hardtuned.com's double 500 : background story

Double 500

Why the Double 500? The whole process reminds me of something we did while working at Autoscene. We found a Renault LeCar with a blown headgasket and purchased it for $35.00 (split three ways.) It ran for a grand total of probably less than 20 miles before it blew up… but we had great time fixing it, flogging it, then dismantling it before sending it to the crusher.

Fast forward to the present: Bill and I had both seen an article in Excellence magazine recalling Jay Lamm's $500.00 Porsche 928 bought specifically for the "Double 500" and the antics of dealing with such a fine piece of automobilia. This prompted more research into the event, including tracking down the October 2001 article in Automobile magazine on their own Le Car Double 500 adventure last year, and a few online references to the event.

Armed with the rumor that the event will run on the last Saturday in June, from Denny's in Corte Madera, the hardtuned.com team commenced the search for a suitable candidate for our effort. (The actual meeting place for 2002 is San Francisco Toyota, Van Ness and Sacramento at 7:00 am June 29th) The process of locating a sub $500 vehicle suitable for automotive mayhem turned into its own grueling sport. We became consumed with Craigslist, searching for crap cars that ran but had other problems…. Emailing each other several times a day, attaching scores of ads as they came out. One team member ran an ad looking for "project cars" on Craigslist.

The following are email subject lines from the countless piles that we contemplated:

1985 VOLVO GL 240 series, $475 obo; 1983 BMW 320i Running; needs TLC $400 obo Mazda 626, jetta, I called on this - have not heard back, '62 Volvo? 1985 Thunderbird - reliable transport - $650 76 Mercedes Benz 280 - $250 ...

The Real Candidates: Our first candidate came from a response to this ad - a $250 Mazda 626 four door hatchback missing the front bumper cover, a couple of large dents and sagging rear shocks. I was out of town, and coordination of the pickup of the car was delayed and it was sold… It was really ugly. I had visions of lopping the roof off of it.

Candidate 1.

The second candidate was also from the projects wanted ad. It was a 1962 Volvo Amazon 4 door coupe. It was solicited with the following description:

I've got an old '62 volvo that i'd like to get rid of.
Maybe we could swing a deal?
I drove it regularly for 10 years but it's been sitting for about 8 months now. About a month ago the battery died but prior to that I was running it every 2 weeks to move it for street cleaning without any problems. 1 1/2 years ago I spent $2000 replacing the engine, axel, brakes and some other adjustments so there's some good stuff in it. The car is mechanically sound (or pretty close, the timing definitly needs to be adjusted) but it's an aesthetic nightmare. Needs seats, gas cap, the rear triangle windows, window crank broke.... There is some body damage and rust though it's not too bad. Anyway, I love this car but realize I HATE working on cars. It's time to let her go. The registration ran out last June but would be $50 or less to register. I think it was about $30/year. The car predates smog inspection. If you think you, or someone you know, would be interested in this car, let me know. I originally wanted $500 but am willing to negotiate.

The car was only a couple of miles from my house, so I went to look at this with a battery and some tools. I had made a deal that if I could get the thing running, I would get the car out of the owner's life, and maybe give her 50 bucks. She agreed. The car was really ugly, the driver's door didn't want to open, the seats were not fastened to the floor, etc. etc. I hooked the battery up, and cranked it over. It cranked but didn't want to start. The car was getting spark, and I tried some starter fluid (through the frozen SU carb. With no gas cap for the past eight months, the gas was no longer flammable enough to keep the car running after the ether burned off. I decided to pass on the car.

The winner of the hardtuned.com double 500 rallye car search

The winner of our search was a 1976 Mercedes 450 SEL. We had been keeping an eye on it for a couple of weeks, and when the price dropped from $800 to $700, we knew we might have a chance to negotiate. It was described as "muffler is badly needed, side window stuck open - minor electrical problem, body straight, small surface rust spots only, steering wheel shakes at high speeds sometimes-not always, tinted windows…." What made it more appealing was the fact it had European headlights and late model 16" wheels. Serg and I made the appointment to check the thing out- and came with cash in hand - just in case. We were amazed when we pulled up - this thing looked pretty good. The story was that the owner had taken it plus cash for a boat that he sold. He drove it a couple of times, but the intermittent shake at the front end discouraged him from driving it more. We took it out for a spin, and it ran fine, stopped, had working lights, and we didn't feel any shaking…. We tried for $450, but the best we could do was $500. As good as this thing looked, with the current registration and smog legality, $500 felt like a real deal!

Then we drove it home. After adding a mere 21 gallons of fuel to the tank, we were cruising about 45-50 mph in a left / right sweeper on a wide city boulevard. The car was great through the left portion, when the car transitioned to the right the shaking began. "Oh boy - Holy S___ " we were screaming, sure that the car was about to hurdle off the road with the wheels pointed in opposite directions. The steering wheel and column were oscillating up, down, right and left as the wheels seemed to be bouncing up and down as well as turning. We slowed, and the shaking stopped. We drove the car on the freeway later that day, with no shakes. Maybe it was just a left - right transition issue, and it would be just fine. We cleaned the car.

I drove the car by myself the following week and while entering a freeway encountered the shake again. This time I felt it was worse, and it was difficult at 45 mph to keep the car in one lane. It was more violent than before, so I turned around and beached it in the garage. It was fine on the way back. I did some research on symptoms of intermittent violent steering shakes, and found it might be the steering damper. I checked the resistance, and there was none. Serg picked up the part. $28 later, we rolled out with the new damper, and no shakes. The window issue turned out to be a seized motor/regulator, so we have converted the window to rope activation. To give us the rally look, a set of semi-functional rallye 2000's have been attached to the front bumper, and plastic drain pipe brake ducts have been added to cool the front brakes. After 187 miles of trouble free driving, the car has averaged an environmentally friendly 9.2 miles to the gallon.

I forgot to mention that the heat is stuck on. This might be an issue later in summer. While driving on a warm day back from a party in Hercules it became very noticeable even with the windows down and the sunroof open. Oh yeah, the tranny seems to slip a bit in reverse, especially up hills. I have properly checked the fluid, and added a tiny bit, but honestly I don't think that is the problem. The shake happened on the freeway again last week after hitting a bump -but it was not nearly as bad. With that in mind, we are saving the thing for the event.

There are a couple of things still on the "to do" list: Register the car: This may be a bit hairy due to the condition of the paperwork. Serg insists that he has registered motorcycles with less. We shall see. I was impressed when we took it to the smog place last week and it passed. We intend to add some hardtuned.com graphics and other rallye graphics for the event itself.

UPDATE: 7/1

We have received the title for the car - after filling out some paperwork and the kind help from our friends at AAA. The car is still awaiting a graphics package.

modifications

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