Who has has their car for a really long time

1962-----2008------300,000 happy line chasin' miles---NO TRAILERS!------Don

 

This probably dosn't qualify as a really long time but i've had my 57 chevy for 20 years this Nov, more than half my life.
First car bought when i was 14 with lawn mowing money (34 now)..grand total of 1000..Borrowed some from my dad and had to pay it back as i made it..
It's gone through multiple makeovers throughout the years, the last being two years ago..
Most of the pics i have are not on here though..
Here's one from the day we brought it home...me as a chubby kid with really bad hair

And the other from when i finished putting it together two years ago..

It's changed a little since then as well though, now sporting an original Cal Custom tube grill..And yes, eventually i'll get the front bumper back on..

It's funny how a machine can effect a person. nothing more than sheet metal, steel, rubber etc....yet they have such a sentimental value that nothing can replace it...
This one will be handed down and never sold unless it's life and death....

Tony

 

Had the '49 for lil over 10 years --- in the garage for 8.5 of them (sad)....

 

Great pics and stories, guys. Keep them coming. Really interesting reading. Here's a couple of pics of my Father-inLaw's '39 Ford, which he's owned since 1955.

 

Some of you guys are making me feel like a newbie. I've only had my 38 Chevy coupe since 1974

 

<o></o>This 23-T has been resurrected after 32 years of storage. It was first on the road in 1975 and driven to the Street Rod Nationals in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1>Tulsa</st1></st1:city>. It was torn down and stored for 32 years and just made its return “Life”. It is not quite road ready but getting there. The front rubber is 32 plus years old and it still has to have some safety stuff that we did not care about in 1975.
<o></o>
Me and bro circa 2007


New engine – in 1975 it had a 337 inch small block with a 1965 Fuelie unit on top




This is a scan of the Window sticker that was still on the windshield

 

1962 Studebaker Hawk Gran Tourismo.
Trailered it home from the east coast in 1976 in several "parts baskets".

That's 32 years ago.
It seems like just last week. Where did all those years go?






Built this in 1976-77 when I was in my early 20's

Started out brown metallic, painted it black for 1979 and early 80's, then red in the late 1980's.

Used it as the family car and travelling car for decades. Back seat full of kiddie car seats.

Now that the kids are off to college, I need to do a new interior and paint job.

 

I put together my Stude truck in the late 1980's and have been using it as my work truck ever since. That's just about 20 years now.
The kids got such a kick out of going to car shows and meets in the truck or the Hawk (depending on how many of them wanted to go at one time)
Everywhere we went, we got thumbs-up from people every day, no matter which car we drove or whether it was in good shape or looking bad.
The kids grew up to dislike owning "anonymous cars" as much as I do.

 

I got my RPU (the one in the avatar) in 1959 when I was 15. It's currently going through another revuild...

 

There is a guy her in salt lake named Glen Cox that has had a 35 Chev 2 door sedan since 49 or 50? His dad bought the car in 39 and gave it to him to drive. The car was channeled in 1954 and has always had a very mean 261 stove bolt 6 in it. Never chopped, he doesnt like chopped car but loves the chaneled look more. I need to find a picture.

I was at a show a couple weeks ago and was looking at it and some kids walked up and was looking it over and noticed the paint was begining to crack in spots and said "must be a cheap paint job" I told them the paint on that car is older than ther dad! quite funny.
The intake was made out of carb adaptors and welded with a torch and arc rod. All aluminum.

 

30 years ... and no plans to sell ...

There is a non HAMB ... non computer guy that lives near me and he has had his 32 Ford Deuce sedan since 1957. It has a dropped axle, SBC and a automatic. All steel car and pretty nice.

Quite a few 32's in my state ... have long history with their owners.

My brother has owned his first car ... a 1966 GTO since 1972

 

Have had my '40 Chevy convert for 29 years. Been a great car.

 

I have had my 53 XK120...since 1974. Going for a ride as soon as the fireball in sky goes down..

109* today..

should be gettin' hot soon...

