Last weekend I made a run to Canon to check out the Canon Car Club show in the park. They have such nice parks in Canon City that anytime they are having something in the park you should try to attend. I headed south and got the car show in time to see most of the entries. A well attended showing at that , the park was full and it is a big park…
It is wishful thinking and old memories that keep me going to old car shows… What I once thought was near new and a great ride is now a classic and generally has to have been restored… Kind of like me, I am to a point of needing restored as all the parts are wearing out and I don’t run so good anymore…Wait, I don’t run at all… but even walking at times finds more aches than I have places?
This was really interesting. My first real car was just like this… well not this nice but was yellow and white and a 55 post and I reworked the interior with Black pleated stuff. painted all the trim black, dash black, etc.… wasn’t show quality but looked pretty good… I hadn’t had it more than a month or two and the engine decided to throw a rod… it was back in the day when the oil pumped up to a filter then drizzled down, now a pressure system, and I guess we should have drained the oil when we got it but we were told it had just been serviced and was ready to go? well seems the oil line in the main shaft got plugged or something. I had checked the oil and it was full. but when it started knocking it was too late and bank it went out, through the block. I got to swap out the engine with another junk yard special my DAD found.
We should of torn that engine down and put new rings in it when we got it, but I didn’t have the money for all the fixing this thing was needing. What can you expect… we only paid $85 for it from a dealer in Fairview… got the replace engine for $40 with the guarantee that it ran before the car it was in was wrecked??? I worked a little extra around and saved up “fixing” money so I could do little jobs as time allowed for fixing.
Then the brakes started making funny grinding noise… the back drums were wore plumb through and yes, apply the brakes and the outer disk would lock but it wasn’t attached to the wheel part… so replace all the brakes, and the muffler fell off… sounded cool but a bit too noisy inside…
I did replace the clutch when we swapped the engine… but never could get the overdrive to work again. It also had a strange condition of going fine then poof die… jiggle the wired some and it would run fine again for days, weeks or ? then poof die… never found the short causing this and I spent some time tracing all the wires back out… I think it had gremlins in it?
Next up, one night I was at a party with friends, got in, reached to shift the column shifter into reverse and it popped off in my hand. Broken off? the column ring was pot metal and it broke right at the cotter pin. I used a big screw driver to shift it from then till I got a replacement floor shifter, cheaper than trying to get a new column setup… But the shift links needed a groove put into the connection on the transmission to put the holding bolt through? at least one did and I had to file that groove in so I could get the link tightened up to actually make it shift into Second gear. It was tedious as I didn’t have anything but a small rat tail file and not big car lift or any of the great modern show tools… I laid in the grass, under the damn thing for hours filing that groove.
Then some time later, as I was going to meet a friend a few miles over and ride in his newer car to town, Old Yeller quit… gas gauge showed over a quarter tank but it would not start. We towed it back to the house, parked it and left. I still had my old trusty $50 pickup so I wasn’t afoot. When I got back I put gas in it anyway as we had a big storage tank for the farm, and the next day… it started? It did that again a few weeks later and the gauge showed almost a half tank… so I parked it till it warmed up and I used my old pickup for a week or two, it had a heater and ran good…so I left old Yeller set till I could figure out why it was dying with gas in the tank… it was almost Christmas and I had been whining I guess, and looking at newer cars with fewer problems… well that Christmas I got a 1964 Impala SS… We put old Yeller up for sale and actually made money on it ( just figuring the beginning price and the parts I put in)… We also figured out the gas gauge didn’t work right. As we were getting it ready to sell we hooked up to it and towed it some to get it started since we had run the battery down. We towed it over some rough ground in the pasture and poof the gauge dropped to “E”… then I figured out that the gauge was sticking so we put some gas in it and poof it started right up… and the buy wanted it bad so away it went and it paid about half of the cost of the new Impala… boy wish I could buy one today for near that price… but that is another story and another car trade that looking back… sure whish I had kept them all stored at the farm cause I had several really good classics… that would be worth a lot today… oh well…
After walking the lines of cars and getting these pictures..
My trusty old pickup at least the front part looked similar… mine didn’t have any chrome though and the newer bed on the back look interesting…
My neighbor up the road had one of these for awhile… a whole other story about heading to the stock car races with Don and Max and some Old guy pulls in front of us in Enid and just mangled up the front end. Don had just gotten it back from the paint shop all painted up Candy Apple Red… We were all fine other than knee dents in the glove box, warped steering wheel from Don pulling so hard up while pushing so hard down on the brakes… but we went on to the races after the tow guy and police were done and caught a ride home with some of the other guys there we knew …but the car was a mess…
A new version of history… Bought my daughter one of these when she started out driving. damn thing had a carburetor problem but we kind of had it fixed, It was a hardtop but then when her and Sherrie were at the Dentist some lady backed over it? Insurance totaled it out. oh well..
This is in the class of I really like the color and would love to have one but… they aren’t cheap in this condition. Although I could get a sign like this…
After the car show I went by and picked up Tim at the OSU geology camp and we went to lunch. Had a great visit, decent lunch but while getting ready to order this was in front of me?
The picture does not correctly represent this creature. He appeared to be in his mid 30’s or more? was balding in front and around the beginning of the dreads. He was with a couple that I assume were his parents as they paid. Not sure what he does , if anything, but just appeared to be an ODD DUCK? Am I getting old here?
This week some of our memorable moments are… The Rubber Duck is on the loose..
I think they had the air compressor at home?
Went to Lakewood for the day Friday… and all the boys were playing in the sandbox PaPa built last year…
Then Saturday we made a return to Canon for the Green Chili burger… got to have a few of those ever so often to even things out…
there is a burger under there, then fill it up with Green Chili on top then put some cheese and a salad on top… we add the fried mushroom on the side and split it… and get stuffed for $14… Well we do stop at McD’s for the $1 large unsweet ice teas before we run on to Big Burger World… Grab this slopper up and go to the park (same one that has the car show last week) and set under the trees and enjoy… nice cool spot, near the river, huge trees all around, can’t beat that for a great spot to relax…
I had seen these before… but as I was going up to order this guy and his wife both had the “BIG” burger… Takes both hands and then some , It would be Pie Plate size half pound burger… He was kind enough to allow me to get a shot of just how big the damn thing is… Guess that is why they call it BIG BURGER WORLD?
With all that said it is time to ride off into the sunset until something else of interest comes up…
WD0AJG