Nellie’s Makeover….Getting There

This has been quite a makeover.  I thought I would be tooling along most of the summer in Nellie.  But it has been one little setback after another!  Like people, I guess cars that are old get tempermental and need gentle handling also.  (I am not thinking of anyone in particular here! )

Here’s Nellie’s bits and pieces waiting to get back in their place.

When Wally was replacing the shocks, he decided to pull the axle and take it to be turned.

For the motorheads, here is the brand spanking, shiny new engine!  A straight 6 cylinder/200ci.  (Wally told me, I don’t really know!) These pics were taken at the shop when we picked it up.

Wally made arrangements with a gentleman in our neighborhood who is a master mechanic to help get the engine reconnected and to do the brakes.  But three different times the man cancelled.  We had our eyes set on a big Cruise here in Denver and thought we had plenty of time to get Nellie running.  But now we were scrambling.  So, I encouraged Wally to just go for it.  He has rebuilt engines in the past and although it has been awhile, its just like riding a bike, right?  Well, maybe not but things went pretty well.  And I think he was pretty pleased with himself.

We were burning the midnight oil the night before the big cruise.  Wally found a mechanic who made house class and he was there doing the brakes.  Wally’s childhood friend Mike Durham had just arrived from Indiana but he was out there with Wally in the garage. The moment came to turn the key…and…absolutely nothing! Not even a little click, and definitelu no vroom-vroom!  I could not even believe it!!  All heads were bent over the hood, questioning and examining…loosening wires and reconnecting them.  Still nothing.  Wally and Mike came inside to eat something.  When they returned to the garage, believe it or not, the brake mechanic’s wife had solved the problem…with a baby on her hip!  She had unconnected the wires that went to the starter solenoid and reconnected them.  Something was not right in there but it was working now.

So, we made it on the Cruise, one end of Colfax to the other, ending up at Mile High. It was sort of fun, we were late of course and the cars at Mile High were packed up and gone by the time we got there.  But the drive through downtown was fun and we saw lots of old cars along the way.  There were several stops along the way where cars could park and show off.   I got Wally to stop so I could take a picture of some cars.

Nash Metropolitan

This is a ‘58 Ford Fairlane with a retractable hardtop.  They were just putting the top down when I saw it.      Pretty cool!

By the end of Nellie’s maiden voyage, she was not sounding very good.  There were obvious problems with the transmission and the new exhaust was leaking.  But we were getting there!