At 7/23/01 09:39 PM, Jim wrote:
Date: Mon, 23 Jul 2001 12:39:33 -0700
From: "Timpe, Jim" <Jim.Timpe@xxxxxxxxx>
Subject: RE: [OM] another long, mulit-subject post
Anyone out there brave enough to admit to once being a Fiat owner??????
Worse than that, I still own one! The wife and I bought a blue 1971 850
Sport Spider in February of 1972 - the last time it saw Winter streets in
Minnesota! We both enjoyed it in our young pre-kids days (my wife was
driving it when she was about 8.5 months pregnant with son #1 - still not
sure how she got in and out!) Stored every winter, driven every Summer
until about 1992, when sons reached driving age and insurance on all our
vehicles went through the roof. I still fired it up every now and then, for
a brief cruise around the block, until about 1996. Something clogged in the
carb, and somehow I never got around to fixing it. During the Fall of 1999,
a friend offer to pull the carb and rebuild it over the Winter; come the
Spring of 2000, we dropped the carb back on, and it fired right up! Upon
pulling out of the garage, however, I found the brakes were pretty much
completely gone. A bit of searching around town turned up a small
hole-in-the-wall shop that specialized in Italian sports cars; I got on the
waiting list (Earl, the owner, pointed out nobody gets their Italian sports
cars fixed during the winter, but come Spring......) Anyway, my 850 spent
most of the Summer sitting in Earl's service bays or lot, while they
replaced the brake system, rebuilt the engine after it dropped a valve on
the test drive just before I was supposed to pick it up, and reworked the
carb a time or two. Unfortunately, one of the times it was sitting in the
lot, a tow truck driver managed to roll a car into the rear left quarter
panel... but at least he admitted it. Anyway, I got to drive it most of the
Fall (a great stress reliever, so long as I stayed off the freeways!) Over
the Winter it spent some time in a local body shop who also had a great
reputation for Italian body repair. This Spring it was great to again
cruise about, until a bad tank of gas messed up the carb again! So now it
sits once again, waiting a slot in Earl's workload -- sigh! Of course, it
has been atypically hot here, so I would probably not have been driving it,
but......
Since it is the first car my wife and I bought together, she says we need
to hang on to it - and I'm happy with that..... now if I can only get it
going again, and replace the top, and maybe reupholster the seat, and.....
P.S. This all was before I caught the Olympus bug - now I have to divide
my attention (and budget) between Zuikoholism and Fiat maintenance!
Curt
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