Cars, bikes, trucks, Hummers, SUVs, tanks, skateboards – whatever gets us down the road. Even Vespas, although I doubt it
GIVE TIL IT HURTS!
CF Lifer hhluce has a brief Substack post following up on my own “Yeah, no” jeremiad from a cpl-three days ago, which he commended to our attention in the comments and I felt was worth a main-page mention here as well. Go ye and read of it, for it is…well, damned disturbing, actually, if you own a car manufactured in the last five years.
One of the all-time greatest scenes in the history of the cinematic art.
A blazing campfire way out in the boonies; a handheld camera shooting from the back seat of a scarlet 68 Chevy Impala ragtop purchased specifically for the purpose, rolling along at no more than 25mph so as not to jostle the cameraman overmuch; gorgeous, gleaming, one-of-a-kind Harley Panhead choppers; joints with actual, no-shit weed in ‘em for purposes of artistic verisimilitude; three immensely talented, daring actors improvising the dialogue in real-time, as they went, unscripted and unrehearsed.
Folks, it just don’t get much better than this.
The Captain America and Billy bikes were designed and built by the somewhat unlikely team of Cliff Vaughs and Ben Hardy, which is a great story in its own right.
When The Easy Rider concept was quickly made into form, Peter Fonda set out to get him a couple of bikes for the movie. There’s lots of controversy about who built these bikes. Some say Dan Haggerty, who was in the movie. The guy who painted the bikes, his son says it was him (his dad, that is). Some say it was Peter Fonda.
But the guy who built them was a guy named Ben Hardy. Ben was an African american man who knew Harleys, and knew what he was doing. When Cliff Vaughs was asked by Fonda to oversee the building of the bikes, Vaugh’s turned to Hardy who was well known (if you were black) in Los Angeles as the go to guy to build a killer bike, and do it right.
Peter had only one thing he wanted on the bike. He wanted Captain America to have a flag on his gas tank. Beyond that, the design was left to Vaughs. I gotta think tho…Peter was an experienced rider, and Dennis hopper wasn’t. That had to have come up in the conversation somewhere, because the Billy bike was a much easier bike to ride. I had a fat boy that was really close to the same configuration, and my brother has a friend with a Billy Bike replica. They’re easy bikes to ride. The captain America bike? Cut that steering head off and rake that bitch out like it is, throw in those long forks with no front brake and see how you fare. You don’t give that kind of bike to a beginner.
It was Cliff who actually first offered the name “Easy Rider” to Fonda. It was a term he used in the day. Whats an Easy Rider? that depends on who you ask. In the 1900s it meant a freeloader. A guy who mooched off you. To Dennis hopper, it meant a man who lived off the money of a whore. He got it from an old Mae West movie. Whatever cliff meant by it, I’m not sure. All I know is he redefined the word. To this day I think it is associated to Harley riders. Maybe because of cliff, but most definitely because of the movie. When you say Easy Rider, I think of the movie. I think of Harley’s.
Vaugh’s quickly took the idea to Ben Hardy. Peter bought four 1950’s panhead police bikes from auction, and got them to Hardy and Vaughs. Jim Buchanan fabricated the frames, the engines were built by Hardy, Dean Lanza did the paint (his son is adamant he built the entire bikes). 2 bikes were for filming, 2 were for the final sequence of the movie, which I’m fucking assuming you know about, otherwise you wouldn’t be here reading this. Hardy went to work, and the rest is history.
It is at that, it surely is, and not just biker history alone. A pic of Hardy, and of his LA shop.
The shop is still there as of the writing of the above article (mid-2012, that would be), in the same location, albeit with a new name and under different ownership, seeing as how the great Ben Hardy passed away in 1994. Betcha didn’t see all that coming, now did ya? And I truly hope you didn’t think for a moment I’d leave out one last cultural lodestone immortalized in the film.
For whatever it’s worth, I always dug the minimalistic, cut-down lines of the Billy-bike bobjob way more than the near-parodically stretched, raked, and extended 60s chopper archetype represented by the Captain America machine. Two beautiful bikes, two completely different stylistic approaches, brought together in one unforgettable movie masterpiece. Taken for all in all, Easy Rider is as 100% all-American as apple pie, hot dogs, and hog-leg Colt .45 wheelguns; it could never have happened in any other time or place.
Nitpicking update! One decidedly trivial flub-up from the early part of the movie that has always irked me disproportionately is when Billy chides Captain America for being incautious about gassing up his bike, saying “Man, all the money we have is riding inside that peanut tank.” No, gawddammit, it is NOT a “peanut tank,” Billy boy. That’s the nickname for the original Sportster gas tanks, like thus:
As any fool can see without half trying, the American-flagged receptacle adorning Wyatt’s bike is actually a Mustang tank, to wit:
The Mustang tank is so-monikered because of its origin—namely, on the pioneering Mustang mini-motorcycle, a cute li’l thang that went the way of the dodo back in 1965 after a tragically abbreviated nineteen-year run during which it somehow never found its market niche, despite a plethora of innovative technical advances such as being the first American motorcycle of any size or type to feature the now-ubiquitous telescopic-fork front suspension.
