Cruise to Columbus 2012

Sunday was a great kickoff party at Dave Ruh's shop......good food, drinks, fun times. We met all of the Crusiers and received our maps and instructions. Monday morning we all met at the Headquarters hotel for the start of the cruise. Gary Meadors had his new Chrysler woodie convertable, powered by a Viper...cool car, but it would not start! He drove it from CA and had a some problems, thought it was fixed. The next step was a flatbed to go to the Dodge garage. The rest of us headed for West Branch, IA to visit Chassis Engineering. They had a great lunch for us and a nice tour of the plant. Roy Lewis the now retired founder was there also. He was working on his twin diesel powered stream liner Bonneville car. He signed autographs and posed for photos...a fun time. As we were ready to leave, one of the cruisers need a jump start. Being the good guy that I am, I used my car to jump him. From that time on I had electrical problems. At the next gas stop I changed alternators, still was not charging right. The next stop was the hotel in St Charles, IL. Kevin's Mustang was stalling at almost every stop or light, that held us up and ran us way late. It was only 177 miles to the hotel, we finally got there at 11:30 PM. That night I went to Walmart and purchased a new battery, I was hoping that would fix my problem. Tuesday morning it was off to Tin Man's for coffee and rolls, then onto Heidts in Wauconda, Il for a free lunch and a shop tour. Tuesday night was Kalamazoo. Kevin with the Mustang and Barry stayed in St Charles, Il to work on the Mustang's carb and distributor. Kalamazoo hotel was only 195 miles away. About 150 miles from K'zoo, we passed the 62 Tbird that was with us, looked in the rear view mirror and saw his left front wheel and tire fly off and across 4 lanes of highway. We were just a few feet in front of him...a good miss for us. Four of us pulled over to help Dan with the 3 wheel bird. I called AAA, found parts, some others found the wheel, the flatbed took him to O'Riley's just a couple of miles away. The next 5 hours we spent in the parking lot fixing the bird. All 5 studs sheared off. We left the lot at 10 Pm and had 150 miles to go to get to the hotel...arrived again at 11:30 PM. While we were at O'Rileys, I got my old battery exchanged for a new one under warrenty, had the alternator checked, it was OK so put that back on. O'Rileys was very helpful, used their tools, turned the rotar, used their jack and stand, really good guys. The radio was not working since the jump and the GPS charger cord would not work, I bought a new cord at one of the gas stops, the radio is not a necessary thing but is nice to have working. The volt meter still show low votage, we were all convinced that the gauge messed up at the jump time. Wednesday morning it off to the Gilmore Car Museum, a private museum owned by the Upjohn drug company retired CEO.....I have always said "drugs are good" Next was a tour of Ididit steering column company...neat place and more coffee and cookies. The last stop was Right Stuff Detailing in Columbus, OH. A free lunch, goodie bag, tshirt and fun time. As we were ready to head out to register for the show, my car would not start...got a jump from a guy with a jump box, got to registration and onto the kickoff pary at hotel and worked on the car for a couple of hours.