Being into old cars, most of us have almost certainly been in a situation where we’ve had to move a completely dead car. Maybe something went catstrophically wrong while on the road, or maybe you had to rescue a car that was destined for the crusher. Perhaps you had to rely on a janky improvised wheel chuck, some life-saving tool like an electric drill-powered winch, or the power of friendship. Anytime there’s two tons of steel free rolling there’s the potential for tragedy or a great anecdote.
What’s your best story about moving a dead car?
The most entertaining comment by next week will receive a prize. Scroll down to see the winner of last week’s QotW, “What’s your favorite song or jingle associated with a car?“.
Many of the hits this week had nothing to do with Japanese cars. It’s all fair game since we didn’t specify country of origin in the original question, and unless you grew up in Japan, the most memorable songs are going to be about whatever’s prevalent in your local market. That’s how we get steve‘s answer of the Rush epic “Red Barchetta” and @ye‘s Janis Joplin folk classic “Mercedes Benz”.
Hollywood movies are also how we get ra21benj choice of “Beat City” by the Flowerpot Men as heard in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Jonathan P.‘s selection of “In the Air Tonight” by Phil Collins as heard in Miami Vice, and setto‘s nomination of “Nightcall” by Kavinsky as heard in Drive.
Representing the Euros, we had Joaquin Ruhi‘s pick of “History Repeating” by The Propellerheads featuring Shirley Bassey, which played in the launch commercial of the 1999 Jaguar S-Type, and Alan‘s pick of “Take My Breath Away” by Berlin for the Peugeot 405.
As for music that makes you think of a Japanese car, Andre came in with a deep cut of Stevie Wonder’s “Overjoyed” as seen in the EF Civic commercials in Japan. dankan went with Van Halen’s cover of The Kinks’ “You Really Got Me” from the classic Barbie Nissan Z32 ad. And to prove how effective a simple jingle can be, Bryan Kitsune and Taylor C. both went with the timeless “I Love What You Do For Me” in old Toyota spots.
Coming in with a close second was Nigel‘s iceberg tier association of Ridge Racer‘s “Speedster Overheat” with the A80 Supra, but this week’s winner was Nihonnotekko:
“The beautiful roooootaryyyyy….Savaaannaaaaaaaa, arrr ex sevennnnnnnn!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBUUYPwqjBU
A longer, extra jazzy version can be heard at ~16:00 in this video, and it slaps pretty hard. The whole video definitely deserves too be watched, notwithstanding the catchy jingle:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMHIOGH1bcA&list=LL&index=58&t=2s
If Mazda still has the full-length version of this song somewhere in the archives and would share it for the rotary enthusiasts everywhere, it’d be a small miracle.
Omedetou, your comment has earned you a set of decals from the JNC Shop!
I wouldn’t call any of them “best”. They’ve been anywhere from disaster to horror stories. Towed one to a transmission shop. They utterly mangled the tranny & engine. They gave up before telling me they had a mechanics lien & to pay up or they’ll repossess the car. Found another car a few states away. Paid a trucking broker arrange to transport. Truck arrived & driver demanded payment. Tried to call the broker. Disappeared into thin air. Asked a friend in the shipping business with a law degree. She told me I was screwed. Paid twice. Hope this is a cautionary tale “for what it’s worth.”
PS: That was enough money to buy a nice 1970 Datsun 510 Wagon.
Moving a dead car is like moving a dead body. Circumstances around it are never good. Don’t believe those barn find mutli-million dollar Ferrari videos. Just content fillers for the ‘gram.
With that said, back in the day a friend reached out in a panic and said he needed to move his dad’s mint Hunter Green Mica 1994 Mazda MPV out from the garage. Odd, since its his dad’s daily and was pretty sure the car isn’t dead.
Turns out his dad was out on errands and he took the car out for a spin without permission. When my friend returned home, he couldn’t park it straight inside the garage and he kept adjusting. In days before 360-degree cameras, a buddy and hand signals was the next best thing.
