Thread: Tulsa Buried Car

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Mike, Sounds like a great trip! Kind of a "car junkie's heaven"! Can't wait to see the pictures. Thanks for letting us share your experience.

Well we ill be leaving Des Moines to head back in a little bit. Had a great time here. Rick the guy I'm visiting go back a long way, used to work in the same garage years ago.

I stored his 70 SS 454 Chevelle for several years until he shipped it out here.

As I mentioned he works at American Dream Machines here in Iowa they specilize in the higher end 60/70s performance cars.

The first picture is Ricks car

Then there's he rig they just boughtThe truck, trailer (and the Shelby Cobra rag top that go with it) are are something they just got in.

The shop area was more interesting to me than the show room (go figure)

The operation is a really neat setup. Apparently the building stated as a Cadilliac dealer in the 30 and eventually became aJag dealer in the 60-70s.

A really neat old building and it works great for what it is now.

Then we went to Porkies last night for their cruise. I'm told the turn out was actually light (about 100 cars) due to the weather. There were some really nice cars, couple of tri-power GTOs, and an old red 4 speed Satelite (with a 426) of course.

We got back from Porkies and Rick and I kicked back in his garage and kicking tires and re-living some of the old times till about mid-night. All in all we cramed a bunch in the last 2 days but I'm actually about ready to be back at home.

Thanks, Mike. Wouldn't that be a dream job, working on old muscle cars? :-)

"......Wouldn't that be a dream job, working on old muscle cars?......."

I asked Rick that......he still loves it....but some of the neatness wears off after a while..........sort of becomes a job.

Well I guess it's about time to close this thread out.....we pulled into the driveway about 1PM this afternoon. The car is unloaded and back in the garage and I'm just unwinding. Man what a trip....I would not have traded it for the worlds. Donna also had a great time The hotel was close enough to everything at Tulsa she didn't have to stick around past when she wanted to. Her and Rick's girlfriend hit it off great so they went shopping...while Rick and I baby sat the garage and cars with a cooler full of beer.......what could go wrong

BY the way they seem to have located the winner of the car

http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/artic..._A1_iEdit41017

All in all we did 3600 miles in the last 2 weeks. Total problems with the car were 1 lost hub cap and 1 broken sway bar support (Des Moines pothole).

The car was not babied during the trip ....we stuck mostly to the interstate running 70-80 MPH. The drive included of a total of about 5 hours driving in rain from light to "if it gets worse I'm pulling over cause I can't see." We drove thru about 50 miles of fog inTexas and even hit a couple of gravel roads back where I grew up at. The car preformed flawlessly.

I Figured the biggest test would be if it would cool running 80 MPH on a 100degree day (oh say like TODAY in AZ) with the air on. It did great temp never got above 200 and that was pulling some hills.

The car averaged 20 MPG and for a 50 year old car was actually pretty confortable even on the 18 hour strech we pulled yesterday. It does not have all the comforts of a newer car but after this shakedown trip I'm pretty confident I can take it juist about anywhere.

Originally Posted by Mike P

"......Wouldn't that be a dream job, working on old muscle cars?......."

I asked Rick that......he still loves it....but some of the neatness wears off after a while..........sort of becomes a job.

Well I guess it's about time to close this thread out.....we pulled into the driveway about 1PM this afternoon. The car is unloaded and back in the garage and I'm just unwinding. Man what a trip....I would not have traded it for the worlds. Donna also had a great time The hotel was close enough to everything at Tulsa she didn't have to stick around past when she wanted to. Her and Rick's girlfriend hit it off great so they went shopping...while Rick and I baby sat the garage and cars with a cooler full of beer.......what could go wrong

BY the way they seem to have located the winner of the car

http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/artic..._A1_iEdit41017

All in all we did 3600 miles in the last 2 weeks. Total problems with the car were 1 lost hub cap and 1 broken sway bar support (Des Moines pothole).

The car was not babied during the trip ....we stuck mostly to the interstate running 70-80 MPH. The drive included of a total of about 5 hours driving in rain from light to "if it gets worse I'm pulling over cause I can't see." We drove thru about 50 miles of fog inTexas and even hit a couple of gravel roads back where I grew up at. The car preformed flawlessly.

