If you drove to school, do you remember

Only drove to school my senior year, fall 1970 / spring 1971
Drove a 1969 Chevy Biscayne. Had a 250 cu. in. 6 cyl engine, with a 2-speed automatic transmission.
Top speed was about 80 and it would get there if you gave it a minute to think about it.

fYmHe1B.jpeg
 
Imogene said:
That’s another thread to start. What was the car we all sold that we shouldn’t have. I had two of them.
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My list would be wayyy too long. Be darn hard to choose just one.

59 cars,
34 trucks motorhomes and busses
27 race cars
15 motorcycles
4 boats
16 trailers and tractors
15 unfinished cars, trucks and bikes
 
I rode the bus up until senior year in high school. It was '76 and my dad bought me a '73 Opel Manta that had been in an accident. He knew that because it was traded in by one of his business associates. It had an add-on air conditioning unit and the dealership had replaced the Manta engine with a smaller GT engine. Every time I would go in for an oil/filter change the mechanics would say "it takes an Opel GT filter".

When I would try to go fast I would roll down the windows, turn off the A/C and ask any riders to paddle their hands outside the windows. I would then yell "turbo" and we would still barely move. It was a cool-looking car nonetheless, imported by Buick at the time. It was burgundy, like in the pic.

I kept that Opel for 4 years. Even though it was painfully slow, there was something special about it, and I'm sure I was the only one in my high school class with a German car. Today I own Audis, so go figure.

Opel Manta.jpg
 
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Oh no, another gap in my memory. It's so disconcerting to have no memory of something. I do remember driving to school my senior year, but I don't remember driving my car, I think I drove my mom's. She had gone to a one year training for work in 1973/74 halfway across the country (from Missouri to Virginia) and I went with her and did my high school senior year there. Now I'm wondering if I left my 1965 Mustang at home for my dad to drive and Mom & me took the Dodge Dart with us. Nobody alive to ask now.
 
Trade said:
If I had unlimited money I think a fully restored 1955 Oldsmobile Super 88 would be my dream car.
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If we’re going big, I once had a 1959 Cadillac coupe Deville for a winter beater, if you can believe that lol lol

That is what I would want to restore. I love those big wings.🤠🤠

And of course, that would be assuming I had more money than brains, so I would want Derek Bieri, of Vice Grip Garage fame, to restore it for me since he only lives an hour or so away from me🤠🤠

There would be some interesting stuff going on underneath the hood of that car😂😂
 
I actually had three cars during high school, I already mentioned my first, a Buick Lasabre.

My second car was a Plymouth Barracuda I purchased for $75 dollars from a Hells Angel, a friend of my brother. When I bought it the trunk was completely filled with dirt, the guy said it was the only way to get traction in the winter.lol

Then my senior year I bought a Ford Torino off one of my teachers, of course it was another rust bucket but it did great burn outs. On graduation day us seniors were all doing burn outs as we left and I stopped right in front of the teacher I bought the car from and did a nice power brake burnout and smoked up the entire area, my way of saying "later".
 
All this car talk made me remember that after we moved to the country the husband bought this really cool old car.
I think it was from the 1950's but Im not sure. Now its bugging me cause I cant remember what it was. Anybody have a clue.

What I liked most about it was the speedometer. Instead of a dial it went in a straight line. It had a colored line that changed colors
as your speed increased. I wish the new cars came with one. I would love to have an old car but then I would have to snag a guy
to work on it and thats not going to happen.

Neither of us are mechanical so he lost interest in it and we decided to sell it. Parked it out front and some lady hit it.
Insurance company paid us for it and took it.
 
Veronica said:
All this car talk made me remember that after we moved to the country the husband bought this really cool old car.
I think it was from the 1950's but Im not sure. Now its bugging me cause I cant remember what it was. Anybody have a clue.

What I liked most about it was the speedometer. Instead of a dial it went in a straight line. It had a colored line that changed colors
as your speed increased. I wish the new cars came with one. I would love to have an old car but then I would have to snag a guy
to work on it and thats not going to happen.

Neither of us are mechanical so he lost interest in it and we decided to sell it. Parked it out front and some lady hit it.
Insurance company paid us for it and took it.
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The American car you're describing is the Oldsmobile from the late 1950s to early 1960s (primarily 1959–1962 models, such as the Dynamic 88, Super 88, and Ninety-Eight).
This design was a short-lived GM innovation, discontinued after 1962–1963 in favor of conventional gauges.



olds.JPG olds 2.JPG
 
squatting dog said:
The American car you're describing is the Oldsmobile from the late 1950s to early 1960s (primarily 1959–1962 models, such as the Dynamic 88, Super 88, and Ninety-Eight).
This design was a short-lived GM innovation, discontinued after 1962–1963 in favor of conventional gauges.



