Most people are aware that there is a virus going around lately, you can catch it and be perfectly fine or it can seriously affect your health. It’s been on the news.
This week someone is dropping off his car to have a coolant leak checked out. He says “Oh, you guys don’t mind using the breathalyzer to start the car, do you?”
I would have said, “Sorry, we employ no sober people here.”
CSA
Interesting question, sanitize and blow I guess.
ck in the days when cars had fins and hubcaps instead of rims.I was following a late model Cadillac down the road driven by a large woman driving on a flat tire.
I saw a hubcap come off and I knew they were $200 at the dealer so I stopped and received the hubcap for her. Sure enough, I found her car in a gas station a few blocks later.
She was standing outside her car looking irate with a large scowl on her face. I approached her and handed her her hubcap.
She looked at it and asked me if it would fix her tire. I said no, it would not fix her tire and she took it and gave a heave worthy of a college discus thrower across the road and deep into the woods. Th question about the breathalizer seems much more sensible than hers.
I was working in the garage and a gal pulls in and asks me to check if her engine had been stolen. She said that she had a tune up done and thought that the mechanic swapped her engine on this very high milage beater of a jeep. I played along not wanting to be offensive. I asked if it was running all right and she said it was running great. I opened the hood and showed her a motor mount bolt and told her that if someone stole her engine and put another one in there would be shiny spots on that bolt from when it was removed. That’s not necessarily true, but it satisfied her suspisions.
Odd question, but alcoholics need cars too. The breathalyzers I saw on line use replaceable straws, and I guess the customer would provide a few for the mechanics to use. Is there a special way for you guys to get around it?
Let me guess , complaint intermittently will not start, LOL .
Breathalyzers these days require a 3-step sample…exhale, inhale, exhale. Even with a new mouthpiece I wouldn’t ask anyone to suck on something that someone else just blew into. Not when there’s a virus going around that’s spread through respiratory systems. We were able to circumvent the interlock enough to get the car in and out of the shop.
I cannot believe that the company which leases the alcohol-interlock device–and these devices are always leased rather than sold–would not have a phone number for a mechanic or other licensed business to call in order to have the device temporarily bypassed for business purposes. Even during normal times, I would not want to put something in my mouth which someone outside my immediate family had put in their mouth, and during a global pandemic, forget about it.
There’s always a number to call. Sometimes it’s staffed, sometimes it takes an hour for someone to call back. Wasted time is wasted money. Either the customer has to take time out of his day and stay at the shop to start the car whenever we need, or we find a way to bypass the system and the customer can deal with the company.
In NC it’s called ‘ignition interlock’.When car is taken in for repair, the owner calls the interlock company, tells them the car is at a garage. Mechanic calls company and they do an override so car can be started.
Back in the day my buddy used a trash bag. Filled it full of air and squeezed it till the breathalyser was satisfied… Maybe a little too “white trash” for most haha
How to totally piss off the wildlife.
Glad the d@&# drunk didn’t injure any innocent people.
Poor raccoon. Poor homeowner of the fence and swimming pool. No sympathy for the drunk driver.
I’m sure this incident provided considerable humor afterwards among the police and fire responders. 
You couldn’t make this up if you wanted to. Some of the stupid things people do…
You’re a good guy.
Actually it is made up, but it is still funny. In the Navy, we call these “sea stories”. The difference between a sea story and a fairy tale is that a fairy tale starts off “Once upon a time”
But most sea stories actually have a grain of fact in them. A true story with a LOT of embellishment in them.
Should have given that drunken A-hole rabies.
Mopar Guy , did you miss the post that said this was a made up story ?
I did. I was having a case of geezeritis (•‿•)
