WHITBY FREE PRESS, Durham Moves, WEDNESDA Y, OCTOBER 7, 1987, PAGE A7 Cam Cyr aims for quality in restored gas tanks Self-employea since he was 21, he's been "in and, 'it of debt" a few times and toughed out the "dog- days." But Cam Cyr, now on a new venture, is a "serapper" in more ways than one and wouldn't have it any other way. For two years, he and brother Jeff would locate used vehicle gas tanks in the United States, "mostly Texas and Florida," haul them nor- th to Canada and sell them to garages. But earlier this year, Cam, 30, decided to repair the tanks himself and then sell them, complete with a lifetime guarantee. Thus was born the Quality Gas Tank Co. Inc., on Warren St., just off Hopkins, in Whitby. "It's taken us a while to set up and we're still not at full tilt," he says. "We're just trying to get the kinks out of everything." Cyr had special equipment, such as a $12,000 purging oven which rids used tanks of fumes, made up and he tested various hole patching processes and exterior coatings to come up with the best product he could. Co-owner of the building on Warren Rd., Rob Phillips, of R.J. Phillips Auto Repairs Inc., is distributing the product for Cyr. About 20 to 25 tanks are restored, but that number could go up should Quality Gas Tank Co. become a supplier for a cross-Canada fran- chise. "Once we get rolling, I'm hoping to put on another shift of em- ployees. I'm hoping to do a minimum of 800 tanks a month," says Cyr. "I know it will be slow at first," he says, explaining that he was "lucky" to find his location and move in May after some previous unsuccessful searches. Cyr 'got into gas tanks" in January, 1985, after getting the idea from a friend. Brother Jeff, now 26, joined soon after, leaving his job as an A&W manager in Orillia. "He decided to pack it in and come into business with me," says Cam Cyr. Wife Kelly handles the bookeeping for Cam's tank restoration business. She accom- panied her husband in 1982 and 1983 in Saskatchewan where he was in the scrap business, except for winters when he returned to On- tario to work at a steel company in Courtice. "When the economy went bad, I had to give it up," he says of his business. "At réast I tried to give it up. I went out myself to just wrap things up, but I kept finding more work and more work and I couldn't turn it down. I started hauling off farm machinery as weil as other vehicles. And I lived in the back of a pick-up truck for five months." Cyr has vivid memories of life in Saskatchewan -despite the stan- ding around "freezing my butt off" in phone booths, slippery back roads, two flips of his cherry-picker truck, a life of hotels or motels each night when there with Kelly, he has fond, vivid memories of the provin- ce where "we made a lot of frien- ds." But as lor the scrap business there, he recalîs, about the Novem- ber of 1984 when he finally sold it and paid off his dehts: "Boy what a feeling!" He doesn't mind the business risk or the work involved, the latter at- tribute instilled he says by his father. Charlie Cyr, who start ed t he rolling mill at Lasco Steel in Whithy and who has become well-known in Canada as a mil] designer. "He started working in a steel mill when he was 14, in Selkirk. Manitoba,.' says Cam Cyr. "l'm just lucky to have a father who's a hard worker." Cam, born in Edmonton, Alta., and who started his scrap business in Kitchener, is also always ex- perimenting witfh new processes that will help ,iis new business. "My brother and I. we've been told we're too fussy." he says, ex- plaining that even when locating gas tanks in the U.S., they always brought back only the "good" un- scaled tanks. "I've had dog-days, and sometimes it gets scary," he says of Quality, noting that competition is now more apparent than it once was. "But you just keep going." "THE 'PEOPLE PLEASERS" EXCELLENT SELECTION OF OCIE4, 1987 AUTOMATICS .S VARIOUS COLOURS • Copl TOCHOOSEFROM Hurry for your choice of 1987 LeBaron Coupe. Some models with am/fm stereo radio, and airconditioning. Ali have the 7 yr./115,000 k Chrysler Warrantee. e SALE • SERVICE • LEASING. 331 Park Rd. S. Oshawa North of 401 - South of Hwy 2 723-4638 The ACCORD LX boast such qualities as Micheliri steel belted radials, a four speaker sound system, power steering and cruise control with the automatic transmission. Plus Honda's powerful racing heritage of 2 Litre 12 valve engine.