A 1965 Pontiac Bonneville, for which I paid $500 in 1977. Great big car (wheelbase 126, I think; wide enough to sit 8 adults comfortably, 10 if squished a bit). Stuffed with luxury options (leather electric-control dual-tilt front seat; tilt steering wheel; inside-adjust driver-side rear view mirror; retractable radio antenna; electric windows with driver-seat controls for all four; automatic trunk-lid popper; fine chromium and real-wood veneer dashboard; deluxe console and floorboard illumination; even, god help me, a vaccuum-tube powered automatic headlight dimmer apparatus).
Weird custom wheels and wheel rims: 8 lug nuts per wheel, arrayed in big circle, fitting onto fancy finned aluminum brake drums that protruded through the wheel and took the place of hubcaps. Those 14-inch tires would look pretty silly these days on a 3900-pound car, but that’s how they did things back then. I forget the conversion formula that would let me tell you what an H-78-14 tire would be called in modern nomenclature, but you’d have a hard time finding 14 inch tires designed for that kind of weight in a regular tire store.
Big easy-breathing 389 Pontiac engine, hi-octane premium fuel chugger, 10.5:1 compression, 333 horsies (as figured by 1965 formulas) in original stock condition, with the 4bbl Carter AFB 650 cfm carb. Conventional GM TurboHydramatic 3 speed tranny behind it hooked to positraction 3.08 rear end.
I put a mild cam in the 389, an Edelrock lo-profile intake and upgraded the Carter to a 750, put a B&M shift improver kit in the tranny, put better pipes and mufflers on the dual exhaust, set an electric fuel pump back by the 42-gallon gas tank; played a little bit with the caster settings on the front end and tightened up the steering unit’s worm gear; replaced the worn-out coil springs with slightly stiffer new ones, and put hi-intensity halogens in the hi-beam sockets. It still looked like Dad’s Old Car, but it floated effortlessly up to any speed I asked of it and handled incredibly well for a family-luxurycar battleship. I eventually put a tach in it to give me a sense of what I was doing at speeds over 120, where it ran out of speedometer.
After reading these posts, it has re-affirmed my belief that people have a fondness and actual love for their first cars no matter how big of a POS they were.
I am really enjoying reading about all of your first car memories.
1968 Chevelle Station Wagon w/ a 327 and a 4-barrel carb. Great car. I had it for the last, oh, year and a half of high school (1981-82). When I went off to college, my folks thought it would be better if I drove something newer - so they gave me my mom’s 1980 Pontiac Phoenix - easily the worst car ever made. I traded it in in 1984 (got $1500 for it - four years old) for a brand new Nissan pickup, which I got finally sold off about a year and a half ago. Got a lot of good miles out of that truck.
A la Sam Malone, I drove a '78 Plymouth Volare. /6 engine, red paint, red interior, red foam inside the cushions, red inside the glove compartment, red carpet, red inside roof. I think that car was made out of mithril - it was incredibly light (a bitch to drive on ice, we had to put 250 lbs of sand in the trunk each winter), but it was so incredibly durable. I got hit solidly by an old suburban, and left with a mere 1" dent in the bumper. But it wouldn’t quit. Ever. My brother saw it a few years ago. The paint is fading to a nice red-orange. And by “nice”, I mean “puke”.
still living the first-car memory… 2000 Pontiac Sunfire SE coupe w/ 2.4 L engine. She goes vroom vroom I love’er, even though she’s a bit of a lemon (tranny overhaul at 25k km. don’t ask.) You can fit at least 4 people in the back seat. I’m betting I can squeeze in 6 if I stack em right!
Next car, I’d like to have a Bimmer. (BMW z3, if they still make them by the time I save up the money.) After that… it’ll be minivan-ville for me
My first car was a 1974 Buick Apollo 2-door that I bought in 1980. It was pretty much the same as a Chevy Nova and was not in very good shape by the time I bought it. I replaced it in 1983 with my first new car, a Toyota Celica, which I still drive.
72 Datsun 510. Paid $700 for it with 70G. Beat the shit out of it and sold it for $200. Just did a google search - couldn’t believe there is actually a fan club for these cars - with a newsletter and everything!
Quick look at the posts looks like 72 was a popular year for first cars.
Santino, I hate you. 72 Cutlass is my favorite car. Some day, before I die, I WILL own one.
My first car was a used 1988 Ford Tempo. I felt like I was driving a tank, but as it turned out, I needed a tank. I got rid of it about three years ago and got another used Ford. That’s all we drive in our family.
I couldn’t look back as they took Edward (the car’s name) away at the Ford dealership (we traded it in). I cried, but it had to be; I really did need another car by then.