The noble Mustang name lives on in its beautifully understated fuel tank, an unforeseen legacy that’s still available for most makes of big bikes from various aftermarket companies today. It’s been a go-to favorite with more discriminating and tasteful Harley customizers since the 60s. Myself, I’ve run a Mustang tank on every Sporty I’ve owned except for the first and last ones—what is that, three of ’em, four? Whatever, I absolutely adore the things, have ever since I first got hipped to their existence by an ad in the once-glorious Easyriders magazine.
For one thing, the Mustang has a much higher capacity than the stock Sporty “peanut” go-juice tank, which holds a measly gallon or so—some .9, others 1.3, depending on the year. That translates to no more than ninety miles or so before you have to make a stop for a refill. Which, actually, was just jake with me, since an hour and a half of having your teeth rattled and your bones jarred by those old Ironheads on a daylong putt with your local wolfpack was quite enough for anybody, thanks. By the time you’d gone through your peanut tank’s capacity and switched the petcock (Pingel Power-Flo, of course; no shoddy stock PoS will suffice) over to reserve (14-15 more miles at best), you were good and READY to climb off and unkink your aching legs and back a little.
Yeah, while you glided to the nearest pump sucking fumes the Big Twin ironbutts’ unwieldy 5-gallon fatbobs would still be well over half full, so you could count on catching the usual ration of good-natured shit for your “dirt bike” or “woman’s” bike’s short legs from them. But who the hell cares what those Geezer Glide pricks think anyway? Let ‘em snigger, let ‘em chortle to their hearts’ content; their ol’ ladies will be pestering you at the bar later on for a leg-wettin’ thrill-hop packing on the p-pad (“p” for pillion, although some mischievous wags swear it actually stands for pussy, and as all Sportster riders know, neither side is entirely wrong) of your fleet little speed-demon, and everybody knows it too. When some horny, sexy biker bitch is reaching around from behind you to fondle your throbbing erection through the thin fabric of your worn, grease-stained jeans as you rip down a lonely back road, the last laugh will be yours.
Ask me how I know. Never mind, don’t, I ain’t gonna tell ya.
For another, the Mustang tank’s curvaceous good looks simultaneously offset and complement the rest of the Sportster’s no-frills, bareknuckle-brawler savagery, making what was for me a perfectly irresistible aesthetic combination. Plus, back when I bolted on my very first prized Mustang the tanks had fallen so far out of contemporary vogue as to be downright rare; almost nobody who saw mine in those days—be they old-school scooter trash or cake-eating-civilian cager—even knew what the hell it was, although they all liked it. Or they said they did, at any rate, which was good enough to suit me. I certainly did, and as the builder, owner, and rider, my opinion was the only one that mattered.
It still is, I still do, and if I had a Sporty today there would almost certainly be a Mustang tank, in flat-black rattlecan sprayed on by yrs trly etc, perched saucily on the upper frame rail between the top triple-clamp and the stiff, uncomfortable nut-buster of a seat. Or there soon would be, you betcher. Even though I’m too old for that sort of thing nowadays, hey, that’s just how I roll, people.
5
4Oh, I freely concede there’s some killing needs to be done right enough. Plenty and to spare of it, in fact. But not the kind that’s done with any silly switch, by God.
The Kill Switch
Soon the government might shut down your car.President Joe Biden’s new infrastructure gives bureaucrats that power.
You probably didn’t hear about that because when media covered it, few mentioned the requirement that by 2026, every American car must “monitor” the driver, determine if he is impaired and, if so, “limit vehicle operation.”
Rep. Thomas Massie objected, complaining that the law makes government “judge, jury and executioner on such a fundamental right!”
Congress approved the law anyway.
A USA Today “fact check” told readers, don’t worry, “There’s no kill switch in Biden’s bill.”
“They didn’t read it, because it’s there!” says automotive engineer and former vintage race car driver Lauren Fix in my new video. The clause is buried under Section 24220 of the law.
USA Today’s “fact” check didn’t lie, exactly. It acknowledged that the law requires “new cars to have technology that identifies if a driver is impaired and prevents operation.” Apparently, they just didn’t like the term “kill switch.”
No, they wouldn’t, would they? But a kill switch by any other name is still a kill switch, and I say it’s the bunk.
The kill switch is just one of several ways the government proposes to control how we drive.
California lawmakers want new cars to have a speed governor that prevents you from going more than 10 miles per hour over the speed limit.
That would reduce speeding. But not being able to speed is dangerous, too, says Fix. If “something’s coming at you, you have to make an adjustment.”
New cars will have a special button on the dash. If you suddenly need to speed and manage to find the button when trying to drive out of some bad situation, and it lets you speed for 15 seconds.
For all these new safety devices to work, cars need to spy on drivers. Before I researched this, I didn’t realize that they already do.
The Mozilla Foundation reports that car makers “Collect things like your age, gender, ethnicity, driver’s license number, your purchase history and tendencies.” Nissan and Kia “collect information about your sex life.”
How? Cars aim video cameras at passengers. Other devices listen to conversations and intercept text messages.
Then, says Mozilla, 76% of the car companies “sell your data.”
Finally, Biden’s infrastructure bill also includes a pilot program to tax you based on how far we drive.
“A mileage charge seems fair,” I say to Fix. “You pay for your damage to the road.”