However upon arrival, the MPV was already brushed up against a concrete wall and rendered the car unmovable, pretty much dead. Luckily we found a jack and a moving dolly. Picked a solid point around the rear axle and shimmied the quasi-minivan with enough room to call it a decent parking job. Take a breather now? Nope, big scratch on passenger side quarter panel. Scrambled to find a touch up marker in black for his dad’s DA Integra. Slapped some on and called it a day.
You’d think his dad would notice that, but he never said a word even up to the day the MPV got traded in.
Back in 2010 I bought a rear-ended Honda Accord 5-speed as a parts car to support my automatic-to-manual conversion on my 1994 Accord EX Wagon. It was pouring rain that day I met the seller, and the car had been sitting on his driveway for some time, and he concluded that the car wasn’t able to start because of dead battery. My original plan was to just pull the transmission and all related hardware in one single swoop, but my friends and I ultimately realized it was safer to just buy the crashed car outright and have it at our full disposal. My friend brought his trailer for us to load the parts car onto, but “no start” meant we’d have to figure a way to get this car onto the trailer.
So, for the next hour in the pouring rain, I was using racheting straps and hand brake to inch the car up onto the trailer, while the seller just stood and watched. His wife saw the effort we were going through, and when it came time to talk price, she basically told him to stop nickel and diming us, and let the car go for $600, down from trying to itemize all the parts he would have been able to sell.
We towed it home, pushed it off the trailer, and decided to jump start the car. Car started right up; I could have just jumped it and drove it onto the trailer all along. The rear, though, was still smashed, and the muffler was dragging on the ground.
Remember they tried to kill a Civic on Top Gear? That didn’t go very well…
I think I permanently damaged my right wrist from pushing my ’93 Sentra SE-R to the end of an uphill driveway so that a tow truck could pick it up.
I still have fond memories of that car even though it was probably the worst example in the country, if not the world.
I actually have two – both involving model year 1976 automobiles, one with a happy ending and one with a not so happy ending. I’ll start with the bad one first.
In December 1993, I was driving my 1976 Chevrolet Monte Carlo (aka “The Beast” as named by one of my high school friends) to the local car wash to remove the obnoxious quantities of road salt and chemicals off the undercarriage and body of the car. At the time, The Beast was my daily driver, not old enough yet to be considered a classic, and as a result could not be kept out of winter service. As I cruised east on Maryland Route 7 in Cecil County, between Perry Point and North East, the Metallica song “Fade to Black” was playing on my Discman, through a cassette adapter to my car stereo. Suddenly, there was a loud BANG! This was followed by the engine stalling and loss of power. I pulled over to the side of the road and tried to restart, so I put her in park and turned the key. What followed was the most awful metallic screeching sound I have ever heard. I immediately turned the key off and got out of the car and nearly slipped on the large puddle of oil accumulating at my feet. The engine had thrown a rod on the downstroke and punched a hole through the bottom of the oil pan (the bang). I had to have it towed back to my parents’ house, where I was living at the time and attending college. I had goals and ambitions to rebuild the engine, but being a poor college student, my lofty plans never materialized, and I ended up having to junk the car. I came to find out later that the previous owner had rebuilt the engine before selling it to me and ran out of money during the later stages of the engine rebuild putting in cheap or reused parts on the bottom half of the engine – more on this later.
