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2009 Saturn
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2009 Saturn
We spent about 2 1/2 hours this afternoon buying this new (to us) automobile. It's two years younger than the one we traded in, and aside from the color it's an exact clone. The attraction to this car is that it has only 36,000 miles on the odometer. They wanted slightly over 10 grand for it. That was amazing of itself, but they came back with a 4 grand offer for my old Saturn which has 86,000 miles logged onto it. The way I look at it is that I bought 50,000 miles of driving for around $6000. No doubt the newer Saturn is going to outlive me. LOL
Re: 2009 Saturn
Sounds like you swung a really good deal there.
I used to get a new car every year for around 600 dollars difference between the trade in and the cost of the new car.
But that ended abruptly in the '70s for me when I bought the TA for 3 times the going rate for that year car.
I used to get a new car every year for around 600 dollars difference between the trade in and the cost of the new car.
But that ended abruptly in the '70s for me when I bought the TA for 3 times the going rate for that year car.
Re: 2009 Saturn
I like the Saturn I've been driving for a decade. While we have been talking about replacing one of the cars we own, replacing it with another Saturn never came up in the conversation. Mine was in pretty good condition but I never expected to find one that is newer and in better condition. My wife is an excellent researcher and she has been looking long and hard for a sedan with the features we are accustomed to in the old Saturn. Sedans are hard to find these days, but Buick made a LaCrosse that came close. Apparently that model is no longer made and she could not find any for less that $15K. CarMax was her #1 resource and the list of cars they have changes daily. The one we bought was a huge surprise in that not many Saturns are available and especially not with such low mileage. I wanted to look at it physically before I made any decisions, and thus we made an appointment for them to hold it for a test drive. When they offered me way more than I expected for the trade-in, it became an offer I could not refuse.
The down side is that the insurance for the new car went up ... a whole $13 semi-annually.
I'm at an age where I feel I deserve to drive around in a luxury car. Unfortunately they are 3-4 times more expensive than what I bought. We could have done it, but what we did buy is so darned close to the luxury I aspired I simply could not pass up the deal. Wife's Toyota will need replacing some day, and perhaps that will be the time to go off the deep end. A lot depends on those lottery numbers. LOL
The down side is that the insurance for the new car went up ... a whole $13 semi-annually.
I'm at an age where I feel I deserve to drive around in a luxury car. Unfortunately they are 3-4 times more expensive than what I bought. We could have done it, but what we did buy is so darned close to the luxury I aspired I simply could not pass up the deal. Wife's Toyota will need replacing some day, and perhaps that will be the time to go off the deep end. A lot depends on those lottery numbers. LOL
Re: 2009 Saturn
After I had an accident in the '97 Blazer my late wife bought brand new a few years ago.
I hunted for another one for over a year before I finally found one.
Actually, I was hunting for anything I might like, but found nothing.
Then I got a call from a dealer in Jefferson City, TN saying he came up with a cherry '97 Blazer that was identical to mine, except the interior was black instead of gray. Now how he knew the interior of mine was gray I have no idea.
But he too made me an offer I couldn't refuse. I expected to pay up to 5 grand for one I wanted.
He says he would let me have it for 1600 bucks. I told him to hold it and I would get a ride up there to buy it the next day.
It drove perfectly, so I took it! Still have it, and it still runs great.
While there I test drove a couple of other vehicles he had, and none of them felt reliable.
I really don't like any of the new cars I've seen. There were a couple I could tolerate, but unfortunately they were all up around 50 to 60 grand for a small car, more like the ones I paid 3500 to 5 grand for new a few years back. And I wouldn't be totally happy with them, and as you pointed out, the insurance would be astronomical.
Glad you found a car you can be happy with, and that you got a good deal on it.
I hunted for another one for over a year before I finally found one.
Actually, I was hunting for anything I might like, but found nothing.
Then I got a call from a dealer in Jefferson City, TN saying he came up with a cherry '97 Blazer that was identical to mine, except the interior was black instead of gray. Now how he knew the interior of mine was gray I have no idea.
But he too made me an offer I couldn't refuse. I expected to pay up to 5 grand for one I wanted.
He says he would let me have it for 1600 bucks. I told him to hold it and I would get a ride up there to buy it the next day.
It drove perfectly, so I took it! Still have it, and it still runs great.
While there I test drove a couple of other vehicles he had, and none of them felt reliable.
I really don't like any of the new cars I've seen. There were a couple I could tolerate, but unfortunately they were all up around 50 to 60 grand for a small car, more like the ones I paid 3500 to 5 grand for new a few years back. And I wouldn't be totally happy with them, and as you pointed out, the insurance would be astronomical.
Glad you found a car you can be happy with, and that you got a good deal on it.