Oh sure, “fair”—as long as you leave the road-use taxes FederalGovCo (and states as well) rakes in on every gallon of gasoline you buy out of your calculations. Jackass.
One thing you can be sure of: if our Masters are letting the word get around about these supposedly “new” spy-snitch-and-control devices get around, then they’re already in place and functioning, likely have been for a good-ish while now.
Speaking strictly for myself, I’d never even dream of buying, owning, or operating a new(er) car. Not that I could afford to anyhow, natch. But still. At present, the Hendrix automotive stable consists of
1) An extremely rare 2012 Focus SE hatchback skinned in Blaze Yellow Metallic* with some minor performance mods to the peppy little 2.0L i4 under the hood, which mill I’ve personally clocked at an honest 39 mpg. Low-slung, stable, almost shockingly responsive and nimble, the Focus corners like it was on rails, betraying its race-car design heritage at every least twitch of the leather-wrapped steering wheel. The schweet little Focus has never failed to leave a huge grin on my face every time I’ve driven her, she’s hands-down the most just plain fun automobile I’ve ever owned; and
2) A battered, raggedy but dead-reliable old 1994 Burick Century and a Half** Grampamobile for backup
Both of which cars, to the best of my knowledge, predate all that goobermint jiggery-pokery. I’ll stick with my two strugglebuggies until I find out otherwise, thanks, at which juncture I’ma have to either get cracking on some serious uninstalling, or unload ‘em for something older and less personally intrusive.
From my cold, dead hands, you perfidious bastards.
* Factory paint color, 2012 model year only, obtainable exclusively via custom-order through a duly-licensed Ford dealership. I have it from an impeccable authority that there were just over 400 Focus hatchbacks in that color with the also custom-order-only 17 inch alloy wheels delivered across the entire Southeastern US that year. Who knows how many are still on the road or in driveable condition today; a great many Focii get converted into race cars and run on the flourishing, popular Compact-class circuit. So yeah, rare as hen’s teeth. Unfortunately, it’s still only a Ford Focus, of which type there’s a blue million out there, so not all that valuable or collectible, then
** Equipped with the rock-solid Burick L82 3.1L v6 renowned among mechanics as “the Indestructible Six,” and for very good reason; a smidge over 155k on the odometer, which is damned low for a car that age. The two previous owners are close, close friends and/or family, so the Burick’s entire history is known to me, which is always nice. That said, though, the piss-poor 17-18 mpg the big battlewagon clocks in at is a bona fide lifestyle-changer, sadly enough, especially at these vampiric Bidenflated petrol prices…which, cushy, plush, and mechanically solid though the car is, fortunate as I’ve been to have the use of it while the Focus has been down for extensive repair/refurbishment, nonetheless explains why I’ll always think of it as the backup ride
22The Wylde Blogger Wrecking Crew CC, perhaps?
I turned eight in 1954, but I was no different than Randy Honkala, (and is that a mid-western car kid’s name or what?) maddened like every other boy I knew (except for the suspicious weirdos), breathlessly counting the days before the sheets covering the main windows of the major local car dealerships came down in the fall to reveal their glittering trove of chrome and jewel-painted treasure.
I never really got over it, either, and by the middle 1960s my lust for the splendors roaring out from Detroit reached an apotheosis just about simultaneously with Detroit’s own steel climax. You might say we came and went together.
Ten years later, all was rust and ruin, shitbox VeeDubs and Jappo tinfoil cars ruled the American roads, and guys my age were more concerned with whether we’d make it through until Nixon extracted us from Vietnam (the Ukraine meat grinder of its day, although not a patch on our current slavic murderfest).
But those cars. Most of my most beloved vehicles were built in the period from the early 1960s to the mid-1970s. And like Randy, I too Have A List, although not nearly as extensive as his.
Well as I’ve known my old friend and colleague Bill Quick, for as many years as I have, I’ve never really thought of him as a car nut. His taste in lead sleds is impeccable, starting with this shot of a 1959 Impala like the 58 he owned in his misspent youth:
Now as y’all know, I’m a diehard Ford man from a long line of Ford men on my dad’s side. That said, the 59 Impala is one of a handful of exemplary Chevy iron I always really dug, others being the 58 Bel-Air:
And basically, every model of Corvette ever made, up to and including the criminally underappreciated early-mid 80s body styles, known to automotive historians as the Third and Fourth Generation ‘Vettes. Shown below: the breathtaking 1954 Corvette C1.
Ahh, those swooping, curvy lines; the vivid paint in some other color besides nondescript gray, silver, or charcoal; that toothy chrome grill, the stainless body trim! Folks, they just don’t make ‘em like that anymore, and that’s a crying shame if you ask me.
What with anonymous plastic eggmobiles and graceless, chunky SUVs ruling the road nowadays, no wonder America’s long love affair with their automobiles has finally guttered out, except among a steadily dwindling number of mulishly unevolved fans of the vintage Detroit steel who still bitterly cling to the old ways. No esthetics; no gut appeal to anything besides pure utilitarian practicality; no soul, no spark, no romance: seriously, who could possibly fall in love with and take pride in such uninspiring machines as are on offer these days?
