A little bit about my '99 D2. She's an SE7 with 166,000 on the clock and the original head gaskets . I bought her a little over a year ago for $700 and have put about $1000 into her since then. New steering rods, Lucky8 front driveshaft, tires and a couple other little things.

Both my parents and my wife's parents (plus assorted siblings) live in the Phoenix area, so we drive down a few times a year to visit. We had scheduled this visit a couple of months ago, not knowing that Phoenix was going to try and break heat records this week.

Realizing that the temps were going to be brutal, I set about on a maintenance spree to give the D2 a fighting chance of making it there and back. New fluids front to back. I'd just replaced my ABS block so I'd already flushed the brake fluid, then I did power steering flush the night before we left because I had the ASE light make an appearance. Changed the transmission fluid and filter, differential fluids, ect.

So we left in the evening with the theory being that we would arrive before it got too hot in AZ . We loaded all 7 of us in (my wife, five daughters and myself... help me) That kind of worked.

On the way down the SES light came on and was showing a cylinder 3 misfire, but the ASE light went away, so that was nice. I checked the connections at the next gas stop, but all was good. Then the SES light went away before Las Vegas, only to return just as I entered Kingman. Same cylinder 3 misfire. Well

It was 6am so nothing to do but

We pulled into Scottsdale at about noon and the temperature was 112 (on it's way to 117). So we went ahead and jumped into the pool.

Unfortunately, we have family all over the Phoenix area. From Scottsdale to Gilbert and several points in between. That means we couldn't just sit in the pool drinking something refreshing and let them come to us. Here's where the real trouble started. Everytime we sat at a stop light the A/C would go luke warm and then almost non-existent. With the outside temp being 117+ during the afternoons that meant that the A/C never caught up.

I knew my auxiliary fan wasn't working, so I decided to splurge and buy a new one. As soon as I got that changed out (thanks to my brother-in-law having the world's sweetest man-cave. Three words, air conditioned garage...) it could keep up and was colder than it's ever been before . I really considered doing a saudi grill conversion, but I couldn't find the wire mesh I wanted at 9pm. That will be happening soon though.

OK, this is getting long so I'll wrap it up. Last night at about 1am (driving in the cooler temps rules) we headed back north. SES disappeared, D2 performed really well. We just got home a little over an hour ago. I now have a short list of things to do before we venture into hell again, but I'm really happy with this vehicle.

 

That was a great trip overall. SES light sometimes shows up and often feeling like its misfiring especially slight up hill or from a complete stop to go. These are often associated with plug, ht wires and coils.

 

Awesome write up. A lot of valuable lessons in there for those of us doing road trips. Besides not breaking down on the road there or back, next best thing was air conditioned garage. Nice...

 

Agreed, I've ordered some Kingsborne wires and spark plugs to change out, should have done it before, but hey I can't do everything.

 

That air conditioned garage is something I need in my life.

 

Neat write-up!