Saturday, June 08, 2024

this year the Carlow Rally marks the 20th year since the Mk II Challenge, Ireland's ongoing version of the IROC, but on pot hole bumpy rally roads, with 50 Ford Escort Mk IIs competing




and a proper trophy! 


See the full video at


  but seriously, skip the first minute, then learn a bit about it, it was originally started as a low cost series using existing out of date cars, the top spec is now 2.5 litre, 9k RPM, 6 speed, limited ‘125% of max factory displacement’ engine size rule, 2wd. 

Fully plumbed, this car tips the scales under 2,204lb, with a power-to-weight ratio on a par with the latest Porsche GT3 RS.

then get to 6:50 to see the start of the racing

Thank you Kim! 

Vought Heritage Foundation built a replica of a O3U observation biplane. Thank you George!



Today, there are just two original Corsairs left in the world, both of which are export models. A V-93S is displayed at the Royal Thai Air Force Museum in Bangkok, Thailand, and the uncovered fuselage of a V-65F exists in the Museo de la Aviación Naval Argentina in Bahía Blanca, Argentina.

However, no original examples of the O2U or O3U were preserved in the United States, but Grand Prairie, Texas a dedicated group of volunteers at the Vought Heritage Foundation recently completed a reproduction of an O3U-3 Corsair.

Creative live-fire training for USAAF gunners, 1942 (skip the 1st 22 seconds and there's nothing worth seeing after 1:16)


Here's the guy driving the jeep around the banked corner BAILING for his LIFE!




Why didn't they just mount this to a small train cart with an engine that rolled around without putting a soldier down range of live fire? Kinda damn stupid


anyway, at some other gun range, is a LOT of top turret gunners getting in some practice


Friday, June 07, 2024

automakers have been caught selling that data to the detriment of owners, and it has drawn the investigative eye of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton

Paxton is going after the companies under the state's Deceptive Trade Practices—Consumer Protection Act. It allows the attorney general to investigate companies for false, misleading, or deceptive acts. The office has already requested information from the involved carmakers and the third parties to whom they have sold data.

Paxton called the unauthorized collection of driver data "invasive" and "disturbing" and said that it requires "a thorough investigation and appropriate enforcement."

Paxton's office had sent "civil investigation demand" letters to at least four automakers in April—Kia, General Motors, Subaru, and Mitsubishi. The attorney general's office is seeking company documents about the "disclosures they made to customers about the extent of their data collection practices and subsequent sale of their customers's data."

The investigation arrives after The New York Times revealed in March that GM, Kia, Subaru, and Mitsubishi have all shared driver data to a portal for insurers, and some GM drivers saw their insurance rates rise as a result. US lawmakers this year have also accused Toyota, BMW, Nissan, Mazda, Mercedes-Benz, and others of sharing vehicle location data with police without a warrant or court order, raising even more privacy concerns.

here is what's called a pigtail bridge in the Custer State Park in the Badlands National Forest of South Dakota, right by Mt Rushmore


on the Iron Mountain scenic road, a 17-mile journey with 14 switchbacks, 314 hairpin curves, 3 pigtail bridges, and 3 narrow tunnels

the tunnels leading to Mount Rushmore were perfectly aligned so as you enter, Mount Rushmore is framed majestically at the far end. It teases visitors the entire way, building excitement for the participants. The Pigtail Bridges compliment the road by solving a problem and providing an exciting corkscrew route down the mountain.

do you want to trade a fortune for a remarkable So Cal racetrack? Willow Springs is hitting the auction block after 62 years under the care of Bill Huth and his family



Opened in 1953 with design help from Miles, Willow Springs met the need for a fast racecourse as the southern California automotive scene exploded in the postwar era. After experiments with a few NASCAR races failed to turn it into a pro track, it was purchased by Bill Huth in 1962, whose son told MotorTrend in 2015 that he only bought it because he wanted to turn Big Willow's front straight into a drag strip.

It turned out to be too short, thankfully, so the road course survived. Over the decades, Huth added the other tracks and expanded Willow Springs into its present form, always careful to keep its original character. Huth was still calling the shots when he passed away in 2015 at the age of 91, but since then his family continued to operate the track as he did until apparently deciding to sell this year.

It's probably going to get bought by some asset investment firm who will utterly screw up and try to sell it piecemeal to condo companies who think they can find people who want to live track side in the desert (unlike the ones that actually succeed in the east with hills, trees, and nearby cities) 

This would be perfect for a company in the autocrossing business like Speedtech, Lingenfelter, USCA, SCCA, etc

Honor Blackman (Avengers, Bond movie Goldfinger) was a 15 year old dispatch rider in WW2!



