Cars are my passion

[gnalan]

I've been modding cars for 23 years. I bought my first car at 16, and that's when it all started.

It wasn't much of a car, a wrecked 86 Firebird with a salvage title. Did I care? Nope. It was my first car, and I paid for it myself. The only thing I couldn't do myself was have the front subframe and frame horns straightened back out. After that, though, I did most of the work on it myself (with a little bit of help from my dad).

It wasn't the fastest car around, but it was a fun little toy to go out running around in. 2.8l v6, 5 speed transmission, dual exhaust, with a slightly bigger cam. The sound coming from the exhaust didn't sound like a little wimpy V6, but more of a low growl from something bigger.

I had big beefy 255s on the back, and skinny 225s on the front. I don't remember the exact size anymore, but the rear tires were taller and the front tires had the lowest profile they made back then. Plus I had drop coils on the front, which gave it a nice rake and an aggressive stance.

Funny how just a few little mods can turn something boring into something that made v8 drivers turn there head. They'd even pull up and rev their engines next to me, then turn before the light changed. I don't know if they were afraid to lose a race, or if they all had better things to do. I'd see them race other cars, but just wouldn't bite lined up next to me.

Thankfully nobody wanted to race. I could barely get it to 70 before the car was shaking so bad it felt like it was going to fall apart, and getting it that fast took forever. It would lay a patch of rubber down from both rear tires as far as I wanted it to in 1st gear.

It did better at handling, surprisingly. I could kick the rear end sideways, and drift it with no problem. We called it power sliding back then. Drifting wasn't even invented yet. It was nice and controllable. 3.73 posi rear helped out a lot with that. (My 88 Mustang had 4.10s in it, but that's a different story for a different time.)

I swapped the transmission for another T5, with better low end gearing, probably why it was rough getting it to 70. I was more about off the line acceleration, and out of the corner acceleration, than I was about top end speed. It was my daily driven street car, and I never had any reason to go any faster than 55, so to me it was perfect.

It was ugly. Both doors were different colors. Same with the fenders. The hood and front bumper were pink, or whatever factory color they used back then. The rest of the body was red.

I redid the interior myself, with some kind of felt material from Walmart, but I liked the way it turned out. I swapped out the idiot light dash cluster for one with all gauges in it. Plus I yanked out the AC system, since it didn't work anyways.

I'd stall it more times than not, thinking I was in 1st when I was actually in 3rd. Taking off from a stop on any kind of slope took a while to get used to. My dad taught me how to shift without using the clutch! I thought that was the coolest thing in the world. Hearing the whine as the synchros meshed up and it slid into gear sounded awesome, but it chewed up the teeth on them too. I should've just cut every other tooth off to make it a little more durable, but I never did.

I had that car for 5 years. I kept on modding it, and enjoying it, up until the day I sold it. A teen looking for his first car had his eyes on it, and his dad was looking for something they could work on together (like me and my dad did), so I sold it to him. I never saw it again. Not sure what happened to it, but I like to think they enjoyed it as much as I did, and hopefully for as long as I did if not longer.

And that was just the beginning. 15 cars later and I'm still having fun.

Just thought I'd share a little more about myself than what I normally do. You can thank Matt for that lol. It was his suggestion after a long texting session yesterday of me talking his eyes off. He's a really awesome person to talk to, and I'm thankful I get to call him my friend. That you, Matt, for the advice and inspiration.
Nick