Bill’s post moved me to leave one of my infrequent comments in response, to wit:
Gawd DAMN, but that Impala is gorgeous! One of the small handful of Bowties I do actually like. The death of the car culture—premeditated murder, more like—has robbed American youth of a hell of a lot of cross-generational tradition, joie de vivre, and good, old-fashioned fun.
I’ve lamented that grievous loss here before more than once or twice, so no need to belabor the point further right now, I don’t think. To be perfectly honest, I just wanted an excuse to run a few cool car pics, really. My thanks to Bill for providing me with one.
Update! Man, I’m thinking in my munificent spare time I might just try to Gimp up a patch design for our notional blogger CC cutoff, maybe. We’ll see about that; I know at least Bill and Phil over at Bustednuckles would find such a project interesting, if nobody else did. Too bad Randy Herring is gone; if he was still with us, I could get him to draw me a really good ‘un up in a heartbeat. In fact, knowing Randy he very well might’ve done one on his own hook a long time ago, without ever being asked.
Updated update! For Barry, whose comment-section contribution brought it to mind.
Great tune, great cars, even if they are fuckin’ Bowties.
22Amusingly, it’s all bad. As per usual, Buck Throckmorton has it all gathered together in the usual handy, dandy, and convenient spot, closing out this edition’s festivities with a pluperfect example of what sane sorts are talking about when they make sport of those “unintended consequences” brought inevitably on in the wake of shitlib presumptuousness, arrogance-in-ignorance, and mulish disregard for the real-world consequences of their disastrous policies.
Electric vehicles are significantly heavier than their gasoline-powered equivalents, up to 50% heavier in some cases. Aside from damaging roads and putting parking garages at risk, the force of a moving EV is also more than many guardrails can withstand.
“Crash tests indicate nation’s guardrail system can’t handle heavy electric vehicles” [AP – 01/31/2024]
Last fall, engineers at Nebraska’s Midwest Roadside Safety Facility watched as an electric-powered pickup truck hurtled toward a guardrail installed on the facility’s testing ground on the edge of the local municipal airport. The nearly 4-ton (3.6 metric ton) 2022 Rivian R1T tore through the metal guardrail and hardly slowed until hitting a concrete barrier yards away on the other side.
Barriers along the medians of divided highways serve to keep out of control vehicles from crossing over into oncoming traffic, thus preventing high-speed, head-on collisions. That simple safety mechanism has saved a tremendous number of lives. Thanks to the “EV transition,” we’ll just have to get used to mangled cars and mangled bodies due to head-on highway collisions again.
Ooookay, then. Gotta admit, as steadfast a derider of the most recent iteration of the recurrent CPC (coal powered car) pipe-dream as I’ve always been, even I never thought of that one before. But hey, saving Mommy Gaia from the planetary havoc inflicted by those horrible, terrible, double-plus-ungood “fossil fuels” (which are created in the course of Her own natural processes, by the by) is worth any price we must pay, right, idiots?
I mean, otherwise shitlibs might have to own up to being backasswards and wrong yet again, and the grown-ups might smack their hand, tell them to shut up, and make them go sit in the Naughty Kid corner and think things over for a few hours. Why, it’s just so darn UNFAAAIIIIR!!! Can’t have that, now can we?
Well, although I’ve longed ever since having a limb or three chopped off two years ago to be able to get up and turn a wrench again, I never dreamed my return to the ranks of the Most Honorable and Exalted Order of the Gearhead™ would involve working on a blasted…wheelchair?!?
No shit, folks, Memezapoppin’ is delayed tonight due to the fact that I have just spent the last two hours re-installing a wandering hex-head shoulder bolt that somehow worked itself loose from the left backrest riser—without, thankfully, backing out altogether, hitting dirt, and skedaddling off to someplace betwixt here and Timbuktu.
I guess the stupid thing musta rattled out of its assigned threaded orifice because of excessive vibration from the high RPMs the stroked-out big-block Cobra Jet engine installed on this contraption that I…oh God, I can’t even joke about this shit, that’s how not fuckin’ funny it is.
Yep, it’s a long way from banging up my delicate concert-pianist and guitarslinger hands on Harley V-Twins and beater-classic Fords to rasslin’ recalcitranrt wheelchair hardware, all of it straight down. Mind you, the chair I have is actually a no-shit, for-real racing model: Clinton River’s Tailwind, a sweet $800 dealio which was taken off the market years ago ‘cause some doctor fella got hisself hurt in one, sued the company for 8 million simoleons, and won.
How I got mine was, a close friend of mine is always scouting around at the wheelchair store in CLT—his mom has MS and has been locked down in a chair for as long as I’ve known him, which is a lotta years—and happened to see my Tailwind sitting out by the dumpster in back of the store one day, waiting to be hauled off and scrapped. Shane looked it over real good—knowing a thing or two about a thing or two concerning such things as he does—was aware that I’d be in the market for one once I got out of hospital durance vile, and tossed it into his pickup to bring home for me.
I like the thing, actually; the battery-assist never has worked, since the strange-o battery packs have long since gone the way of the dodo just like the chair itself has. Also, it has no brakes on it of any kind, which has taken a great deal of getting used to and requires much careful forethought and attention.
