New V-100

[mkcoen]

Patrick has some big shoes to fill. I can't imagine there is any sibling rivalry there.

Glad to hear David is home safe. Life's going to seem boring not having someone shooting at your windows.

 

[Danger Ranger]

Glad he made it back. Thanks to your boy and his service.
Congrats on his award too.

 

[baseballump]

I want to know How he won the AWARD when the CO, XO, First Sgt. and Plt. Leader saw the shot up truck?? Didn't they tell him not to let that happen.
Thats what we were told in Nam don't let anything happen to your vehicle.

 

[M813rc]

He told his commander that in actuality he was faced with only two options, the sniper hitting him or the window. He managed to articulate how his quick thinking actually saved the government money, since replacing the glass was cheaper than replacing him!

One of the reasons he got the commander's award was because when he didn't have a mission to drive himself, he volunteered as a turret gunner on MRAPs doing route clearance. That boy is TOO darn much like his old man.....
("Why in tarnation would you do that??". "Because it was kinda fun!" Yep, I remember those days....)

But he is home safe, so I'll be thankful and happy with that!

Cheers

PS- they wouldn't let him ship the shot-up window home as a souvenir.

 

[baseballump]

Good answer on glass replacement.
We got in to the convey plt. by volunteering. It was a fun thing, you got to see the country, very few officers went, plus no screwed with us, and we got to drive gun jeeps and V-100 back then. A lot of people thought we were nuts for what we did.

It is great Davey made it home and is safe.
You know if the would have let him bring that glass home, the Military would have wanted him to pay for it. Maybe even to replace the whole truck.

 

[M813rc]

If you watch this video, you may recognize the V100 in it (starting around the :51 mark).
They (Textron) saw the videos Pawnshop posted on Youtube and contacted him/me for permission to use them. We of course said yes. I also sent them some additional clips. We were going to take some additional stuff, but they had a time crunch and I had a couple of deaths in the family, so they used what they had. We will do some more videos for them for a later project.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TsRNbJY26g

Cheers

 

[Pawnshop]

WOW, they made my krappy iPod videos look good!

 

[wgtactical]

Awesome Rory!

 

[M813rc]

WOW, they made my krappy iPod videos look good!

And my krappy point-n-shoot camera video!

Waiting on some video of your WGTV100 Gerald!

Cheers

 

[mkcoen]

Hope you at least got a salesman's sample model for all the effort. They'd probably need a few more minutes worth of video to give you a full size replica.

 

[baseballump]

Rory Good things come to good people. Glad to see they used your V. How are the boys Is Davey home for Christmas yet?? Also Pat getting ready to leave for boot?? If I don't get back to you for a while Have a Great Christmas and a good New Year.

 

[M813rc]

Thanks Louie. Davey comes home on the 21st for two weeks leave. His mum didn't get to make the trip to California when he came home from Afghanistan, so she has dibs on first hugs (followed by his girlfriend, then his siblings, then, hopefully, me!).
Paddy is scheduled to go in February.
Happy Christmas and a prosperous New Year to you and yours too!

Cheers

 

[baseballump]

Rory
dad is always last. That is what my dad told me a long time age. He said son get use to it. But, when it comes to asking for extra money You are First one they ask. Hope he has a great time at home. As I said Hope you all have a great Christmas Louie

 

[M813rc]

I got three great Christmas presents this year.

One was my oldest son coming home, so the whole family could be together.

The second is a flag.
When Davey was in Afghanistan, he got one of the flags that had flown over their FOB for me. Right before he came back to the US it was stolen from him (along with some other items). He told me about it when I attended his homecoming, and though he seemed fairly nonchalant I could tell he was really pretty upset about it.
Well, it seems his buddies on the party that stayed behind to close up their shop also knew he was upset, and decided to do something. They suspected one of the Fobbits (which is what they call REMFs these days) had taken it, and set about something of an inquisition.
Details are clouded, but the end result was that when they came home, so did the items stolen from Davey, and they were returned to him. Thus, on Christmas morning Davey was able to present me with my flag.
I shall treasure it.

Third was a gift from JimK.
This is an original very early V100 instrument panel, a proprietary Cadillac Gage product.
Some may look at it and say "Why do you want that old thing?"; others will see what I see, a beautiful (if weathered) piece of V100 history.
Since my V is an early production one, this is the type of panel it would have been built with, replaced by the military standard one when it was overhauled in 1969.
It won't go back in the V, but will be proudly displayed in my office.
Probably near my flag.

