Breakdowns, Friends, one long day, and a lowered wagon....

Boy Where do i start.

Saturday, our club had a picnic planned, so the wife and i pile in her new 58 Edsel wagon, and drive the 90 miles up there.

About 15 or 20 miles from our destination the car just dies. Runs out of gas, but i KNOW the tank has like 15 gallons of gas in it.

well, so i figure the fuel pump died. Call my club up, they go grab me a pump, and a filter, get that changed, nada. Check the old pump, it pumps fine. WTF?

So i try to blow through the line into the tank, NOdda. blocked. Take the line off of the Tank, and nothing comes out. HMMM.

i can blow through the line, but not when its attached to the tank.

SO the outlet to the tank is plugged. More friends Showed up. 31rodder, and prettyboy form her eon the hamb lend a hand, WE jack her up, drop the tank, and haul it to a friends place a few miles down the road.

Tried compressed air, That wouldn't blow through it, so we shoved some wire down the tube and it was BLOCKED SOLID. Get a old antenna, ram it though. knock the filter bag thing of the end of the inlet tube in the tank. Finally can get air though it. dum,p the tank out. you should have seen the amount of **** that came out of this tank. i bet there was a solid 2 inches of **** on the bottom of this tank. Figures, it sat for 23 years inside a building with a 3/4 tank of fuel in it. and i never cleaned it out.

SO we put some chain in the tank, and add some more gas, Slosh it around a while and dump it out, rinse and repeat about 10 times. Looks alot better in the tank now.

Get back to the car, put the tank in, add some fuel, and vroom off we go.

Get to my friends shop, they own Driven Customs in Fargo. www.drivencustoms.com Great guys both club members, wowcars and prettyboy run the show there.

get the car up on the lift, and we drop her with 3" block in the rear, and 1.5 coils cut in front MAN SHE LOOKS LOW NOW.

MUCH THANKS to Eyeball, 31rodder, Wowcars, Prettyboy, Sko_Ford, CJhacker, and OtherRyan.

Fast forward to Sunday, Take the wife shopping a bit, and then we run over to Menard's to look at stuff for the house. The car dies again in the parking lot. EXACT same thing.

I figure SCREW IT. i walked into Menard's, bought a 5 gallon gas can, walk across the street to Advance Auto Parts, pick up 15 feet of fuel line, and just byp*** the tank completely.

Dive back over to my friends at driven, Drop the tank again, Give it to eyeball, he said he take it and have it boiled for me to really clean it, and we drive home with the gas can and the hose in the trunk.

90 miles to Fargo, took up 6 hours on Saturday. The joy of old cars.

Its wonderful to have great friends that will go out of their way to help a guy in a pinch. my club Rocks.

~Aaron

heres some pics.

On the Side for the Road Pretty Boy, 31rodder and myself under the car.




Here we are just at Driven Customs, getting ready to put her up on the hoist and start cutting.



31 Rodder and Eyeball Installing Shocks... after the rear was dropped.

 

Heres Eyeball and Wowcars fighting to put in a Front spring.



Finished Dropped Pic



Everyone, and Wowcars 46 Caddy Ambulance in the background.



In the shop Again

 

Took Some pics with eyeballs wifes car, Sunday morning.





In front of Eyeballs house, if this was blackand white you wouldnet know what year it is.

 

that what you get for having a pink car

 

she sits right now....and good luck with the tank...at least you got it out from under the car without everything breaking..hahaha-even in color, its hard to tell what year it is..

 

*****in stance.. Like it alot.

 

Wtf? its not Pink, its CORAL! yea thats it..

Coming from a FNG, ill take that as a compliment...

 

Edsel Villagers are cursed..... Simple as that....

I have a '59 Villager, and she is very moody, a real woman, I have to talk to her nicely because if i don't she has a funny turn.... She normally only behaves for me....

I have this on going problem with the gears, there is nothing actually wrong with them, its just on occasion they get stuck and I loose all power... This is not fun coming back from a show, in a monsoon, on the M3 and bam it goes, fiddled (read hit repeatedly) for ages to get them to click back in but no.... 5 hours later on the back of a recovery vehicle... *yawn*, then when we get home, *pop*, good as gold.... Typical!!! Least it saved on fuel I guess??

LOVING your '58 boomerang tail lights..... Looks lovely that low too..... *drool*, oh the plans I have for ours, just need the £££

What other plans do you have for yours..... Oh and nothing wrong with 'coral'

 

It's a GREAT feeling knowing your car pals are there for ya when you need them. I'm looking forward to seeing your crew next weekend at the Pileup.

 

Good thing you didn't break down in Ohio.

