The Kolar's trip BACK from Wisconsin, 2000
Go to the Updates Howdie,
My first idea was to get a U-Haul car-carrier and a truck to pull it but there weren't any around within 150 miles that were going to be available for immediate use. While Ken, the owner of Maple Grove Auto Center and U-Haul,
The mechanic's Mom and Dad We will never again stay at that or any other Motel 6.
The next morning bright and early, we drove the 300 miles back to Land O'Lakes and picked up our car that we keep there in the garage on jacks all winter.
After turning in the rental car we pretty much drove straight through from Madison to Groton except for the numerous stops to get gas and take short naps. Jeanne drove some of the time but I found out years ago that if I turn the wheel over to her that she drives just fine until I fall asleep and then she, having no one to talk to will start to get drowsy too and pulls over to nap, usually waking me up in the process. So, it is just easier to stop and nap every time you get gas or get tired. Meanwhile, the Van, filled with all of our daily routine commodities, except a couple of shirts and our underwear, sits in Mentello, Wisconsin waiting to be fixed yet again. It is electrically plugged in so at least all the frozen food and the stuff that we take back and forth from the refrigerator here to the one in the cottage will survive the ordeal. I certainly hope the young man at the Maple Grove Auto Center in Montello can find and kill the gremlin that has plagued the Van for the past couple of years. The last little misadventure that we had this trip back was that while I was in the airport terminal, returning the rental car, Jeanne was parked in the arrival pickup zone. It is legal to park there as long as you keep the engine running and someone is always there with the car for 15 minutes while business such as I was concluding takes place. Anyway, she was moving herself from the driver's side to the passenger side and accidentally closed the passenger door on one of our cats who had taken the open door as an opportunity to try and get away from all the jet plane noise. Maggie loudly complained about the door hitting her and when Jeanne pushed the door back open, Maggie jumped out of the car to the sidewalk and started to furiously fight with her leash. She was very scared over the whole thing and unfortunately a jet was roaring out of there at that exact moment too. Jeanne tried to pick her up but she would have none of that and bit and clawed at Jeanne until she was free from both Jeanne and her collar-leash. She ran across 6 lanes of traffic and disappeared into the parking garage just about where I had parked the returned rental car. Jeanne tried to follow her but was afraid to go too far from our running, unoccupied car so Jeanne could not follow her into the parking garage and had to go back across the 6 lanes of traffic and back to our car before something even worse could happen. 3-5 minutes later when I returned to our car from paying for the rental, Jeanne was busy nursing her scratch wounds and then left immediately for the garage area to try and find Maggie. I drove our car around to the garage entrance and parked so that I could help look for her too. We spent 2 hours. until it was dark, looking all over and under the nearly 500 cars that were parked in that garage and I even searched the lawn and shrubbery in the outside areas of the parking garage. I found a good coffee cup but no cat. We got back together and decided that it was futile to search any more that night since it was getting dark and we did not have any flashlights other than the small one I always carry in my shirt pocket. Jeanne went to the airport security office and gave them all of our particulars. And we sadly got into our car and silently started the trip home from Madison, WI to Groton, Ct. We got home here in Groton about 7:30PM - 8:00PM Saturday night and found the house in good, if not much better than we expected, shape considering all the rain this area got all summer. Two hours after we got home the phone rings and it is the Madison airport Security Office telling us that they had found our Maggie and that she was fine, not hurt, and no longer afraid. The lady said that Maggie let one of the airport workers just pick her up and easily bring her into the Security Office facility. So, when I go back to pick up the Van, I will also be picking up Maggie who is now safely sequestered at the Emergency animal clinic there in Madison. This all started out to be an almost unbearable ordeal but now that we know Maggie is OK, we are looking back at the last few days and are chuckling to ourselves at how much fun it had all been and are grateful that we were able to have all that extra fun and not get sick over having to do it. September 19th, 2000 - Update..... September 30th, 2000 - Update..... October 3rd, 2000 - Update..... Van back on tow truck... October 5th, 2000 - Update..... October 9th, 2000 - Update..... October 11th, 2000 - Update..... October 12th, 2000 - Update..... headlights blinking... October 13th, 2000 - Update..... Van goes to LOL... October 14th, 2000 - Update..... Same trouble.. October 17th, 2000 - Update..... New fuel pump... October 21th, 2000 - Update..... Maggie delivers... October 29th, 2000 - Update..... Kittens' eyes open... November 10th, 2000 - Update..... The Last trip Home in Year 2000. November 12th, 2000 - Update..... More trouble.. November 16th, 2000 - Update..... The last entry, The End... August 31st, 2000 - Update..... As of Thursday night (August 31st) our little pregnant Maggie is safe and sound, back in Land O'Lakes and living, temporarily, with Noel (Butch) Volmer and his significant other, Elisa Bruns. Lisa is the real HERO of the whole affair here because she selflessly volunteered to travel from Land O'Lakes to the Emergency Animal Clinic near the Madison airport to pick Maggie up. Realizing that it would be a 600 mile driving day for Lisa, Butch decided to accompany her to help with the driving. Much love and appreciation go from here in Connecticut to her and Butch. We knew that Butch and Lisa were our friends but we now know that they are truly good friends. I will know by the end of the week when the Van can travel and then I will be driving back to Land O'Lakes to bring back both my Van and my Maggie to Connecticut.
