Thursday, April 23, 2026

have you seen the Lego Pan Am DC 3?



you need a laugh, admit it

I stopped at the Shell station to grab a drink. 

 As I was pulling up, I noticed the police watching a little young chick who was smoking a blunt while pumping her gas.
 I saw her and thought, this girl is stupid, crazy, or both, especially with the police standing RIGHT there!

 But you know me, I minded my own business .. kinda.. and I went inside and got my drink.

 As I was paying for my stuff I heard someone screaming!! Like I’m talkin' a violent death scream! 

I looked outside and I saw that this girl’s arm was on fire!! She was swinging her arm, running around Acting like a fool !! 

 When I got outside, the police had the girl on the ground and they were putting the fire out!! Then they put handcuffs on her and threw her in the squad car.

 I was thinking, arrested? Shouldn’t she be in an ambulance, not a squad car?? 

And being nosey as I am, I asked the police what they were arresting her for...

He looked at me, dead serious, and said, "WAVING A FIRE ARM”!!

(thank you Rick for the dad joke!) 

T P (probably stands for Terrific Place, or Totally Perfect) Auto Repair on El Cajon at Texas St (an ASE-certified NAPA AutoCare Center)

 about 30 percent less expensive than the other shop that was inhospitable and unprofessional - and 5 percent more expensive than the shop that wouldn't order from anyplace except O'Reilly's... and had the work done in less time than Smitty's insisted on having my car JUST TO CHAARGE ME 100 DOLLARS for an INSPECTION I DID NOT NEED

End result? Awesome service, great job, done in exactly 2 hours, 1/2 the time I thought it might take, and I completely recommend them for car repairs and parts replacements/upgrades... but keep in mind, I'll be taking my commuter back there for a anything it needs in the future, so, I'll might see you there! 

https://tpautorepair.net/


Who has EVER seen a place with so many perfect reviews? 

It's the newest addition to my list of Recommended Shops! I love this place! https://justacarguy.blogspot.com/search/label/recommended%20shop

What's red white and blue and AMC but not a car? The CJ7 of Gene Henderson's Competition Limited Team


so, here's a rare example of someone getting CRAZY lucky.... a 61 dollar fix for a Porsche Cayman transmission that Porsche claimed would take 15,000 dollars to fix



Grassroots Motorsports magazine

if there's a cool car that has been parked a while, don't put much hope into it running for a reasonable amount of money...

 successful sharks don't stop swimming

Tom Suddard, Grassroots Motorsports magazine

reason a C4 Corvette is better for racing than a C5? Smaller body, less air resistance. 2,025 were made and they had carbon fiber hoods


https://bringatrailer.com/listing/2004-chevrolet-corvette-z06-38/

Good article in 2024 Hagerty magazine issue


The article dives into MGAs

The MGA's design was loosely based on a factory-built race car for a privateer running the 24 hours of Le Mans in 1951, that was scrounged up using MG TD mechanicals by Syd Enever, who joined the company in the 1920s at the age of 14

The MGB was ultra rigid, a unibody, and MG's monocoque car, and resulted from contributions from Syd Enever. 

The MGB GT had a sculpting assist from Pininfarina

SAIC Motor of Shanghai bought MG in 2007 by acquiring Nanjing Automobile Corporation (NAC), which had bought the brand from the defunct MG Rover Group in 2005. Currently, MG operates as a division within SAIC's passenger vehicle branch.

what the hell is wrong with the city streets dept? There's a hole in the street so big, it's earned a two safety cone cover.... in the middle of the damn street? Fix the hole! Fill it in! Plate over it!





I don't know what the heck people are tuning in for, but something sure caught traction today... right after I put Mission Hills Automotive on blast for being lousy at professional conduct. I guess a million people must have seen that!

 


that's about 1/2 of last months entire audience, in one day... since 5pm last night

Wednesday, April 22, 2026

sweet piece of carving!


This 1932 Lincoln KA Phaeton parts car was purchased by Paramount Pictures in the late 1930's and converted it to a pickup truck, then used as a parts car around 1962. 64 years later, it's getting restored


https://www.facebook.com/groups/108645673031162/permalink/2059976217898088

British singer Dua Lipa has helped fund a pickup truck for Ukraine’s First Medical Battalion as part of a humanitarian effort supporting frontline medical units


Driving Ukraine has been supplying vehicles to Ukraine since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, refurbishing and delivering ambulances and transport vehicles for frontline units.


One innovative and interesting methods for fundraising was a club night. 

The “Club For…” event which reached the British media and was also promoted by the Dua Lipa book club.

have you heard of a "bedbug"? Fiberglass kid truck bed on a newish VW Bug. Darby Waund, a senior in chemical engineering, and her dad transformed a Volkswagen Beetle into a Purdue-themed truck that has become a rolling display of school spirit.

she and her dad used an aftermarket fiberglass conversion kit from a company called Smyth Performance, Inc   Waund said. "And you literally just take a saw, and you chop the back half off."

The Beetle's rear section is cut away, then replaced with fiberglass panels that form the truck bed and the reshaped body.

