So I left my house to go to my brothers to pick up a trailer with which to move a car…
About 3 miles down the road, I get a warning: “Service Air Filter”
Now, I am not the most anal about maintenance, but I change the oil filter every 500 5000 miles (the oil every 15…it is a diesel and that is the recommended change interval), and when I do, I check the air filter and do the other assorted service checks.
Anyway, I read the message on the dash display, and think: “hmm, that’s odd”. I look at the windshield, where I write the oil change mileage reminders, and I had indeed changed the oil 2700 miles ago…and I KNOW I checked the air filter then….
I looked at the turbo pressures on the dash….yep, the turbo is working hard.
I continued to my brother’s house and there, opened the hood.
The air filter was not new, but not dirty either.
However:
That is 2 -1/2 gallons of hickory nuts jammed in the air cleaner box. No wonder the truck was working hard and the computer thought that the air cleaner was clogged. The box was absolutely full to the bottom of the air filter. Some miscreant squirrel thought that the truck is a good place to hide nuts for the winter….
Methinks I am gonna have to get the air rifle and go hunting
But he brought you a early present for Christmas. So you can’t really shoot him but you could relocate him.
You might want to take a quick look at the actual numbers you typed in for mile change intervals. In my neck of the woods, those intervals would be considered anal.
Shellbark hickory nuts? They look very large for shagbark.
nope, shagbark.
I was a “dock boy” at a boat rental place on a lake in the Desert Southwest. We had an old Ford “work truck” for fetching tanks of fuel for the boats. We NEVER started that thing until after opening the hood and checking the air cleaner. Invariably there would be a ground squirrel nest in the “dirty side” of the air cleaner can. This would happen EVERY DAY.
One time I parked my ’59 Ford and headed down the the dock. After work I went to start the car and heard FRING! FRANG! BANG! The ground squirrels had picked my car for their new home. Those sounds were ground squirrels becoming …ground… squirrels… as they tried to run through the radiator fan… WHAT.A.MESS…
500 miles between oil filter changes? SHEESH! Ain’t that a bit extreme?…
Take it easy on the little fella. He or she IS gathering some yummy nuts for you. Now you know where to find them.
Or build a little tree box for them.
Better squirrel than rats. Rats chewed a little coolant hose on my Dodge. NAPA had them in stock, so I’m guessing it’s a common occurrence.
2 weeks later they did it again.
Now they have to eat through the bait packets to get to it next time.