Sinners AZ Tx adventure, or True Tx hospitalty

As the Sinners aZ are returning to AZ after the LSRU on sunday afternoon we get a call from a brother sinner that left ahead of us that he's having overheating problems. We are coming into Ozona and he's on the side of the road in Ft Stockton.

He gets it off the hiway and to the auto zone there. The rest of us catch up around 3 in the afternoon and finish getting the water pump on. As we are doing this I see anice 40 ford pull into the lot. I'm thinking, "Nice car, Healthy sound, bad choice of wheels". Had weld rodlites on it.

Gentleman gets out walks over, says "saw the cars, need any help?"

Thinking that we have the problem in hand, we say we're alright, thanks. Caht for a little bit, he's on his way. Get the water pump finished up. fire the motor.

Jesse, car owner, calls me over, asks "What do you think this noise is?"

A really bad rod knock, Ask them "Didn't you hear this?" His wife says, "No, I had my IPOD on."!!!!

It's getting to be about 4 o:clock on Sunday afternoon in the middle of Tx. We start figuring our options, can we change out the motor in the parking lot, rent a tow dolly, FIND a motor?

A call to U-Haul lets us know that the closest is in Odessa, An hour away and hey close at 5.
A check with the people at Autozone, Yeah, my brother has an SBC, $400."

We're thinking that there are 6 guy here, we can muscle this in and out. Then the brother decides not to sell his motor!

Autozone clerks now the guy with the 40 ford, a quick call and he's on the way. this gentleman returns at about 5:30 on a Sunday afternoon! We explain the predicament to him, he says "You can use my garage, have some tools, come and see where it is". A couple of guys follow him over, About half an hour later the come back with his trailer, say lets loa it up.

Turn out the "garage" is a converted turn of the century machine shop. What a neat place, Has 2 overhead cranes that run the length of the building, about 10 cars parked inside, looked like 20,000 sq ft, 16 ft high ceiling of pressed tin. We wee in awe to say the least. Then he says come on a tour of thother building and outside storage!

Second building was on the other side of about a 3 acre lot. We walk over and get inside, another 5 projects, including a 60 ford Sunliner. An local ex-drag car with a 427 side oiler with factory cast iron headers!

We are still trying to figure what to do about the motor, do we store the car there and come back later with a trailer, what to do?

Meanwhile, Sidney, the owner of the shop is making a couple of calls.He says "how about a motor out of a 78 truck, running when parked, $400." We're figuring, yeah, running when parked!

It's a friend of his, tows the truck over to where we are. I see the truck, hot wire the motor.
The deal is done!

Now we just have to get the one out an the other in!

Split into 2 crews, Sidney's son shows up with his work truck, as a crane , compressor and air tools. Whoohoo!!!

With his help we get the motor out of the donor while the othe crew is pulling the motor out of the chevy. 8 guys , 3 ladies for moral support, we had a great time. Picked up pizza, had a couple of bats fly thorough the shop keep us bug free! A fantastic time.

After getting there at about 6 and looking around for about an hour we have the motor in place about 11. Have to change the intake, edelbrock won't fit on the stock q-jet manifold.
Had to use the old gasket since therewas no place open at that hour and Sidney didn't have a set,even though he looked.

We got everything buttoned up, started the donor motor, after correcting the starter wiring. Jesse, owner of the car, had said the he thought the key switch was bad since he had to jump the starter every time. Found that the wire from the switch was on the run terminl instead of the start terminal! Wow it starts now!!!

Good sounding motor, Got him out the door and headed back to tucsomn at about2:30 since he had to be at work on monday. The rest of us stayed to clean up and generally wind down after the thrash. We took up a collection among ourselves to try and thank Sidney and his son for their help. They both refused it saying that it was fun! We decided to make a donation to the H.A.M.B. father in Sidney's name as a thank you for the Texas hospitality!

To top it off we got a call from our nomad Sinner Jay that he was broke down outside Ft Stockton Tx. Sidney to the rescue AGAIN!!! Gets his trailer and gets him off the road.

Jay was driving the 35 plymouth with the hemi. Broke a pushrod. Sidney said he has a couple of hemis at his other house! What are the chances?

This may be a long story but we can't thank the New friends enough!

thanks to Sidney and his son form the Sinners AZ, jerry, MikeD, Timmay, Jesse, prospect Gary, friend Victor, and lady friends and wives Mischonne, Debbie, and jessica.

True Texas hopitality and hot rod friendship!


jerry

 

Stories like that are never too long. Sidney sounds like a pretty stand up guy, to say the least. The good kharma comes around to those that sow it.

 

Damn! What a story. I'm glad you guys got it pulled together.

