Hot Rods The Story about the Smoke is True

The story about the smoke is true !!!!!!!!!!!!!
We all know the story that our cars run on Smoke. If you let out all of the smoke, the car will quit. Well I am here to tell you that is the Gospel truth.
Last night I was driving my 62 Vette on my way to the GG’s event in Bowling Green KY. I had planned to spend the night with my son in Lake Zurich Il. And continue on to BG this morning. You know what they say about the best laid plans of mice and men.
I was about a mile from Brian’s house on a 2 lane road when I started to smell a obnoxious odor and noticed smoke coming from under the hood and under the dash. I pulled off on the shoulder and got out of the car with my trusty fire extinguisher in hand, I opened the hood to be greeted by a huge cloud of noxious fumes but fortunately no flames. I noticed a guy running towards the car and saw that it was a local gendarme who had noticed the smoke and had his cruiser parked behind me with the lights flashing. We determined that there were no flames after a close inspection but that all of the insulation was melted off of the engine harness and the under dash harness.I can’t imagine why this could happen, the wiring is only 46 years old, you would think it would last longer than that wouldn’t you?
The local fire department showed up with sirens blaring and lights flashing and used their heat detecting thingy to look for hot spots, upon finding none they departed wishing me good luck. Yeah I sure needed some of that about then. The officer was nice enough to call a rollback and my son showed up about the same time.
Good luck mixed with the bad, First of all, there were no injuries. Second, the car was not burned to the ground. I am sure that most of you have seen what fire does to fibergl***. It ain’t a pretty sight. Third, the guy that does the work on my kid’s 68 firebird. Is only about a mile from where I am stranded and he is also a respected Corvette shop
.(My son and I built that 68 Firebird while he was in high school, we got it done in 1986 and he has put 100k on it since then.)
Brian calls Doug and he is nice enough to go down to the shop and wait for the roll back to bring the charcoaled plastic fantastic in. We put it in empty stall and did a quick inspection to determine the harness’s were toast.
This morning after cancelling my BG hotel room for tonite some more good luck made itself known. The company that makes the replacement wiring harnesses’ for these old critters is only 25 miles down the road. I head down the road in my rent a wreck and return with 698.00 worth of goodies to get the old girl back on the road.
The downside is that Doug has the kind of shop that does not allow or encourage customers to hang around and offer help and advice. When I handed him the parts he put them in the front seat and said. “ I’ll call Ya”. So here I sit wondering how it is progressing and it’s driving me nuts.
The bottom line is that I will continue my ROAD TRIP, if the car isn’t done by tomorrow afternoon I will spend a nice weekend with my son and his lady. That would mean I miss GG’s BG but I will still continue.
So, Earl Scheib, Kustm52, Keisler Engineering, Corky Coker, Doc, Austin Speed Shop, Ryan, Nick79, Dirty2,The Fidgiter and a whole bunch more folks. Don’t pay the ransom, I will escape and see you next week.
The whole purpose of this Epic Journey is twofold.
1. To deliver the 62 to Santo TX where it is going to be used to develop a Power Rack & Pinion conversion kit for the solid axle vettes. I will leave it there over the winter and pick it up in April and drive it to the LSRU on the 16th which BTW is my birthday. That will be a terrific B’day present.
2. My bud and body man FNG duchan bought a 62 Buick special off of the cl***ifieds and Dirty2 now has it at his shop. He is replacing some hoses and lines and an idler arm to make it safe for me to drive back to Wisconsin on the 27th.
This started out to be a short recap of my adventures so far but you know how long winded some of us old farts are.
Thanks for listening.

BB

 

Sorry to hear about your misfortune but happy to hear that it happened how and where that it did. good luck Bob.

 

Wouldn't be a real road trip without adversity like that!

 

A couple of years ago I put a wiring harness in a 68, 427, 6pk Vette for letting the smoke out.The customer tried to do his own tune up and never fastened the grounding wires on the plug wires, the arced out on the coil wire.

 

BobK,

Just pulled into the parking lot here in BG.

First car I see is a '62 Vette!

It's dark, so I couldn't see the color, but knew it wasn't yours.

