What's your family car history?

[rrneck]

I was thinking about the first car I remember. We had a 59 Chevy Impala. Ours was dark blue and had no air conditioning. My mom wouldn't let us roll the windows down much in the summer for fear of messing up her hair.



My dad figured to buy a car every ten years. We got a 1969 Chevy station wagon. It had a 327 instead of the straight six in the Impala. Plenty of power to pull the boad but my dad said, "It burns a lot more gas". I remember seeing the entire back of that car filled with bags of groceries.



The last car they had was a 1980 Chevy Monte Carlo. It was a tragically appropriate lemon yellow. Turbocharged V6 that was about as far from a normally aspirated engine as you could get. It wouldn't pull your friggin't hat off and sounded like a loose pile of bolts rolling down the road.



I told you that story to tell you this one:

The first car my dad owned was a 47 Chevy Coupe. He bought it brand new right out of the navy and it was the only car he signed a note for. The first day he got it he brought it home to the farm. When he got up the next morning the turkeys that my grandmother kept had discovered a new shiney thing and had spent several hours walking around on it pecking and scratching their reflection in the paint. It pissed my dad off so much that our family never had turkey for Thanksgiving. Ever. I was thirty five years old before I tasted turkey on Thanksgiving.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

1. Prior to me leaving the house...here goes:

The first car I remember my family having was a late 1960s/Early 1970s Volkswagon Squareback:

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Cp4FV6mBBvU/R_ZNHfIun2I/AAAAAAAAAPc/n4XmccfA2YA/s320/68+blue+squareback2.jpg

Originally it was my family's primary car, but my dad continued to drive it after we got a new primary car, which was...

A 1981 (I think) Toyota Corolla Wagon:



(Which is sort of ironic, as the current wagon version of the Corolla is the Toyota Matrix, which I now drive.....it all comes full circle).

My dad then replaced the Squareback with a 1981 Dodge Colt that my aunt used to drive:



Which was red


We then replaced the Corolla with a 1986 Dodge Colt Vista Wagon:



My dad then replaced his 1981 red Dodge Colt with....another 1981 red Dodge Colt (this one my grandparents used to drive):




And then we replaced the Vista with a 1994 Dodge Caravan:



Which was a great car....lasted my dad nearly 250,000 miles.


Since I moved out, my parents have since replaced Colt No. 2 with a 2000 Saturn SL and the Caravan with a 2006 Pontiac Vibe.

[rrneck]

9. Most of

the Chrysler/Dodge owners were pretty loyal to the brand. I think we always had Chevys by default.

[SacredCow]

2. My family went through all kinds of cars....

I remember:

A 1970's Oldsmobile station wagon (with a 454 ci V8 in it, so Dad loved it for passing on the highway)
1960's Ford truck (burned a quart of oil per tank of gas)
A pair of 1970's Datsun trucks (mostly for working around the farm, but Dad commuted in one of them)
A 1970's Chevrolet Beauville van (with a fuel filter the size of a dime, and tucked away so it was impossible to replace quickly. Nice job, GM :eyes: )
A 1960's Triumph Spitfire (cute car, but we didn't have it for very long)
A 1970's Toyota Celica (run until it literally fell apart)
A 1982 Nissan Sentra (first car they bought new in a LONG time)
A 1971 Datsun 240Z (supposed to be for my Sister and I, but she commandeered it)
A 1984 Ford Bronco II (Shared it with my sister for a while, but ultimately became mine)
A 1984 Toyota truck (dad's ride for many years)
A series of Chevrolet Astro/GMC Safari Mini-Vans (mom's ride for many years)

And the last 2 were what they had when I moved out, 1992-ish)

[Throd]

3. That Olds came with a 455. Sorry, but I'm an Oldsmogeek.

[SacredCow]

7. I stand corrected... I was, maybe, 5 when they got rid of it, so the details are vague...

All I remember was sitting in the back cargo area and being thrown to the back window when Dad punched it. Good times!

[rrneck]

10. I like your style nt

[david13]

4. Neck. Just a tecknikality here. You have mentioned text wise about

a 1980 Chevrolet Monte Carlo, but have included a photo of a 1979 Monte Carlo. The easy way to tell the dif on those two was, the 79 has a single (each side) headlight, and the 80, a double each side.
dc

[rrneck]

11. Thanks.

I think I might have been in denial. Every time the damn thing broke down they would call me first. I told them not to buy it, but noooooo, mom just had to have that yellow car.