As of Tuesday the 19th, the Van was running great, able to leap tall buildings on a single gallon of gas etc. etc. The problem with the Van turned out to be was all in the distributor. On top of being stuck in the block so that it could not be turned to adjust the timing, it also had some sort of malfunction going on with the vacuum advance mechanics inside. It seems that it was somehow loose inside so that every now and then it would fall off its connection and just willie nillie float around adjusting the timing at will. This explains why curving to the right caused the engine to loos so much power and why, like most things, taking it to a mechanic usually produced only a bill for repair and nothing actually fixed because they could find nothing wrong with it. With every bump in the road, the timing had a new value, sometimes good and sometimes bad. Anyway, Ken chopped the old distributor out and put in a new one so that portion of the repair is done. Concerning the fuel supply system. They have been flushed out and just to be sure, Ken has installed installed a nice big glass bowl type fuel filter right on the gas line before the carburetor little bitty filter so that I can easily observe whether or not I am getting any dirt out of the tanks and trap it before it can plug up the non-viewable filter. The exhaust leak which we were all hoping was just a donut, turned out to be an exhaust manifold so badly cracked that it came off in pieces. Ford no longer stocks any new 1976 351M V-8 manifolds anywhere in the country so we had to settle on a salvaged one from a yard in Michigan somewhere. The one that was taken off was brand new from Ford just 4 years ago and they had trouble finding that one so I was not surprised that he could only get a used one. He will have the replacement manifold installed and the Van ready to travel by the end of this week. September 30th, 2000 - Update..... The Van now has an installed, like new, and functioning perfectly exhaust manifold for the right side of the the 351 Winsor v-8. Ken decided to test drive it a couple of days before giving me a call to come pick it up. October 3rd, 2000 - Update..... Ken was going to call me today to come pick the Van up after test driving it around Montello area on short trips for the past couple of days to make sure everything heated up and cooled down properly without any problems. He never had an opportunity to call me before my call to him at 11:30AM revealed that he had the Van out this morning for a last test drive, before calling me, and was about 4 miles from the shop when the Van started to loose power rapidly. After a minute or two of progressively worsening power output the engine quit and he had to get a tow back to the shop. The inline glass bowl type fuel filter was plugged up badly enough to starve the engine to a stall. He is going to take a closer look at the gas tanks this afternoon. This was one of the things I initially complained about to him and he could find no problems with them until now. October 5th, 2000 - Update..... I called Ken today and he had taken the old gas tanks down on Wednesday and after examination decided that they were too far gone, rust wise, to be saved so he ordered 2 new tanks for the Van. If he could have found any to order, he would have also ordered the gas gauge sending units because they were both very munged up and rather than sitting there cleaning and rebuilding them, he would have just replaced them both. But, they are no longer made and all known stocks of them are depleted. As of 2 PM today, only one of the tanks had been delivered with the other one scheduled for delivery by 5PM today. He was not sure enough that everything would go according to his plans so he has advised me to wait out the weekend and Monday to give him a chance to not only finish the tank remountings but to once again do some test driving. So, we will wait for his call on Monday or Tuesday. October 9th, 2000 - Update..... Ken called me today about 4PM and has officially declared the Van to be 100% ready to travel East. He thinks that it is in very good shape now and should last another 100,000 miles without a sweat. Finally, and not a day too soon either. They have already had 5 1/2 inches of snow in Land O'Lakes and even though it has mostly melted off this means that they will start salting the roads during the next storm. If I get caught by snow now, I will have to rinse the car's undercarriage really well before putting it up for the winter. This is not easy to do in Land O'Lakes. So, as of today, the plan is that I will leave here on Tuesday the 10th, drive, rest, drive, rest, drive, etc. until I get to Crown Point Indiana where I will stay with my Cousin Charles Kolar and his lovely wife Joy for a day, maybe more, and then get on up to Montello. I plan on putting the Grand National onto a car carrier and towing it with the Van