u/ellufeyeno

Car is currently running very well. The suspension is up next and then it’s the interior. It has all the issues you’d expect from a 192,000 ‘85, but since it was a daily driver for so long there was a lot done over the years, AC is 134 and the seats are in great shape so I’m optimistic that after fuel, braking, cooling and now suspension that working my way through the switches, motors, carpet, panels and audio is likely to get me something I genuinely enjoy driving,

But after contemplating all the 40 year old plastic on the interior I’m starting to question whether chasing all the squeaks and rattles is a rabbit hole I ever come back from.

Anyone gone down that path?

I should preface by saying this C4 was my dad’s when I was in high school, passed to my mom who did what she could to keep it running, and I purchased it from her a decade ago to help her with medical bills. My wife and kids, or at least my oldest son anyway, would be very disappointed if I sold the car… and to be honest now that I’m a little down the path I’d like it to be something like I remember driving when I was 16 (which has been a very long time!)

I’ve never been someone that worked on cars more than I had to. I have a good mechanic that I trust but I know he’s not cheap. I let this 1985 C4 sit covered for 9 years in my garage before I had the money and the inclination to reclaim my garage which meant the car had to run or go. I’m about $6000 into the repairs to get the fuel system replaced/rebuilt, the brake system rebuilt, steering column repaired, cooling system, etc. iI’s running ok and sounds great at this point.

I know everything rubber is going to have to be replaced and the suspension will have to be addressed before it’s something I want to drive. Interior is ok…. Displays all still work, but dash is cracked, lots of squeaks, carpet is faded etc.

At some point I’ll clearly be needing to do some of the work myself to keep this even in the realm of reasonable, but my question is really is this: is there anywhere in the greater Dallas/Ft Worth metroplex or North Texas where there might be someone that does enough of these at a volume that might bring the cost down some or is my best bet just sticking with my own mechanic who I know will do good work.

Any advice on how to proceed from here to get to something fun (and safe) to drive again is great appreciated.

Not sure I ever felt it like that tonight… usually sit on my porch but chose my garden. From the get go it felt hostile and just like “static” in maybe every sense of the word. By the end I was feeling better, but felt on the spot sitting in my garden and not my porch.

Whole thing felt like I wasn’t welcome. Totally different than anything else. Was it just me sitting somewhere different before everyone was asleep or something else?

I built the garden to sit in and enjoy. Gonna be mad if it got rejected by the hosts! Lol

About 5:15 this morning I woke up thinking the dog had stepped on the remote and turned the tv on. Lots of static sounding noise (which should have been my first clue since TV’s don’t do that anymore) woke me up. I turned the TV off and on… same noise. Got out of bed to see what was wrong with the stupid tv… Realized that’s not the TV!

Walked into the bathroom and the angle stop had busted off the pipe. Full bore hot water flooding the bathroom! Of course the shutoff was buried due to recent rains, couldn’t find the key when I got it exposed….

Pulled the baseboards grabbed all the fans and started taking readings. Crawled under the house and did the same.

UGH. All I could think was “god I don’t want to file a claim.”

Made me curious, how many of you are like me and would rather lose a toe than deal with a claim on your own stuff?

Small order from INT warehouse, got tracking at 3 weeks from order and delivered the next day. I didn’t even know tracking had been issued before I had it.

As far as Basic goes I don’t know that it gets much quicker than that.

I’m not new to gear. I’ve run a lot of cycles with a lot of compounds and helped a lot of others do the same over the last 20 years. But I got sick and blew out my shoulder, life got busy, went from the field to the office… and well I got fat.

To normies I guess I still looked “big” but what do they know, ya know? Anyway so I jumped on Reta at 1mg/wk (bumped trt up to 400mg/wk) and started a bunch of landscaping projects around the house to stay in the fat burning zone for 6-10 hours a few days a week, lots of protein, you know the drill. It worked.

In 50 days (25 on Reta) I’m down from 196 to 176 at 5’8”. One thing I’ve never done is cut leading into a cycle and I’ve never run Reta before this so my understanding is there is likely to be a rebound if I come off.

I’ve got plenty of test, a little npp, and mast. And my thinking was to run the Reta another 2 weeks at the same dose while shifting from moving wheelbarrows, rocks and timbers all day into a hypertrophy routine. While letting the gear get going.

In my mind something like 400 test, 300npp, 300mastE with the rebound off the Reta should really put me into serious recomp phase I could ride out for the rest of the summer.

I usually have a pretty good sense for these things but figured if this works like I think it should someone out there has done it and can share their experience.

It should be said I’ve never gone fully under but got close tonight. I use a pen and I got a little uncomfortable. So I decided to open my eyes and stand up…. and the molecule was kind enough to show me my legs existed, and then erased them. I’m on my porch in the glow and still laughing about “sit down, sir. We’re not done here. 😂