We had a long tiring Thursday at the mechanic’s shop and the news isn’t all great.
The front brakes are reassembled with polished rotors and brand new pads from the American parts store in the city of David. It took all day but that was great. What disturbed me was what Marco and Eleazar found that caused our brake problem.
It’s nasty up in there inside the wheel well but Marco showed me every step of the way. The brake hose was kinked preventing the drivers side brake from functioning. We burnt our brakes because they weren’t working evenly, and not because we took a steep hill. I hadn’t been able to understand how I cooked the brakes after driving so cautiously in the first place but now I knew. 
After a long day of waiting we got the rotors back all polished and new and with the new pads the front end was good. However Marco showed me another problem. Great! The rubber supports for the steering and suspension have worn out after 92,000 hard miles.
On a front wheel drive vehicle this rubber donut supports the plate that moves up and down with the drive wheels. This is the cause of the vibration when I brake and they need to be replaced. The van is not properly driveable until they are.
The shop closes Saturday until the New Year for a well deserved vacation. Today the rear brakes will be checked and the fluid in the system changed and we hope no fresh problems will come to light.
We will be looking to see if we can buy new bushings at the Fiat dealer as the chassis of our Promaster is based on the very popular Fiat Ducato van which is sold worldwide. If they don’t have the bushing Marco says he can get a new one made at a shop he uses in town. So it will get fixed and GANNET2 will be made whole in the new year. That is excellent.
What disturbs me greatly is that any of this happened in the first place as we went to Ohio last August 28th to avoid this kind of situation. I asked the shop to check the front end and check the brakes and so forth. I’m
not mechanical but I know how my Promaster works and in making our appointment I specified what I, the theoretician knew needed to be done. A month earlier I wrote to the mechanic listing what I wanted done so he could block out the time. I asked for no discounts or favors.
I suppose you could or perhaps should call me naive but I expected Kip to check the “tie rods etc…” but apparently I was expecting too much! That does hurt I have to admit and Layne and I talked at some length about that sense of betrayal. Had the bushing failed in the Andes or the brakes not worked properly in those remote areas this journey would have been a lot more adventurous than I might have liked. As it is we are extremely lucky. Not only is Marco conscientious and thorough he lets me watch in the work area and justifies everything to me directly. We know we are extremely fortunate as Panama is a good place to make repairs. I have always been worried about driving at 15,000 feet on some of the highest roads in the world and I thought I had done a good job of being prepared. Obviously I feel let down.
We are lucky too in that 40 minutes away we have a comfortable and secure full service campground where we had planned anyway to stay over Christmas. As I said to Layne some people ache to spend their annual vacation in a place like this more or less, by the pool! 
It’s not a Sandals resort but at ten bucks a day we are very happy to be here with all facilities among good people. As Sonja commented it’s not a bad spot at all.
We took advantage of Marco’s partner Sergio, an electrical engineer to fix a couple of nagging issues built into our custom van in the original build in Florida three years ago. He studied our electrical system and improved ventilation to our hardworking 110 volt inverter which has overheated on hot days and he sorted out the reversing camera which had failed but that I couldn’t replace as the wiring was jammed inside the ceiling built into the van by Custom Coach in DeLand. They left no slack to allow the camera to be easily replaced. I have been carrying the spare since Florida in August and finally found the man who could help. Next time it fails Sergio made sure the connector is easily accessible.
His wife is an interesting study. She is a project manager but has got tired of working for businesses who don’t plan their projects properly and she is in her last year of law school. She is a woman with a mission and she is passionate about doing her part to fight corruption in Panama’s massive bureaucratic government. I suspect she would have supported the recent protests that shut the country down for six weeks…
It was a long hard day but we have got repairs in hand which may end up costing perhaps $1000 to $1500 to repair, money we have in our emergency fund. We have plenty of time as we have only just entered Panama and Layne may move back our shipping date to Colombia to give us time to do some touring which we are having to put off at the moment. She is finding some cheap rental car options…
We could feel sorry for ourselves but this is the pain and pleasure of travel. We have an unexpected problem and we are fixing it. We are safe and comfortable and rather annoyed! I fear my travel writing will grind to a halt but it’s the holidays and time for all of us to rest. Besides this stuff isn’t fun to write about even though it is the reality of being on the road.
Thank you Silvia from Brazil for cutting my hair and we reciprocated by helping her fix a drawer in her RV. The more fun side of life on the road!
We may rent a car to drive around a bit and I will post photos if we have anything fun to write about but until GANNET2 is fixed and ready to roll our lives here will probably be too mundane to be of interest. If I have pictures of interest I will of course post them.
In any event Merry Christmas to all and a happy New Year wherever you may find yourselves. And I look forward to unraveling the mysteries of South America in 2024. And driving at very high altitude on solid brakes!