 

Well I have had my 50 Mercury since it was 1 year Old drove it all around the USA Raced the shit out of it
in 58 I put a Olds-J2 engine in it Raced up & down th East Coast with it
The engine let go 150 miles away from NYC & flat towed it back Put in the Flathead with a C&t Strocker Kit in it
in 76 put a 327/300 hp with the Powerslide & thats the way it is now

 

Here's some pics of the Deuce I bought for $125 back in 1955. We sort of grew up together over the years. It wound up in pieces and in storage when everyone else went drag racing and I discovered Bluegrass music in 1964. About ten years ago the bug re-bit me and it was still waiting patiently for me in storage. Instead of modernizing and updating, I tracked down all the old crap that I used to run back in the sixties so we could both pretend to be new, young and back in our prime. Enjoy



1956 style beater


1958, now on the road with a Nailhead



Showtime, Tulsa 1961



1965 to 1995 - Unloved, unwanted but not forgotten



1998 - Bringing her back to life



A blast from the past ready to roll



We make the Big Time and hang out with the Big Dogs Dearborn '08

 

I've had my '62 since.. Well, I got the pink one week ago.
You guys have cars easily 3 or 4 times older than me.. weirdddd.

 

My 64 Comet I bought in 1988 when I was a junior in high school. I drove it for 3 months until a friend of mine out ran the cops in it and I ended up parking it for 6 years while I tubbed it out. It has been on the road ever since with changes every year .My 6 year old son already calls it his so I guess it will be in the family for years to come.

 

built my 47 ford coupe in 88. Went to lincoln neb from the BlackHills somewhere east of ogalla neb we picked up a chunk of rust from the gas tank that sidelined us until a pig farmer with 3 in. of pig shit on the floor boards picked me up and took me to a small town. The mechanic in town drug us in and blew out the fuel line and sent us on our way at no charge.

 

I got my grandfathers 1937 Ford pickup when he died in 1965
I got my 47 Merc in 1967
I got grandpas 1954 Ford from my brother in 1990
I have my grandpas 1940 Farmall Model H and his 1907 telephone
I got my 1946 Harley in 1975
I got the 1942 Harley in 1980

 

I've only been driving my 1939 Ford pickup every day for the last 16 years

 

It's nice to see some guys keeping their car for a long time.
A lot of people seem to get bored with their current car and are
on to the next and the next....without seeming to really enjoy the
vehicle.

Got my 47 Plym in 1973 from a salvage dealer in Springfield, MO
Looked like this (not the greatest quality pic)

http://

Today, it looks like this. Has a 57 Plym flathead 6.

http://

 

Here is the story I posted back in Jan 08 about my Dad's Model A Roadster. Still working on getting the roadster in shape to drive. I can't wait to drive it!

Enjoy

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=232944

 

I Got the 48 early in 1973 as a 75.00 beater that was painted with a brush. When I decided the T bucket wasn't going to be ready for the NSRA Nats in Tulsa that year I started a three month thrash that cumulated with a slick gold painted truck with a Bobby Russel roll and pleat seat and a 25.00 set of 67 15x7 Z28 Ralley wheels.
The trip to Tulsa wasn't without trials and tribulations. Fuel lines plugged with gold paint and I burned up the tail shaft of the trans crossing the Red River going into OK. Bob Davis who used to have a number of F-100's around Waco helped me replace the tail shaft of the trans in a junk yard driveway and away we went again. It was a great weekend and my wife and I had a ball after finally getting to Tulsa. The trip home to McGregor TX on Sunday was without issues except Jean got the bottoms of her feet hanging them out the passenger window while we headed south for 6 hours.
The truck moved us and all of our belongings to WA state in 1975 towing a 16 ft Uhaul in the process.
It went to the Chevy GMC Truckin Nationals in Ogden in 82 as a chopped Red very low truck, my avaitor was taken there.
It has been a work truck, hotrod, daily driver and part of the family for that length of time. I started the redo this week finally after a couple years of gathering pieces.
Previously and for a lot of years during when I had the 48 I had the 51 Merc coupe that I bought as a 16 year old sophomore in high school. it too went on many adventures until someone with a lot of cash decided he wanted it and caught me at a weak moment I had it for 32 years.

 

1962 to present time, 300,000 happy line chasin' miles driven all over the USA!!-----------The 32 roadster & me are same age-------Don

 

I've always liked your roadster in its current state....Mike

 

not sure what a "long time" is..kind of a relitive term..but anyway
My 53 chevy has been in my life for over 10 years..One of my Non HAMB friendly cars my 3rd 68 Charger has been in my hands for over 13 or maybe 15 years now.