Hope you make it down.

Doesn't feel like home without the gnome!!

Stay safe, brutha!

- RBR

 

Very glad to hear the car (well, and you!) is ok...I really want to see that thing! Good luck Bob...shouldn't take long to swap in a harness. Good luck on the rest of the trip!

 

Let the smoke out???

I didn't know Lucas made the wiring harness on a plastic cl***ic

 

Close call for the travelling gnome! glad things will be OK Bob. You are a mouse? Whodathunket?

 

Wow! Glad your misfortune turned on the upside. I wish more folks had your disposition. Hope to bump into you, cause I'm buying! Have fun on the rest of your trip.

Ken

 

There is magic smoke in a lot of things. Computers, stereo equipment, cars, motorcycles, etc. Glad you caught it before something bad happened.

 

Scary! I can imagine the pucker factor you were feeling seeing all that smoke from under the car.

Glad to hear it didnt become a crispy critter!

I can relate a little bit. While pushing my truck into the garage one night when changing out the bed on the 35, I dropped my battery onto the driveshaft. It smoked the ground strap going from the frame to the starter totally into two peices! That much electrical smoke is not meant to rise from a vehicle!

 

Long winded don't describe it Bob!

Very glad that the car came thru fairly un****hed. Best of luck on the rest of the weekend. See you at the LSRU!


jerry

 

smoke bad.

no fire good.

 

The Brits know about this problem, and they sell Replacement Smoke.

It even has a Lucas Parts Number...




Glad your Car is going to be OK...

That could have been a lot worse.

 

Hopefully the rest of your trip goes smoothly! Casa de Joyo awaits your arrival.

 

Glad you didn't burn it down.

 

glad to hear there wasn't much damage, that would be an expensive one to replace!
it's been a heck of a year, hasn't it?

 

Bob
It's my understanding that the cigarette lighter socket in early Corvettes is NOT fused and is frequently a cause of wire-meltdown on Vettes. You might want to check the replacement harness. If it's a factory reproduction, it might not have a fuseable link in the lighter either.
Ol Blue

 

On Pops Studebaker, the cigarette lighter will turn off the headlights!!

 

Bob,

Denise and 'other' Bob and I were going to dinner here in BG.

Fired up my wagon and, well...... FIRED up my wagon.

Toasted the harness between the regulator and the starter solenoid on the old Ford.

Hopefully I can junkyard engineer something and cripple her back home on Sunday.

Guess that'll teach me to laugh at the gnome.

- RBR

 

If you'd just stay at home once in a while and not drive those cars all over hell and tarnation you wouldn't have these kind of problems. But then you'd have less stories to tell and we ALL know how you like to spin a yarn or two

Glad the car (and you) are OK.

Dennis

 

Long winded fart...Bob you know that lighting your farts while driving is just downright dangerous. Didn't your dad warn you about playing with matches? Some just have to learn their lessons the hard way I guess. What will the adjuster say though? Oh wait, you're an insurance man aren't you? Likely story, I bet!

 

Put some pressure on me bro !

 

That is some funny stuff!

 

Thinking about this statment tells me that you may have isolated the problem. Normally in my puffing days that cigarette lighter would only be used for a couple of seconds at a time.

On this trip however, I was using my GPS for 4 hours and also charging my phone at the same time for about 2 hours.

Could it be that the excess usage overtaxed that wire and started the whole mess? Maybe.

When it gets fixed I will definetly put an inline fuse in that circut. I wonder what amperage fuse to use, prolly a 10 amp.

I will be going to the shop at 07:30 this morning to see how things are progressing.

BB

 

Darn Bob, a quick trip to O'riely's , and us Missouri guys would have had you up a runnin already . Hope it all works out for you, and I'll see you down the road somewhere, sometime. Rusty.

 

Glad everything seems to be working out despite your setback Bob.

Keep us posted my friend.

 

Just talked to the shop, they say I should be rolling late this afternoon. If so I will leave for BG as soon as I can, I figure it's about 8 hours from here so I will be in late.

Here are a couple of pics from before the repairs were started.







Crispy eh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

BB