Tuesday, October 29, 2024

they temporary bridge was quickly built by locals and volunteers in Northeastern Tennessee for crossing the river bed after the real bridge was destroyed during flooding from Hurricane Helene




three flatbed trailers placed parallel, because they are easy to install and remove, and the load rating of a semi trailer is a known quantity!

because locals still need supplies, whether it be food, building materials, or what have you, and when there’s only one way in and out of town, they have to do all they can to keep it open.


This is similar to using railroad car beds like I posted in years past 

Monday, October 28, 2024

previous crashes the Osprey had were attributed to a recurring “hard clutch engagement”. However, in the November 2023 crash, investigators pointed to the gearbox as the cause in their preliminary findings. Now they have a "Why" and "How"

While both the publicly released AIB and the internal SIB blamed this single gear, the latter mentioned that the “single crack” was “similar to those seen on seven previous failures in low-speed planetary pinion gears.” Five of those prior failures, which go back to 2013, were caused by “non-metallic inclusions” – defects in the metal alloy from which the gears were made.

Universal Stainless, a key supplier for Boeing – itself facing allegations of shoddy manufacturing standards amid a standoff with workers’ unions – has a history of quality control issues dating back to 2001. At the time the company was sued by Teledyne Technologies for defective steel that caused “multiple crankshaft failures” in aircraft engines, with “over 90% of the crankshafts found to be flawed.”

Former Universal Stainless employees describe a toxic workplace culture with equipment dating back to the 1950s, pressure to prioritize production over quality, “racial discrimination and unsafe working conditions.” Universal is now facing lawsuits from multiple former employees, for racial and age discrimination, disregard for safety, and retaliation against whistleblowing employees.

Hunterbrook cites the 2014 case of British aerospace major Rolls Royce, which discovered a “large air pocket” in the center of a steel bar produced by Universal. Smith told Hunterbook: “We got this bar back and the ends were great, but the middle of the bar had this massive air pocket in it. I don’t understand how you miss that.” He added that somehow the bar had been passed through about “10 departments.”

In this context, Smith said that the steel is “refined by an outdated facility” at Dunkirk in New York, unlike its “state-of-the-art” and “sophisticated” plant at North Jackson, Ohio. Some equipment “dates back to the 1950s” or even “the World War era”. “You can’t even get parts for this stuff.” Smith added. During his time at Universal Stainless, meetings addressed manufacturing only “after a customer discovered a problem, rather than through internal quality control.”

Summed up, there simply was poor quality control and outdated equipment at the steel company behind the failed gears on the ill-fated CV-22 Osprey


Thank you George! 

if you had these full race incredibly valuable winged Mopars leaving your event, wouldn't you stop oncoming traffic for 30 seconds?


skip the first 30 seconds on this next one

this poor little Ranchero is stuck in a damn tow truck yard... it's like an innocent convict in jail

did a need for attention cause them to dress out their Mustang like the Batmobile? Or is it just putting on a Halloween costume

I parked near this the other day

 

Squareback spotted in traffic the other day,





thanks to you guys that quickly reminded me of the name of this model!

For some unknown reason, there are a couple Chevy Malibus with Colorado Fleet license plates in my area. That's sorta strange.

Hasn't seen daylight since mid 80's and a 10,000 mile original survivor. Still factory paint and interior.





VW will be slashing jobs, closing factories, according to the union

the auto giant aims to shut at least three factories in Germany, downsize its remaining plants and lay off tens of thousands of staff as part of a cost-cutting drive.

the results are posts of the Rudi Klein junkyard collection $9,355

 
the 1956 Mercedes-Benz 300 SL 'Alloy' Gullwing sold for $9,355,000

most of the 911 engines sold for about 4k














the Vega air filter, was known as the "bedpan of doom"




GM decided to put the paper filter inside an unopenable metal housing. The housing was still made in two pieces, and was pretty similar to a regular air cleaner design, but the top and bottom were permanently crimped together to enclose the air filter element inside. This assembly then bolted onto the carburetor directly.

the 513th Expeditionary Rapid Engineer Deployable Heavy Operational Repair Squadron Engineers (RED HORSE) Airmen, have spent the past year or so restoring World War II-era airfields on the Pacific island of Tinian.



