Puzzler of the week

[Scott MacLean]

This week's puzzler:

A schoolteacher had taken his car into us, and we had done a lot of brake work on it. He came in one day and said, "I'm kind of disappointed. Now that the academic year is over, I've been doing a lot more driving. During the school year, I drove back and forth to school, and everything seemed fine. Now I'm on summer vacation, and I've been taking a lot of long distance trips.

"I've noticed that if I'm driving on the highway for any period of time, when I get off the highway I often lose the brakes. I step on the brakes and they sink to the floor."

So, we put the car on the lift and we pulled off the wheels. We went over everything we had done to the car, checking to see if the calipers were free, the brake hoses free. Everything was fine.

Crusty, meanwhile, was just sitting there in the inky shadows not saying a thing. Finally, after we determined there was nothing wrong with the brakes, Crusty said, "When did you have the exhaust system replaced?"

The fellow says, "As a matter of fact I did have it replaced -- just before the end of the school year."

Crusty says, "That's the problem."

And that's the question.

How in the world could someone's exhaust system affect his brakes?

Last week's puzzler:

While we were way up north this fall looking at the New England foliage, we visited our friend, Doug Mayer. He said, "There's a road right near my house that runs directly north and south."

I said, "Yeah? Show me."

And Mayer says, "I can put my car on this road and point it north, and drive for a mile and when I'm done, I'm a mile south of where I started."

The question is very simple: How's he doing it?

Last week's puzzler answer:

How does he do it? He puts it in reverse and drives backwards.
_______________________
Scott MacLean
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