During World War II, at the age of 15, Honor became a motorcycle dispatch rider for Britain’s Home Office. She helped play a crucial role in the war effort delivering vital information and messages between headquarters and remote field units. “I was only just old enough to ride a bike and my mother was terrified, but I thought it was heaven. It was pretty dangerous because we were in the midst of war and had to mask the headlights during the blackout. Bombs were falling, but the roar of the motorbike engine used to drown out the sound of the doodlebugs (the German V1 rocket bombs) so we never heard them coming. It seemed terribly exciting to me.”


She studied part time while holding down a clerical job in the Home Office, and, with war raging, also worked as a motor cycle dispatch rider.

Toadboy65 gave me a compliment of the day!

I keep forgetting to say how wonderful this blog is. I read and enjoy it every day.

I'll be damned, someone FINALLY got the message, and is doing the right thing - TRAINING people who want a job, and what's more, free housing during the 16 week training course! They must be DESPERATE!


Navy Secretary Carlos Del Toro returned from a tour of Japanese and South Korean shipyards with strong words for U.S. contractors.

“For those companies that are having problems in retention, damn it, take better care of your people!" 

Worker shortages had been building for years—and then came the pandemic, said one industry leader.

“There was already a challenge in the manufacturing workforce, and we were gonna have to ramp labor to meet the demand. COVID accelerated that. What we didn't expect is inflation,” said Christopher Kastner, CEO of Huntington Ingalls Industries.

For now, the focus is on public outreach “to attract Americans into well-paying careers in submarine manufacturing,” Dames said.

And that doesn't necessarily mean moving to fucking Virginia



The U.S. Navy, along with its shipbuilders and their thousands of specialty suppliers, need more than 100,000 workers to help build attack and ballistic missile submarines over the coming decade. That’s according to BuildSubmarines.com, whose ubiquitous ads you may have seen during reality TV shows, on NASCAR hoods, at WNBA games, and amid Major League Baseball broadcasts.

Last year, the BuildSubmarines.com website was launched, as part of a “We Build Giants” ad blitz that targeted high school graduates, troops leaving the service, trade workers looking for something new, and other job seekers. (never heard of it until just now from George!) 

In September, the company added a BuildSubmarines.com career portal powered by recruiting site ZipRecruiter. The site has since amassed more than 3 million visits and 147,000 clicks to apply for jobs, said Katherine Dames, who leads BlueForge Alliance’s workforce division.

“For individuals who already have the skills and experience in welding, machining, electrical, additive manufacturing, or engineering, we can connect them to immediate openings across the country through BuildSubmarines.com,” Dames said. “For individuals who think manufacturing might be the career for them, we can connect them to high-quality training—sometimes at no cost to the individual.”

One such program is the two-year-old Accelerated Training in Defense Manufacturing initiative run by an agency of the Virginia state government. It provides workers with nearly four months of training—for free!—and enables them to leave with a certification in additive manufacturing, CNC machining, non-destructive testing, quality control inspection/metrology, or welding.

“It's completely funded by the U.S. Navy, it is tuition-free for accepted students, and the housing is no cost,” said Debbie Fuchs, strategic communications and marketing manager for the state’s Institute For Advanced Learning And Research. “It's a really intense process…basically going to school from 8 [a.m.] to 5 [p.m.] every day, Monday through Friday for 16 weeks.” (like every Navy school I had, 2.25 year of schools)

“Specifically, the Navy is working to train people and place them in the submarine industrial base and those manufacturing jobs. So the big national campaign is ‘build submarines’,” Fuchs said.

Since 2021, the Danville-based program has graduated 472 students, with 60 percent placed in submarine and defense industrial base jobs, according to IALR’s website.  That’s just a fraction of what’s needed, but every bit helps.


Navy officials did NOT (HUH! IMAGINE THAT) answer questions about the origins of this innovative approach and how much money they are pouring into it. But the idea that a branch of the U.S. military would fund an aggressive effort to help a key industrial segment find and develop workers is logical, one expert said.

“It’s a very sensible notion of building up the workforce, training workers for skilled jobs. And you've seen that across many different industries, different times. And so it's doable, and it's sensible.

The question is time, of course. It takes, really, years to take someone off the street and turn them into a skilled welder, which is one of those critical skills you need for submarines. And you have to get enough people interested in, frankly, blue-collar jobs that are a little dirty and a little uncomfortable, but pay well,” said Mark Cancian, Center for Strategic and International Studies.

