A Second First
So from the last installment the car restoration was finished. I now had a cool, running, driving car that worked well. I did have some issues, including a vibration that took me a long time to solve, but it didn't happen except for on the highway at certain speeds, so it wasn't on the critical list. I enjoyed driving it sparingly and doing some car shows and just family driving.
Below is a picture of me with my son at a car show. this is probably around 1998.
My son liked the car and I remember once when we drove from my in-law's house. We had two cars with us (my wife's and the Road Runner). My son wanted to be in the Road Runner but my wife was afraid of the two hour drive and the noise. But she gave in and my son (maybe 5 years old) sat in the back in his child seat. Probably 15 minutes into the trip, he fell sound asleep and I had to keep reaching back to try and sit him up since he was hunched over sideways! But he was content and enjoyed the ride!
By the way, I should mention that my father-in-law owns a speed shop. Cars he has been involved with own at least 9 NHRA national records, so I had access to any and all machinery (and knowledge) needed to upgrade the 340 engine. It needed a rebuild, so it got one, 'Hawk style'. My father-in-law tried to talk me out of it because he said it wouldn't be good on the street, but I
knew better...
...well it sucked. The compression was too high and I had a single plane manifold on it. When I finaly listened to my father-in-law, he did a
secret cut on the pistons to bring compression down to 9.33:1. Nowadays this is common, but it helped the quench area and made the combustion chamber effectively more compact so the flame wave didn't need to travel as far. The engine also got a dual plane manifold and other work to make cam and all parts work together.
NOW it ran like a scared ape! That was a great lesson to me: All the hype about speed parts doesn't mean much unless you pair the right parts and combination to make the engine run well for its intended purpose!
Anyway, fast forward to 2010. My son is 16 years old. I decided that the Road Runner was really cool as my first car, so
I gave it to my son as his first car. It was my first car, and now his first car! My wife was less than thrilled about her baby getting a hot rod with no airbags, antilock brakes, crumple zones, etc. to protect him. I promised her I would
really teach him how to drive it, and I did. We even went to a high performance driving school together. The final day allowed use of our own cars, and we drove on a third of the Pocono raceway, along with twists and turns on the infield. My son reeled in a fox body Mustang in the rain with the big 'ol B body! I have a cool video of it, but I can't post those here. But trust me, it was fun to sit in the car and experience it. (The video doesn't convey the violence of the car in the turns, but it is still neat.)
Here is my son in the car a day or so after the car became his.
He brought it to some car shows to. Here we are at the Pypes car show. My best guess is this is 2011
After that (and at with my blessing), it became a daily driver for him - it was the only way he would build neat memories of the car. It saw snow and rain and sun and... ...whatever. (It did have a garage spot, so it didn't normally sit outside though.)
My son became quite a fixture at school. No one else had a bright yellow hot rod they could drive to school. He was well known for his car!
One story during the high school years: My son had school timing down to a science. He knew exactly when he needed to leave to get to school just in time. So he started the car at almost the exact same time every morning. My neighbors began using that in their timing to get ready for work. When the Road Runner started (with a roar), my neighbor knew he had to finish getting ready and get in their car to go to work!
My son drove the car through high school and then college. Then in his senior year in college, disaster struck. It was late 2016, and he was heading back to school. He was set to graduate in May of 2017. On his way back to school as he was on the highway, the engine threw a rod out the side of the block. The engine was totally destroyed.
Now remember, My father-in-law owns a speed shop. Labor is free and all machines needed are available.
But the block was still toast. Yes, you can sleeve cylinders that got trashed, but the pan rail was also damaged. The number matching engine was gone.
Kaput.
Dead...
Suddenly, my son's time with the car ended. He needed other wheels quickly, and there was no ability to rebuild an engine quickly enough to get this going - just finding another 340 block is hard enough.
So in early 2017 the Road Runner entered a period of slumber...
Next:
The resurrection
