Car Stories II

This is a continuation of a “Sunday Story” – about car stories.  No politics here, but lots of “stops” along the highway!!

The VW Life

1967 VW Squareback (mine never looked that good!!)

The Squareback (Volkswagen Station Wagon – not a “Hippie Van”, that will come later) was the car of my college days.  For a ten-year old car it held up well, only completely breaking down a couple of times.  I did drive it around Washington, DC without a battery for a couple of months. But I found parking lots with slopes – and as long as I could park at the top, I could push the car into position, get it going downhill, then jump in the driver’s seat and “pop the clutch”.  Once the engine was going – who needed a battery anyway?

Besides, traffic was crazy and parking expensive in DC.  So I generally took the bus or the brand new Metro (subway) to work on Capitol Hill at the Longworth House Office Building.  Driving the rest of the time wasn’t a problem – as long as I didn’t want to stop.

In the winter of my junior year of college the engine blew again.  I was giving a ride to a friend from Cincinnati back to school at Denison on a sub-zero Sunday afternoon.  All of a sudden, the entire car was filled with smoke, and I quickly pulled over to the side of I-71, just past Fort Ancient where the Ku Klux Klan had their “training farm”.  I walked to the back, opened the door, and lifted up the engine hatch (remember, the engine was in the back).  Flames leaped out at me, and I quickly slammed the hatch shut.

A Cold Day

Sure the engine was on fire.  But the immediate issue was the freezing cold.  Ten below was serious, and while the fire warmed us for a minute, it wouldn’t last long.  We stood huddled on the side of the road, trying to decide whether to jump the fence and deal with the KKK guys, or walk the five miles to the nearest exit.  Luckily, a passing trucker noticed our plight, and pulled over to offer us a ride.  He took us in his eighteen-wheeler to the next truck stop.  My passenger called for another ride, and I arranged to have the Squareback towed back to Mom and Dad’s house.

It was right in the middle of the Winter Olympics.  I remember this, because Carlos (from next door) was a former professional skier.  So while we worked on the engine in the garage, we also kept track of the skiing competition on TV.  In fact, there were various engine parts that migrated into the family room as we worked.  It was warmer in there anyway.  

Cooking Engine Parts

Mom wasn’t too concerned about that.  But then, there were these two parts that were a very “close” fit.  In fact, it was so close that the “hole” had to be heated to make it bigger, and the “peg” iced to shrink it, so it would slide in the hole.  So when Mom found the pistons in the oven, and the wrist pins in the freezer, we finally reached the end of her patience.  We were banned to the garage fulltime. But we got the engine going once again.

It wasn’t mechanics that finally doomed the Squareback – it was rust.  After I graduated from Denison and began working at Watkins Memorial High School in Pataskala, there were these open holes in the floor.  That might have worked for Fred Flintstone, but winter in Ohio was too cold for that kind of ventilation.   I  even got frostbite on my accelerator foot on one long trip. So I started looking for my next “luxury” car.

Riding in Style

1970 Volvo 144

And I found it; a nine-year old Volvo.  It was the height of luxury; cloth seats, a big four door sedan, a trunk as big as my apartment; but still with a “stick shift” that could make it drive like a sports car.  And I now had another reason to want a bigger car – I was coaching, and needed to haul kids to meets from time to time.  No longer would I put nine in the car, but the Volvo could comfortably (and legally) hold six.

And the Volvo served me well for four years. Sure there was that one time when I was sitting in my apartment, watching the black and white TV, when someone urgently knocked on my door.  When I answered, they asked if the black Volvo was mine.  I said yes, then they calmly said it was smoking in the parking lot.  I ran down to find the entire wiring harness was burning out, a $700 fix for a $1000 car.  That was how I learned the lesson of “bad money after good”.  When you own used cars, you need to know when it’s time to “let it go”.  But I stuck with the Volvo for another two years.

The Last Trip

It was on a track trip that the Volvo finally convinced me it was done.  We were going to a meet in Dayton, a couple of high school kids and an eighth grader running in the Junior Olympics at Trotwood.  As we were passing through downtown Columbus, we hit a bump, and hard a big bang.  All of a sudden, the Volvo was much louder – part of the exhaust system was in the middle of I-70.  There wasn’t much to do, so we kept heading to Dayton.

When we reached the track, I noticed a huge “bubble” on the side of the tire.  The exhaust was now blowing directly on it, and partially melted the tire down.  But we had a meet to run, so I decided to deal with that later.  After the meet, I changed the tire, and bent the exhaust away from the wheel.  Then it was back in the Volvo for the trip home.  But something else was wrong.  The Volvo engine had two carburetors, but one of them decided not to work.  That meant that instead of four cylinders generating power, we were driving on two, about the size of a motorcycle engine.

We took the back way home, averaging forty.  When we finally got back to school, I knew it was time to go car shopping once again.  This time, it was different.  This time, I was looking for a “new” car.  

The Sunday Story Series

Author: Marty Dahlman

I'm Marty Dahlman. After forty years of teaching and coaching track and cross country, I've finally retired!!! I've also spent a lot of time in politics, working campaigns from local school elections to Presidential campaigns.