[Liberty1970]

This exact problem happened to my parents a few years ago. They had a big van they park under a walnut tree that they hadn't driven in a few weeks. They took off on a vacation with it, got a few miles down the road and it died. Turns out the engine compartment was absolutely stuffed with walnuts, they were jammed into every crevice and filling up the air intakes and so on. They should have called the media, apparently. ;-)

[svcw]

Not chipmunks but mice.
Stupid rodents, stripped the insulation off much of the engine wires and set up a nest in the framing.
The mechanic almost had a heart attack when several mice pocked their heads out of the frame when he was explaining, “wow look at that the wiring is all chewed up”.
$980 later............
Problem solved by packing the frame with moth ball pellets, mice don't like the smell. (Me neither but I do need to drive the car.)

[ravingnutter]

Awww nuts...don't you hate it when that happens?

Not a car, but I had squirrels tear up $400.00 worth of lawn chair cushions to make nests. I was so mad I told hubby to start shooting them on sight.

[Tax-chick]

"It's funny, but it's not," she said.

No, actually it's just funny.

[rockinqsranch]

Many stories to tell. Squirrels in the fan belts (quite colorful), Rats eating the wiring, as well Oppossum dropping out of the engine compartment onto the dirt roads (thump, thump, crunch).

Too many stories and all costly one way or another. Just part of country livin’.

[ROLF of the HILL COUNTRY]

Black walnuts are pretty darn big for a chipmunk to carry. I wonder if the real culprits weren’t squirrels.

[conservativeharleyguy]

I once bought an old Yahama dirt bike out of a buddy’s back yard. I got it cheap, because he said it hardly ran. It was a “beater”, so I just changed the oil, put air in the tires, and rode it around for a couple of weeks until the urge to fix it up a bit hit me. When I pulled off the seat to replace the air filter, the airbox was stuffed full of about a pound of apricot pits! That bike sure ran a lot better, once that air intake obstruction was removed.