By: LsFarm On: Mon Mar 17, 2008 8:55 am
I had several slant sixes, all after I sold my '65 formula S barracuda,, so I hated the slant six, it had no guts, no glory, no pzazz.. I bought a '72 dodge dart 4door from a salvage yard, it was driveable, this was the slab-sided design like the mid 60's Lincolns.. but nowhere near as interesting.. This Dodge dart had been driven between two trees, so it was even flatter on the sides... I replaced both front fenders. did my best on the 4 doors, and the rear quarters.. It looked like a Dodge Dart from 10-20 feet, looked butt-ugly all the time. It was painted that unfortunate green that the utility companies used.. Bell Telephone and Detroit edison green.. this car didn't just get hit by an ugly stick,, the whole forest of ugly fell on it.
I bought it with around 90K miles on it. I disliked it so much that I decided to kill it.. It was too ugly to sell, so the only way to have to get another car was to kill this one.. So.. I lived 1.4 miles from the on-ramp to I-75, which I drove on into Detriot to go to College classes, and back each day to work in the VW shop at night don't know when I slept.. I would hit the onramp and put the pedal to the mat, the car was anemic,, it would only do 105-108mph indicated.. I left it there traffic permitting [usually light traffic] untill the engine temp gauge went into the red, then backed off to 90mph.. I did this to this car for over a year,, it just wouldn't die.. my sister's car died so I had a good excuse to get rid of it.. My sister got 'ol 'Ugly Green' with ~150K miles.. and it went to 250K for her, and she gave it away, to a friend.. same engine, same trans.. just amazing..it finally blew the trans at ~300k... the engine was finally getting tired,, you had to add oil every 1K.
I can't remember what I bought next, I think it was the stolen and recovered '66 Porsche 912.. VERY rusty, but I wanted it.. it was a rust nightmare,,, I got lucky and broke even on it a year later.. But I still remember driving it home when I bought it, I was on a cloverleaf freeway on-ramp, pulling some [partial] g's in the turn, when.... I got wet pants.. no, I didn't piss myself.. the passenger-side sunvisor was pouring water out of the pivot point.. the visor was one of those padded plastic envelopes heat sealed all the way around.. it was water-tight, except at the hinge pivot points.. the visors were full of water... HOW do you ask??? I found out that the car had been stolen, and recovered,,,, in a lake... yep I didn't buy a Porche... I had bought a PERCH... it was nicknamed... the Perch... When I took the carbs apart for a cleaning, I found SILT in the float bowl, on the outside recesses and all through the car, inside the instruments, all had lake water sediment.. The Perch was a great car,, I drove it hard, and it held up.. but the rust was making the body- a uniframe type construction dangerous.. the steel was like egg shells.. looked good, but was very close to crumbling... I found a guy to buy it for the drivetrain and parts.. Whew!!
Then I made my poor-man's Porsche... a hopped up VW Karman-ghia...I built an ultimate street-driveable engine, it had 165hp at the rear wheels, measured on the same chassis dynamometer that the stock engine turned to 43hp.. this ghia was a total sleeper.. had rust in the 'eyebrows' over the headlamps, rust around the wheel openings, and it was the orange that was popular for the '69,70's small cars.. remember the bright 'pastel' colors?? blue, Orange Yellow... Mine was FADED orange.. emphasis on faded... this car was a wolf in shabby sheep's clothing.. it would run 0-50mph in sub 5 seconds. the 1/4 mile in the low 13's... I had a ball.. oh man,, the stories... maybe after a few 7&7's around the campfire... but for the grace of God... I'd be long dead..
Later,, Greg L
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Scott