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What was your first car? What happened to it?
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After going in the Army, my sister hit on hard times, and she needed a car. My Mom was scared to death of my Chevelle (she drove it once or twice and hated the way people always wanted to race). My Mom and Dad asked if they could trade my car in for one for my sister, with the promise they would help me get a NEW car when I got out of Army schooling. I foolishly agreed.
My parents traded my car straight across for a Datsun B210 for my sister (remember the gas crisis?). I ended up getting a new 1978 Toyota Celica GT (another great, fun car), but I never got over the Chevelle.
I finally bought a 1970 Chevelle about 6 years ago, and it sits in my garage, waiting for warmer weather. Its not as awesome as my original (which today would be worth $$$$$), but it turns heads and tires all the same.
Thanks for listening.....
Tough luck, txmarko, you may never be able to work back up to the level at which you started. I knew there had to be something good about my starting with that tired 80 HP Studebaker.
But when I met my first boyfriend at 19, and finally got my first job, he taught me how to drive and went car shopping. I was attracted to the 'danger' look of the '67 Fastback Mustang, so I bought it for $900. It was the same style that Steve McQueen drove in the movie 'Bullitt'. I drove it from Oregon to California three times, and back. I watched the odometer went to 000000.
It was amazing! The only thing I hated about the car was when I drove my mom to work, I have to warm it up for a long time while I sat there shivering in my fur coat!
My husband was having problem with the car after we've had it for three years. He sold it for $300 to a guy who collect classics but couldn't get it to run for a couple years. (We were lucky to be able to drive it there to get the money, but we were in touch with him after it was sold and he told us he couldn't get it to work, still.)
Every time I see a turqouise Stang out there, same style and color, I get depressed. Now that I have so much money, I COULD HAVE BOUGHT A NEW ENGINE and fixed it up good.
Our 8th car is now a yellow '00 BMW M Roadster. You KNOW WE'LL BE KEEPING THIS ONE FOR LIFE!
My husband and I have to agree that we drive it every other week, and take turns! He doesn't get angry if I have lunch or have an affair, but he gets really pissed if I drove it when it's not my turn! I guess, it's like your first love, you will never forget your first car.
Sold it to friend for a $100 when I joined the service. The frame was rusted out in the area of the transmission crossmember. If you let the clutch out too fast the engine would torque ever and the fan blades would hit the radiator shroud, still ran good though.
The Bad - 1965? BMW 1800 - I've only seen 1 other. This was a 4 door, but I had my manual transmission. A friend of my fathers helped test drive it. He was into racing and taught me to heel/toe. Big mistake - I thought this was the way to drive all the time. This car was a mechanical nightmare. When it ran, it was great, but that never lasted for more than a few weeks. It had a 6 volt electrical system and not many mechanics back then had metric tools. Blew fuses consistently. Parts had to be flown in from Germany and cost way too much. Wouldn't start when the weather was anywhere near freezing. Finally blew the engine. Dear old Dad bailed me out of that one. He paid to get it fixed (used 1600 engine, brakes, exhaust, etc), and then quickly sold it. Probably lost more on that car than any I've ever had since.
The Ugly - 1971? Pinto (1st year they made them)- Ugly mustard yellow color, but a wonderful car. Cost $2,100 new with the 2000 engine and the optional disk brakes. Installed an 8 track in it. Ran the heck out of it. Had a lot of friends with Pintos and we called them our racing Pintos. Never had a mechanical problem. Drove it on trips all over the country. That car gets a lot of bad press, but my friends that had them still talk about them affectionately.
First car I bought myself (to replace the KG) was a '57 DeSoto convertible with the huge fins and 330 hemi. Really cool car. When I left home to go to college I sold it to another young guy who promptly drove it into a tree. I think he survived without a scratch (the car and tree didn't).
Those old Mercs were cool, and some were seriously fast. My buddy had a Merc station wagon he used to humiliate kids with.
It ran ok,but not right,the dealer found out it had the wrong fuel pump on it,and once they changed it,it ran good.Eventually,I did some stuff to it,and it ran a 13.97 at the strip.It also broke the weak Duster rear end in it.A 8+3/4 was swapped in,and my problems were over.
After 4 years of it,I stupidly traded it in on a 77 Dodge Power Wagon,a total piece of trash.It was a never ending parts eater.
I had someone run the VIN for me,and it said the car was still around.It was registered in a pretty hi buck area of town,so I had a friend go and drive by,since I don't live there anymore.He turned on to the street,and it was coming towards him.He said it looked perfect,and rumbled pretty loud when it passed him.
He followed it to a strip mall,and asked the guy who got out about it.It has the 440 now,with leather interior!Its still silver w/red stripes,and has big wheels and tires.The guy had finished restoring it about six months ago.
Damn,I wish I had it back...
I still have it, but that's probably b/c I'm only 19 and between the loan/insurance/gas and parts, I'll be paying it back for the next ten years. Well, that and, it'll always be my baby...=O)
It had a lot of rust on the bottoms of the doors and rear quarters, but ran strong with the "Rocket 350" engine.
