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Not quite Friday... GFMPH off topic a bit... What was your 1st car?

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Posted 6/6/2013 5:17 PM (GMT -5)
My first car was brand new...AMC Jeep CJ-7Purchased it in Korea while in the service! They had a program for overseas military sales! I paid for it for a year before it was built! I personally went to the manufacturing plant in Toleto OH. They gave us a tour and allowed us to follow the vehicle down the line as it was built! The employees gave my Jeep special care because I went in uniform! Getting into it fresh off the line was one of the most memorable experiences I have ever had! I can still remember the smell of all the new stuff!
Posted 6/6/2013 7:02 PM (GMT -5)
'72 metallic green 4-door Ford Torino bought in '78 about a year after I went in the USAF.  Family car with a 351 Windsor under the hood.  Rolled a lot of miles on the thing and finally sold it on Guam before I transferred back stateside. I suspect my first son was conceived in that thing yeah
Posted 6/6/2013 8:14 PM (GMT -5)
When I was 15 I bought a wrecked 1959 MGA sports car for $150.   My father and I rebuilt it and it was my daily driver until we had our first son in 1976.   I sold it for $750 and thought I did real good.   Today the car is worth 25 grand!!!

I do have my original 1961 Chrysler that was my grandfather's car from new.   A great ride.

Posted 6/6/2013 8:41 PM (GMT -5)
I was fortunate to have learned to drive in a '69 Buick Electra 225 2 dr (think it had a 400 hp engine?) and the Buick Skylark with a 350 V8.  So, I was a little partial to the GM cars.

My first ride, and boy I wish I had her today, was a 1969 Chevy Caprice 4 dr hardtop with a 350 V8 (2 barrel).  That car had the Comfortron (set your temp) heat controls, factory AC, factory 8 track, and a bench seat that my sweetie could sit right next to me while I was driving.  (Long held that the divorce rate went up in this country with the increased popularity of bucket seats).  It was a medium sort of metalic blue with a dark blue vinyl top.  Oh, and did I mention the Corvette style rally wheels?

I bought her at 7 or 8 years old with 57,000 miles on her for $1,500.  Served me well for many years. 

***sigh***

Ashamed to admit that I traded her in on a Ford Escort.)

Posted 6/6/2013 8:43 PM (GMT -5)
(Picture this car in blue: http://www.chooseyouritem.com/classics/files/323000/323262.html )
Posted 6/7/2013 1:10 AM (GMT -5)
1965 Austin Healy Sprite convertible--fire engine red with racing stripes. It went toTurkey with my wife and 1st son..His seat was my wife's lap., Back to Illinois on military leave and had 2nd son in Berwyn hospital--now 2 kids,wife, in a 2 seater sports car. Left for Nam 10 days later and a year later wife picked me up at O'hare in a gray 68 VW beattle--Said my sports car would never start so she sold it. Put 100k's on the beattle..:2nd night home from Nam asked wife for ckechbook so I could buy some brie cheese and model wine..Brought me 1 check and informed me that 2 couldn't live out of same checkbook--Haven't seen it since! Whatever happened to the shy girl I married--lol?? smhair
Bill
Posted 6/7/2013 3:35 AM (GMT -5)
a 1960 Chevy Impala I bought for $200 bucks. fastest car I ever owned and the most powerful too.
Posted 6/7/2013 6:37 AM (GMT -5)
75 used Ford Granada with broken leaf springs, lasted about a year before I totaled it.
Posted 6/7/2013 8:24 AM (GMT -5)
My second car was a 65 Ford Falcon..bought it "wrecked".
Posted 6/7/2013 8:36 AM (GMT -5)
1970 Plymouth Barracuda. It's been sitting in my barn since 1986. It was running when I parked it.
Jeff
Posted 6/7/2013 8:53 AM (GMT -5)
Jeff,if our cars could talk they would have some interesting stories to tell.
Posted 6/7/2013 9:10 AM (GMT -5)
Jeff there is room in my garage for the Cuda, if you need the room.....just sayin'
Posted 6/7/2013 9:15 AM (GMT -5)
Yellow '67 Camaro with black interior and black vinyl roof. Sold it in 1972 when I moved to California. It needed a valve job and I needed money. Got to Calif. and bought a '72 Vega. Definetly a bad trade off.

