Auto Owner Story - Entertaining & Helpful Personal Automotive Stories

I bought my 1968 Camaro Rally Sport from a used car lot in Thousands Oaks California. It was light blue inside and out. It had a four speed manual transmission and bucket seats. The body looked pretty good, although I would find out later that it had some bodywork done on the passenger door and truck lid.

I bought the Camaro in my senior year of high school or soon after graduating. I can’t remember exactly when. During my high school years I worked in a gas station. It was good for me because I learned how to work on cars.

My First and Second Cars

I was driving a 1954 Ford truck. It had lots of problems so it wasn’t long before I realized a replacement was in order. You can listen to that story here. I bought a Red1964 Corvair Monza that was in good shape. Just needed tires and new carpet.

The Corvair was fun and very reliable. I bought new tires. They were called Tiger Paws if I remember correctly. They were wide and had a red stripe on the sidewall. I bought some small Chevrolet hubcaps and repainted the rims black. Like I said it was fun but I wanted something more.

Moving up to a Camaro

The Camaro had stock wheels with ugly hubcaps. A common look for sporty cars in that time was to have split rims. They were modified to be wider than the originals. You would take the tires off the wheels and send them to a machine shop.

They would put the wheels on a lathe and cut them, or split them into two pieces. Then they would bend a piece of metal that is two, three, or four inches wide and weld it into the wheel. I think mine were two or three inches wider than stock. I only did the two rear wheels because that was the look I wanted.

When you mounted the tires on the wheels it spread them out. With wide tires on the back and stock on the front it look sweet! The car didn’t need much more work other than a good wash and wax. But after driving it a while I noticed it would jerk slightly or shudder when I let out the clutch.

General Motors Motor Mount Breakage Causes Clutch Shudder

I started a process of trying to figure out what was causing the shudder. That problem turned into the most difficult mechanical issues to resolve of all my vehicles. It resulted in me pulling out the transmission probably six times.

I replaced two clutches, a new flywheel, and a transmission overhaul to replace the throw-out bearing sleeve on the front of the transmission. Checked the clutch linkage. Lubed everything relating to the clutch. I just couldn’t find the problem.

The owner of the gas station I worked at was a master mechanic. We worked together on it but couldn’t figure it out. I talked to other mechanics but no one could help. One day I was talking to a guy about the problem. He mentioned that Chevrolet cars in that era had problems with engine motor mounts breaking.

If the motor mounts were broken and the driver accelerated hard the engine would lift up. That would bind the throttle linkage and cause the throttle to stick in that position. You can imagine the problem with having the throttle to stick in a heavy acceleration position. The car would continue at that speed even after the driver took their foot off the gas pedal.

Rather than replacing motor mounts on hundreds of thousands of cars GM decided to put cable straps from the car frame around the exhaust manifold and back. The purpose was to hold the engine in place during a hard acceleration.

After talking with that guy I had hope of coming up with a solution. When I got to work that night I had my boss watch the engine when I let the clutch out with the park brake on. The engine lifted up and the car shuddered! The broken mounts could have not only bound the throttle linkage but they also could affect the clutch linkage. That was the cause of the clutch shudder. I replaced the engine mounts and the problem was fixed.

After all the problems and working on the car so much I got burnt out and thought I would make a change. During that time small pickups had...

In this episode of the Auto Owner Story podcast I’m going to share about a work vehicle I bought. I used it to travel the roads of southern Idaho and eastern Oregon. I was working as a sales representative for an automotive diagnostic equipment manufacture. I also sold point of sale and repair manual software to auto repair shops.

I bought the 2003 Buick LeSabre used with 18,000 miles. It has been one of the most reliable cars I’ve ever owned. It’s like that TV commercial from years ago for the Timex watch. It just keeps on ticking! It’s got 343,452 miles and every time someone goes out to use it starts and runs with virtually no problems.

It’s been semi-retired for years so it sits a lot but when needed it’s ready to go.

My family has used the Buick as a back up vehicle for situations when someone needs transportation while their car is being worked on. My wife likes to use it for short runs in town rather than taking the truck.

The car is a white four door with cloth interior. It has A/C, cruise control, electric windows and locks. It’s a Custom model car but fully loaded. The engine is the famous 3.8L 3800. I believe it’s the best engine GM has ever made. The engine has a lot of miles but it’s as reliable as it can be.

There are slight engine oil leaks but it never needs to have oil added between oil changes. I have replaced some gaskets for oil leaks over the years but the car is 17 years old so that is expected.

A comfortable car for long road trips

I was a sales representative for 15 years. Southern Idaho and eastern Oregon are located in the northwest part of the U.S. The area is sparsely populated. Both states have a lot of farms, agriculture and open rangeland.

Living in Boise Idaho I was centrally located in my territory. Travel times to the far edges of my area were five hours in each direction.

I was successful in my position but to do that it required a lot of windshield time, meaning I was always driving to my next sale.

I chose the LeSabre because it has a long wheelbase compared to many front wheel drive cars. That makes them a very stable and comfortable road car. Something needed when you are driving eight to ten hours a day on the road. The other thing I liked about this car is the abundance of legroom for my 6’ 2” body. There was plenty of room to spread out and move around while driving.

Having been a mechanic and technician for many years I knew the value of maintenance. Oil changes, transmission flushes, coolant services were always done as needed. Even with maintenance the car still needed repair work at times like water pumps, transmission repairs, axle bearings, etc.

The body has been great. Doors and windows all work well. The paint looks good.

The brake pulsation problem that wouldn’t go away

One of the common problems I had was disc brake rotor warping. It caused that pulsation you get when you apply the brakes. I would have a repair shop turn the front rotors and install new brake pads to fix the problem. The next time it needed fixed I’d just replace the rotors and pads.

I started having an intermittent pulsation problem that varied by the type of road surface. It confused me, and two of my shops, for several years. They turned rotors, replaced rotors and checked everything they could think of on the brakes. They couldn’t fix it. One day I was at one of the shops getting an oil change and a new mechanic checked my front end. He found a loose ball joint. We discussed it and determined it could be the cause of my brake problem.

I wanted to get a second opinion from a suspension mechanic so I had a tire store look at it. That turned into a fiasco because the young mechanic who check it said the ball joint was good but that it had a bad steering tie rod end. So I went across the street to another tire store to have them check it. They said the tie rod was okay but the ball joint was bad.

Those are the type of things that happen in the auto repair industry. All service industries

Kevin tells the story of purchasing his first car that he bought from his grandfather, a 1960 Hilman Husky which he transformed into a surfer’s car with a musical twist that served as transportation to the beach and back. He tells about getting the car running and them dressing it out with a stereo and paneling.

My first vehicle was a mechanically worn and unreliable 1954 Ford Truck that frequently wouldn’t start. The body was worn with doors that often wouldn’t stay latched. Amazingly, once the engine started it ran well, like the “Little Truck That Could”. I finish by reminiscing about my next two vehicles, a Corvair Monza and my favorite car, a 1968 Camaro, that I wish I’d kept.

On this Auto Owner Story podcast episode, Dave Eastman interviews his sister, Gayle Hughes and asks her to share some of her early memories about the cars she drove and her driving experiences. Gayle tells about getting her license when she was 17 and driving her brother's '68 Camaro Rally Sport to school and on errands while he was overseas in Viet Nam.

This Auto Owner Story podcast introduces the website and presents the benefits of the podcast episodes that will be interviews of auto owners. The idea is to capture entertaining and helpful stories from our past. Stories presented from fond memories of trips with our families, your first vehicle, or your favorite vehicle that you wish you still had.