Do you have a group of car friends you wrench with?

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MuuMuu101 said:
Do you have a car club or group of friends where you all get together, wrench on each other's cars, go to meets, race, etc.? Although the FABO and online community is big, most my mopar friends in real life live far away, are +20 years older than me, and I see them all of once or twice a year at Fall or Spring Fling. To be honest, the hobby can get kind of lonely.
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Good topic, Samy.
I wish that I had more car buddies. I am a member of the Capital City Mopars, a Sacramento area club. There are only a few guys in the club that actually do anything with their cars. Most are older guys. I'd love to do junkyard crawls but most of the guys are not into that much anymore. My main Mopar buddy went through a divorce and lived in a tee pee for 2 years while building a new house. He sold his car to buy land and hasn't been much into any car stuff for a few years now.
I still love this stuff. I'd be happy tinkering and wrenching every day if I could. This whole "work" thing that I have to do 5 days a week really interferes with my life.
 
Sounds like I'm in the at same boat as others here. At 37, the majority of guys I know around my age aren't into hotrods at all. I have one buddy into cars - he's got a cherry 69 Camaro (oddly enough with a 8.75 mopar rear). But when it comes to wrenching time, I'm flying solo. If I need a hand (i.e. bleeding brakes, etc), a nicely framed request is directed to my woman who usually obliges.

When all else fails, my dad - though 400 miles away - is willing to lend a hand.

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I wrenched with my VW buddies and Jeep Club, but when dental school started I had no time for anything let alone cars.

Now with the Mopar I do everything alone in the garage with the occasional help from the minions or wife. My buddies still wrench on jeeps (ones a jeep shop and Maserati performance shop) but I dont have anyone besides the great men and women on FABO to help with the Dart which I'm truly grateful for. Maybe one of these days I'll be able to meet and learn something from @70aarcuda, the car would have to be able to make it there first ha.

My helpers

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halfafish said:
I greatly enjoy time working on the car by myself, but I'd be open to developing a Mopar buddy to work with. Many jobs are tremendously faster with two people working on them.
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Especially when one of them knows what they are doing, so for me it'd be like 10x faster working with a mopar buddy :rofl:
 
DentalDart said:
I wrenched with my VW buddies and Jeep Club, but when dental school started I had no time for anything let alone cars.

Now with the Mopar I do everything alone in the garage with the occasional help from the minions or wife. My buddies still wrench on jeeps (ones a jeep shop and Maserati performance shop) but I dont have anyone besides the great men and women on FABO to help with the Dart which I'm truly grateful for. Maybe one of these days I'll be able to meet and learn something from @70aarcuda, the car would have to be able to make it there first ha.

My helpers

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That's Fabulous DD,
Pic's like that will certainly bring back scores of memories for those of us with kids that have been knocking around with Cars 4ever and had them as our little helpers. I can remember like it was yesterday tossing them in the back of my still Seatbelt and Seatless 69' BB Cuda...Standing on it and them Rolling around like marbles back there banging into everything like they were in flight. After stopping they'd be like "Oh Dad that was cool, Let's do it again" Lol!

Thanks for Sharing the Pics of your lovely family!
 
Hemioutlaw said:
That's Fabulous DD,
Pic's like that will certainly bring back scores of memories for those of us with kids that have been knocking around with Cars 4ever and had them as our little helpers. I can remember like it was yesterday tossing them in the back of my still Seatbelt and Seatless 69' BB Cuda...Standing on it and them Rolling around like marbles back there banging into everything like they were in flight. After stopping they'd be like "Oh Dad that was cool, Let's do it again" Lol!

Thanks for Sharing the Pics of your lovely family!
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Their faces after you punch it around corners and they fly all over the back seat is priceless!

I used to let my son drive the jeeps when we went off roading. Him standing on my lap hands on the wheel head out the window looking behind us and all around.

The memories made are why we do this. The car could catch fire tomorrow and it would suck to lose it but we will never lose the memories made with the cars.
 
I have 3 older brothers all have mopars nothing like having your older brothers to help and when We can’t figure out what’s wrong I being the youngest blame them for getting me into the hobby.
 
MuuMuu101 said:
Do you have a car club or group of friends where you all get together, wrench on each other's cars, go to meets, race, etc.? Although the FABO and online community is big, most my mopar friends in real life live far away, are +20 years older than me, and I see them all of once or twice a year at Fall or Spring Fling. To be honest, the hobby can get kind of lonely.
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There's a few of us within a couple of miles but like my Dad used to say to us kids when we were younger, "One of ya is worth 1 kid helping, and two of ya are worth half a kid, and three of ya aint worth **** for help".
I guess we screwed around a lot.:D

A lot of times I let someone help that wants to be involved or do a payback for me helping them, but I'd just as soon do my stuff myself..
We also go to cruises, car shows, breakfasts, lunches and BBQ's together.

So yea, we have a "group" that work together to help each other out with whatever one of us needs.

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My neighbour had a 69 dart. Owned it from new. Its pristine. nobody touches it. But i got to fix his clutch pedal.
 
