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Post by Adelard of Bath on Mar 19, 2023 12:29:58 GMT -5
 That's mine! Vroom! Okay, that's not really mine. That is a picture I borrowed from Wikipedia, of a very-nearly identical one except in super good shape. 1979 Volvo 242, 2-door, 4-spd stick (with the crazy Swedish "pull up the little ring with your first two fingers and then notch the stick left and up" for reverse) Manual rack-and-pinion, oh steering was a dream on that thing. Parallel parking was not. It said, "Made in Goteborg, Sweden" under the hood. Also had a really cool big red/orange sticker that said "Roterande flakt und drivremmar" or something, basically it meant "rotating fan and drive belts" Rear wheel drive, good for snowy-parking-lot shenanigans, but put 300lbs of tools and books back there and a set of snow tires and a friend said, "It's like driving on Velcro" Pretty much manual everything, even the clutch. Not a lot of power, but a respectable 2.1, I had a lot of fun blasting around on that thing. And the stick makes it feel not as weak. The seats were this awesome soft cloth, I can still feel it. Nice Swedish orthopedic-designed seats. Everything built like a tank. It had a sweet little clock with hands in the middle of the dash, I used to sit in the car and listen to it tick. I still have one I got from a junkyard. Speaking of things that were weird and Swedish, in college I gave a ride to a girl and when we got there, she looked down at the door handle (or where the handle would be) and asked, "How do I get out?" It was NOT normal. That sticks in my head. Got the car in the second half of the '90s for $500, and drove it as my Daily for probably ten years. Sadly it's gone. People used to ask me, "What year is that?" It was clearly a vintage car. When I got it, the odometer was broken at 173k, so I made a new gear out of brass and used the lathe to roll the odo FORWARD to 199,999 just so I could watch it roll over to 200,000. I think I sold it at 235k, it needed work and I wanted something with power steering and a/c. Youtube recently told me, "Watch this!" and the thumbnail was basically my car, so it got me thinking. |
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Post by nrspepe on Mar 19, 2023 14:35:13 GMT -5
Technically, my first car was a 1965 Chev Covair sedan. I had it for about a week before my mother convinced my father that I would die from the fumes while driving. My next car, and what I would consider my first, was a 1966 Ford Mustang convertible. It was an automatic - white with a black top and black interior. It was never one of my favorite cars. I sold it a couple of years later for $100.
I might add that my dad was a car dealer. Through the years, he facilitated me getting some amazing rides. My two favorites were a 1971 Ford Torino GT (I loved that car) and a 1975 Cadillac Seville. Looking back, I wish I had half the money I’ve spent on cars.
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Post by simbasmom on Mar 19, 2023 16:49:38 GMT -5
My first car was a gift from my parents, a used 1961 VW with a convertible roof. It had an annoying habit in that if I the RPMs rose too high in a gear, the engine would "pop" loudly out of gear into neutral.
The first car I bought with my money was a brand new 1973 Ford Pinto (coincidently the same color as my VW-red) I bought when I graduated from college and got my first "real" job. It was also a standard, but it didn't have the same annoying habit that my VW had. However, I later learned that Pintos had their own problems.
I didn't drive my first automatic until 1985. The car salesman with me heard me say, "So what do I do with this-just put it in 'D' and GO?" DH said that was when the salesman was ready to bail out of the car from the look on his face.
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Post by helenabear on Mar 19, 2023 18:43:19 GMT -5
My first car was a 1983 Plymouth Horizon. Clyde was his name. One of my siblings totaled it and a 1982 Horizon was the replacement. Beulah. My first purchase was a 2000 Civic 4dr 5spd. I'm back to personally owning a non-manual but 1 pedal driving of EVs is just as fun. My spouse has a 6spd so we can eventually teach my kid.
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Post by disnydad on Mar 19, 2023 19:19:56 GMT -5
1963 Chevrolet Biscayne, 6 cyl, 3 on the tree. Bought it in 1968. Sold it to my sister in 1970
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Post by hatfieldhlt on Mar 19, 2023 20:07:31 GMT -5
1986 (I think) Mercury Lynx. My mom bough two (cheap) for me and my sister. Explained that these were her cars and if we couldn't afford to keep gas in her cars, we wouldn't be driving them. When we started working full-time, she allowed us to use them as a trade in to get a new car because "you need to have car payments like normal people".
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M2JRA
One Bedroom
Posts: 231
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Post by M2JRA on Mar 19, 2023 21:06:08 GMT -5
1982 Buick Electra, Navy Blue
My dad gave it to me for my 16th birthday and was comfortable with me driving it because it was a tank and so he figured I was well protected.