Re: 2009 Saturn
Perhaps the most dreaded part of buying a car, any car, is the negotiating with the dealer. Back in the days when I was buying new cars I did a lot of research on sales techniques as well as pricing. I read of a trick used by dealers but it sounded underhanded until I proved it to be true. Wife and I were shopping for a used car at the time and found one we almost fell in love with. The sales person must have seen the gleam in my wife's eyes and said he would leave his office so that we could sit there "alone" to talk things over. I agreed that we needed a few moments to ourselves, but I took my wife out of the office and headed to a remote corner of the showroom. The sales person almost had a heart attack. He insisted we stay in the office ... uuhh ... for better privacy. What he didn't say was that his desk phone was wired to be an intercom so that he could monitor what we were talking about and come back with some counter offer geared to offset our concerns. We did make it off to a corner and I told my wife what I suspected was happening. We decided not to take the car after all. The sales tactic was simply underhanded.
When CarMax entered the Chicago market they came in as a fixed price dealer. No negotiations over the price was involved. Take the sticker price or leave it. Doing things that way meant we, the buyers, only had to know the value of what we were buying and rate that against the sticker price. The only questionable part in that kind of purchase is related to trade-ins. They have an appraiser on the premises who comes up with a value for your car and it's up to us to know if it's a fair estimate or not. The way around that concern is to buy the car at the CarMax sticker price. They will "buy" the trade in at some later date if we so choose. It does not have to be attached to the sale. Thus that sticker price is THE price no matter what. I could be getting screwed over every time I buy from CarMax. I honestly don't know. But I don't think they are playing games or using tricks to make a sale. I am guessing that if you have a buddy who works for a dealership, and this buddy knows what is being traded in, that could be an advantage. New car dealers don't like to keep trade-ins in stock so that they might be willing to bend a little on the price. The hard part is finding that buddy. LOL
Well, yes, I'm happy with the Saturn. Because the deal was as unexpectedly good as it was, it looks as if my wife will also be able to get a newer car sooner than she anticipated. That's two for the price we set aside for one. I don't think CarMax is being exceptionally generous, but I have a feeling this pandemic is putting them in a difficult position. And ... if my wife of many years does end up with a replacement car, and if there is cash left over because we underestimated the trade in value of what we have, all that will make it difficult not to build a new computer of my dreams.
And now you know the rest of the story.
When CarMax entered the Chicago market they came in as a fixed price dealer. No negotiations over the price was involved. Take the sticker price or leave it. Doing things that way meant we, the buyers, only had to know the value of what we were buying and rate that against the sticker price. The only questionable part in that kind of purchase is related to trade-ins. They have an appraiser on the premises who comes up with a value for your car and it's up to us to know if it's a fair estimate or not. The way around that concern is to buy the car at the CarMax sticker price. They will "buy" the trade in at some later date if we so choose. It does not have to be attached to the sale. Thus that sticker price is THE price no matter what. I could be getting screwed over every time I buy from CarMax. I honestly don't know. But I don't think they are playing games or using tricks to make a sale. I am guessing that if you have a buddy who works for a dealership, and this buddy knows what is being traded in, that could be an advantage. New car dealers don't like to keep trade-ins in stock so that they might be willing to bend a little on the price. The hard part is finding that buddy. LOL
Well, yes, I'm happy with the Saturn. Because the deal was as unexpectedly good as it was, it looks as if my wife will also be able to get a newer car sooner than she anticipated. That's two for the price we set aside for one. I don't think CarMax is being exceptionally generous, but I have a feeling this pandemic is putting them in a difficult position. And ... if my wife of many years does end up with a replacement car, and if there is cash left over because we underestimated the trade in value of what we have, all that will make it difficult not to build a new computer of my dreams.
And now you know the rest of the story.
Re: 2009 Saturn
The few times I made exceptional deals on cars, they always had some reason why my car didn't come in yet. These were new cars needed to come from the factory. They would try to hit me up for price hikes since I ordered, things like that. So I finally started taking what they had in stock, if it fit what I wanted that is. This is how I often got the best deals on price.
In 1969 I switched from American cars to foreign as a second car. Usually a sports car to have fun in.
I bought a '69 Fiat 850 sport spyder brand new off the dealer floor for 850 bucks. We loved going to sport car rally's!
In 1970 I bought the second one for 1 grand, and by 1971 my last one cost 1200 dollars.
My main car in 1968 was a Camaro which I still had until 1974 when I bought my wife a Dodge Charger.
I also had a Suzuki 380J motorcycle I used from around '68 to '77 when I bought a Chevy LUV pickup truck.
In 1976 I bought a Pontiac 50th Anniversary Special Edition Trans Am.
Now I didn't intend on buying that one, instead we bought a white with blue trim TA for 5500 bucks.
I forget now what happened with it, but even though we already paid for it, something happened and we couldn't get it.
Ended up paying an extra 10 grand more or 15000 bucks for the SE Trans Am.
However, that car was supposed to sell for like 20 grand, but the dealer knew I had him over a barrel.
We later found out he sold the one we had already bought and paid for, which is apparently against the law.
And this might be why he knocked 5 grand off the TA, even though it was more than we wanted to spend.
The sad thing is, the Ex took this car when she left in 1978 and left me the payment book, hi hi.
The only car we bought brand new that I considered super expensive was the '97 Blazer at 36 grand.
Heck we only paid 35k for our house. But then it was the wife who wanted it, and who made the payments on it until she died, then I had to make the last 2 years of payments when I was near broke.