 

in 1988 when I was 16, I dragged a derelict '62 GP out of a coworker's back yard for $200...car had no motor or trans, the rearend center section had a window in it and the wiring was fried...but I had to have this unusual car.

I found a '66 389 and rebuilt it while in highschool, then I scrounged up the (at the time) impossible to find stick parts and converted it to a 4-speed. In September of '94, I made my maiden voyage around the block with open headers, shifting the T-10 with 1/4" craftsman wrench by reaching thru the hole in the floor (I didn't yet have a shifter!)... what a feeling!

The next summer I drove the car to Back to the '50s in MPLS with several friends with their cars... My mickey-mouse exhaust system lost a muffler about half-way there so I unbolted the other one, threw 'em both in the trunk and finished the trip essentially with 5' long zoomies! My buddy Joe's girlfriend Sarah got ill from the intense resonance inside the car but we made it...

I am in the process of doing a body-off on the car and when it's done it'll have a tri-power 421 HO, 4 speed and 3.64 gears out back... Plan is to have it done in a couple of years...

I'll post some pics when I can scan 'em...Thanks for reading this.

 

I don't know if this counts or not but here goes...

About 20 years ago, my parents and grandparents drove across Texas in my grandfather's RV to Windsboro Texas to spend the weekend at my great grandparents lakehouse. That weekend, there was a classic car parade and in the shed out back was my great grandfather's 1950 Plymouth Special Deluxe. Saturday Morning, with my grandfather driving, my great grandfather riding shotgun, and my mother and myself in the backseat, we rolled in a long procession of ancient steel. I seem to remember the night before the three older men tinkering with the engine in an effort to get it to run. I caught the bug that Saturday. I was 8.

8 years later, my great grandfather was laid to rest and my mother had set out to buy the car. My great grandmother had sold the car to her several years prior. In my parent's garage sat the same baby blue 1950 Plymouth that had infected me with my love of cars years before. One morning during the summer, my mother and I made our way to the garage to fire up the car and for her teaching me how to drive it. I remember standing over the hood of the car, the stench of the starter fluid burning my nose as the engine turned over attempting to catch. I learned the concept of a clutch, that downshifting doesn't work on that transmission and that my mother's voice gets really high pitched and loud when I grind a gear. After my mother returned to work and the keys to my car were taken from me due to the typical teenage shenanigans, I would steal out to the garage, jumper some cables about and hotwire the old plymouth (as a teenager with a basic comprehension of electricity and with access to a car without a locking steering column, the world was my oyster). At the time, I never understood why the car sat for so long in the garage (months at a time). It was almost sacriledge to me. Everytime I fired it up and drove it around through town (never after dark and never in the rain) she seemed to love the road. The timber of the engine was like music, the scent of the exhaust like ambrosia, and as a virgin I longed for that seat in the car almost as much as I longed for the touch of a woman. (Actually, now that my virginity a distant memory, I prefer driving the car... less headaches).

12 years later still... The car had sat for almost a decade. My father never really cared much for the car and had decided to take it off insurance years before. Over the years, I pled with my mother to part with it, either by giving it to me or finally finally by selling her to me. When I say I pled, I mean I annoyed her endlessly to part with it or get it back on the road. I can't explain it, but seeing that car sitting in the garage was painful for me. Last October I returned from a job I was working Pascagoula Mississippi and set to work on pulling the car from the garage. The rear wheels had seized and the engine wouldn't crank. My original intent was to trailer it back to my house and get the engine running, but the brake issue demanded attention first (and was beyond what I felt comfortable with attempting myself at the time). I had her towed to the shop, located all the parts myself, purchased a parts car, stripped the components for the brakes, and after 7 months, the car moved, under its own power, 80 miles over the back roads to my house. It was magical and also a huge pain in the ass. It has continued to be a fair mix of the two. I guess that is what makes this fun.

Here's where we started:


and here's where we are today:


John

 

You know what the sad part is? We keep getting older but the old cars keep getting better.

 

Im 35 and my 40 convertible was purchased by my dad when I was 5. I think he paid $400 and I know he drove it home.