RAY: Hi, 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 puzzler. Now, this puzzler came from what I thought was a very interesting letter I got like four or five years ago --
TOM: Oh, you're up-to-date.
RAY: -- and it went something like this. Four of us have been working as missionaries in a small African village and we had to make our way to the next village some 50 kilometers away. So we engaged one of the locals to take us in his Toyota Land Cruiser. We put our belongings on the roof, you know, in typical fashion --
TOM: Oh, yeah.
RAY: -- and tied everything up with rope and we began our journey. At one point, we pulled off onto a sandy shoulder to let another vehicle pass. As luck would have it, our driver stalled the engine trying to pull out of the sand and when we went to restart it, it wouldn't start.
TOM: Oh!
RAY: The starter motor was dead. We tapped on it, we spit on it, we cajoled it, we rubbed it. We did everything, including the incantations, but the starter motor had just started for the last time. That was it.
TOM: Hmm.
RAY: Now, we knew there was no way we could get it push-started in the sand so we started looking around the Land Cruiser for things with which we could start the engine.
TOM: Geez! It seems unlikely, you know?
RAY: Seems unlikely. All we could find, in addition to our suitcases, was the regular jack, you know, the one that can jack up one corner of the vehicle at a time; about 30 more feet of that rope that was used to tie all the suitcases onto the roof; and a quart of Philippo Barrio Extra Virgin Olive Oil.
TOM: Um! I got some ideas.
RAY: Night was coming on fast. We were starting to panic. The buzzards were circling; the hyenas were closing in. Our driver says, "I have a plan." Within a minute or so, we had the thing started and off we drove.
TOM: Get out!
RAY: Now, I know I have a bad reputation for putting in obfuscations and useless information and I was counting on that in this puzzle.
TOM: Yeah.
RAY: That nobody would believe that the rope and the jack could possibly have anything to do with getting the car started.
TOM: But they have everything.
RAY: That it must be the suitcases.
TOM: Right.
RAY: Or the Philippo Barrio Oil. And here's how we get the car started. We jack up one of the rear wheels and anyone who has ever started a lawn mower probably knows what we did. We carefully wrapped the rope --
TOM: Around the tire.
RAY: -- around the tire in such a manner that the four of us were able to pull it and when we got the tire spinning fast enough, the driver would just pop the clutch with the key in the "on" position and it would be tantamount to push-starting the vehicle.
TOM: Wah!
RAY: And the reason it works is that the differential is peculiar in that if you have one wheel up off the ground, only that wheel will get power and the other one won't and once the thing was started --
TOM: Man!
RAY: -- then we could simply put it in neutral, lower the thing down and drive away and hope that the knucklehead driving it doesn't stall it.
TOM: Doesn't stall it again.
RAY: So who's our winner?
TOM: Well, first of all, I have to say, although, theoretically this is true, I just wonder if a couple of people would have the strength to really get that wheel turning fast enough.
RAY: Oh, absolutely. As a matter of fact, it would be easier to start it like this than it would be to push-start it. Don't forget, you think four people could push-start a vehicle? Of course they could.
TOM: Yeah. I'm just wondering how hard it is to move that wheel.
RAY: It's very easy. This is a true story. This is a true story.
TOM: I believe it. In fact, Fred Miller from St. Petersburg, Florida, thought it was possible because he's the winner this week. And for having his answer selected at random from the pile of correct answers that we got, Fred is going to get a $25 gift certificate to the Shameless Commerce Division at the Car Talk section of Cars.com. You get that?
RAY: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, sure.
TOM: You go to Cars.com and you go to the Car Talk section of Cars.com. And with that gift certificate, he's going to get a, he could, if he wanted to, get a copy of our new music CD, "Car Talk, Car Tunes."
RAY: And this is a high-class site and you ain't going to find this in the bargain bin at Wal-Mart.
TOM: You mean next to our book.
RAY: Right. Yeah, you'll find all those books there. Anyway, we'll have a brand-new puzzler coming up and this puzzler, I'm going to say, is quasi-automotive --
TOM: Quasi-automotive. String related?
RAY: No, no. No.
TOM: Matchstick related.
RAY: No. And not World War II related, either. And quasi-historic.
TOM: Quasi-automotive, quasi-historic.
RAY: And maybe quasi-[bogus??]. We don't know.
TOM: And will there be a quasi-Quonset hut in it? No.
RAY: Maybe.
TOM: Wow!
RAY: Anyway, all that will be coming up in the third half of this show today, so stick around. Right now, if you have a question about your car, naturally, or anything else, you can call us at 888-Car-Talk, which happens also to be 888-227-8255. Hello, you're on Car Talk.
[ Car Talk Puzzler ]
