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How often do you drive you cars? for typcal maintance milage. once a month? every other month? what do most like to do to keep their car up? thanks
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Re: Maintance
Just what I thought no one drives these cars. -
Re: Maintance
What ? I drive my trailerd Corvette , over 100,000 miles in the last 24 years. Or I should say pull a trailer! I restored it to DRIVE , not to just look at it. Had to rebuild the trans twice, three sets of tires , new brakes and many little thing that go wrong.
But it's all worth it to see other people enjoy seeing it too.
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Re: Maintance
I store mine winters and drive about 1k - 2k per year. Every Spring I change the oil and filter, lube the chassis, top off all fluids, clean the foam air cleaner element, check tire pressure, check belts and hoses. In the Fall I fill the gas tank, change the oil, and check antifreeze. Every other year I purge the brakes and coolant. Tune up every few years as needed. Disconnect the neg battery cable and hook up a battery tender, when car is not in use. That's about it. Baby has never failed to start and never broken down!Comment
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Re: Well Lyndon
Unfortunately, my milk crate is STILL where the floor boards and seat should be, but I will tell you that when the the rubber hits the public byways, it will get the stuffins driven out of it, and THEN, after I lose my license for the first six month period, I'll probably go to work on the never ending task of touching up and tweeking
ChuckComment
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Re: Maintance
John,
I love driving my red 66 BB roadster through the northern California hills. Don't even get Joe L. and some of these other guys started about not driving these cars. I suspect that you are tongue in cheek, but these guys get touchy.
Regards,
SteveComment
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Re: Maintance John
John! your right , some of these people remind me of what to say when your in trouble with your wife=== ( I'm sorry I hurt your feelings)Comment
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This is probably the best response.
The best thing to do in my mind is to drive it and enjoy it. If the thing is running well, keep the hood shut and don't mess with it! I'm not kidding. Some people just have to work on their cars and the more you work on them, the more chance you have for something to go wrong.
If you're a fair weather driver, grease it every six thousand miles or so. No need to do it annually. If you don't feel the need to fire your car up everytime you go in the garage, but only when you intend to drive it and warm the engine real good, change oil at 3-4000 miles. Filter too. Spark plugs? When it starts to miss at the rpm you run it at, change them. Anti-freeze? When it's no longer green, I change it. I have radiators in cars that are 40 years old and still cooling using this change interval. Still cool and doesn't leak.
Some people have the idea that because it is a "CORVETTE". it requires "special" treatment. Not true, this car is basically (C-1,2.3) A passenger car based design which can handle all kinds of maintenance ommisions.
If you look in the archives on this board, you can see many, many instances of owners working on their cars trying to do service on them, only to wind up screwing something up or otherwise thinking "well, while I'm in there.........".
If you have any idea of the previous service history of you car and it appears to have been good and on time, the best thing you can do for you and your car is to let it alone.
Flame begins.Comment
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Re: This is probably the best response.
Mike.
Loved youf post!! Second and Third paragraphs especially! I'm old enough to emember (Isuspect you aare too) when these C-1's were just small nimble and neat cars that carried two people and could thrash MG's, Triumphs, Austin Healey's, Porsches too. any time THEY needed to be reminded that sportscars were also made in the USA! Regards,Comment
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Re: Maintance
I wasn't sure what you were looking for so I let someone elso go first.
I drive my 66 roadster about a 1000 miles a year. In Atlanta, cruise season runs from April to October so it usually gets driven at least every other week.
In the winter months I try to drive it monthly to keep the fluids moving.
I also run the AC a few minutes in winter months
I have the oil and filter changed every spring. I have this done professionally by a mechanic who is in NCRS. He also does a mechanical inspection of the car to determine my next project.
I plan to flush the brake fluid (Dot 4) every 2 years.(new calipers,M/C and fluid 2 years ago).
Hope this is what you were looking for.
RandyComment
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the oil and filter should be changed BEFORE
you store any car for the season because there is acid in the oil and when it sets it attacks the bearing. change the oil and filter,start it up to get the fresh oil to the bearings and you should be good for storageComment
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Re: the oil and filter should be changed BEFORE
If they had ever seen a set of bearings that looked like worms had been traveling around in them they would understand what the acid in oil does. Over the years I have torn several engines down that had not had the oil changed like you say. One had set for about 15 years, one had been only drived a couple of hundred miles a year and they did not understand why the bearings were worn out. Not a pretty sight.Dick WhittingtonComment
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Re: the oil and filter should be changed BEFORE
Clem,
Would the Mobile 1 synthetic I've been using in both the 66 and 67 since they were restored have the acidic issue you refer to as well....thanks.Comment
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Re: the oil and filter should be changed BEFORE
the acid is formed by the combustion process and also older carburated engines have a problem with excess gasoline getting into the oil so guess the same problem would occure with mobil 1 in the crankcase. even though my corvette is FI and computer controlled i still change the oil and filter before winter storageComment
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Mobil 1
I put that oil in a 91 Nissan that had been on regular all it's life. The thing I noticed is that at oil change time the oil was much much cleaner, same colour pretty much as when it went in.
I asked several mechanics who just shrugged, the last one explained that the molecules are more consistent size and you get a better seal and have less blow by, hence the cleaner oil at change time. Not sure if that is the correct answer but the oil still looks pretty much the same colour each time it is changed.
WarrenComment
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