An Autometer/Wild Canary Story

[brianrupnow]

I haven't posted on here too much since I finished the Wild Canary roadster pickup 8 years ago.
This hotrod is my daily driver from May until late September, and I have enjoyed it more than any other car I have built.
This year, when I first got the model A out for its maiden spring voyage, the speedometer was acting funky. Needle kept jumping around, then finally died and laid on the pin. This is an Autometer gauge, (electronic speedometer, no cable) purchased as part of their "Golden Oldies" set of 5 gauges. All the gauges have performed very well up untill this year. I enquired at my local Hotrod parts retailer,"Performance Improvements" in Barrie, and was told $200 for a replacement speedometer, and that included a new sending unit, and no, I couldn't buy JUST the speedometer at a lower price. (The sending unit costs $127.00)
I called the Autometer techline in Illinois, and they said "Send us your speedometer---we can probably fix it for a much better price, or worst case scenario, replace it at a lower price."
-----So----This morning I pulled the speedometer out--(Remember I'm an old fat white guy, laying upside down in a roadster pickup, kind of like a Sea lion in a go kart)----
I boxed the speedometer up and mailed it off to Illinois, insured for $200 in case Canada Post loses the damned thing. (Jeez, that by itself cost $23.70)-----Now I play the waiting game untill I hear from Autometer. I'll let you know how I make out.
And Oh Yeah---A speedometer is IMPERATIVE here. I don't get any heat from the Ontario cops, but I see the suckers setting everywhere with their radar units, and I really don't want to give them any business!!!

[brianrupnow]

Okay Guys----So here's the rest of the story. It turns out that whatever was wrong with my speedometer was not fixable. Autometer GAVE me a brand new speedometer, and adjusted the accumulated mileage on it to match my old "unfixable" speedometer. They told me it was a "warranty replacement, no charge" even though I built this car 8 or 9 years ago and have driven it daily every summer since. I put the speedometer in my roadster pickup this morning, calibrated it as per their instruction sheet, and its working perfectly. This time its even registering in Kilometers as I need it to, not miles. I don't honestly know if that capability is something new, or if I screwed up the calibration on the old speedo when I installed it 8 or 9 years ago. I do know that I could only ever get it to register how fast I was going in miles per hour, and then had to convert that to kilometers per hour in my head----which was a royal pain in the arse!!! So---From me---HOORAY FOR THE GREAT FOLKS AT AUTOMETER!!!!!!----Brian---(And, Oh yeah---what was my total cost?---Well, $23 to ship it from Ontario to Illinois, and $62 to FEDEX to get it back, so a total of $85---which beats the Hell out of paying $200 for a new one at my local speed shop.)

[NTFDAY]

That doesn't sound too bad, seems as though a lot of folks are having gauge problems. Glad to see you back Brian.

[IC2]

Brian - glad to see you recalled how to post here and that some of us still remember who you are(sarcasm intended) .

Also happy to see that another company in these economic and perilous times still have a good customer service department. I didn't choose Auto Meter for mine, but VDO - and my guess is that it would have cost me the entire shot for a replacement.

[rspears]

Hey Brian,
Great to see you back on the forum! I had a similar experience with AutoMeter and a tach - went south, reading funky and they "fixed" it for $25 plus $12 shipping. Had it back about two weeks and it went erratic again. Contacted them, decided to invest the $5 USPS charge to send it to them again and they replaced it as a warranty claim, though it was clearly out of the time window. Good guys & gals at AutoMeter.

[Mike P]

Hi Brian, glad to hear the RPU is back in action........and GREAT to see you post here.

[34_40]

X2, It's great to see you posting again Brian and thanks for the updates to your build.

[brianrupnow]

Guys---I haven't forgotten this forum. Its just that the Wild Canary has performed flawlessly since I built it, and I've had very little to post about. I am still working from home, doing my design engineer thing, although now at almost 66 years old I don't flog it as hard as I did for the previous 45 years. My wife retired two years ago, and we both "took it easy" for about 3 weeks-----then decided that we were going terminally crazy from "Do nothing-itis", so she has been doing contract work as a human resource specialist and I went back to work doing custom machinery design for industry from my home office. I have fairly bad arthritis. Not so bad that I'm in pain all the time, but enough that I can't get up and down off the garage floor fourtry seven zillion times (as is required when building hotrods from scratch.) I purchased a lathe and a mill about 5 years ago, and have spent a lot of my hobby time building model steam and gasoline engines, and exhibiting them at steam fairs. Its nice to know that some of you fellows remember me.---Brian.

[Rrumbler]

Good to see from you Brian. Also nice to hear of a manufacturer standing behind their product so well. You know, you don't have to be doing something to "The Canary" to stop in and post; as i recall, you were always fiddling around with something other than automotive, and your commentary was always interesting and informative. Your absence have been quite obvious.

[rspears]

Brian,
I'd love to see some pictures of your model steam engines, but especially the model gasoline engines. Saw a bunch out in California at the Pleasanton GoodGuys a couple of years back, and they were super cool! Do you have project progress photos, by chance?

[cffisher]

Well Howdy Brian. Good to hear from you and glad your speed'o' is working. Always enjoyed your postings. Have a great day and welcome back

[brianrupnow]

rspears---I probably posted as many "in progress" shots and write ups on building and machining my model engines as I did when I was building the Wild Canary on this forum. The are all over on HMEM (Home Model Engine Machinist) forum. I will try and find them and post the links here for you to have a look at.----Brian
http://www.homemodelenginemachinist....?topic=10831.0
http://www.homemodelenginemachinist....?topic=17384.0

[pepi]

I like the name of your hotrod "Wild Canary" good one !

[johnboy]

rspears---I probably posted as many "in progress" shots and write ups on building and machining my model engines as I did when I was building the Wild Canary on this forum. The are all over on HMEM (Home Model Engine Machinist) forum. I will try and find them and post the links here for you to have a look at.----Brian
Brian Builds the Kerzel Hit and Miss I.C.
Brian's Donkey Engine

Crikey!
I spent over an hour looking through that site (the 'Hit and Miss' engine,) and still didn't get to the end!
Will have to go back!
Very interesting and very clever.
Thanks for the link.

And yes; it's good to see you're back.

.

[brianrupnow]

Just for Pepi---