Blog 21: Independent component 2

Literal

A) I, Omar Rodriguez, affirm that I completed my independent component which represents 30 hours of work. 

B) The sources that helped me complete my second independent component were my mentors, Jorge Ramos, Carlos Ortega and Victor Mendoza. 

C) This is a log of my hours. Hours Log

D) For my independent component 2, I continued my hands on learning at Daniel's Auto Center in La Puente with my mentor, Jorge Ramos. Because I was doing more hours of service learning, I got to get more experience in the field of auto mechanics which helped me in finding my second and third answers to my EQ. 

Interpretive 

During my second independent component, I learned a lot more than I would have through any research article or any amount of research. The reason for this was because I was getting hands on learning with 3 automotive mechanics who always showed me how to complete a job step-by-step. Not only did they show me step-by-step instructions on how to do things, but also gave me an explanation of why certain things were done in a certain order and how to do them. For example, Carlos - one of my mentors - and I were working on the torque tables of a 1991 Chevy S10 Blazer which required a lot of work such as removing the entire intake manifold, the thermostat, and the rocker arms. At the end of this job, we had to put everything back on which required the cylinder head bolts to be torqued to specifications. I didn't know what it meant to torque a cylinder head bolt or even that when you do, you have to torque the bolts in a specific order. Carlos explained to me that you have to torque the cylinder head bolts in order because each bolt has a certain amount of torque to be applied on it that can only be achieved if the previous bolt is torqued properly and if you don't, one bolt will have more or less weight on them than required which will also cause the cylinder head gasket to not seal properly. This is only one example of how my mentors helped me. My mentor, Jorge Ramos, also taught me something really important when we changed the the switch for the headlights of a car (I never could remember the proper name for it) next to the steering wheel. Because we had to remove the steering wheel of the car, we had to remove the airbag in the steering wheel. It was at this time that he taught me that all yellow wires in a car are very vital because when they're covered in a yellow plastic, it means that they are connected to the air bag system. 

Here's the yellow wire I was talking about. That's also where the steering wheel is supposed to be.

And here's the steering wheel without the airbag. 

These top two pictures are from that same job. It's a picture of all the wiring under the steering wheel. On the bottom picture you can see the switch hanging off. 

This is the camshaft pulley of a 2001 Chrysler Pacifica. 

And now this picture. This is from one of the most time consuming jobs we've ever had. This is from when we had to replace the heater core of 2001 Ford Expedition. 

This independent post also contains some pictures of my independent component. 

Applied

This component helped me come up with my answers because of all of the time I spent doing hands on work. It helped me understand what's really important in a car, what keeps it running and my mentors helped me come up with ways to word my answers and explain them. 

The Mayor didn't want to work with us...

Today I went back to the shop for a couple hours to kill some time and I found out the mayor didn't want us to fix his car because it was too expensive and he didn't think the car was worth it. I agree with him, though. His Lexus was in really bad condition and needed a lot of work done. The downside of this is that we won't be working on the mayor's car but the upside of this is that my mentor and I won't have to fix the cylinder heads, which means we won't have to work on the car for 20 hours! Whoo!

Kügel Motor Video

So I found this really cool video explaining how the Spherical engine mentioned in my last post works. It goes step by step on how it works and give details of what is really going on in the engine.

Kugel is German for "ball"

So, I found this really cool engine 2 weeks ago. I read about it in a couple of articles (that I couldn't count as an article for RC because they weren't over 750 words) and I found it really interesting. I'm still a little confused on the whole mechanics of it all but I'm going to start searching up more articles about it and get a better understanding. So, the engine was designed by Dr. H üttlin and his team and was displayed at the Geneva Motor Show in 2011. He named it the kugelmotor because kugel is German for ball and the engine itself if a spherical engine. My understanding of it, so far, is that the engine's spherical design gives you the milage of a hybrid engine and runs on almost any fuel. Like I said, I still don't fully understand the mechanics of it. I just thought it was a really cool concept for an engine.

Here are a variety of pictures of the Hüttlin Spherical Engine 

Its not everyday you get to work with the mayor!

So, I pretty important person came into the shop last Saturday. Mayor of Baldwin Park Mr. Manuel Lozano. We're not actually working with him, but we are working on his car. His car is a 1994 Lexus LS400 and it's in pretty bad shape because, according to him, it's been sitting in his garage for about a year. So far, it needs a new timing belt, a new battery, and work has to be done on the cylinder heads which sucks because the amount of work for the cylinder heads is at least 20 hours worth of work.

Well, here are some pictures of Mr. Mayor's car

This is his car's engine

And this is his car on the lift.

And again. 

And again.