Air Care

I took the car through AirCare this week.

This is an annual rite of passage for those in the Lower Mainland (bi-annual for vehicles after 1992). You spend 30 -45 minutes in line and having your vehicle tested, pay $23 per year and the environment gets cleaner, great in theory............. BUT IT'S A JOKE.

Last year our venerable Toyota failed miserably and we figured "well that's it" but the car still runs fine, burns a litre of oil a month, and we only put about 5000 K a year on it. I was bemoaning our fate to neighbour McGyver who says "well let me see what I can do".

So McGyver cleans out a filter, adjusts the timing so that the car runs horribly and disconnects a hose - the result ...........

Pass with flying colours.

The car runs just fine for another year. This year McGyver spends 10 minutes under the hood, disconnects the hose again and the car runs miserably to the AirCare station where it once again passes easily.

Bear in mind this is not some black smoke belching beater - the car is just old and as such, according to my mechanic, the government wants it off the road. I might feel bad except that if I lived in Kelowna or Kamloops or anywhere besides the Lower Mainland I wouldn't even have to go through the whole process.