Thanks a heap, Ram Truck Division, or “Truck Company Formerly Known as Dodge,” or whatever you’re calling yourselves this week.

I took the Ram to the Auto Hobby Shop for it’s 60,000-ish mile maintenance (oil, filters, serpentine belt, transmission servicing… I’ll do all 16 of the spark plugs in the driveway when the engine’s cold, thank you very much) after stopping by O’Reilly Auto Parts for supplies. $300 later, I had everything, including a new steering wheel cover. I’m especially happy with the manufacturer because my 2012 Ram is a 2 wheel drive truck… not my customary 4WD (I have the Jeep for that, and I hardly ever used 4WD in my ’97 Ram). Anyway, I got the Ram in the air, drained the oil, changed the oil filter, drained and cleaned the transmission pan, and looked at the pan really funny as I was putting the pan gasket on. According to the instructions with the filter kit, I had a 4WD pan (stepped bottom shape with a ‘deep’ sump, rather than a single-plane shape with an ‘outcropping’ for the filter).

WTF, Over?! I have a 2WD truck, with a 4WD transmission pan… from the factory! Well… crap! Now what?

Fortunately, my pal Chuck Glaspie offered to drive me back to O’Reilly’s to exchange the transmission filter kit. Got there, and the awesome parts people sympathized and made the exchange – I’d already glued the gasket from the 2WD kit to the pan, but the pan shape is identical to the 4WD pan, so they grabbed the gasket from the 4WD kit and tossed it into the 2WD kit I was exchanging and gave me the 4WD kit – no extra charge! (they were the same price, too… but the guys were still cool for doing so).

Chuck got me back to the shop and I was able to finish up the filter swap and dump in the new fluids without further hassle – with only a few minutes of overtime graciously granted by the Auto Hobby Shop crew while I cleaned up my space and backed out.

The only thing missing from this story are the absent wise-cracks from my pal Jim Eimer, otherwise this would be just another “Jim & Eric Automotive Adventure,” which I so desperately miss. I’m sure Jim’s looking down from above grinning and chuckling to himself while nudging Don Myers saying, “Watch this sh!t.” I hope they’re having a ball at my expense. Well played, Jim… well played. Miss ya, Man!