Howdy Webriders! Dr. VW back again for your weekly dose of foreign fridays. However this week… the news isn’t foreign. Every so often, something so important comes up that it takes precedence over the normal cycle of things. I know you all want to know about whats going on in Europe, Asia, and the rest of the world outside North America, but just this once we’re going to sidestep for a minute to talk about a trainwreck in progress right on American soil. Hit the jump to see the latest abortion from GM. Read the rest of this entry »
Greetings WebRides faithful, for all those wondering what happened to the MCotW last week allow me to explain. Last week I had intended to post the newest installment of MCotW when AT&T decided to take a s*** on my plans. You see, apparently when AT&T asked my dad if he wanted to bundle our internet and phone services together with no interruption in service they really meant to ask if they could f*** up our entire week with phone calls attempting to get the internet turned on. After countless hours on the phone and another few spent in anger management classes the internet got turned on this last weekend and after spending a few days in SLO moving into a new apartment I am back and ready to deliver one hell of a muscle car, the 1969 Chevrolet Chevelle sYc or Yenko Chevelle. Now this wasn’t any ordinary Chevelle SS396 mind you, getting your hands on one of these beasts in 1969 meant you had to know a few tricks up your sleeve. Hit the jump. Now.
My good friends over at Endless USA, specifically Dominic Chen, wrote this pretty comprehensive write up on the new Nissan GT-R’s brake system. Take a read. Lots of technical information contained within.
With a good portion of my time recently devoted to R35 brake solutions, I figured I’d post as much as I could so that all of the facts and key points are in one place. It makes it easier for me to remember everything and hopefully some of you will find it useful or at least interesting.
I know that last week I finished my blog on the Ford Torino CJ with a hint that this week’s installment would feature a car with the monstrous Hemi, and I will not disappoint. However this week’s car is more than just another Hemi car, for when it was introduced, the muscle car market received a shakeup that made those who thought they were untouchable feel a very real sense of fear that their days controlling the market were numbered.
It is no doubt that Pontiac stole the muscle car market in 1964 by catching everyone off guard when they introduced the GTO, and it would take some time before any car manufacturer challenged the presence of the first muscle car. However, in 1968 the gloves came off and Plymouth delivered a staunch blow to the belly of the once undisputed majority shareholder of the muscle car market.
Good afternoon everyone, Big_Blocker here for the newest installment of Muscle Car of the Week. In recent weeks I have noticed that I have been giving a lot of attention to General Motors and MOPAR muscle cars, but what about those Blue Oval guys? Not being much of a Ford fan myself, I do appreciate what Ford brought to the table in the muscle car age and have decided to feature one of my favorite Ford’s this week: the 1969 Ford Fairlane Torino Cobra. Hit the jump to read more about this budget racer powered by the beefy 428 cubic inch Cobra Jet V8.
Hello Web Riders, Big_Blocker here once again to bring you all a look at a car that most of you have never heard of, the 1970 Chrysler 300-Hurst or 300-H for short. Anyone who knows anything about muscle cars knows that most muscle cars rolled on a mid-sized chassis or were even smaller and known as “pony cars”, like the Ford Mustang. However, by the time the year 1970 rolled around and customers of all income brackets were demanding high performance, Chrysler took a page out of their 1955 playbook and made a full-size muscle car. Read the rest of this entry »
This past week I experienced my first accident. Technically it wasn’t my accident because I wasn’t there, but it was my car. My first car incident occurred when my mother was pregnant with me. A couple years ago I backed into a family friend’s Camry from the 80’s, but they decided to retire it - problem solved. I label this past week’s incident as my first accident because I made the accident of lending my friend my car. Worst of all, I live in Los Angeles, so traffic is unforgiving. Essentially nothing is coming out of my pocket, as my friend has agreed to pay out of hers, but that’s not to say this experience has been easy by any means.
Over the phone, my friend told me she was part of a chain reaction that ended up with her hitting a BMW X5 . I assumed she had been smashed from the rear as well. She warned that the damages were bad and apologized profusely. When I ended up seeing my 1995 Toyota Camry (nicknamed Blue Pearl), I sighed in relief. The rear of the vehicle was fine. My friend was the last car in the chain. The front of the car wasn’t terribly bad. My hood was bent, the grill was shifted backwards, and my left headlights had been pushed back and broken. My imagination had prepared me for the worst and I had experienced about half of that. Not as bad as I thought, but bad is bad.
