Last night, something happened that made me want to reflect on my experience with my Acclaim. I never realized (or maybe I did) that I was so attached to this car until last night.
It was my first day of my first IT internship in 2008, and someone had run a stop sign and totaled my Ford Escort. We knew of this car sitting somewhere for $150, needing a head gasket, and it was us or the crusher that were going to get it. "Nobody fixes these, they aren't worth anything" was the sentiment of the guy getting rid of it. But, it was in pretty nice shape, an old lady must of had it before and took good care of it. It was shiny in a way that only a garage-kept car could be, and other than peeling clear coat on the hood (that I now think was from overheating and probably what killed the head gasket) and a dent in the fender, it was a nice looking car. My 20 year old brain thought it was supposed to be a piece of crap that would get me by until I find something better. However, over the years, it has shown me that it is more like a tank than a car, and that I would struggle to find a better car, even when comparing to new cars. For reasons that I cannot understand, the other younger people that I see driving Acclaims or similar cars always look so pissed off about being in it, and never seem to take very good care of them. Little do they know, if it is anything like mine, they are driving the best car they will ever own, and whatever they get next will not be so forgiving to the obvious abuse they subject their cars to.
Not only has this car driven me from being an intern starting my career into being a full-fledged professional IT worker at a time when jobs are scarce; it has driven me through 3 homes, hundreds of job interviews, 2 jobs, 4 girlfriends (1 now my wife), 2 trade ins of my wife's new cars, and countless other adventures. The time it went 15 miles with zero coolant after the defective gasket blew and I was on a 2-lane road in the middle of nowhere on a -20 degree day, or the snow drifts that were over the bumper after the city halfass plowed after a blizzard? It handled it like a champ and started right up for more next time I needed it. Being stuck on the side of the road was very rare, and repairs are usually relatively easy and cheap when something does happen.
Last night, at 190,100 miles, my car decided to nuke its head gasket when I went to start it after running into a store for a few minutes. Literally drove the car to the store, went inside, came back out, hit the key, and was treated to a bang, the car struggling to run, and tons of white smoke. The only reason to suspect an issue with the gasket stemming before that was from when I overheated a few years ago, but the car ran great ever since. Other than smelling antifreeze maybe twice when I started it over the past few months, and the occasional weird bump at idle that went away when I hit the gas, I never had more than a slight hunch that there was an impending failure. This would be the 3rd head gasket we put in the car in ~5 years (1 blown by previous owner, 2nd was defective, and this one 3 years later).
As I'm sitting there waiting for my wife to come and pick me up, I'm really feeling like it's the end of the line for the car that has brought me through so much. We were leaving it parked where it was overnight, 50 miles from my home, so I removed all of the valuables and put the other stuff in the trunk. I can't help but admit that the song "Right Here Waiting for You" was playing in my head as I prepare to abandon my car in a somewhat unfamiliar place for the night. It looked so sad, like it knew that it had let me down and that the future might not be good. My wife asks me "are we looking for a new car, yet?" No, we're going to get it in the shop, look closely at how far it is gone, and make an informed decision. This morning, on my way to work, I see my dad pulling my car on the trailer, so I know it survived.the night in the big city. I give him a call, "Yea, she started right up, and it was limping, but it made it on the trailer on its own before the smoke got too bad."
After a quandary of whether the car was worth fixing since it's so rusty underneath, it actually started to look more solid than rust. We were able to locate a replacement motor from a friend of ours (who owns a junkyard) that has 120,000 miles on it for the cost of labor to remove it from the car its in. That one is pretty beat up and is going straight to the scrapper, so we got to it just in time. The guy actually drove it in to the junk yard, an unfamiliar concept to me. To us, it is cheaper and about the same amount of work as replacing the head gasket, so we're going to go for it. We're pulling the motor out of my car this weekend.
Some people (my wife) will never understand why some of us choose to keep these old beasts going when we can afford something newer. All I can think of is that my $150 car has been doing the job for almost 5 years with less than $1,000 invested overall, and for that I owe it to it to keep it until it falls apart around me. Here's to 200,000 and beyond, Mr. Acclaim!
