On 3/8/2025 6:16 AM, Jim Wilkins wrote:
"Bob La Londe" wrote in message news:vqg3on$3pkap$1@dont-email.me...
On 3/7/2025 5:19 PM, Jim Wilkins wrote:
As I understand it, a cheap new car can't compete on price with a
nicer model used car.
That MAY be true, but it there is no chance in hell of an expensive new
car competing with a used car. My first new truck was a GMC Sonoma, and
my second was an Chevy S-10.
------------------------------------------> That depends. I bought and fixed up old cars until I could afford new,
Me too.
67 Ford Cortina GT (4 banger CI unknown)
Had a packrat nest between the fender and the battery when I got it.
The money in the packrat nest paid for a new battery and some other
stuff. There was nothing in particular great about the Cortina despite
being a GT. I had been rolled three times before I got it. With 60s on
the front and 50s on the rear it was more stable, so instead I caught it
on fire... TWICE... I mean smoke and flames on fire. I also torched
out the wheel wells so the tires would clear. With two bags of cement
in the trunk its was pretty good in the sand, and its 0-60 was quick if
you knew how to speed shift and didn't mind pushing redline, but it took forever to get to 80 which was its absolute top speed with a tail wind.
There used to be a guy in Phoenix buying them up for some special racing
class he was in, but I never connected up with hm. Eventually the junk
man got it.
71 Chevy Caprice (400) (fast)
Kid overheated it and cracked both heads. I gave him a hundred bucks
for it and put mismatched used 350 heads on it. I also had to rebuild
the transmission later on, but that didn't last. I left it on a fair
grounds in Redlands California.
69 T-Bird 2dr (429) (fast and quick and faster)
It was fine until I popped a freeze plug and had to drive 20 miles at a
time topping it off with whatever water I could get. At one time I
stopped on the freeway grabbed some trash 2 liter bottles laying along
the road, climbed over the barb wire fence, and fought my way through
the brush, so I could top the radiator up with river water There is a
long story there, but I wound up abandoning it in a mall parking lot and catching a bus. Hard corps car guys cry when I tell them that. That
was definitely a desirable car. Particularly with the factory 429
Interceptor in it.
71 Dodge Dart (225) (bullet proof) I mean it was tough. After I bought
my first truck I tried to kill this car. I had it airborne a couple
times. Ran it straight line across the desert without a road. Drove it
like I was a Duke boy. Bought it cheap with a "bad" transmission, new
filter and fresh fluid and it was fine. The guy I sold it to sold it to
a farm laborer who was still driving it around years later. Might still
be driving it.
76 Plymouth Volare Wagon (318)
This was my first trap line vehicle. I got it stuck a lot until I
really learned to drive it. I recall running my traps one day down in
the river valley after a rain to stay legal (must check traps every day)
and it was nothing but water and mud. I kinda sorta knew where the
trail was, but staying on it was a trick. I could atleast see the
breaks in the brush lines where the trail was. More than once that day
I was flying across a mud flat hammer down aiming at the next bush to be
able to make a course correction. I jacked up the torsion springs on
the front as far as they would go and put tall shackles on the back for
ground clearance and I still tore out the oil pan going into the Gila
from Sentinel looking for the old Mormon dam. JB weld is some amazing
stuff. It may not seal on an oily surface, but it makes a fair plug to
slow the leak. I don't recall having much trouble with this car. I had
an ignition issue once that was fixed with a new resistor wire.
71 Plymouth Swinger 318 (Dart with different badging)
No engine. I figured if the Dart was so good with a 225 this thing
would be a hoot with a 318. I pulled the engine from the station wagon
to go in this, and was about to put it in when somebody offered me more
for the engine than I paid for both cars. When the junk man bought them
it was just bonus money.
76 Ford F150 (360)
Complete overhaul and 30 over with RV CAM. Loved it until somebody
sideswiped me and cracked the frame... right where the steering gear box
bolted on. Power steering went, and I threw an older manual gear box on
it. It was fine except it was hard to keep tight over the truss plate
holding the frame together. Oh, yeah I straightened the frame before
welding by hooking a chain to the frame and the dock bumper on a flat
bed truck my dad had and backing up hard. It worked. I towed mobile
homes with this thing. I left it at my dad's place, and somebody
offered to buy the engine, and somebody offered to buy the cab and
somebody else came along and offered to be the bed. By the time the
message got to me all three people had cash waiting to hear from me. I
told them to work out the break down between and give me the money. If
I had to tear it down the price was double. My dad brought me a wad of
cash, and it was gone.
80-Something Toyota Celica ST (very agile)
Only thing I ever did to it was put a new clutch, pressure plate, and
throw out bearing in it. I did it after sunset by flashlight laying in
the dirt with the wind blowing pretty hard on a cold (for here) winter
day so I could use it the next day. Used one of my motorcycles to run
parts. Don't recall why I didn't use the truck. Maybe because I had
about enough money for parts and that F150 sucked gas like crazy.
76 Chevy 2500 (350)
This was my first business work truck. Before that I hired a buddy
because he had a truck, and I just paid for gas and maintenance. I
think the only problem I had with this was the linkage from the key
broke inside the column. An employee was driving it and they were 120
miles away when they called me late at night. I got up in the middle of
the night and rode my motorcycle out where I got it going again about
sunrise by busting open the steering column and clamping a bent steel
rod to the linkage. That's the way it got driven until I sold it.