the rest of the way back up to the cottage. Ken, at the Maple Grove Auto Center, said, before the fuel filter plugged up, that I could pull a house with that Van and not to worry pulling that little GN on a trailer. So, wish me luck and good weather. Ed out// October 11th, 2000 - Update..... I stopped in on my cousin Richard Kolar and his wife Joyce in Argus Indiana. Had a nice visit and some fantastic apple crisp that Joyce (a fabulous cook) had made with apples from their own small orchard. I wish that I could grow them as large as the ones they gave me, they are the size of grapefruits. Back on the road to Crown Point. Chuck and Joy were glad to see me get to Crown Point safely. Chuck has retired since I last saw them and he says that he is working harder than ever now. October 12th, 2000 - Update..... Slept well and then helped Chuck out with his computer a bit before heading off to Montello and the Van. I made it to the Maple Grove Auto Center at about 4:30PM just before they closed for the day. I was pushing myself to keep driving because I really didn't want to stay overnight just to wait for ken to be open. They efficiently got the Van outfitted with a car trailer and the GN loaded up onto it and I took off for the cottage, 3-4 hours further north. Everything had gone along smooth, they were even joking around the shop that they had killed the Gremlin that had been living in the Van. But, the Gremlin wasn't dead, it was just sleeping, waiting for me to try and use the Van. Ken had put $10 worth of gas in each tank just to test fuel flows and for leaks. I was about 25 miles further north when I spotted a Mobil station and pulled in to fill the tanks. All fueled up, I was rolling on out when a passing motorist signaled me that I was having a headlight problem. The headlights were blinking on and off like candles flickering in the wind. This was not good and after a quick inspection for any visible causes showed me nothing, I decided to see if Ken was still at his shop and started to call him on my cell phone. I was just about to complete the call when Todd, Ken's mechanic that had done a lot of the work on the Van, showed up at the Van door asking me what was wrong. Come to find out he lives across the street from the Mobil station. We fiddled with the lighting system long enough to figure out that it was the light switch that was causing the problem. This was the original switch and hadn't been replaced in 1980 when the interior of the Van burned out right before leaving for Wisconsin. (I'll have to write that story up too someday, you will watch for it, right?) Anyway, the Gremlin had one more thing up its sleeve. With both tanks full, whichever tank was not selected as the supply tank would push gas through the line to the online tank causing the online tank to overflow at a rate of about a quart a minute. Had I not had the headlight problem, I would have been out on the road spraying gasoline all over the GN behind me. So, we unloaded the GN and I drove it back to a motel Ken recommends to all the stranded people that magnetically seem to be drawn to Montello. Ken and Todd would have to fix the problem tomorrow, until then I was going to bed. October 13th, 2000 - Update..... Got to the Maple Grove Auto Center today at about noon after a small brunch at the Hilltop Restaurant next to the Hilltop Motel where I had stayed overnight. The light switch was replaced and the headlights were on and not blinking and the gas tank problem had been solved by replacing the A-B switch. Back on the road again.... Now I don't drive through Land O'Lakes to get to my place so I haven't picked up Maggie yet but I did get here to the cottage in one piece and without any further Gremlins showing up on the Van. I will get Maggie tomorrow when I take the car trailer to the U-Haul place in Eagle River. As far as I know, Maggie hasn't had the kittens yet. Could be any day now though and this way when I bring her home the place will be all warmed up and dried out for her.That is all there is for now. I will insert some links to pictures tomorrow night. Check in again Sunday. Ed out// PS, Thanks for your prayers, I had great weather for this whole trip. October 14th, 2000 - Update..... The Van pulled the car just fine. I was even able to attain a speed of 70 and had peddle left for more. I drove right into the yard here and parked the Van exactly in the same spot that I had parked it this past June when it had driven out here so nicely. Got up this morning and took the trailer back to Eagle River. Damned if the Van wasn't pulling the same shit it had pulled the last time it had been parked in that spot after a good drive. I couldn't get it to go over 50 MPH to save myself. In order to take off from a stop sign and get up to 50 I would have to constantly pump the accelerator. Boy, is my right leg and foot tired tonight from pumping that peddle