On the bright side, it has always been the best and most reliable car I ever owned in my life.
Which is one reason I spent a year looking for another one just like it!
In 1969 I switched from American cars to foreign as a second car. Usually a sports car to have fun in.
I bought a '69 Fiat 850 sport spyder brand new off the dealer floor for 850 bucks. We loved going to sport car rally's!
In 1970 I bought the second one for 1 grand, and by 1971 my last one cost 1200 dollars.
My main car in 1968 was a Camaro which I still had until 1974 when I bought my wife a Dodge Charger.
I also had a Suzuki 380J motorcycle I used from around '68 to '77 when I bought a Chevy LUV pickup truck.
In 1976 I bought a Pontiac 50th Anniversary Special Edition Trans Am.
Now I didn't intend on buying that one, instead we bought a white with blue trim TA for 5500 bucks.
I forget now what happened with it, but even though we already paid for it, something happened and we couldn't get it.
Ended up paying an extra 10 grand more or 15000 bucks for the SE Trans Am.
However, that car was supposed to sell for like 20 grand, but the dealer knew I had him over a barrel.
We later found out he sold the one we had already bought and paid for, which is apparently against the law.
And this might be why he knocked 5 grand off the TA, even though it was more than we wanted to spend.
The sad thing is, the Ex took this car when she left in 1978 and left me the payment book, hi hi.
The only car we bought brand new that I considered super expensive was the '97 Blazer at 36 grand.
Heck we only paid 35k for our house. But then it was the wife who wanted it, and who made the payments on it until she died, then I had to make the last 2 years of payments when I was near broke.
On the bright side, it has always been the best and most reliable car I ever owned in my life.
Which is one reason I spent a year looking for another one just like it!
Re: 2009 Saturn
The one car I bought with no reservations and was a happy camper afterwards was a demonstrator Acura. I went in the dealership just to look at Acuras because I never investigated them previously and knew very little about them. I was impressed and was ready to walk out when the sales person said he had a special car that I might like right there in the showroom. It was as nice as all the others and the special part about it was that it had a manual transmission. Only certain people were interested in manual shifts back then and the sales person knew that is what I've been driving all the years up to that point. He encouraged me to take it for a test drive, which I did. It had well under 10k miles on it, but I don't recall exactly what the odometer read. All I did know was that it could not be sold as a new car. Plus, this being a demonstrator suggested to me that it was well maintained because it was the show car. I don't recall what the asking price was but it was surprisingly low. I bought it and was happy with the deal. My guess was that they couldn't find a buyer for a long time and the inventory costs were accumulating. They were glad to get rid of it. LOL
The Acura was sporty and light weight. After a year or two of driving it, I discovered the disadvantage of the lightness. This was a front wheel drive car but in certain turning situations it would fishtail. It happened on wet pavement the first time but I was able to do it on dry pavement too if I made a hard enough turn. In theory FWD cars are not supposed to do that. I didn't keep the Acura for the 100k miles as I was accustomed to doing. We bought an automatic trans Plymouth to replace it and I never went back to manual trans afterward. I don't know what Honda did to that Acura but it was the only car I ever owned that fishtailed without warning.
The Acura was sporty and light weight. After a year or two of driving it, I discovered the disadvantage of the lightness. This was a front wheel drive car but in certain turning situations it would fishtail. It happened on wet pavement the first time but I was able to do it on dry pavement too if I made a hard enough turn. In theory FWD cars are not supposed to do that. I didn't keep the Acura for the 100k miles as I was accustomed to doing. We bought an automatic trans Plymouth to replace it and I never went back to manual trans afterward. I don't know what Honda did to that Acura but it was the only car I ever owned that fishtailed without warning.
Re: 2009 Saturn
The problem I had with both of the front-wheel-drive cars I owned or used, is they were horrible in ice and on wet blacktop too.
I ended up in the creek twice in the Cadillac. I think I told you the story of taking my step-daughter to school in the snow and showed here how dangerous front-wheel-drive vehicles were. I hope I scared her enough she never bought one.
When we go places out of town, we have to rent a car for the trip, and all they have now are front-wheel-drive jobbies.
The steering on them is super heavy and you can't really feel the road properly on the steering wheel.
One of the little compacts we rented, when I turned off the highway and had to make right turn at the stop sign at the bottom of the ramp, I had the back end slide around to the left which surprised me too. It was raining and the intersection was quite oily due to many bumps in the road right there. But that's the only time that ever happened to me.
Debi's niece had a rental car she thought was going to tip over frontwards on her. The few times she had to stop fast, she said it felt like the back of the car came up off the ground. It probably didn't, just all that weight in the front and probably cheap springs and shock made it nosedive more than a real car.
I ended up in the creek twice in the Cadillac. I think I told you the story of taking my step-daughter to school in the snow and showed here how dangerous front-wheel-drive vehicles were. I hope I scared her enough she never bought one.
When we go places out of town, we have to rent a car for the trip, and all they have now are front-wheel-drive jobbies.
The steering on them is super heavy and you can't really feel the road properly on the steering wheel.
