Ness’ Outpost

Penelope was due for her 95k oil change service and I had noticed some “chirping” noises in the wheels since I need to roll down my window to access the magnetic key fabs for my building. I had been ignoring that for quite a few weeks now because some days my 2002 Chevy Cavalier is a symphony of groans and squeaks.

That “chirping” noise was the front brake pad warnings - I should have known better since it went away when the brakes were applied. Apparently when they inspected the pads on the lift I had 3mm left therefore a brake job was in my future as well. I knew my rotors were warped since the car bounced around pretty well when braking was taking place so I had to bite the bullet and make the decision on the spot.

When I bought the car the dealer did a brake job for me at 65k so those pads only lasted me 30,000 km - which I found out from Scott at Richardson Chevrolet is near the norm depending on the parts used.

The rotors were already warped, having only 3mm of pads I didn’t want to drive it around since I could etch the rotors with the calipers if those 3mm wear out, I don’t have a jack, stands or a garage to do the work in myself. I was stuck, so I had the guys at Richardson do the work.
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I discovered this pretty neat graphing tool in PHP called SparkLines. You’ve probably seen them often if you are an avid investor. The idea is to make small text sized graphs that can go inline of the text that displays basic information.

I’ve added a small graph at the top of the table listing of the mileage page in VehicleLog. Yeah, I know it’s highly nerdy to track your fuel and mileage consuption but I’m ok with that since it’s what I do.

Source code can be found on https://code.nesser.org/browser/trunk/VehicleLog/