all the way to Eagle River and back. And, even more disheartening was that the exhaust leak that Ken had so successfully eliminated with a manifold changing was BACK, pop pop popping away just like it was before. I checked the glass globe filter, it wasn't plugged up. I decided to open it up to see if there was any fuel pump pressure left in the line and even though it had been about an hour since it had last been running there was still a hefty amount of pressure in the gas line between the fuel pump and the carb. I am going to change the fuel pump Monday, per Ken's request. It is just possible that the fuel pump is in someway not giving the carb enough volume of flow. After tightening the filter, I starting the Van back up. The glass section sure took a long time to fill up with gas. Ken will look into the manifold leak when I get the Van back down to him but that won't be until it can run down the road much better than it is doing now. October 17th, 2000 - Update..... I changed the fuel Pump today. The job wasn't to bad to do but seemed very hard because I couldn't feel anything with my left hand and had to rely on visual queues to tell me if I was holding the wrench right etc.. Took about 3 1/2 hours all together but I was rewarded by the Van running properly for a change. Yes siree Bob, it just tooled on down the road on the test drive. The exhaust manifold leak even quieted down after it got warmed up. I hope that all Ken will have to do is tighten it up a bit to cure the popping noises you can hear when it starts up cold. The old fuel pump looked brand new yet but the crud from the bad tanks must have done a number on the diaphram inside because the only thing that was pumping any gas for the engine was the accelerator pump. I am enjoying it up here and will stay here for awhile yet so that Maggie can have her kittens (due any day now). I will be ready to come home when she and the kittens are fit for traveling. Hopefully within a couple of weeks because it will get to be too cold up here for a house without a furnace and only a wall heater for heat. October 21th, 2000 - Update..... Maggie delivered this morning at 7:30AM. She had 5 little white kittens with big feet, just like they are supposed to be. They are, as usual, very small kittens and the last one was the smallest. She would not win the mother of the year award for sure because if it were up to her to decide, she would take care of just 2 of them and cull out the rest. So, it was a good thing that Lisa was with her through the whole thing. Thank you Lisa. October 29th, 2000 - Update..... First off, I hate the loss of daylight savings time. For my part, I would rather see the sun come up at 9 in the morning and go down much later in the evening. Maggie's little kittens are all doing real well and all have their eyes open now. The two biggest ones are even crawling around their nest, looking out, examining their new world. Little do they know that their surroundings are going to dramatically change when I take them back to Connecticut after the election. The coldest that I have experienced it here was down to 28 degrees and the wall heater kept up with that very nicely. I did take the precaution of winterizing the Van's potable water supply though just in case. Current weather is a lot different from what I lived through back in the mid 90's, the last time I stayed out here this late. November 10th, 2000 - Update.....The Last trip Home in Year 2000 It was a lot of work to do without Jeanne there to help but I finally got the Van packed up for the trip to Connecticut. Packing was a little different this time because the stuff, like cans of Latex paint that would freeze if left in Wisconsin for the winter, had to be packed inside the Van instead of in the cargo boxes normally strapped to the hitch extention cargo carrier and the cloths that we usually have inside the Van were put outside etc. All because of the cold weather I expected to have for the trip home. Left the Cottage at about 11:30 AM on Friday the 10th of November. Drove straight through to the Maple Grove Auto Center and left the Van there overnight so that Ken could start it in the morning and trouble shoot the horrendous exhaust noise you get from a cold system. Spent the night at the HillTop Motel again. All I can say is that it is conveniently located next to a restaurant. Other than that, I am glad that I am not claustrophobic. Saturday morning.... Ken had the Van all finished by the time I got there at 10:30AM. It turned out to be the Gasket called a "donut" between the exhaust manifold and the pipe was just not tight enough. I now have a spare, ready to install, right side exhaust manifold and will carry it with me on every trip. I forgot to get the bolts from Ken though and will have to call him on that since they also are hard to get in the correct length. Took off and drove straight