That said, though, it also has quick-detach main wheels and the seat-back folds down flat, making it a lead-pipe cinch to break down, toss into the back seat of the car, and motor on off when the walls here at home begin to close in on me and I just GOTTA get out and go somewhere…ANYwhere. Which is usually about once a week or thereabouts.
The no-parking-brake thingie, though downright dangerous when it isn’t just an ordinary pain in the ass, admits of a blood-simple, inexpensive workaround which I’ve already worked out in my head and plan to implement as soon as possible, transforming this already-rare wheelchair into a true one-of-a-kind custom build. Someday, it’d be nice if I could figure out a way to do away with the heavy electric motors on each of the main wheels and lighten this little jewel up a bit, but since that’s where the splined shafts of the detachable wheels go in and attach, I haven’t got that one figured out yet in such a way that wouldn’t require full-machine-shop access and some serious fabrication.
What can I say; once a gearhead, always a gearhead, I guess.
21If it’s gonna be done, it’s gonna have to be Musk that does it.
180 Days for a SpaceX Starship Moonbase
There is a proposal to use the SpaceX lunar starship as a rapidly deployable moonbase. It could be completed 180 days after the SpaceX lunar Starship lands on the moon.The payload area of the Starship is about 1000 cubic meters. This proposal would tip over the lunar Starship and cut it open to use three times as much volume and enable it be buried for radiation shielding.
NASA and Thales Alenia just rolled out their first Moon Base concept for the Artemis project. Why do we need a tiny module when we have over a thousand cubic meters in Starship? Does this base have any use at all?
Does it really matter? It’s nothing but pie in the sky, a pipe-dream. NASA can’t even get a man into low-earth orbit anymore.
Via Insty, who quips: NOW THIS IS MORE LIKE THE 21ST CENTURY I WAS HOPING FOR. Heh, indeed. Now about those Jetsons-style flying cars we’ve all been waiting for, Elon…
Which reminds me of a humorous incident from a cpl-three weeks ago. I was trying to access a shopping-center wheelchair ramp blocked by one of those damned Teslas, see. Thankfully, the driver was still in the driver-seat—her BF/husband/whatever had dashed into a restaurant to grab their go-order while she waited, it soon developed. Anyhoo, as she backed out of the way for me the car made that burbling beedle-beedle-beedle noise originally produced by the Jetsonmobiles in the classic old Hanna-Barbera cartoon. I just about fell out laughing at that, and I’m still laughing.
I solemnly swear to you here and now, that Tesla sounded so exactly, precisely like the above I have to conclude that Musk must have licensed a recording of it to use in lieu of the exhaust note typical of an ICE. Good going, Elon!
Buck Throckmorton has rapidly become the go-to guy for EV news, debunkings, and unpleasant realities, and there’s a very good reason for that. To wit:
Welcome to 2024! Since New Year’s Day one year ago, the “electric vehicle transition” has gone from being a foregone conclusion to being a rolling failure. Auto manufacturers who bought into the hype are looking at a catastrophic financial miscalculation, and typical car drivers have gone from being curious (at best) to being generally negative about purchasing EVs. I believe that the conservative media’s pushback against EVs has had a considerable impact.
In other words, 2023 was a very good year – a year in which we turned opinion against electric vehicles. The people who want a boutique, status-symbol EV can continue to buy Teslas. (But can we please kill off the taxpayer subsidies for Tesla?) For all the rest, let 2024 be the year when legacy automakers throw in the towel on the eco-communist EV experiment.
For today, let’s do our periodic update on the EV Follies…
“Ford cutting 2024 F-150 Lightning production plans by half, suppliers told; The news comes amid an industrywide pullback in EV investment due to slower-than-expected sales growth.” [Automotive News – 12/11/2023]
Ford Motor Co. is dialing back planned output of the electric F-150 Lightning pickup by half next year because of “changing market demand,” a steep pullback of a high-profile nameplate the automaker spent most of this year working to build in larger numbers.
Although I’ve enjoyed writing about how emphatically consumers have rejected Ford’s flagship EV, in fairness I should point out that the Ford F150 Conflagration Lightning is a spectacularly awful vehicle. Aside from its tendency to burst into flames, it performs poorly at towing, hauling for distance, and operating in the cold – the basic functionalities that are expected of a pickup truck.
The buried lede in this story isn’t that Ford is cutting weekly production of its electric pickup from 3,200 units per week to 1,600 units per week, rather it’s that Ford’s executives still think there is a market that will absorb 1,600 of these abominations per week.
*****
It’s not just Ford that can’t sell its EVs. Half of Buick dealers would rather surrender their franchises than have to sell General Motors’ atrocious EV offerings.
“GM buys out nearly half of its Buick dealers across the country, who opt to not sell EVs” [Detroit Free Press – 12/20/2023]
GM’s awful executives, with little understanding of automobiles or their customers’ preferences, think they can simply dictate what consumers should buy. GM dealers, who actually understand automobiles and what their customers want, know better.
General Motors said nearly half its Buick dealers took buyouts this year rather than invest in selling and servicing electric vehicles as the automaker’s brands transition to all electric by 2030.
That means GM will end 2023 with about 1,000 Buick stores nationwide, down 47% from where it started the year.