One of the little compacts we rented, when I turned off the highway and had to make right turn at the stop sign at the bottom of the ramp, I had the back end slide around to the left which surprised me too. It was raining and the intersection was quite oily due to many bumps in the road right there. But that's the only time that ever happened to me.
Debi's niece had a rental car she thought was going to tip over frontwards on her. The few times she had to stop fast, she said it felt like the back of the car came up off the ground. It probably didn't, just all that weight in the front and probably cheap springs and shock made it nosedive more than a real car.
Re: 2009 Saturn
I'm thinking you and I have some drastic differences in our driving experiences. I lived through some terrible winter storms up in Chicago and I can confidently say no motorized vehicle does well on snow and ice. I've seen buses full of people as well as loaded garbage trucks slip and slide and get stuck in some of that Chicago snow. My daily trip to work included more than 10 miles of open country where the snow would drift across the highways and strand people for hours. And yes, I've seen more than a few cars in ditches or off to the side of the road where the snow was deeper than the wheel axles on the car. And, especially during the last half of my driving life, I'd feel confident saying that upward of 90% of those automobiles were front wheel drive design. My considered opinion of all that winter driving is that the FWD vehicles I observed did not perform any worse than can be statistically expected. I certainly can ascertain that fact from my own personal driving experience. I'm not questioning your misfortunes nor the precautions you take to protect yourself while driving. I would, however, hesitate to put the blame on the design of the car. To me that would be similar to people who do not fly in airplanes because they sometimes crash. That fear exists in spite of the fact that air transportation is proven to be among the safest ways to go. Given your background with racing and automobiles in general, I'd say you are much more familiar with design related issues that I will ever be. Perhaps I'm not as sensitive to the frailties of auto design as you would be. You know the song, "fools rush in where angels fear to tread." 
Re: 2009 Saturn
Almost all of my cars over the years were only rear wheel drive, and not all of them had posi-traction, only the later ones.
Some folks thought I was crazy because come winter, I had snow tires put on all four wheels.
I also carried chains, a couple sets of them in my trunk of different types too.
I was not afraid to go anywhere no matter how bad the ice or snow was.
But the key here, is I was prepared for it!
I know you've driven normal cars over the years, long before front-wheel-drive came out.
And being from Chicago, I'm sure you've driven in your share of ice.
When driving on ice in a normal car, if you step down too hard on the gas pedal, you can spin your back wheels.
By the same token, if you let off the gas too fast, your back wheels can slide.
But the thing is, you always had your steering and braking to correct yourself out of a skid.
Now in a front-wheel-drive car, if you step on the gas too much, or slow down too fast, and you lose your friction grip on those front wheels, you've also lost your braking and steering capabilities. Therefore you cannot correct yourself in a skid situation.
If you are trying to go uphill, instead of just being stuck not moving forward as in a normal car, your front end can slid around sending you in the opposite direction. I know, I saw this on the hill going out of our subdivision many times every winter. A phenomenon I never once saw happen before they came out with front-wheel-drive cars.
The same thing happens on oily wet blacktop as well. And this is why they go out of control so often.
Their only advantage is there is more weight on those front tires, so it is harder to break the friction grip on a clean dry surface, but add rain and oil, or snow and ice, and they are an accident looking for a place to happen.
When I was driving OTR, I've seen more than my share of accidents over the years.
But the reason I quite driving OTR, despite the 35k reward only 200k miles ahead, was because of the types of accidents I started seeing, and those types of accidents kept growing, the more front-wheel-drive cars were on the road.
It is true they claim the passenger compartment is much safer, but the chance of being in an accident has gone up exponentially since they began building these cheaply made cars and selling them for the price of a conventional car. Sad!
Just notice the number of people who get out on the roads and get stuck blocking the roads.
It's a whole lot more now per capita, than it was in the days they made real cars.
Some folks thought I was crazy because come winter, I had snow tires put on all four wheels.
I also carried chains, a couple sets of them in my trunk of different types too.
I was not afraid to go anywhere no matter how bad the ice or snow was.
But the key here, is I was prepared for it!
I know you've driven normal cars over the years, long before front-wheel-drive came out.
And being from Chicago, I'm sure you've driven in your share of ice.
When driving on ice in a normal car, if you step down too hard on the gas pedal, you can spin your back wheels.
By the same token, if you let off the gas too fast, your back wheels can slide.
But the thing is, you always had your steering and braking to correct yourself out of a skid.
Now in a front-wheel-drive car, if you step on the gas too much, or slow down too fast, and you lose your friction grip on those front wheels, you've also lost your braking and steering capabilities. Therefore you cannot correct yourself in a skid situation.
If you are trying to go uphill, instead of just being stuck not moving forward as in a normal car, your front end can slid around sending you in the opposite direction. I know, I saw this on the hill going out of our subdivision many times every winter. A phenomenon I never once saw happen before they came out with front-wheel-drive cars.
The same thing happens on oily wet blacktop as well. And this is why they go out of control so often.
Their only advantage is there is more weight on those front tires, so it is harder to break the friction grip on a clean dry surface, but add rain and oil, or snow and ice, and they are an accident looking for a place to happen.
