My Gemini Vans
~ The FeralVan 2000 ~ Page One ~
Holden TD Gemini van built 05/78
UHZ-617 & GEMIN-1
Cheers,
Dave
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Dave's Automotive Anomalies My Gemini Vans ~ The FeralVan 2000 ~ Page One ~ Holden TD Gemini van built 05/78 UHZ-617 & GEMIN-1 |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Back to my homepage | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| The FeralVan2000 was, without a doubt, the worst car I've ever owned. I've not owned many I know, but this thing was a nasty piece of work, and my heart goes out to the poor surfie who bought it. Hopefully for him, everything that went wrong with it, did it under my ownership and he's had a trouble-free run. But I doubt it. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| The really annoying thing is that the FeralVan2000 was, without a doubt, the best LOOKING car I've owned. When I bought it, the paint was only a couple of years old, it was lowered on Kings Springs, the windows were tinted (and the back window was really dark), the interior was pretty good, the load area had been carpeted and it was straight and smooth, unlike its FeralVan '97 brother. While I did say that I don't set out to name cars, FeralVan2000 seemed like a good name for this one, as it was early 1999 when I got it - and 2000 seemed like a cool, futuristic thing, even if it was just the next year! | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| I really enjoyed driving the FeralVan2000 with the signwriting on it - cops NEVER looked at it. In fact, nobody really looked at it! After a week or so, I decided to take the writing off. Actually, my mate Ross did most of it - his patience and steady hand a contrast to my irritability and not-so-steady hand! Most of the signage was laser-cut stickerage, while a little was light airbrushing which came off easily with some good cut-and-polish. However, the large sticker on the driver's door took a fair bit of paint with it, despite Ross' excellent work. So $200 later, the door was resprayed. I had talked the owner down from $2000 to $1800, so I didn't really mind, as I had the money up my sleeve. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Some minor modifications were done right away; factory-style tacho, Momo steerer and front bumper were all lifted straight from the FeralVan '97, and I bought a NOS grille for it, because the original was slightly broken. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| left: The FeralVan2000 entered my world as a stock parts-getter for Power Torque Automotive. It wasn't for sale, but I rang the number on the side and made them an offer. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| I also ditched the TD Gemini SL hubcaps, because I wanted the car to look fairly stock - and in my book, a stocky Gemini panelvan has got exposed wheels with plastic centre caps. Just Gemini Spares had a set of chromed caps, an accessory for the base-model Camira, the box said. They looked pretty cool in the centre of the factory grey-style stock rims, but were damaged easily. Every time the wheel studs were undone or done up, they'd get damaged. That turned out to be reflective of the FeralVan2000 as a whole. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| I wasn't too happy with the UHZ numberplate. It reminded me of some sort of frequency or something, and it wasn't from the correct era of the car. U numberplates didn't come in until about 1981, so the car should have had some sort of plate starting with S - that's South Australia for you - you can tell the age of the car by the plates! So I went and got GEMIN-1. The plate is a 'Personalised' plate, so there were no choices in colour, I'm afraid - just green and gold. But the good news was that it was a one-off fee, rather than the custom plates that, while allowing six letters (eg GEMINI), cost about $250 per year. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| The only other modification I recall doing was putting the Pedders springs from the FeralVan '97 up under the bum, because they sat it about one or two centimetres lower than the Kings Springs. The rest of the time, money and effort spent on the FeralVan2000 was spent on keeping it alive, and keeping it looking good. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| The Shit That Went Wrong On This Car: | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| So much went wrong with the car, it's hard to recall which order things fell apart in. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| I mean, there was the window frame of the passenger door which didn't quite match up with the seals. I had replaced all the seals, but no no avail. Dave from Formula Collision did a bit of bending, but it seemed to go out of shape again, so I tried to bend it. Of course, I cracked the window frame, so Dave welded it up for me. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| The locks were shagged from day one, so I bought a set of reconditioned locks from Just Geminis - actually, I'd bought them back in the days of the FeralVan '97, but it seemed pointless to put them in. Now that they were put in, I noticed that the reconned locks were dodgy - especially the one in the tailgate. Can't really blame the car for that one though. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| right: The FeralVan2000 proved it COULD look good. Sometimes. Then again, Christine looked good too. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| I had a top moment one night driving to my girlfriend's house. It was Sunday night, and we'd been down south at Moana Beach for lunch. Driving around, I noticed the steering getting heavier. I checked the tyre pressures, but they were OK, so I put it down to being tired. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| On the way back from Moana, we probably hit about 140kph downhill in a 100 zone. Sorry to any cops that are reading this, but like Chopper Read, I ain't gonna tell you what's fact and what's fiction, OK? We got home and my girlfriend headed off to her house. I had dinner at home, then left for her joint as well. I was going through a roundabout in Grange, not that far from my house and still about 28 kilometres from the girl's house when I heard a rumble. I came out of the roundabout OK, but the rumble got immediately worse, then BASH! | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Me and the Satanic FeralVan2000 were thrown into a beautiful 180 degree spin, into the path of a distraught Asian man and his Sigma. I got out of the car, shaking and immediately apologised for the near-miss. I asked him if he could help me get it off the road. "Must go home. See daughter. Will come back later," Of course, he didn't, but that's OK. It took a car-load of five guys in a Commodore to help me get it to the side of the road. The front-right wheel was shoved back into the guard, tearing it severely, and the suspension had all but collapsed. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| I called the RAA and waited ages for a tow truck. The moment the towie arrived, a Police car also arrived. I chose the cops over the towie and went up to them. The driver, a young bloke, asked me, "Did you have a crash or did something break?" I replied that something had just broken. He looked at the car again for a moment and then said "Looks like your lower control arm's fucked," and drove off. Bizarre behaviour for a cop, but it was a relief. I went up to the towie and explained what had happened. Together we checked under the car. Although the breakage had all the trademarks of a dropped ball-joint, it WAS the lower control arm that 'was fucked', as the cop suggested. It was broken fairly cleanly through. It didn't occur to me then, but I reckon the FeralVan2000 had received a fairly sizable shunt in the front at some stage, which was probably the cause of half its woes. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Getting it onto the tow truck was a nightmare in itself. He didn't have a jack on board, and neither did I. So he drove me to my house a few k's back up the road. Fortunately, I had a strudy trolley jack, so we grabbed it and went back to the scene of the dramas. We jacked the car up and removed the wheel, then heaved and hoed and heaved and hoed until the car was properly parallel with the gutter. It then took some hefty work to get it on the truck. When we did, it was a nice long drive to Phoenix Mechanical, where I dumped it out the front of Pete's house. Pete is a champ and is an expert in the field of Commodores, but I can't fault his work on my Gemini - he comes highly recommended. Anyway, when I rang him the next day, he didn't show any signs of being annoyed, but I'm sure he was. He fixed it up in good faith and me and the FeralVan2000 were back on the road again, albeit with a cut guard. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| About 12 months beforehand, I had bought part of a TX Gemini shell with a couple of mates. Some guys wanted seats, others wanted other stuff and I wanted two good guards for the FeralVan '97. I never used them, and I was stoked to find that all Dave had to do at Formula Collision was respray the green right guard I'd picked up and attach it to my car. Bingo - only $300 later and the damage from the lower control arm was fixed. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| The Holiday: | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| The Holiday was a bit of fun. But I'll get to it later - I've got photos to proove that it made it and I wanna scan them in! Cheers, Dave |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ~ on to FeralVan 2000 ~ | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||