Have you ever driven a car until its last dying breath?

When I was 26 I had a old 1980's Ford Escort and when I bought it, it was on its last leg. I think I paid $300 for the car, I dove it to Ohio and back. And I drove it for about 3 months total and then the motor blew up. And then I called the local junk yard to pick it up. If I remember right they gave me $60 for it lol. Have you ever driven a car until its last dying breath?

Greg

 

Interesting thread really! I have driven really old cars and I've brought at least one from the dead lol, but I can't say I've driven it until he died because I still managed to sell it. On the other hand I did had a nasty crash and the car died on the spot...

 

That's funny but i would never do that on purpose. The truck i have now has no interior, no windows, or doors and it will be driven until its last breathe.

--- Double Post Merged, Jul 13, 2014 ---

I enjoy bringing them back from the dead too. I'm a car lover not a car killer.

 

I have had some that were in pretty bad shape. The kind you have to be "prayed up" before you get on the road with them.
I haven't had one that totally blew up with me, but I have had some that just needed more to fix them than it was worthwhile doing, and usually sold them to someone with some mechanic skills to deal with their mechanical issues.

One of the most interesting (and problematic) vehicles was an old (I mean really OLD !) Datsun pickup. I think it was about a 1962 model. I didn't think they even had them here in America that long ago, and in any case, it was pretty much one of a kind.

The shifting lever was on the column, but the whole shifting pattern was reversed and backwards. First was over and then up, second was down, and then third was in and up, reverse below that. I don't know how many times I forgot and tried to drive off in third gear !
Parts for that pickup were almost impossible to find ! We usually had to find something close enough that my ex could make it work. The color was kind of primer grey, but with blotches of all sorts of paint here and there, and more dents than you could even count.
We named it "Ugly Bugly" .
It had no windshield wipers. One fine day the kids and I got caught in one of those unexpected snowstorms, so we had all the windows rolled down, and the kids were leaning out and trying to wipe the snow off the windshield while I drove. Boy, I was glad when we finally drove out of the snowstorm ! !

I actually don't remember anymore what was the final straw for poor Ugly Bugly. But something broke down that we could not find a replacement for. It was still running, but we sold it to someone who thought they could fix it.

The kids still talk about Ugly Bugly. It might have been on its last legs, but it had a lot of "character"......

 

No, I have never driven a car until it was fit for the junk yard. I always managed to take care of my cars and then resell them. You had yours for a short time so I am guessing it was not in a very good condition when you bought it, so you probably got a deserving time out of it.

 

I also haven't owned a car all the way up to it's last dying breath. I have only owned two trucks in my lifetime and I sold the first one before it started giving me issues. I think if you sense that a car is going bad on you, you should try to sell it as soon as possible while it's still worth something to someone.

 

I haven't personally, but I've been in a car while it died. My dad owned a Ford Aerostar in the 90's and it must have had a million km's put into it. We drove every year for a decade through the united states in the summer and that baby just took a beating and never flinched. One day we were driving up a mountain in Vermont and it couldn't take anymore, just died. We had to get a tow down the mountain and took a train back home. Was a memorable family vacation to say the least. I kind of miss that car. Lot of good memories and very reliable for us.

 

I didn't bring them to life mysef, I don't have the knowledge to do it, but I did pay a guy that found me half an engine and replaced it, pretty much Frankenstein style, but it worked.

 

I took a road trip a few years back when I decided to go and collect an item that I bought online as opposed to waiting for them to deliver it via post. My car was actually in good condition or so I thought. We will almost 5 minutes away from our destination when my car started making funny noises which forced me to stop. Unfortunately that was the last stop I ever made in that car. The car engine failed in me and it was more expensive to fix this car as opposed to by another vehicle and so I opted on buying another car

 

That is bad news... Something similar happened to a car from my wife, she let the engine overheat and she burned it, no possible recovery there, but it was misuse, lack of experience from her.

 

I really haven't, I tend to get rid of my cars the minute I continually have to keep fixing them and spending too much money on it. As of that point start looking for a new car and getting rid to get rid of the old one, so sadly no I haven't yet.

 

Sadly yes, it was unfortunately because I got into a car crash and the car was good for nothing but scrap.
If it was just random problems with the car I might not have the patience to endure it either and end up switching cars.

 

For me it's not a just a matter of patience, if it's giving too much expense it's simply not worth it to keep it, we are better off if we just buy a new car.

 

Yes. As the Queen of Cheap, I have been guilty of doing this only once. It happened one time because it was not fun when my car stopped in the middle of a busy intersection and you have people going around looking, talking, honking their horns as if I'm Bewitched and I can wiggle my nose to make my broken car work again. The whole ordeal was exhausting and it was a very hot summer day. Never again.

 

Ahah, the queen of the cheap, not so nice title though... Yes, having an unreliable car is something dangerous and exhausting, I once had one that was losing gasoline (how dangerous was that) and a couple of times the car just stopped in the middle of the road...