When I was driving OTR, I've seen more than my share of accidents over the years.
But the reason I quite driving OTR, despite the 35k reward only 200k miles ahead, was because of the types of accidents I started seeing, and those types of accidents kept growing, the more front-wheel-drive cars were on the road.
It is true they claim the passenger compartment is much safer, but the chance of being in an accident has gone up exponentially since they began building these cheaply made cars and selling them for the price of a conventional car. Sad!
Just notice the number of people who get out on the roads and get stuck blocking the roads.
It's a whole lot more now per capita, than it was in the days they made real cars.
Re: 2009 Saturn
All that I can add to the above is driving on anything other than dry pavement requires more skill than it takes to get a drivers' license. Some people acquire it, and some do not. We have traveled different parts of the country in our days, and we certainly have witnessed many different and dissimilar things. I'd not expect us to see the same things and much less come to the same conclusions.
Your comments about going uphill are interesting. Most of my life was lived in the Prairie State and I didn't see too many hills; the part of Missouri where I live now is quite the contrast. The only incline I did live with for twenty-five years or so was my 65 foot long driveway to my garage. Frankly I don't see a difference between the front end sliding around trying to gain traction verses the back end doing the same thing. You don't get far up the hill either way when the snow is up to your elbows. LOL
Your comments about going uphill are interesting. Most of my life was lived in the Prairie State and I didn't see too many hills; the part of Missouri where I live now is quite the contrast. The only incline I did live with for twenty-five years or so was my 65 foot long driveway to my garage. Frankly I don't see a difference between the front end sliding around trying to gain traction verses the back end doing the same thing. You don't get far up the hill either way when the snow is up to your elbows. LOL
Re: 2009 Saturn
I used to love going out during the worst ice storms, just driving around to laugh at all of those with their big fancy cars stuck at the bottom of the hills. There were a couple of subdivisions a friend of mine and I used to drive up to the very end of, then tape our horn button down and slowly drive back down the hill, at 2 or 3 am, hi hi. They had all their luxury cars parked at the bottom of the hill, hi hi.
One year I had to ram my pickup truck through a snow drift that was rooftop high, but only about 20 feet wide at the base. Even so, the snow was about a foot deep everywhere in the subdivision. That truck didn't even have posi-traction, just one wheel drive, and I still made it out of the subdivision, dropped a friend off and work, then drove to my workplace. Good thing too, because only the boss and two other employee's made it in that day. Earned me a 150 dollar bonus for the day too!
Working on a farm part-time also, the horses need fed, the water troughs filled, and all the other critters taken care of, regardless of what the weather is.
One year I had to ram my pickup truck through a snow drift that was rooftop high, but only about 20 feet wide at the base. Even so, the snow was about a foot deep everywhere in the subdivision. That truck didn't even have posi-traction, just one wheel drive, and I still made it out of the subdivision, dropped a friend off and work, then drove to my workplace. Good thing too, because only the boss and two other employee's made it in that day. Earned me a 150 dollar bonus for the day too!
Working on a farm part-time also, the horses need fed, the water troughs filled, and all the other critters taken care of, regardless of what the weather is.
Re: 2009 Saturn
You laughed at the luxury cars at the bottom of the hill, but I laughed at the 4WD monster trucks on the same expressway as I was on sitting idle during a snow storm in grid locked traffic. Those guys paid twice or three times as much for the muscle in their vehicles and got nowhere on the expressways. On the other hand, I have no doubt they could have simply plowed over the back end of my car and drive right over the top as far as they wanted to go. But, fortunately, they didn't do that.
I have some sympathy for farmers and their livestock. I guess winter up north is the main reason they invented barns. But, I realize, some critters do get stuck out in pasture and need rescuing. I think they use snowmobiles now instead of trucks.
I have some sympathy for farmers and their livestock. I guess winter up north is the main reason they invented barns. But, I realize, some critters do get stuck out in pasture and need rescuing. I think they use snowmobiles now instead of trucks.
Re: 2009 Saturn
When I worked on the horse ranch my grandfather tended his entire life, we had an old Fordson tractor that was a paid to keep running. But when it snowed, I had to clear all around the feeders and troughs, plus a path to get to each of them, and then around to the stables so they could come in for their oats.
Animals usually follow the same path so they keep those paths fairly clear by themselves.
But they can't do that in the areas they cannot get to, due to the fences and closed gates.
So I basically had to plow the entire corral area first, then open the gate so they could get in there, and from there they would go to their feed stalls, which paths I plowed earlier, before the corral.
I also had to drain all the hoses after filling the water troughs or they would freeze. Had to make sure they were well drained too.
At the time I worked there, I had large 12 inch diameter pulleys I added up at the hayloft boom so I could pull the hoses up there and let them hang without them getting a kink in them.
I also put large black oil cloth on top of 1/2 the water troughs so the sun could help keep them from freezing so fast.
It worked as long as the horses didn't paw at them and cause them to sink, hi hi.