It was my first day of my first IT internship in 2008, and someone had run a stop sign and totaled my Ford Escort. We knew of this car sitting somewhere for $150, needing a head gasket, and it was us or the crusher that were going to get it. "Nobody fixes these, they aren't worth anything" was the sentiment of the guy getting rid of it. But, it was in pretty nice shape, an old lady must of had it before and took good care of it. It was shiny in a way that only a garage-kept car could be, and other than peeling clear coat on the hood (that I now think was from overheating and probably what killed the head gasket) and a dent in the fender, it was a nice looking car. My 20 year old brain thought it was supposed to be a piece of crap that would get me by until I find something better. However, over the years, it has shown me that it is more like a tank than a car, and that I would struggle to find a better car, even when comparing to new cars. For reasons that I cannot understand, the other younger people that I see driving Acclaims or similar cars always look so pissed off about being in it, and never seem to take very good care of them. Little do they know, if it is anything like mine, they are driving the best car they will ever own, and whatever they get next will not be so forgiving to the obvious abuse they subject their cars to.
Not only has this car driven me from being an intern starting my career into being a full-fledged professional IT worker at a time when jobs are scarce; it has driven me through 3 homes, hundreds of job interviews, 2 jobs, 4 girlfriends (1 now my wife), 2 trade ins of my wife's new cars, and countless other adventures. The time it went 15 miles with zero coolant after the defective gasket blew and I was on a 2-lane road in the middle of nowhere on a -20 degree day, or the snow drifts that were over the bumper after the city halfass plowed after a blizzard? It handled it like a champ and started right up for more next time I needed it. Being stuck on the side of the road was very rare, and repairs are usually relatively easy and cheap when something does happen.
Last night, at 190,100 miles, my car decided to nuke its head gasket when I went to start it after running into a store for a few minutes. Literally drove the car to the store, went inside, came back out, hit the key, and was treated to a bang, the car struggling to run, and tons of white smoke. The only reason to suspect an issue with the gasket stemming before that was from when I overheated a few years ago, but the car ran great ever since. Other than smelling antifreeze maybe twice when I started it over the past few months, and the occasional weird bump at idle that went away when I hit the gas, I never had more than a slight hunch that there was an impending failure. This would be the 3rd head gasket we put in the car in ~5 years (1 blown by previous owner, 2nd was defective, and this one 3 years later).
As I'm sitting there waiting for my wife to come and pick me up, I'm really feeling like it's the end of the line for the car that has brought me through so much. We were leaving it parked where it was overnight, 50 miles from my home, so I removed all of the valuables and put the other stuff in the trunk. I can't help but admit that the song "Right Here Waiting for You" was playing in my head as I prepare to abandon my car in a somewhat unfamiliar place for the night. It looked so sad, like it knew that it had let me down and that the future might not be good. My wife asks me "are we looking for a new car, yet?" No, we're going to get it in the shop, look closely at how far it is gone, and make an informed decision. This morning, on my way to work, I see my dad pulling my car on the trailer, so I know it survived.the night in the big city. I give him a call, "Yea, she started right up, and it was limping, but it made it on the trailer on its own before the smoke got too bad."
After a quandary of whether the car was worth fixing since it's so rusty underneath, it actually started to look more solid than rust. We were able to locate a replacement motor from a friend of ours (who owns a junkyard) that has 120,000 miles on it for the cost of labor to remove it from the car its in. That one is pretty beat up and is going straight to the scrapper, so we got to it just in time. The guy actually drove it in to the junk yard, an unfamiliar concept to me. To us, it is cheaper and about the same amount of work as replacing the head gasket, so we're going to go for it. We're pulling the motor out of my car this weekend.
Some people (my wife) will never understand why some of us choose to keep these old beasts going when we can afford something newer. All I can think of is that my $150 car has been doing the job for almost 5 years with less than $1,000 invested overall, and for that I owe it to it to keep it until it falls apart around me. Here's to 200,000 and beyond, Mr. Acclaim!