What should I do? I’d never been in this situation before. Call my insurance? Call her insurance? Call a friend for advice? I’ll refer to my friend as Sally for convenience. I ended up doing all three. Did my insurance cover the damages? Yes, sir. Did her insurance cover the damages? No, sir. Screwed. So I called my mentor for advice. He said if the repairs were minor enough I could just pay out of pocket to avoid unnecessary insurance involvement.
But what shop or dealership was I supposed to go to? I Googled all the nearby Toyota dealerships, only to find that each one had extremely poor reviews. The only positive reviews were from folks who needed oil changes. Anything more and service was questionable. No, thank you. I’ll take a private auto shop. I emailed all of my email contacts and called all of my auto enthusiast friends in the area for advice. I ended up picking a place in Rosemead, CA. My good friend praised the shop’s good quality work and friendly boss. He added that they did work for car shows, which somewhat soothed my worries.
Where was my friend during all of this? Probably doing some work of her own. No help whatsoever. I was on my own, thank you very much.
Another friend of mine (Teresa) and I drove 45 minutes through ridiculous Los Angeles traffic to get to the body shop. I made a huge mistake by not thoroughly checking the front of my car before we took off. Sally told me she opened the hood twice and assured me it could open and close with ease. The problem was, it opened too easily. The latching system was misaligned and I had no idea. I really should have checked. About 10 minutes into our journey, my hood flew up and blocked my view, except for a few portions on my extreme left and right sides. Hazard lights on. Step on the brakes. Pull over into residential area. Luckily, Teresa drove a truck with a bunch of rope that I could use to fasten my hood shut. I crawled under my car and made it work. The frame of my car had been bent and I feared the worst for Sally’s wallet. She was under the false impression the hood could be bent back into place and the situation would be fixed. She estimated a sub-$200 fix. Yeah, right. Onward the journey continued.
I get to the shop, which I’ll refer to as Al’s Auto, and quickly found the nearest employee to ask for help. Unfortunately, the owner, Al, was out for the day and wouldn’t be back for another couple days. I didn’t want to drive my car back home 45 minutes only to have to drive it back again later in the week. In addition, I didn’t want my friend to have to escort me again. So I ended up leaving my car at the shop for an estimate and taking off with Teresa to conquer the I-10.
After 3 days of continuous calls to the shop, Al was finally in for a day and gave me an estimate over the phone. The plan was to replace the grill, headlight, and hood and reshape the front of the car’s frame. An $800 repair, which was a lot less than my paranoid self had estimated. If you hadn’t realized already, I’m not even a beginner when it comes to car repairs.
The car is currently in the shop, and Al reassured I’d get my car by July 4th, which is when my relatives might visit. This ordeal is far from over and I can only hope the rest of this experience runs smoothly. Sally still has to work out the repairs for the X5 and I don’t want to have get involved in that. I’m quite certain repairs for the BMW will be a multiple of my Camry’s repair costs. While my pockets may be protected, I’ve lost a lot of work hours trying to figure out this whole situation. Wish me luck.
Lesson Learned,
ededsu
As of June 4, the Honda Civic is America’s best-selling vehicle. With news of Libya potentially reducing oil production combined with OPEC predicting prices above $150/barrel by the end of the year, crude oil prices topped a whopping $140 this week. Until this year, pick up trucks dominated American sales for the previous 17 years. $1.14 could afford you a gallon of gas in 1991. Nowadays, $1.14 worth of gas wouldn’t even get you out of the station. The Ford F-150, which has been the reigning sales champion for over a decade, lost sales this year and fell behind the Toyota Camry , Toyota Corolla , and Honda Accord . While the F-150 tops out below 20 miles per gallon (highway), each aforementioned compact vehicle provides its drivers with over 30 miles per gallon on the highway.
Now at first glance many people unfamiliar with this car will wonder what kind of monstrosity it is. Furthermore they may also question the presence of God in this universe that such a thing could roll off of an assembly line. No it is not an alien spacecraft. It is a 1969 Dodge Daytona and it is the feature of Muscle Car of the week. Greetings all, Big_Blocker here to give you all a look at one of the most unique cars ever to come out of Detroit, the Dodge Daytona. Hit the jump to read the whole story. Read the rest of this entry »
Once again it is Thursday and time for the newest installment of Muscle Car of the Week. It is my goal to give all the WRTV faithful a look at some vintage cars that people don’t normally hear about instead of the usual Hemi Cuda’s and big block Chevelle’s. The last two weeks we have taken a look at some heavy hitters from General Motors, so for this week I have decided to see what the Bowtie Bunch has to offer in terms of flat out performance. That brings us to the chosen car for this week: the 1970 Chevrolet El Camino SS LS6.
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