The van didn't eat my money.....the rodents did!

So, we've been having van troubles. It all started on Saturday morning, or at least to our knowledge.

We had an oil change Thursday evening and then parked the van, not starting it until Saturday morning. We had the van all packed up for the day in the Steinbach area and a number of people to see. We set out.

Within the first block, I realized the speedometer wasn't working! Strange. Something didn't feel right with how it was driving either. We turned around and went home.

We then thought that we'd just go the speed that the rest of traffic was doing and make it out to Steinbach without a working speedometer, if that was our only problem. The guy we take our van to lives out there anyways so maybe he could take a look at it. So, we set out for round #2.

Within the first block, the RPMs were up at 3000 and not coming down! The speedometer still wasn't working and then the engine light came on! Oh boy! We're not going anywhere! So, we turned around again.

By Sunday morning the van wouldn't even start! What is going on?

By Monday at lunch, we were waving good-bye to our lovely van that has been running like a dream for the last 13 months, now to suddenly be dead, as the tow truck wheeled her away.

By Monday evening, we had been told that the battery needed to be replaced, as the rod was totally loose on our old one, and now it was absolutely dead. The doors didn't even want to lock or unlock. Alright. And, the service engine soon light wouldn't go off. The computer needed to be scanned. So be it.

By Tuesday late afternoon, we had been told it was definitely a wiring issue. The van wouldn't even shift into gears for the garage guy. All kinds of problems were coming up on the scan.

So, we get a call this morning (Wednesday now), saying that the van repairs are finished and we can pick up our beauty.

We trudge through the snow and meet the mechanic for the first time. Nice guy!

Well, lo and behold, it wasn't Mr.Lube's faulty oil change that caused us grief. It wasn't even something that we did.

It was some tiny little rodents trying to find a warm place and a bite to eat! They managed to get into a small place up inside our van and chew away at the wire cables. They ate right through the coating around the wires and exposed all of them in that certain cable, causing about 5 codes of problems to come up in the computer scan!

The electrician had rarely seen such a thing so he took a picture and has been talking with mechanics on the web about the situation with our van! We got to see the picture and were shocked to hear the culprit of all our van issues in the last few days was a rodent! Our van wasn't in bad shape. A mouse or a squirrel just had a meal and disrupted our peace in the process!

So, our van is back to running beautifully again! And our wire cables are coated in Pinesol to hopefully ward off any other hungry animals!

At least we had comic relief for an expensive van repair! All because of a hungry rodent!