Everybody wants stick time, so the clutch has been warm ever since we brought it home. KB and S’man have the mechanics of shifting after only two lessons. They are good to go — as long as I’m riding shotgun… and the hills aren’t too steep… and it’s not commute hour traffic. Spencer wants to know if he should take the revs up before changing gears… From idle to 5000 RPM the car is harmless. You’d think that you were listening to a CIVIC under the hood. Tip your foot into the throttle and by 6000 the little Formula 1 motor comes on cam and begins to pull extremely well to its 9000 RPM redline. Shift early 😉 The transmission is close ratio so when grabbing 2nd you are still in the power band and the tail steps out. ( Kids, don’t try this at home!)
We call it the fun car. The top is never up and we can’t stop grinning.

B.O.U.R.Girl and I drove over to the north side this afternoon to inspect an S2000 that I spotted on craigslist.org. The owner represented it as her “baby”, and pampered, “near tears over parting with it” but it turns out that she is only a silent partner and that it’s really her brother’s car. The windshield has some kind of graphic logo spelled across the top. Translation. Little brother owns a tuner shop and sells nitrous and speed equipment… and I just have to ask: “…of course he never bolted anything on THIS one — right?” We walk away from the vehicle taking backward steps toward our car.

Yo! Hey! Ouch! Yo! :-O

Was killing time in Virginia yesterday morning and decided to visit Sterling BMW / MINI just up the road from my crashpad. I wanted to inspect the Mini Cooper close up so I put my butt in one and it was fiiiine. Sticker shock though. All of them are loaded up with leather and accessorie options bringing the base from 16K to 26K (!) Too much for that go-kart. B.O.U.R.Girl still lusts for the S2000, which is okay by me 🙂

Come to think of it, the most exotic cars I see are on the web or in magazines — until I got to South Florida… Spotting at least one or two speeding Bentley Continental Coupes or a Lambo per day is not unusual. Witnessing some outrageous moves on the expressway, stuff that would get you shot in Small Town USA, I don’t think that I would want to commute in my nice ride but rather, an 80’s GMC pickup truck beater. People would tend to make way. I’m using a Ford Taurus rental mobile to get to the beach. Must take care to return it whole.

I would estimate it was a late ’80s Continental, the model that shared a stretched platform and the drivetrain with the Ford Taurus sedan. Imagining that it was once someone’s proud new luxury car it had long lost its clear coated glossy metallic sheen to the elements. It had been abandoned in our hotel parking lot long enough for spider webs between tires and pavement. We even thought we saw a tumbleweed wedged under, curious for a place like Florida. The old car sat bottomed out on its legs, the air ride suspension had leaked down. We wondered whether it had been stolen. Whether there was a body in the trunk. Maybe the owner was trying to skate the airport parking garage fee. Well, today a hook came and dragged the mystery away. Maybe someone will return to claim it. Maybe not.

An old tune referring to the reliability of the early horseless carriage. Catch the PBS documentary on the ultimate test of a motor carriage (man and dog too). Dr. Horatio Nelson Jackson drove his 1903 Winton across the country under impossible conditions. He was the first to achieve this in an automobile and made history on America’s first road trip. There were other contenders that year: The Packard Company and also Oldsmobile funded factory efforts but Horatio’s drive prevailed. SF to NY in less than 90 days.

Such a small leak, a dollar size pancake, you should hardly notice. That’s what I told B.O.U.R.Girl ’cause I didn’t want her to obsess over the weekend. She’s coming off of a previous relationship with a bad leak. The pink fluid on the garage is either transmission or AWD clutch over-run.

The auto-stick is an improvement over the ‘old’ car. It knows to hold 1st gear after a stop light. Also, you can optionally select 2nd (or even 3rd gear) from a dead stop which would minimize wheel spin when starting on mud / snow / ice.

Hank, from the shop says, it’s a seal and he “hain’t seen that kinda problem yet – better leave it with us overnight.” Gota just stop the bleeding.

Sue, across from us was wringing her hands. Her daughter’s old Blazer 4 x 4, now derelict and since replaced by a newer ride, died and has been stationary in the driveway for weeks. The cost to tow and repair said beater would likely exceed its residual worth. She cranked the worn V-6 which sputtered but spewed raw fuel from a split in cracked and rotted fuel hose line. Sue asked if it’s okay to drive and I replied yeah — so long as nobody flicks a cigarette butt your way at an intersection stop light 😉 Do you feel lucky? (said with Clint Eastwood impersonation). I knew it would be an easy fix. But I kept that to myself, not keen on making a parts run to the Pep Boys nor crawling under the belly of the beast for a guaranteed dowsing of fuel. We discussed scenarios and I walked (ran) away.

By the end of the day, however, S’man and I rose to the challenge and had it fixed. It became a father and son project. Conveniently, a section of NOS fuel line from a previous repair was discovered in my garage. My idea was that he’d do the work and I’d supervise. The job required cutting out the old fuel filter with exacto, screw driver, clamps, and a flash light. A third hand (mine) was used to plug the dike while splicing in two new hose sections. Very low hassle factor, as it turns out, but I was right about the other. We both totally reek of gas.

No mind. The fumes will dissipate in a few days. Sue and her daughter loaded us up with praise, gratitude, admiration, and some leftover baked lasagna dinner.

S’ man gets behind the wheel and likes it. After a few laps around the boatyard: “That was really cool Dad!”, he says grinning. He’d never really expressed the desire before so it was spontaneous when he asked if I thought it’d be alright. And away he went. SOLO