BarryA

Stumbled into a job selling IBM mainframe software in '82 through a contact in the 356 Porsche Registry (after being either partially, under, or unemployed for 7 years after college graduation), got fired after 8 years and 5 million dollars in sales, got laid off from two more software sales jobs over the next 2 years, got hired to do marketing where I now work but wound up selling automotive repair software for them for 20 years, and now work in the side of the company that builds the repair programs. Looking back over the last 40 years from the vantage point of age 67, the best suggestion I can offer is to find something you don't hate doing (if you're lucky enough to be able to work at something you're passionate about, so much the better), when opportunities pop up, try not to miss out on them for the wrong reasons, and do your best to both hold your expenses down and put as much money away as you can, starting as early as you can. At 25 or 30, being "old" seems very far off, but 60 comes up faster than you'd believe possible, and you can't retire and play with cars if you don't have assets put away.

See you guys in the morning...... the other Barry in Sacto

Don't know if anybody who's planning to make the Bay Area 02 drive from Sacramento will see this in time or not, but it looks like I won't be able to make it - after a week of sleep deprivation brought on by several days our of state (son's wedding) and a sick dog, I feel like I'm coming down with something - fatigue, achy joints, sore throat, the works. Bummer - this will be the first Swap & Show I've ever missed....... Barry

Don't know, but may find out soon - with the runup in '02 valuation (especially for original, unrestored "survior" cars) I'm giving serious consideration to selling the '69 and building a semi-hot rod daily driver square light car using as much of the running gear off my E21 as possible. If I do make that jump, I'll document the project and we'll see just how expensive it gets.......

Me - do we want to meet @ the Safeway on Alhambra, or ??

I was picking them up 3-4 at a time at a Wal-Mart in a kind of run down area that's on my way home from work, but haven't had any luck there recently - have also been looking for the recently released first generation Nova station wagons without success. Started doing some modified Hot Wheels - next ones up are an '02 touring and cabrio (first ones I tried were two '66 Nova hardtops converted to a 2 door wagon and a convertible - both "phantom" body styles - there never was a 2 door Nova wagon, and there were no 2nd gen convertibiles. Photos of the Novas are attached

Congrats on the new format, Steve - looks great! First time on the new site format today, and immediatly ran into a problem - not sure if it's because I hadn't been on the site in several weeks or not, but my old login/user name & password wouldn't work. I finally signed up as a new member using the same user name and password I had previously, so I'm assuming my original record got blown out somewhere along the line. It's not a big deal, aside from being back to being tagged as a noob. Barry A Fair Oaks CA

If anybody's looking for HotWheels 2002's, I've got several (5 white, 4 Inka, 5 dark blue) plus 2 E30 M3s - will have 'em at Brisbane, along with a detail-painted white one & an Inka with the graphics polished off and the details painted in (amazing how a bit of paint makes the details pop!). Have seen a couple of dark green ones in multi-car sets, but haven't seen any in that color in single packages.......

In past years we've met in the Safeway parking lot at Alhambra and J - close to gas stations & banks (for ATM access) and I believe there's a Starbucks inside Safeway as well as a couple of fast food places across the street for anyone who needs the other kind of fuel.......

Local friend has a partially stripped Euro E21 323 (was a donor car for part of his M2 conversion) that has to be gone by the end of the month. Complete 2.3 liter euro M20, motor mounts, front suspension crossmember, struts and brakes, decent sheet metal and glass, partial interior with euro dash. Rear suspension (crossmember, disc brake trailing arms and diff) are gone as are the transmission, Euro bumpers and Recaro seats. For those not familiar with the euro 2.3 M20, the distributor is mounted low on the left side of the block (driven by the oil pump jack shaft) rather than off the nose of the cam – saves a critical couple of inches for an “02 M20 conversion. Car is located in Sacramento CA, will have to be jacked up and loaded on a trailer – must be gone by the end of Feb, or it goes to the crusher. Contact me at bja_47@yahoo.com with a name & phone number and the owner will call…….

Turbo sighting, aprox 4 pm Friday 12/14, Sacramento CA – Chamoinx, appeared complete and correct but a bit dirty, turbo script on the rear panel a bit askew, may have had some prior bodywork on the driver’s side (turbo hocky-stick graphic looked a bit wavy on the driver’s door) – white CA plate 3GGV122. Middle age guy driving, got on US 50 eastbound at Power Inn, off at the next exit (Watt Ave) – never seen the car before, might have been on a test drive from Schatz & Krum (shop’s just south of the freeway, between Watt & Power Inn). Anybody familiar with this one?

