Bob's Cars

My first car, purchased in NJ from the Want Ad Press for $1000 dollars, then driven to Big Sur. Sold for $1000 to the daughter of a friend, who drove it back east to college in Boston. I needed the money. 

4-speed, 2-cylinder two-stroke with suicide doors and a pleated sunroof. Three bolt wheels, scary to go over 45 mph.  Abandoned in the bushes near the little trailer Beth & I rented, I brought it back to life and drove it unregistered and uninsured for several months.

Purchased for $750, it had the 1600cc bus engine and was great on dirt roads. An open vehicle with a snap-on canvas roof, it was no fun in the rain and cold to drive on the coast highway. I needed a 4-wheel drive vehicle.

$800 dollars from a mechanic in Monterey. 4-cylinder 4-speed with Warn overdrive and 4-wheel drive with Hi-Lo range. Removable hardtop. The windshield wipers ran off a pneumatic pump that was pressurized from the valve cover, so the faster you drove the quicker they wiped. This was a terrible system when you had to go slow in driving rain. The transfer case leaked and ran dry while four-wheeling, causing the transmission to seize. I remember seeing smoke coming from the rubber boot at the base of the shift lever. I sold the engine and overdrive to another Scout owner for $1000. Until my VW Golf TDI it was the only car I ever made money on.

Beth had this car in Big Sur, purchased from a friend in Wisconsin. Straight six engine, luxurious leather interior, power windows, locks, & mirrors. It ran great but was completely rusted out. Dust would pump into the interior when we drove on dirt roads. Sold it to Charlie King, who drove it to Seattle, where it lived a long life until an 800 lb. crab pot was dropped on it on the Ballard waterfront. 

Beth's next car. Purchased with a blown engine for $500, it was a rust-free California bug with crank sunroof. We had a rebuilt 1300cc engine installed. It ran great, but with a 6-volt system, flashlights duct-taped to the hood would have been brighter than the headlights. Beth drove it cross country to Providence when I left for Alaska. She sold to her cousin, who drove it for many more years.

Sven, purchased in NJ from the Want-Ad Press with my first fishing money.
I drove it across country a couple times and mechanics were always surprised to see it had a Ford V4 engine, which meant that points, plugs, etc. were easily available. Late at night Beth & I were rear-ended on RT 128 in Boston and the car was pushed into a concrete overpass support. Very scary, we were okay, the car was totaled.

Bjorn, also purchased in NJ. Last year for the 96, we drove to Wisconsin for our wedding, then to Seattle for the summer. Still running great when we sold it in Providence. 

Purchased in Providence as a second car, ran great but a terrible rust bucket.

Caleb was born in February 1982 and Beths’ parents did not want their first grandchild being transported in our funky cars, so on Christmas day they surprised us with this new car, delivered to our apartment.  Going out to look at it, we were so excited we locked ourselves out of the apartment with Caleb asleep inside and I had to break the door open to get back in. A 1.6 liter with 4-speed manual transmission, we used this car to move to Stoughton. It was a reliable car until it slowly lost compression (cracked head) on the way to an Easter party at Mary Evelyn’s in Long Grove. We had to turn around and crawl home on the interstate at 15mph. It had 115K+ miles and I remember the Ford mechanic called it “a disposable car, just like a cheap electric drill”.

Purchased in Stoughton after being unregistered and off the road for many years. A Minnesota car, it was remarkably low mileage and rust-free. I rebuilt the dual SU carburetors and had it repainted in its’ original red. Sadly, Caleb rolled it into a cornfield soon after he got his license. He was okay because it was a Volvo.

4 Cylinder, 4WD, 5-speed. Great truck. At about 7AM on a freezing March morning, Caleb and I were driving to Madison, I hit a patch of black ice and the truck slid sideways, then rolled over onto a farmhouse lawn, coming to rest upside down on the crushed roof. Very scary, we both climbed out the drivers’ side window, and a passing car stopped and called an ambulance. The truck was totaled, we were both fine.

I liked that truck so much I bought another one, used with 34K miles. Drove it until it reached 218K miles, then sold it to the neighbor across the street, who is still driving it.