Quite an interesting thread and one that is pertinant to my own exerpience and learning about cars and a subsequent convert to Volvo-dom.
Before I say much about my own experience, I urge you to abandon the Falcon as the learning vehicle for Mike. It is in his best interest that he limits his experience in htis vehicle if not only for his safety. It is (was) one of the worst designed vehicles ever to come out of Detroit.
When I attended college in Arizona in the early 70's, I drove out in my father's '67 Mercedes, a car that I had already worken on with him in my teen years in CT and learned the art of auto mechanics on one of the worlds 'finest automobiles' as my father often said. When had the car on my own, I soon found out how problematic it was, not to mention costly to repair. After some engineerig school, I soon learned what exactly this meant and then refered to the Benx as an "Over-engineered German Mess". I wanted something more simple, cheaper to own and more reliable to own, so I took the Benz to a used car dealership and traded it with all it's electrical and mechanical problems for a '69 Ford Falcon 2-door. It was a low miles 'cream-puff' rust free Ariz car, and the car dealer was eager to take the 150k+ miles Benz in trade, which included $1000 cash plus the 60k miles Ford.(My father had a fit!) I thought, "Great!, I can now rid myself of that anchor and have some fun instead of constantly working on the car". The PO put a GM (firebird) three-speed tranny on the floor, which made it really cool, although pretty lame in the acceleration dept with the 170 CI six. It did get 32 mpg on regular which was a great change for a kid with no money.
I drove back home with a friend and my dog to CT through Milwaulkee to pick up my sis and head home to CT for Christmas. Enroute, we hit a bad storm in Chicago and I had my first exerpience in driving the Falcon in bad weather. This was an experience I will never forget. The car was unlike any other car I'd ever driven in snow or ice. Surely not even close to the Benz, and was completely uncontrolable and unpredictable. We spun around on IH 70 three times, carrening off a tractor trailer truck front wheel and landing feet away from a bridge abuttment, nearly killing us. The side of the car was shredded along with two tires and the door was flung open, the dog spooked and ran off into the storm. We spen three days looking for the dog and getting the car fixed with new tires and coathangars to hold the door shut.
The folowing year I moved back to CT after school was over and fixed up the Falocn, preparing for the winter yet to come. I had this bad vibe in my head about hte past accident, and thought it must be because of worn steering, shocks and brakes, so I went forward to replace everything with the best components. New, better springs, Moog parts for the front end rebuild, complete brake job, and a set of good tires. I also got a new door and did some bondo on the side panel and had it painted. It was a really cool car. Even made a oak dash to replace the crappy cracked vinyl dash.
Close to the holidays, I was driving home on some back roads, takeing every precaution while the first snow began to fall. Around a corner I began to exerpience the same out-of-control handling I'd had the year before. Without warning the car just skated off the road and hit a stone wall and totaled the car, putting me in the hospital. There wasn't anything I could do, the car just didn't have the traction, brakes, handling and sure footed-ness to encounter even the slightest bit of inclement weather driving.
I went and bought a '1972 Volvo 142E, my first Volvo, and have been driving one ever since. It is perhaps the best rwd car I've ever driven that can handle any kind of bad weather driving, including my 245 which is pretty good, and better than the Benz. After I began to drive the car in the snow, I felt so confident that I would look forward to just going for a jaunt in the snow on back roads in CT. It was absolutely sure-footed and predictable. I have never had this type of experience with driving a Volvo, any of them.
Do Mike a favor and keep him out of the Falcon for his safety.
--
'89 245 Sportwagon, '04 V70 2.5T Sportwagon