being the nice guy that I am, I posted it in the free section. Around 1:20 am, my phone rang. It was some idiot calling at 1:20 am to ask about the bike. I was furious. "Its 1 in the morning. What's wrong with you?" I asked. His reply was "Well you just posted it 10 minutes ago." Although I definitely should not have been awake at such an hour, this in nowise justified calling a complete stranger at 1:00 am. I told him to call back in the morning. A little after 4:00 am, somebody else called and left me a message. When I listened to the message, it was a guy asking for the bike. At that point I'd had it. I realized I was not going to get any sleep unless I turned my phone off. I use my phone as an alarm clock and didn't want to have my life run by these early morning freeloaders. So I hopped on craigslist, deleted my post and hauled my bike to the alley. Problem solved. I got rid of the bike and slept... at least for a bit. I received another call at 6:00 am and another after 7. I'm not Captain Tact, but my advice to those late night browsers is, if you can't wait until morning, just email the guy. My beef is not with people who want free stuff. My problem is with the people who are willing to throw any ounce of respect they may have had for other people out the window to be the first to get the freebie. Well, I'm taking a stand on this one. No bike for you!

the sonata lives on!

I'd been wanting to find out how the airbags in my wife's corolla worked for some time. So, on a sunny, November day in Queen Creek, I slammed it into the back of a Chevy 2500 pickup. The airbags worked great. Kiri and I were thrilled. Our car, which was insured with liability only, was totaled.


My beautiful spray paint and duct tape-clad civic had been out for the count for a few weeks so I thought I'd take the civic to the shop and ride out our car problems in style. Diagnosis: 3 dead cylinders (more damage than the car was worth). Long story short, we needed a car pronto. We borrowed a car and frantically began the hunt. We found an '02 Sonata and, foolishly believing that Hyundai had mended their crapish ways, plopped down a chunk of money that we didn't have on a fixer-upper. The brakes and CV joints were bad, but otherwise the car appeared to be mechanically sound. After making the necessary repairs (with some serious help from the brother-in-law), I found a dent in the engine compartment indicating the car might have been wrecked. A few small things didn't quite work right on the car so I decided to change some fuses. You can imagine my delight when I crawled up under my steering wheel to find that the airbag idiot light fuse was missing. I pulled another, less important fuse to fill the vacancy and watched the airbag idiot light come on. At this point, I didn't even know if the car had airbags. Quick note: if you ever want to pull a fast one on someone, just pull the "my car is broken" indicator light fuse and watch your car go from piecer to steal. I called a dealer and was told that 9 times out of 10, an airbag error light is caused by a bad connection under one of the front seats (the seats have pressure sensors). I bought a can of electrical connection cleaner from Checker, unbolted my seats and cleaned and reseated every connection under the front seats. Much to my dismay, the stupid airbag light still stayed on. Clutching my empty wallet, I took the car to the dealer. $95 later, I was driving home without the stupid airbag light. Turns out that the car had some 18 history codes. All they needed to do was clear the codes and the airbag system was as good as new. Not only did the dealer's mechanic fix my annoying light (convincing me the car was safe enough to trust my wife and child in), he also did one of those six million point inspections and didn't recommend any service besides changing the air filter. If a dealer can't find another way to juice my wallet, I think I'm sitting pretty good. I stopped by Walmart and picked up an air filter and now have a completely different attitude toward my Hyundai junk heap. It's still completely gutless, gas guzzling piece, but in a safer, I didn't get ripped off so bad sort of way.