$500 car

[KC2YOI]

Don't knock it till ya try it 

[ka3zlr]

Keeehee hee hee another chitty chevy

Pulled two out of the mud up at Butlers Mud Fest   wif my wittle wanger

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L38wthA4Ld0&feature=related


I Got-R-Done

[ke7trp]

I think he will enjoy the Rover.  Its very capable off road.  Hell for that money, I would have purchased the thing in a second.. But I like odd types of cars..   One of my Dream cars showed up on ebay recently. I know its going to go for big money. 

Yeah its slow.. Real slow.. But thats not the point.. this is the nicest one I have seen.

160452564845


Clark

[ka3zlr]

Ah Heck Ya dem Rovers are Known Performers ya Buddy...

[The Slab Bacon]

I built my "dream truck" too.  A '66 Ford 6' stepside with a '71 Chrysler 440 unda the hood. 12 mpg pulling, loaded or empty it didnt matter! Back tires lasted for 2 or 3 days    but it was fun blowing off many of the day's "supercars" Consistant 13.50s left in drive and floored. And a big "shit eatin grin" on my face.  

[KC2YOI]

Well, mine won't pull any crazy 1/4 mi times but it will run on juss bout anything greasy and free 
 I do like huge, mid 60's Chryslers. My friend had a bone stock 383cid Newport granny hand me down that was rediculus fast.
It was a rolling motel room in High School 

Clark,
check out the Suzuki samuri / 1.6L VW conversions. I want to build one next.
Daily driver, turn key kits start at at about $650.

[WA1GFZ]

my dream truck 1972 1 ton with a wood flat bed. 350 plus .030 fuelie cam and 411s
Take any stock vet out of the hole.
butt ugly primer black
A guy here has a '73 with a 454 that looks interesting. Body pretty clean

[ka3zlr]

LOL I had my first ride was a 61 Ford Falcon 6 cycl three spd on the column Get-R-Done..

73

Jack.

[Steve - WB3HUZ]

I thought a truck was for hauling stuff. Who gives a crap if it can hole shot a Vette or go fast in the 0.25 mile.

Next you'll be telling me how good your SSB rig sounds.   

[WQ9E]

A nice old Scout would be my dream vehicle, Rodger.  Had a '78 Scout II that's essentially medium duty truck on a little chassis.  Absolutely indestructible except for the famed IH tinworm infestation.

This beast has one thing in common with the older Scouts - you can go into LO/HI range independently of being in 4WD.  2-LO is kinda nice for creeping in heavy traffic.

I grew up with a '79 Scout II that replaced a '73 1010 Travelall and the Scout is perfectly sized and easy to work on (and parts are fairly cheap, the $500 that you paid for the Rover would buy about one injector for my current diesel pickup).  The problem with all of the local Scouts I have found is too much rust and too many mods (poorly installed lifts, hacked up frames, Chevy engine installed, etc.)

I have a couple of leads on some fairly local Scouts and I need to do something in the next year since I will be getting a new pickup soon and 4WD adds about $3,000 to the price so if I come up with an alternative for heavy snow I won't need it on the truck.  I only need 4WD a few times a year and since a full sized crew cab doesn't fit in the parking deck at work I have to park in a surface lot and scrape the snow/ice off before leaving.  A Scout would fit as easily as my CTS and as I recall is even more maneuverable.  I could have gotten the CTS with AWD but with low ground clearance it would have been a no go out here in the country.

I bet you make a profit on the Rover when you leave and sell it!

[w3jn]

Why in the world would anyone replace that wonderful IH 345?  I had the wide-ratio 4 speed manual in mine; the granny gear was quite useful.  In 4-low and granny gear you could get out, walk along the Scout, and get back in easily.In any event, once in a while eBay coughs up a halfway decent Scout, but they're pretty far and few between nowadays.

Rodger, sometimes I think you're my doppelganger - or vice versa    Same taste in radios, same troubleshooting mentality, and now I see we have exactly the same taste in cars.  My other car here in Athens is a 06 CTS, 3.6L 6-speed.  Raven black.

Unfortunately as a US government employee I'm prohibited from making a profit on selling personal property during my overseas tour.  That's one reason I got the Land Rover cheaply - the guy I bought it from had purchased it at an embassy auction for about the same price.   So if there's anything left of it, someone else will get lucky (or unlucky, as the case might be) down the line.

[WQ9E]

I agree with you on the IH motors.  They are strong enough to be used in medium duty trucks and a school bus so they are plenty big for a Scout.  They pull nicely without having to run at a screaming RPM and last a long time when treated with a little care.  My current GMC pickup has a 6.6L diesel and I test drove one of the 6L gas engines before buying but it just didn't feel right in the truck after having driven diesel engines in my previous two trucks.  Like the Scouts, with this engine and the 6 speed Allison automatic it has the equivalent of a medium duty driveline in a light duty vehicle and gets between 19 and 20 MPG running 1800 RPM at 70 MPH.

The CTS is the first RWD car I have owned since my 1985 Monte Carlo SS and I had forgotten how much I like RWD cars.  Our daughter was 5 when I ordered the car (2008 3.6DI) and had great fun helping place the order and choosing the color (Black Cherry) and it wasn't hard for her to convince me we needed a sunroof and nav system.  With the weight balance the CTS does surprisingly well in snow but it wouldn't take too much of a drift to stop it due to lack of ground clearance.  For our use, it is a design that GM got right.

