As my friends on Facebook already know, last week was rough. After the Wednesday night session (Sept 4th 2019) at Griffins of Kinsale, I left on a road trip to Estes Park, Colorado. Sligo Rags was scheduled to perform Friday-Sunday at the Longs Peak Highland Games & Music Festival, and I had a 16 hour drive with half of the band’s gear and all of our merchandise in my van.

As I was nearing the top of the Cajon Pass, I started smelling something burning in my engine. I pulled over at the nearest gas station and looked inside. What I saw appeared to be a leak coming from one of my radiator hoses.

I located a Pep Boys a couple of miles away. I made it there about 4:30am, parked the van in their service parking lot, and I waited for them to open at 8:00am.

As daylight approached, it became light enough outside for me to see that I had fluid dripping all along the side of my van. When I touched my finger to it, I knew right away that it wasn’t coolant ... it was transmission fluid.

I was able to get the folks at Pep Boys to take a look at it for me, but they said it might take awhile. So I decided to break out my folding chair and practice my fiddle in the shade under a tree in their parking lot. When I pulled my fiddle out of the case, I discovered that it was damaged. Apparently, somebody at the session (audience or participant, I have no idea) knocked my fiddle into the piano onstage, causing some serious damage to my instrument. Aside from knocking the corner off of the C-bout and putting another dent on the top plate, there was seven inch crack along the ribs, against the grain and open at least 2 millimeters. It is unplayable.

Then came the really good news: The mechanics at Pep Boys couldn’t find any leak in my transmission, but they verified that the fluid was, indeed, from the transmission. They recommended that I take it to a Transmission Repair shop. I was able to squeeze in to one of the top-rated shops in Hesperia.

After waiting an additional hour and a half, I received the really bad news: 4th gear was bad, and it had apparently been spinning in 4th gear while I was driving up the Cajon Pass. It caused so much friction that it superheated the transmission fluid and caused it to spew out the breather tube. I was told that I could probably baby it back home, but there was no way I could drive it to Colorado.

I successfully drove the van back home, parked it, and through a series of small miracles I was able to get a rental car for the week. Also, I have a spare electric fiddle which I could use over the weekend. I was able to make it safely to Estes Park in time to do the showcase concert set  Friday night ... with half an hour to spare.

Of course, I related all of this on my Facebook page, and I was overwhelmed by the amount of support I received from so many of my friends. Five or six of them said that I should start a GoFundMe campaign so they could help me out with donations.

I just returned from Colorado this evening (Monday, Sept 9th). I was able to call around to several transmission shops and verify that a rebuilt transmission will cost me $2,200.00 and take 4-5 days.

I plan on taking the fiddle into my luthier tomorrow morning to figure out how much repairs will cost. Hopefully they can return it to a condition where it at least sounds good. If not, I’ll be shopping for a new fiddle. Worst case scenario is that a replacement fiddle will cost me about $2,800.00. I will, of course, update this campaign once I get some real answers from the luthier.

If you would like to help me out in this situation, I will gratefully accept any amount you feel comfortable donating. Even if I don’t make my goal in this campaign, every little bit will help.

Finally, I want to thank those of you who have already stepped up and helped me get safely up to the festival in Estes Park. I truly have some amazing friends!