How to Speak "CAR" to Your Mechanic

With a stern gaze and jutted chin, the matronly woman looked the service advisor squarely in' the eye and said, "Uhden dunt, uh-dunt, dunt...dunt... dunt...psst!"

She and many other car owners are finding that their high tech marvels of the road make weird sounds. In their efforts to convey to servicemen any information that might help hasten the repair, they try to mimic their cars' final gasps.

"fuden... fuden...duff," one man muttered repeatedly while the mechanic watched his performance in amazement. But the man insisted these were his engine's dying words, and eventually the syllables clicked a spark of recognition in the technician and he was able to begin a diagnosis.

Believe it or not, this is a good way to communicate with a mechanic about a car that won't run, especially with today's technologically advanced models.

Of course, if the car runs, the best thing to do is take it for a drive with the mechanic, hoping the problem will manifest itself before a new audience. However, cars, like children, don't always do what's expected of them. They will limp and sputter and cough, until you arrive at the service department. Then when they see a mechanic approaching, they purr like a kitten and accelerate like the Russians just landed in Ft. Worth.

You're left with no choice but to describe the "konk," the "clunk," the "ping" that brought you to the shop. But, in addition to the age old "chunka-chunka-chunka" to describe a dead miss in the engine, high tech cars have brought with them new sounds that require owners to achieve a new level of creative communications.

So foreign are these sounds to our long-acquired instincts that traffic jams have been blamed on the "freeway chorus" as passing motorists slow and sometimes stop, not sure whether the strange noises are coming from their own cars or someone else's.

When you're in a service department and hear another unfortunate owner making the funny noises, you're tempted to snicker. But you'll make the sounds, too, when your turn comes. There just isn't much else you can do. Communication is important to getting the problem fixed the first time. Duplicating sounds and noises gives the mechanic something to go on. He has a real problem looking at a car that won't run and can't talk. So the owner must do the talking.

One woman described steam coming from the exhaust pipes this way: "Its breath is fogging, and it's not even cold."

Some people tend to take their cars' noise as a personal affront. One man insisted his transmission was "growling at me." Others have complained, "My car is whistling at me," or "my car is spitting at me."
The classic service department waiting room story is the one about the well cushioned lady who burst through the door and announced to the service advisor, "Quick! My rear end is bumping and grinding. I need some help, now!