A funny thing happened to me on the way home

[jackson101]

I bought the 67 230S and was determined to drive it home. My boy and I worked on it at the PO's place all morning. Replaced master cylinder, started bleeding brakes,...you guessed it, they all ruptured in one place or another from rotting. OK, no problem, the hand brake works fine, I only have 3-miles to my house.
Start on fuel lines, yup, all rotted too. No, problem, I'll rig a fuel cell from an old push mower the PO provided. That was the only thing that really worked out well all day. Put the cell up stream from the in-line filter, fired her up, ran great, but really ate that fuel up quickly. Battery is dead of course, no problem, once it's running, I won't need a battery, ( if the alternator works ) will I?
No, the alt. doesn't work either, so the PO supplies a well charged loaner battery. Now, I prime the carbs., fill the fuel cell, get behind the wheel, the car fires and roars to life. I quickly put it in gear, mash the accelerator and I'm off. I merge onto the main road ( two-way secondary, blacktop ) and find myself roaring along at a blistering 40 MPH, with my 16 and 17 yr. olds in a chase vehicle behind me. I instinctively check my gauges,....temp 80C and holding, speed 40, fuel,...doesn't matter, I'M GOING TO MAKE IT,..DAMMIT!
Then it happens, that sudden loss of power, the kind you know, that no matter what you do, the power will not return and I coast to a stop in the emergency lane. I check to see if the battery is still charged,it is.
I check the fuel cell,...bone dry. I burned a quart of fuel in 1-mile??? Crap! I grab the primer bottle and the gas can, I start to lift the hood and as I do, I see the red and blue lights of the county sheriffs car behind the chase vehicle. OH god,..no plates, no title, no insurance,....I'm f**ked.
He sees the gas can in my hand and says "you out of gas? I can see why, your tank is leaking gas pretty good there" I explain that I'm aware of a small leak and I'm not putting gas in the tank and that I have a small fuel cell under the hood. He says " that ain't no small leak, that's a gusher " I attempt to correct him as I walk to the rear of the car and peer underneath, hoping he's not too embarrassed when I point out the small dribble to him. "you see there's just a small,....holy ****!!!!!!!!" It's a gusher!!!!! The fuel is pouring, unabated from?? the tank, the lines?? After only a few seconds, the puddle of fuel is as wide as the car and half as long. ****!!!!! Now the cop is smiling.
The cop is a bit older, perhaps 60, short, slightly round, glasses. He looks at me and says " what if someone was to drive by here and throws a cigarette out the window " My mind is numb, I blurt out the first thing that churns its way through my cerebellum and wiggles its way to my tongue. " That's littering, isn't it? " He's no longer smiling.
"You need to get this car off the road" he says. I tell him I'm going to get my truck, a tow strap and a friend who can handle the Mercedes. He wants to know how long I will be, because he will need to call a tow truck for it pretty soon, if it's not gone. I promise him 10-minutes.
I jumped in with the boys and they took me back to the house, I gabbed the strap and called the PO and asked if he could help. He was willing and only a mile from the car. So I went to pick him up.
As I passed the fintail, I saw the the fire trucks had appeared on the scene. I hung my head out the window as I passed and screamed "I'll be right there". The cop looked up and waved. I picked up Kirt and we went back to the fintail, the puddle and the cop.
When we arrived the fire truck was gone, after spreading something that looked like "oil dry" on the gas puddle. We attached the tow-strap and drove off down the road with the 230 in tow with our police escort. Kirt assured me that the hand brake could slow himself and the tow vehicle,..probably. As we approached my driveway, perhaps 400 feet before it, I began the "brake" hand signal with my arm out the window and my arm bent at a 90 deg. angle, hand pointed skyward as if in prayer. This is the " start brake" position to the person being towed (done correctly, the person in front, the tow-er, should rarely need to use their own brakes), I did not feel any resistance, so I lowered my arm a bit, perhaps to a 45 deg. angle. Still, I feel I'm not slowing.
I'm watching Kirt's face in my mirror, I see glimpses of him as I survey the road, adjust my speed using only the throttle, watch for traffic and begin to calculate the speed, distance and time to entry. We will need to cross traffic to go into my drive. We are not slowing enough. I drop my arm again, I am now at the "full brake", 180 deg. from the "start brake" position, now with hand pointed straight down to the ground, I have just wet myself, position.
As I make my usual checks,.speed, distance, traffic, adjust, only just a bit faster on this cycle. I linger on Kirt's face in my mirror, looking for a sign. He is almost unrecognizable now, his face is contorted, there is madness in his eyes, his lips are moving, he's saying something. He is 20 feet behind me and I can see the sweat pouring off his skull. I can see he is pulling the hand brake, the handle is just under his chin, perhaps fully extended, probably completely useless. We will not make my drive, I know it, probably less than 100 feet away, there is a hint of good luck, traffic is still clear coming at us. I've been easing off the throttle and we have been climbing a gentle incline, so we have slowed some with little or no apparent slack in the tow-strap.
Just as we pass my drive, still too fast to attempt a landing, I feel a jolt and the truck slows quickly, I pilot the truck across the oncoming lane and into my neighbors drive, close enough. After I enter the driveway, we slow a bit more as I turn left and we go cross country through the neighbors lawn and right onto my driveway, just like we planned it.