*****
General Motors is rolling out an electric version of its popular Chevrolet Blazer sport utility. Well, it’s trying to, but not very successfully.
“2024 Chevy Blazer EV sales are already halted over software issues” [Elektrek – 12/26/2023]
Dozens of potential customers will have to keep waiting.
Ah well, I guess it’s nice to know it will impinge on mere dozens of the poor, pitiful fools; could be worse, could be hundreds. Nice also to see a few major manufacturers finally pushing back against being force-fed this fascistic, auto industry-killing program of FederalGovCo’s devising, instead of just lying back and taking it without demur as they have been up till now. Lots, lots more disincentives to buy into the goobermint’s credulity-straining propaganda push for these abominable, exorbitantly overpriced boat-anchors over at the Ace Place.
21GOD, how I love this. Who says there’s no good news anymore?
1930s Luxury Vehicle Going Into Production Again?
Packard Motors, an American luxury automobile company that first produced automobiles in 1899, is on the verge of manufacturing vehicles in Ohio.One of the “Three Ps” – alongside Peerless Motor Company and Pierce-Arrow – the Packard Motor Car Company gained a reputation for building high-quality luxury automobiles pre-WWII.
“Owning a Packard was considered prestigious, and surviving examples are found in museums, car shows, and automobile collections,” Wikipedia writes.
“Packard vehicles featured innovations, including the modern steering wheel, air-conditioning in a passenger car, and one of the first production 12-cylinder engines, adapted from developing the Liberty L-12 engine used during World War I to power warplanes,” it added.
“The handmade vehicles were exported in record numbers to Europe and competed successfully with Rolls Royce and Mercedes Benz,” Cleveland.com states.
“After surviving two world wars and the swings of the auto market, the last true Packard rolled off the assembly line on June 25, 1956. The company closed in 1958 after a failed strategic takeover of Studebaker Corporation,” Packard Motors writes.
Now, a 1934-style convertible could bring the company back to life.
If I could just live long enough to see one of these beautiful beasts rolling down the highway, I could die a happy man. Further details here, including several pics. This is pretty danged cool too:
Andrews collaborated with his friend, Steve Constantino, on the prospect of building new versions of 1930s Packards.
“They found a company in Nebraska that makes all the parts for those particular vehicles. Andrews researched and now owns the legal rights to the Packard brands, patents and trademarks, which was a major step in moving forward,” Cleveland.com writes.
Lastly but by no means leastly:
Packard Motors gets ready to build its new ‘old’ cars to order https://t.co/1d4jtv6VJA pic.twitter.com/mMsJaHO6Ts
— Nordonia Hills News (@NHillsNews)
Of course the new Packard will be far, far out of my pitiful price range, but who cares? Such a vision of loveliness is its own reward, even when the beauty is beheld from afar.
Creepy AF update! And within mere minutes of posting the above, what should arrive in my email inbox but an ad from eBay headlined thusly: Under the hood: An ice-making Land Cruiser and Cadillac Woody, offering all kinds of car paraphernalia for sale, from the aforementioned 56 Cadillac View Master resto to chrome mags to race-driving gear to you name it. Why, if I didn’t know better I’d think I was being watched by somebody or something.
52via:Liberty
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11Just another nail in the EV coffin.
The true cost of an EV? Think tank claims subsidies for electric vehicles cost $50,000 PER CAR over a ten-year period
The true cost of electric cars to the average American taxpayer has been laid bare by a landmark new study into the eco vehicles.In order to bring EVs to market, governments have created a variety of tax incentives for buyers and manufacturers. They have also sponsored the development of the infrastructure needed to charge them.
But those subsidies can come at a cost to taxpayers, buyers of gas vehicles or simply households that pay electricity bills.
A new paper by conservative think tank Texas Public Policy Foundation estimated that the average electric car incurs hidden costs of $48,698 over a 10-year period.
‘Electric vehicle owners have been the beneficiaries of regulatory credits, subsidies, and socialized infrastructure costs totaling nearly $50,000 per EV,’ said one of its authors, Jason Isaac.
eparately, it found that the infrastructure required to facilitate electric cars in America is not paid for directly by the owner of the car. It described those expenses as ‘socialized infrastructure costs.’
‘Home and public charging stations used by EVs put a significant strain on the electric grid, resulting in an average of $11,833 in socialized costs per EV over 10 years, which are shouldered by utility ratepayers and taxpayers,’ read the paper.
The authors argued that the gasoline infrastructure is used for other products and society at large, whereas electric vehicle charging costs currently only serve EV owners.
They also claimed that the additional strain placed on the power grid when charging electric cars would ordinarily incur ‘demand charges’ – or a premium for higher energy consumption at a certain time.
‘Currently, most utilities are socializing that cost for EV owners by not assessing demand charges on residential EV chargers, even though those chargers can use as much power at certain times as several homes,’ the report claimed.
Right up until the useless Wokester toy blows up and burns the house to cinders and ash.
So let’s see, now:
OOH-OOH-OOH I WANT ONE I WANT ONE I WANT ONE!
