January 31st, 2004 was an ordinary Saturday. Many football fans were gearing up for Super Bowl XXXVIII, where the New England Patriots would defeat the Carolina Panthers 32 - 29 in what is considered one of the greatest Super Bowls ever.
The racing season had just begun as the Rolex 24 hours of Daytona was that weekend. In a few weeks, Dale Earnhardt, Jr would win his first Daytona 500.
In other news, MySpace was still brand new, having been launched at the beginning of the year. Germany was reeling from the guilty confession of Armin Meiwes, the self professed cannibal who murdered a man and attempted to eat him. He was the inspiration behind the Rammstein song Mein Teil.
Here at GRM, you guys were doing a variety of things.
Some of you guys were working, others were having a great saturday on ski trips, hanging out in a bar, or taking care of newborn children. A great number of you were in the military.
I was a 16 year old kid, with a learner's permit and me and my parents were at a local used car lot, and we were hoping to bring something cool home.
We did.
This was that day. We brought it over to see my Grandpa Clark. I'm the one bent over petting one of the dogs.
This car was small-town famous. Guy that owned it worked at a car audio shop and it was known for having a serious pair of subwoofers in the back. It had a rebuilt title, flowmasters and way too illegal window tint. It even had tint on the windshield. He bought the car wrecked from an auction, and rebuilt it himself.
In our small town, the only things to do were drink, and cruise main street. I wasn't much of a partier, so I would wash dishes for gas money, and cruise downtown. This is a more recent picture of what it looks like.
TO THIS DAY when I see someone from those days, they ask if I still have that old car.
Here's some pics from back then.
and an old snapshot picture-of-a-picture from before I had a desktop and scanner. Sorry.
Car was a solid ten footer. It was an automatic, TBI 305, slow as molasses, but it sounded good, and I was cool for once.
And then on August 20th, 2004 I got in an accident. Actually, at the intersection the above photo was taken at. It was a rainy night, not unlike the one above. I was turning left to go down Main, and young me misjudged the speed of an oncoming car and I got caught in the quarter panel, which pushed me into the car sitting in the turn lane.
My ego was deflated but I was okay. The car that hit me ran. Never did catch him.
We found a body shop, and he replaced the passenger quarter and door, and repainted the entire car. More on that later.
And then, life happened. I still drove the car occasionally, but it got fewer and fewer. I didn't have a gararge, so it sat outside and although it wasn't in mint condition, it went downhill fast.
In the meantime, I had a kid, got married, had another kid, got divorced. I really should have passed it on to someone else, but I couldn't bear to part with it. Fast forward to 2017 and the new missus and I buy a house, with a garage! Okay, so it's more like a barn with a concrete floor, but it's a garage! Finally after all these years I can park the car indoors. So on labor day weekend, in the middle of moving in, I begin to drive the car out to our new home, when it started to spit and sputter, and it died.
It was dead. After some diagnosing, I determined it wasn't getting fuel. After some sluething, I determined an injector had gone out. In my hurry to install it in the parking lot (ironically, the same car audio shop that the previous owner worked at before) I broke down and had to have the car towed.
We backed it into the garage and it sat. For almost three years. With a blended family of four kids, we're really busy. And sometimes, out of sight really is out of mind. I changed jobs, and came home exhausted most days and didn't feel like diving into the car. Slow, incremental process was made here and there, and a few weeks ago I get a text from my step son (13 year old BoostKid 1) and he and his older friend down the road (who's 16 and a damn good wrench) got the car running.
They went with me on the maiden voyage down the road. It felt good to drive it again, but damn does it need work.
This build thread is going to go slowly, mostly me addressing things that a nearly thirty year old car needs anyway. I'll get some now-condition pictures of the car soon.
I've wanted to write this thread since I joined here ten years ago.
Stay tuned!
