Tie rod ends, eh?

In the two weeks between driving to Florida and driving to Denver, it seemed like a good idea to get the van to the repair shop. It needed an oil change and we figured with the ridiculous amount of long driving we were doing, things should just generally get checked out. Plus Audrey was sure there was something shaky with the steering or wheels in general that I was having a hard time noticing.

I think its pretty obvious what happens here - the repair guys find the problem, and it is some very expensive part, and not fixing it will be incredibly dangerous. Specifically, the tie rod ends are heavily worn and the rack and pinion is slowly leaking power steering fluid. The shakiness, though, was probably because of the cupping on the rear tires. Also, the brakes need to be replaced. The total cost to do these repairs makes us look at the option of trading the van for a newer van with a lot less mileage (ours has been driven almost to 100k now). However, if we do the repair we might have a chance to actually pay the van off in the future.

What strikes me as the sure mark of the complete derangement of our economy is that we could buy a new van and add much more to our total debt load, but not effect our monthly budget much because we would just switch to paying off the new car loan instead of the old one, which we could engineer to be at about the same monthly payment. Or we can put ourselves much less in debt and charge the repair bill, but thrash our monthly budget for a while as we try to pay it off. It is significantly more difficult to go into less debt!

However, the dangling carrot of possibly not having a car payment down the road was enough for me, and we are going ahead with the repair. It also helps that the mechanics all agreed that the van we drive has a solid engine that is known to last to 150k or 175k miles with some reliability, so long as one gives it pep talks, oil, and keeps up the brakes and other bits.

Aside from all of the above, I am friends with my van. it has strange personality quirks, it hugs my kids on long trips, has some fun fiddly bits, and has taken us many places in air conditioned, or heated, safety. Trading it in feels like throwing it to the wolves somehow, or being ungrateful for its years of dedicated service, and right now I don't think I could afford to spring for a gold watch, anyway.