Re: Power Tour story

[Gary Futrell <gary-futrell@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

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That has to be the longest story I've read on this
list, but a great one. Gear heads are some of the best
people out there. You'll remember that trip forever.
Hope I can make it on the Power Tour someday.

  Gary



 
> This will be a pretty long post, but I think it's a
> great story about how
> many good people are out there .
> 
>  
> 
> The beginning of this story is my mistake of having
> someone else work on my
> '62 Dart - someone who only had $$ as the incentive.
>  I had an oil and trans
> leak, and wasn't having any luck on my own trying to
> fix them, so I took it
> to a local Tuffy shop I had used for years for
> brakes/mufflers.  The owner
> had a pretty nice older Chevy Malibu drag car, so I
> figured he was a 'car'
> guy and would take good care of my Dart.  He took
> the oil pan off and the
> trans out (at my request - I planned to get it
> rebuilt at a local trans shop
> I had also used for years).
> 
>  
> 
> He said the rear main seal had been installed
> backwards - not sure why it
> just started leaking after being that way for 3
> years, but hey, he was a
> 'car' guy, so I believed him.  He said he could
> install a new one without
> having to drop the crank.
> 
>  
> 
> Time passes . trans gets rebuilt . I deliver trans
> back to 'car' guy, and he
> puts the engine/trans back together.  Calls me to
> say the intermediate shaft
> driving the oil pump snapped shortly after he fired
> it up for the first
> time.  Blamed it on 42 year old steel.  I bought a
> new one, delivered it to
> him, and was driving the car home shortly
> thereafter.
> 
>  
> 
> Couple weeks pass . then I drove the Dart from Novi,
> MI to Saline, MI on the
> Saturday before I left to go on the Power Tour - to
> a guy's (Dan) home/shop
> where he works pretty much exclusively on Mopars.  I
> just purchased a new
> Road Demon carb and needed someone who knew what
> they were doing to set it
> up for me.  He turns out to be a *great* guy who
> really knows his stuff, so
> I know I'll be bringing the car here again whenever
> I need something done.
> 
>  
> 
> Sunday morning - my son and I leave at 7:30 am to
> drive to Springfield,
> Illinois to join the Power Tour.  I realize that I
> had left my complete Dart
> shop manual at the guy's shop in Saline, so we
> decide to drive there, as
> US-12 goes right by his place.  We get about 5 miles
> from his place when my
> oil pressure gauge goes to zero and the oil light
> comes on.  I immediately
> pull over ( in front of an Antiques store :-) ) .
> knowing full well that I
> just snapped another intermediate shaft.
> 
>  
> 
> I call Dan . note that it is 8:00 on a Sunday
> morning . he's in his shop,
> working on cars . says that he'll get me back on the
> road if I can get the
> car to him.  I call AAA and get a flatbed to come
> pick me up and delivery me
> the 5 miles to his shop.
> 
> I gladly wait about 2 hours while he finishes up
> with the car he was working
> on. He takes an intermediate shaft out of a car he
> has in his yard and gets
> me back on the road.  He mentions that he'd be
> concerned about something
> possibly floating in the oil pan causing the
> problem, but we're in a hurry
> and figure we'll be okay.
> 
>  
> 
> 10 hours later we show up in Springfield at 10:00
> pm, missing all the day's
> activities.  We crash at the hotel, get up early the
> next day to join the
> 3,000 other cars for the drive to Indianapolis.  45
> minutes on the road, the
> oil pressure hits zero again!  This time in the
> middle of no-fargin-where.
> We were at an intersection where there were 3 corn
> fields and a fenced-in
> grass field belonging to an oil pipeline company. 
> There was a guy mowing
> the grass . he shut down his tractor and came over
> to the fence and asked
> what was up.  When we explained, he said that he has
> at least three of those
> intermediate shafts for a small block Chrysler back
> at his shop . calls his
> brother, who then sends his son (this guy's nephew)
> out to deliver the part
> to us.  15 minutes after breaking down, I was
> holding a replacement part in
> my hand . and they didn't want any $$ for it. 
> Incredible.
> 
>  
> 
> I then called a friend of mine who was a shooter
> with Hot Rod Magazine, and
> he gave me a phone number to call.  I called it, and
> in less than an hour an
> automotive transport semi truck showed up, loaded up
> my car, and hauled it
> the rest of the way to Indianapolis Raceway Park for
> free.  Incredible.
> 
>  
> 
> Oh, by the way, during the 45 minutes I was broken
> down there, at least 100
> cars stopped, offering help.  My son and I took
> advantage of two kind souls
> who gave us rides (my son rode in a sweet '72 Road
> Runner - myself in a nice
> 68 Ford something-or-other).  Incredible.
> 
>  
> 
> We get to Indy at about 3:00 pm . enough time to
> watch a couple hours of
> drag racing and wander about the vendor tents and
> such.  My car shows up at
> about 5:00 pm.  The GM Goodwrench trailer goes out
> of their way to lend
> whatever assistance they can to help me fix my car .
> I have the part, but
> this time I'm determined to drop the oil pan and see
> what the heck is
> causing all the trouble.
> 
>  
> 
> I send my son to a local part store for 'stuff' . he
> returns with a
> hydraulic floor jack, a couple jack stands, and most
> important, a powerful
> telescoping magnet so we can get the end of the
> shaft out of the oil pump.
> We jack it up, get the jack stands in place, and
> drop the pan.
> 
>  
> 
> There had to be a whole tube of black silicone
> *inside* the oil pan . the
> 'car' guy from the first paragraph had used copious
> amounts of the stuff to
> seal the pan.  The screen on the oil pickup was
> completely full of the black
> goo.  No wonder the pump was seizing up and causing
> the shafts to snap.
> *sigh*
> 
>  
> 
> We were missing a few tools to finish the job, but a
> couple of folks that
> happened to stop by while we were working on the car
> came through.  We
> didn't finish that night, as they closed the track
> at 9:30 pm.  We got a
> 
=== message truncated ===

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