Vapor locked Ford Cure : Chocolate!

[Farrell In Vancouver]

Silly stuff Stolen from the Interweb This may put this problem to bed! LOL



A complaint was received by the president of a major car company:

"This is the fourth time I have written you, and I don't blame you for not answering me because I must sound crazy, but it is a
fact that we have a tradition in our family of having ice cream for dessert after dinner each night. Every night after we've eaten, the family votes on which flavor of ice cream we should have and I drive down to the store to get it. I recently purchased a new Model A from your company and since then my trips to the store have created a problem. You see, every time I buy vanilla ice cream my car won't
start. If I get any other kind of ice cream the car starts just fine. I want you to know I'm serious about this question, no matter
how silly it sounds: 'What is there about a Model A that makes it not start when I get vanilla ice cream, and easy to start whenever I get any other kind?'"

The Ford company President was understandably skeptical about the letter, but he sent an engineer to check it out anyway. He had arranged to meet the man just after dinner time, so the two hopped into the car and drove to the grocery store. The man bought vanilla ice cream that night and, sure enough, after they came back to the car it wouldn't start for several minutes.

The engineer returned for three more nights. The first night, the man got chocolate. The car started right away. The second night, he got strawberry and again the car started right up. The third night he bought vanilla and the car failed to start.

There was a logical reason why the man's car wouldn't start when he bought vanilla ice cream. What was it?







Answer

Vanilla ice cream was the most popular flavor and was on display in a little case near the express check out, while the other flavors were in the back of the store and took more time to select and check out. This mattered because the man's car was experiencing vapor lock, which is excess heat boiling the fuel in the fuel line and the resulting air bubbles blocking the flow of fuel until the car has enough time to cool. When the car was running there was enough pressure to move the bubbles along, but not when the car was trying to start.

Moral of the story: Sometimes even insane sounding problems are real. A better moral: Chocolate ice cream cures vapor lock.

[brito36]

Anything is possible.

[Marshall V. Daut]

This reminds me of the classic Smothers Brother schtick where between songs, Tommy talks about the time that he was taking a tour of a chocolate factory. As the tour group was walking on a catwalk above a huge vat of hot, bubbling chocolate, Tommy accidentally fell into the vat. He yelled: "Fire! Fire!" At this point in the story, brother Dick Smothers interrupts Tommy to ask why, if he had fallen into a vat of chocolate, why did he yell "Fire!" Fire!"? Tommy answered logically enough: "Who'd have come to save me if I had yelled "Chocolate! Chocolate!"???
I think this story loses its punch when typed out. It's best to see the Smothers Brothers perform it. I laugh every time I think of this story.
Marshall

[WestCoast]

model a's don't have fuel pumps they are gravity fed, so no matter what fuel flows down hill to carb, so really not possible to have a vapor lock problem, a dry carb maybe

[J Franklin]

WestCoast, are you picking a fight?!!

[WestCoast]

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no im not, just stating a few facts, nothing here to fight over

[J Franklin]

WestCoast, Hey that was a joke! with all the posts about vapor lock on here I thought you would get it!

[Marshall V. Daut]

Thanks, Vince. I hadn't heard that routine in 40 years. I kinda remembered it wrong until the punchline: "CHOCOLATE!!!"
Marshall

[WestCoast]

wow, im getting old I guess (hell I am old), that one went right over my head lol

[gweilbaker]

And it maybe more prevalent now with the corn fuel.