Currently driving a red Hummer H-3

Bill from Florida
Posted 6/7/2013 9:31 AM (GMT -5)
My first car was a 1959 DeSoto with a push button automatic transmission. So rusty that when you took off from a light you left 1/2 lb. of car behind. They used a lot of salt in Ohio. Problem was I was 14 years old and lied about my age buying it from a gas station owner. At 14 I was 6-2 and looked older than my age. My mom had died a couple years earlier and my dad more or less just left me and my sister to raise ourselves. Although my sister learned where I stashed the car and my dad made the original owner buy it back because of my age. Thus once I turned 16 I bought a 1960 Chevy Biscayne with a standard on the column shift. Needless to say I burnt out a clutch learning how to drive stick. Six months later I traded it for a big old boat a 1960 Oldsmobile Super 88(I think). with bad springs but power everything else. I changed the leaf springs and kept that car for a year. Even though it was officially my third car it was my first automotive love. Even though it too had a significant amount of rust.
Posted 6/7/2013 4:02 PM (GMT -5)
My first car was a '62 chev corvair...4 speed manual... I think a guy named Ralph Nader had a special interest in this chev model. I still have the (my) original ownership card in a box at work. I was 17. It got me to my part-time job and finishing high school before going off to college.

My parents and kid brother just moved away to another part of the country. So, the car was not only a temporary home at times, it was storage for all my worldly property (the front trunk).

The heater hoses from the rear motor had long rotted out, so I had a suction cup heater element and fan I attached to the windshield in winter and plugged into the cigarette lighter as needed. The gearbox was connected to the stickshift by some really badly engineered cabling system. I lost reverse. Parallel parking was a hoot as I just opened the driver door and pushed the car backwards with my left foot. Then the starter went. So, I just got used to parking at the right end of an incline so I could get going again.

I often think of how much simpler things were, LOL.

 

Posted 6/8/2013 7:29 PM (GMT -5)
1971 Chevy Vega. Won it brand new the summer after my senior year. Total piece of crap. Haven't won a thing of consequence since shakehead

Tom
Posted 6/8/2013 8:20 PM (GMT -5)
1967 Plymouth Fury. My dad was a K.C. cop and they all drove Fury's on the job. Maroon, with bench seats, auto transmission,...grandpa car. When prom came around. I rented a car with a little more style. Got totaled when I was T-boned on the Country Club Plaza (Google it) while following my then girlfriend home to be sure she made it ok. The car that got me was a delivery car for a local drugstore. Driver and his buddy were higher than kites. Insurance for the store made good on the loss. They even paid for new hockey gear.
Borrowed her car for awhile until Christmas Eve 2 months later, when was T-boned again.
I thought that she was bad luck, dumped her, started dating my wife and we've been together over 39 years now. In truth, I actually had eyes for my wife before the ex-girls car got totalled, so the Plymouth and the Monte Carlo were not complete losses.

Knock on wood, haven't had an accident since. Have owned several cars since, the worst being a Chevy Vega that we took over payment on for in-laws. POS that I sold the month it was paid off.
Now in my 60's and drive pick-ups, Chevy, Dodge and find that I like slower speeds than I used to. Bob
Posted 6/8/2013 9:12 PM (GMT -5)
My first car was a hand-me-down 1960 white Ford Falcon.  Ron's was a flashy 1967 Ford GTO.  He thought he was so cool!  LOL!
Posted 6/8/2013 10:25 PM (GMT -5)
Tom, I remember too, when Vega's were new. My father took me to the Chevy dealer in Dade City, FL when I was still in high school. We were amazed that there was rust showing on a brand new car on the lot, around the bottom of the rear window, and on the inside edge of the back fender. Figured that wasn't a good omen.
-----------------------------
Don't laugh, but I actually have a good Yugo story. Bought one new in NH in 1986, paid 3,990 bucks brand new. Never had a lick of trouble in the 3 years and 43k miles I put on it. Guess I was one of the luckier Yugo owners. Think I hold the land speed record in one at 93 mph, coming off a big hill in Freedom, NH with a tail wind. Probably a miracle it held together. Traded it later on a new 1989 VW Fox Sports, and got back most of my money on the Yugo.

david
Posted 6/9/2013 12:17 PM (GMT -5)
David,

I can believe it about the new Vega having rust. No wonder it was a give away. By the time I paid the tax and the endless repairs, I probably could have purchased a better car for what I put into it the 4 years I owned it. I got me through college, but the first thing I did when I graduated and got a job was get a different car. Even Yugos were better than the Vega.

