A month ago, or more, Josiah was away somewhere. And I went to visit my parents. Both of our cars are older, but in pretty good shape for their age. When I got home that evening, probably close to 10, I was planning to go to bed early, maybe read until Josiah called to tell me he was driving home.
But when I got home, I noticed that my brake lights wouldn't go out, even with the car off and the key out of the ignition. I wasn't sure what was going on, I am not a mechanic, but I do know enough to make me dangerous.
I tried pulling the fuse for the taillights. That didn't work (I still don't know why). I thought the easiest thing would probably be to disconnect the battery, but I have no idea how to do that, so I called my dad, who is a mechanic (and farmer). Thankfully, he has had this issue happen to several vehicles before, so he knew what the problem was.
I wanted to get it fixed before Josiah got home so that he wouldn't have to deal with it and could go right to bed because it was going to be midnight or after. I thought I could do it, I'm a pretty good problem solver when I need to be, I can be creative.
A small rubbery piece behind the brake pedal had broken off and was not pushing the pedal the whole way back to it's resting position. If I pulled on the pedal (I had to pull pretty hard!), the lights would go out. So I needed to figure out a way to block up the pedal or pull it back toward the driver's seat.
You should have seen all the tools that I gathered! I had a few bungee cords, a chain, a wood block, some baler twine, a pliers. All I was missing was the duct tape!
Finally, after about an hour on the phone with my dad, and a lot of trial and error, I got the lights to go out! Baler twine, bungee cords, and lots of sweat!
Josiah called a while later, after I had gone inside, and I told him about the whole ordeal. While telling him, I glanced out to look at my handiwork... and the taillights were back on! The bungee cord or twine had stretched out just enough that it wasn't working anymore. I was so disappointed, but there was no way I was going out to try again!
When Josiah got home, he went right inside, grabbed an ice cream bucket and wedged it right under the pedal. Problem solved.
I think I was trying to be too creative and I overthought that one.
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