Diesel car being held in captivity !!
Actually, the car depicted on these pages is owned by a Mr. Stern who lives just outside of Hopkinsville Ohio. Mr. Stern has owned 5 Diesel Chevettes, and thinks they are one of the finest automobiles ever produced in the history of Earth. ( Really ) Coincidentally, Mr. Stern knows the owner of the two Diesel Chevettes depicted on another page, and has tried to purchase those in the past ! This puts quite a few Diesel Chevette's within a few miles of each other !
The 1984 Diesel Chevette, with 72,000 miles on this page has been in storage for 6 years inside of this rather large garage. Mr. Stern is a retired World Traveler, and has quite an eclectic collection of "things". But he is rather proud of his Diesel Chevette past, and his sons are also involved. The car on this page is technically owned by one of his sons, and his other sons have owned and operated Diesel Chevette's in the past also. One of his sons was driving his Diesel to work, and was badgered so badly by a railroad worker, he was "forced" to sell his Diesel Chevette to this person to shut him up !
I found out about this car recently, and it appears that one of his sons, the owner, will be returning this car to "active duty" soon. The car will be re-assembled, and put back on the road soon. Maybe. Probably. Since the Sterns appear to be Diesel Chevette fanatics, I have no doubt something will happen to the car. In any event, they know I am interested in it if they lose interest. ( Like that's going to happen ! )
On to the show !
As you can see, the car is currently being used as a "storage shelf system". Actually, underneath all of this stuff is a surprisingly solid car. It is currently in primer as you can see, but appears to be rust and dent free. The interior is also in pretty good condition. Mr. Stern swears that it would start right up with a battery !
And now for a surprise ! Something you may never see again in your entire life, here is a Diesel Chevette engine in Mr. Sterns garage, nestled up against a Diesel Ford Escort engine ! Mr. Stern feels that the Isuzu engine is the better of the two because the Ford engine has an aluminum head, but, one of his sons did put 400,000 thousand miles on the Ford Escort ! ( I may purchase this Diesel Chevette engine for a Diesel Generator Project I am working on. But that's another War. :-) Below is a close-up of the Diesel Ford Escort engine. I have never seen one, and thought others might want to.
Mr. Stern also related quite a few other stories to me, but I especially liked the one about in the dead of a very cold winter, his German Mercedes Diesel car would not start, along with a few other vehicles, but the Diesel Chevette would always fire right up !