Backtracking Part 7 - The Final Descent

  After bellies full of Pizza and deliciousness. We decided to head on to home. We had about 40 minutes left in the trip. At this point I was tired of listening to nothing so, I turned on Pandora, on my phone, and sat it in the cup holder. Even at highway speeds I could still hear it with the volume up all the way.

  Things were still looking good. Aside from burnt strawberries and burning oil smell, lack of seat back adjustment, a somewhat unstable front end, and no radio, the trip back was progressing nicely.

  I was approaching a stop sign and began slowing down as normal. Everything seemed fine until I stopped all the way. Then it felt as if the whole car was rocking side to side. I'm not used to the rear wheel drive shimmy. The RPMs were low, the engine was running on, what felt to me, like four cylinders. This is concerning.

  I gave it some gas to roll away from the stop sign and it seemed to struggle. Not quite so bad now though. It was still moving forward. It just felt rough. This is when I started getting a bit nervous. After we got back up to the posted speeds I tried slowing and then accelerating a bit to see if there was any difference. Felt the same. No check engine lights or flashing warnings, I figured it can't be that bad.

  We were getting real close to home when, I missed a turn. Given this and the car running rough I pulled into a neighborhood. I drove all the way in and found a cul-de-sac*. I motioned for my buddy to come around. I told him I missed the turn and had no idea where we were. Even with GPS, a strange area at night can be disorienting. Luckily, he knew right where we were and how to get home. I asked him to drive the 328 the rest of the way. He was a man of knowledge in the e36 department. I wanted an expert diagnosis.

  Once we finally got back to my place. I opened up the garage door. We swapped spots. I parked the 328, he parked Sally (our Saturn). I asked him what he thought. He said its was running on 5 cylinders. He had the parts to fix it and was raring to go but, I was tired. It was a long drive and it was late. Tomorrow was another day. A strange saying but hey, it fits.

*There's only one way in...and one way out. :p