I have a whole network of friends in my little town alone that I can defer stuff to, have them come help or go to their house to help. My brother lives just 5 miles from me, and we’ve been doing car stuff together our whole life.

im currently waiting my turn to take the Roadrunner to my buddy’s house up town. We’re going to do the floor pan, clutch and exhaust there, and my welder buddy lives just 2 doors down from him so he can just walk over and start welding. That will clear up a space in my garage to bring Rich’s car in and use as a template to do the convertible top on Little Red. I’m trading a kitchen install to another buddy who does tops, I help him, he helps me, and if there’s enough in the kitchen job, I’ll have him help with Rich’s top as well. That’s the way we roll here in The Mitten!
 
Good topic.

Have been around this area here most of my life, so lots of us started out as car people out of necessity. Add a V8, 4spd, bucket seats, some aluminum slots, cherry bomb exhausts, a simple red paint job from the neighbor's borrowed spray gun.

Then take them into town on Friday / Saturday nights, such a good time. Most everyone around here that knew how to wrench was doing the same thing.

Lot of these people are still around the area coming into local car shows with cars or just walking in to relive the memories.

Good to keep the friendships cultivated over the years. In fact the "Cars" have worked as a tool to renew old friendships that have fallen by the wayside over time. And create new friendships too like @340mike here on FABO.

My buddy Brian and I texting, Mopar this and Mopar that every single day. So yes been a good thing and we are getting others involved too, so the circle keeps growing.

Here is a pic of my first car at 16 years old, my best friend's Dad owned the local auto salvage yard, so parts galore.

My Dad used to get mad cause I was always working on the car every spare moment I had, when he really wanted me to do the things on the farm.

Miles of Smiles . . .

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The '73 Barracuda came along in 1976, so rightly so I was hooked on the Mopars.

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Oldmanmopar said:
The older helper died boy I miss him. The two young hyper replacement pups chew the ends of the screwdrivers off. They also grab things and run and won't give them back. We tried to catch that silver lab and take that stick from him . It wasn't happening. He does the same thing with tools. Everything is a toy in his eyes. Look at him laughing and he knows I can't catch him.

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LOL!! You made me feel bad for forgetting to mention MY shop buddies, too!
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They don't help much with the wrenching, but they DO keep the squirrels out!
 
Man these cars in the thread are beautiful, and the shop dogs too. My dogs aren't good for anything.
 
DentalDart said:
I wrenched with my VW buddies and Jeep Club, but when dental school started I had no time for anything let alone cars.

Now with the Mopar I do everything alone in the garage with the occasional help from the minions or wife. My buddies still wrench on jeeps (ones a jeep shop and Maserati performance shop) but I dont have anyone besides the great men and women on FABO to help with the Dart which I'm truly grateful for. Maybe one of these days I'll be able to meet and learn something from @70aarcuda, the car would have to be able to make it there first ha.

My helpers

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Looks like you've got the makings of a mighty fine pit crew there. The future is in good hands!
 
It's nice to know that I'm not alone. I guess I'm a social guy and don't mind other people in my garage working on my car. I had a friend in college who would wrench with me on my car but after we graduated he lost interest and likes to wrench on his own car.
 
mopowers said:
Sounds like I'm in the at same boat as others here. At 37, the majority of guys I know around my age aren't into hotrods at all. I have one buddy into cars - he's got a cherry 69 Camaro (oddly enough with a 8.75 mopar rear). But when it comes to wrenching time, I'm flying solo. If I need a hand (i.e. bleeding brakes, etc), a nicely framed request is directed to my woman who usually obliges.

When all else fails, my dad - though 400 miles away - is willing to lend a hand.

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No better help then quality time with your dad. My dad would help me all the time. A 73 polara wagon fell on him when my son was one year old. He died in my arms that day.
 
Sometimes I wish I had friends that were still into cars and Jeep's. My dad used to be the guy I would call when I needed a hand. He's in his eighties now and really has no desire to get dirty. In fact, he's the one who pushed me to paint my own car, because he just didn't want to do it any more. He painted cars for a living since the late 50's.
Even the clubs I belong or used to belong to have kind of slowed down in activity. The interest just seems to be gone in a lot people today.
I prefer to to work on my stuff myself anyways. It's a lot more fulfilling to finish something from start to finish.
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This was finished before I started back on my barracuda. It was a rolled over $2500 pile of parts and I did everything on it myself. Including the body and paint (1st paint job)
 
Thats how I wanna go.
Oldmanmopar said:
No better help then quality time with your dad. My dad would help me all the time. A 73 polara wagon fell on him when my son was one year old. He died in my arms that day.
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Other than my Dad nope..... Lost my 2 gearheads years ago (Rip Stevie and Dickie)and abandoned the cling-on group. I did help out with a Small tire car a couple years back but too much drinking for me so it's back to the solo cave for me and that's OK too.....

I would probably be open to helping a young kid find their mechanical spirit but I don't look for it and will probably never show up. Working on equipment all day is more than enough wrenching for me most of the time.....

JW
 
I have freinds who do specific things, motor, transmission, tires front suspension etc. and I've done paint and bodywork none of it really mixes.
About the most common thing is the dragstrip I see everyone down there.
 
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