RAY: We're back. You're listening to Car Talk with us, Click and Clack, the Tappet Brothers, and we're here to talk about cars, car repair and the answer to last week's quasi, quasi-automotive Puzzler. I don't think the puzzle was that quasi?

TOM: You want to discuss the issue of Mrs. Woodrow?

RAY: Well, I do actually. Before we get to this week's Puzzler, I have something here, just a minor little thing...

TOM: A minor little thing!

RAY: I just want everyone to know that these Puzzlers are so carefully researched.

TOM: Yeah.

RAY: That it's rare that we make a mistake.

TOM: Hardly ever.

RAY: But there was a tiny, tiny, tiny mistake made in a recent Puzzler. I'll read the little e-mail we got from Erin Tabscott. "In October, you used a Puzzler which asked which mother of a president by her own admission, did not vote for her son in the election. While the gist of the answer was correct, the wording of the question made it incorrect. Janet Jesse Woodrow Wilson, mother of the 28th president of the United States, passed away in 1882."

TOM: 1982 or 1882?

RAY: 1888 actually, "32 years before Woodrow Wilson was elected president. So, by law, she was not allowed to vote. She was not alive to have made the admission that she did not vote for her son."

TOM: Gotta be so careful about the wording, you know?

RAY: "So, neither of Wilson's parents were alive when he entered the White House, though his father did see Wilson become president of Princeton University, etc., etc." Of course, this person, this Woodrow Wilson authority saw, I guess. Minor little slip-up.

TOM: A minor little slip. Just because she was dead.

RAY: But had she been alive...

TOM: Had you been able to ask her, and maybe your channeler could have gotten through.

RAY: Exactly.

TOM: Mrs. Wilson? Would you have voted for Woodrow? And she would have said, "I would have tried, but I wouldn't have been allowed."

RAY: "I was not allowed to vote."

TOM: A little, a minor little thing.

RAY: Well, let's see how many people can pick up the goofs in this Puzzler. This came to our web site from a guy named Bob Cofield, and he says, "I'm disappointed that you have never paid tribute to the venerable patron saint of automotive diagnosticians, Gus Wilson. Surely you'll remember Gus, etc., etc." Gus was the proprietor of Gus's Model Garage and Popular Science, and here's a Gus Wilson classic.

TOM: Yeah.

RAY: I remember as a lad reading the Gus Wilson thing.

TOM: Gus's Garage.

RAY: Gus's Model Garage.

TOM: Yeah.

RAY: It seems that there was an intense but friendly rivalry between the volunteer fire departments of two nearby towns, Jeffersonville and Eastern Norriton. Pride was at stake as their rivalry climaxed each year in the firemen's competition at the county fair. So closely matched were the two fire brigades in skill and experience that the preliminary hook-and-ladder events produced a virtual tie, leading up to the final showcase event, the race of the firetrucks.

TOM: Woo-hoo!

RAY: Page two. Twenty laps a race, counterclockwise around the quarter-mile dirt track at the fairgrounds, both brigades drove identical pumpers scrupulously maintained and adjusted to peak performance. The rules require that they be set to factory configuration, fully loaded and equipped with crews identical in total weight to the nearest ounce. Both drivers were skilled and experienced. You got the idea, at least in principle, that these trucks are exactly alike. Well, the Jeffersonville team had come out disappointed 27 years in a row, having lost the final event by the smallest of margins. They appealed to Gus to provide them with some small competitive advantage. In other words, try to create a...

TOM: Can we cheat?

RAY: So, Gus took a look at the high-wheeled pumpers and the dirt track, and mused while he knocked the ashes from his pipe.

TOM: Nice touch.

RAY: He then stepped forward, and without tools, and without violating the rules, and without even opening the hood of the truck, he manages to make a quick adjustment that enables Jeffersonville to take the trophy home that year. What did he do?

TOM: Yeah.

RAY: Bribe the judge.

TOM: He didn't have to use any tools. He just took out his wallet.

RAY: Well, because they're racing counterclockwise around a track...

TOM: Yeah.

RAY: He wanted to make it so that the Jeffersonville truck would be able to negotiate those constant left-hand turns easier than the East Norriton truck.

TOM: I knew there was something to that counterclockwise thing.

RAY: And without using any tools, he simply let a little air out of the left-hand tires of the Jeffersonville truck. You know, if you have low pressure in one of your tires, your car will tend to pull in that direction.

TOM: Yeah.

RAY: OK? Now, it could be argued that this doesn't satisfy the...

TOM: They're going counterclockwise.

RAY: Counter, yeah.

TOM: Counterclockwise.

RAY: You've got it now?

TOM: Yeah.

RAY: So, they're making all these lefts.

TOM: All these lefts.

RAY: And the low air pressure...

TOM: Out of the left side, so it's leaning...it wants to go in that direction.

RAY: There you go.

TOM: I like it!

RAY: Well, I'm sure we'll get some letters about the fact that the rules required that they be set to factory configuration. That's the...

TOM: Yeah.

RAY: Yeah.

TOM: You can interpret that any way...

RAY: But I don't think anyone saw Gus do this, so I don't think there are rules violation.

TOM: No, no, I think it's great.

RAY: Yeah, and if you have a problem with this, don't call us. Call Gus Wilson. Who's our winner, Tommy?

[ Car Talk Puzzler ]