WARNING : BIG BLOCK OF TEXT INCOMING : WARNING
MUCH WURDS, MANY SORRYS
Wanted to post this here for a while now, but anxiety and bad camera skills kept me from doing so.
I don't know what it is about big lux cars I like so much, being raised in an era where even employed limo drivers get condescending stares from Prius and cigarettegio owners. The very first car I owned was a '97 Lincoln Town Car as a "graduation" gift, until I wrecked it out in Seattle. Managed to limp it back to the ranch, but needed to trade (what was left of it) for a truck for obvious reasons. All I can remember of that truck is that it was an '89 Ford, longbox, but I can't remember if it was a F150 or F250. Then I learned always to check to make sure to put the oil cap
back on after changing the oil. Later managed to talk my parents into paying for the other half of a 2004 Chrysler Sebring to deliver pizza's in.
It was on one delivery that I saw this parked outside a casino with a "For Sale by Owner" sign in it.
The shine of the bumper and condition of the paint caught me WAY before those protruding blinkers did. A '75 Ford Galaxie 500. I later called the guy who owned it and met him in the previously mentioned casino. He started it up, it spat some blue smoke, but I thought that was from it sitting for so long. But the engine started right up, no clicking or rattling, sound was well muffled, but you could still here the power. The interior was sundamaged beyond repair, still needs to be entirely ripped out and replaced. Surprisingly, the old AM-only radio still works. After driving around the parking lot for a while, I asked him, "What do you want for it?". $500
It's smooth ride, easy shifting (for an automatic), white-wall tires, and having all 4 original rims still on and intact, it was all too easy for me to silence that voice in my head that screamed, "SOMETHING IS WRONG!!!"
And indeed, after delivering pizza's in it (anyone with a with a smartcar in their driveway promptly stopped tipping) for about a month, she gave out on the trip home one night. Was able to push it to a local gas station, where it was towed from the next morning. Worn out timing sprocket. The shop it was towed to was a farm town shop, the only shops that still work on old stuff like this, and they only charged about $650 for the repair, at a surprising $65/hr! Never had a problem other that small stuff after that. But it was here that I learned that the blue smoke coming out on ignition was due to corroded "valve-stem caps," which the oil gunks up on when the car isn't running. To fix those would be another $600, which I wasn't willing to spare at the time. Anyway's, as long as I kept feeding her (thick) oil, she'll do for now.
After that it was the starter, which was a quick roll up some ramps to do myself. The leak in the radiator was rescued by JBWeld, a worn bearing on the front was replaced with some needle-nose pliers, and the rest were some corroded wires. Step-by-step, I was going to save this car. Then stuff happened.
After a clusterforget of bad choices, cold weather, family dividing decisions, and rent prices too complicated for
you to care me to go into, I ended up making the choice to move from home in the foothills of MT down to the Ozarks of MO through Denver, CO... yeah, let's leave it at that. The trip to Denver was uneventful, I can get her up to 80mph, but I was mostly doing 60-65 for the sake of gas.
It was about mid-Kansas that the car started vibrating when I tried to hold speed. Something in the driveline between the shaft and differential was borked, but I had come to far to stop now. "Just get to Joplin," was one of my many mumblings, "they can help me in Joplin." Nope. About 8 miles out of Wichita something went ping, something else went clang, and sparks lit up behind me. I cut the engine, and dragged something over into the breakdown lane. I got out to inspect, saw oil pouring out of the differential, but thought something was missing. I look directly behind down the road expecting to see a trail of gears and steel shavings. But all I found was one piece: the driveshaft.
Towed in once again, the shop told me that a flange near the diff had split in two. It might have been more complicated than that, but I got the call on a wet cell phone with bad reception, and when I got to the shop I was too stressed out to talk at length with them. All I'm sure of is that it was about $350 of my and my friends money (luckily, he accepted "free personal driver for whatever, whenever" as repayment).
Now it's with me, in little old Doxmebro, MO. Needs tires right now (whitewalls are expensive), but looking good as ever now that the snows gone, no matter how hard the salt damage is to hide. Might go back to delivering pizzas again, all that I was told was here has failed to appear, but I'm still hopeful, the internet's faster!
Holy stuff, that was a big block! Feels good, tho :)
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