[cth350]

Next time you're picking up a car, remind us all to keep out of the greater Rockford area.

That cop was very, very nice to you. So were several guardian angles who must have had a slack day otherwise.

Driving like that is what you do at first light, before most people are up and few cops are around to make your day.

The reason you went through a quart of gas was probably the fuel return line from the carb. Did you route it back into the little gas can?

-CTH
PS. Greg and I have probably done worse.

[jackson101]

Hmmmmm, Fuel return line you say?

[Squiggle Dog]

Wow, quite the story! It reminds me of driving my roommate's 1966 200 home 100 miles. The previous owner said that it would make the drive home fine, but upon seeing the car, it probably hadn't been started or driven in at least 5 years! I had to make a few repairs along the way to keep it running, such as jamming something against the alternator to keep tension on the belt, adding coolant, and having to pull the clutch pedal out by hand after changing gears.

[Colorado220]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! That was a great story!

[LUVMBDiesels]

Reminds me of when I picked up my first car, the Corvair.
Oh she started OK and ran for about a mile then Pop! There goes the belt!

Of course being a newbie I had no spare belt.
My father had his (then new) Chevy Celebrity and was behind me, but we had no strap.
He got his shiny new plastic car against the rear bumper of the 'vair and pushed me the two miles home! Of course the Corvair's brakes were also shot - metal on metal I found out later!

All in all a FUN trip home - especially the two big hills - up and down we had to do!

He never let me live that one down, but the car infected him with old-car-itis and we had fun putting her back together.

[mgburg]

Driving my 450SLC back from NY, I stopped overnight at Erie, PA. at a Comfort Inn (used up some points I had). At 0730 the next morning, I get the wake-up call (I didn't ask for one) from HELL.

FRONT DESK: "Mr. Burg? Do you own a blue Mercedes Car?"
ME: "Ah...yes. (Starting to REALLY WAKE UP!) What's the problem?"
FRONT DESK: "Well Mr. Burg, the FIRETRUCK...."
ME: "I'LL BE RIGHT OUT!!!!"

I throw on my pants and slip into my shoes, grab a shirt, check my "fly" and grab the key-card and "fly" out the door...as I remember that in order to see anything, I also need my glasses. I head back into the room, locate the eyeballs, then try for the parking lot.

Sure enough, as I round the corner, there's Erie, PA's finest volunteers (South of I-90) standing by the rear of the SLC, with about 200 feet of cat litter spread across the parking lot. And right next to them, is the other "hero" of the tale, PA's finest Highway Trooper in blue...with his book out.

Thankfully, it was the book for taking notes, not the "Policemans' Ball Invitation Booklet" - And they all wanted to talk to me at the same time.

Someone from the front desk noticed the SLC leaking fuel, and since there had been a "shift change" from the time I checked in that morning (about 0200), the "newbie" didn't think to check the register FIRST to see if a GUEST had the SLC...they had ASSUMED that a nearby bar patron had dumped the car early that morning. Apparently, this type of thing happens too much. It wasn't until the heros arrived that the desk-person decided to see if a GUEST might have owned said vehicle. Hense, my wake-up call.