through to Cousin Chuck's house in Crown Point Indiana for a relaxing evening of chit chat with Chuck and Joy. Come to find out, Joy loves to play golf and Chuck has just started to play the game so I am going to get them the Links LS Golf game for their computer as a present this Christmas. November 12th, 2000 - Update..... Sunday Morning.... All had gone so well on the trip from the cottage to Ken's and then from Ken's to Chuck's house that I wasn't expecting to have any trouble for the remainder of the trip from Chuck's house through the states of Indiana and Ohio etc.. But, half way through Pennsylvania right before Lamar, I felt the Van loosing power AGAIN. I couldn't keep up with the truckers let alone the cars gong 65 or 70 MPH. After a minute or two I knew I would have to pull off the highway or be stranded there. So, when I saw a T/A sign protruding into the night's sky, I exited to the truck stop. I no sooner got into their parking lot when the engine died and then just spun without any of the customary compression sound effects when I tried the starter. I immediately knew what had happened, I had thrown the timing chain. Let me tell you...., T/A does not mean Truck/Automobile. They are not licensed to work on anything using gasoline, who knew? I called Jeanne on the cell phone and had her call AAA for me and 30 minutes later the Van took a short ride to the local Gulf station for the rest of the night. I opted to stay with the Van because of the Maggie cat and the 4 kittens. They were all smuggled together for warmth but I knew that I had to either empty the seat locker so that I could run the furnace installed there or I had to go outside and look for a near by power outlet so that I could use the small space heater otherwise it was going to be an ambient 28 degrees inside the Van by morning. I found an outlet and had just enough extension cord to reach it so although it wasn't the Waldorf, it wasn't like sleeping in a refrigerator box either. November 16th, 2000 - Update..... Home Leg of Trip. I spent 2 weeks in Lamar Pennsylvania on Monday and Tuesday. There isn't much you can do in Lamar without transportation to get you somewhere else to do it. Trouble shooting on Monday morning confirmed that it was the timing chain that was not allowing the engine to start. Tressler's Gulf station felt that I would be better served if they took the Van to a private mechanic friend of theirs (and now mine.) So, they took the Van away and I had to stay at the station and wait for its repair. The station is kept at a constant 62 degrees and needless to say, I froze for the next 12 hours worse than the night before. Marvin Haagen from Haagen's Hauling and Repair delivered the Van to me at the station about 8:45 PM. He had a rough time with the Van getting rusted up bolts loose etc. and was himself not fully satisfied with the performance that he was getting from the Van and wanted to pick me up with it to see if I wouldn't allow him more time to find out why the Van wasn't running very good. I went with him back to his HEATED garage, willingly, and Marv worked on the Van until about 1:30 Am Tuesday morning and still wasn't able to solve what appeared to be the same old lack of fuel flow problem that has come and gone with this van since the 26th of August when it initially broke down. The glass globe filter seemed to be drawing air out of the tanks instead of gas. Finally, I went to sleep in the Van and shortly thereafter Marv and his very helpfull wife shut off the lights and disappeared until about 9AM that morning. To speed this up for you, it was the carburetor that was causing all the problems with the power and air in the globe etc.. Marv could not get me a new carburetor from anywhere local but he was able to get a rebuild kit. The inside of that carburetor was all plugged up and crudded up with fine rust silt from the 2 replaced gas tanks. and after cleaning and rebuilding it allowed the Van to perform the way it should. After 3 days in the same cloths, worrying over the Van's repair, and both hands constantly falling asleep on me from sleeping in the Van's cramped quarters, I decided that enough was enough with this camping stuff and took a room at the local Comfort Inn. I eat in their Down Under Restaurant and had a very good steak, first food I had had since Monday noon's small SubWay sandwich. The nice people at this restaurant were even willing to give me a couple of styrofoam containers of hot meat scraps so that I could feed my dog Bijou and Maggie the cat. Maggie had the last of the Whiskas pouches that I had brought along at about 3PM that day and she was used to eating every 4 hours since she started nursing the kittens. Marvin and his wife Linda  are great people and I would recommend anyone having mechanical problems within the 100 miles that AAA will tow you, to get towed in for Marvin to fix you up. All