Thankfully we don’t go this far when someone asks a simple question
Even if William X wanted to play with the woman’s head to some extent, he should at least have not given her any potentially dangerous advice.
What if she had taken the car for a high-speed drive after dropping the tire inflation by half? What William thought was funny could have led to a blow-out (or two), or at the very least could have given her such poor handling that she could have gone off the road or crashed into another car.
Even if his advice did not result in an accident or a blow-out on the day that she deflated the tires, it could have led to weakening the sidewall of her tires, thereby setting-up tire failure at a later date. No matter which of these outcomes might have taken place, his “joke” could have resulted in a very disasterous situation.
Fooling with somebody is one thing, but giving advice that could wind up killing people is simply irresponsible and is ultimately–not funny.
Not funny at all,I’ve had BS tongue in check advice and didnt like it all,what if someones prank backfires and kills someone?Thats why no Horseplay in the workplace-Kevin
While it will never be known, what happens if the lady deflated her tires halfway, rubbed the sidewalls out, and she has a potentially fatal blowout in a week, month, or even a year from now?
William needs to be taken to the woodshed; both for creating a lethal situation or even causing some extreme embarassment to the lady.
Maybe she forgot to deflate the tires and only took care of the flux capacitor, wowsers. People only listen to half of what anyone says in my observation.
I often have to give tech advice to the clueless in my job. I have never been tempted to do this, because as thick as some people may be, they’re relying on me, and I’d feel awful misleading someone, even if it wouldn’t possibly cost me my job in the long run. Now sarcasm is a tool I employ sometimes when I’m having a bad day, but it’s often lost on the recipient.
I feel that my job is to educate if I can so that people will at least not make the same mistakes again.
It’s kind of amazing that enough time has passed that so many people would not get a Back to the Future reference. Hopefully the mechanic she took it to knew what a flux capacitor was and was kind in educating her on the matter.
I also agree that suggesting someone do such things to their tires is a very bad idea.
So if you deflate the tires “halfway”, is it deflating the tire pressure, the air pressure, the tires to half height. or half the air?
@aecullar,
William says to effect a reset, you need to deflate the tires. Nothing to do with air pressure or its opposite, tire pressure. Catherine needed a ruler not an air gauge.
I dunno. Kinda cruel. Many moons ago there was a home owner call in show in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area. A guy called in asking about snapping sounds on the roof. It gets cold here and snows and in the winter it is normal to hear cracking noises coming from the roof as it contracts. The guys on the show had some fun and told the caller that he needed to get out of his house right away and that it would likely collapse. I’m sure the caller believed him and they yuk yukked it up for months after-wards. Some people just don’t know much about cars or houses or whatever and sometimes you just need to be gentle.
I’ll bet if I went to Florida or Texas or Arizona someone could feed me quite a line on the snakes or fungus or other maladies I might be concerned about down there. I’d probably do some Googling on it first but they may have a laugh or two on me.
If You Go Near An Airport, See If You Can Pick Me Up A Bucket Of Prop Wash. It’s Been A While Since I’ve Cleaned My Propeller.
CSA
See if you can pick me up some turn signal fluid when you go to the parts store next time. Mine have been blinking slowly…
Personally I hate practical jokes, except for the mildest. Life is cruel enough without making it worse for people.
@longprime No it was a big joke to them. All wood framed roofs crack and pop in Minnesota in the winter when it gets very cold.
CSA, would you also like a tub of relative bearing grease to go with that prop wash?
Keith, That’s Not Necessary. I Just Had My Muffler Bearings Repacked And Got The Carburetor Pins Retimed. I’m Good To Go, But Thanks, Anyhow !
CSA
I’m not quite sure where I first ran across this, but this website seems to be a good supplier for all those hard to find parts: www.kalecoauto.com
@nw2012, I found it!
http://kalecoauto.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=8&products_id=21
Does anybody actually order this stuff?
Out here in the western PNW, @Bing, the homes get more secure because the wet weather, swells the lumber around the nails-tighter. It’s in the late summer when we have to careful about homes collapsing from shrinking wood. However, there are times when the wood swells so much where the studs literally raises the roof.
For anyone who has served in the Army, Navy, or any other branch of the military, you may remember an incident where someone was sent to headquarters to pick up some ID 10 T forms. 
I even remember a story about one clueless guy who was sent by his drill sergeant to get the M^sturb^tion Papers. (LOL) I guess at one time or another most of us have had some pranking fun at someone else’s expense.