Bavarian gremlins

As I still had telescope gear in Will's car, I took it to the DDO, so to help with the First Light program. Car worked great.

But, last night, as we closed up and left the premises, I could not start the car. Nothing. No clicks or clunks or spinning of the starter motor. Lots of power. It was not a dead battery! Tried rocking it, clutch in, neutral, wiggling the key. Weird. Woke Willy up.

In the end, I abandoned it.

Will and I drove to the DDO this morning. He was freaked out by the place. Never been. He was awestruck by the admin building. So I did a quick tour of the grounds, talked a bit about the recent history. I encouraged him to bring the family up for a Saturday night lecture!

We checked the time on the sundial.

In the parking lot, after chit chatting with the MoE guy, I tried to spark it up. It started!

Ah ha! The Bavarian gremlins fixed the car overnight! Took Will to lunch at the Vietnamese BBQ Restaurant for his trouble.

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Tried to start the car! The problem was back! So strange. We tried everything we could think of.

Finally, as Will played with the remote, locking and unlocking the car, it occurred to me that the strange signature pattern of the car cycling the locks had changed recently. I went to the trunk and unlocked it. Tried starting the 530. It worked!

Something wrong with that bootlid solenoid!