5/06/2020 Purple Reign ll

    This ford or F250, taught me quite a few lessons over  10 yrs. Four years later, I notice the truck's paint on the hood is starting to peel. I read about peeling paint problems with the ford vehicles in the past. I took it to a Ford dealer to see if they would fix it. The next day, I got the answer and the answer was no. So I thought to myself eh I'll try somewhere else. And the next week I did. I got a different answer here after a couple days. Yes we'll do it, no charge to me. I talked to an employee, who said, we send them out to get painted. It will be painted orig color. I found out the place where they were going to take it. Talked to the owner of the body shop and asked him if he would paint the truck with my paint, he said no problem. He said a quart would do it. I got a quart of air craft paint cost like 90 dollars, color a magenta with metalic flakes. Got the truck back, boy was it bright. I thought I made a mistake with the color. After 2 weeks I got accustomed to it. That paint wore like iron. It was emron paint.

    So picture what you want and do things to make it happen. Don't give up without some fight.

    One night, I was driving down a highway about 12:.30 am. In my mind, it says something is wrong with the truck, I check my gauges, everything is normal. I say out loud, there's nothing wrong with this truck! Wrong! I hear a click and the truck can no longer hold a gear, from 70 mph I coast over a mile to a dead stop. Eighty bucks later I'm back home. The F250 is a 3/4 ton truck, my model had 5 diff transmissions put into it. They could not be interchanged. My mechanic couldn't find one on the internet. First he sent it to a transmission shop. After 2 weeks I didn't hear anything, I went to mechanic, what gives? Tells me where transmission guy is, guy says it's there in cardboard box, little pieces of gears, he says can't fix it. I don't know why he didn't tell my mechanic. You want things done, you'll have to take the bull by the horns and do it yourself. I tell my mechanic and that's when he looks for parts in junk yards across the US via the web. A week goes by, can't find anything.

    I head home thinking, I'm going to find this damn blasted trainy if it's the last thing I do. That was box number one...... check mark. Box 2 up next, need more info. I knew there was a little brochure sold in the convince stores that catered to selling of used trucks and parts. In my haste,  I grab the car version of vehicles and parts, it is when I get home, that I realize my mistake. Just great, didn't need that. A couple days earlier I found out about my trainy. Of the 5 Trainies, there were three ford and two Mazda, mine was one of the Mazdas. I jotted down the long part number. There were only two places I could get it Atlanta and Chicago. Brand spanking new, cost a little over 3000 dollars. Say what!  I had 500 bucks max for that trainy. I had my model and serial number writ down and started to call junk yards that I found in the car brochure. I got alot of nos. one guy I called was busy, the phone line, called again, same thing. Before I made my 5 th call, I said this is the last time I'm calling this guy.  Ring Ring at least there's no busy signal. Hello, finally! Yes, do you have a Mazda trainy with blah blah(numbers) . Yes I do he says. I proceed to drop dead. How much says I, holding my breath... 500 bucks says he. No way says I, Way he says. He said it just came in yesterday. Noo I says. Yeah the kid wrapped it around a telephone pole. Do not sell it, I'm coming tomorrow morn with the cash, which was almost all my money. The auto yard was in the next state over. When I neared the place, I saw a very small sign welcome to blank blank the same town I grew up in but a different state. Took the transmission over to my mechanic, he looked at it, how did you do it? I didn't, Spirit did it with my help. I kept getting delayed, because the transmission wasn't available yet.

    Spirit was setting things up for my miracle. There were far fewer F250s made than the more popular 150s. Plus I could only use 1 of the fi've trucks. The odds were astronomical against me, but not for spirit. I was use to automatic trucks at the time, to check the trainy fluid you would check the dip stick. The truck I had was manual transmission, no dipstick. To check my transmission, I would have to crawl under truck, remove a small bolt and stick my finger in, if I didn't feel liquid, it was time to add fluid. I had no clue. So my old transmission ran out of oil and the smaller gear failed which took out the other gears, just like a handgrenade. Reading the owners manual would have helped, but then I would have missed my big miracle, thank you spirit.