When I heard about Jay driving from Canada!?!? Whoa! Unreal!

 

good read.glad you got it all handled.jerry do you ever go some where and NOT end up working on something.

 

what's more fun, the events themselves, or the adventure of getting there and back? i know my answer...

 

It was good to run to TX with you guys. Gald all worked out and you made it back OK.

 

awesome

 

Holy crap that is an awesome story. This is why I love this place and Texas!

 

That's a cool story and pretty amazing.

I wonder if that is the guy that has all the cars inside the building in Ozona? I didn't stop there this time but as I recall there is a bunch of real high dollar Ford stuff (Cobra, GT-40 maybe) inside a glass paneled building in front of a hotel there.

 

Hmm... 949 words from Jerry and not one of them was 'tequila'... weird.

Gotta love that kind of hospitality - sounds like a new regular stop on the way into/out of Texas. Thanks for sharing this, Jerry!

 

Oh yeah, now I remember, going to Phoenix a few years back and hit a deer knocking out the starter and wiring. Caught a ride to town, got a starter from the AutoZone and the guy gave me a ride back to the car. Anyway, Fort Stockton is a fine place with a lot of good folks. I'll bet a lot of people know ole Sidney in Ft. Stockton...at least they do now huh?

 

Damn Jerry, that WAS an adventure. Dude, good spendin' time with you again, as usual.
MoKan, here we come.
BigKen

 

No, this is in Ft Stockton. Just a guys hobby shop. And he doesn't have everything moved over there yet.

I can recall seeing A 60 sunliner with a 427, 37 ford coupe, next o a 50 ford shoebox,a 32 chevy, A chopped 49 ford, 3 or 4 30's ford pick ups, a 54merc outside, numerous others outside.

too busy at the time to recall others. It was just sensory overload.


jerry

 

GREAT story, hats off to everyone that helped out. 5 star post for sure.

 

Jerry, I again must thank all the AZ Sinners to include me and a buddy on the trip to LSRU. I had a blast and the adventure getting back home was something I will not soon forget. Plus seeing you in a brand new WHITE t-shirt was priceless! Next year I will be in the "A"ttitude you can mark my word on that. We are going to have to make Syd's place a regular stop from this point foward. what a great guy!

OH and you forgot to mention the 37 ford hump back that you drooled all over.

 

This is great stuff! Love to hear adventures like this!

 

that is when having a belly button sbc comes in handy.try finding a running j-2 olds,or a 264 nailhead in the middle of nowhere.

glad our state left a good impression.see you next year.

-danny

 

im so proud to be a texan right now. great read....proof there's still the good ones out there...

 

damn Jerry sounds like you all should have some new members in Tejas?

 

Sounds like that "gentleman" was "street rodder" :-O
See, they're not all bad.

Glad everything worked out well and hope you guys all come back next year.

 

cool story

 

One of the many reasons Texas is known as "The Great State"

 

And I thought it was fun changing your Transmission at the Drags, this was a damn party.

I'm guessing the old SBC is still bouncing around in the back of your truck?

Good job fellas.

 

This is why I like Road trips....sounds like a real adventure!

 

No, it's in Scrap Irons truck. I've got a small jaolopy racer body in mine that I brought back for a friend!

This was a truly memorable trip.


jerry

 

My coworkers from the U.K. and Thailand say Texans are larger than life.

They're Right!!!

 

ALL I CAN SAY IS WOW........I am a member of one of the greatest brotherhood of friends that i have ever known my car club the Sinners Arizona. These guys really helped me out and really made me get all mushy inside as i pulled away from the Garage.

Jerry got all the basics of the story correct. Me and my girl left Austin ahead of everyone to pick up the kids from grandmas house and so i can head on into work on monday. my car ran into Austin Fine and was running great heading back. I was too tired after already hitting about 5 hours of drive time and Jessica says she wanted to drive so i could nap. we start the car, everything is fine and as soon as i lay in the back seat she yells that something was wrong. we shut the car down after only going two miles down the freeway. got to the side saw it had overheated. thats when our good luck and the great texas hospitality began.......

Luckily my Bel Air attracks attention and we had a big gentleman named Frank pull over. he offered some help and i said the car overheated. He said he had a buddy that owned the tow company or he had a tow strap. He called his buddy and he charged us $50 dollars to come hook us up and drive us 9 miles to the autozone. I was more than happy and gave him a tip of equal value cause i know what a tow off the highway, on a sunday can actually cost. So i am at autozone in less than 30 minutes after we stop the car.

