Yep, reality bites..... And no matter if we beat the horse or put it on life support, at some point we'll end up having to admit it's dead. Enjoy while you can....
Yes it seems within the last ten years in my area the traffic is a lot more impatient than before. Speeds on two lane routes are 65 minimum. And of course the four lanes are 75. I don't have any commute for work and live in a small community in a rural section. Still drive the old cars when I can. Stay off four lanes and out of any rush hour. Everyone is in too big of a hurry anymore and rarely show any patience. I really don't believe they teach defensive driving anymore.
My dailys are 66 GMC pks. But they have by todays standards marginal brakes. I been intending to upgrade them to front disk brakes and a dual master cyl. However last Saturday I bought three trucks a 76 ford 4 wheel drive 390 4 speed for $350. pretty good old truck. and a 1984 chev C20 350 granny 4 speed 2 wheel drive and its a good truck except for a caved in passenger door $350. and a 74 chev 1/2 ton not to good parts missing 350 automatic for $275. but it has a winters Z 28 intake on it. These where at a estate sale and not running when sold. That 74 could be a donor for a complete front crossmember disk brake swap for my older drum brake trucks.
Well there are only two times that I really hate KC and the metro is big enough to rank as a big city. When there is a ball game the freeway and surrounding streets get clogged to the max with idiots, and when it snows here. When it snows anyone who ever thought that they wanted to drive a car steals one and tries.
I drive the '59 Ford almost every day all winter unless there is snow and salt on the roads. I drive it in the rain too since I have wipers and a heater. On those cold 13 degree days, it was out. I did have it apart for a while making improvements for about a month. Even with the cam it has good street manners and does okay in traffic... but I watch that gauge... also the gas gauge, always seems to be heading south on me. Must be a correlation to my right foot or something. I do the Long Island Expressway with it, gobs of power and at 70 it runs at 3200 RPMs. It stops well with the front discs and I have 3-point belts in it. I probably could have built it a tad milder, but it is a blast to drive. I'd never take it through NYC so I'm locked up on Long Island unless I opt for a ferry ride to Connecticut and points north. The next one will be a little more friendly to the interstate.
And that, along with these other reasons is why I no longer own an old car. I live in Los Angeles, Traffic is horrible 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.People are idiots and can't drive. I like the safest car I can get.My wife drives a new Mazda 6 with literally every option she could get.It's a fun car, not FAST, but so what? Where is she going to drive fast?? We live in an apartment, I am retired , 64 years old and we have a semi fixed income. Plenty of savings, we don't worry, I won't buy a house just to get a garage.Don't want to pay 400k for a modest house!! I have a shoulder injury that NEVER stops hurting and two bad knees.No room for tools, project cars,no crawling under things! Those days are past. Had plenty of projects in the last 40 years. I drive a 2010 Mustang GT that I bought new, had Galpin Auto Sports tweak a bit, I love it, FAST, STOPS and sort of comfortable. Will do 140 plus, that's fast enough.Has what? 280 cubic inches? LOL Gee, safe and fast, works for me. Stops amazingly well , level, no nose dive, ABS really works. I still LOVE hot rods, old cars and drag racing, I always will, but as Ryan says, REALITY....my life is good, doesn't suck.
LOL Gimpy, you CAN get them, but they are, uh, fixer uppers. The median price of a house in LA is $622,900. Yep. I'd rather live in an apartment with LOW rent and have that money to SPEND!
Lets see if this works: https://www.facebook.com/100001406577138/videos/1356968734359999 If you don't have facebook sorry, but this was last weekend on the 91 Fwy near Knotts Berryland.,,
Th There are some right around me in Van nuys, Panorama city, Burbank, etc. Some you might invest in firearms before you move in! LOL Really, there are homes for that, just not great ones.Think about that 400 thousand dollars for a so so house! No thanks!
Loo Looks like fun! Cool car. But, is there a point you are trying to make?? As often as not, the 405 looks like this! Reality!
When the weather is warm, it's a nice drive to and from the shop on the two lane country road, tooling around my hometown, or some occasional pre-planned road trips. But road salted Wisconsin winters will eat an old car dead in a couple years, hauling paint gear around will trash anything nice, and city driving is possible but just not any fun. I'm not going to white knuckle anxiety drive through heavy traffic or on a fast highway just to prove a point. I'm glad I live in a place where I can have pleasant drives when the weather is nice but daily and all year round just isn't in the cards for me.
