I’m sitting in the Alaska Airlines terminal/STS, waiting for a flight to Portland. I’m off to meet Mike and Sue Richmond, for a ceremonial visit to the DMV and a wonderful dinner party with the local Fiatisti.

The occasion? Mike has decided to sell his amazing 1974 Fiat 124 Sedan in favor of a more modern Fiat, and I am lucky enough to be the new purchaser of this unique old classic.

The purchase has been cloaked in mystery so far, mostly because Mike is a fun guy and decided to announce only that the car had been sold, and I’m a lazy guy that hates drawing unnecessary attention to myself.

I’m planning to post a few pics and stories of this little three day road trip, and have a nice adventure coming back from Portland.

Current plan is to leave Portland tomorrow morning, stop in Grant’s Pass to visit the new Black Flag Armory location, and then up the hill to a cabin at Hyatt Prairie for two nights before the drone down 5.

I’m so excited about the car! I’ve been telling myself I need a Coupe, a 131, perhaps a 128, and this vintage cruiser is exactly what I’m looking for in a long range comfortable road car.

More as the day unfolds!

UPDATE 22:00 Oct 2 – Safe flight, no issues at the airport (other than it being HUGE) and Mike was there in the car waiting. We had a nice 1+ hour drive in moderate Portland traffic, which was a perfect time to catch up and get some brain dump time in.

Oregon DMV is real different than CA DMV. The plates on the car were paid up until 3/2027. They offered him the option of keeping the plates so he could put them on a different car and get his money’s worth. What? Fair and reasonable treatment at the DMV? Just… (!)

On the way back to Richmond’s house I noticed a very slight fuel odor. When we got there, I found a slight seep at the fuel inlet to the carb, which I thought was the hose but it turned out that the brass fitting had gotten loose. It took a tap and tightened up but still seeped, and then I cleaned and dried it and hit it with JB Steelstik for a couple hours. As of this writing, everything is nice and dry.

Sue made an amazing dinner. Beautiful Bruschetta style appetizers that were transformed by her fresh garden tomatoes, fresh tomato and mozzarella salad, a kale salad, and two Lasagna that were out of this world. I didn’t have dessert, but it looked incredible. Joining us were Brett and Sandy, Dean Rees, Merrill Richmond and his wife Mary, and George Ramos arrived as I was wrapping up my fuel system repairs.

I’m checked into a nice quiet Marriott that perfect host Richmond arranged and covered, and planning on a morning departure, perhaps with a real quick stop in Salem to visit with Dave Decker, who could not make dinner tonight.

This could not have been a better day. All the stress of air travel behind me, Mike and Sue were amazing hosts, and I love this car. I even got to work on it a little bit, and here’s hoping (knock, knock) that we have a nice time tomorrow getting to know one another without any hand tools involved.

I can see the car from my room window. I keep going over to look at it.

Until tomorrow….

UPDATE 23:30 Oct 3

First stop today was Dave Decker in Salem, he has a rad new house and killer shop that he’s just now visualizing. Man that’s a magic time.

My only regret is not grabbing a couple early morning tacos from the truck down the street, they were busy early and that is usually a good sign.

The car was brilliant today. I got to start a car with a manual choke, tune that for the next few minutes to best effect, and then get on the road.

I drove it yesterday, but today was that golden period, where you learn the best bits of the beast. This little thing just squats down and gets it done on the freeway, but it really showed its best on Dead Indian and Hyatt Prairie. The tires on this car are not performance tires, yet I flung it up the road like an old friend. Here is a case of Koni shocks, a fresh front end with some custom alignment tweaks, and basic but quality rubber making the old car do what we always valued them for in the first place.

I’ve always liked the 1800, and with high compression pistons they are crispy as they rev! This one likes premium fuel, but the tune seems to be on with no signs of pre-ignition even under WOT.

Running it up the road to this area was such a perfect experience.

Until tomorrow!

Currently ensconced in a nice cabin at Hyatt Prairie! This is not connected to the Resort, and it has a few issues, but it’s a nice place to be.

UPDATE 21:00 Oct 4

Saturday was a nice relaxed day. Brian and I took a ride in the Sedan over to Apserkaha to take a photo:

Brian and I took a few nice trail rides in his CR-V exploring trails we had not visited in a long time, or had never seen. There are a lot of roads on that Monument, and some of them connect up in really interesting ways. We saw a lot of Deer hunters on our journey, this was the first weekend of the season (I think) and everyone was out.

It was a nice Fall day out by the Lake, followed up by an excellent Prime Rib dinner from Hyatt, and overall I was very glad I made the decision to stay a day up there instead of just rushing home.

‘Sad Sunday’ is always the day to leave the Mountain, and this was no different. I got out at a reasonable hour (09:00), went down to take a photo at the lake and get a coffee from Hyatt, and on the road.

