’84-’85 Dodge 600 ES photo from the Cohort by L Seddon
By 1999 we had ditched the domestic brands and had become a full-fledged Honda family, with a fleet of Civics at our service. Not worrying if the cars would start, run and stop freed us to concentrate on our children’s teenage years.
Talking about those teenagers; Michael had saved his money and decided he wanted a convertible, of which there were very few in central New York. As such, that Civic interlude would prove shortlived and much as I tried to dissuade him, he had my mother drive him 60 miles into the country where he bought an ‘84 Dodge 600 convertible ‘as is’.
As soon as he got it inspected he found that it was rusted out; underneath the carpet where the floor boards should be, pieces of plywood and old license plates were found. The rear window was also missing, so my son cleaned out the garage to park it inside and not have the back seat fill up overnight with snow.
The 600’s ignition switch didn’t work, but Michael just used a screwdriver to start it (a chip off the old block). While I didn’t care for the car, one thing I did caution him about was its 2.6 Mitsubishi four cylinder engine with a known tendency to fail when oil starved. I made sure he kept it topped up, but he had a nasty habit of racing the engine at start up before the oil pressure could build up.
With no way to keep those youthful impulses in check, one day I got a call that the car wouldn’t start at the mall. As usual, Michael had raced the engine, and then it stalled; it wouldn’t turn over after that. A mechanic friend of mine offered to tow the Dodge to the scrap yard for whatever it would bring and that was the end of that. My son’s next purchase would follow a newly established pattern.
’86 Honda Accord image from the Cohort by canadiancatgreen.
While in high school Michael had been working and saved up some money. After his senior year, he got a job in a steel plant making serious money until he went off to college and found a 1986 Honda Accord in good condition, or as good as any 13 year old car in Central New York could be.
Michael drove the Accord that summer but had to leave it at home when he started college since freshmen were not allowed cars. I ended up taking the Accord to Georgia in mid-September when I was recruited to a car hauling trailer manufacturer. It was time to give the car some personal attention.
The radio/tape player had been stolen so I made the 1100 mile trip in silence. Fortunately, it did have good working air conditioning. The rust had taken its toll on the body and undercarriage; the curbside brake caliper mount broke off and the caliper would bang against the suspension every time the brakes were applied. I got a complete assembly from the Honda scrap yard in Buford and cut off the bolts holding on the old mounting bracket and installed the new one. Then the alternator failed and I replaced it with a rebuilt unit.
My middle daughter joined me in Georgia in late May 2001 and we shared that Honda until June of that year. We flew back to Syracuse and got our ‘97 Civic coupe so we each had a car for a few weeks, though she shortly after ruined the Accord’s bumper after hitting it when going over a speed bump. We agreed to share the coupe and park the Accord until we could figure out what to do. It had 246k miles on it when we gave up on it, the first car I ever owned to last more than 200k miles.
’86 Mustang LX convertible photo from the Cohort by Foden Alpha.
We ended up donating the Accord to a local ministry for scrap value and buying an ‘86 Mustang convertible; once again, a purchase driven by teenage desires. The Mustang was priced right and ran well, but after a few weeks, my daughter began tiring of it. First, the car’s gas gauge didn’t work, and she ran it out of gas at least once. But the real issue she had with the Mustang was that it was old and didn’t send the right message in the high school parking lot.
It turned out that a newer Honda with shiny paint was higher on the pecking order than an old convertible in need of good detailing. She started driving the two door Civic and I gladly took over the drop top. In New York you left a convertible top up and only put it down when you drove it, while in Georgia you left the top down and only raised it if it was going to rain while it was parked. Meanwhile, our new home had not accumulated a garage full of excess so I could keep it under cover.