Well they say you can't go home. I could if I could afford it. I am going to happily retire to my 12k retirement villa with my 30x40 and low cost labor just 15 miles away. The older you get the more secure your neighborhood needs to be. his is not fear, nothing in my life is fear driven. Good logic says that when the lion grows old he needs to watch out for the younger lions.
A few back, I was forced to use my T Bucket as daily transportation. It was okay.... at first. I ended up concentrating more on the assholes around me, than the fun I should have been having.
My Point was that it is 'possible' to drive a hot rod in California traffic, though it was the weekend. Daily on the FWY? No way. My daily is the back roads, avoiding the FWY, of 12 miles. But when it is 100+ and I am at a major interchange or major on-ramp, I watch the temp as it climbs on the 454 panel, and hope I don't have brake fade in the Comet.
Of course you can drive a hot rod in LA traffic, I see it almost every time I drive.and on weekends I usually see some old restored cars as well, as well as exotics . Then you can actually have some fun, but as a daily driver? You can, but is it fun really? Whatever, to each their own. Once my idea of a GREAT car was raw horsepower, now I'd REALLY like to get a 1950 Plymouth Deluxe like my Grandfather had, and we inherited.It was our car when I was a kid! Things change. Isn't that the point of Ryan's blog??
Gary, If I won the lotto, I would drive one of the overrestored 50's cars that Ryan once covered. The ones with the Morrison frames and full built modern motors, the 'patina' rides. Then you have the look with the safety,,,, so I take my 59 ford panel,,,,,,
I live out in the country too and only have a 15-20 min commute to the city.The 55 Chevy has been my daily for two years now ( exept last Jan/ Feb, they put tons of salt out, washed away early March). I had an old rustbucket BMW for these two months that came with a set of winter tires for 500 Euros.... I was glad when I got the Chevy back on the road ,and it is no hot rod by any means.Unmolested, rust free and drives smooth as glass, 235, 3 on the tree, OD. But I have a smile on my face I get in it and go to work every morning...we went to the Alps last weekend.To me this is living the dream.
Me too! For several reasons, not the least of which is that I assume I will die first ( statistically true for males), and I NEVER want my beautiful wife of 36 years to ever have to struggle, live in fear or want of money. She come before anything. I have almost bought cars, then I think of insurance, renting a garage, paying someone to work on it, having it stolen, etc.....and the fun goes very quickly! Now, if i won the lottery......!
LOL now that splitting lanes is legal two wheels is the only way to go. But I am not sure that I would want to crash my way though bumper to bumper daily. of course I am no longer in my 20s. LOL I still remember the Mediterranean Fruit fly deal in the bay area in the early '80s. I was living in San Mateo and working in San Carlos. Riding to work was a breeze took me about half an hour, but coming home I had to do all those road blocks, some evenings it took me 3 hours to get home. Unless of course if I stopped at the watering hole in Belmont. One time I decided that taking my '46 to work was a good idea, less work for my bandy little legs. That was a mistake. I spent twice as much time at the roadblocks because they kept wanting to search my car. I guess guys in '46 Coupes were banana smugglers.
I guess guys in '46 Coupes were banana smugglers. THAT is hilarious. I had a good friend who drove his 49 Plymouth Business Coupe to work every day. Stone stock, it always ran great, but brakes...........another story.He almost bought it late at night while cruising in the fast lane.Suddenly there is a COUCH up ahead, panic stop across all lanes, goes around it before he stops! NO TRAFFIC, !!! They just got worse.He was tired of working on them.
We always drove the '46 like there was no tomorrow. My brother Paul's wife drove it more than I did and she is a crazy woman still. She ran a car load of the ladies over to half-moon bay to a party one Friday night and I guess she was sliding it around corners in the hills and one of them asked if that was safe and she just said, "Well its benno's car its in good shape." I still laugh about it. Paul said he had to go through the brakes about 5years ago. Guess she hit a shopping cart with it. I never asked how fast she was going or where the shopping cart was.
back in the 80's I drove old cars from Fremont to Oakland Ca. every day. not "Hot Rods" but a 62 caddy, 66 nova, and my 61 Dodge. it wasn't so bad back then. today I work 15 miles closer to home and drove my 61 Dodge when my regular car was broke until I found another... took two months. 2 months of hell. one side mirror, no blinkers and two tail lights low to the ground with 1 bulb each. not to mention stop and go traffic with a non synchro 3 speed. these old cars are for fun, not transportation. especially in the S.F. Bay area, second only to LA in the shitty commute contest. we are catching up fast. in the next few years I will be moving to Calaveras county where it takes an hour to get to any freeway. then I can drive my oldies once again and enjoy the ride.
The Jalopy Journal