total, Marvin replaced the timing chain and gears, and rebuilt the carburetor. He also, at my insistence replaced the Water Pump while he had it off to change the chain. He worked about 30 hours on my Van, replacing and repairing all that I mentioned and the total bill still only came to about $800.00. I even was given the opportunity to play with his computer on Tuesday while he worked on my Van, thus giving me something to do besides stu in frustration.Wednesday morning..... Slept very well, got up, showered - again, and headed for Connecticut. The Van ran very well. and I am cruising down the road without any problems.... until.... an 18 wheeler's rear tire blew out and shredded itself right in front of me. Tire debri was flying everywhere and several peices hit the front of the Van. I don't think the truck driver even knew that it had happened and drove on down the road. I stopped to the side of the road and got out to inspect the front of the Van expecting to see tire sticking out of my grill at least but the only thing that happened was that the front fiberglass faring that used to extend below the front bumper now was only attached on the drivers side and the rest was mangled underneath the front of the Van. It is all screwed up and will have to be replaced. The only other damage was to one of the Fog lights. I will tell my insurance company about it but Since I have no information on the truck to give them, I am sure my deductable will cover the costs. This happened on route 84 right before getting onto 391. The rest of the trip to Groton was uneventful and I arrived in Groton at about 4PM Wednesday afternoon. It had taken a long time and nearly $3500 to get the Van home from the cottage this year but with any luck I will get many more trips out of the old gal before I am finally forced to spend the $35,000- $40,000 that it will take to replace her. I want to thank all the nice people along the way that helped us out with this problem. I have tried to mention everyone that played a part in this little drama but if I have missed anyone, please forgive me. I have senior moments too, and may just remember if you remind me. Ed out//  Questions or comments? Please email me! Attn: Ed Kolar  |
We left the cottage at 10AM Thursday and got as far as Montello, WI. when the Van suddenly would not get over 30 MPH. I stopped and changed the fuel filter and it helped matters for about 4 miles further. Every time I would turn the wheel to the right, the engine would act like it was out of gas. Straighten the wheel and it would run better but still not the way it should run. I stopped just north of exit 106 on route 51 and changed the fuel filter. The one that I took off was plugged up. I got a nice burn on my arm from the radiator but the changing went well and the Van seemed to run better for about a mile and then it started doing the same thing again. I decided, after talking to the nice State trouper that stopped to help, that I was going to have to have it towed to the U-haul center in Montello off Hwy 51, exit 106, just north of Portage. 
drove us, with as much of our belongings as we figured we had to have, to the Madison airport (70 miles south-west of Montello) where we rented a car. We were exhausted in the near 100% humidity and only drove the rental to the nearest motel that would let us bring 5 CATS AND 2 DOGS into the motel room over-night. It turned out to be the 5th place we stopped at and it was a Motel 6. It had air conditioning and we cooled down after about an hour in the air-conditioned room. Unfortunately, This Motel 6 uses an infra-red motion system to monitor the rooms for activity and if it doesn't see movement in the room, it will turn the AC off and let the room temp go to ambient, an energy conservation measure. Every time we tried to sleep the room would get so hot and humid that it would wake you up and you would be in a sweet. We finally just took turns sleeping, what a pain in the butt. 
It is not a very practical car for long distance being a 1987 Buick Regal Grand National that requires 92-93 octane Gas but I felt it would be a lot cheaper than paying for a rental car over the next few weeks They don't allow "one ways", can you imagine?) until the Van gets fixed and I can go back to Wisconsin and retrieve it. We took to the road again, straight back to the Madison airport to drop off the rental car. The rental car was a new Ford Taurus and let me tell you, that is a very nice car to drive, I was impressed. Later, driving the GN, I kept thinking what a difference just a few years of computer aided design had done to improve an automobile's riding comfort. I had to drive the rental and so Jeanne drove the GN from Land O'Lakes to the airport. We had a pair of cheap walk-ie-talkies from Walmart to keep in-touch with each other as we drove; that was fun. 
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