Malfunctions

In the forty-plus years that I've been driving I've never had to call a tow truck for one of my personal vehicles. I attribute that to a couple of factors: The first is that my daily drivers are always well maintained and I frequently check for leaks or signs of unusual wear. The second is that I tend to notice subtle differences in how the vehicle is behaving, meaning that I can almost always detect problems before they become serious... But that was not the case with the delivery truck I drove in the summer of 1972.

The first incident was when the exhaust system fell off. Yeah - the weld broke right below the exhaust manifold... (Never seen that happen before...) The main reason I remember it (aside from how loud it was) was watching the old mechanic at the Dodge truck dealership (used to be on Commerce in West Dallas) try to fix it. They didn't have the correct down pipe in stock so he decided to fabricate one and he really wasn't very good at it... Measure, cut, weld, cuss ... measure, cut, weld, cuss. It was painful to watch... He ended up patching together bits and pieces of four different pipes. It worked, but it was ugggg-lllly.

Then one day I was in downtown Dallas when the clutch got so badly overheated that it warped and wouldn't release. I discovered the problem while approaching a red light. I couldn't get the tranny out of gear and the only way to stop the truck was to kill the engine. And then I had to restart it (in second gear) to get moving again...  (And yes - I had been telling the boss the clutch was slipping for weeks but he said to keep driving it...)
Eventually I stopped at a gas station by the expressway and called the boss to let him know what happened. While I was there the clutch cooled off a bit and I managed (with a bit of effort) to force it into third gear... Luckily, I was able to get it started that way and I limped it onto the expressway so I wouldn't have to deal with any more stoplights... I felt really bad about it because I couldn't go much over 30 MPH and traffic was really heavy (I probably caused a huge backup) but at least I got it to the repair shop without having to call a tow truck :-)

And now for the most memorable breakdown:

I was pulling away from the loading dock at the Sweetheart (now Solo) Cup manufacturing plant down on Ledbetter when there was a loud thump followed by severe vibration. Turns out that one of the blades on the engine fan had broken off. (I've never heard of that happening either - it had to be defective.) ... So I called the boss and told him that the truck was absolutely not OK to drive but he refused to pay for a tow and told me to drive it to the Dodge truck dealership (10 miles away). And that meant going right through the center of Oak Cliff.

Now - I've heard that there's been a lot of "gentrification" in Oak Cliff in the decades since (and a large Hispanic influx), but back in 1972 the core area was almost entirely black. (Think Watts or Harlem.) And tensions were particularly high at that point because earlier that summer the Dallas PD had shot and killed an unarmed 70-something year old woman and a 5 year old child in Oak Cliff in separate incidents (a couple of weeks apart), and when members of the black community tried to march peacefully into downtown Dallas they were blocked by police in full riot gear... And that's why I was somewhat apprehensive about passing through that part of town at that particular time...

I no longer recall which intersection I was at when there was another loud pop and the engine suddenly started running smooth again. At first I thought it was a good thing, but then a plume of steam appeared at the front of the truck which was a pretty clear indication that things had gone from bad to worse... Luckily, I was right next to a gas station and it only took a few seconds to pull in and kill the engine, but the damage had been done. The unbalanced fan had caused the water pump to break off and launch itself through the radiator... (So much for saving a few bucks on a tow.)

The station attendant was totally cool with me being there (much to my relief), although he was highly amused by how much trouble I was having understanding him. (We're not talking "ebonics" here. This was a local dialect that was way beyond that)... He let me call the office and it was decided that Bert (the VP) would bring me his GMC Caballero (same as a Chevy El Camino) to use for the rest of the afternoon while he took care of getting the truck towed to the dealer...

So I spent the next 50 minutes or so observing the ebb and flow of life at the corner gas station... It was kind of a "mini" mini-mart - not very big but there were racks with cigarettes and assorted food all over the place. I ended up sitting in a chair in the far corner of the room (pretty much obscured from the cash register) so not many of the customers even noticed me, but every once in a while someone would inquire about the honky and the guy would point to my broken truck and they'd all have a good laugh :-)

Then the Dallas cop sauntered in. (He didn't notice me either)... Apparently he was investigating something that had happened the prior day and - let's just say that his demeanor, language and actions were highly unprofessional. I was beyond appalled... After a minute or so he finally stopped and looked around - and you should have seen the expression on his face when he spotted me and realized I had witnessed the whole thing... He suddenly became very polite (asked if I was OK, etc) and got the heck out of there... Afterward I said something to the attendant like "What the f***? Is that how cops usually act around here???" He assured me that it was... Yeah - that was a real eye opener...

Epilogue:
Bert arrived around the same time as the tow truck, and after we transferred the remainder of my load to the Caballero I took off to make my afternoon deliveries... And for some reason people kept almost tail-ending me... I figured I must just be having "one of those days".

Then when I got back to A1 and handed Bert his keys he said "Hey, did I remember to tell you that my brake lights don't work?"... No, Bert - you didn't... That would have been really nice to know :-)