How did you get started working on cars?

[thisistoto]

Hobby, own a shop, etc?


We never did any large mechanical work on the cars, just minor stuff. I would love to learn more though. Any tips?

 

[katshot]

Started tearing apart my mom's appliances when I was a kid in the 60's and it just kept going from there. Now, I'm a retired ASE Master Tech, ex-fleet manager, ex-shop owner, ex-engine builder, ex-car/bike builder with a few toys to keep me busy.

 

[rbohm]

i got interested in cars when i was in jrhs in 1970 when i read about the then new datsun 240z. got interested in mustangs about 2 months later when i read an article about modding a mustangs suspension, and seeing the mustang with a worn out 289 outperform the 240z.

i started working on cars in high school when i took auto shop. one thing my parents always encouraged in me was self reliance, so i tend to do most of the work on my own cars.

 

[BIG-MAC]

My father bought my Mustang new in 68 and it was his daily driver until I turned 16 in 1981 when he gave it to me. Before I was out of high school I had converted it from an auto to a 4 spd, built a new engine, painted it in the garage and put a 31 spline 9" rear in after the original 8" blew up about an hour after I finished putting in the 4 speed. Glad I kept it...

 

[bnickel]

about 2 hours after i got my first toy car i tore it apart and tried to put it back together, unfortunately it was promo model of an olds that my grandfather got at teh dealership he worked at...probably worth a mint today. pretty much teh same thing with every bicycle and go-kart thereafter and literally within a few minutes of getting my 1st car (my 69 GT) home i started tearing into it to do the needed maintenance that had been neglected by the po.

 

[chepsk8]

I wouldn't know where to start! Tearing apart toys when I was 4, building models when I was 5, rebuilding bicycles, mini-bikes, motorcycles, working in a gas station the day I was old enough, my first mustang in 1976 at the age of 16, MCA Tropies when I was 26 back in 1986, now crashing Cobras!

Only one auto shop class in the summer of my Sophmore year in High School.

I have always felt you can learn about anything, but to really understand something, it has to be "in" you.

To learn, study, make mistakes, tear things apart and learn why they do what they are designed to. Be inquisitive, never stop learning no matter how you learn.

But most of all, be humble. There is always someone out there who knows more.

 

[zookeeper]

My earliest car memory is my Dad firing up a full-race flathead he put in his Model A coupe in about '65. I was about 3 1/2 and I remember it like it was yesterday. Since then I built models, read Hot Rod magazines until they litterally fell apart and dreamed about cars every waking minute. I helped my Dad rebuild his Model A coupe when I was about 12 and we got it finished when I was a junior in high school. I drove it to school a couple days a week and at the same time we built a Model A pickup for me. It was on a budget and I worked at odd jobs to finish the thing (I still have it, but it's disassembled for easier storage) and drove it for several years. It seems like for as long as I can remember, all my spare money and time have gone into cars, streetbikes, dirtbikes, killer sand drag Banshees, trucks and assorted other stuff related to them. I'm one of the pickiest guys I know when it comes to working on my cars, which is probably why my '68 is taking forever to finish, but hey, building a car is 75% of the fun for me.

 

[88gt]

For me it was when dad took me to the shop where he worked on (back then they weren't called sprint cars) super-modified dirt cars.

Got bit buy the bug and it hasn't let go. Now I'm building a '65 fastback and soon to be building my son a '63 volkswagen beetle. I've got a cool kid!!

 

[t_chelle16]

I've been helping my dad work on cars since I was little.

-Chelle

 

[65Stang200]

My grandpa has been driving the mustang since I was born. =D He bought me one when I graduated from HS, and I never looked back.

 

[katshot]

I'm one of the pickiest guys I know when it comes to working on my cars, which is probably why my '68 is taking forever to finish, but hey, building a car is 75% of the fun for me.

Ain't that the truth! I'm the same way. My problem is that I tend to get bored with the project when it's almost done. I can't tell you how many cars I've sold once I reached the 99% point or just after finishing them.

 

[69 scj coupe]

I remember walking into a custom paint shop when I was 17, that was in 1979. When the guy told me it would be $700 to paint my Camaro, I just thought that was way out of line. I went home and painted it myself with a Kirby vacume cleaner and some help from my dad. Turned out so nice I painted several cars for friends so I could aford an air compressor. In the mid 80s I bought a house with a 30x40 shop. Built a paint booth and just thought I was in paradice. Ended up painting several Shelbys and rare Mustangs, with many making it to the pages of Mustang Monthly. In the late 90s I suffered from complete car burn out. Sold the house with the shop but luckly keeped the cars I had aquired. Now I have some realy neat cars that all need some paint work done to them, but I am to lazy to do it myself and still to cheap to pay some one else to do it.

Larry

 

[zookeeper]

Ain't that the truth! I'm the same way. My problem is that I tend to get bored with the project when it's almost done. I can't tell you how many cars I've sold once I reached the 99% point or just after finishing them.

Wanna know how bad my sickness is? As a machinist, I tend to be overly critical of things nobody else would ever notice. When I was fitting my 'glass Shelby hood to my car, it was horrible, so I cut, fiberglassed, etc, until it fit pretty well. Then to do the final fit, I bolted it on and to check the gaps and height with machinist calipers. I see professional paint guys just eyballing it, or using a paint stick as a gauge and calling it good.

