Problems you have had while 500 miles from home

Almost forgot about another one. When I bought the Fairlane back in '02, the ad had it listed as "drive it anywhere". I talked to the seller on the phone and they suggested I fly Southwest ($50) to Austin and they could pick me up, then I could drive the car home to Dallas. I picked the car up, ran good, brakes were good, fluids were clean and topped off, so I gave them the dough and hit the road.

As soon as I got on I-35 (less than 5 miles from their house), it made a god-awful noise and I thought the exhaust had fallen off. When I put my foot back on the throttle, she was dead. Long story short, she blew up and I was sitting on the side of the road.

Luckily, the seller was EXTREMELY cool and she payed for the tow and offered up a full refund and a flight home or a partial refund to cover making the engine right. I flew home and made arrangements to get back down there to bring the car home.

 

Pennsylvania, Labor Day, 4 years ago, in the '48 Pontiac 'vert (LT1, 4L60E complete harness etc. from a '94 Fleetwood), pulling the Spartan trailer, on the way to Maine for vacation. Gas gauge reading half a tank, the car suddenly began sputtering, coughing, and we rolled to a halt along the shoulder, with an exit in sight. For some reason, I walked to the back of the car, and loosened the gas cap. I was rewarded with a "WHOOOSSHH", and then a popping "BOINK, BOING, BOINK" sound, which turned out to be the poly gas tank, popping itself back into shape.

Got back in the car, turned on the ignition, gas now reading just off empty. Turned the key, fuel pump cycled, shut off, started, but ran sorta ragged, and headed for the town at the exit. Everything closed, Labor Day Holiday, and drove about 15 miles back to the previous exit where we pulled into a BP station, and REALLY ran out of gas as we approached the pumps.

What had happened was the gas tank vapor recovery selonoid had failed, the tank isn't vented, nor the cap, and as the fuel got pumped out, the bottom of the tank got "sucked" up, leaving the fuel pump high and dry in the middle. When I opened the gas cap, air rushed in, tank popped back out and the gallon or two of gas that was REALLY in the tank was able to be pulled up by the pump and we made it, barely, to the closest open gas station. The gas gauge read almost half full because the float was pushed up by the bottom of the tank itself. I had just been thinking, "This thing gets really GOOD gas milage pulling the trailer!", when it began to sputter.

Only trouble I've ever had, aside from, in the same car long ago, losing the brakes approaching a Chicagoland toll booth on the way home from the Nats and coasting thru it, scrubbing the curb to slow down, and replacing the starter in it another time, again at the Nats in St Paul, in a parts store parking lot.

 

the story is too long to recount again... but read my post about my wedding. We drove out in 2 50s cars and after a near-death experience, returned in a rental

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=194331

I also had numerous carb issues on the way to Austin a few years ago, but made it there in back with the help of my friends and the HAMB

 

Another San Antonio to Calif. trip this time driving my 49 Cadillac sedan DeVille..near my destination Mokelumne Hill/Railroad Flats area the trans was seizing up on the ol girl..We pulled into the cabin of our friends in a cloud of burnt trans smoke..after a few days and a few six packs it was determined that the money and availability of fixing the trans was an impossibility..We stripped the car down as light as possible, cut the center post out of the fourdoor and turned the car flat up against the cabin for a porch!..we turned the front seat sideways against the other side, put up some curtains across the open doorway, left a hot battery innit so you could use the domelight and listen to the radio..One of my goals is to go back to the area, find the site and show Sally what was, surely it can't still be there?!...

 

I had a head light(quartz) burn out around midnight in the Middle of South Dakota on the way back from Sturgis in to the Twin Cities 1985. I was on my Suzuki GS 1100 and had to use a flash light held above my windshield until I got to a small town off of the interstate. Slept on top of my bike at a gas station til morning and finished the trip.
I have the looonngg story about my 66 Shelby breaking down in Dinosaur Canyon. i should move it to here.

 

While traveling in Southern Mexico on our way to the Carrera Panamericana our service/tow truck lost the rear drive shaft, I remember a weired shudder and then noticed the drive shaft going by me down the road, what to due? we were about 70 miles from Guatamala in the exact middle of nowhere the only people we'ed seen in hours was a couple of guys hauling fire wood on donkeys, one old racer said "it's 4 wheel drive right?" why not pull the remaining yoke and run it in front wheel drive? so we did and drove the next 110 miles pulling the trailor and race car like that, front wheel drive. the next day in Tuxtla Gutiereze my navigator hammered out the drive shaft on a stump, and we got the only u-joint in town that would fit and were back in business.

 

Got a phone call telling me someone had broken into my shop, while I was out of town, and stole all my tools. I figured it had to be someone that knew me to know I wasn't around then. Made me sick, but then my heart got ripped out when I found out my son was the main person behind it. The turd is in jail now and I hope he rots there.

