How bad have you drove a vehicle into the ground?

I had a post in another topic about an old Datsun I had and it made me think of this question. When short on funds I had to strap together the ride I had and keep going.

Datsun 310: (600$ and disintegrated in 2 yrs)
all outside door handles broke
inside pass door handle was a rod
ignition key was a big screwdriver
busted rear coil springs - (replaced with truck springs)
pillows for seat cushions
broken back seat back - (removed back seat)
5th gear gone
crimped rear brake lines
no dash lights
ran on brights with tops of headlights painted
shifter coat hangered to floor - (it fell through)
toggle switch turn signals
hatch hinges rusted off body - tied down with coat hangers
muffler was from side of road -tied on with coat hangers of course!

several other mechanical problems I actually HAD to fix - spark plug blew out, water pump shattered, etc.

Front driver side strut came completely off car - that finally did it in, because I ran out of coat hangers LOL!

Man! I look back and wonder why I kept it that long!? Oh yeah, I needed the money for beer!

 

I had a Nissan once that had a 4x4 (I'm talking wood here!) bolted in to make it sit level until I replaced the torsion spring. Drove it that way for the better part of a year.

For the last 2 years that I owned it, I had a split cv boot wrapped with a couple bread sacks and a few tie wraps. It actually sealed it well... atleast I cleaned it out and loaded with grease first!

Sold that car with over 250k miles on it and it still ran.

 

brothers cavalier (dang chebys), had wood holding the front seats in place as the floor had rotted through. had a blanket straped to the driver seat in a bad attempt to make a seat cover. rear ended a semi so he had to hold the hood shut with a ratchet strap. bunge cord holding the truck with 2 10"s in it shut. a mouse ate through a bunch of wireing so practicaly no gauges worked cept for the gas gauge that we fixed. no exhaust, fell off. half finished body work, still bare bondo. bad attempt at putting in a new headliner that fell down in a week, so he held it up with thumb tacks. ran just fine though suprisingly. that thing practically rattled its self to peices when he had the 15"s in it hence the reason half the stuff still on the car was held on with wood screws.

 

When I was in high skool I got the hand me down car for my first car. It was a 73 chebby nova with a 350 4 bbl But by the time I got it and drove it for a while it was a serious dog... By the time we HAD to give it eternal rest heres a list of the make shift fixes


you couldnt open both doors or the center would drop. unibody was so rusted.
Street sign for drivers side floor nothing on passanger side made a good beer drop when stopped by the local PD
plastic pasanger side window
Screw driver for keys, ignition, trunk everything
coat hanger holding up a non existing muffler
flash light for dash lights speedo didnt work anyway

Thats all I can remember right now

Lets just say it was a gem

 

one of my first cars i got when i moved back to iowa was a gremlin. i drove this car everywhere like i had just stolen it. it went fishing hunting skiing ditch running snow plowing and racing. i finally blew a football size hole in the engine. seems we were coming back from fishing on the mississippi and had worked over several 12's while we were doing that. i remember being in the ditch and then jerking back on the road , scraping and spinning out. then my tranny started to slip and instead of stopping and seeing what was a matter i tried to go for it. 2 miles later with the tranny lines severed from the ditch running, i was slipping like crazy and my foot on the floor. kaboom. one dead gremlin. had that car for only 2 years

 

I have an '82 F-350 I picked up for $650 at a farm auction. The motor was shot and cab was even worse. 4x4 and tranny seem to work fine, it's hard to bust a C6. The motor ran pretty well, but for a 400, it just had no power, you'd have to rap it out to get it to roll. Has a really nice flatbed along with a solid frame. I'm rebuilding it now, some pictures of it in my gallery.
When I started tearing apart the cab, I was afraid for myself that I was riding in it. There was pretty much nothing holding the cab up, except for a 4x4(wood) between the back of the cab and the flat bed. Had no rocker panels, cab corners and pretty much cracked all the way from one cab corner to the other. Floor boards were about to fall through, when out muddin' you could feel the mud hitting your feet. The doors didn't shut, had to "lift and slam" to get them to latch. The heater did work surprisingly well, I needed it during the winter since the cab was kinda drafty.
It was an awesome truck to beat around, through the timber and mud and anything else it could find. I'd just put it in 1st and put my foot to the floor and let the motor scream, I wasn't too worried about blowin' it cuz it was wore out, but it never did give out. So if anybody wants a wore out 400 for cheap, let me know.

 

Well, I didn't have much that compared, always took care of the problems like that, but I had a 74 Mustang II that I welded floor pans in, had a nasty habit of tipping the seat back when I sat down.. the material for the floor... retired road signs. Had a Datsun 510 given to me by my parents, had been rear ended when my sister had it at school, parked... wrecked so bad you could get into the trunk without opening it. I beat the crap out of that car, and it just took it. Finally rolled it by my own stupidity, lesson learned. E brake at 60 is not a good idea... tv made it look so easy... My 68 Chev 1/2t I had I could get rid of pop cans through the cab corners, but it was solid other than that. The Citation I ran out of desparation I had to do a floor pan fix, but could have been worse... and the 76 Mustang II I ran for lack of other operational wheels, had no 4th gear for several months... I had 15 miles to go to work, usually ran back roads... but nearly trashed the car driving home from the bar... then a year or so later fell asleep at the wheel coming home from work, that car is surprising to be still intact, but the rats have trashed it.

 

I did that e-brake thing in my roomates Escort once - didn't loose it, but slid it sideways and flattened all 4 tires! Man we were laughing!