“And the Navy needs it, because the Navy wants to expand submarine production. I mean, it's basically unable to even produce what it's been funded to produce, and wants to expand it. Now, what's been funded is two Virginia-class submarines a year plus one Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine. They can't even build that. And many people want to go to one ballistic missile submarine and three Virginias. So to do that, you have to expand the workforce. And there are other elements of the supply chains you have to expand also. But workforce has been one of the major constraints.”

Indeed, the shipbuilding industrial base is “still losing more people than is healthy on a year-by-year basis,” Nickolas Guertin, the Navy’s acquisition chief, told lawmakers on April 17.

“We need to get into a better place so we can understand how to interact fluidly, flexibly, and efficiently with industry so we do a better job of building these ships,” Guertin said. “These welders, pipefitters, electricians, pipefitters, they are vital to our ability to provide the resources the Navy and Marine Corps are going to use to defend the nation. We need to stop thinking of them as fungible and think of them as strategic assets.”  (and pay them right, what it costs to buy a house. Having a professional career job, like a welder, CNC operator, etc, who will remain broke and renting? Ain't gonna fly)

Building up the workforce is key to the Navy’s 30-year plan to grow to 387 subs and ships, but the problem is hardly confined to the future. In April, for example, Naval Sea Systems Command chief Vice Adm. James Downey said the difficulties in hiring and retaining workers at Fincantieri Marinette Marine’s busy Wisconsin shipyard were contributing to the three-year delay of the $22 billion program guided missile frigate program.

Worker shortages had been building for years—and then came the pandemic, said one industry leader.

“There was already a challenge in the manufacturing workforce, and we were gonna have to ramp labor to meet the demand. COVID accelerated that. What we didn't expect is inflation,” said Christopher Kastner.

That inflation, coupled with rising minimum wages, shrank the pay gap between entry-level shipbuilders and what someone could make working retail, he said. And it’s hard getting workers to choose a career in manufacturing.

“It's challenging, tough work. And the cost to switch for them is very simple. And that's where we have high attrition rates,” Kastner told reporters at a media lunch in April. “So we're working very hard with the Navy and with our local communities to try to get programs in place that make it positive for someone to become a shipbuilder in the community.”

In March, Navy Secretary Carlos Del Toro had strong words for U.S. contractors.

“For those companies that are having problems in retention, damn it, take better care of your people,” Del Toro said, as reported by USNI News. “If they can’t find housing in your local communities, well, then work with the governments to build housing in the local communities to get about it. That’s what problem-solvers do.”

Kastner said the company is already working to meet people where they are.

“We need to provide more flexibility for shipbuilders, when they come in. Historically, it had been a very binary arrangement: ‘come to work or you're gonna get fired’, right? So we provide much more flexibility for shipbuilders now,” including time off at the beginning of the process while new workers acclimate to the job, he said. “We used to just train them and send them out to a crew. Now, we train them, we bring their foreman into the training center and we put them out as a team.”

HII is also recruiting outside immediate areas around shipyards and using data analytics to determine which areas are more successful and targeted incentives.

“We actually just started a pilot program down in Mississippi, where if you stay and your attendance is good, and you're consistent for this and add no work violations, we're going to increase your pay by a certain amount over that time period. We're paying machinists more in Newport News, [Virginia], in some places where it's critical to get the job done. So we're doing targeted incentives in various areas that we have critical needs,” Kastner said. “We have Chick-fil-A at Ingalls…So we are having to meet the new employee where they're at versus just assuming they're going to come in with two years of training and metal shop at high school and wanting to get right to work in the shipyard.”

BlueForge Alliance and its partners have their work cut out for them. But if their template works, other parts of the Pentagon and defense industry might come knocking. Already, the company has a much smaller contract to help build up a 3D-printing industry on Guam.

For now, the focus is on public outreach “to attract Americans into well-paying careers in submarine manufacturing,” Dames said.


Thank you George!

It must have been great to be a Model T or Model A mechanic. I am watching "Vise Grip Garage" on Max (Hbo Max, Max +... whatever the hell it's going to be called 5 minutes from now) and the episode on the Detroit Model A is a quick lesson in simple engines 101


I am getting a kick out of the host, Derek ... he's a fun guy, and damn good at running patter while working on cars in the field, or in the garage. 

I recommend the show, either on Max, or You Tube. But You Tube has a short video, and the ones on Max are 45 minutes, roughly. 

