A Pinto Odyssee

One of the best things about loving cars is that you are never without a story to tell. People own cars because they need them, but people who “love” cars will often own something just for the connection they share with it. Maybe it was a dream they had growing up to own one, maybe they worked on it with their dad as a kid. Maybe they are enamored with its aesthetic or engine or any other number of factors. But for whatever reason car lovers will often buy something unloved for the purpose of restoring it or cherishing it in its own way. Silently we challenge ourselves to bring something most would count as lost back to life. It is a pathological and crazy obsession that we often will share with our friends. Sitting around a campfire or dinner table we muse that if we had the time or the money we would do this and or that and we laugh knowing that it will likely never happen. One such group of friends responsible for the youtube channel Fuzzy Dice Projects got together around a campfire and dreamed up a challenge that to most people would sound ridiculous, but to me, a person with a like mind, it sounded like a grand adventure. But instead of just musing they made it a reality and fortunately they had the foresight to invite the internet along for the journey and a Pinto Odyssey was born.

The dream was to buy a car, sight unseen, on one side of the United States and drive it home to the other side for as cheap as possible. Any old car would not do, it needed to be something with a lot of character, something that if not bought was sure to meet a cruel fate. Something like a Ford Pinto. You don’t see many Pinto’s anymore so it might be a good idea to start with a breakdown of why this car is “special.” Produced from 1971 to 1980 the Pinto was the first subcompact car Ford ever made. It was built to compete with Japanese and European imported vehicles in the United States that were increasing in popularity due to the uptick in gasoline prices. This combined with stricter and stricter emissions laws choked down the large V8 cars popular in the US before leading to V6 and eventually four cylinder cars becoming much more common. In the 70’s Ford built 3 million Pinto’s but despite its moderate success it has never attained to the legendary status of the Mustang and Thunderbird. But that does not mean that for millions of people who learned to drive in the 70’s it was not in its own way special.

My Dad had a Pinto and he tells stories of pulling the transmission and rebuilding it over a weekend, side pipes that deafened his friends and wheelies he would pull racing his friends who also had Pinto’s. The car played a role in the childhood of millions of Americans because it was cheap. All the subcompacts of the time were cheap which meant that if you wanted a car and you did not have a lot of money, it was what you bought. The cars were less than 2,000 dollars (14,000 in today's money) when sold new. But used they were even cheaper and considering you could repair and modify them easily. In fact the Pinto from the video series had a 302 v8 installed in it by the owner Andy, who appears early in the video helping the guys a lot.

Another theme of the video is the droves of people who made the adventure possible by just being kind and supportive for no reason other than just that they could. Several instances where people checked on our intrepid heroes, helped them at no cost and just were interested in the old car they were driving. Cars bring people together and while the old Pinto will never make it onto anyone's favorite car list, the car still is far from forgotten. Indeed the preservation of cars like this is a portal back in time when things were much simpler and putting a V8 in a compact box was possible, though not always recommended as our faithful explorers find.

I do not want to spoil the series, any car lover should really experience the journey for themselves. But I do want to recommend the four part adventure for its superb editing, fun and engaging voice over and comical hijinks. The humor really does cater to people who love cars and I found myself laughing quite a bit throughout. Through the ups and downs though you not only root for our heroes but also the little car that takes them home. The Pinto Odyssey is inspiring and lends some real credit to all of our dreams of cheap car challenges like this. The journey of classic car ownership and preservation can often be painful and uncomfortable. But for the dedicated it can be a source of enlightenment and lead to some truly special stories shared around the campfire.