What the heck, whoever said virtue-signaling came cheap, right? Them’s the breaks. All of which I’d be okay with; hey, if smug, self-righteous Enviro-nut assholes don’t mind paying through the nose to establish their presumed moral-superiority bona-fides, well then you just have at it, fools. Unfortunately, though, we ALL get to pay for their dubious “privilege” right along with ‘em. To wit:
But the largest cost identified by the report was that on buyers of gas cars.
According to the paper, around 16 states have ‘zero emission vehicle’ (ZEV) mandates whereby the state sets a number or percentage of new vehicles sold that must be zero-emission.
‘Of course, the cost to meet these mandates is not limited to the states that impose them but spread out over the entire fleet of each automaker trying to meet them,’ read the paper.
On top of that, federal regulations impose similar obligations on automakers that incentivize them to make more electric vehicles.
‘The largest source of financial support for EVs comes not from direct subsidies but from hidden costs driven by federal regulations,’ read the paper.
‘The Biden administration’s stringent fuel economy standards and regulatory manipulations are driving American automakers toward bankruptcy and adding thousands of dollars to the cost of every gasoline vehicle,’ said Brent Bennett, another of the paper’s authors.
Just this month, Ford said during its third quarter earnings call that it lost an estimated $36,000 on each electric car it sold in the quarter.
Well, whaddya know about that: look closely enough, dig down far enough, and we learn that, of course and as always, the real problem has its roots deep within the bowels of the meddlesome, authoritarian Leviathan-state. Quelle surprise, that.
31So since posting “American badass” yesterday, I have fallen DEEEEP down the rabbit hole of all things 70s dirt-bike. After another long, stimulating conversation with my friend Stan this evening on the subject, I’ve been Wiki-searching all the great old names: DeCoster, Jim Pomeroy, Malcom Smith, John Penton, Heikki Mikkola, et al. This serious sidetrackery led me to a couple of real finds.
Preach it, Steve! Next up: truer words were never, EVER spoken.
Heh. Anybody out there who grew up like me, Stan, and his brother Chipps did know exactly what it feels like. In our conversation earlier tonight, Stan brought up Chipps’s old Honda Mini Trail Z50—the bike Chipps taught me to ride on back when I was, oh, 11 or 12, which looked a little something like this:
As I recollect, the one Chipps had sported a slightly different paint/decal scheme on the tank, although it was certainly red as all getout. See the black plastic knobs down at the bottom of the bars, just above where the risers meet the top triple-clamp? Turning those counter-clockwise (lefty loosey!) would loosen each handlebar to fold down alongside the fork leg independently, making it easy-peasy to toss the little Z50 into the trunk of Dad’s car when a nice weekend camping trip up to the mountains was in order.
Can’t see very well in the pic, but the bars are supposed to have a bit of space between them. On Chipps’s Z50, however, they were bent so badly from innumerable falls, collisions, and other what-have-you that they actually touched in the middle, about halfway along the rise to the turnout where the grips, front brake lever, throttle, and kill switch (that red button thingie by the left grip) all live. It was funny to look at, kinda like a bunny with its ears all a-flop rather than sticking up straight.
Three-speed (or was it four?) auto-clutch tranny; chrome steel fenders front and rear; honkin’ big chrome heat shield over the upswept exhaust, which of course would be summarily removed and thrown into a remote corner of the garage for the duration, the oversize muffler drilled/hacksawed/gutted to replace the offensively meek, barely-audible “putt-putt-putt” sound with a more manly, throatier growl; cable-actuated drum brakes front and rear; cute little semi-knobby balloon-tires and mag wheels; in short, all the traditional styling, hardware, and running gear standard on the kid-size Hondas from that era.
That tiny little booger provided my first-ever experience with the indestructible nature of pretty much all Honda engines; like my beloved Ford 289s, they simply can’t be kilt, no matter how severely you abuse ‘em. Which of course we did. It’s long been my theory that you could’ve blown a few .50 caliber holes in that 49cc motor with a Ma Deuce and it still woulda cranked on the first kick and purred like a cat eating guts anyhow.
The seat had a latch on the side, allowing access to a small storage compartment underneath, among other things. On Chipps’s bike, the spring holding the latch closed was broken. This meant that whenever you jumped the thing, momentum would leave the seat flapping in the air—not such a big problem when you’re standing on the pegs and airborne, but a real nut-buster when you landed and went to sit back down again with the seat in the “open” position and stuffed into your crotch.
A more dire hazard than that top frame rail on our old Schwinn boys’ banana-bikes was, believe you me. Whoever wasn’t actually riding at the time and was off fooling around in the woods or catching tadpoles in the nearby crick always knew when the other guy had crested a hill and caught some air by the sudden profane shouts of pain at having been caught again by that $*&^$##@@#!!! loose seat.
Ahh, those were the days, my friend, we thought they’d never end.
2Ahh, but let’s not forget the number of times she had to have busted her ass whilst learning how to do all this.
— ONT WTF (@OntWtf)
Amazing. The union between (wo)man and machine on display here is damned near total, and quite impressive. Take especial note of the scrupulously careful, almost gingerly way she places her feet on the rear pegs as she keeps the front wheel in the air throughout. Hats off to ya, ma’am.
