Under hood critters UPDATE

Ron · **Posted:** Tue Jan 10, 2006 12:44 pm

The wife and I took off Sunday to do some errands and I noticed the brakes seemed a little stiffer than normal. After almost rearending someone I pulled over and popped the hood and found that something had ate the vacuum linefrom the brake booster can. This is currently our commuter and it just amazes me these critters can get under the hood and do this much damage is so short a time.

My point is if you have wild critters running around check under the hood at your wiring and hoses every now and then. The brakes were so hard it felt like I was driving a 48 DeSoto. It would stop but you sure had to stand on them...

brpn#1 · **Posted:** Tue Jan 10, 2006 12:51 pm

something like this happened to my old car when i left it sit while we moved for a few months.. a friend who is a mechanic did me a favor and checked it out and did tuneup on it before he put it on his flatbed truck and drove it up here for me.. he said there were areas where you could tell something chewed the rubber hoses like mice/rats or something.. it sat for 6 months so i dunno but my friend, brpn#2, who is my neighbor, one time his wife was screaming and we all ran to see what happened and there was a mouse running around the windshield/hood area.. it tried to go down under the hood near the wipers.. we opened the hood and it ran.. scared the dickens out of her lol.. was funny.. but yah.. around here there are some MONSTER field rats.. i see them sometimes while we hike.. MONSTERS!! lol..

Guest · **Posted:** Tue Jan 10, 2006 2:50 pm

I was cleaning up a white 05 KJ Limited 4x2 for delivery one day at work. as usual, I popped the hood open to hose everything down and noticed the underhood liner was messed up. the service manager gave me $20 to put mine under there and offered to pay for a new one (i was gonna yank it out anyway), and everything was forgotten...until....

I went out at around 8:30 to fire up a CRD to take home to show my mom since she was thinking about buying one. heard some crazy animal noises after it fired, and a raccoon bolted out from under the front bumper. it'd been test driven earlier that day, and I guess it was tryin to curl up by the radiator because it was kinda cold outside. We figured out what was tearing up the insulation liners, lol.

similar story my dad told me about back in his single days

he lived in a townhouse with a pair of loud people that always fought next door (a fat lady and a skinny guy, and there were always thuds on the walls that he swore were her throwing him against the wall). they also had a cat that went outside. sometimes he'd go to start his Ranchero, and the cat would run off, he'd cuss the cat, and go on about his business.
one morning the Ranchero stopped turning over when it was starting. up comes the hood, and there's a mangled cat dangling from his v-belt.

Jeepjeepster · **Posted:** Tue Jan 10, 2006 6:31 pm

Hmm, thanks for the cat story.

Ive had mice make nests from my underhood stuff, made me mad.

Myke · **Posted:** Tue Jan 10, 2006 6:35 pm

Jeepjeepster wrote:

Hmm, thanks for the cat story.

+1 on the ew factor.

Besides spiders scaring the poop out of me while driving I havn't had anything else in my jeep.

Jeepjeepster · **Posted:** Tue Jan 10, 2006 6:44 pm

lol, why is everyone scared of spiders? I kinda like them unless they bite me, thats not scary though, my cat bites me all the time and im fine. :shock:

the1jferg · **Posted:** Tue Jan 10, 2006 6:49 pm

Get yourself one of those little battery operated motion detector alarms and stick it under the hood. That should scare the critters off.

Myke · **Posted:** Tue Jan 10, 2006 6:52 pm

Jeepjeepster wrote:

lol, why is everyone scared of spiders? I kinda like them unless they bite me, thats not scary though, my cat bites me all the time and im fine. :shock:

I don't like anything that can sneak up on me, Like If I saw the spider coming it wouldn't creep me out, but when it crawls across the dash I happen to scream like a little school girl on steroids.

tommudd · **Posted:** Tue Jan 10, 2006 7:34 pm

Getting away from the under hood critters here and going inside, but years ago a friend of mine bought a 49 Ford from an old farmer where it had sat in the barn for 15/18 years, you can imagine what it looked like but we go dragging it down the road towards my garage when all of a sudden I see him waving like everything for me to stop, as I start to slow down he bails out and runs like a 150 feet back down the road, car rolls into the back bumper of my truck and stops. Hes yelling something but I can not fiqure out what until I look inside.....yep 46 inch long copper head crawling around "his house". Couldnt fiqure where we were taking him and ...yup his girlfriend was in there also. He sold the car to me the next day for half what he paid for it! What a deal!