 

[Max Power]

I was born to it. Nobody else in my family understands it.

 

[StangDreamin']

My folks laid down the law long before I was born - their kids could get a license and drive when they reached 18 and could afford their own car and insurance. But Mom never got a license (depth perception problems) and Dad was already getting "sickly" (TIA's and full strokes) when I turned 16. Mom complained to Dad that she needed me to drive her when he was not doing well; so Pops made up a simple solution: I could get my license when I learned to his satisfaction how to do oil changes, brake re-lines and plugs/points/condenser replacement. Got my license at 16 years and 2 weeks (he worked me like a dog on his '71 LTD and '70 F-100 4x4, and I also learned water pump, u-joint and master cylinder replacement on the truck).

After I could afford my own car (and the insurance) at 18; the older brother who sold me my Gran Torino taught me about intake swaps and "vacuum-gauge tuning" a Holley 4bbl.

When I became a poor college student, good Chilton manuals and better parts houses were my best friends; and I got into "stock" suspension work, as well as timing chain replacement, engine swaps, axle bearings, and the twisted path of finding parts for my girlfriend's (now Mrs StDr) AMC Gremlin.

After I get the Cougar "on the road" for Tink's little sister (which is gonna include suspension work and new (not rusty) inner fender panels around the shock towers); my next project will be tweaking on the ECU's for my F150 4x4 and Mrs StDr's Ram Quad Cab.

 

[65mistress]

Necessity, I was given a car that needed constant work and I didn’t have the money to pay anyone to do it. Then I was introduced to the almighty dollar when I helped to replace head gaskets on a Camaro with my friend’s dad. Since then, I’ve been tinkering, puttering, flitzing, fussing and fighting with automobiles as my therapy to get the hell away from keyboards, monitors and mice at work. As good as computers are at simulations, but there’s nothing like the throaty rumble of a V-8.

 

[jikelly]

I remember walking into a custom paint shop when I was 17, that was in 1979. When the guy told me it would be $700 to paint my Camaro, I just thought that was way out of line. I went home and painted it myself with a Kirby vacume cleaner and some help from my dad. Turned out so nice I painted several cars for friends so I could aford an air compressor. In the mid 80s I bought a house with a 30x40 shop. Built a paint booth and just thought I was in paradice. Ended up painting several Shelbys and rare Mustangs, with many making it to the pages of Mustang Monthly. In the late 90s I suffered from complete car burn out. Sold the house with the shop but luckly keeped the cars I had aquired. Now I have some realy neat cars that all need some paint work done to them, but I am to lazy to do it myself and still to cheap to pay some one else to do it.

Larry

I only ever tried to paint one car so far, but one day I will have me a house with a shop out back for car projects.

My dad, uncle, and aunt all had 66-69 Torinos, My Aunt's car was a Talladega, green and way cool. Dad sold his car in 78 and bought a station wagon

I remember that same year was when I fell in love with the big body mustangs. Sure I liked to take stuff apart and fool with it when I was a kid, but I didn't get into working on cars till after I got my 73 at age 21 and blew the motor driving home from Ft Polk. My stang sat 6 months Actually I was too chicken to work on it myself so my dad helped me out and had a friend who owned a shop put in a new engine for me. I wanted to go to work for that guy but he said they couldn't use me.

So I got braver and started fooling with things on my stang to give it a little more get up, rebuilt the carb, slapped on a new ignition coil, replaced plug wires, and finally started timing the engine. Boy did it really come alive after that.

A week later I let my mom borrow the stang to go to work. She was late because her car had a flat that morning. She came home that night without my mustang.

A water hose blew and she didn't want to get stuck so she didn't stop till the engine seized. One of the rods broke and wedged itself between the crank and the block. (She told me like a year later she'd been driving however fast my car would go, shoot I'm lucky she didn't hit someone or something and kill herself and my stang )

Took me six months to scrap together enough money for a new engine and stuff. This guy I met at a car dealership helped me get the new engine in, and since then I've put 186000 miles on the stang, replaced all the steering and suspension components twice, installed a new interior, threw in a Tremec 5 speed, painted her, and I'm about to install the fourth new engine into the old girl.

It'd be more fun though if I had a lot more money for parts and stuff. Anyone want to donate?

 

[mustangman70]

Definitly stated young taking apart appliances as well haha

When i was 12 i was changing oil and doing minor **** with dad on his T-Bird. Which woulkd have became mine if it wasent T-boned....

Then dad bought me the 70 when i turned 16 and it was over from there. Ive ventured off into boats as well from that.

 

[iskwezm]

I took some auto shop classes in high school, went through the Ford ASSET program right out of highschool,master tech certified at 24,did a short time at Ford in R&D,came back to the dealer,got burned out and now at 35 its a hobby.

When you turn you hobby into a career,you lose your passion for it.

 

[Max Power]

When you turn you hobby into a career,you lose your passion for it.

You got that right. In trade school they never explained to you that you would spend all day as a line mechanic working on POS Chevettes and Citations. I was an ASE Master Tech at 20, and a retired ASE Master Tech at 22.

I hated working on my own cars then. I love it now.