80 dodge colt with the twin stick transmission. damn fine car. an idiot totalled it within a few months, and i found an “RS” version with some fancier stuff. kept that one for a long time. pretty fast and handled okay, so i could wax many people with it. very cool transmission and superb in the snow.
in it old age, i rented it to a photographer in LA and it was used on a billboard to advertise smoking cars and the number to report them! it smoked pretty bad, too! (they used fake smoke in the shot)
finally sold it when i moved out of california.
good car.
and i used to own a 72 LT2 also, till a fuck-wad stole it.
My parents won a dodge in an auction. They let me have a car from it when I was 17. Instead of the dodge, I picked an English Ford. It lasted a few years as it broke down 400 miles from home on the Mass turnpike. The engine seized up as a result of an oil pump conking out.
One the carburetor leaked and I fixed it with chewing gum.
It was a cute and dignified car during the tailfin era, but it had pre WWII insides.
It cost about $1250.00 new.
First car? Got it mt senior year of high school (don’t we all?)
A 1986[sup]1[/sup]/[sub]2[/sub]Nissan Pickup with a wooden bed. Yes, wooden. The original had rusted out, so the previous owner made a new one out of pressure treated wood. This happens a lot in the Northeast, or a lot on VT, anyways. All that damn salt they put on the roads. And yes, it was a half year model. I loved that thing, still do. It’s sitting on my parents lawn right now. I should sell the thing, I need the money. But it has so much sentimental value.
Trunk in the front, air-cooled engine in the back.
Heater warmed air by running it through the engine and pumping gas fumes into the passenger compartment, so I smelled like a gas-station attendant every winter.
You could start the car and then remove the key with the engine still running.
Engine belt kept slipping off, so I was constantly forced to pull over and wrestle the belt back into place.
84’ Pontiac Trans-Am, black and gold, t-tops…oh man I loved that car. Sold it to a neighborhood kid, after I bought my Cadillac coupe Deville. Apperantly it was his first car, as well, because he crashed it a week later. I was sad to see it go.
Mine was a 1957 Chevrolet BelAir, 2 door hard top. It had a continental kit on the back, which at the time, I thought was just plain ugly. It had a 283 cid engine, bored 30 over with a just slightly over stock cam and 11 to 1 pop up pistons. The only problem with the car was that it had a power glide automatic. Of all the cars that I have ever owned, that is the one that I wish I still had.
A couple of people have mentioned owning Yamaha 100s. When I got mine there were two options: Dark metallic purple for the street-legal one, or silver for the off-road-only one. Even though I was years away from a driver’s license, I chose the purple one.
Fast forward to 1999. I’ve always had used cars. Now I was looking for a brand-new one. The Porsche was too small. (Gobs of fun, but I needed something practical.) My choices were a small car (still more room than the 911) or something with lots of room. I decided I needed room. Station wagon? No. The only one I saw that I liked were the Suburu and the Volvo, and both of those were too expensive. A mini-van? Ahhh… no. An SUV? Okay. I looked around and they all seemed too “citified”. I do like to go out and get dirty sometimes. The Jeep Grand Cherokee had “soccer mom” written all over it. I liked the earlier design. So I bought the Jeep Cerokee Sport. It looks like a Jeep, and it has a solid axle (so did the Grand) for going into the rocky places. Plus it had room for my stuff.
I looked in the catalog and chose the one I wanted. I found a nice blue colour they called “deep amythist”. Cool. I like blue.
But when I got it, I found out that “deep amythist” actually means “dark metallic purple”. I didn’t like it at first. Purple! But it wasn’t so bad. It looked different under different light. And nobody else on the road had a car that colour. It kinda grew on me. Then it struck me: My first ride was purple. Now I have my first new car, and by accident I had ordered a purple one! Serendipity! And to top it off, I’ve seen Jeeps with the colour I thought I was getting (dark met. blue) and I don’t like the colour as much as the one I have.
I just thought it was interesting that my first new two-wheeler and my first new car were the same colour. Come to think of it, my first bicycle (which I didn’t choose – I wanted a red Schwinn Stingray and when I got it for my birthday it was a Royce-Union) was purple. Weird.
$100 from my parents and $100 from me got me my first ride, a white two door 1957 Chevy Belair. This was in 1967. It ran fine; it had a 283 and a three-on-the-tree. I put a Hurst Mystery Shifter in and removed the hubcaps and painted the wheels black.
I love’er, even though she’s a bit of a lemon (tranny overhaul at 25k km. don’t ask.) You can fit at least 4 people in the back seat. I’m betting I can squeeze in 6 if I stack em right!
