BBQ'd Cougar
I walked around to the back of Accurate Frame's building where my Cougar was parked. Opening the passenger's side door a cloud of white fire retardant powder rushed out. I poked my nose inside. Damn, it smelled bad. The whole interior reeked of smoke and fire extinguisher that had combined into something nobody's car should be- a wet BBQ pit. If I thought the upholstery needed work before... it really was going to need it now. Along the top edge of the rear seat, the leather had been charred black by flames to reveal gaping holes through it's cushions. Totally destroyed.
The frustrating thing about this is, I was going to remove the rear seat before I took it to the shop as a courtesy. It's a ten minute job. But, laziness caught me by the shirt collar and I decided to let them handle it. That was their job, after all.
Ed and myself sat down in his office to discuss how we would handle this. He was visibly nervous and completely embarrassed. I think he was worried that I would take him to court and sue him or at the very least make him pay for fully restoring my car's interior. A full restoration would cost thousands of dollars. Because the Cougar's interior was already thrashed I reasoned it would not be fair to make his shop pay for brand new carpet, headliner, leather bucket seats, etc. If I had brought the car to him in new condition and this careless accident happened I would think otherwise.
We came to a gentleman's agreement. Ed's welding work was going to run into the $400 to $500 dollar range. Replacing the rear seats would nearly be that much. I suggested Ed ditch the bill for welding, and I wouldn't hassle him for money to fix the entire interior. Seemed reasonable enough to me. Both of us shook on it. Done deal.
Driving home I had to roll all the windows down because of that wet BBQ pit smell. It was overpowering. At least the rear end of the car felt like it was firmly planted on the road again. Their repair work to those shock mounts at least was good. When I got back home I parked the Cougar out front. There it sat for weeks collecting lawn trimmings and hornets while I thought about what I was going to do with it next.
The frustrating thing about this is, I was going to remove the rear seat before I took it to the shop as a courtesy. It's a ten minute job. But, laziness caught me by the shirt collar and I decided to let them handle it. That was their job, after all.
Ed and myself sat down in his office to discuss how we would handle this. He was visibly nervous and completely embarrassed. I think he was worried that I would take him to court and sue him or at the very least make him pay for fully restoring my car's interior. A full restoration would cost thousands of dollars. Because the Cougar's interior was already thrashed I reasoned it would not be fair to make his shop pay for brand new carpet, headliner, leather bucket seats, etc. If I had brought the car to him in new condition and this careless accident happened I would think otherwise.
We came to a gentleman's agreement. Ed's welding work was going to run into the $400 to $500 dollar range. Replacing the rear seats would nearly be that much. I suggested Ed ditch the bill for welding, and I wouldn't hassle him for money to fix the entire interior. Seemed reasonable enough to me. Both of us shook on it. Done deal.
Driving home I had to roll all the windows down because of that wet BBQ pit smell. It was overpowering. At least the rear end of the car felt like it was firmly planted on the road again. Their repair work to those shock mounts at least was good. When I got back home I parked the Cougar out front. There it sat for weeks collecting lawn trimmings and hornets while I thought about what I was going to do with it next.
posted by factory_peasant at 11:11 AM
4 Comments:
BBQ IMPALA ---
Harkens me back to the early 70's.
My first car was a 1964 chevy Impala, convertable, and this being northeastern Ohio (aka "The Rustbelt") by the early 70's this fine auto was pretty well eaten away with rust caused by winter salt corrosion etc..I paid $75 for it.
Anyway, the worst rust cancer was in the area of the underbody and the front floors were mostly gone, the only thing between me and the many Ohio freeways was the slowly rotting carpet. It had even developed a few holes of various sizes and I could see the road wizzing by underfoot as well as the muffler which crossed under the car at that point, (this will come into play later in this narritive).
The one good thing about the missing floor area and holes in the carpet was it became a handy exit repository for ciggarette butts and other smoking remnants as were prevalent in those carefree times.
So, on to the BBQ....
I was happily sailing home from work one night...speeding along on the expressway as I was prone to do.
I began to smell something funny that wasn't associated with whatever I was inhaling at the time. The smell became stronger and soon smoke was beginning to waft up from somewhere beneath me.
Apparantly what had been occuring while I was not paying attention was the carpet had sagged down into the gaping rust eroded floor and was resting on the muffler and due to my speed the heat of the muffler had caused the carpet to begin to smolder. By the time I noticed it , I looked down and saw a ring of embers slowly burning a bigger and bigger hole in the carpet.
I freaked out and sped even faster to escape to the nearest exit the car filling with smoke.....
Unbeknownst to me a cop had noticed my speeding and chased me down for that and of course when I pulled over the smoke was billowing and he called the F.D and they came out and put it out with that dusty white powder that coated the interior of my smoldering rusting hulk of Impala.
Needless to say my lame excuse for speeding, that I was trying to get off the freeway as safely an quickly as possible so as not to be a danger to others, Sir, didn't wash.
ETW
ETW- great story! the cop STILL gave you a ticket? that's fucked.
Oops....I forgot to mention the one little thing that tipped the scales of Justice in the cops favor.
I ,at the time, was running with some unscrupulous characters and this car of mine was often used by them to "go places" and "do things".
Well after the fire had been put out and a through search of my self and the car had been conducted the dilegent cop informed me of an item which had been found stuffed in the back seat of the car - said item being a most likely stolen Police Nite Stick......uh...I don't know how that got in my car officer....one of my many friends who borrow my car or something......He didn't buy it and said if I really wanted it back I could go down to the police station and explain why I should get it back....(One of my friends did own up to it later - said he "found" it in an unattended police car......
So he passed on the nite stick but settled on presenting me with a tick. (Also I was a minor of 17 at the time)Ok by me at that point...Ahhhh the 70's
I was in a car once(80s civic)with a lady from the south. We were both dressed up for a fancy dress ball. The fucking thing caught on fire in oakland, and she pulled it into a gas station. I know...not to bright. Well i went in and asked the Asian attendants for a fire extinguiture. I had to ask like 5 times before they got the picture saying shit like "fire extinguisher?!!! We go boom!!!" and pointing at the car. They finally came through and i ran out to the car, in tails and dress shoes mind you. I grabbed the chicks dress out of the thing popped the hood and tried the extinguisher. It apparently had no charge in it, a weak stream of white crap came out and all i could do was laugh and watch the car burn. Fun. I did find a mixtape with Debby Deb weekends on the ground while we waited for the fire truck. neat.
DT
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