FOCUS! FOCUS! FOCUS!

[DRIVEN]

This past Sunday I celebrated 10 years of cheating death. It was actually a pretty depressing anniversary. On 11/15/99, on my way home from work, a 19 year-old girl in a Dodge Neon pulled out of an apartment parking lot right in front of me and stopped. She was making a left and stopped to wait for traffic (sideways in my lane). It was a 4 lane with a turn lane in the center and the occasional planter median. I was in the left lane and she came from my right. There was a car to my immediate right and a planter strip to my left. All I could do was throw out the anchor. It is a long story but I'll summarize. I hit her and was thrown from the vehicle (no seat belts). I spent 3 days in the hospital (skull fracture, internal bleeding, etc, etc) and was off work for 6 weeks. At the time my daughter was 6 months old and I was the only bread-winner. A cop in the area "heard" me speeding (I was not) and showed up at my house the day after I got home to site me for careless driving. Paid a lawyer $1400 to beat that $300 ticket. The passenger in the other car sued both drivers and won $24k for 3 chiropractor visits and a 1/4" scar under his eyebrow. The insurance companies tied it up in court for almost 3 years. When all was said and done, I was $60K in the hole (medical, attorneys, vehicle, etc), my truck was totalled, had no sense of smell, poor balance, moderate back problems (doctors refer to it as severe but I've gotten used to it), and a very negative general world view.
So here we are 10 years later and my truck still isn't fixed. WTF? Complete lack of focus -- that's what. I have too many projects. It's not done and I only have myself to blame. Here's the rundown on my clunker fleet:
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1935 Ford pickup. My first love -- the one that started it all:


...and today...

I have the replacement frame, fenders, grille, hood, door, Corvette suspension F&R, LT1 and 5-speed.
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The 1935 sedan project:

Powered by a Ford 4.6 DOHC/4R70W, 8" rearend, hidden torsion suicide frontend, 4 inch channel. The top will be below my chest at ride height.
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The twins:

Both run and drive. Blue one is for sale and the orange one will be a full rebuild to replace my wife's aging daily driver.
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My daily driver Datsun 1200:

I've put around 30K miles on it and still haven't managed to get the interior done...but at least I can drive it.
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The "smell-camino":

A back-up for the 1200. It's my hauler/tow-truck and technically belongs to my wife. Her grandfather bought it new, gave it to her dad, then we got it about 12 years ago. It has over 400,000 miles on it. The original 327/M20 are in storage and it now has a 350/New Process A833. There is a torque-built 400 on the stand that will go in once I buy a flywheel and headers.
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1950 Studebaker:

I'll be honest, I have no plans to do anything on this one. I got a good deal on someone else's failed project. It has 2 of every body part (except the cab) and everything was sandblasted. Came with new patch panels, disk brake kit, newly upholstered seat and headliner kit. Frame was blasted, painted and rebuilt and was set up for 440/727. I plan to take it to the Portland swap-meet in April to hopefully turn a handsome profit.
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Spares:

Left to right; LT1('35 PU), 327('66 El Camino), 400('66 again), A12(Datsun), DZ302 wannabe/Saginaw (was in the '35 PU).
Under the stairs; 2 more Saginaws, M20, T5, misc bellhousings, flywheels, clutches.
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The Goldwing:

This is how it sits today. This winter I hope to add spoke wheels, indian fenders and repaint it. Probably won't get to it though.
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...and there's still the Cutlass. I'm exhausted. On a positive note, I recently sold my Jetster boat project and my sandrail. I know that means I'm headed in the right direction. Anyone wanna buy a Stude or 510 wagon?

[Oldsmoletick]

It's digusting on how the legal system works to screw us over, when I had my one accident (other driver ran a red light and turned left in front of me), I had a good friend with me, (nobody was hurt thankfully), anyway, for weeks after that, my friend kept getting phone calls from different lawyers asking if he wanted to sue me and the other driver!! He never took any of them up on the offer (like I said a good friend). But it really does baffle me how someone would try to sink (or try to convince someone else to sink) another person for a quick buck for no reason at all. That's really sickening with your situation, that would leave a terrible taste in my mouth about mankind as well.

[DRIVEN]

Thanks for at least referring to it as the legal system and not the justice system.

[Blake442]

That's quite the fleet!

Nothing makes your projects go too slow like having too many projects...
Ask me how I know!

That's a shame about the '35 PU, but to be honest it sounds like you were lucky. If you hadn't been thrown out, the rescue workers probably would have been sawing off the steering column imbedded in your chest to get you out of the car...

We restored about 6 '36 Fords (various body styles) at the resto shop I worked at, and I refused to drive every one of them other than in and out of the shop, for the very reason that the owner did not want us to put seat belts in them(bone stock resto's). Fuck that, I'm not dying in one of those tractors!

Glad you made it through ok, all the b.s. that followed it aside...