I called my fellow club members to get a status on where they were. I asked them to stop so i could rejoin the caravan just in case something else happened. When they arrived i was buttoning up the water pump and i noticed this yellow street rod following them in. as i finished the last bolts the man asked if everything was ok and i said just a water pump, no prob and he said if we needed anything he had a shop we could use. I was already like "wow, people are cool around here", especially with the way i look, big 6'5" fully tattooed mexican that looks like trouble. We start the car and right away my heart sunk. i called Jerry over being our club Guru and before i could ask he said oh shit......

We all began to figure what to do. Mike (hotrodnailhead) right away said i need a trailer, Gary (scrap iron) and his friend Victor offered to drive to Odessa to the nearest Uhaul and be back in the morning, and then we all thought swap the motor. we asked inside of autozone to see if they had a crate motor for sale and they said no, but we could help you out. The lady inside of Autozone was named Marie and she was calling around town to get us some help. from the owner of the Trailer Dealership, to her brother who owned a repair shop and other people in town that could sell us a motor. Me and Scrap Iron were asking everyone that walked in if they had a motor for sale or knew of one. just as i was giving up and could see that everyone was getting tired in the sun i remembered the old man that stopped by earlier. i walked into autozone and asked if they knew him and Marie said "oh, thats sidney. He's a really nice man. let me call him." so she called and talked to him and she turned around and said that he was on his way. i walked out of the autozone and told the guys that they called him and he was on his way, and literaly 10 seconds later he pulled up. we told him the situation and he said come with me.

So i get in his car and he said he can take me to his shop and we can do what we need there. If not we could BORROW his trailer and "just make sure you bring it back". I was STOOPIFIED.... this guy does not know who we are, or anyone that might know us and he offers up his trailer???? the third option was to leave my car at his shop. lock it up take the keys with me and just come back when i could. Then we arrived at his shop. it was a huge turn of the century brick building with a faded machine shop logo and lettering on the side. he said lets come on in so you can tell me if you want to use my shop. He opens the door and i see this chopped shoebox, a COMPLETE 32 chevy 5 window coupe, a 36 ford pickup, a 37 humpback and god knows how many other cars. For a minute there i was like ok, this is divine intervention and i just walked into gods garage........ the best part was i forgot what was happening with my car. This man offers his personal tools, air tools, jacks, everything we needed was there for us to use and get us on the road. Once again i was in SHOCK. then he said you want to check out the place???

He walks me around back and opens this chainlink fence. as i turned the corner, the wood got even bigger as i looked at what he had back there. chevy trucks, ford trucks, more mid thirties ford cabs, a model t coupe body, flathead motors, rocket motors, caddy motors and i mean shit...... HEAVEN. He's touring me around the property tells me what he paid for his shop (which was less than what he must have into that street rod) and explains that his shop is HALF a city block. that all three of the buildings on the half block were his!!!! he walks me into this little building in the back where he has these two imaculate 36 ford pickup cabs and that starliner jerry talked about tucked in there....... WOW. He offered up the trailer to bring the car back from autozone, so I called up Scrap iron and said get over here fast, you guys will not believe this place...

to fast forward a little everyone gets there and tours the place. Jerry along with the rest of us were walking around like little kids in disneyland when Sidney calls me over. Sidney found us a motor. We pulled the car into the garage and started the break down. everyone there was getting dirty including the girls. the donor arrived and we divided into the teams and started the swap. Sidney offered his fridge full of his goodies and we sent out for pizza. the girls were having a such a hoot watching and helping that sidney was laughing saying he should have bought his grill so he could cook us up some real texas steaks and gotten some beer so we could have all gotten drunk and made it a real good time!!!

all in all we finished everything and the new motor made it 700 miles to Arizona fine. i am eternally greatfull and thankfull to everyone there. Marie at autozone, sidney and his son, my sinner brothers Jerry, Mike D, Timmay, their girls, The newest prospect to our family Scrap Iron and his buddy Victor. Thank you for never thinking twice about leaving me stuck or alone to fend for myself. To the girls i say thank you for the help and the conversations about how i would have to "payback" the guys, and to the guys for all of you hard work to get me back on the road at 2:00 a.m.. We said this made this trip unforgettable and it will definitely be a story to tell the grandkids. I will never forget this. I Love You guys and i am in debt to you ....... especially Sidney and his son. you can bet that i will definitely will be stopping by in and visiting them on the way out to the LSR next year.......

 

i was just thinking, may be off base here but you should make sidney an honorary member of the sinners, may be cool since he was such a helpful dude and didnt want to accept any money. and if you guys are ever up in havasu hit me up.

 

I already thought about that and presented it to the club leadership

 

Jerry,
It was nice to meet you, Gary and Victor.
We had the cabin next door to ya'll.
I drive that orange 50 Chevy truck.

Glad ya'll made it back all in one piece.