Faith in mankind...... that's what it's all about.......
Now what would have happened if that was an 85 Ford Tempo instead of a
classic automobile? Maybe they would have done you the favor and kept on
driving....
Blaine Dumkee
59 GMC 9314
Fort Smith NT
Canada
http://www.chevytrucks.org/users/wayne/blaine59.jpg
-----Original Message-----
From: G. Simmons <gls@4link.net>
To: Ole Truckers <oletrucks@autox.team.net>
Date: Wednesday, June 07, 2000 10:36 PM
Subject: [oletrucks] An interesting day...
An old chinese curse goes "May you live in interesting times." By that
standard, I've had an interesting day.
I set out to drive my 55 thunderbird down from my parents' house, about 60
miles away, to mine. Everything went fine for about 50 miles then the rear
passenger side tire blew, and the brakes went out.
I managed to coast over to the shoulder of the freeway and stop without
hitting anything. But then I saw the smoke, and in the proverbial way, I
also saw the fire.
Calmly, but not too calmly, I opened the trunk and removed the fire
extinguisher from its box, pulled the pin, and began spraying the white
powdery substance at the flaming tire. This annoyed the tire sufficiently
to put it in retreat until the white powder ran out, after which the fire
returned to its work.
A kindly motorist stopped and used his small powder extinguisher with
similar results, after which the black tire smoke again began to grow. A
third motorist arrived with a large CO2 extinguisher, and he was still
dousing it when the fire department arrived to put out the fire for good
with water.
I learned several lessons from all of this.
First, the cheap little powder extinguishers are next to useless. We should
have larger units if we actually want to keep the car instead of collecting
the insurance proceeds.
Second, never put up with a single master cyllinder on any car which is
actually driven. This is the second one which has left me in the lurch. I
am 90 percent sure that the fire would not have happened if I had been able
to stop the car sooner.
Third. People are really nice. Not one, but two perfect strangers stopped
and ran up to try to put out a fire burning right next to my gas tank. Once
the firemen had put the fire out, they waved and drove off. They didn't
even let me get their names so I could buy them new extinguishers and send
them each a bottle of scotch. Now that I think about it, this is really
the first point, not the third.
So after all that, I towed the the car home, and it seems ok, in spite of
everything.
Regards,
Grant S.
54 3100 (mostly all there)
54 3100 (mostly not there)
55 1st 3100 (mostly rust)
Los Angeles, CA
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