I'd love to own a convertible version of that car because they're very rare today and classics.
We towed the Coronet in, junked the 383 and inserted the 440. The Coronet 2 door red ext, white interior shined up real nice. The car idled so rough (cam as I found out) that the mirrors were all but useless. No other mods, showing 92,000 on the Monaco clock she ran great and as I pulled out I quickly realized someone had also put a rock hard shift kit in it. It just banged from one gear to the next with "fury"!
At 5 to 6 mpg I had a Mopar that was really too fast. Gas was 60 cents a gallon and I loved to leave the base and cross over the big white line off of Gov't property and just dump it. Every time I came back I was doing a nice 25 mph on base. What a car. I sold it to pick up a Cherry 66 Fairlane 53k from the original owner 289, which I drove home to PA in 2 days. Those were the days.
We finally gave it up due to escalating mechanical needs, we traded it to a friend of mine for a complete set of the Ian fleming James bond books. He had it for another year or two before it completly self destructed.
it was in the Junkyard by 1990
I've driven 4 cars in not even two years
One of my memories of that car were that the heater/defroster did not work so this car would fog up on the inside requireing me to drive and wipe the windows at the same time. As I couldn't wipe the back window from the drivers seat, backing up could be interesting! Once on a foggy morning I backed out of a parking space ... into a police car. I rolled down the window, heard laughing and almost died when I saw two cops rolling with laughter. They waved me on my way.
I sold the car after three years to my sisters 16 year old friend. Her parents immediately had the bodywork done and a repaint etc. She, however never checked the oil or anything and it died a quick death in her hands.
Let's see, Current ride, "Patsy" is a 95 Ford Thunderbird with 205 horsepower, 281 CID V-8, 1,000 pounds less weight, an air conditioner that works, a driver's window that rolls down (without the drivier pushing on it from the top), 27.5 MPG highway, flimsy plastic bumpers, and looks like everything else on the road.
First ride? One light green 1978 Mercury Grand Marquis with a 153 horsepower 400 CID V-8 (gotta love 1970's emissions controls), no air, the drivers window was operated by a hand pushing down on it, a horn that occasionally satyed on when you released the button, got 12.5 MPG highway the only time I was brave enough to calculate it, had enough room to relocate a family of pachyderms, a massive chrome bumper that was known to give broken down Chevys a loving nudge outta the way, and more steel than Pittsburg's NFL franchise. My T-Bird is a more practical daily driver, but I hung on to the mercury, figuring I'll eventually rebuild the enigne minus the obsolete, ineffective emissions controls, add a computer controled EFI, and see if I can't get some decent numbers out of that engine. But first I'll have to concentrate on finishing college ;-)
Pretty good all-around cars. They're not real fast but look cool and sound great. It always seemed to me that the build quality on 1969/1970 Mustangs was a lot better than Camaros and Cudas/Challengers of the era.
Car I first learned on? '65 Plymouth Fury with a Slant 6. Real dependable - my parent's car.
Second car - '68 Chevy Impala 305 - o.k. great back seat for my age (like a couch, used as a .... I'll let you fill in the rest!)
Then, got my parent's '72 Plymouth Valiant Scamp with a 225 slant 6. Great engine, as the separate discussion topic shows.
Had that until I got my first new car in May 1983: VW Rabbit L. 1715 cc engine, last year with a carb, 4-speed. Neat little car.
My father had a temporary assignment in Italy, so they moved there for two years while I was in college, so I got sole use of the Fury. It did develop a fascinating problem - there was a fault in the wiring harness that would cause intermittent temporary electrical separation between the interior and underhood sections. When this happened, everything electrical would switch off, and the ignition switch was a dummy. No lights, horn, windshield wipers, etc.. And you couldn't turn off the motor. Chrysler issued a recall for this (go figure!).
My parents sold it to a neighbor when they bought their diesel Peugot (they wanted a diesel they could buy in US form in Italy, and bring back to the US). The neighbor drove it for a couple of years, then an engine mount let go and the cost of fixing it was more than the car was worth.
The first car I actually owned was a tennis-ball yellow '79 Civic 5 speed purchased a couple of months after I graduated college. A fun little beast that was one of the few '79s that could run on leaded gas. Quicker than it looked and dead reliable too. I put on better shocks, stiffer and shorter springs, a bigger front sway bar and added a rear bar. And an Ansa exhaust.
Sold it after 6 years and 80,000 miles for about 1/2 of what I paid so I could buy an '85 T-bird Turbo (which depreciated 75% over the 6 years I owned it). I ran into the people I had sold it to a few years later, it was at 130,000 and still going strong.
I learned to drive in it, drove her to college, back and forth to work. She was my baby. I had an on the body restoration done to her. I loved the way heads turned when she went into the parking lot. I was getting high milage so I put another car on the road for a daily driver. I was given a 79 Transam with 6.6 litre engine. Would pass anything but a gas station. That was a money pit. LAter sold it and bought a new 94 Lumina and paid it off to buy my now current 2000 Impala LS (bought in May,1999). Now my LS is my daily driver and the convertible is my nice weekend car. Http://www.geocities.com/W_Bassett
you can see a picture.