Anyways, the cat litter was doing its job, the firemen (3) warned me not to drive the car in its condition (I assured them they wouldn't be seeing me two times in one day.) and after getting all my personal data (I knew something seemed a bit "querky" about those questions...), they piled into their rig and took off, leaving me to start the Q&A with the Trooper. I showed him all the traveling/insurance papers and he suggested a towing service they deal with all the time. He loved the look of the SLC and commented on how he had an acquaintance that owned one a long time ago and how much he enjoyed riding in his friend's car. He shook my hand and headed off.

I called the service that he recommended and about an hour or so later, the guy shows up w/a flatbed, loads the SLC up, and the two of us head over to the Erie, PA MB Dealership. We arrive and I only had to pay him $65.00!!! HELL!!! I gave him a $20.00 tip!

Then the SM came out, tossed a catchpan under the fuel-pump area and told me it would be about an hour or two before they'd be finished. I hiked about a 1/4 mile up the road, got a bite to eat and when I got back, the car was ready and I was about $125.00 lighter in the travel-fund pac.

It turned out to be just a connecting hose (Not the one[s] with the banjo-style connectors on 'em.). It was brittle and with the mileage and fuel-pump pressure, it just finished itself off. The rest all appeared to be in good, solid shape, so it must have been an odd one that never felt the tender touch of a service mechanic in its 34+ years of manufactured life.

For some strange reason, the gas mileage seemed to improve (it went from about 12mpg up to about 14-15mpg).

I haven't quite figured out when I'll start to break even on the tow/repair costs vs. the fuel savings, but it should be sometime before the end of this decade...if I keep enjoying the heck out of this thing!

BTW: The dealership was nice enough to show me the underside where the problem was...it must have been a slow day.

Now the fun part...

About 2 or 3 weeks later, I received a bill (yep) in the mail from the Firemen. They are a volunteer outfit and apparently, in their little (outside of Erie itself) township, they have to make a few trips to various businesses down the road from this particular "bar establishment" that I had mentioned earlier...for the same type of issue...leaky cars.

Well, the township "bills" the owner of said vehicles a flat $300.00 "Incident Fee" so that they can recoup the cost of Cat-litter and the sage advice that they hand out after they spread the stuff around. BTW, YOU are responsible for cleaning up the Cat-litter AFTER everyone leaves and the stuff's done its job.

I'd hate to see what the bill would have been if they had to pull the hose off the truck and spray everything down.

Either that, or they would have charged me for the bag of marshmellows they roasted waiting for the flames to die down.

Thankfully, I'll never know...

[LUVMBDiesels]

^^^ this got me thinking of when I bought the SDL.
It was about 90 miles form my home in WV. I was going to get a car trailer to bring it back with, but the PO called and said I needed to get down there ASAP as somebody else was going to buy it.

I ran down without a trailer and gave the guy the $2300 for the car and signed the papers. Now I had two vehicles and no way to get them both back home. I had the idea of calling AAA. They wanted to know what was wrong with the car and if it was running I said it was but got the idea of saying it was leaking fuel - which it was from the return lines. Well all hell broke loose as AAA called the fire dept to make sure the car was safe to tow! The VFD came out and checked. Lucky for me I had taken the plate from the 300SD and stuck it on the SDL (both the same general make and model and color)
The FD finished up and the tow guy took it home with me leading the way.
When I got home I put the return lines I had in the truck on the car got it registered and went from there
Oh and the tow was free

[jackson101]

Thanks, good to know, I'm not alone on this one.

[meltedpanda]

Originally Posted by mgburg

Driving my 450SLC back from NY, I stopped overnight at Erie, PA. at a Comfort Inn (used up some points I had). At 0730 the next morning, I get the wake-up call (I didn't ask for one) from HELL.