View attachment 474663 View attachment 474664
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Thats the one. Thanks ever so much. 🎁 🐈‍⬛🤶
I still wish they offered that speedometer. You cant get in the zone with the new ones.
JMO but I think it was a lot more "readable" than the conventional ones.
 
oldman said:
I wish I still had my pictures. As I posted in the past, our home burned to the ground a year after I retired. Losing our pictures was painful.
I would like to have this car back and my 1962 Impala.
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The 1956 Olds 98 that I had I bought for $295 from a guy who who said we would have to wait a day to do the deal becuase as a 7th Day Adventist he could not do business on a Saturday. So I figured a religious dude would do right by me. Wrong. First time I took it out I got it up to about 90 and then when I put on the brakes they faded to nothing after about 2 seconds and I had to bail out onto the shoulder to avoid crashing into a car in front of me.

Turns out the brakes on all 4 wheels were metal against metal. No lining whatsoever. And the drums were scored up pretty bad. I couldn't afford to fix those brakes right. That would have involved new drums and shoes allm the way around. I ended up going to a junkyard and getting some used brake shoes. I didn't care how wraped the linings were just as long as they had some. I remember some were so wraped they had waves in them like in the ocean. But at least they stopped better than bare metal. :D That was far from the only issue I had with that car, but that's enough for now.

That 1956 still had the 324 V-8 with a 4 barrel. It got the same 12 mpg that my old Dodge had gotten. A guy at our High School had a 1957 with the 371 engine with 3 two barrel carbs. He challeged me to a race once but I declined. No way I could have won that one.
 
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On the rare lucky day, my dad let me drive his '73 Pontiac Grand Am to school. It had a 400 v-8 with a 4 barrel. It got 13 mpg on a good day and I still remember the long lines during the gas crisis. He kept it for years, then gave it to my cousin, who drove it for many more years. Everything was falling off and creaking inside but it drove like a champ until it finally gave up the ghost.

My great uncle happened to be in town during my senior prom and was a funeral director who owned a late 70's black Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham. He let me drive it to the prom. The car was huge and was like driving on a cloud. I thought I'd died and gone to heaven!
 
Trade said:
The 1956 Olds 98 that I had I bought for $295 from a guy who who said we would have to wait a day to do the deal becuase as a 7th Day Adventist he could not do business on a Saturday. So I figured a religious dude would do right by me. Wrong. First time I took it out I got it up to about 90 and then when I put on the brakes they faded to nothing after about 2 seconds and I had to bail out onto the shoulder to avoid crashing into a car in front of me.

Turns out the brakes on all 4 wheels were metal against metal. No lining whatsoever. And the drums were scored up pretty bad. I couldn't afford to fix those brakes right. That would have involved new drums and shoes allm the way around. I ended up going to a junkyard and getting some used brake shoes. I didn't care how wraped the linings were just as long as they had some. I remember some were so wraped they had waves in them like in the ocean. But at least they stopped better than bare metal. :D That was far from the only issue I had with that car, but that's enough for now.

That 1956 still had the 324 V-8 with a 4 barrel. It got the same 12 mpg that my old Dodge had gotten. A guy at our High School had a 1957 with the 371 engine with 3 two barrel carbs. He challeged me to a race once but I declined. No way I could have won that one.
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The drums at a junkyard shouldn’t have cost a lot. Maybe the shop teacher would let you use the lathe to turn the drums.
My car needed a front seat. It was torn and tattered and looked like a bunch of mice got in there and chewed on it. It wasn’t an old barn car. It was sitting in the man’s backyard for about 10 years. It belonged to his kid that was going to sell it, but let it sit.

I went to the junkyard and got one that looked good for $40. It took a few hours to get the old one out and about an hour and a half to get the used one in. I had to replace the valve cover gaskets because they were leaking and the thermostat and gasket because the old one was stuck open. I changed all the fluids and dropped the transmission pan to replace the fluid, filter and gasket. I thoroughly cleaned the pan and the filter was a screen that only needed cleaned. It was a little messy, if memory serves me correctly.
 
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