 

Only a few hundred miles away, but on the way to the HCPU last year, I cracked a brake line in Gary, Indiana. If you've ever been there, you know it's not the best place to be stranded just before dark. Especially in an old Caddy. Thanks to help from the gang we were back on the road in about an hour.

 

Great thing about this story is it forced the trailer queen to get that thing out and drive it. That is a good thing and you should get a pat on the back for that one.

 

Bout 8 or 9 years ago I decided to go lookin for a new ride. Found this killer mean lookin 1960 GMC Carryall(just like a suburban.) 4x4 327 4 speed, big tires, ugly green pain it several shades. AND it was ONLY 1800 miles from home. Jumped a plane and headed home. Mind you it was the middle of January and I was drivin from Portland to Kansas City, and I didn't take the southern route! Thing ran great, sucked some gas, leaky valve cover(bout a quart every 100 miles!) Middle of Nebraska I hit a snow storm on I-80. NO idea how fast I was goin, speedo didn't work! But kept goin slower and slower, didn't matter big 'ol 11in wide tires were like slicks! It was a hairy ride! Finally spun hard enough to send me across the median and into and oncoming semi....well actually 3 BRAND NEW Freightliners stacked on one another. Landed back in the median and I am pretty sure I was out cold. Jump out walk around the beast, right rear quarter and tailgate is now trashed but I am still on all for wheels and tires! Battery had turned over but once righted truck fires right up and seems fine. Did jack up my speakers though so no more stereo. Semi driver was real nice, so were the cops. He had to wait for a tow, I headed home. Now try that in a late model! Made it within 100 miles of home before the right rear wheel broke the 5th of 6 lug bolts and things started clankin. Made a call and got the best guy in the world to come out at 10pm in the snow and drag it home on a trailer, which was to narrow and I had to run up on one rail! Next mornin when they unloaded it the wheel fell of as they did! Took me 3 days to warm up, didn't have any heat either! Same day that Derrick Thomas had his car accident and ended up dying later that week. It was a LONG trip.....

 

Driving my 46 Chevy coupe home from the Nats in Loiusville in '99. Only about 300 miles from home I heard a clicking/ticking from under the hood. My wife is with me and she's quite worried that we're gonna get stranded. I stopped on the side of the X Way and opened the hood, of course you couldn't hear anything with the traffic blasting by five feet away. It was running fine, just ticking loudly. We drove to the next exit and pulled into a parking lot. I'm thinking the bearing in the alternator is about to take a dump. Open the hood and listen...nope sound seems to be coming from the rear of the engine. I start thinking maybe flex plate bolts loose...as I lean down to listen i put my hand on the dipstick. The dipstick is tapping my hand in time to the tapping sound I'm hearing. I try to pull the dipstick out and it won't come out. I pull harder and it finally pops out...missing the last couple inches. tapping noise stops. All I can figure is that we just came into Michigan when the noise started so I blame it on the crappy roads here. The pavement was all uneven, each concrete slab tilted up or down. The car had been bucking like a horse enough that I had actually slowed down. I think the dipstick got to bouncing around and touched the crank and got bent over. I could see where it was broke off that it had a 90* bend in it. I drove home and got a new dipstick, the broken piece is still in the pan today......

 

Love to see the Shelby story....

 

This is kinda long, I'll try to shorten it up.

We were on one of the old Hop Up runs with my roadster, Paso to Harris Ranch. The ranch is on I5, north of Bakersfield for non CA guys.

The group left the Paso Inn on Sat. morning and drove up 101 for awhile before turning inland onto two lane roads. We were a bit arrears when I began to hear big noises from under the hood. I was letting Jim Miller drive and discovered he has a hearing problem. I told him to stop ASAP. Turns out that a front of block bolt, SBC 283, that held the alternator bracket had broken off flush in the block. The bracket, single underslung type, was loose and dropped the alternator and jumped the single accessorary belt.

We were broke down! After a few minutes some guys ,from Washington State?, stopped to see if they could help. I stood back while the Washington farmers and Miller cut wire from a nearby vineyard fence. Miller took the bracket and bent it into an overhead support using the ball and hitch on one of our savoiur's truck. The fence wire tied the alternator back to the engine mount - amazing stuff.

We made it another 50-75 miles to Harris Ranch. Drank almost the 1/2 gallon of Jack Daniels I had with Dennis Varni and others. The next day we headed down I5 towards LA. Just before the bottom of the Grapevine climb I noticed we were a little hot. Miller and I stopped at one of the truck stops and found out that the wire holding the alt to the motor mount had broken. Jim went into the gift shop and picked up some plastic rope and a knife. He tied it all up and we made my driveway, 75 mi., just fine.

I broke out some good whiskey glasses and we had the rest of the Jack.

If there are any of the guys that helped us that day on the HAMB please let yourselves be known. I had names on a piece of paper but, lost it of course.

BTW - the trip to Paso from my house, 4 hrs., was uneventful except for waving at girls.

DW

 

My Model T magneto came apart a hundred miles from home. Had to get pulled by a modern car...