"You don't mess with the chassis or the axles or anything like that," Waund said. "But you cut all of the metal off the back half of the car, and then you replace it with these fiberglass panels and paint it, make it look all pretty, and now you've got bedbug."

https://www.facebook.com/bavarianautohausreno/posts/pfbid02NhRDArMs5oPtxyFvb8mfRbPnUp2WFBPZViy5DbQbHnG4PWvSsUjFpCCSXJvNBxJ7l


but somehow I've never heard of the Worlds Largest Drum crew until now, and Darby is the team co-captain!






In 1921, Paul ‘Spotts’ Emrick decided that the “All-American” Marching Band needed something to set them apart from other bands. Emrick’s idea called for a bass drum larger than any other. The idea for a big bass drum had previously been imagined, and there were already drums four feet in diameter. Emrick wanted one at least twice that size – a “drum larger than the man playing it.” This sparked the idea to create the World’s Largest Drum.

Of course I posted it, it's got WHEELS! HA! (and they are Model A racing wheels!) 

The Drum is transported on a steel-frame carriage. A bar attached to the front of the carriage and two handles fixed to the back of the Drum allows for a crew of 4 to easily maneuver it.

 In the 1920s, the carriage was equipped with standard bicycle wheels, however these were quickly replaced with Model A Ford racing tires, due to the Drum’s immense size and weight. These are the same wheels it rides on today. The Drum itself weighs 315 pounds, while the carriage weighs 250 pounds, totaling 565 pounds.


Steve Green, along with his decrepit-looking VW campervan, Cecil, are on a mission to rid the beautiful creeks of Cornwall rivers of 166 abandoned fiberglass yachts



the legacy of the mass-produced fibreglass pleasure boat boom is unfolding. 

Yachts bought in the 1960s and 1970s are now reaching the end of their useful lives and end up in landfills, but because disposal is charged by the ton, many of them are abandoned by their owners, who don’t want to foot the cost (between 1 and 4k) or take responsibility for disposing of them. (in San Diego they were anchored out in the bay, and then sunk)

Steve relies on small charitable grants, crowdfunding and enthusiastic volunteers willing to paddle kayaks out to wrecks and help. Green ran up £8,000 on credit cards last year when the grants didn’t cover all the decaying boats he took to the dump.

Green is keen for Britain to follow the French model, in which boat manufacturers have to pay an eco-contribution for every boat sold. This is combined with an annual tax on boat owners – who are easy to track down because boats have to be licensed – and used to fund 35 free-to-use boat scrapping centers across France.

 The Association pour la Plaisance Eco-Responsable, which runs these centers, has removed more than 16,000 boats since it was launched in 2019

when 1986 Daytona 500 winner Geoff Bodine was invited to visit the Lake Placid Olympic training center in the early ‘90s he became fascinated by the bobsleds. In 1992 he founded Bo-Dyn Bobsled Project, Inc. In 2002, they won silver and bronze, in 2010, they made the fastest sled in the world, and won gold


  After hearing how the US was an also-ran entrant in the sport using borrowed technology from Europe, Geoff decided to bring his chassis designer Bob Cuneo ( I wonder if he is related to Terence or Joan? https://justacarguy.blogspot.com/search?q=cuneo  ) in to see how they could create the next level sled and lead the US to success.


With Bo-Dyn technology, the U.S. won silver and bronze for the four-man race in 2002 but still lacked that little something extra to top the podium. 

After another eight years of cutting-edge innovation and development, the Bo-Dyn Bobsled Project unveiled “Night Train,” a $250,000 state-of-the-art American-made bobsled. Dubbed the fastest sled in the world


These advancements proved so successful that European teams began bidding for the sleds, a complete turn-of-the-table from the imported European sleds of the early ’90’s.

Bodine refused. “The money was dangled out in front of us to see if we would cave in and sell some of our equipment, but we said no,” said Bodine. “We didn’t do it for profit. We did it for our American athletes and no one else.”

in 2010, the U.S. Olympic Men’s Bobsled Team won its first gold medal since 1948, ending a 62-year drought

The push team included a New York Army National Guardsman, and a biological systems engineering PhD and middle linebacker for the University of Nebraska Cornhuskers.

(I've already touched on Olympic bob sled teams recruiting exceptional football athletes https://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2024/09/you-never-know-what-youre-going-to-find.html when I met Justin Orr, 2010 Olympics Bob Sled team)


the beauty of Bugatti


I don't think I've come across this Von Dutch truck until now, and I haven't been able to find anything else about it


Michael Furman is still publishing excellent photos










very COOL game of chance for car events! Thank you Nitto for this !!






bumper stickers spotted in traffic

 

So, I had to look that up

spotted in a garage parking lot while it's engine is getting rebuilt at an engine shop



“Cotton” Owens — with help from family, friends and a team of highly qualified craftsmen from the Spartanburg, S.C., racing community — built this 1964 Dodge Polara to replicate his original Polara race car.



But until you see a close up, you won't get a kick out of the headlight covers, maybe the coolest ones I've seen 


I think you'll agree, bitchin' spare parts use!