Limping Home in Broken Car Stories

[njsteve]

Back in the 1979 I had my 69 Z11 Pace Car. I was running an Edelbrock 3x2bbl intake on it with three Rochester 2GVs (IIRC). The damn thing never ran right but looked really cool.

I was up on Cape Cod for the summer and was cruising one night when the throttle bellcrank snapped. This is the actual pedal cross bar/bellcrank that bolts to the firewall and the pedal hangs off one end and the throttle bracket/rod mount attaches to the other end.

The only way to get home was to use a roll of 10 gauge electrical wire I had in my tool box and tie it to the center carb throttle arm. First I put the convertible top down, then I routed the wire up, through, and out the cowl hood opening at the front of the windshield, over the top of the windshield header and down into the passenger compartment. I had to use the wire as an actual throttle "cable" for the hour long ride back to the house.

The next day my friends took me to a local junkyard in Hyannis, Mass and we found that an early Impala - around 1964, that had the same bellcrank I needed, minus the pedal.