Some Dodge I forget Pickup. It started clacking the day after I
bought it, so I threw a for sale sign on it, and the guys who bought it
drive it away clacking loudly.
81 (I think) S-10 flatbed. Yeah no kidding. The city was selling off a
bunch of trucks at an auction. All had 65-70K miles. I had jobs to
finish so I sent my wife and told her to buy me a truck. I was thinking
a nice little pickup for a few thousand dollars. She picked that one
because it had tool boxes and a ladder rack bolted to the flat bed. I
wasn't happy, but it turned out to be a great truck until it blew a hose
with an employee driving. He had a service radio. He could have called
me right away. He did call me from a truck stop. He said it got hot,
and he stopped a soon as he could. We have a beautiful freeway with a
wide emergency strip and a gravel strip beyond. His idea of as soon as
he could was the next exit... five miles down the freeway. It started
to smoke within a month after that. Eventually it smoked so bad I quit
using it. Some guys came by my office one day and said they noticed it
didn't get used much and asked if I would sell it. I said it got
overheated and smoked real bad, so make me an offer. They offered more
than I thought it was worth, and I told them to get their tow vehicle.
Mileage is not bad as long as you understand that's miles per gallon of
engine oil, not gas. One of them walked across the corner to the gas
station and came back with a couple gallons of 40wt and they drove it
away.
78 Ford F250 (460)
Jumped time and bent everything. Reman engine and transmission. Holley
750, adapter plate, headers, RV cam. When I decided to fix the dash
lights the gauge cluster just disintegrated in my hands raining gauges
and components out on the floor like a hail storm. I still have flash
backs of holding what looked like the desicated carcass of an animal in
my hands as the the gauges bounced around on the floor.
65 Ford F250 (352 industrial) with steel transmission all the racers
wanted.
I think the only thing I did to this was rebuild the transmission. I
took it to somebody (just the transmission) and they tried to buy it
from me three times. Even offered to give me a brand new C6 to replace
it plus cash. I parked it with a burst hose, because i had my first new
truck by then. Somebody came buy and offered me a bunch of cash for it.
Didn't even have a for sale sign on it.
AMC Amabassador - Drove it a lot when I cracked my right wrist.
Tended to run hot on long trips, but otherwise it was fine. If I had
kept it I have a pressure flushing rig that works on engines and
radiators if they aren't totally plugged. I only paid a couple hundred
dollars for it. When I quit using it I had it parked on the street, and
the city kept giving me a hard time about it. Paint marking my tires,
notice on the windshield, & sometimes they would call, etc. I didn't
even start it. I just pushed it back and forth a couple feet every few
days to get them to leave me alone. I tried to donate it to one of
those charities, and they kinda sneered at me, so the next time the city
called me I let them take it. Two weeks later that same charity called
me back wanting it. I said, "You know when I called you you sneered at
me because it wasn't a gold plated Cadillac. I gave it away. don't
called me again." To be fair it might have been a desirable collector
car because it was a clean, straight, all trim in tact including OEM hub
cabs, everything worked, luxury car. I was just to busy contracting to
deal with it and the Internet wasn't as good as it is today for getting
people and cars they want together.
There were a more. Some I turned over quick. Those are the ones that
come to mind.
I don't actually like working on cars. I did it because if I didn't I'd
walk. Like a lot of things I do it because it needs to be done.
then I bought the Helms factory shop manuals and kept them in good
I always liked the old Motor's manuals, but they quit publishing them
back in the late 70s or early 80s. My dad had several and if I can find
them they will get added to y shop library. The Chilton manuals were
all I knew about when I started working on cars, and they just weren't
as good or as a well organized. Later the Hanes manuals aren't bad, but
for a lot of things I try to get the factory service manual even if they
cost more. Most expensive factory service manual I have is for my 3320
John Deere diesel. I'm not sure I know what a Helm or Helms manual is.
When I say factory I mean factory. Not third party factory. I was
turned on to the fact that they exist for many things when I got into
Harleys. I had the factory service manual and parts manual for all the
Harleys I owned.
condition as long as rust let me. Thanks to MIG I still drive the 1991
Ranger and 2000 CRV. Styling overcame substance on the newer CRVs so I'm waiting for the 2026 Passport which reverts to the old Land-Rover-
inspired practicality with squared space replacing swoop, a full sized
spare tire and built-in folding picnic table like my mine.
We have a lot of rust free chassis and bodies around here. Back about
69-70 my uncle tried to make a business of joining northern engines with southwestern bodies, but he didn't have the capitol for it. Its still a
real thing, but to many people "Know what they got" now-a-days.
The table is a useful workbench for construction projects at the club's shooting ranges, it keeps us old guys from having to pick tools up off
the ground. I bought a spare as a "cargo space floor" from LKQ for $12.
Tables are just a space suck in my shop. They all have Horizontal
Surface Disease. HSD. If I need to use the big welding table the first
thing I need to do is schedule myself an afternoon to clean it off.
--
Bob La Londe
CNC Molds N Stuff
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