Costa Mesa or BUST!

Zero oil pressure in Santa Barbara! What the hell?

Some cars that were there





Aries truck getting chop-chop-chopped! He scored on this one for sure!




204 miles to Costa Mesa was the test for the coupe. Would it make it, shit, I hoped so! I took off right after work on Sunday morning and headed south for my journey. I knew when I left that I had a leak at the pan/front seal area of my motor. After topping off all the fluids at my house, I figured I was good until I got to Ventura to pick up D-Smoke. WRONG. I hit Goleta and realized my pressure had been steadily dropping for the last hour. When I pulled off the road, the needle dropped to ZERO! CRAP! I limped it over to the closest gas station and shut it off ASAP! I checked the dipstick, nothing. CRAP! So, I put in about half a quart that I had with me and headed to the closest Kragen. Picked up 2 more GALLONS of oil, then headed south to Ventura. After stopping to pick up D-Smoke, I topped the oil off again. We hopped on the 101 and headed south to Costa Mesa. I was pretty surprised when that little coupe hauled 70-80 the entire way with NO issues (besides going through oil!) the whole way. We spit out a little bit of water coming up the hill into Thousand Oaks, but once that needle hit 200, it never went higher. We pulled off and topped her off again. We cruised into CM at about 2. Man, the weather there is PERFECT! Anyways, we had a blast at Champion Speed! Thanks to Ian for hosting. Arie and Marky put on a BBQ for the members of RuffRodders which was real cool. I finally met people that I've been talking to online for the last 4 years or so. Anyways, we all had a good time and I'm looking forward to coming down next year! D-Smoke and I crashed in Costa Mesa that night, and then headed out around noon on Monday. Before taking off, Ian was kind enough to let me use his shop to fix a few things on the coupe before heading out. I was having a bitch of a time trying to weld the shifter back together, so he took over and finished up, thanks Ian! It was probably all the Coors Light from the night before! HAHA! After picking up a roller dog (Free Chili!) at 7-11, we headed north for home. We were cruising along about 70 when I felt the motor start to miss. Being on the 405, I pulled off as soon as I could. We pulled off on Inglewood Ave. at a Petco parking lot and tried to troubleshoot the issue. Across the street was a shop that happened to have a coule hot rods, so I ran over there to see if they knew of a parts store nearby. Long story short, it was AlteredPilot from the HAMB and RuffRodders! Man, what a small world! He let me cannibalize a Model A for its Coil to check mine. Mine turned out fine. Then we checked the spark plug wires, one was pretty badly chewed up. Thank god he had another one, and I could modify it to work. I ran it up and down the street a couple times and it seemed to drive fine. We said thanks and headed on our way. Not a half mile down the 405, it started acting up again. I just looked over at D-Smoker and said "F it dude, lets see how far we can get. We hammered down and pointed north. We finally pulled into Ventura a few hours later with only minor missfires along the way. I dropped him off and took off for home. I had to pull over for oil a few times along the way, but I made it home no problem. I did run out of gas though! I was about to get off on the next exit in Santa Barbara, but Rosie decided she wanted fuel NOW! No biggie, I had a a gallon of gas just in case.

All in all, it was a BLAST!!! I went on the trip to meet some cool cats, but mostly to see if Rosie had it in her to make it. This was a bit of a reliability run of sorts. I have some minor issues to adjust, but its nice to know this car will cruise at 70 no problem! I wonder what she will do with heads, cam, and a blower?