90% of our chicken waterers were glass. So in the winter months I set them inside the coops with a heat lamp shining down on them. But for those in the outdoor cages, I used the metal feed troughs for water and for food. Had to have a few of these because you can't get frozen water out of them without letting it melt. So just inside the tack room I kept a shelf covered with heat tapes to set the frozen ones on. Worked pretty good too.
I had an old Corvair I used to bring the hay out to the fields because of how hard it was to get the tractor going.
Later on, I used that Corvair to build a Float for the Bicentennial Celebration. You couldn't see the car under the decorative float materials. Had to partially demolish it to mount the huge round sign that it supported.
Animals usually follow the same path so they keep those paths fairly clear by themselves.
But they can't do that in the areas they cannot get to, due to the fences and closed gates.
So I basically had to plow the entire corral area first, then open the gate so they could get in there, and from there they would go to their feed stalls, which paths I plowed earlier, before the corral.
I also had to drain all the hoses after filling the water troughs or they would freeze. Had to make sure they were well drained too.
At the time I worked there, I had large 12 inch diameter pulleys I added up at the hayloft boom so I could pull the hoses up there and let them hang without them getting a kink in them.
I also put large black oil cloth on top of 1/2 the water troughs so the sun could help keep them from freezing so fast.
It worked as long as the horses didn't paw at them and cause them to sink, hi hi.
90% of our chicken waterers were glass. So in the winter months I set them inside the coops with a heat lamp shining down on them. But for those in the outdoor cages, I used the metal feed troughs for water and for food. Had to have a few of these because you can't get frozen water out of them without letting it melt. So just inside the tack room I kept a shelf covered with heat tapes to set the frozen ones on. Worked pretty good too.
I had an old Corvair I used to bring the hay out to the fields because of how hard it was to get the tractor going.
Later on, I used that Corvair to build a Float for the Bicentennial Celebration. You couldn't see the car under the decorative float materials. Had to partially demolish it to mount the huge round sign that it supported.
Re: 2009 Saturn
Keeping livestock during the winter months up north seems to me, a city slicker, to be an impossible task. Wisconsin, noted for it's dairy farms, seems to have it all down to a science. I don't suppose they have the same problems down in Texas as they do in Wisconsin, but farm animals anywhere are very dependent upon their keepers. Feeding them is just part of life on a farm/ranch, I suppose, but I have issue with simple things like walking the dog. LOL
I tried to make an ice pond for the kids in our back yard one year. I used a 50' garden hose to attempt flooding the back yard, but that only lasted about five minutes. The water, even though it was flowing through the hose, froze. Fortunately the spigot did not get damaged. I think the hose stayed stiff and frozen for several months that year. I don't know what you used to fill the water troughs on the farm, but I'm guessing it was not a plastic garden hose.
I tried to make an ice pond for the kids in our back yard one year. I used a 50' garden hose to attempt flooding the back yard, but that only lasted about five minutes. The water, even though it was flowing through the hose, froze. Fortunately the spigot did not get damaged. I think the hose stayed stiff and frozen for several months that year. I don't know what you used to fill the water troughs on the farm, but I'm guessing it was not a plastic garden hose.
Re: 2009 Saturn
It was a lot of work in Missouri, so I imagine the further north you go, the harder it gets.
All of our hoses were made of red rubber, well black in the early days. But the red rubber was the best for winter.
I might add that these were not reinforced hoses, just plain rubber tubes. Which means you can't use a sprayer head on them that stops the flow of water or they will split from the pressure.
We did have a few hoses that did have braided cores to use for garden work, car and animal washing, etc.
All of our hoses were made of red rubber, well black in the early days. But the red rubber was the best for winter.
I might add that these were not reinforced hoses, just plain rubber tubes. Which means you can't use a sprayer head on them that stops the flow of water or they will split from the pressure.
We did have a few hoses that did have braided cores to use for garden work, car and animal washing, etc.
Re: 2009 Saturn
I recall seeing red rubber hoses. But that's it. I don't recall the context, but I do know I was a very young kid at the time. LOL
We had a park nearby that flooded a field every year for use as an ice pond. The fire department was called to do the flooding which is what gave me the idea about using a garden hose. Obviously they had better equipment. LOL
We had a park nearby that flooded a field every year for use as an ice pond. The fire department was called to do the flooding which is what gave me the idea about using a garden hose. Obviously they had better equipment. LOL
Re: 2009 Saturn
We had a large flat patio in our back yard when I was a kid.
My dad would lay those long canvas tubes filled with sand around the perimeter, and spray water over the bags to get them saturated, and also all over the patio, in fine layers until he knew it would hold water. Then he would turn on a tap that fed to the center of the patio and let it fill with water. Watching to make sure he didn't add to much water that would cause the other ice to melt.
He wanted us to do our skating there, rather than down at the pond until it measured X number of inches thick.
Because of the way he filled it, it was always smooth as glass.
If it snowed, he would spray water over the top to get it to melt, and then turn on the center water again to fill it up even more.
It wasn't until I was in my teens that I figured out why his center fed pipe never froze.
The faucet that fed the patio fountain was in the basement, and was one of those with a valve on the side you could open to drain the water out of the pipes.
