Like many of you, I have a mom. My mom has been around for a long time, and happily she’s still going strong. She’s also still driving, and driving a 2013 Fiat 500 that, when compared to her own shtetl-hobbit scale, is like an SUV. She mentioned the other day that she saw a screw sticking out of the hood of her car and wasn’t sure what it was, which, of course confused me. A screw? Just sticking out of the hood? The hell is going on?
She wanted me to drive the car around anyway because she felt it was sounding loud, so I had her bring it by so I could drive it and listen and all that. Oh, and I could also take a look at whatever the hell was going on with that screw.
I’m happy to say the car drove and sounded just fine, at least to me. Of course, my standards for what makes for a loud car may be pretty far off what most rational people who don’t daily drive rattly air-cooled tin cans around, but even with that in mind, the car sounded fine to me. Really, that little Fiat has been a remarkably reliable car for my mom, despite those acronyms going on about all those Anthonys, fixing the cars again.
My mom’s Fiat is one of the 1957 Edition ones, which means it has nostalgic, old-school Fiat badges, a white roof and mirror caps, chrome bumper inserts, special wheels and chrome hubcaps, and some other detail features to give it a charming even-more-retro look. It also has the 1.4-liter, 101 horsepower naturally aspirated engine, which will sort of factor in later as we look into the Mystery of the Screw, In fact, just this very second, I realized you can see the screw there on the right, by the headlight, in the picture above from when my mom brought her car to the Old Folks Car Show we just had.
There’s the screw. Just sort of trapped in there. How long has it been there? Months, at least. I opened the hood to get a better look:
The screw was just sitting there, pinned between the hood and radiator support/front fascia. But where the hell did it come from? How did it get there? Based on the way it was stuck in there, it must have been inside the engine compartment and gotten trapped, as opposed to somehow being flung in there from the outside, which would have Final Destination levels of improbablity.
It must have come from somewhere inside the engine bay; but where? I looked around, but didn’t see any obvious places a screw like this would have been. The mystery here, it’s intoxicating!
I did eventually figure it out, but I’m not going to tell you just yet, because why steal all the fun? Here’s an image of the engine bay from the Fiat’s owner’s manual, and I can give you a hint: the location of the wayward screw is actually visible here. There’s really not many components labelled in the image, because, well, not many are really all that visible in the little bay. That battery takes up a good chunk of space at one end, then the engine coolant reservoir at the other side, and a lot of plastic engine cover in the middle.
So where do you think this screw came from? Take a moment to think about it, and here, while you’re considering, you can watch Charlie Sheen drive a Fiat 500 Abarth around inside a house while he’s under house arrest and having a party, a party where the dangers of carbon monoxide poisoning are likely being prevented with copious amounts of cocaine.
Okay, think you know from whence the screw came? Here’s where it was from:
The air cleaner housing. The screw on the passenger side! I suspect it was left when she had the car serviced last, and they changed the air filter. I changed her battery a bit before this, earlier in the year, and this must have happened after that. But I think it’s been like 3 or 4 months? Can that be right?
Anyway, I was glad to have figured it out. Otherwise, that screw would still be driving me bonkers.
I’m no connoisseur of screws, but I could tell right away it was the kind of thing I would try to replace with a zip tie after losing it.
… like loose screws to complete the charming, classic Italian car feel.
Cucù! – Peekaboo in italian
The logistics of a screw in a Fiat 500 are too much to contemplate this early in the morning.
As soon as I saw the coarse threads and the wide shoulder I knew it was the airbox. Typical FCA screws…
I thought I was looking at a wood screw of some sort.
Threads into plastic; probably through a decently thick plastic piece to start with. Something on the intake path sounds most likely to me, but I don’t think I’ve owned a car that the airbox has loose screws to lose during a filter replacement.