Sgt. Veteran

Your first car or what you learned in, person that taught you & the year


1930 Desoto my father gave me, my Brothers in 1954
Car was a tank!!, seating for 11 plus luggage, 22 turns lock to lock on the steering, a clutch that would make popeye cry and a trunk you could fit 2 honda civics in .... I do belive my Brother stole the L/F tire in Harlem to get the car mobile and yes nice slick of a R/F lol - Packard headlighs on it I think .... & thats me in the middle

67gtxclone

This is a long time ago....1973 for me. I learned to drive in a 1964 Ford wagon. I think my DI (Drill Instructor) Dad taught me, but I can't remember for sure because he kept slapping me upside the head when I screwed up, and now I have brain damage. The first car I owned was a 1965 Mustang with the straight 6. I bought it for $400 out of the local classified ads. It was a 3sp on the floor, and I ruined the trans 3 times learning to drive a stick.

PS. I also learned how to rebuild a 3spd standard trans.

Sgt. Veteran

lol sweet man .... they were nice cars I liked the fastback alot

RROriginals

First car I learned in was a 1973 AMC Matador in 2009, very touchy car.

72RDRNR

That was the year I was born.
My dad was the one that taught me to drive. I think it was in our dodge minivan . After that I went wayward but a couple of years later I found my RR and have been mopar since.

1966sportfury

1st car i learned to drive was my dads 73 charger he would let me and my sister drive it up and down the rd. i was 11 she was 15.. i even drove it...1st car i really learned in on hwys and such was his 73 challenger big block.. 400 block 383 crank with stock 440 pistions in it,, had it bored .20 over. then he gave me his 65 dodge 3/4 ton to drive after i got my license,

dodgenut7

cant remember the year but it was an old stub nose dodge van 6 cyl 3 speed not in the best shaperust everywhere and a couple of holes in the floorboards apparently to see what i ran overafter the fact then i got my first car a 68 lemans [ i know not a mopar but i was young and niave now i just old and forgetful ]

MReeves

WOW, most of you all make me feel OLD!!!!! I learned in about 1963 or 64..... Coming from the country I learned to drive a Jeep in the hay field... Pulling a hay wagon for others to load the hay.. I was so small I couldn't lift the bales of hay so I got to drive.. Was doing fine except when I would take a corner WAY too fast and loose the load!!!

Barfly

1971 Doge Challenger, complete with a Pontiac hood tach

Pictured in 1979 is my Dad and myself standing next to my first car. I found an add in the classifieds and we went to look. It was parked in a barn at a cherry orchard. The deal was that Dad would match any money I saved for a car. He matched my $300 and we got the car for a whopping 600 bucks.

With a everything stock 318 she was no race car, but I sure was proud of her and a prime example of "man I wish I had that car now!"

Sgt. Veteran

Awesome people !!

sweeperking

Mine was a 72 plymouth duster I bought on my own when I was 16. Kind of a beater but I loved that car. Like the 318 the 225 was bullet proof. I remember dad saying that if I graduated high school on time he would buy me a 69 cuda. It sure did motivate me but I was half way through my senior year when he made the deal. Bottom line here, I didnt get the car.

blue 68 gts

Hmm... My first car I learned to drive in was.... my dads 89 Nissan 4x4 King Cab 5 speed truck. I was pretty young, but he'd set me on his lap and I'd steer while he did the braking, accelerating and shifting.

Next was my uncles H1 Hummer... Then the Dart..

And i learned to drive a stick on a brand new BMW a couple years ago.

mr340

The year was 1980, the ride was a 1967 Cadillac Fleetwood Brogham. The car was triple navy blue and it rode like a dream. It was 22 feet of land yacht that would burn the rear tires down to the rim with no effort at all. It was by far the biggest thing on the road at that time, I really should have been issued a boat license instead of a regular license. I think I have a pic or 2 of it somewhere.

67Polara

my first car was my 67 Polara, and my mom taught me 2 drive in her late 90s jeep grand cherokee, i think the year was 1998 or 1999

Sgt. Veteran

....lmfao!!!

Buffalojoe426

1985 Mazda B2000 pickup! Nothing could stop that little truck, wish we still had it.

BuckNeccid

We never had a car in my family while I was growing up, so we walked everywhere, took a bus or cab. I always watched what the driver was doing, and if I could get away with it, I'd ask questions. When I was about 15, a buddy let me drive his '55 around White Rock Lake in Dallas, then would never let me behind the wheel again. My next turn came when I got a '62 Simca (yea, it's a Mopar ) and basically taught myself to drive. It's a miracle the car had a clutch after the first few days, but there I was, 15-16 years old, no driver's license, no insurance, and temporary plate changed with a Majik Marker, and driving my butt off.

I actually got my first driver's license in the Military, came home on leave before heading overseas and Took the tests to get my WV license. When the driving part came around, I got in the car with the testing trooper and he wanted to see my permit. I opened my wallet and he saw the Military ID, asked if I was in the Army, and when I said yea, he told me I passed. The car I was using to test in was a friend's boss... sometimes I wonder what that relationship was, the friend was 15 and looked about 12, had a paper route and it was his manager who took us both up there. He'd never before seen me in his life.

Arrived in Europe, got my international license within 2 weeks, and actually had the real IL in my hands before I ever got the WV one.

I shoulda been in jail, huh?

Sgt. Veteran

lmao Buck!!! ...... yes

67gtxclone

In the best tradition of a car guy, I am teaching my step daughter to drive. We started last summer where I let her drive my 85 GMC stepside around the acre I live on. Then I introduced her to the standard shift in my 98 Chevy Metro. She did amazingly well. Within just a few tries, she was able to get the clutch out without over revving the engine or killing it. I think all this was made possible from all the practice she got from the go cart I got her when she was 10. All the time she spent on that over a couple of summers transferred right over to driving a car. She is 14 now and counting the days till she can get her permit.