Derek has some FUN sayings... 
for example, he calls a sledgehammer (used for breaking loose brake drums) a Tonya Harding 3000.

he calls a rattle can paint job in an engine bay, or on the engine, a "Craigslist Rebuild"

he calls a cutting torch is a "gas axe"

I'm gonna do the right thing and pretend I didn't see that. 
richer than Oprah Winfrey. 
That's hotter than Shania Twain in the 90s
I can’t believe this but I guess I got to, I’m looking right at it!
Holy Terry Labonte! (I love that one)
Hood Prop 300
Ice Cube Juice
Time for Cold Snacks (beer)
I wonder what Reba McEntire is doing right now? 
Terminator Broccoli (throttle body) 

He makes up the most impressive descriptions for smells when discovering the stench of decades of dead animals and whatever in the trunk
"smells like a hot armpit of old dentures"
Smells like a cross between 87 octane, Pennzoil, a high school gym locker and Sasquatch.
Smells like a horse hoof dipped in gas station nacho cheese
Smells like a bowling shoe mouse house with a hint of green onion
Smells like a wet shoebox full of alligator feet and red onions
Smells like a potato sack full of cigar boxes and a lotta regret

https://www.reddit.com/r/vicegripgarage/comments/ydfwl0/smells_like/

Have you ever heard of the Model A engine timing pin? A simple great idea for easily finding TDC.


pointing to the pin, which is threaded into the front cover... it's removed, then flipped over, pushed into the hole it had been in, with your finger, where it will ride along the face of the gear (while you sloly rotate the crank by hand) UNTIL that one little dimple that it has machined into it for No 1 piston TDC. When the pin pushes in, you're EXACTLY on TDC and can set your ignition timing. 


skip to minute 2:42 

Wednesday, June 05, 2024

As of February 2024, Doyle Archer was recognized by Guinness World Records as the world's oldest male truck driver at 90 years and 55 days old.


Doyle was recently awarded a “Million Mile Safe Driver” accolade after hauling goods safely for 1 million miles without any incidents at his company of the last 20 years, Coomes Inc. in Phillipsburg, Kansas. “Anything you can haul in a truck, I have hauled it,” the world’s oldest trucker said. “My favorite views I’ve been able to witness are the mountain views, scenic prairies, and the timbered forest of this great country.”

the first 3 cars I owned, all rusty and mostly painted rattle can gray. 1992-94




 72 318 Barracuda I made a 340, 71 Challenger 340 and 727, 72 Demon 340 and 904. 

I think I paid 400 for the Barracuda, 1200 for the Demon, and 3k for the Challenger. I loved those slotted mags. I got the back ones from a guy who bought them for his 68 Road Runner, and they won't fit on that 68 Road Runner unless you change something about the back and he wanted to keep his car stock except for the wheels. 

the Gov of New York calls it quits on NYC congestion pricing. Turns out that's a bad idea in an election year... it pisses off the voters

The plan to toll drivers in Manhattan south of 60th Street was designed to reduce gridlock and pollution while funding billions worth of mass transit upgrades.

Instead, it would result in protests, voters trying to get the opposition elected, etc

67 Rambler Rebel was originally acquired by the owner of an AMC dealership, in 1979, it was presented to his nine-year-old son as a gift. The kid didn't want it. So, it waited 43 years in a barn




https://www.autoevolution.com/news/rare-heirloom-1967-rambler-rebel-sst-convertible-last-run-in-1979-old-gas-smells-divine-226613.html#

This video only gets to where the car is taken to a garage, put on a lift, had the brakes, tires, and carb replaced, then if you want to see the rest of the story, you need to got to HBO / Max and look for the season 1 finale if "Roadworthy Rescues" 

It turns out, this is an edited teaser video, the same video on Max, is 43 minutes, and just the above video section of 13 minutes is more like 19 on the streaming service. 

70 Nova SS


I can't remember seeing anyone drive one of these in 30 years. 

I just learned from this article that the 1962 Chevy II was the base trim, and the Nova was the high price trim. 

I don't know, or care, what resulted in this kid's getting his grand dad's farm and tools, but what I found interesting is that the kids decided to clean up the decades of clutter... and organized the tools... there are 57 crescent wrenches, and 554 combo wrenches



that's a ridiculous amount of wrenches... I can't think anyone has any use for more than 4 or 5 sets of wrenches. One for home, one for the remote job, one for a fix in the field, one to bring in the truck to help a buddy. 
 And it's ridiculous to have more than a dozen adjustable/crescent wrenches. I think it's a bad idea to use them in any circumstance except larger than 1" nuts or bolts that don't need torque, but having one really effing big crescrent wrench saves you hundreds of dollars in 4 or 5 combo wrenches you'll probably never use more than once. 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgCtxMu7zM0