Before dad built the two flower beds with the BBQ grill centered between them, he had a round stone BBQ grill in the center of the patio. From the time I was two until I was perhaps 6 or 7 years old. He has always only used real charcoal to BBQ, and the water pipe was there to put out the fire when he was done cooking. Not only to save some of the charcoal, but to wash all the ash away into a waste pipe that ran to the edge of our property.
After he built the new BBQ grill, he turned the old BBQ grill into a shallow fountain. So the waste pipe became a stand pipe for overflow, and he only used the water pipe to fill it. It had a little giant pump to run the small fountain head. It had a flat stone seat all the way around it to sit on.
When he had the new patio installed, the waste pipe got buried, but he kept the water pipe under a paving stone. Just in case he ever decided to put a fountain back in again, which never happened.
My dad would lay those long canvas tubes filled with sand around the perimeter, and spray water over the bags to get them saturated, and also all over the patio, in fine layers until he knew it would hold water. Then he would turn on a tap that fed to the center of the patio and let it fill with water. Watching to make sure he didn't add to much water that would cause the other ice to melt.
He wanted us to do our skating there, rather than down at the pond until it measured X number of inches thick.
Because of the way he filled it, it was always smooth as glass.
If it snowed, he would spray water over the top to get it to melt, and then turn on the center water again to fill it up even more.
It wasn't until I was in my teens that I figured out why his center fed pipe never froze.
The faucet that fed the patio fountain was in the basement, and was one of those with a valve on the side you could open to drain the water out of the pipes.
Before dad built the two flower beds with the BBQ grill centered between them, he had a round stone BBQ grill in the center of the patio. From the time I was two until I was perhaps 6 or 7 years old. He has always only used real charcoal to BBQ, and the water pipe was there to put out the fire when he was done cooking. Not only to save some of the charcoal, but to wash all the ash away into a waste pipe that ran to the edge of our property.
After he built the new BBQ grill, he turned the old BBQ grill into a shallow fountain. So the waste pipe became a stand pipe for overflow, and he only used the water pipe to fill it. It had a little giant pump to run the small fountain head. It had a flat stone seat all the way around it to sit on.
When he had the new patio installed, the waste pipe got buried, but he kept the water pipe under a paving stone. Just in case he ever decided to put a fountain back in again, which never happened.
Re: 2009 Saturn
I think you inherited some of your mechanical genius from your dad. That patio BBQ/fountain setup sounds like it was a step up from the conventional. I believe the outside water spigots on this house have long stems that reach into the basement an inch or two. There is a shut off valve for each spigot, but no drain plug as your dad had in his arrangement. That probably was a standard piece of plumbing back in the days, but I've not seen anything like it in my own experience. Then again, I don't get into many construction projects.
While I talked about ice skating I never did any of that when I was a kid. There was a large park not too far away that had a small hill in the center of it just the right size for sledding and tobogganing. It was also a great hill for bicycles during the summer months. I could get the speedometer on my bike up to 35 mph going down that hill, but I almost killed myself doing it. One day they were doing some digging in the park and unearthed a large rock that they placed off to the side. It happened to be in the path of my bicycle daredevil run but I didn't notice it until I hit it. I went over the front wheel of the bike and landed on my face. A second or two later the bike came crashing on my back. The front wheel fork was bent to make the cycle unusable so that I had to walk a mile or so, injured as I was, to get home. Looking back on it all it's a wonder I survived my childhood.
While I talked about ice skating I never did any of that when I was a kid. There was a large park not too far away that had a small hill in the center of it just the right size for sledding and tobogganing. It was also a great hill for bicycles during the summer months. I could get the speedometer on my bike up to 35 mph going down that hill, but I almost killed myself doing it. One day they were doing some digging in the park and unearthed a large rock that they placed off to the side. It happened to be in the path of my bicycle daredevil run but I didn't notice it until I hit it. I went over the front wheel of the bike and landed on my face. A second or two later the bike came crashing on my back. The front wheel fork was bent to make the cycle unusable so that I had to walk a mile or so, injured as I was, to get home. Looking back on it all it's a wonder I survived my childhood.
Re: 2009 Saturn
If you look at your Main Shut Off where it comes into your basement, there should be a little screw cap on the side of the valve that you can open to drain the house, as long as you have turned off the water first.
This doesn't mean it will drain all the pipes completely though, but does a pretty good job just the same.
A bleed valve on the main shut off has been code for as long as I can remember back to.
In my dad's case, he actually had a drain valve to empty the pipe to the fountain.
Actually, my dad wasn't all that mechanically inclined, he just told other workers what he wanted and how he wanted it done.
Although, when he was younger, he did do quite a bit of things himself that I was amazed at.
I had a normal bicycle that we added a slim gas motor to. It didn't go all that fast, because the belt pulley on the back wheel was as big as the wheel itself, less about 2 inches in diameter. I did put a larger pulley on the motor itself to get it to go a little faster, hi hi.