Whatever you wind up with, do your best to protect any car from the weather - rain and humidity encourage rust, and direct exposure to sun will trash the paint and interior. Use a car cover when it's not raining and try to find some way to keep it as dry as possible when it is (without having a tarp, etc, directly on the car). Do NOT use armorall on the interior - use a good vinyl protectant / preservative (Vinylex is excellent - buy it in bulk from Car Care Specialties, as it's expensive in small spray bottles) on vinyl and plastic surfaces, and keep the carpets and fabrics clean and free of dirt build up. No reason you can't use an older BMW as a daily driver - I put almost 100K on my 69 before semi-retiring it to weekend status, and have put 150K of 60 mile-per-day commuting on an 81 E21 (320i) in the last 7 years.

in front of the 3 row radiator on the '69 (4 blade "arctic" engine driven fan just wasn't cutting it on 100 + degree days during Sacramento summers). Brackets were easy to fabricate, and bolted up through the existing radiator mounting holes; thermo switch is installed in an existing bung in the bottom of the coolant plenum on the underside of the modified factory 2 bbl intake manifold that was installed with the 38/38 Weber, and the factory E21 fan has been dead reliable. Ever since, the car has run cool in the hottest weather - sitting in traffic, the temp gauge will get just short of the mid-point the blue segment, fan kicks on, needle drops back to about a third of the way up, and the fan shuts back off. Recommend powering any electrical fan you install through a relay with the switching power taken off the ignition switch, then routed a thermo switch and the primary power tapped directly off the battery.

believably bad experience with a Wal-Mart semi totalling her car and almost pushing it (with her and her 5 year old son in it) off an embankment on I-5 in southern Oregon, followed by Wal-Mart's legal department refusing to settle with her while they tried every move in book to avoid a payout for medical bills. As a result, I pretty much refuse to do business with W-M - unfortunately, so far, they're about the only place in this area I've been able to find Hotwheels '02's, so they've gotten a few dollars from me recentlyh.

A number of years ago, there was a little known clause in the CA DMV regs that allowed the waiver of past due fees for cars more than 25 years old that had been put in storage "for future restoration" but had NOT had the registration put on "non-operational" status. The critical factor here is that the car has to fit the "non-op" criteria - if there's any documentiation that it's been driven, towed or even parked with the wheels touching a public road or street, you're dead in the water. Couple of things you can try to get past having to pay all the back fees: 1) The DMV has a registration assistance line (877-563-5213) for folks with out-of-the-mainstream registration issues - you might try calling to see what assistance they can offer. 2) In the past, I've had remarkably good luck with taking my stack of paperwork into the DMV office and requesting assistance with getting past a problem - it seems to work best to make an early morning appointment (get to the counter clerk before (s)he's had a tough day dealing with unreasonable people), explain the situation, and ask for the counter person's help. They seem to have more latitude than you might think to modify fees and waive requirement....... By way of example, a few years ago I bought an E21 (with the registration several years out of date) to get the wheels – it had been through three ownership changes without ever having the title transferred, and the pink slip and several additional documents were missing from the chain of paperwork that would’ve normally been required to transfer title and registration to me. I took the whole pile of paper to the local DMV office, told them I was trying to buy the car, and asked if there was any way to get the paperwork straightened out. The counter guy went through the pile, pulled out and discarded about a third of it, gave me a form with several sections highlighted to have the current owner fill out, and told me all I’d have to pay to get car registered was the current registration and transfer fees and a fee to file for lost title. A week later I had the transfer completed – total fees were about $50.00.

should be et12 for both front and rear (my E21 came to me with a set of correct 6" & 7" Alpinas installed, and currently runs a set of 6" & 7" OZs) - the extra width in the rears is evenly split between the inside and outside halves of the wheel, so there IS a visible difference in the rim width between the front & rear wheels, with the outer rear lip 1/2" wider than the front.

motorbikes also had a single rear wheel, which was the other qualifer - with 4 wheels they had to be licensed as automobiles.

turn it on (it usually lives in the bottom of the E21's glove box, turned off). See everybody in the morning......

time to time, there's a very good chance that fluid IS collecting inside the booster. Had a master cylinder that was leaking into the booster a few years ago - didn't realize where the brake fluid was going or how much fluid had collected in the booster until the afternoon I made a fairly high-G, off camber left turn and immediately got massive detonation and a huge cloud of white smoke. Took a few minutes, but I finally figured out that when the car leaned heavily to the right, the brake fluid that had collected inside the booster sloshed up to the vacuum port, and a bunch of fluid got sucked into the intake manifold (was damn lucky to have avoided hydrolocking #4 cylinder and doing some real internal damage). Pulled the m/c and found the booster almost half full of brake fluid - cleaned it out, but the damage was done and the booster diaphram failed about a month later.

Everybody ok with linking up at the Safeway parking lot at Alhambra & J between 7:30 & 8 tomorrow am? For those who don't go back far enough to remember C.W. Mccall, the Rubber Duck & the CB radio craze of the mid-late 70's, a link to the lyrics is below......... http://www.lyricsfreak.com/c/cw+mccall/convoy_20026575.html

definately going from Sacramento and want to get together for the drive down? Planning to leave Fair Oaks (Hwy 50 & Hazel) @ 7:30, probably via the most direct route (I-80 to the bay bridge & 101 to Brisbane); may take Norm's route back through the Delta on the way home. Post a response by tomorrow night if you want to link up - I probably won't boot the computer up before leaving Saturday morning..........

get a pretty early start to get there between 9 and 10 am - in past years, it's been difficult to get everyone in one place & on the road by 8. How about coming back by that route?