Hi guys I got the old 67 2+2 loaded and almost ready for the trip to Foam Lake to drop it off at Vinces. Then it's on to Gimli! I let Warren know that barring the flu or a blizzard we'll be on the road by noon on Friday. I'll keep you posted so we can meet up for the big Canadian Poncho convention, otherwise known as coffee at Timmys.
-- Edited by 66 Grande guy on Monday 2nd of November 2009 10:36:42 PM
There's snow right now but its supposed to be warm for the rest of the week so this might be the best chance to do this. I just have to fix an axle seal on the borrowed dolly, scrounge up a couple more tires, figure out how to hook the trailer wiring to my borrowed SUV and put a license plate on the dolly, (oh yeah and keep my wife in a good mood so she doesn't realize how crazy this trip is)
Things are looking good! I still have to though some stuff together tomorrrow but we should be heading out by 1300 hrs as that's when my wifey is getting off work.
We'll take some pictures and post the story when we get back (after i catch up on my sleep)
Made it there and back! No major snags.(thanks to Carl S and Warren) I'll post some pics and a narrative of the odyssey when I recover from my road lag for the curious.
Hi guys, I would have posted my story of the misguided mission to Gimli already but I got kind of distracted last night by other stuff and to tell you the truth I was still kind of bagged from the 2700 km sojourn over the weekend. It is actually kind of tiring pulling one old bulbous parts car (with a questionable dolly I borrowed from my neighbour) about 700 km then racing another 600 with the dolly bouncing away back there then thrashing to load another bulbous old parts car and then towing it back 1300 kms. Lets not even mention trying to keep my wife, (who came along for the ride) kind of amused so she wouldn't actually figure out that this isn't the way normal people spend the weekend.
Crazy? Nah just a Canadian Poncho "hobbyist"
Before I ramble on here though, let me express my undying appreciation to Carl Stevenson and Warren Hunt for helping me get that poor old thing in shape to take its biggest trip in 30 years. I would have been totally defeated if you guys hadn't made such good progress by the time I got there.
Anyway, some impressions of the trip.
We left Lac La Biche without actually checking if one or more of our 5 cats hadn't crawled in to the 67 2+2 I was hauling so my wife insisted that I stop and actually look. I sort of figured that that problem would take of itself but she wasn't buying my tough love approach so that set us back a vital few minutes. It was a tight schedule made tighter by the fact we left about 2 hours later than I was hoping because my wife had to feed the fish, cats, birds, kids etc, do laundry make a couple of lists.... Man Oh Man it was making me twitch!
Anyway we took a back road out of our town as there really is no other kind in my neck of the woods and tested out how fast we could actually tow the beast. As it turned out at exactly 98 KMH it would start fishtailing alarmingly enough to throw my brothers SUV around so with some resignation we settled in to actually observing slightly under the speed limit the whole way to Foam Lake and Vince's place.
We ended leaving at about 1500 hrs so daylight left us pretty quick. None of the tires or bearings seemed to be heating up but I had to check the bindings a few times to get everything settled in back there. In Myrnam we ran across a really cool little diner(old dealership?) with a neat vintage sign that in my opinion has to date from exactly 1960 as it was all one piece I do believe. Once we hit the Yellowhead we started to relax a bit on the fourlane. We had a pretty good breeze blowing from the west so we actually made pretty decent mileage. Topped up at Lloydminster and kept on trucking past the Battlefords and then Saskatoon. Feeling pretty good until about 2230hrs and then we needed to find a hotel. We stopped at one small town whose name I can't remember but nothing was open but the streetlights. Lanigan proved to have just what we needed and just in time as I either hallucinated or really did drive over a dead deer laying on the highway and smeared it pretty good. No trace or anything underneath the vehicles though. Very mysterious!
Anyway at this point I'll post a few pictures we took on the first leg and continue with another post. Hope this is what you want to hear so far!
November 7th, a new day and some new energy, Thank God! Couldn't beat the weather for November 7th. Topped out at about 13 degrees C with a nice west breeze. We saw lots of farmers cleaning up the crops which I have never seen in November.
By about 1000 we had touched base with Vince and set up a meet just out of Foam Lake. Sure enough there he was waving frantically and we formated into town where he led us down a bunch of twisty streets (in Saskatchewan?) to his great shop and yard.
We slid off the 67 and it joined the other 67 he had gotten from me as some of his less distingished parts cars. (I thought they were pretty good qualiy until I got a look at his inventory of these things.) Man that guy has got some great stuff! Typical small town weekend too as a couple of neighbours sauntered by to see the biggest show in town.