Only had one speaker, and the former driver must have been a "large" person cause the driver's seat tilted to one side quite a bit.
The VERY FIRST day I had it some lady in a huge boat backed into it at a McDonald's. Of course she had no insurance.
It ran pretty good, but no one told me I had to add water to the battery. I spend my first tax return on new battery and rotor. Sheesh.
What happened to it? I "loaned"/"gave" it to my fiance and when we broke up he took it with the promise to send me $2000 for it... Of course, I NEVER saw a dime.
We had alot of old Pontiac stuff. My father used Pontiac engines in the race cars. There were alot of interesting performance parts laying around. He had 3 Pontiac convertibles over about 7 years. The 64 was one of them.
Excellent. A diehard-Pontiac buddy of mine found a 61 Bubble top Bonneville. He's looking at restoring it. It's alittle rough but all the pieces are there. You still have any vintage Pontiac stuff?
When I was away at Parris Island for the Marine Corps in 1984, my sister drove it while home from college. Blew the radiator hose and drove it home, frying the valves. Car still ran. Brake master cylinder went out - still drove it, just pump the brakes. Heater went out next, still drove it with my head out the window. Was going to use a torch and cut the roof off as a homemade convertable the next summer - parents gave it away.
Currently drive a 2000 Intrepid R/T - miss the old Catalina, but it started my love affair with big American cars.
Drove it for another year and gave it to my brother to use at college when I went to England -- when I came back two years later, he had used up what remaining life was left in it and ended up trading the car straight-up for a hanging plant!
drivers license cost .50 cent then in mo.also no
test
dish fish
Jim
Don't miss either of them. Now my first new car the '72 MGB is another story.
It was a 1984 Gutless Ciera 4 door. Colored Purpple/brown and pinkish/orangish two tone and a brown and orange interior. What a crate. Rust all over. Bought it for $100 in 1995. It ran on 3 cylinders and the windows wouldn't roll up, leaked oil out the header covers and had all four original hubcaps. Licence plate NOGO 500, no go 500 miles. So I fixed it, put in a cd played and 2 new speakers and it was good to go.
I used it to deliver landscaping supplies, dirt, blocks, timbers. Delivered pizza, drove to school, girlfriends, drove to funerals, weddings and I loved to drive it.I would park next to the most expensive cars I could find and wait for the owners of that lexus or porsche to look down at my NOGO. Mine was paid for, how 'bout yours? That gutless would make 100 mph if I held it down long enough.
Best moments were dying at the toll booth, i got to push it through for free, and the muffler nailed a tailgating corvette at the on ramp to route 55 in Chicago. I pulled over 1/4 mile down the road to see the steam cloud from the destroyed radiator, laughed all the way home.
second best moment was changing a flat in January, -30 temp, -75 windchill. I jacked up the car, and the jack crashed through the floorboards. Drove the car on the flat, with the jack dragging to the Firestone. I'm surprised the sparks didn't catch the car on fire.
God Rest NOGO, traded it in for $1700 for a Buick, dealer didn't even see my car, it was getting a new muffler, and I walked to the dealer. I parked it over by the oil cans when I turned it in.
Drove my NOGO 28000 miles, and almost exactly one year. best piece of crap I had ever driven.
Had the car for 3 weeks and going to work one morning plowed it into the back end of a 52 Chevy that was sitting dead in the left lane (no mean feet to find a 15 year old car to crash a 12 year old car into)
Hitched rides with friends for most of the next year till I got a '68 Falcon!
FDIII
I've driven a lot of Stangs since then, but still think if I were to go for a classic car project it'd have to be a late 60's 442.
That Maverick lasted me about a year and a half when it finally went due to its timing chain snapping at speed on the Long Island Expressway in the fall of 1988. Off to the junkman it then went.
It was replaced with a real antique...a '66 Fury with a slant six I owned for about two months and gave to a friend when its brakes went (at slow speed pulling out of the driveway, luckily). I got that car for $70.00.
I was then given a '78 Dodge Diplomat wagon by a relative at Thanksgiving 1988 for $1.00...loaded and filled with options. That lasted about two years and only got junked when it wouldn't pass inspection due to rust on its underbody. That one went in the summer of 1990. I then got a 1983 Ford Escort wagon (ugly orange thing...purchased for $400.00) that ran like a tank for almost four years until its head gasket went. I then bought my first new car...a new 1993 Escort that I got in the spring of 1994. That was a little more expensive ($11,000) and lasted me a bit longer...traded it in the summer of last year after I put 147,000 miles on it. May my current car, a 2000 Pontiac Sunfire bought new in July 2000 for $18,000 last me as long, or longer than my dependable old 1993 Escort did. However, I still remember my first car fondly...wish I had gotten that Maverick new.
Freddo K.
The old Ply mouth got bought from tote the note lot by some guy that worked down the street from my part time job last time I saw her she had the trunk wired closed & looked like a fogging machine going down the road.