He also put an envelope with $100 cash in the glove box for emergencies, and also got me a AAA membership, which I have maintained ever since.
Gosh I'm tearing up remembering this. He's been gone 15 years....
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Post by ermindy1133 on Mar 19, 2023 22:30:34 GMT -5
1975 Ford Grenada, 4 door model. Brown with baby poop gold interior. 🤢 Only driven by a little old lady for church on Sundays. And that was probably true, because it used more oil than gas! I kept a case of oil in the trunk at all times. The first time I drove it, the master cylinder went out on the brakes as I pulled into the parking lot at the video store. I hit the emergency brake and only did minor damage to the store’s door frame. They had to call Daddy to have the car towed. Another time, one of the seatbelts froze up, and we had to cut my friend out of the car. I kept the turd for 9 months, and then talked my parents into letting me trade it off for a metallic light blue 1983 Ford Thunderbird, with lovely blue interior. I wouldn’t let my friends come near it with food or beverages. Payments on it were $225.90/month. I was only 5 payments short of paying it off when a woman in a Camaro Z28 made a left turn across my lane and totaled it. I still miss that car…
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Post by cpnkirk on Mar 20, 2023 6:06:17 GMT -5
I had a 1972 Ford Maverick (not a pickup back then!). I thought it was the ugliest brown color, and I still think it was the ugliest car of all the ones I've owned in my life. However, if you google a picture of that car, it actually doesn't look as bad as I remember it. I also had to carry around a case of oil in the trunk! I drove that car for 2 years, then traded it for a 1963 Falcon convertible. Now that's a car I wish I had back, although I've gotten use to more luxury interiors and probably wouldn't enjoy driving it around these days unless I could put the top down.
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Post by amdev on Mar 20, 2023 6:34:18 GMT -5
My first car was an '83 Chevy Celebrity. It was this awesome blue/green color that changed depending on the light. I remember the front seat was a bench seat, not bucket seats, and the trunk was massive, which later proved to be fortunate because I was rear-ended on the way home from school and had friends with me who would have been seriously injured if that giant trunk hadn't taken the hit.
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Post by bakerworld on Mar 20, 2023 7:49:08 GMT -5
My first car was my aunts Ford Fairlane - I've no idea of the year. I had to buy a hard seat cushion to put in back of me so I could reach the brake and gas pedal. There was a hi-beam button on the floor but I couldn't reach that at all. I drove that for about 3 years until one day it wouldn't start. My brother, who is a mechanic, asked, 'what is this fluid all over the engine'. I told him that on my way to school the battery fell of the shelf into the fan. By the time I got to school and righted the battery back onto the shelf the fan had cut a hole into it. He told me that the 'water' in the battery was actually acid and it had eaten a bunch of stuff that ran the engine so it wasn't worth fixing. From there I graduated to my mothers Ford Galaxy = huge car. I grove that for another 3 years until we traded it in on a Chevy Monza, my first new car. When the salesman drove the Galaxy away only one side of the car had lights and every bump the car bounced up and down. If you drove it over a bump fast enough I could make it hit the ground. LOL
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Post by BWV Dreamin on Mar 20, 2023 7:52:57 GMT -5
1970 something Dodge Coronet with a stick on the column. Pea green! Like an army tank it was. But hey, put in an 8 track player and suddenly it was the greatest car ever! Plus a CB…hahaha..” Trucker Trucker this is the one Witty Kitty”!
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Post by stellabutterman on Mar 20, 2023 9:13:12 GMT -5
1970 something Dodge Omni--I cannot even remember the color, but it was like driving a box on wheels. One of my husband's most memorable driving experiences was the time he drove it to work, and the exhaust system (more than just the muffler) fell off making it sound like a crop duster.
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Post by oldhalfelf on Mar 20, 2023 9:59:43 GMT -5
The first year DW and I were married, we walked everywhere. (Grocery lugging -- ugh.) Mid-second year we bought a 1980 Chevrolet Citation on the recommendation of my car-loving father. It was essentially identical to the red 5-door 1980 model shown in the Wikipedia article at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevrolet_Citation . I have very fond memories of the utility of the hatchback and the front wheel drive in the snow, both of which were novel to me at the time. I know there was pushing and shoving between Motor Trend and Car & Driver regarding the quality of the car, but we had no trouble and I liked the innovations.  |
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Post by captjacksfamily on Mar 20, 2023 10:34:58 GMT -5
1972 Toyota pickup, wasn’t much of a car but I could put my dirt bike in the back of it.
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