Hwy 66 to 273 is the best way to descend/join the freeway. You have a nice drive that isn’t Dead Indian on the way down, and a nice ride to the summit instead of just droning up I5.

The car was very nice and well-behaved, and I was very hungry when I arrived at my lunch stop, Bartel’s. This is the best burger on I-5 IMO, they’ve been there since 1975.

https://www.bartelsgiantburger.com/

The rest of the trip home was routine, ~30mpg between fills and no real issues until Hwy 20.

There are only a couple of passing opportunities out there. It’s very important to make the most of the first one.

I saw a Colusa County Game Warden pull out behind me once we were past the Fruit and Nut stand, and when the passing zone came up we were already at 70+ mph. I pretty much assumed he wasn’t out to write traffic tickets and I was right, but circumstance and a _very_ cautious driver in front of me got me on the wrong side of the double yellow line, way over the limit, and a traffic stop from said Game Warden.

“But wait, Game Wardens don’t do traffic at all!” is what every one says.

It turns out that they do, you just have to f*ck up bad in order to get their attention.

Properly chastised, I drove home in a much more relaxed fashion, and got the car home safe a little after 16:00 Sunday afternoon.

This was a fantastic trip. Mike and Sue could not have been better hosts, it was great to see old Portland Fiat folks, and the car was a treat to drive home.

If you ever wonder if you should take a road trip, say Yes. That’s the real takeaway from this experience, and I’m having all sorts of fun with the car now that we are home.

Not long now until we reserve the site for Oregon 2026, keep an eye out for the dates!

And lots of plates spinning in the air!

‘Ole Yeller’ currently has both the transmission and half the interior removed. The interior that is being installed has been lovingly cleaned, painted and carefully reinstalled by Pierre.

We had a problem with the radio console. The original had a few stereos installed and was not a good candidate for a recovery job, and with options limited, we got creative. I had a tan ’79 radio console handy in decent shape, so we modified it to work.

I call this the “1978.5” Radio console, because it’s out of a ’79 that hadn’t moved the BMW style round hazard switch to the radio console yet. 1979 Spiders had it up in the middle of the dash.

Pierre and I decided it might make sense to adapt the later console to an early angled hazard switch enclosure, and with some hand fabrication it worked out.

I was adamant that Pierre should not paint or treat the surround on the hazard switch because I was worried that aluminum paint might look tacky, and I now see that this yellow chrome looks horrible and he was right all along.

In other news, the transmission is still out, we have worked out some flywheel bolt issues with the help of David Voss, and now it’s just a matter of time and energy to install the transmission.

We have an awesome local machinist whose domain seems to be in some search companies grasp right now. Eric is a super nice guy, he can do Fiat work and he’s a valuable resource:
Lindauer Machine on Piner Road, 707-544-6988

See you all soon!

7/22/2024 -> 7/28/2024, of course the heavy end of the event is Thu/Fri/Saturday nights.

Same place, same people plus new friends and good Dogs, we hope!

Take the time off work, get there, and be there.

Here’s a Reminder:

My Gallery: https://isaac509.smugmug.com/Events/Oregon-2023

I don’t want to make too much of this, but the magic is happening, even in the early part of the week where it’s usually very quiet.

Today Andy drive his X down to town for mechanical bits and spares real early, and came back with a lot of good parts that might be game changers for the ‘77. Pierre took the Subaru into town to visit some friends, pick up some groceries and also essential bodily fluids for the ‘77.

Dan Loomis and I went over to the BLM to sight in a rifle, and while we were getting that handled Robin and his friend Maggie went to Lake of the Woods in Andy’s X.

While I was making lunch, one of the very tame deer that live around here visited us, and I had a chance to hand-feed her a little bit of bread. It was a great experience, the deer up here behave like skinny tall dogs and it is a lot of fun.

Trey and Heather arrived midafternoon, looking sharp in their 124, and then Greg Smith and cool dog Obi in a white Scorpion, none the worse for wear despite a rough trip from Portland.

Obi is adorable, and also a kisser…

I always stay up late and have trouble sleeping around this event, because the time is so special for me. I’m working on the site from my iPad in the kitchen of Apserkaha late at night, because there is more light in here than my cabin and I have successfully killed all the bugs in here that are actionable.

I love coming up to this event because all my favorite people are here, and it’s a very beautiful place to be. The silence at night is about deafening.

Tomorrow morning we start trying to figure out why the brake pedal on the ‘77 124 is so variable, and always low. The car runs and stops, but there’s something not quite right yet.

I think/hope there’s a bit of air left in the system that I was not able to bleed out, and I’m also confident that we have the right people here to figure it out.