Last week my sister was driving back from my parents house in KY. It's a 7 hour drive for her. She has a 90 Buick Skylark which has always sounded like crap, but never failed any of us that have owned it.
Anyway when I was at my parents I did an oil change on it, when I turned it on it was making some really odd sounds, like a banging under the hood. I thought some pump was going out on it.
Well when she's somewhere in Indiana I get a phone call from her. "Ryan, I'm somewhere in Indiana and my car is FUCKED!!!" "I put oil in it at a gas station and when I go to get back on the highway it starts screeching and smoking really bad, then I heard a loud noise, and the battery light is on in the dash".
I told her that she probably spilled oil on the belts and it possibly shorted something out. "Just drive back and don't use the stereo or headlights" "Call if you need me to fix the car on the highway".
I drive up to her house the next day and pop the hood. It was the alternator making all of those sounds I heard. It was fused into one piece because I could not turn the thing. The alternator belt looked like a charred curley fry somehow wrapped around the PS belt (despite being there for 2 hours worth of driving?!).
Odd thing is that I replaced that alternator 3 years ago! The one on my car has gone through 10 years and 200k miles with no issues. Hers had 3 years, and 40k miles put on it.
The bearings had shot out of the back of it, 3 of the balls were still in there with one half out of where it was supposed to be. Me being the nice brother I am bought her a new alternator and belt and had the car running in half an hour (it was cold out and I was dicking around).
Here's the best part, we took her car to return the core... dumbass locks her keys in the car at Autozone. Luckily a cop came to jimmy the lock after we waited for him for 20 minutes in the cold.