Update! After re-watching it for about the tenth time, I realized there’s another party involved that deserves some kudos: whoever was behind the camera recording it. Always in focus and perfectly framed; steady-handed zoom-ins and -outs; never any shaking, wobbling, or losing track of the subject. This is some incredible stunt-riding and some top-notch lensmanship both, I’d say, a real two-fer.
4First question that occurs to me is, why on earth would you WANT to? Myself, I wouldn’t trust a Dart to get me to the corner liquor store. But then, some people are just natural-born risk takers, and love taking on a challenge so daunting, so obviously insane, even the Gods Themselves would tremble at the prospect.
Dart Across America: Adventures of Driving a 1975 Dodge Dart 3,300 Miles in Six Days
The 225-cid. slant-six engine is touted for being bulletproof and able to handle all kinds of abuse. That’s one major reason why Erik Jesperson chose a 1975 Dodge Dart as the classic car for his coast-to-coast road trip adventure from Ocean City, Washington to Ocean City, New Jersey. The other solid reason was its mostly clean, rust-free body.The road trip was arranged after Erik’s friend Josh asked what he wanted to do for his bachelor party before his wedding on December 1, 2023. A road trip across the country had always been on Erik’s bucket list, and he’s not the type to turn down an excuse to buy another project car.
After locating the 1975 Dodge Dart at a dealership, he had the car inspected by a local mechanic before fully committing to the trip. The mechanic came back with good news, simply recommending a tune up and stating the wipers didn’t work and the suspension was worn, nothing that would immediately jeopardize the 3,300-mile six-day drive.
“The Roadkill and Vice Grip Garage type shows have always spiked my interest,” Erik began. “Being a mechanic, I knew if I had the tools and supplies, I could probably make it happen.” Another piece of reassurance came from Josh, who works for U-Haul and had the ability to locate and rent a truck and trailer anywhere in the country at a cheaper rate (worst case scenario, of course). “My fiancé, Kristen, loved the idea of us acquiring an older car that we could use in the wedding as well as take to car shows and cruises together,” he added. That was the icing on the cake. Erik finalized the purchase and worked with the salesperson to pre-order any parts that could be needed for the trip, such as a mini starter, alternator, cap, rotor, fuel filter, and fluids. He packed items like spark plug wires and a few other parts in his luggage before catching his flight to Washington.
Wise move. The old MOPAR PoS did better than anyone intimately familiar with the road-apple abominations might expect, actually; minor annoyances like a broken fuel gauge, a rotted-out heater core, and getting becalmed in Sturgis H-D rally traffic were dealt with, until…wait for it…WAAAIIIT FOR IT…
Gee, didn’t see THAT coming.
Our intrepid duo did indeed make it to Ocean City, NJ in the end, which speaks volumes about their pluck, ingenuity, and good old can-do spirit. Jesperson and his fiancé plan to keep the “car” for some reason or other, which speaks volumes about their mental health, far as I’m concerned. Then again, though, I’ve never been known for being at all hesitant about embarking on high-risk, no-net road trips myself. Remember, I’m the guy who rode a 1971 Shovelhead FLH, replete with apehangers and suicide shift, from CLT to NYC just to see a pretty girl.
TWICE; I did that TWICE. So, y’know, maybe I ain’t exactly the one to be sitting in judgment on Eric and his affianced, eh?
(Via Ed Driscoll)
2Family learns the hard way that they’d be better off to spit on their asses and slide than relying on a coal-powered EV for their transportation needs.
Family ditches electric truck on drive from Winnipeg to Chicago after charging troubles
Road trip completed with rented gas-powered vehicle, while Ford says charging infrastructure is improvingThe owner of a 2023 Ford F-150 Lightning Lariat with an extended-range battery regrets buying the electric truck after attempting a road trip, only to abandon it and finish the drive with a gas-powered rental vehicle.
Dalbir Bala of La Salle, Man., left the truck in Minnesota last month after he said he tried unsuccessfully to charge the battery at two different charging stations.
“It was really a nightmare frustration for us,” Bala said.
He bought the truck — which is advertised as having a range of 515 kilometres — for $115,000 in January. He spent an additional $16,000 installing chargers at his home and his trucking business, and upgrading his residential electrical panel.
Bala, his wife and three kids left on a trip to visit Wisconsin Dells, Wis., and Chicago for business, on July 27. The truck was fully charged when they left their home just south of Winnipeg, and Bala had plans to stop at level 3 charging stations, which provide faster charges, located along the planned route.
Bala’s first stop was about 350 kilometres south of Winnipeg in Fargo, N.D. He paid $56 to charge his vehicle’s battery from 10 per cent up to 90 per cent.
The trouble started at his next stop in Albertville, Minn., where Bala said the only fast charger brought up a faulty connection message in his truck when he plugged in. He called the number on the charger for help but never got a response.
He headed to another charging station in nearby Elk River, Minn., but a charger there wouldn’t work either, he said.
With only 15 kilometres remaining on his battery and no fast charger within that range, he decided to ditch his Lightning. Bala got it towed to a Ford dealership and the family rented a gas-powered Toyota 4Runner to finish their trip to Chicago.
A nightmare indeed. The ultimate lesson here was expressed in a great movie from many years ago:
There’s another great old movie clip that is quite apropos to this sad story.
Heh. Indeed.
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