I had a 1954, small-window Dodge truck back in the 1970’s. It’s funny how a 20 year-old truck seemed so much older when I was younger. My 1990 Suburban is the same age now as the old Dodge was then but the Suburban seems modern to me. I can remember new Suburban’s rolling off the dealer lots that looked exactly like mine. I wasn’t even alive when the ’54 dodge was built.
The Dodge had a flathead 6-cylinder engine that sucked gas at an alarming rate. 10 miles per gallon was as good as it got. The truck had a three on the tree and was geared very low. Top speed was 70 miles per hour. On top of the cylinder head was a ball valve tapped into one of the cylinders. The valve had a quick-release air chuck fitting. The idea was to supply compressed air (with a bit of gasoline mixed in) for tire filling or bomb making. I never used that feature.
Besides the clutch, brake and throttle the Dodge had a floor switch for high beams and a fourth pedal that engaged the starter motor when it was depressed. The starter had no solenoid; the floor pedal did it all. You could turn the key off and the starter would still spin the engine. I thought that was a great idea. In 1954 Dodge gave you a horn and brake lights but no turn indicators. I used arm signals like on a motorcycle. It’s a hard habit to break so I still signal the old way in a panic situation.
Underneath the driver’s side floor was a battery compartment. The electrical system on the Dodge was 6-volt but a standard modification back then was to install an 8-volt battery. You didn’t have to tweak the voltage regulator and the lights were much brighter. Starting was a breeze with the extra couple volts. The 8-volt battery in my Dodge was shot. It was weak, even after a night on the charger the engine would slowly crank.
The obvious solution would be to buy a new battery but I didn’t have a lot of money to blow as I was trying to get out to California. A battery was expensive. We lived behind a gas station so I went over there looking for a used battery. The service guy handed me a couple packages of VX-6 battery additive stuff and said, “Try this first, it works good.”
What the heck, Lee Petty endorsed VX-6, he said he’d rather run without tires than his VX-6. That was good enough for me. Lee Petty does not bullshit. So I dumped the stuff in the nearly dead 8-volt battery and let it sit overnight. The next morning I tried the starter and the engine started like it had a new battery.
I was stunned. I mean, that hocus-pocus additive junk has never worked for me. Not only that but the battery worked perfectly from then on. I drove the truck to California and all over San Diego for years. The VX-6 battery was still in the truck when I traded it for a Yamaha 125 Enduro.
Recently I looked around for VX-6 and can only find old stock on Amazon and Ebay. It figures, the Battery Illuminati must have gotten to VX-6’s manufacturers. Maybe they threatened VX-6 employees or their families. Battery sales were suffering. Their stuff was too good. It’s no coincidence that you can’t even access the cells on most new batteries.
There are more ways to measure wealth than money. Sure, traditionalists rely on a strict net worth approach, adding up the figures on electronic statements in a system where the winner is whoever has the highest number. You can count all sorts of things, though. You can count friends, you can count grandchildren, you can count experiences: These are forms of wealth that won’t show up on that balance email from the bank.
On of my largest assets is the 4-speed Suburban project. When I bought the ’90 ‘Burb it came with a malfunctioning automatic transmission. I hate automatics and malfunctioning ones even more so. The 700R4 works in Drive and Reverse but not in 1-2-3. The truck runs fine and it will tote a 3000-pound load without complaint but that boring automatic has got to go. It’s a rare Suburban that came with a 4-speed from the factory and even rarer to see a ½-ton version. I’ve only seen one 4-speed ‘Burb and it was ¾-on. This project keeps earning interest and I’ve been training a weather eye on Internet sale sites for a cheap, manual transmission, 4X4 GM truck to steal the guts from. I found a late model, 4X4-IFS 1/2-ton truck with a 5-speed and a nice FI engine that ran well but the transfer case and transmission housing were broken and besides everything was on the wrong side for the old straight axle suburban.
