SteveSS
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- May 28, 2013
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- Colorado Springs
No pictures of the car yet, it's still rainy. My son Bryce was going to help pick up the 1978 Camaro Z28 I bought last weekend. I made a big post about it last week. So Bryce calls and said he had Wednesday off work and he could help. I first thought about driving it home but it's a 3 1/2 hour trip one way from Steamboat Springs, Colorado to Monument, Colorado so that was iffy in an old car and I saw the right front tire was worn on the inside. We decided the best way was to use our trailer and Bryce's 2001 Ram diesel 2500. This would take all day but we were up for it.
On the way up to Steamboat, Bryce remembered he needed to top off the radiator but no big deal we could do that after we loaded the car. We had to get to Steamboat before 1:00 pm and we made it with 15 minutes to spare. We got the Camaro loaded easy-peasy and took off toward home, forgetting to top off the radiator. You have to know Steamboat Springs is a ski resort town and I thought it would be cool to get a souvenir t-shirt at Walmart before we left town. Ski resort towns rarely have such guache stores as a Walmart but this one did. No T-shirts and the shops downtown don't have room for a truck pulling a car trailer. The base of the mountain town of Steamboat is 7,500 and Rabbit Ears pass is the first thing we hit leaving town. That pass is 10,500 feet above sea level. The tuck started overheating. We had 4 bottles of water so we let it cool down and put those in. No difference.
Now, what to do? Bryce said the fins on his radiator had gotten dirty once from an oil leak and maybe that was happening again. We went the 4 miles back downhill to Walmart and parked in an inconspicuous spot behind the store. This shopping center also had an O'Reily's. Bryce had a plan. He had a bunch of tools in the back of his truck and he was going to pull the radiator. By now it was mid-afternoon and was raining lightly. Bryce is not a trained mechanic but he is a mechanical engineer and he has a brain that lets him fix most things. He drained the radiator into a bucket and yanked that radiator pretty quickly. and I unloaded the Camaro. A couple of guys stopped by and asked if they could buy the Camaro. So Bryce found a car wash and took the radiator in the Camaro and cleaned all the fins and flushed it out the best he could. Back to the truck and the radiator was installed, filled with new coolant, and the Camaro was reloaded. We were now on our way again. The evening was setting in and the rain was picking up. He stopped by the car wash with the whole rig and sprayed off the trans cooler and intercooler as best he could.
Off we went to tackle Rabbit Ears' pass again. This time all was good, thank the car gods! The temp gauge got to the middle at most. The ambient air temperature had dropped to about 58 which helped and it was still raining. The ride down to I-70 was beautiful. The low clouds were getting stuck in the mountain valleys. I tried to take some pictures but they didn't turn our well. We made it to Silverthorne and the I-70 intersection. Just east was the Eisenhower Tunnel and our last big climb up and over the continental divide. This pass is over 11,500 feet. We made it with no problems. Now the clouds were getting stuck on the eastern slope of the Rockies. The rain was fairly light but steady. But it was very foggy. It's not real fog of course but it's low clouds. It was bad enough that cars and trucks were driving with their emergency flashers on so no one would ram them from behind. By Denver and our turn south we were below the clouds and just had rain. We got to my house at about 11:00 pm and my son had another hour to drive home. It's still kind of rainy and cold so I'm not messing with the Camaro today, that post will come later.
Thank God for family!!!
On the way up to Steamboat, Bryce remembered he needed to top off the radiator but no big deal we could do that after we loaded the car. We had to get to Steamboat before 1:00 pm and we made it with 15 minutes to spare. We got the Camaro loaded easy-peasy and took off toward home, forgetting to top off the radiator. You have to know Steamboat Springs is a ski resort town and I thought it would be cool to get a souvenir t-shirt at Walmart before we left town. Ski resort towns rarely have such guache stores as a Walmart but this one did. No T-shirts and the shops downtown don't have room for a truck pulling a car trailer. The base of the mountain town of Steamboat is 7,500 and Rabbit Ears pass is the first thing we hit leaving town. That pass is 10,500 feet above sea level. The tuck started overheating. We had 4 bottles of water so we let it cool down and put those in. No difference.
Now, what to do? Bryce said the fins on his radiator had gotten dirty once from an oil leak and maybe that was happening again. We went the 4 miles back downhill to Walmart and parked in an inconspicuous spot behind the store. This shopping center also had an O'Reily's. Bryce had a plan. He had a bunch of tools in the back of his truck and he was going to pull the radiator. By now it was mid-afternoon and was raining lightly. Bryce is not a trained mechanic but he is a mechanical engineer and he has a brain that lets him fix most things. He drained the radiator into a bucket and yanked that radiator pretty quickly. and I unloaded the Camaro. A couple of guys stopped by and asked if they could buy the Camaro. So Bryce found a car wash and took the radiator in the Camaro and cleaned all the fins and flushed it out the best he could. Back to the truck and the radiator was installed, filled with new coolant, and the Camaro was reloaded. We were now on our way again. The evening was setting in and the rain was picking up. He stopped by the car wash with the whole rig and sprayed off the trans cooler and intercooler as best he could.
Off we went to tackle Rabbit Ears' pass again. This time all was good, thank the car gods! The temp gauge got to the middle at most. The ambient air temperature had dropped to about 58 which helped and it was still raining. The ride down to I-70 was beautiful. The low clouds were getting stuck in the mountain valleys. I tried to take some pictures but they didn't turn our well. We made it to Silverthorne and the I-70 intersection. Just east was the Eisenhower Tunnel and our last big climb up and over the continental divide. This pass is over 11,500 feet. We made it with no problems. Now the clouds were getting stuck on the eastern slope of the Rockies. The rain was fairly light but steady. But it was very foggy. It's not real fog of course but it's low clouds. It was bad enough that cars and trucks were driving with their emergency flashers on so no one would ram them from behind. By Denver and our turn south we were below the clouds and just had rain. We got to my house at about 11:00 pm and my son had another hour to drive home. It's still kind of rainy and cold so I'm not messing with the Camaro today, that post will come later.
Thank God for family!!!
