The Glowing Converter
It's time to boggle the mind with a new puzzler. Now, this is an automotive puzzler, and it can apply to a lot of different cars.
A fellow community do-it-yourselfer came into the garage. And he said, Geez, guys, I have a problem." He said, "and I hope you can solve it. I think I have a faulty part." I said, "Oh, yeah. What is that?" I think he had something like an 81 or an 82 Chevy pickup truck. It's not important what he had, but he had a late model vehicle of some kind.
He said, "Gee, you know," he said, "I had a problem where my car had no power. I couldn't climb hills. And one day we're trying to climb a long, long steep hill. I got out night and I looked into the car and lo and behold, my catalytic converter was glowing red. Oh, geez, it must be all plugged up. I listen to you guys all the time."
He is out in the middle of nowhere, unable to climb a hill and his converter is glowing red. So what does he do? He goes out and he buys a new converter. And he spends the whole next weekend busting his knuckles, removing the converter, and putting a brand new one. Guess what?
He tried to climb the same hill at the same time of day. Didn't make it. Looked under the car and lo and behold, it was all red again!
So he realizes that either he misdiagnosed the problem or as he suspects, he bought a faulty converter. So he goes to the parts store. And the guy says "Unlikely twerp! You did not buy a faulty converter!" Whereupon he comes to our garage, head in hand. Weeping, "Help me, Help me!"
Yeah, the question is, what's wrong here? Was it really a converter?
