PennSilverTaco's "Perfect 5-Lug Regular Cab" Build, Aspergers, and General BS MegaThread!

My truck is a base model, but I really want to call it the “Bass Model” for its powerful stereo system; Unfortunately, another TW member has already taken this nickname for their 2nd Gen RC 5-lug sound system on wheels...

 

I think I’m a bit more OCD than you...

 

As others stated, the rear drums do eventually need to be replaced but for most people that will take 200-300k miles:
1. the front brakes (usually discs) do most of the braking work
2. drum brake shoes last a very long time
3. when the rear brakes do need service, the drum can usually be turned/machined during this service
4. this turning/machining of the drum can be done several times if you are starting with new drums.

So yes the drums themselves seem to last forever.

 

I replaced my rear shoes only, not the drums, at 120,000 miles. They could have gone longer but the weather was good and I had time. I went through a phase where I pulled a brakeless trailer. This puts more wear on the rear brakes than normal. I don't pull stuff much anymore. Every time I rotate my tires I pull the drums and check the shoes. I've had more issues over the years with other drum brake vehicles having axle oil seals go bad and leak stuff everywhere than worn shoes.

 

I know, I know...

 

Truck’s modded...

That’s “mortgage payment” or “European vacation” money!

 

Good for you man. Everyone needs a good hobby. As long as you enjoy doing it, it’s not wasted money.

 

Yeah, it was a very expensive hobby; I can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic or not, but I don’t want to live with my parents forever and I want a condo, or even better, a nice little 3-bedroom brick rancher!

 

Not, I have a lot of hobbies

 

Copy/pasted from my post in the "Pennsylvania" thread:

This occurred up in Maine and not here in Pennsylvania, but it's still worth telling in this thread (the car in this story was purchased in Pennsylvania and spent most of its life there though)...

When I was like 14 or 15, my Grandpa was letting me drive his Lincoln! Grammy and Mr. P (I always called my step-Grandpa "Mr.P") were living primarily in one of their lake houses up in Maine. They owned two houses next door to each other, both on the lake. The Stinkin' Lincoln, as we affectionately called it, was a 1993 Lincoln Continental Signature Series that Mr. P bought used in 1994. He bought it from a small independent used car lot called Murray Motors, in either Bethlehem or Hellertown (still in business at the same location). The story goes that Mr. P went out for his morning walk, went all the way to the dealer on foot (he was 70 at the time; Yes, my Grandpa was a badass), and came back with this car that he hadn't even told Grammy he planned on buying. He paid cash for the car, and it was the last car he ever owned. My aunt borrowed it after totaling her own car, and managed to seize the engine after driving without oil in late 2004 with just over 100K miles on the clock. My grandparents almost paid to put a new engine in it, but their mechanic told them that the air suspension was shot as well and this was not worth the expense to fix. The mint (albeit with a blown engine) Lincoln ended up at a salvage yard somewhere in Lehigh County.

Seriously though, my 80-year old Grandpa with a heart condition would let me drive his car, while he just sat in the shotgun seat smoking his pipe! I stayed within the confines of the heavily wooded neighborhood where the lake houses were located and never went on the serious public roads. Sometimes I'd put Meat Loaf in the cassette player and rock out while driving around. I miss that Lincoln, and I miss Mr. P even more, but the hood ornament from that car still hangs from the rearview mirror of my Taco as a symbol that he will always be riding with me.

 

I got my learner's permit for the first time when I was 16 (December 2005) and ended up not getting my driver's license until I was 22 (May 2011), but I was driving long before I was actually old enough to legally drive!

• My first experience was in about 1995 at the at age of 6 when my dad let me sit in his lap and steer his 1993 Chevy S-10 Blazer while he backed out of the driveway.
• My first time on a public road was in the spring of 1998, at the age of 9, in Mr. P's friend's 1993 Toyota 2WD pickup. He was willing to let me actually drive the truck while he sat in the passenger seat, but I could barely reach the pedals and it was a stick shift. I settled for sitting in his lap, but I steered the truck all by myself (I'm 99% sure that truck DID NOT have power steering; It definitely DID NOT have A/C). My mom was understandably NOT happy when she found out I'd done this maybe three years later.
• In 2001, when I was 12, my dad let me drive our rented 2001 Chevy Malibu a few feet in the driveway of Grammy's lake house.
• In 2003, my dad let me drive our 2000 GMC Safari conversion van on a back road in the Maine neighborhood.
• In about April 2004, Mr. P let me drive the Lincoln at the Maine house for the first time, and I did it a few more times over the course of that year.
• In December 2005, I finally got mt learner's permit.

 

@shakerhood
@Taco critter

This was literally the exact same car that Mr. P owned from 1994 to 2004, right down to those "cross-lace" wheels! It had either had white walls when he bought it and he switched to black walls, or vice versa (I forget)...

 

I'm bringing you over to my BS thread so we don't clutter up that other one...

Are you stationed overseas? I'm a Navy brat myself but my dad was never stationed overseas for more than six months, and he was never stationed outside the US after I was born.

 

My Grandpa's car also had a supposedly relatively rare option...

The bench seat/column shifter configuration (See below) was standard on the 1988-1994 Lincoln Continental...



I believe that this is the interior of the car in the photo above.

 

Optional was a bucket seat/console shifter configuration, which Mr. P's 1993 Continental Signature Series had. I have no idea if this generation Continental had this as an option beginning in its 1988 debut, or if it became available later, but the bench seat/column shifter configuration was always more popular with the Continental's mostly elderly buyer demographic. Floor shift models (see below) like my Mr. P's were apparently quite rare. I don't think Mr. P really had a preference, but the 1983 Cadillac Brougham he had before the Lincoln had a bench seat/column shifter. Regardless, Mr. P loved his Lincoln!



I just realized that both interior have different steering wheels. I seem to remember that my Grandpa's 1993 had a steering wheel like the one above, so I'm guessing the first car with the bench seat is older...?

 

And then Grammy drove a 1987 Mercedes 300E like this one from 1987 to 2002, and only put like 85K miles on it in that time!



She bought a brand new 2002 Lexus RX300 and just got rid of that this past summer with less than 88K miles on it. My dad's best friend bought it, and my Grandma hasn't gotten a new car yet...

 

I live in NJ. About ten years ago, a couple of years after moving here from NH, I pulled into a gas station with a 90s Chevy Malibu. It was handed down from a relative who passed away. We used it to keep miles off of our other cars.

Anyway, the fill was in the passenger side. It had crank windows. I was not rolling the passenger side window down to hand the credit card out. The attendant had an attitude because he had to come around to the drivers side.

I told that guy to take a hike, and I didn’t need him to pump my damned gas anyway (heavily edited for content...)

I have pumped my own gas here ever since. “I got it buddy” is all it takes for them to leave me alone.

At my regular spots, they don’t even head my way.