I Figured the biggest test would be if it would cool running 80 MPH on a 100degree day (oh say like TODAY in AZ) with the air on. It did great temp never got above 200 and that was pulling some hills.

The car averaged 20 MPG and for a 50 year old car was actually pretty confortable even on the 18 hour strech we pulled yesterday. It does not have all the comforts of a newer car but after this shakedown trip I'm pretty confident I can take it juist about anywhere.

Mike, Thanks for giving us a more personal insight into the event.

Ok, can't resist one last post (it's the last one really )

Just got a copy of the local paper. Turned out to be the best picture taken of the whole trip

How kewl! That is the best vacation souvenier ever!

Absolutely cool. How many copies of the paper did you pickup? I would have done about 20.


Don

I got 2 (the family sent them to me). One is in the "build book" for the car, and the other will be framed and hung between the 2 front page Tulsa news papers I picked up when I was in Tulsa.

Got to admit this was iceing on the cake for what what probably the best vacation I've had. It wsa also fun sharing it with my friends here (beats a slide shows and 8mm films).

(Don, I've been following your build....man it looks like it's getting close).

Cool!

Pat

You are right Mike of souvineer makes the all trip. Good for you.

After 14 years I figured I’d bring this old thread back one more time.

I just got back from my “50th” High School Reunion. Technically my 51st as it got cancelled last year. Had a great time, it was good to reconnect with a lot of people and see what they had done over the last 50 years. We’ve lost 25% of the class over the years but the rest actually looked pretty good (for a bunch of old people).

3 hotrods showed up; my 57, a 69 Nova SS 396/4 speed, and one of the new factory hotrod Challengers. I was informed by a few people that when they saw my old Plymouth driving around town they figured that it was probably me.

The Plymouth did good on the trip, 4000+ miles in a week and no problems. I missed the 20 MPG I got with the Tri Power but the fun factor of the dual quads still wins . Only minor issue I had was in Iowa and Nebraska. A couple of stations I pulled into ONLY sold 87 Octane…… drive on down to the next station and the same thing . The Plymouth DOES NOT LIKE anything below 90 Octane.

Anyway the reason I brought this old thread back up is that the Buried 57 Plymouth they dug up in 2007 has finally found a home in a museum about 150 miles north of where my reunion was. I had enough time while I was back there to drive up and visit it…..basically see what it looked like after it was de-rusted and cleaned up.


RT1 by M Patterson, on Flickr


When I pulled into the parking lot a guy came over and suggested I back into the parking place “so all the cars would be pointed in the same direction”. I must have looked at him kind of funny because he said “you’re here for the car show right?” He was a little disappointed when I told him no. Anyway I spent some time talking to some of the guys that showed up for the show and when they saw the AZ tag on the car the biggest question I got was whether I had trailered it to IL. They were impressed it had been driven.




The museum has a lot of interesting displays but a lot of the cars are “replicas of” or pieced together, others were the real deal.


RT2 by M Patterson, on Flickr


The buried Plymouth looked a LOT better than the last time I saw it…..which isn’t necessarily saying a lot.



RT3 by M Patterson, on Flickr


RT4 by M Patterson, on Flickr


I think the only thing holding it together is the paint. There’s not a useable part on the car. It was worth the trip to see, if nothing else just so I can say that I did. I built my 57 so I could drive it to the show when they dug it up, and it seemed appropriate that that’s what I drove now that it has a resting place.

Anyway, all in all it was a good trip.



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Congratulations on a great trip driving your '57! I have not been to Club Hot Rod in quite a while, thanks for posting and giving me a poke to stop by. Hope everyone is well.

Pat aka STU COOL

Sounds like you had a good trip and got to see some old school mates, that's always fun doing the trip on memory lane.
I remember seeing the car(s) being dug up, there was 2 of them wasn't there? Or maybe my memory is fuzzy.. LOL

I had created a group on facebook for my graduating class and we are up to 14 members, it's been 44 years for us and we're talking about having our own re-union this fall. Should be fun I think.