DELAYED PART 2

Let me start you off with a story.   Two years ago I started planning for a trip of a life time.  With that comes long hours thinking about what could go wrong with my vehicle and fixing it before leaving and/or have the parts with me to fix it when required.  Given the fact that I am a journeymen mechanic in Canada I felt I was thinking about every possible failing point on my classic truck. Given the age of it I expected things to breakdown.  I have always had a plan and tools in place to solve the problem, allowing me drive from Canada to Panama and back again with little issue.  Was I wrong???   The problem is when you pay someone for special parts and information you expect them to be an expert.  Why wouldn't you, right!!!

So today I woke up thinking it's maintenance day as we would be hitting the road in two days.  Just a quick greasing and gearbox oil check I thought.  But just as I was finishing up out of the corner of my eye I spot a sliver of rubber extruding from the leaf spring bushing.  "Oh no thats going to take a couple hours to fix," I thought. "But its ok, I have spares."

So after two hours of jacking up the truck, removing hardware and using Land rover Special tool #1(A big bleep'n hammer) I had the bushing out of the leaf spring and I was ready to insert the spare.  

As I banged my head against the frame of the truck I realized it was 0.076" too small - I had the wrong part.  Not a big deal your thinking,  just go to the parts store and get the right one.  Thing is, the parts store I need is in Canada or England, not here in Mexico.

So I decided to go direct to the manufacture, bypassing the distributer I had dealt with in the past.  After calling Rocky Mountian Parabolics directly, I was greeted with expert advice and a quick parts order to be shipped direct to my hotel in Mexico from 6000 km's away.  I have to say its amazing to have such great service and to deal with a company that backs their products.

So the ending of the story goes like this - we get to hang around this awesome little town drinking cerveza and playing in the water for an extra five days.  Yet again, waiting for mail!