Nine months of that year I drove the Mustang almost every day without putting the top up; even on cold mornings I would put the windows up and blast the heat and be perfectly comfortable. On hot summer days the A/C was a necessity in traffic since sitting still with the sun beating down was overwhelmingly hot. The V6 and auto transmission was sufficient for driving around town and I would never have trusted the car on any extended trip, so it never made it to the interstate for more than a few exits. It was definitely not a performance car, but a pleasant ride, the open air experience more than making up for any lack of even modest ambitions of sportiness.
As happy as I was with this lineup of two 4 year old Honda Civics and the Mustang, it turned out that with five drivers in the family, we needed at least one more car. My son was coming back from Marine Corps boot camp and ordinance school to go to North Georgia University while he did reserve duty. He located a 97 Civic LX with 60k miles, and based on our experience with the first two I approved the purchase. It was nicer than the two we brought from NY; it had air, power windows, a center console and nicer upholstery. Other than that it was identical except for color.
While payments were made on the Civic LX, my son’s unit was activated and deployed to California during the Iraq War, so we drove it intermittently while he was gone. By then, I discovered that life on my son’s campus in South Carolina had been hard, so some work was needed on the car. The car’s trunk had been broken into, and a new latch was placed. Then, the side rear door had been bashed one night and I located a door on Craigslist and repainted it to match. We spent a whole afternoon on the job, which would have been simpler, except for the power door locks that had to be transferred onto the replacement. Finally, when the stereo died in 2009 we upgraded with a new system for his birthday.
With my son’s return in 2005, we were short one car, once again. So my wife and I shopped for a family hauler as none of the four vehicles in the fleet was suitable for all five of us to ride together. The next purchase would show that some lessons take time to sink in.
Chrysler sold a ton of those K convertibles, and another ton of the later Sebrings. But as much as I have loved my Mopars, I think the Mustangs of the 80s and 90s made far, far better old used cars.
We had plenty of experience with the late 80s Accord and the late 90s Civics. They were indeed a new way to drive for me – just turn the key, change the oil every now and then, and there wasn’t much to worry about. I’ll bet it was a treat to relocate from the heavy rust country to a place that is so much easier on cars!
Awesome! Glad there were no outright thefts reported, at least so far. Those Hondas were/are hot commodities and often were.
Using old license tags to repair rusted out floorboards was a common rustbelt repair technique at many far north car dealers. I became quite proficient at quickly shaping and pop riveting them in place. Our dealership even had some shop-made forming jigs to aid in hammering the tags to fit some of the common rust areas on popular car models. A little sealer followed by a quick spray from the undercoating gun completed the repairs. You may laugh it this today, but our repair jobs often lasted longer than the original steel.
Common rustbelt technique? I guess I missed out of all that luckily and don’t have to deal with rust and cars. Actually I do deal with rust except not on a car but on an aircraft carrier. At 81 years old you are bound to have some attacking the thinner steel. License plates don’t work. Speaking of which I am off to the carrier for the day…
Enjoyed this much, Harry. It’s so true that some lessons, like your son’s with the Dodge 600 convertible, must be learned firsthand. This purchase totally sounds like something I would have lobbied strongly for. The ’86 Mustang, however, would have still have been cool to me, even with a six, but I get that some in the younger generation may not see the Fox body as being as special.
I admire it when people have the know-how to make their own repairs, as was the case when you replaced the Accord’s brake assembly. A college buddy had a same-vintage Accord also in the late ’90s that still seemed shockingly well put-together for a car that old.
The rusty car reminds me of my first car purchase in college. In the summer of 87 I bought a 78 Scirocco, thinking there was just surface rust on the fenders, then I took a hard look at the strut towers and discovered life on the shore of Long Island sound had rusted them out and I lacked the means to weld it up, so I scrapped it and bought another Scirocco with no rust.
Oddly I have never owned a Honda car, but that may change
Impressive there are still early 2000’s Hondas to be seen, here in Ottawa, and Southeastern Ontario. Some are rusty. But at least, they are still on the road. Indicative that owners, don’t want to part with them. As most other manufacturer’s autos, of similar vintage, are long gone.