TOLEDO, Ohio — Late in the afternoon on the last day to sign up for a special retirement deal, Richard Ignaczak sat fretting in his car with his grandson outside the mammoth General Motors Corp. factory here.

He worried about ending a lifetime of work — 35 years to be exact — and not having enough money stashed away for him, his wife and grandson to live on. Tales of retired auto workers barely getting by haunted him. He had not slept well in nights.

"Go ahead, Gramps, do what you always wanted to do," urged 15-year-old grandson Zachariah Deer, prodding him to get out of the car and sign the papers that would separate him from the factory job that has provided his family a middle-class lifestyle envied by many.

At 59 years old, the slightly paunchy millwright debated whether he should work a few more years and save more money or whether he should bail out of GM. He couldn't make up his mind. He couldn't move.

These are very uncertain times for the U.S. auto industry, and Ignaczak was just one soul struggling late last month with whether to join 35,000 of his fellow workers who opted for buyouts and retirement packages from GM, and another 12,600 workers who did the same at bankrupt parts supplier Delphi Corp.

For Delphi and GM, the large number of departures was welcome relief in their struggle to survive a rapidly changing automotive landscape.

But for many GM and Delphi workers, the decisions to stay or leave were both financially and emotionally agonizing. It meant saying goodbye to friends and places where many had worked their entire lives. Such jobs provided better pay, benefits and security than most U.S. factory workers nowadays could ever expect to receive.

SENIORITY PAYS

Two types of workers contemplated leaving: those with 30 years or more on the job, who would get their full pensions of about $3,000 a month plus a $35,000 bonus. And those with less seniority, who were eligible for buyouts of either $70,000 or $140,000 without any future benefits.

Geography and local economies were a factor in the decision of whether to go.

In Toledo, for example, there might be a chance of finding other work. But in places like Flint, Mich., where the auto industry's implosion has left a jobless, shaken community, worried workers looking for advice flocked to the office of Russ Reynolds, president of United Auto Workers Local 652.

Local 652 represents workers at a 100-year-old Delphi plant set to close. About 1,500 of the factory's 2,500 workers accepted retirement or buyout packages. But those who did not, said Reynolds, wondered where they will find work once the plant closes.

"When these good paying jobs disappear, what is going to happen to America?" said Reynolds, expressing a sentiment heard often these days.

In Toledo, officials were surprised to learn that 1,226 out of 3,200 hourly employees at GM's transmission plant had signed up for retirement or buyouts. Then again, a crunch of workers sought advice in recent weeks, and about 200 workers rushed to sign on the last day of the company's offer.

SENSE OF UNEASE

Ignaczak was one of those workers, finally forcing himself to get out of his car and sign the paperwork. But GM gave workers another week to reconsider their deals, and Ignaczak continued to wrestle with his decision.

A sense of unease about the plant's future tugged at him and many others.

Not long ago GM said the plant would shift from making four-speed transmissions to more popular six-speed transmissions. New technology would allow the plant to build transmissions more efficiently, usually an indication of a smaller workforce. Though GM officials would not say how many workers would be needed, UAW officials predicted employment could plummet to 900 workers.

At Lil' Sheba, a dark, noisy bar across the street from the factory, goodbye gatherings were hosted at the end of June.

At one get-together, 59-year-old Phil Gannon said he was "pumped up" to be leaving after 37 years and six months at the factory. A single father, he said he now will have time to spend at home.

Over the bar's growing din, Gannon's mood changed, however, as he talked about a co-worker with heart problems.

"I said to him, 'You don't want to go out of here as blue as your uniform.' And he says to me he doesn't have anything going for him. He says he has no life on the outside. It is just such an empty situation."