JIM McGOWAN jmcgowan@hemmings.com
Feeling the Squeeze
A
In my case, we’ll just tighten the financial strings to keep things rolling.
few days ago, an old friend who owns several Mopar and Pontiac muscle cars stopped by to say hello. He is retired from a career in law enforcement and an avid muscle car show attendee. Because of the time required by the force, he never married and was dedicated to his cars as if they were his family. We discussed the current state of world affairs, and he was ranting about getting ripped off at the gas pump. If you’re reading this, you’re certainly familiar with how our favorite vehicles like to consume fuel, and there is nothing we can do about that except to leave them sitting or to bite the bullet and pay the higher fuel prices we’re currently seeing. I have a real problem with that, and I’m sure you feel the same way. I feel guilty about not driving my car. I’ve never been one to let it sit for very long; these old cars need to be started and driven regularly. Even with winter coming, prices most likely will not drop, so there really isn’t much choice. In my case, we’ll just tighten the financial strings to keep things rolling. If there is any silver lining in the situation with gas prices right now, it might be that many of us who have become reluctant to take longer drives to events now have a lot of time to attend to all the little things we’ve been ignoring. I can think of quite a few tasks that I’ve been avoiding on the bottom side of my car, and the interior is long overdue for a good cleaning and vacuuming. Even here in sunny California, the undercarriage of a restored muscle car takes a beating. Road junk, rocks, potholes, and myriad other things encountered while cruising all leave scars of some kind. That’s not even getting into fluid leaks, mud, and other nasty stuff. I’m going to make September my month to reacquaint myself with working on my back on the garage floor, and tending to whatever I find during my mechanical and cosmetic explorations. I’ve found it completely advisable to take the necessary safety precautions prior to beginning a project like this. If you don’t have a moveable creeper to lay on, a floor jack, sturdy jack stands, and suitable work clothes (including a pair of good
work gloves), don’t even try this type of chassis restoration. It really helps to have a work partner assisting you with tools, cleaning items, touchup paint, and so on, as you don’t want to have to slide out from under the vehicle every time you need something. A little pre-planning is certainly recommended and will save your body a lot of postproject discomfort! On a less challenging note, I still have to spiff up my 1965 GTO’s Teal Turquoise interior. This is considerably easier on the old body (mine, that is) than dealing with the undercarriage. I have all the necessary cleaning supplies on my garage shelves, so that will be the second part of my detailing project. Years ago, I removed the dash pad while doing a thorough gauge cluster restoration. At that time, I replaced the stock standard gauge cluster with a Pontiac Rally gauge cluster; I also redyed the dash pad. This time around, a simple cleaning should be all that’s needed. The seats, door panels, center console, and carpet haven’t been touched in quite a while. Even though cleaning these parts is fairly easy, there should not be any time limit on completing the project. The old saying, “haste makes waste,” is doubly relevant for interior cleaning, particularly if dealing with original material, which in this case is 57 years old. An old car buddy, who also is the proud owner of a 1965 GTO, also stopped by recently for a visit. He only lives about 15 minutes away so it’s easy for us to get together. He cruises a Tiger Gold, four-speed hardtop with a black interior. We worked together for many years in automotive publishing, and he had also owned a ’65 back in the day. Once he saw my ’65 he had to have one like the GTO he had originally purchased brand new. We searched together for a few months and finally found one that needed a total restoration. For several years we cruised together to many car shows in southern California. Hopefully, we’ll be able to start doing that again in the near future. I have great hopes for our muscle car hobby surviving the challenges of these times and hope that we’ll all soon be able to get back to a somewhat normal automotive lifestyle.
