There are three things I hate doing; visiting a dentist, getting a colonoscopy, and the worst is buying a new car. At least with the first two events you get an anesthetic.
I arrived in Toronto in June 1970 and shortly thereafter bought a Ford Cortina Station Wagon. I bought a Cortina because I had been driving one in England. I bought a wagon because I had joined a photocopy company as a salesman and needed a wagon to allow me to bring a photocopier with me to demo.
All was going well with the car at first but eventually I noticed that the breaks were pulsating. I returned the car to the dealership for repair which at the time was Donway Ford. Soon I would change it to Donway Fraud.
Donway replaced the brakes and drums and all was well for a while. Then the problem returned and I went through the rigmarole of going back to Donway.
By now we were into winter, so I put on snow tires as we often went up to the cottage in Orillia which is in the snow belt.
Driving a Cortina was pretty easy, the car was light and so turning the steering wheel for parking was simple.
It was now January and there had been some heavy snow around Christmas but none in the New Year. This was my first winter driving in the cold Canadian climate. I was on my way home one night and made a left turn onto my street. The road was wet and the surface was “greasy” a term we use for the road when there is a light mixture of rain and ice on the road. I had just turned onto my street and wasn’t going fast for the conditions; certainly under the 30mph speed limit. I saw a car in front of me parked further out into the road than usual because of the snow bank where the plow had gone through some days earlier. Coming towards me was a car. It was hard to tell the car’s speed so I slowed down and my car’s brakes locked sending me into a slide towards the parked car. I released the brakes and steered to the left of the parked car but the oncoming car had stopped parallel to the parked car leaving me the width of my car to steer through. I again braked and again the wheels locked and I slid straight into the stopped oncoming car. As I said, I wasn’t traveling that fast and so it was only a small collision. However the car I bumped into was a Cadillac. The Caddy’s bumper pushed my car’s radiator into the engine and now my car could not be driven. My car knocked out the Caddy’s headlight. The police were called and it was determined that I was speeding. The cop seemed to ignore the fact that I had just turned the corner and completely ignored the locked brakes. I was eventually given a ticket for “Failure to yield”.
What a pain! The court date was set for mid March.
Meanwhile my car was repaired. Soon after I got my car back I noticed that the engine was misfiring. I figured it was a cracked distributor cap. I was working on Bathurst Street at the time at a tape store called Target Tape. I was one of the two store managers. We sold records and cassette tapes and we also installed 8 track tape decks. I was on good terms with the guy who owned the Shell gas station on the other side of the road, south of the store, so I took my car in there for a check-up while I was at work. I remember telling him to be extra careful and make sure he covers the fender as he works on my car. During my lunch break I popped over to see if my car was ready. I found the owner and asked if my car was ready. “Oh, er, we had a bit of an accident while bringing your car into the shop”, he stated. I smiled and said “yeah right .” He knew the story of my accident and l figured he was just joking with me. He took me around the car and showed me the damage. The left front side of the car was all smashed in. Apparently the accident happened as he was bringing the car into the shop bay. As he applied the brakes the wheels locked and the car slid into the side of the garage door post. I smiled. He asked why I was smiling. “Easy”‘, I answered, “I am now vindicated.”
The court day arrived and I turned up with my friend Steve, who was an articling law student. We were ready to do battle. We had drawings, we had testimony, we had a foolproof plan. Watch out Mr. Prosecutor; Perry Mason and his trusty sidekick were here to win. They called their first witness, the cop. He wasn’t there. They called their 2nd witness, the driver of the other vehicle, he wasn’t there either. Steve wasn’t prepared for this, the prosecutor asked for a new court date and it was granted. Dazed and confused we stumbled out onto the street. Steve was berating himself for not asking for the case to be dismissed on the grounds that we were ready and able to put on a defense, “Oh well”, I said “we’ll get our day in court”. But it was not to be. Seems the date chosen was a Saturday and since there’s no court on Saturday that was that. No fine, no loss of points, nothing I was free to go.
The car was repaired by the Shell station.
Shortly after I got my car back I went through a car wash. I got out to check that the wash was done perfectly and I noticed the car now had a scrape along the whole of the driver’s side. I went to the car wash manager and showed him the damage. “How do I know that wasn’t done before you came here?”, he demanded. “Because the scrape is at the same height as the car wash detector wand, that’s how.”, I explained. He agreed and the car was repainted, once again. Did I mention that the car was lime green? A lime is about as close to a lemon as you can get.
The car was barely 2 years old and had been painted 4 times. I should have traded it in then and there. But I persevered.
One day I was visiting a friend and was parked in the underground car park. I backed out cautiously and while looking over my right shoulder and turning the wheel I hit the same left side fender again. Bugger! I said “screw it” I’m not doing this again and drove around like that until I got a new car.
Some years later, after I had sold the car, I noticed an article in the newspaper. A group of owners of cars of the same make and model as mine, had brought a class action suit against Ford. Seems that this particular model had a faulty brake design. The brakes were power-assisted and too powerful for such a light car. This caused the brake drums to go out of true causing the brakes to pulsate. Also in wet weather the brakes locked.