[Kali]

5. some kind of baby blue ford sedan when I was a tyke

then the new 64 ford wagon (family truckster - what a beast, in AZ with no air, but it had posi and could go anywhere - learned to city drive in that sucker)
then a used Mazda (forget what model but it had a wankel)for a secondary car in the late 70's (still had the wagon)
then we "inherited" my Grandmother's 64 or 5? Mustang (was supposed to be mine but I wasn't qualified or something) it was a cool looking car but god what a POS it really was. And so tiring to have people tell you constantly how much it was worth, but never wave any cash at you.

After I moved out they started picking up used Escorts and Tracers from the rental dealer. I have inherited a few of those over the years.

When I met husband he was driving a 70 international PU. We bought a Nissan 4x4 king cab soon after we got hitched, then a little ford ranger. Since we moved to the ranch there have been numerous pick-ups/vans etc. I'm also the owner of a 64 (pretty sure, might be 63?) corvair lakewood wagon if anybody wants to make an offer!

[rrneck]

12. Ha! I understand

about the Ford wagon. I took my drivers test in a 69 Ford shortbed PU witha 460 V8 (I think) and a straight stick three in the tree. No power steering either. Smooth is not a word to use to describe the way I drove that sucker.

[wysimdnwyg]

6. Since there are so many, I'll limit this to just mine

Gonna go backwards...
Current: 2000 Nissan Frontier


1995 Chevy S10


1983 Pontiac Grand Prix (this one was a beauty - converted from diesel to gas and was in the shop more than I drove it)


1973 Oldsmobile Cutlass


1981 Renault Alliance (blew the engine after 9 months when it over heated and had to replace the clutch cable - twice)


1974 Ford Pinto (300k miles and a host of problems, but the alternator was the final nail)

[rrneck]

13. The day

I tried to drive a Pinto that wouldn't start unless I put on a seatbelt was the day I vowed never to own one.

[flvegan]

8. My mom and dad had great taste in cars. Then they had kids.

My mom owned everything from a VW Bug to a Bug-eye Sprite to a '67 Mustang Fastback. My dad had Austin Healeys.

Then my brother and I came along. I remember my mom having this gargantuan station wagon, complete with wood paneling and then a tiny Civic CC. My dad had an International Scout and a Triumph TR-7.

[rrneck]

14. I had a buddy

whose dad had a 69 Ford Country Squire station wagon. It was huge. The shocks were a wreck and it handled like a listing aircraft carrier, but it had a 460V8 (I think).

One Halloween we all piled in the car to look for mischief in a neighboring small town, but we found that we would pick up a tail every time we drove through. Somebody had ratted us out. So we started to head home when an unmarked car with a blue light on the dash pulled us over. We thought we'd had it considering the contraband we had with us. When the occupants of the unmarked car got out and walked up to the side window we relaxed though. It seems some other kid was out in his father's "constable car". They told us to get out and we did. All 13 of us. Think clown car. They graciously let us go with a warning.

[Broken_Hero]

15. From what I can remember,

73 GMC truck(Custom Deluxe), a Ford Fairmont, a Toyota Brat, an 89 Eagle, a 68 VW Bug, 89 Suburbuan, 91 Suburban, 1977 Ford Truck, late 80's Dodge Caravan, 85 Chevy Blazer, 88 Chevy Malibu Wagon, 2000 Ford Windstar, an 89 Pace Arrow RV.

I believe thats all the vehicles we had while I was growing up.

Since I've been out of the house:

88 Honda accord, 89 GMC Vandura, 2000 Dodge Intrepid, 2004 Dodge Intrepid, 95 Ford Windstar(I don't recommend these at all), 85 and an 87 Dodge Ram, an 83 Ciera, and currently the main car is an 06 Chevy Malibu Maxx LT with a hatch back.

[nickinSTL]

16. my parents had 2 cars when I first became aware of such things

A Camaro, late 60s or early 70s, I'd guess, white with a black top - not a convertible, and a tan Volkswagen station wagon, probably from sometime in the 60s.

Then we got my grandfather's Datsun station wagon, which was green.

Following that, we had a 1981 Datsun/Nissan station wagon- which was blue.

We followed that up with another blue Nissan wagon, virtually the same as the previous one.

Then my dad got a 1966 Mercedes-Benz 250 - it was originally white, and the previous owner had painted it silver - my dad had it repainted white. We had that for many years.

Then we got another Nissan station wagon, old and red...we had to buy a new car when the frame on that had rusted out to the point that it wasn't safe to drive.

At that point, we got a 1992 black Toyota Camry wagon.

The Camry and the Mercedes were what my parents had when I moved out. They now have a 1995 Toyota Celica and a 2002 Toyota RAV-4.

I've had a Toyota Tercel, 2 Toyota Corollas, a Hyundai Santa Fe, myself.