Fast forward about 30 years to shortly after I had purchased Samus Aran (my beloved 1976 Datsun 280Z 2+2) in 2023. I was showing her off to a friend and took a small errand trip to my local Costco. When we returned, the engine would crank and crank but would not turn over, stranding us there. My wife came and picked up my friend, while I called and waited for the tow back home. I had a great conversation with the tow truck driver, who was also into classic Japanese cars, his flavor of choice being Mazda RX-7s, having worked on them with his dad. He imparted that my kids would probably always remember the Datsun as a cool car, no matter how much trouble it causes, especially if they ride in it (both my son and daughter), and help fix it (my son). Using my engineering knowledge, I dove into troubleshooting my issues. Soon, I developed a deep and unlawful carnal knowledge of the operation of the fuel injection system, reading through and memorizing passages from the Datsun Fuel Injection Bible. Eventually, I was able to determine the several root causes to the starting issues, which included an undersized aftermarket fuel pump, bad transistor ignition unit, and an aftermarket and failing rebuilt ECU. I also I was able to replace all of the broken parts with OEM parts (apart from the TIU which was upgraded) and now Samus runs like a champ. As the tow driver predicted, my kids have both grown to love the car, now if only I could convince my wife to do the same!
I think the moral of both experiences here is not to take shortcuts with critical automotive parts – OEM or better will always be my minimum standard. Part of the used classic car ownership experience is finding and correcting the sins of previous owners. They may have had good intentions but limited funds. Also, I am superstitious enough that under no circumstance will I ever listen to “Fade to Black” by Metallica whenever I am driving!
One Thanksgiving many years ago, my tryptophan-and-rum-and-Coke-induced khumari was interrupted by a stranded friend in need of a helping hand. I ended up pushing his disabled EG8 down the shoulder of the 5 South for several miles – ginger–carefulling – to avoid marring the Black Jade front bumper of my pristine 60k-mile, single-previous-owner UCF10.
We rounded off the night with various pie slices and cocktails while watching Best Motoring on Youtube into the wee hours, and after a suitably late rise, diagnosed the Civic’s woes: an empty fuel tank.
Sometimes, when you’re feeling grateful, God will gift you the best kind of problem.
I stalled my ’85 Celica upstream of a local street signal and couldn’t restart. I had starter problems that my cousin later found out was a bad starter ground. Car was blocking 1 lane. I was ready to start pushing the car when a police car arrived and pushed my car with his front push bumper. With my car now on the right shoulder, I waited 10 mins and the car started up again.
well my best story actually coincides with the murdering of a car (which has since been resurrected and made it’s way into my possession).
my buddy (let’s call him jimbo) had to tow his project car from one town over, at the time my usual towing rig was out of town so there was no other option than a flat tow with my project car and drag the wounded comrade over to the shop. thing is…my project car had a clutch like an on/off switch, heaps of torque and a flywheel like a pizza pie…not ideal for towing, fun for sliding.
so at the lights somewhere between a mile and a kilometer from home i took off, maybe muscle memory, maybe user error but we ripped the entire front off jimbo’s project car leaving him stranded and me dragging everything from the radiator support forwards behind the car.
good times, great excuse for a tubular front end and reinforcements!
Around 8-9 years ago, my B13 SE-R died and I had to get it towed back to my parents place. We had a pretty bad neighbor, who would report any car he thought he could get towed, so we pushed into the backyard. Even when my car was perfectly running, he called people to tow it several times in the past. I didn’t want to let the car go, but also couldn’t see any viable options. I prayed for God to provide a way… and an engine hoist that I could use. In short order I had some friends reach out and ask if I could help fix their son’s computer. I said sure, fixed it and cleaned it, and then gave it back to them. They were so impressed, they gave me a $250 Amazon gift card, despite me not asking for any compensation… and it was just the amount I needed to purchase an engine hoist! I begged my parents to let me use their backyard to pull the engine and rebuilt it, and they finally acquiesced.
My parents were pretty worried, not wanting a car potentially stuck in their backyard. I had also never taken on that intense of a car project before, but I had dreams of much larger car projects, and knew this was my chance. If I could succeed, I would be ready for even greater challenges in the future. I got the engine and transmission rebuilt, installed a mechanical LSD, and was able to drive it out of the backyard.
Fast-forward to now, and I’ve got nearly a quarter million miles on my SE-R, and will likely be selling her in the next year or so to make room, since I am on to even bigger and more epic car projects!