I spent as much time as I could until I ran out of drool looking at his collection of mostly 67's but some other neat stuff too. (a 67 two door sedan!)
My head was still spinning from over stimulation as we pulled out which why I left it in 4 low to try and turn around on the street. Almost ripped the guts out of my borrowed SUV until Vince came over and clued me in. (I had put it in 4 low to give the dolly a good crisp snap so the car would unload itself)
So from that point on the SUV felt like it had wings! That dolly was just a bouncing back there as my wife tried to get up to her usual 120 kph on Saskatchewan pavement. I chilled out a bit in the passenger seat and tried not to tell her to stop at every boneyard we passed and also tried not to succumb to her high pitched whining every time we passed a casino. Vince had told us it was about a 5 hour drive to Gimli through the northern route but as 1500 hrs approached I could figure we weren't going to make it until at least 1700 hrs. Carl and I had chatted a while back and we was on his way from Winnipeg and would be in Gimli for 1600 hrs so I gave him a call and sort of hinted we'd be arriving around 1700 hrs as vaguely as I could. He was cool and just figured it would give him more time to look over the mysterious half AC installation.
We pounded on her to get it there for 1700 hrs and finally pulled up to see Carl and Warren wiping their sweaty brows as they had just finished pounding to pieces the back brake drums so they could actually get the back axles free to turn.
I worked on jacking up the front and switching tires to the set of msmatched beauties I had scrounged up. I had the dolly kind of in place and was trying to pull all the dangling stuff off the car when it became apparent there was a snag in the back. All the studs but one had snapped off and it was pretty clear to us all that you shouldn't really tow a car on a dolly for 1300 klicks with only one lug nut holding on the rim. We put our heads together and figured with the drum off we might be able to get a couple of 3/8's bolts with nuts to hold at three spots at least. The rim centre was snug on the axle so that would take most of the rolling strain. Warren managed to scrounge up a few nuts and bolts and actually get his hand up behind the rim to get them started.
We hacked off what was left of the exhaust and I checked to see if there was actually any oil in the disappointing but expected 10 bolt. I hooked up the lights and after some toing and froing I managed to turn the rig around.
We stopped at Warren's garage and rigged up a electric impact to snug up the bolts that we couldn't quite get any other way. We also had a chance to look at the heartbreakingly lovely 67 GP he has for a few brief minutes although it deserved so much more time. I have to say those Amercian Ponchos are pretty sexy!
Time was still pressing so we started on the long haul back. Carl followed for a while in his sinister Impala SS hoping to find a coffee shop but in a couple of blocks we were out of town and out of luck. Rats! Next Time!
Made it all the way to Lake Winnipeg and never even saw it. Bizarre or what?
I'll post a few more pics here and pick up the return tomorrow.
So by this time we're starving. The first town we ran across was Arborg and there was exactly one restaraunt open, but it was packed with local Icelanders and Ukrainians which boded well for the food. Oh yeah! So stuffed with chicken we staggered out and started our misbegotten caravan down the long road home. The car towed real well and we could actually do the speed limit so that was good.
All the bearings, bindings and the weird assortment of nuts holding the wheels on seemed to be holding really well which me feel fairly sure of Carlès judgment back at Gimli when he said "All you really need is three, no problem. We ground out the miles back through the narrows and Lake Winneposis and retraced our steps to Dauphin where we crashed for the night at the Canway Inn.
Next morning with a slug of Tim Hortons best in us we started the last leg of 1050 kms.
Not much to really say except somewhat a test of endurance as the novelty of new landscape was gone on the return trip so we just drove and gassed up and ate junk food (which is still working its way through my system if anybody wants to know!)
We hit the Alberta border at about 1800hrs and started to switch drivers more often as we were stating to feel kind punchy by that time. The last 100 kms was like in slow motion but we wobbled into Lac la Biche with the car still attached by about 2100 hrs.
Even though we had left two teenagers to fend for themselves all weekend the house was actually standing. Amazing!
The most notable and demoralizing thing about the whole trip was that the only snow I saw on the whole journey was in my own yard Thatès got to tell me something about my lousy choice of homestead. Still, it and my own bed looked pretty darn good.
Would I do it again Well there is the other car still in Warrens yard and they do belong together.....
So for anyone who doesn't believe that 1 original wheel stud and a few more Grade 5 hardware store bolts with nuts and lockwashers will hold a back wheel on a B body that distance, you're WRONG!!!
Great adventure Ken. Next time you have to allow a bit more time so we can slip in to the city and have coffee with the Manitoba gang.
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1966 Strato Chief 2 door, 427 4 speed, 45,000 original miles
1966 Grande Parisienne, 396 1 of 23 factory air cars
2 supervisors 