I had to move over on the shoulder of the road for a car that was coming toward me in my lane, and my front tire dropped down into a gap between the paved road and grassy area. In retrospect, I should have just fell over, but no, I kept going and pulled the front tire out of the rut, then the back tire caught the curb and more or less sling shotted me across the road. The bike landed on my hand and back of my neck. No broken bones, but it caved in the front wheel. Took me half the summer to save up enough money to buy a new front wheel and tire. Right after I got it fixed up and running great again, I sold it to another kid for more than double of what I had into it. Used that money to buy a little scooter, which I used for about a year, then got a slightly bigger scooter, a Cushman Eagle. Wish I kept it, they are worth a fortune now, hi hi.
As far as pedal bikes go, besides the Schwinn 10 speeds I've had. I had a two-seat bicycle I picked up used, and my pride and joy that was short lived. I got a high wheeler from bicycle shop that was closing, they had it in their front window probably for 40 years or longer. Needless to say, the tire was dry rotted, as was the leather seat, and leather hand grips. I recovered the seat, added new style hand grips to it, cobbed from a twig lopper.
I was dying to try and ride that thing. So I picked up a long black hose designed for high pressure, fed a length of trot line through it, so I could tie it tight enough to hold it on the rim. I was able to get a tire for the small back wheel.
I already knew how to tie slip knots, so it was no problem getting that hose to work in place of a tire, at least long enough for me to be able to ride it. I'll tell you one thing, you are not going to be able to climb a hill on one of those things.
There was a slight gap where I had tied the knot in the tubing. Plus I had the loose end of the rope around the wheel, so the rope itself never touched the ground. I only rode it a couple of times, and then it stayed parked in dad's garage.
My uncle bought it, and using the same rubber tubing I had used, he cut it slightly smaller and added a tube inside that he could glue in inside the outer tube pulling the seam together tightly. I knew this would make that tube smaller than the rim, but somehow he managed to slip it over the rim and then he rode that bike back and forth through town to show off a few times. My aunt said at least two times, he dressed in vintage clothing and rode by the old farmers market. Wish I had a picture of that, hi hi.
Some of our old equipment on the farm had solid rubber tires with 1/2 holes drilled through them so they rode smoother I guess. I was too young to appreciate some of the older things I saw around there. Loved the old one-lung motors with the big flywheels though, hi hi.
This doesn't mean it will drain all the pipes completely though, but does a pretty good job just the same.
A bleed valve on the main shut off has been code for as long as I can remember back to.
In my dad's case, he actually had a drain valve to empty the pipe to the fountain.
Actually, my dad wasn't all that mechanically inclined, he just told other workers what he wanted and how he wanted it done.
Although, when he was younger, he did do quite a bit of things himself that I was amazed at.
I had a normal bicycle that we added a slim gas motor to. It didn't go all that fast, because the belt pulley on the back wheel was as big as the wheel itself, less about 2 inches in diameter. I did put a larger pulley on the motor itself to get it to go a little faster, hi hi.
I had to move over on the shoulder of the road for a car that was coming toward me in my lane, and my front tire dropped down into a gap between the paved road and grassy area. In retrospect, I should have just fell over, but no, I kept going and pulled the front tire out of the rut, then the back tire caught the curb and more or less sling shotted me across the road. The bike landed on my hand and back of my neck. No broken bones, but it caved in the front wheel. Took me half the summer to save up enough money to buy a new front wheel and tire. Right after I got it fixed up and running great again, I sold it to another kid for more than double of what I had into it. Used that money to buy a little scooter, which I used for about a year, then got a slightly bigger scooter, a Cushman Eagle. Wish I kept it, they are worth a fortune now, hi hi.
As far as pedal bikes go, besides the Schwinn 10 speeds I've had. I had a two-seat bicycle I picked up used, and my pride and joy that was short lived. I got a high wheeler from bicycle shop that was closing, they had it in their front window probably for 40 years or longer. Needless to say, the tire was dry rotted, as was the leather seat, and leather hand grips. I recovered the seat, added new style hand grips to it, cobbed from a twig lopper.
I was dying to try and ride that thing. So I picked up a long black hose designed for high pressure, fed a length of trot line through it, so I could tie it tight enough to hold it on the rim. I was able to get a tire for the small back wheel.
I already knew how to tie slip knots, so it was no problem getting that hose to work in place of a tire, at least long enough for me to be able to ride it. I'll tell you one thing, you are not going to be able to climb a hill on one of those things.
There was a slight gap where I had tied the knot in the tubing. Plus I had the loose end of the rope around the wheel, so the rope itself never touched the ground. I only rode it a couple of times, and then it stayed parked in dad's garage.
My uncle bought it, and using the same rubber tubing I had used, he cut it slightly smaller and added a tube inside that he could glue in inside the outer tube pulling the seam together tightly. I knew this would make that tube smaller than the rim, but somehow he managed to slip it over the rim and then he rode that bike back and forth through town to show off a few times. My aunt said at least two times, he dressed in vintage clothing and rode by the old farmers market. Wish I had a picture of that, hi hi.
Some of our old equipment on the farm had solid rubber tires with 1/2 holes drilled through them so they rode smoother I guess. I was too young to appreciate some of the older things I saw around there. Loved the old one-lung motors with the big flywheels though, hi hi.