I am the grit in the gears, the missing bolt, I am the poker of sticks into spokes.
I like to know how things work, but sometimes when I take them apart and rebuild them, I have a few pieces left over.
I am a man, so I tend to leave reading the instructions until after it goes wrong.
And like all men I have a comprehensive mental map of the world and never need to ask directions.
I never get lost, only sometimes I'm late, or end up in the wrong place entirely.
It's what we do.
Wednesday, 30 May 2012
Some More Rust, Reviewed.
These pics are all from my previous, 2011 Texas Travels, with the Red Dirt Girl.
I am glad you are posting more frequently. I like your pictures of rusting cars and trucks. I have no idea why so many people seem to keep them. Farmers I can see. Perhaps. And junk dealers. And hobbyists. There sure are a lot of them, some that will never move again on their own.
I shall soon run out of rusty car pictures. Will have to steal them off the interwebs, or.... travel back to Texas! As for how they come to exist, well, I remember my farming relatives, there were always a few rusting vehicles on each farm, often the story would be that the old car/truck/van/tractor/whatever had failed for some relatively minor fault, a starter-motor, or a clutch, and it had been dragged around to the back of the barn awaiting repair, but then... Someone at the cattlemarket turns up in a truck with a 'for-sale' sign on it, and my uncle would buy that, and leave the old one to rot.
My uncle Raymond, whose farm I used to stay a week or two on, most summers, had a huge and mysterious Humber Pullman Limousine in a shed. This thing, to me, was huge, it had a chauffeur's compartment with a glass partition behind it, in the back it was all leather, and walnut burr veneers, and little cabinets with decanters, and a cabinet with field-glasses. I imagine it belonged once to some chap who'd been fond of racing, watching the horses whilst enjoying a dram or two.
Raymond had, I think, taken the car in payment of a debt, but I think there was something wrong with the engine. One year it was gone, sold to a friend from the pub who was going to put a Perkins Diesel into it. Sacrilege. I've had close experience of Perkins Diesels. The trusty 4203, and the altogether meatier 4236. Good reliable engines, High torque, low revs, more at home in a combine-harvester, or a crane, than a gentleman's motor-carriage.
One has 'sold' scratched into the door. Is this a version of the Barry scrapyard perhaps? Interesting how the older cars have more character than newer ones. Progress is strange.
Ah, the great Barry scrapyard... a legend in its own lunchtime. Back in oh, a year when landing on the moon was still an unfulfilled boast, I travelled, with my school, to, I think, Crewe, where we had a guided tour around a locomotive graveyard, where the pride of the railways was rusting, awaiting export, in a few cases, but mostly waiting to be broken up. I travelled on the footplate of a 4-6-2, and photographed the crew at their work, as they hauled three more locos off to a distant siding. I wish I knew where those old black and white pics went. I'd been given my dad's old 'vest-pocket' folding Kodak camera, and was as pleased as a very pleased little boy might be, as my friends only aspired to box-brownies, and the like. Just before the rise of the instamatic.
As for 'Sold', I wonder if the buyer is the guy whose field it's in, or if the buyer, many years ago, changed his mind, and never came with a handful of money and a dream?
My brother took me, when about 8, 9 or 10 to clamber amongst engines at Murrayfield. If only we had taken a camera! All were lined up for removal! Years later we discovered our estranged granddad drove steam engines, possibly for the NB.
My brother and I once rebuilt a '53 chevy P/U not unlike one of those depicted. Slapped in a 283 rebuilt block and hit the junkyard for switches, lamps, mirrors, etc, and tires. Didn't deal with the rusty body which remained as god had intended, apparently. Only problem was a breakdown in the Oregon desert when a universal went but was quickly fixed with 2 bolts and a power drill. I sometimes wonder where that baby is now??
I am glad you are posting more frequently. I like your pictures of rusting cars and trucks. I have no idea why so many people seem to keep them. Farmers I can see. Perhaps. And junk dealers. And hobbyists. There sure are a lot of them, some that will never move again on their own.
ReplyDeletePosting freakishly? Me?
DeleteI shall soon run out of rusty car pictures. Will have to steal them off the interwebs, or.... travel back to Texas!
As for how they come to exist, well, I remember my farming relatives, there were always a few rusting vehicles on each farm, often the story would be that the old car/truck/van/tractor/whatever had failed for some relatively minor fault, a starter-motor, or a clutch, and it had been dragged around to the back of the barn awaiting repair, but then... Someone at the cattlemarket turns up in a truck with a 'for-sale' sign on it, and my uncle would buy that, and leave the old one to rot.
My uncle Raymond, whose farm I used to stay a week or two on, most summers, had a huge and mysterious Humber Pullman Limousine in a shed. This thing, to me, was huge, it had a chauffeur's compartment with a glass partition behind it, in the back it was all leather, and walnut burr veneers, and little cabinets with decanters, and a cabinet with field-glasses. I imagine it belonged once to some chap who'd been fond of racing, watching the horses whilst enjoying a dram or two.
Raymond had, I think, taken the car in payment of a debt, but I think there was something wrong with the engine.
One year it was gone, sold to a friend from the pub who was going to put a Perkins Diesel into it. Sacrilege. I've had close experience of Perkins Diesels. The trusty 4203, and the altogether meatier 4236. Good reliable engines, High torque, low revs, more at home in a combine-harvester, or a crane, than a gentleman's motor-carriage.
One has 'sold' scratched into the door. Is this a version of the Barry scrapyard perhaps? Interesting how the older cars have more character than newer ones. Progress is strange.
ReplyDeleteAh, the great Barry scrapyard... a legend in its own lunchtime.
ReplyDeleteBack in oh, a year when landing on the moon was still an unfulfilled boast, I travelled, with my school, to, I think, Crewe, where we had a guided tour around a locomotive graveyard, where the pride of the railways was rusting, awaiting export, in a few cases, but mostly waiting to be broken up. I travelled on the footplate of a 4-6-2, and photographed the crew at their work, as they hauled three more locos off to a distant siding. I wish I knew where those old black and white pics went. I'd been given my dad's old 'vest-pocket' folding Kodak camera, and was as pleased as a very pleased little boy might be, as my friends only aspired to box-brownies, and the like. Just before the rise of the instamatic.
As for 'Sold', I wonder if the buyer is the guy whose field it's in, or if the buyer, many years ago, changed his mind, and never came with a handful of money and a dream?
My brother took me, when about 8, 9 or 10 to clamber amongst engines at Murrayfield. If only we had taken a camera! All were lined up for removal! Years later we discovered our estranged granddad drove steam engines, possibly for the NB.
ReplyDeleteMy brother and I once rebuilt a '53 chevy P/U not unlike one of those depicted. Slapped in a 283 rebuilt block and hit the junkyard for switches, lamps, mirrors, etc, and tires. Didn't deal with the rusty body which remained as god had intended, apparently. Only problem was a breakdown in the Oregon desert when a universal went but was quickly fixed with 2 bolts and a power drill.
ReplyDeleteI sometimes wonder where that baby is now??
I think it is time for a new post. It is so long since the last one that all the cars have rusted.
ReplyDelete