 

I don't see too many Edsels around here...the only one I knew of was a two door, in good shape sitting in a field...but someone ******ed it up. Anyway, I like that car. The more I look at it..the more I like it. Good job on the roadie rescue...it's great to have people around to help when help is needed. Sounds like a great bunch...good luck!

 

Hot rodders in general are good, I was broken down on the side of the road a long way from home one sunday arvo with a disintegrated right front wheel bearing.
A guy in a 37 coupe just happened to be p***ing by and stopped, never seen this guy before in my life. He took what was left of the unknown bearing (I didn't build that car) and turned up half an hour latter with a new one! Turned out that the original 38 spindle had been machined to take standard boat trailer bearings for some strange reason!
Helped me put it back together then wouldn't accept a cent in repayment for the bearing or help, so I took him to the closest bar and bought him a beer!
Doc.

 

Thats a payin it forward Car Karma kinda story. Last year I towed a really nice '49 Ford Truck off the highway 11 miles into town and helped the owner push it into his garage when I was already running late. When I finally got to my intended destination and my wife jumped me for being late, I told her "this is a required response as far as I'm concerned". She finally gets it after helping stangers in hotrods out, doing a leg of a HAMB relay, giving away parts to help get a locals project on its legs and shipping car parts out on promises of getting paid - I've yet to be burned by a car guy. It will happen I'm sure, probably by some young "en***lement generation" punk, but the way I figure it I'm way ahead on Karma and hopefully when I need a break some one just like me (but a better mechanic) will be coming around the corner with a tow strap.

s.

 

Hell yeah, I find it real hard to drive past someone broken down, I have to have one VERY good reason for not stopping. Its not a dangerous thing to do over here yet.
Doc.

 

thats funny, right there....

 

Glad to see you guys have such good friends. The car is cool as well.

 

The exact same thing happened to my friends 50 ford on the way to Viva last year. We got it running the night before and filled the tank and hit the road. Him in the 50 and me in my A. It had a clear fuel filter and I kept taking it apart and dumping it out. We were on the 5 freeway in socal on a workday (not fun) I finally took my A and got two 5 gallon cans and 6 feet of hose put them in the back seat of the 50 and ran the hose thru a rust hole in the floor to the electric fuel pump. It was 100 degrees out and I told him not to smoke. We got all the way to Viva and back! My friend was a little loopy from the heat and fumes though. I just was loopy from the heat in the A.

 

it looks great! I look forward tos eeing it next weekend. Kidnap Wowcars, tie him up, and throw him in the back.

 

You always find out how good your friends are when you have to make "that" call. Great looking car! Really dig the Edsel wagons.

 

hahahaha.

Cant wait for next weekend. Hopefully she wont give us any trouble on the way down.

wowcars is already pissed that he cant come, first pileup he will have missed.

this will be my first one though!

~Aaron

 

****, I usually just see you as I'm rolling past.

Yep, the wagon is way *****in. Looks vaguely familiar too.

 

kidnapping is only a crime if someone presses charges

 

It takes a real man to drive a pink edsel!

I like it, sits nice.
It always surprises me what people are able to accomplish on the side of the road. Heres an old shot of me and my buddy on the way to Viva Las Vegas 2001? 3 out of 5 lug nuts snapped off. we were lucky to make it to the rest stop at like 5 mph for about 1o miles! we met a cool guy from canada in a VW bus that was driving accross the US with his family. He had a really good copper mallet that he let us use to borrow 2 lugs from the other rims. I had to play a show in vegas that night and we made it there just in time! The bearings disintigrated on the way home, but luckily I had bought a hammer and new bearings while in Vegas.

 

That wagon is so cool! there will probably be more bugs to work out but totally worth it. She's lucky to have that machine!

 

great story!

 

Yeah that felt great that night getting her back on the (much closer) road. That is what I really do love about this club. You can always depend on 'em for heping you in times of need. BTW, I didn't get bound and gagged to go to the Pileup. I wish I woulda, tho! No charges woulda been pressed. haha.

 

It was nice of the Edsel to have trouble before you lowered it... probably made it easier to work on, on the side of the road!

Nice cars, man!

Ben

 

Just came across this thread again. Fun to go back and read. Here is a picture now that their car is almost finished.

 

It thru me for a loop when he said you helped work on it and I thought to myself humm I didn't know Ryan moved back to ND and then when I say the photos of guys in short sleeves I looked at the date.

Wagon looks great now.

 

She cleaned up real purty. It's tough to tell in that lighting, but I ***ume Coral is still coral?


I have long known that, unlike kryptonite, a color doesn't threaten my masculine superpowers