I have another story concerning roadside repairs...after running my one and only marathon (Houston Tenneco), it was a COLD January in Texas..at nooon Sunday right after the run, we set off back home (500 miles)in the old 75 245. After 2 hours on the road, it overheated....my wife gamely (cuz I was sore from running) would go to roadside ditches and use a can to get water...we kept going for another hour till the engine got so hot it conked out....diagnosed as dead waterpump..got towed by nice cowboy to town...called my brother back in Houston to go to auto parts store and drive 3 hours with the waterpump. He did so and we installed it, filled with antifreeze and my wife, myself, my 2 kids and my mother, too ,took off again...started to overheat AGAIN...we had a leak...stopped about every half hour to add water....at 2am we stopped at a redneck truck stop and Bubba grabbed a full pepper shaker off the counter, said "pour this into the expansion tank , fill with water and drive home"...IT WORKED. Got home, no problema, but pepper fumes were strong when I drained the water to repair the inlet rubber ring-gasket to the metal line under the exhaust manifold.
Lesson: be sure all rubber fittings are not twisted when installing water pumps and carry a can of pepper just in case.
Take care,
el Raidman.