"If you can get it going, it's yours" stories

I went to see a guy about a Citroen ax last year. I wanted a cheap car for my nephews t hoon around in the fields. It belonged to a priest who had moved to the coast,and his brother was selling it.
Car was seriously filthy and had stood for ages. He wanted 100 euro for it,but since it didnt ran,and stinked like hell,i said: how about a good deed from your brother-priest,a gift for these youngsters( i had taken my nephews with me)?
A phonecall later,and he said: ok,my brother said the boys can have it!!
Went back next day with trailer,but took oil-water-brake fluid...and a new battery with me. It started straight away!!! Topped everything up,and drove it onto the trailer!!
We cleaned it the best we could,had a lot of fun with it playing RALLY in the fields,and sold it on after the summer holiday,for 500 euro😝😝😂😂

The best way to dry anything out is with a good de-humidifier

"If you can get it going, it's yours" That's exactly what my neighbor said pointing to her rusty Peugeot 104.
I got it going, drove straight to the wreckers and got 100 bucks

First was Honda SS50 moped (a step thu' engine in a proper bike frame ) from the back of a mates garage, it had been there since his dad had retired from work many years earlier.
It was soon running and fixed up for mot, I used it for a couple of years before fitting a 70cc top end as an upgrade from the 50cc.
That gave it a bit more vibration and a lot more power (comparatively !)  

Later (still before t'internet), I advertised locally wanting cheap a bike project, a chap in the next village rang to say he had an old Honda 250 - free to anyone who could collect it.
I got it home - it was stuck in 2nd gear and hand painted black.
Spent a long time trying linkages before admitting defeat and splitting the crankcases - no faults found and all gears worked ok - just put it back together and used it happily for the next 10 years 

Moved into a new house, chap who lived there had bought a large sectional concrete garage in pieces, and had it delivered onto his drive.
The bits were still blocking the drive when he moved out so he couldn't get his car off the drive   
I scored for an mot-fail Citroen BX with no keys. Attacking the steering lock with an angle-grinder soon got it running.
Sold it as a running project once I'd assembled the garage and the driveway was useable 

Many years ago, my wife's uncle gave me his Mini 850 automatic which had a blown head gasket. Towed it home ( probably shouldn't have) . Few hours later, drove it back to let him see it. Possibly the slowest car I've ever driven !

picked up quite a few "freebies" back when i was banger racing. best one was a dark blue samba , just needed a jump start to get going. got it home and an inspection revealed a basically tidy car barring no n/s door pillar. in for a penny in for a pound , so i whipped the door off , bent up and glued in a new pillar , blew a lick of rattlecan over it and stuck it outside the house with a for sale on it. a couple of days later a knock came and a lady inquired if i would take her (VERY rotten but VERY race-able) talbot sunbeam in px. "sure" says i , "that and £300". she was over the moon.... but not as much as me!! win win win.

Horrible feeling seeing your car in flash flood
The Jag escaped but my MK1 Focus which was given to me for zero pounds got caught in a one this summer and ended up with water up over the seats.
I gave it a day to drip dry before attempting to start it plus the engine bay looked like a compost heap with the amount of vegetation that has settled in there. I blew all the curse word from the belts and brakes with the compressor and cleaned up up until it was the best it had been for years.

Upon starting it up the dash looked like a fruit machine and giving it a tentative run around the block all sorts of weird buzzes and judders came from places I wasn't expecting. Over the following few days things improved except the increasing stench of river water to the point where you wouldn't have known anything had happened.

To dry it properly the interior would have to come out including all the door surrounds and centre console. I couldn't be bothered with that so had towels and dehumidifiers in there with the carpets pulled back as much as possible. After a month and in desperation I discovered the miraculous absorbent properties newsprint and the car was completely dry in in a few days. win

I'd beg to disagree. At the time, I was driving around on a clunky looking 50cc 4-stroke Honda PC50 3 speed auto moped which could touch 40mph downhill with the wind behind me* so his claims of 70mph on his more streamlined 5-speed bike didn't shock me. I believe the top end on the (unrestricted) 5 speed models was 50-55mph in stock form; I'd add that my brother is a qualified MOD fighter jet technician, a marine diesel engineer and is skilled in automotive performance tuning, (in the mid 80's he rebuilt my Allegro 1300 engine to give it a 0-60mph time that was comparable with a contemporary Porsche 911). 
*Although the PC50 did occasionally drop a valve when pushed.