The chalky blue, 1974 MG GT came with Tinfiny Ranch and was listed as an out building on the deed. This car was on the chopping block until I started reading about MG’s with Buick 215 cubic-inch aluminum engine swaps. I really have to stay off the internet. The Buick engine triples the horsepower, doesn’t weigh much more than the iron 4-banger it replaces and sounds cool as hell revved up to 6000 RPM. This is one asset I kind of wish was not in my Project Bank as I’ve never been that interested in cars. Still, it’s there waiting on me.
Tinfiny Ranch itself is a huge source of endless work, but beyond the physical plant The Ranch continues to deposit surprises into my Project Bank. This Merry Tiller project revealed itself as I was hauling away two, multi-panel garage doors. The doors sections were stacked with spacers in the popular rat-paradise fashion and I gave chase to a couple fat rats but they got away from me in the thick brush down by the ravine. The Merry Tiller looks like it will come in handy for the raised-bed vegetable garden (yet another deposit in The Project Bank) I’m planning for the back yard. The engine on the tiller is not stuck and being a Briggs & Stratton I’m sure it will run so I’m leaving it in The Bank for safe keeping.
It takes 60 shovelfuls to fill the adobe mixer. Originally designed for mortar, the outside drum of our mixer looks like an inverted lunar landscape. Dimples as large as a quarter, back when a quarter was worth 25 cents, protrude far enough to run afoul of the mixer’s I-beam chassis. It’s the rocks, see? Mixing adobe eats up the rubber wiper blades on the paddles and as the gap between the blade and the drum grows larger things start going south. When the gap grows large enough the mixer paddles wedge into the rocks and a sharp pop, like someone hit the machine with a 16-pound sledgehammer, is followed by a lurch of the heavy machine. Another dimple has been created. If the conditions are just right the mixer blades will lock up solid and it takes a quick hand on the clutch lever to prevent a smoking V-belt.
With adobe mixing the show must go on so Pappy and I work in silence. Not total silence though, because we have to keep count of how many shovels we are throwing into the hopper. “I’m at 13,” I tell Pappy. “15” for me, Pappy replies. The mixer locks up, I grab the clutch. We move loaded buggies to the block-making area then we shovel more dirt into the hopper. Soon the injury is forgotten. “Is that good?” “More water.” Pappy says. “4 more shovelfuls.” “Ok, that’s good. Let’s let it mix” Pappy feels bad about yelling at me, I feel bad for hurting Pappy. We are a team again. I’ve got to be more careful working around others.
“Who wants to give it a try?” Pat asks and several would-be adobe builders jump in and start laying blocks. Instead of cement mortar, more mud is used to set the Adobe blocks. I’m cutting a bevel into the blocks to create a space for small volcanic rocks. The rocks are fitted into the bevels and held in with a white lime mortar. Once these protruding rocks are set the lime plaster will adhere to the rocks, hopefully keeping the plaster from sloughing off the wall.
There’s another, even older method of finishing adobe walls borne from necessity: More mud. Mud plaster doesn’t last as long as lime plaster but if you don’t have lime what’s a poor boy to do? Think of mud plaster as a sacrificial coating. It erodes so that the adobe blocks underneath don’t. Mud plaster is applied by hand or trowel, and re-applied every few years as needed. As Pat’s students, we got to try all application methods with special emphasis on the difficult ones.
My friend Louie and I were wrapping up a hard 500-mile day through Arizona back in the 1990s. I know what you are thinking….500 miles is not that much for a solid day’s riding, but it was brutally hot in the way that only Arizona can be in the summertime. I was on my vintage Honda CBX and Lou was on his Gold Wing. We stopped for gas and Louis filled up first. While I was filling up the CBX, Lou rode over to the air hose to top off his tires. I filled my tank, fired up the CBX, and rode over to Lou, paralleling the sidewalk. I put my kickstand down and started to lean the CBX over.
This time, I was easing into my own driveway on my 2-week-old Suzuki TL1000S. Gorgeous bike. Bright red. A real rocketship. As I made the sharp turn into the driveway, I turned the forks to keep my balance. Lock-to-lock turning (you know, how far you can push the bars from one side to the other) on the Suzuki is waaaay less than any motorcycle I had ever ridden. And as it turns out (pardon the pun), that really makes a difference when you’re trying to balance a bike at low speeds.