Hoping all of you had as good a Christmas as I did.
Cheers

 

[baseballump]

Rory Great items Glad Davey got back your flag. Don't remember if that was the panel we had our not still great to have Glad yous had a good Christmas Happy New Year Louie

 

[M813rc]

After a 3-month hiatus from my normal life, I came home again Monday night. I had left home for a few days at New Years to help my mum get over surgery, and help her clean out her garage. Things turned out differently, and we had her funeral last Saturday.

What better way to get back to your life than work on something green?
I had committed late last year to participating in the Texas Vietnam Veterans Memorial groundbreaking on the 24/25th of March at the State Capitol. Part of this will entail escorting an urn containing a set of dog tags for each of the 3417 Texas troops killed in Vietnam down to the foundry in Bastrop where the actual memorial will be cast. The dog tags will be cast inside. The urn will be carried on on Quonsethut's guntruck replica, escorted by my V100. This will entail about a 140 mile round trip for me.

During my absence, my new V tires arrived at my shop (thanks to HellonwheelsV100 and WGTactical). They are Goodyear 14.00s already mounted on a set of V wheels, taken off of Gerald's V100. This will allow me to take my original V runflats off and store them away, since they cannot be found anymore and I don't want to use them up for just driving around on. If I ever take the V to a convention or some such event, I will put the original "proper" tires back on for the show.

I also finally figured out why the V was throwing the alternator belt with such regularity. It was a real Doh! moment roll. Turns out to be a not-too-obviously mismatched alternator pulley. The belt rode just enough out of whack to eventually jump the slot. I replaced it with a pulley off a failed deuce alternator and all my problems appear now solved.

Some wiring and connector replacement and I now have working tail-lights again (after the last belt failure dragged the harness into the fan and chopped part of it into tiny messy pieces).

Sunday I will wash and detail the V in preparation for Mondays events. I'll post some pictures of that.

Cheers

 

[baseballump]

Rory
Glad to see you back.
Again Sorry about your mom.
Glad you are getting back to normal. Hope everyone is doing well. And yes you had better put pictures up when you can. Also, did you change the Alt. bracket?
If I can find it there is a place in Chicago that has dog tags of everyone who was killed in Vietnam hanging.
That Carry Travel Safe
Louie

 

[M813rc]

Thanks Louie. Don't know that I was ever normal enough to get back to that, but I'll get back to something.

I kept the alternator tensioning bracket as we inspected that pretty carefully and don't think it was a factor in the belt shedding, just that slightly off pulley. I may be embarrassed in the future for saying that...

Anyway, it now runs, drives, and has all its light functioning again, ready to go through the car wash and detailing procedure sunday so it will be appropriately pretty to show due respect monday.

Cheers

(pictures still to come)

 

[baseballump]

Rory
You normal You know I was just being nice. So are you driving the V, 140 miles round trip (remind me what gas mileage a V gets ) And I hope you have a soft seat for you're rear end. And, that is great that you are cleaning it up. But that was not something we didn't much over there. It was keep stuff running and make sure you're weapons are clean and in working order.
It is Great that you guys are doing that Good Luck!
So How are the boys doing Davey still on the west coast, and Pat did he get off to the Marines. Yet.

Travel Safe and Be Careful Louie

 

[M813rc]

Yep, 140 mile round trip, at around 3 miles per gallon. I figure I will use about 47 gallons of premium gasoline, so the gas bill will be close to $180 (paid out of my pocket). But I know you guys were not treated as well as you should have been coming home, and in the years right after, so its well worth it to me to be able to contribute something toward this. As a Marine I remember being refused service in restaurants in California in 1979, being told "We don't serve your kind here", or worse.

The gas mileage is bad because no matter how hard we try, we just can't get that carb to tune any better. I have a buddy who is a whiz with carbs, and he is ready to pull his hair out. I will take some advice given by B3.3T on a replacement Edelbrock carb that is a bolt on modification. He says he gets around 9mpg with that setup.

Anyway, attached are pictures of the "re-shoeing". It was a murky morning, so the pictures are not great.

Louie, yes, Davey is on Camp Pendleton until he deploys again later this year, Patrick is off to bootcamp on the 13th (they kept changing his date, trying to get lined up with his aircrew school). The good news is that both boys (men, I should say) will be stationed on Camp P for a few weeks at the same time, so they can pal around in their free time. Davey did get to come for the funeral.

Cheers

Pic 1- My neighbour and good friend Sarge showing me how smart people move 14.00s
Pic 2- The V with one Commando runflat on the front and a Goodyear on the back for comparison
Pic 3- The V with a Goodyear on the drivers side and a runflat on the passenger side
Pic 4- All the Goodyear tires on