Well, even if you can't make a profit you certainly shouldn't lose anything on the vehicle and you will have a lot of fun while you are there.  My wife spent a semester in Greece when she was an undergrad and wants to make a return trip so I have a feeling I will be over there for a trip next year.  I am working on a project to get back to Cuba for a few weeks and our next overseas trip after that will be to Greece.  After Greece I plan to attend a conference in Vietnam but that may be a solo trip.

[w3jn]

Be sure and contact me before you go, and let's hook up Rodger!

Cuba was one heck of an experience.  Lemme know how it's changed since you were there last (I lived there 2001-03).

[WQ9E]

JN,

Will do!

[K1JJ]

Todd,
        I've owned and repaired many british motorcycles. (Triumphs & BSAs) All had elecrical problemz!! Mechanically they were reliable as a rock if you had frequent bolt tightening partys. (parts would vibrate loose and fall off!) I put over 100k on a 1963 T-120. (for those who know what that was) And it never had to come home in the back of a truck.

BUT I'D LIKE TO HAVE $1 FOR EVERY TIME I HAD TO RIDE IT HOME AT NIGHT WITH NO LIGHTS AND A DEAD BATTERY              

I feel your pain....

Back in 1971  four of us from CT rode our Triumph 650 bikes to Calif and back.  It was a one month Easy Rider trip.  Somewhere around Illinois my bike started running intermitant. I troubleshot it myself in a campground - it took me two days to figure out the problem. The Lucas ignition key switch was intermitant to road vibration, I finally located one and it had like 12 wires coming and going to it. What a hassle fixing it out on the road with limited test gear!

On the same trip as we crossed the Calif line in the dark, my bike suddenly went dead.  After another hassle, it turned out the battery cable went intermitant and burned out all the lights on the bike from the soaring gen voltage.  

I used to watch in envy as those slick BMW bikes went humming by. Now those were road trippers!

T

[David, K3TUE]

Todd,
        I've owned and repaired many british motorcycles. (Triumphs & BSAs) All had elecrical problemz!! Mechanically they were reliable as a rock if you had frequent bolt tightening partys. (parts would vibrate loose and fall off!)

It sure is funny, and a little bit sad.

People have been bemoaning the loss of such good makes as Triumph and BSA for decades. I think it started with the Honda Cub and the Honda 750 four was the steak in the heart. People want to own and be seen on them, but many sure did complain about having to tighten fasteners on occasion and put up with a few minutes of buzzy hands after a few hours of big grins on a long twisty ride. Seems to me all the foreign players were just giving them what they were asking for. It was not until they stepped back and saw what the consequences were of what the wanted that they started lamenting.

Now most motorcycle editors would be inclined to say here that they don't miss those days of catching hell over oil spots on the garage floor and like all the actual riding they can do now. But that's not how I feel. Sounds to me like more appliance user apologies. But I'll spare you all the waxing about the soul of the machine, since you have all heard it before, and I know many of you feel it too, which is why we meet here and not elsewhere.

[David, K3TUE]

Re: American Trucks, I built my own "dream" Chevy.
A 94' Extracab 4x4 with a UPS/FritoLay 3.9Liter 4cyl turbo Cummins w/ a tow truck 5spd OD trans = 23 to 26 mpg on cut and filtered waste oil, #2 and pump Diesel.
I drive it 400mi/wk & love it!

That looks like a real serious motor. It's like I had heard somewhere recently about someone who has abandoned buying consumer appliances for his home in favor of industrial-grade ones because they are the only things designed to last and be serviced anymore. Of course his wife is not always happy with their appearance.

[WA3VJB]

Most of the Lucas troubles on older cars revolved around grounds, those terrible Smiths guages, and voltage regulators when I worked in that shop. 

--

Then there were the XJs with the SU carbs, and the owners who never knew to fill 'em with oil...

Hey I still have my Uni-Syn, John, and yeah, topping the damper oil is "routine maintenance," both on the British-made SU and the knockoff Hitachi side drafts I have on the Datsun Roadster. I use the Uni-Syn on them when needed, but I tell ya, it was a foreshadowing of the Nippon Invasion in the automotive world, that Japan came out with a sports car that was reliable, woo wooh !

On the 'Healey, I had an intermittent in the ballast resistor off the coil. Damn thing would work fine for months, nay, weeks at a time, and then suddenly the points would overheat, melting the plastic rubbing block. I got so where I could swap in a new set in about 10 mins, using the paper end of a match as a feeler guage.

International Harvester.  In the early 1970s, our neighbor across the street was a dealer for them.  He ordinarily brought home a demonstrator 'Scout, and I really liked that model. However, somewhere during production there was some sort of problem with the drive shafts where the torque would twist the damn thing like a pretzel. It happened on his once and I was amazed at what the driveshaft looked like.

Always the salesman -- he said, "too much power !"

[W2PFY]

Bought from a colleague who's leaving Athens.  The first non-American car I've owned - 1991 Land Rover Discovery.

On a side note: What cha doing over there?

Can you here the guys on 75?

[w3jn]

Paul, the IH 345 has enough torque that it'll start out in any gear with minimal slipping of the clutch.  Put it in 4-lo and bang the throttle and there's probably enough torque to bend the Brooklyn Bridge.

Terry, I can hear some of the big guns on 75 sometimes.  Depends largely on my noise level here.

[WU2D]

My second car cost $500. It was a 1965 Dodge Dart Slant 6. I bought it on an Indian reservation near Massena NY and it already had mega miles on it.

Constant TLC to keep the brakes happy but indestructible motor! Had it much longer than I should have - I used it though college - New York, Ft Lauderdale years and finally Montana where I sold it for $300.

I ran a National NCX-3 in it and still had room for a passenger in the front seat.

Mike WU2D