New Car for my kid

[ERS]

In 1975 I was primed to buy my first car and a coworker at a summer construction job had a 69 Plymouth Satellite silver with black interior 2 door 318 4 barrell. I was to pick it up on a Sat morning and when I got there Junior was in hospital and the car was toast. He took it out for a final run and flipped it end for end. Later I found a 69 Mustang Mach 1 with a 351 in it ($1200) and got my mother to take me to pick it up. When we got to the dealer she asked which car was I getting and when I pointed it out she did a U turn and took me home. 'No 17 year old in my house is driving that she said!' I lost the itch for a car then for awhile and ended up with a VW Beetle a couple of years later. Spent every Saturday working on that Beetle, I would trade 20 of them for that Civic. Although I really wish I had ended up with the Mustang!

 

[Kelvininin]

You are way nicer than I plan on being with my three kids. My rents never bought my brother or I a car or paid for school. I tell my kids, much like their old man, to save their pennies, they are on the hook for both, and they have to move out or pay rent after graduating high school.

 

[CrabbyJack]

My first car was a '64 Volkswagen Beetle that my grandparents bought in Germany and shipped home after driving it for a summer over there. My dad bought it from them (I don't think they liked him very much) and my older sister and I "shared" it after he was done with it. By the time my sister and I got it, the heater air boxes had rusted through, so it had no heat or defrost. We used 2 ice scrapers in the winter, one with a brush attached for outside and a smaller one for the inside windows. On very cold mornings, I had to go chip the ice out of the fuel pump before the engine would run, and many times I had to do it in the afternoons, too. 6V systems didn't work very well in Minnesota winters for starting cars, so many times I would have to call dad to come and tow me home after the battery died. His idea was that lashing the front bumper of the VW to the back bumper of his van was the best way to tow it... until the first turn and the VW bumper was ripped right off. When I left home I left that POS there forever, I thought. 2 years later, he's getting nasty letters from the city about the derelict car in his front yard, so he says he's "giving" the car to me, as I lived farther out and no one would care if I had it in MY front yard. So we're towing it to my house, I'm in the VW and he's in his van, with at least a 6' piece of rope this time, and of course the brake pedal is rusted solid so I have no brakes and every time we come to a stop sign I crash into the back of his van. We get just about a mile from my house, when we hit a big bump, and the driver's seat, you know, the one I'm sitting in, falls through the rusted floor boards with me still sitting in it. I spent the rest of the trip half squatting over the driver's seat with one hand trying to hold up the back of the seat and the other one trying to steer the car. I HATED that POS car.

CrabbyJack

 

[CrabbyJack]

BTW, my kid drives my old '99 Accord with 240,000 miles on it. He's learning about mechaniccing by doing all of his own work on it, like CV joints/axle, brake rotors, etc. He works at NAPA, so he gets plenty of help and ideas from the other guys working there and he gets parts using his employee discount. He'll have different stories to tell...

CrabbyJack

 

[majicmaker]

My first car was a '64 Volkswagen Beetle that my grandparents bought in Germany and shipped home after driving it for a summer over there. My dad bought it from them (I don't think they liked him very much) and my older sister and I "shared" it after he was done with it. By the time my sister and I got it, the heater air boxes had rusted through, so it had no heat or defrost. We used 2 ice scrapers in the winter, one with a brush attached for outside and a smaller one for the inside windows. On very cold mornings, I had to go chip the ice out of the fuel pump before the engine would run, and many times I had to do it in the afternoons, too. 6V systems didn't work very well in Minnesota winters for starting cars, so many times I would have to call dad to come and tow me home after the battery died. His idea was that lashing the front bumper of the VW to the back bumper of his van was the best way to tow it... until the first turn and the VW bumper was ripped right off. When I left home I left that POS there forever, I thought. 2 years later, he's getting nasty letters from the city about the derelict car in his front yard, so he says he's "giving" the car to me, as I lived farther out and no one would care if I had it in MY front yard. So we're towing it to my house, I'm in the VW and he's in his van, with at least a 6' piece of rope this time, and of course the brake pedal is rusted solid so I have no brakes and every time we come to a stop sign I crash into the back of his van. We get just about a mile from my house, when we hit a big bump, and the driver's seat, you know, the one I'm sitting in, falls through the rusted floor boards with me still sitting in it. I spent the rest of the trip half squatting over the driver's seat with one hand trying to hold up the back of the seat and the other one trying to steer the car. I HATED that POS car.
CrabbyJack

Ding Ding Ding Ding!!!! CrabbyJack, YOU WIN!!!! Best first car story so far!!! Rotflmao!!! :laugh:

 

[hppants]

When I was still 17, having saved my nickels for a while (well, at least 6 months....), one hot afternoon, I met my father just outside the house. In my memory, he was a giant. Not so much in physical size, but in stature. That man walked on water. When he spoke, the earth moved. I finally worked up enough nerve to ask:

(Pants) "Dad, can I talk to you?"

(Father) "Sure son, what's up?"

(Pants) "Dad, I've been working for my first car, and I've got some money saved up. I'm getting close and I was wondering if you would be willing to help me out a little?"

(Father) "Sure son, I'd be happy to help you out."

(Pants) "Thanks Dad, I knew I could count on ya. There's this Camero that I've found.."

(Father, interrupting) "Yeah, sure - I'll give you some help. I'll let you park it in my driveway. Right here just behind my boat."

And that was the end of the conversation. He walked and faded away into the distance.

One year later, I put twenty crisp Benjamin's down on a 1982 Ford Escort. 4 on the floor, no radio, crank windows. But for the first time in my life, I was truly free. And it was mine. All mine.....

 

[Bounce]

Kudos to your wise Dad.

My Dad and I worked for most of the summer, hand sanding and prepping for paint (water sanding every little (and big) chip) on a 64 Convertible Corvair Monza (heaven forbid that it might be the more powerful 150Hp Spyder motor). Once done he took it to a friend and we got it painted Competition Blue. Only recently has Ford pulled that color out of mothballs and used it on select Mustangs. His buddy also gave it a nice orange peel finish at no extra cost

).

He GAVE me my first car. It stunned me. That doesn't happen in my family. Turns out he had bought it to make it into a dune buggy. After he installed short-throw shifting linkages and did something to the suspension (new-for-1965, Z17 package) for better handling, he realized he couldn't afford to see the project through to completion so this was a way to get it out of his garage (Mom and he were divorced and he was remarried) while earning some kid points in the process. This was 1972 so I got to drive it my Senior year of HS.

[Never had the control issues that Nader genned up about the model which were later discredited. To this day, this is where I attribute as the beginning of learning "smooth" as a mantra for how to handle vehicles. My brother, who cut his teeth on Cevelle's and Hust Rock Crusher shifters amazes me with his SLAMming through gears and hard/jerking steering inputs even on his current cars/trucks.]

Small world... the ducts that ran from the engine bay to the vents under the back seat (and the defroster) didn't work on mine either, CJ. I have one of those "quicky defroster guns" and would turn it on and put it inside my Army Surplus OD Green Field Jacket in the winter. My Brother's friend had a Beetle that had rusted through floorboards which you had to carefully put your feet around to avoid while watching the road whiz by.

One thing I learned from, and used with my Daughters, was that getting them invested in the car (sweat-equity in my case) gives them something to value in it. Both my girls took better care of their cars than any of their friends did.