Those of you following my build thread read that I have been close to taking the car apart for repaint. Last week I decided since my car would be down for 6-8 weeks repainting, I decided to take it on a long drive before I did that...so...put the door handles and gl*** back in and off I went. This was the first long cruise I've taken it on. I thought about Colorado for the nsra show, but 40% chance of rain, and I had just been to NM a few weeks ago, so looked elsewhere. Dallas was expecting flooding, but Oklahoma was going to be clear...just hot...so I headed east. Thursday and Friday I put about 800 miles on it (speedometer still not working)... Mostly hiway driving, took I40 east to Hinton OK, then south thru Chickasha, southeast to Pauls Valley to get on I35, then South to the Winstar Casino on exit 1. Friday I headed back north to Cl***ic Auto parts and a few other stops in OKC, then back home. Had a smile on my face the whole way. The car ran like clockwork......except maybe for a little white knuckle driving for a few hours during some really high winds on the way home Friday, lol. My car doesn't like windy days. I'm convinced it's the rake I have on the car, because I still have an issue with the car feeling like the back end wants to come around when making a curve to the right, particulaly while going downhill. So, next week I'm going to drop the rear an inch and see if that helps as I suspect. I remember having handling issues with a '58 Ford way back in the 60's that I put a rake on for a few weeks by reversing the shackles. As I said, the car ran great and I averaged (near as I can tell by guestimating with no speedometer) 26.5 MPG!! Total usage for gas was pretty close to 30 gallons, and I was around 800 miles. The thumbs up I've been getting on the car are definetly down since 1/2 the car is in primer and looking more rat roddy, but still got lots. On I40 the first day I watched an SUV coming up behind me pretty quick, then never p***ed. After a few moments, I looked over to my left and they were driving along side of me...the woman on the p***enger side with her window down and a big video camera pointed at me! pretty cool. Now I got the bug.....after I get the car repainted, I may head out for a really long trip...east or west coast..we'll see.
oops...gotta have pics or it didn't happen... The gas station is in Shamrock Tx.....first town in Texas headed west on I40. The route 66 sign was at the rt66 museum in Elk City, OK.
Cool! I wish I would have known you would be so close to me. I'm located about 10 miles South of Winstar Casino in Gainesville, TX. I'm glad you had a good, safe, fun trip!
I go thru/to Gainsville two or three times a year.....anytime I'm going to the dfw area, I stop in Gainsville the night before and go make my donations to the Indian Nation at Windstar. Quite often if I'm in my Outback DD and the weather is good, I just sleep in the car at the secure rest stop between Gainsville and the border.
Send me a message next time you're heading my way so we can hopefully meet up. I think that would be cool. I just need a couple day notice.
Don't you just love that Modular engine? I had one in a '62 F-100 and it averaged about 26 mpg highway. I really miss that truck.
Great Texas, that sounds like a lot of fun. Talk about accomplishment. 800 miles is your notion of a long cruise? Man, my entire country is about 400 miles on a straight line from one end to the other...
Flyboy: Definetly made a good decision on that...for me anyway, as I'm not enough of a mechanic to be constantly fiddling with points, distributors, carburetors, etc. It is still running in a back up mode due to engine codes being thrown, but as I've said before, it's running so good I'm not going to worry about it til it comes up on the priority list. Rui....I take off at least once a month for shows, swap meets, ect., until now in my DD. But I'm usually in the 600-1000 mile range for the trips, so I guess yeah, 800 miles seems likes good number for a long cruise. I haven't done too much of southern Texas though...actually none at all below Dallas. It's 666.6 miles to Corpus Christi from where I live, so sounds like two Portugals would fit in Texas. HMMMMM...is that weird? Amarillo is 666.6 miles from a place called Corpus Christi? I've been telling my wife for years Amarillo is hell, lol.
I will be looking for your 57 at Goodguys Ft Worth in Oct. If I get real lucky maybe in my 55, yeah, REAL lucky.
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