Sgt. Veteran

lol thats sweet .... and nice looking truck sir.

67gtxclone

Thanks Sarge! It is a good old truck....and best of all.....PAID FOR! In fact all my cars are paid for......I really love that feeling of no car payments.

Sangetsu

My first car was an old Austin Healy 3000 into which someone had already shoehorned a small block Chevy V8 into. I was 15 at the time, and taking auto shop in high school. Unfortunately, the old 3000 had sat for many years before I bought it, and the engine was locked up tight. I sold it for what I paid for it (you don't want to know how much).

When I turned 16 my mom gave me her old '71 Ford Pinto. It was a pile of junk, but I enjoyed it very much. It had the old British 1.6 liter Cortina engine in it, with a 4 speed tranny. It was slow and ugly, but it was fun to drive. Somehow I managed to get a speeding ticket while driving it, which is hard to believe considering how anemic the car was. With this car I learned how to adjust valve clearance (the old Cortina engine was a push rod mechanical cam type), tinker with ignition timing, and a few other things.

Eventually the Pinto broke down, and the repairs were beyond my ability at the time. I was reduced to commuting by bus to my part-time job. At the intersection where I had to transfer buses, there was a gas station, and one day I saw a '73 Plymouth 340 'Cuda sitting in front of the station with a for sale sign on it.

The price for the car was $2200, a staggering amount for me, but I wanted to car badly. I went to the gas station and talked to the owner of the car, and we took it for a test drive. It ran well, the AC worked fine, and it was fun to drive. I didn't have nearly enough money to buy, it, but I wanted it anyway. I scraped together all the money I could, and I borrowed the rest.

I was 17 at the time, and I finally had a "real" car. It was a blast to pull into the high school auto shop driving the 'Cuda after having had to take the bus for so long.

I immediately set about tinkering with it, adding headers, an intake, carb, and whatever chrome engine bits and pieces I could find. During the process of installing all these goodies, I made a terrible discovery, the car didn't have a 340 under the hood, it had a 318.

This discovery led to my doing my first engine swap. What a job that was, it took about 14 hours of hard work. I had found the 340 in a wrecked '72 'Cuda at a junkyard, the car had low miles, and was quite clean. Luckily the engine ran well after I installed it.

Unfortunately, this 'Cuda was cursed, and I had nothing but bad luck with it. I damaged it badly in an accident one night, and I endured my first trip to the city jail when I was arrested for street racing. I sold the car to a friend, and he had bad luck with it as well.

When I sold the 'Cuda, my mom told me one of her customers from work had a Dodge Challenger for sale for $300. I went to look at the car one night, and it turned out to be a '70 R/T model with a 383 Magnum V8. The car was sitting on flats, and had a dead battery, but 2 hours later (and $300 poorer) I was driving it home.

I really enjoyed the Challenger, it was bomb-proof. I remember racing it one night when it suddenly lost power and the engine began making a racket. Somehow several of the pushrods had become bent during the race. I took the pushrods out, laid them on the sidewalk, and pounded them strait with a hammer and a piece of wood. I put them back in, and the car ran fine.

After that car I came across many others. Back in the mid-80's muscle cars were dirt cheap. You could by an R/T big block car for less than the price people now pay for a set of beauty rings for a rally wheel.

Mr.Duster

my first car i had was a 1986 chrysler fifth avenue. It was given to me from my dad, it wouldnt down shift so you had to manually do it. The thing was a tank and a pig. It made it with me to college for the first/second year till it met up with a bridge didnt have snow tires on it(i have pics of it up). The first care i bought though was my 72 duster.

ef8340

i learned to drive in a 86 mercury sable man that thing was ugly but it was moms and the tank was always full ...... well atleast when i first got in it then me and my brother found me a 78 camaro 305/auto bought it for 150 bucks i thought i was king sh@% for the 22 days i had it i even raided my mom and dads 8 track collection aint nothing like blastin elvis doin 80mph and have the road turn into a gravel road saved the car week later another fellow high school student decided his escort would look alot better if he turned into the drivers side of my rusted out camaro so at a 4 way stop he accomplished his goals and took my dream of wife beater shirts t,tops listening to journey way to loud away from me. i did manage to get 2500 bucks out of the insurance settlement and my mom got 700 bucks for me using her sable

78D200

1988 Jeep Cherokee 2dr 4.0 and a 5 speed. Learned on a Class VI road how to drive and wheel at the same time.

Sgt. Veteran

Very awesome people with all the posts, I just wanted everyone to remember the joy of getting thier first car and the good times that followed - Sgt.

Sgt. Veteran

P.S. ......love the Challenger Barfly!!!

Moparknighthawk

I learned to drive in 1983/1984. In High School you took drivers ed along with physical education. (the only way to get it in school at that time). We learned to drive on then new 1984 Pontiac 2000's, 6000's and Bonneville's. Practice with my parents involved driving a 1967 Plymouth Barracuda, 1976 Chrysler Cordoba, and a 1973 GMC van. I took my drivers test in the Barracuda.

78D200

That Jeep broke so many times but never once left us stuck. Good times. =-D

samuelcosmo76

My dad taught me how to drive in his 97' olds. Nothing special, I know, but my dad is the nastiest driver ever. Keep in mind we live in NYC. I swear he can get into spaces smaller than his car....must come from driving around a 65' Caddy Hearse as a delivery truck for his balloon business in the 80's (really).....haha.