Reunited and it Feels So Good

Lee dropped off his 1962 Rampside Corvair pickup at a local body shop in September, 2016.  He was told it would be finished in a few months.  After a few months he was told it would be 3 weeks or so. It was "3 weeks or so" every few months since then.  For more than two years.

  

They called yesterday and it was finally finished!  He hooked up the trailer and went to go get it.

  

There were a few minor issues I would have mentioned, but Lee just want to load up the Corvair and get it out of there!

  

Now he needs to put on all the bits and pieces he took off so that it could be painted.

  

This is where the ramp folds down.

He also needs to do some work to get it to start.  It has been sitting for over two years, after all.

  

But that will give him a fun project over the fall.

I'm sure he will be glad to have a drivable, finished truck.

Lee's Newest Old Car

 
This is Lee's newest car.  Newest OLD car.  It is a 1967 Pontiac Lemans.  This is the basic car that the GTOs were made from.  Basically, the GTOs have a high performance package that the LeMans did not. 

Lee found this car on eBay and won the bid.  It was in Connecticut.  That is a long drive from southwest Virginia.  He rented a car trailer and took off.  He was a bit nervous because the guy wanted cash and Lee had never seen the car in person.  He reminded me that this was not craigslist when I expressed concern. 

The seller had been on eBay for quite sometime and has 100% positive reviews.  Lee spoke to him and found he had been in the Navy about the same time Lee was. That seemed to be the kicker to trust this guy.

 

Because GTOs are a LOT more expensive than the LeMans, many people have been buying the LeMans and putting in all the high performance things, engines, etc.  Then they sell it as a GTO clone and they are getting almost as much as the original GTOs  Now the straight LeMans are becoming pretty rare.

At one point it seemed like Lee was going to do that, too.  But after he saw the car, which he had only seen on eBay, he is now planning to keep it original.  This car has less that 100,000 miles.  It has the original paint, which is mostly good, with a few dings and scratches.  It has what looks like the original upholstery.  Next he will look for the build sheet.   According to the sales history, the car has been driven less than 6,000 miles in the last 22 years.  It has been garage kept.

 

Lee is pretty stoked at getting this survivor car.  He will pretty it up some and make sure everything runs perfectly, although it is pretty good now, and then he might take it to some car shows.  He may even take it on a trailer to keep the mileage down.  They call cars that people haul everywhere to keep the miles down trailer queens.

 

So Lee will put this queen in our shop for now.  Hopefully he will still have some enthusiasm for finishing the Corvair ramp side pickup that has been languishing in the shop all winter.

Well, would you like to touch metal parts in below freezing weather? Neither does Lee.

A New Project

It's not like Lee doesn't have anything to work on.  He could work on any of our trucks that need some maintenance.  My car needs some work and a detailing.  But, he sold the 1954 GMC truck he restored and now there is space in the shop. 

 

That is, there WILL be space when the parts for the tractor, that are currently in Korea, get here. 

 

It was leaking like crazy and so it sits in the bay with the lift until they get here.

 

So, of course Lee went on a 10 hour round trip to West Virginia to get this truck.  It is a 1962 Corvair ramp side pickup.

 

They only made these things for about 4 years.  The engine is in the rear and pretty small, so they don't have a lot of power.  Because the engine is in the rear, the steering is a little squirrelly. And you sit right up in front.  If there is an accident, it is your body that gets hit first, kind of like a VW bus. 

So it is underpowered, hard to drive and dangerous.  Of course we want one!

 

They have this really cool ramp door on the side of them so that you can wheel in stuff. 

 

That would be great for deliveries or if you had a gardening business.  You sit right up in front so you can see where you are in relation to your surroundings.  No silly hood to get in your way.

 

Because they didn't make a lot of these, so the value is coming up.  Not too many people have ever seen one, so it would be a real conversations starter.  Things like, "What the heck is THAT!"

It is pretty small and light, so I assume the gas mileage would be good.  And that is going green and good for the environment, said the people with three trucks, and SUV, a car, a Mule, a tractor that is currently on the injured reserve list, and a 1974 Camaro that may or may not be for sale and needs to be in a few car shows first. None of which are newer than 10 years old.  We should rename ourselves Shenandoah Gateway Farm and antique car lot.

On the bright side, the truck runs, sort of.  And there isn't a lot of rust.  Although, there is some. Lee thinks it will be fun to fix up and I hope he can find the parts he needs, as they didn't make many and most of the ones they did make have rusted away.  Lee knows this, as he has gone to see a bunch of them and has come home disappointed.

 

I guess I shouldn't be surprised about the many projects he already has, when taking on a new one.  I have one quilt I am working on and two more that I have in the queue.  I have a fabric bowl I want to make and the book I checked out to help me is coming due at the library.  I just bought a Cricut machine and am trying to fix an issue with that that has me tearing my hair out.  But I can't get to it because of the aforementioned quilt.

And our first guests since we opened up for spring, are coming on Saturday.