Tom
Posted 6/9/2013 12:44 PM (GMT -5)
Tom,

Another terrible "new" car, not sure if you remember these or not (c.1971) were the Austin Marinas. I worked at a Datsun dealership that also sold Austins. We would get cars in not only missing minor things like outside mirrors, or door handles, but even got in a group that were missing the steering wheels! So we couldn't drive them in from the docks in Tampa, FL. Talk about rust, geez, right off the ship, rust out around the windshields and rear windows, something about not using galvanized metal. I pitied the person that bought them. Saw one restored at Eurofest 2012 here in Greenville last year, was amazed that even one lasted till now, took pictures of it.

The Yugo got a bad rap in my opinion, or again, I was just lucky with mine. Where else could you buy a brand new car for under 4,000 bucks, even in 1986. It even came with a full tool kit, spare lights and fuses, and a first aid kit. They were built on a certain Fiat take off. Mine had 1.1 liter engine, 43 hp if I remember. But to most people, they are still remembered as one of the "worse" cars ever made.

david
Posted 6/9/2013 1:54 PM (GMT -5)
David

I do remember the Austins.  Never really saw many in our part of the country so I never knew much about them good or bad.  When it comes to the "good old days" that sure doesn't include many cars.  Most cars today are heads and tails better than the ones in the 60's and 70's.  about the only thing I wish we could go back to is the 25 cent gas wink . 

Tom

Posted 6/9/2013 3:31 PM (GMT -5)
My first real "family car"
Ok, I had the Austin Healy Sprite and then a VW beatle with a 1500 export engine--the Germans only had 1200 or 1300cc motors..received a lot of hand and finger waves on the autobahn as I passed them! With 2 growing boys and a 80# old english sheepdog needed something bigger--ordered a 1975 volvo station wagon through diplomatic sales. Wife developed a fear of flying and refused to see an army psychologist--Put her, 2 boys, and sheepdog on QE!! from LaHarve to Bayonne; there went our savings..
At Bayonne wife, family, dog, and baggage sat in front of Hertz for an hour--no credit card and only an international driver's license--manager finally put her in a car and she was stopped by a tropper in PA for speeding. She wouldn't get out of the car and tropper couldn't put his hand in the window with my dog about ready to kill him..looked at driver's license and gave her a free pass--no ticket.
I showed up about a month later in the states--a dock strike so no car..finally it came in so went to Bayonne..Both NJ and NY wanted thousands in tax so went back to dock--worker there took diplomatic plates off a Mercedes and put them on Volvo. Probably a felony if caught and my Top Secret clearance would be history--jail time?--statute of limitations (lol).
Worst car I ever owned--needed a Swede and fuel injection parts to go with car--end of story.
Bill
Posted 6/9/2013 5:36 PM (GMT -5)
Bill - was your Sprite a Bug-Eyed, or one of the "newer" style ones? Curious. Nothing makes a person smile like a bug eyed sprite, lol. Only Swede car I ever owned, and it was fairly rare, was a Saab 95 Station Wagon. 4 speed on the column (took some getting use to) and this weird free-wheeling device to save gas, but dangerous to use. Even had 3 rows of seats. But always something going wrong, was happy to unload it, but a unique car. Called it the "Cygnet".

Tom - I agree with your statement, many cars in the late 60's through 80's really weren't made well, and well subjective, were ugly as sin I think the quality in many of our cars since 2000 has greatly improved.

My current pride and join is a good example.  I drive a 2010 Lincoln MKS, fully loaded.  Tuxedo Black with black leather and has so many high tech gizmo's, truly a "smart" car.  My fave feature among many, are the heated and a/c front seats, with massaging lumbar support.  With all my pain issues, its makes it possible for me to drive longer than I can normally stand to be in a car.  Only American car with 5 star safety ratings on all sides, thanks to the safety technology  that Ford "borrowed" from 'Volvo" when they owned them.

david

Post Edited (Purgatory) : 6/9/2013 4:39:48 PM (GMT-6)

Posted 6/10/2013 1:13 PM (GMT -5)
mine was a 1960 rambler with pushbutton automatic...this was in 1969. so embarrassing, but it was still INDEPENDENCE !
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