FRONT DESK: "Mr. Burg? Do you own a blue Mercedes Car?"
ME: "Ah...yes. (Starting to REALLY WAKE UP!) What's the problem?"
FRONT DESK: "Well Mr. Burg, the FIRETRUCK...."
ME: "I'LL BE RIGHT OUT!!!!"

I throw on my pants and slip into my shoes, grab a shirt, check my "fly" and grab the key-card and "fly" out the door...as I remember that in order to see anything, I also need my glasses. I head back into the room, locate the eyeballs, then try for the parking lot.

Sure enough, as I round the corner, there's Erie, PA's finest volunteers (South of I-90) standing by the rear of the SLC, with about 200 feet of cat litter spread across the parking lot. And right next to them, is the other "hero" of the tale, PA's finest Highway Trooper in blue...with his book out.

Thankfully, it was the book for taking notes, not the "Policemans' Ball Invitation Booklet" - And they all wanted to talk to me at the same time.

Someone from the front desk noticed the SLC leaking fuel, and since there had been a "shift change" from the time I checked in that morning (about 0200), the "newbie" didn't think to check the register FIRST to see if a GUEST had the SLC...they had ASSUMED that a nearby bar patron had dumped the car early that morning. Apparently, this type of thing happens too much. It wasn't until the heros arrived that the desk-person decided to see if a GUEST might have owned said vehicle. Hense, my wake-up call.

Anyways, the cat litter was doing its job, the firemen (3) warned me not to drive the car in its condition (I assured them they wouldn't be seeing me two times in one day.) and after getting all my personal data (I knew something seemed a bit "querky" about those questions...), they piled into their rig and took off, leaving me to start the Q&A with the Trooper. I showed him all the traveling/insurance papers and he suggested a towing service they deal with all the time. He loved the look of the SLC and commented on how he had an acquaintance that owned one a long time ago and how much he enjoyed riding in his friend's car. He shook my hand and headed off.

I called the service that he recommended and about an hour or so later, the guy shows up w/a flatbed, loads the SLC up, and the two of us head over to the Erie, PA MB Dealership. We arrive and I only had to pay him $65.00!!! HELL!!! I gave him a $20.00 tip!

Then the SM came out, tossed a catchpan under the fuel-pump area and told me it would be about an hour or two before they'd be finished. I hiked about a 1/4 mile up the road, got a bite to eat and when I got back, the car was ready and I was about $125.00 lighter in the travel-fund pac.

It turned out to be just a connecting hose (Not the one[s] with the banjo-style connectors on 'em.). It was brittle and with the mileage and fuel-pump pressure, it just finished itself off. The rest all appeared to be in good, solid shape, so it must have been an odd one that never felt the tender touch of a service mechanic in its 34+ years of manufactured life.

For some strange reason, the gas mileage seemed to improve (it went from about 12mpg up to about 14-15mpg).

I haven't quite figured out when I'll start to break even on the tow/repair costs vs. the fuel savings, but it should be sometime before the end of this decade...if I keep enjoying the heck out of this thing!

BTW: The dealership was nice enough to show me the underside where the problem was...it must have been a slow day.

Now the fun part...

About 2 or 3 weeks later, I received a bill (yep) in the mail from the Firemen. They are a volunteer outfit and apparently, in their little (outside of Erie itself) township, they have to make a few trips to various businesses down the road from this particular "bar establishment" that I had mentioned earlier...for the same type of issue...leaky cars.

Well, the township "bills" the owner of said vehicles a flat $300.00 "Incident Fee" so that they can recoup the cost of Cat-litter and the sage advice that they hand out after they spread the stuff around. BTW, YOU are responsible for cleaning up the Cat-litter AFTER everyone leaves and the stuff's done its job.

I'd hate to see what the bill would have been if they had to pull the hose off the truck and spray everything down.

Either that, or they would have charged me for the bag of marshmellows they roasted waiting for the flames to die down.

Thankfully, I'll never know...

HAHA , good one had that happen to me with a MAzda 626.
BTW - I am from Erie originally , grew up 5 miles from that area!

[Tomas7]

Don't feel bad there's not a lister in this or any other forum that has not gone through an ordeal of some kind or another. If any one hasn't then they are not real car owners yet. The trial and tribulations are the scars of the purist.