VTNomad · **Posted:** Tue Jan 10, 2006 7:35 pm

I had my build a nest in my airbox on my last car a Ford Exploder. There was a noticable loss of power.

I had doves build a nest in the turbo ofmy old work truck, a diesel Ford F-250. I was driving along and all of a sudden smoke started pouring out from under the hood. I was less than a mile from home so I turned around and eased it into the driveway. It took a pressure washer, a broomstick and some serious elbow grease to get the nest out. There were 3 hard boiled eggs in it.

Edwin · **Posted:** Tue Jan 10, 2006 10:11 pm

tommudd wrote:

Getting away from the under hood critters here and going inside, but years ago a friend of mine bought a 49 Ford from an old farmer where it had sat in the barn for 15/18 years, you can imagine what it looked like but we go dragging it down the road towards my garage when all of a sudden I see him waving like everything for me to stop, as I start to slow down he bails out and runs like a 150 feet back down the road, car rolls into the back bumper of my truck and stops. Hes yelling something but I can not fiqure out what until I look inside.....yep 46 inch long copper head crawling around "his house". Couldnt fiqure where we were taking him and ...yup his girlfriend was in there also. He sold the car to me the next day for half what he paid for it! What a deal!

That's a BIG copperhead! :shock:

Good thing he did'nt have a gun, he might have started shooting holes thru the truck.

ManicMechanicJoe · **Posted:** Tue Jan 10, 2006 11:04 pm

I had a 4 foot bull snake that made its home in my last pickup's engine bay. I hate snakes in the wild-if they are pets I am fine something about a wild snake... anyways my dad told me I should either pull it out with my hands or piss it off so it would leave. I figured either way I was asking for a bite (luckily they ain't posioness). I ended up pulling it out right behind its head. I figured it was the most humane and tread lightly. Thought about shooting it but the GF wouldn't approve.

Ron · **Posted:** Wed Jan 11, 2006 10:50 am

Well hunting season is open on what ever is eating the lines. They hit the vacuum line I just replaced plus the washer fluid lines at the fire wall. The KJ goes in the shop Sunday for an oil change and I will be going through it looking for more damage. On top of 25 days of rain, going to work in the dark getting home in the dark and no gararge to work in, it can't get much better than this...

Jeepjeepster · **Posted:** Wed Jan 11, 2006 5:14 pm

Wow, sorry about your luck ron. Ive never had rats do that much damage, but they hurt the hood liner alittle.

x3rdxStrikex · **Posted:** Wed Jan 11, 2006 9:04 pm

my only problem are the dang stray cats that live in the drain at the end of the parking lot. i'll catch 'em sleepin on my skids, or worse, right on top of the hood. Funny coincidence though, ever since i bought my fully auto paintball gun, they've left my jeep alone!

ManicMechanicJoe · **Posted:** Wed Jan 11, 2006 9:13 pm

Hey Ron-have you considered setting Rat traps around your rig? Seriously on my grandpa's old farm he used to have to do it to keep the field mice, rats, squirrels out of his truck. Buy a pack of Juicy Fruit gum, rodents can't resist the flavor and it clogs up their digestive tract effectively killing them-its safer then rat poison for pets and kids...

Ron · **Posted:** Thu Jan 12, 2006 1:31 am

ManicMechanicJoe wrote:

Hey Ron-have you considered setting Rat traps around your rig? Seriously on my grandpa's old farm he used to have to do it to keep the field mice, rats, squirrels out of his truck. Buy a pack of Juicy Fruit gum, rodents can't resist the flavor and it clogs up their digestive tract effectively killing them-its safer then rat poison for pets and kids...

Yeah I just set out a trap with peanut butter on it. It's a live trap so they can't drag it around with them. I use the live traps cause with the poison bait the rats get in the barn and die in the hay or under the floor and stink. This way I know I have them. We'll see if I'm the mighty hunter in the morning...

I've heard of them getting in the hood and battery wraps also but this is a first for me as far as eating the hoses and stuff.

Ron · **Posted:** Sat Jan 14, 2006 12:40 pm

Caught a rat the size of your fist. Guess he was the one eating the hoses. I'm going to keep setting it up for a week or so and see if I get anymore.

Jeepjeepster · **Posted:** Sat Jan 14, 2006 1:10 pm

What do you do with the little guy?

zeero · **Posted:** Sat Jan 14, 2006 1:59 pm

Around here if you go camping or a multi-day hike they advise you wrap chicken wire around the bottom of your vehicle to restrict or at least slow the entrance of critters to your undercarriage. :wink:

Under hood critters UPDATE

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