 

Heading to the 1992 nats in KY in my 38 Chevy.. About 25 miles from home the C clip in my 67 nova rear goes out and I call a friend and we get it repaired on the side of I 64 about 10 pm..
The next day around 11 am , doing 65 mph coming around a curve at Skidders Creek in WV, the right axle leaves the car and I am holding on for dear life. After coming to a stop me and my buddy go back to look for the axle. From the broken tree branches we determined it went down the mountain. I went to find it and found nothing worth bring back up. A rollback showed up and said the car was too low to load but if I had the axle it would help. I went back to get the axle and it wore my ass out getting it back up to the road. The wrecker driver told my buddy," you know , I don't know if I would have gone down there to get that. We have a lot of rattle snake and cooper heads around here."
I get to the host hotel and the starter is cooked. I hoof it to the swap meet and buy a used starter and change it out in the hotel parking lot.
The only luck I had on this trip was I didn't have any water damage as this was the great flood of 92 in L ville.
The one thing I take from this experience is what someone told me when thay saw the damage to my rear fender. He said if your problems can be fixed by money, then you don't really have any problems

 

Leaving Pomona, CA headed home for TEXAS! in a couple of '32 Fords. Couple hours later we were on the road.. TEXAS is the reason.

 

busted coat zipper on the trip from southern Missouri to Austion, TX for the revolution in December! no action taken but was a little disappointed in my lack of attention to detail as it was 22 degrees when I left with the top down!

 

Spun a rod bearing 40 miles short of Birmingham Al on the Power Tour IN my 455 Olds powered 55 Caddy. Luckily I have friends scattered all over the USA and called in a "bud needs help favor" to get back to the Detroit area

 

Went to Clear lake Iowa for the Buddy Holley reunion. My Pretronix went dead after we checked in at the motel. Walked 2 miles in 99* heat to a NAPA for some points,condensor, & resister 42 bucks. Wife cleaned out the glove box before we left & all that was in there.Walked back to the car, took the dist. cap off & shit there is only one screw that holds the Pretronix in place. Put the points in with one screw. The car started & idled but that was it. 5 mph along the interstate back to NAPA to get screwed again

 

You guys are killing me. I want to take my '41 to Bonneville, but I'm a little unsure about the quality of the work performed by the guy I got it from. (solid motor mounts?) If I make the trip, I'm going to have one hell of a trunk load of band aids. Like belts, hoses, wire, fuses, duct tape, J-B weld, coat hangers, fire extinguishers, gas can, scissor jack. What else?

 

On the way to Bonneville on year towing our trailer I grenaded the transmission in my dualie about 90 miles outside of Vegas. Slept in the trailer until the morning then started pulling it. Howard Naftzker (sp) came by and went on to get word to my partner who was way ahead of me. Fred Dannenfelzer, Bob Richards and Paul Madsen stopped and helped me get it in the truck to head to Vegas and then stayed and helped me put the new one in. That's the kind of guys we race with. Always will to help when needed. The plus side was I got to Wendover almost broke but got hot on the machines that night and made what I had spent back plus some. Turned out to be a great week.

 

I lost a engine outside of chicago on I80-90 and had a hard time with AAA,They were asking are you in Indiana or Illinois?
How do I know!
We were in Indiana!

 

It was only 480 miles from home. Blew the transmission in my old motorhome while in Tennessee. Left it at my cousin's. Next trip up, I pulled it. Took it to a retired AAMCO man in Semmes, Alabama, who rebuilt it for $750.00 parts and labor. Next trip up, I reinstalled it and drove it home towing my P/U. Wish I still had that MH. BBC with headers and a TH475 (TH400 with straight cut gears).

 

Where do I start?
Back in '68 I blew a tiny hole in a piston on my '57 Chevy. Pulled the plug and drove on 7 until I got to a town 40 miles away. Then we pulled the piston and rod and got a new one at a Chevy dealer and had it pressed on the rod. Back on the road.
Starters, alternators, water pump, changed in the parking lots of parts stores, or alongside the road. Dropped a driveline and fortunately didn't hurt anything but the rear U joint. Hitched a ride with it in a friendly farmer's truck, and got a new one pressed in. Same farmer gave me a ride back to my truck to put it in. Some rural people were really friendly back 40 years ago!

 

transmission issues/problems hauling a '50 chevrolet from arkansas. luckily made it home and put the daily in the transmission shop.

 

I was in a friend's flathead powered car a couple of years back heading off on an 800 mile, 3-day trip. About 100 miles in the fan slipped forward on the shaft and scored the crap out of the radiator. We limped to a service station after crimping as many cores as we could but at 4pm Thursday in the middle of nowhere it was hard to get a radiator repaired.
We got a small tin of bog/bondo/body filler and messed about with the rad tubes, blowing into it and squeezing the cores shut where air came out, as much as we could. Then we mixed up a batch of body filler and slapped it in the radiator over the holes.
We did another 700 miles and made it home. I posted this as it might help someone else get home with a holed radiator.