The love of my life is
starting to get a bit old in the tooth, crotchety and sagging in the
middle. I took her out the other day and she just doesn’t move like she
used to. The problem is she has always been too short to climb anything
worth climbing, and that feeling of helplessness when your buddies can
get theirs up and you can’t gets you to start wondering whether it’s
time to send her on.
There
comes a time when you start thinking about trading in the old girl for a
nice new, younger model. Keeping the old girl around has its advantages,
the upkeep isn’t that bad compared to the initial cost of breaking in a
new model. You don’t have to say a lot to her to keep her happy so long
as once in a while you treat her right and take her somewhere nice. You
know what you have, the bad and the good and who knows what aggravation
a younger model might bring.
A
self inflicted fenderectomy hasn’t done her a lot of good over the years
so I figured it was time to get the experts in to get her Utah-rized.
Doctor Toumbs put her on the rack and gave her 5 more inches and that
should have made her happy. I didn’t notice much difference in the ride
but in fairness we weren’t at it for that long. Typical old age problem,
when you have the time you don’t have the energy and when you have the
energy it’s bloody well raining.
I
made her a little taller and now she doesn’t look quite so wide but its
getting tougher to swing the old leg up and over to climb aboard. Now
all I have to worry about is tipping over and landing on my head and
then I will have to change my name to Dave.
I’m
getting old as well and I am damn tired of giving her a bath. I have
started to hate mud and have fallen in love with traipsing around the
west especially Utah, hence the idea of getting her Utah-rized. It will
be easier on us both when we take to the highways more which will be
necessary in the Canyonlands just getting to the good stuff. I’m hoping
the extra five inches will help us up the slickrock which can be mighty
steep in places. I put the Boggers in the shed and gave her a nice new
set of radial BFG Krawlers on street wheels so let’s hope what she lacks
in length will be made up in gription. She’s still a little tail heavy
but then I contribute greatly to that problem. I have thought about
adding a little extra mass up front but I am sure that will just lead to
more trouble. I keep saying a little more up front and we would be able
to get it up a lot easier but more length is the answer so we are at a
stalemate. What I think I will do is hop in the saddle and ride around
some more, maybe even learn to drive and quit blaming the old girl. I
will make sure she doesn’t overheat and break her in all over again.
Could be fun!
The new younger models
sure do look good but what would I do with the old girl? I couldn’t get
rid of her – or could I?
[Willys Home
Page]
[The Start]
[First Parts]
[1979
CJ5] [The Frame]
[The Body]
[Body
meets Frame] [Toumbstone] [Extra
Seat Room] [Blocker and Tanker]
[Brakes
and Steering] [Test Drives]
[Details] [Incremental
Willys]
[Incremental Willys Part II]
[Incremental Willys Part III]
[She's getting old]
[Still the best damn
wheeler]
[Timeline]
[Specifications]