Dirt Boyz is the term for civil engineer Airmen who get their hands dirty pouring concrete, operating bulldozers, fixing pipes, and all the other work involved in maintaining an air base or building a new one.

Last year, the 820th RED HORSE Squadron from Nellis Air Force Base, Nev., arrived at Tinian to restore the runways at North Field, a complex of ramps, runways, and taxiways at the island’s north end.

the U.S. seized Tinian from Japan in August, 1944, and “As soon as the island was seized, the Seabees, the Navy’s construction battalions, began work on the largest airbase of World War II—and in fact the largest airfield in the world at the time,” according to the National Park Service.

The base had six 8,500-foot runways: four in North Field and two more farther south at West Field.

The former West Field became the Tinian International Airport and is still in use to this day: Air Force F-22 fighters landed there for the first time in March 2023. That year, the Air Force went public with its plans to restore North Field, with then-Pacific Air Forces commander Gen. Kenneth Wilsbach telling Nikkei Asia that the area would be transformed into an “extensive” facility. The Air Force received $79 million in its 2024 budget for construction projects on the island.

The return to Tinian is part of a strategy called Agile Combat Employment, where, in a conflict with China, small groups of Airmen would launch and recover aircraft from small, scattered air bases to avoid being targeted by long-range missiles. Tinian is one of several locations across the Pacific where the Air Force may operate in a future conflict.

But preparing those airfields takes work, and that’s where units such as RED HORSE come in. The 823rd RED HORSE Squadron from Hurlburt Field, Fla., spent more than six months restoring and rebuilding North Field, putting up new structures and clearing eight decades of overgrown vegetation, according to an April press release. The 823rd went home in April, but other RED HORSE units and Navy Seabees took up the task, with the goal of restoring over 20 million square feet of degraded World War II pavement.


https://www.airandspaceforces.com/air-force-red-horse-wwii-airfield-tinian/

Sunday, October 27, 2024

North Carolina officials initially estimated the road to Big Chimney would take several months to almost a year to complete. Blue-collar workers, team of volunteer West Virginia coal miners, prevailed over bureaucracy by rebuilding a road at breakneck speed on their own terms – allowing residents to finally return home, and they accomplished the task in less than a week.


Also thanks to Paul Panson at A&P for donating additional equipment and manpower. 
Left to right: Charles Dunbar Darrell McCune Jimmy Wood Stephen Boone Jeff Barnhouse (with Rock Solid Construction) Ben Harris Derek Butler Bobby Thomas Jon Campbell








“The DOT (North Carolina Department of Transportation) said ‘yeah, we’ll send some engineers down here and assess the situation.’

“The Army Corps of Engineers took a look and said they’d send some surveyors and engineers, I told them you might as well not waste your time because the West Virginia guys will have this road built before you finish your paperwork,” Lewis continued.

“Then the West Virginia boys came in and said, ‘We’ll have this road punched in in about three days.’ No s–t,” he recalled.

Not a final approved DOT road but an access road to get the people in and out with a SxS or a 4x4 truck.

Fun Tech Lab made a variety of sizes of miniature wind tunnel can be fun just to compare the aerodynamics of your diecast cars on your workbench or desk top




https://www.thedrive.com/news/funtech-lab-scaled-down-desktop-toy-car-wind-tunnel-price-specs-pictures
https://www.fun-tech-lab.com/


Pricing for the 1/18-scale, 1/24-scale, and 1/64-scale wind tunnels is set at $429, $339, and $239, respectively, excluding taxes and shipping.

There were two larger models, they instantly sold out with the Kickstarter

I never heard of a 1969 Pontiac Custom S until now, it was a one year only model


Pontiac’s 1969 Custom S was positioned between the lowly Tempest and the LeMans

The Custom S replaced the Tempest Custom, which had been a trim level for the Tempest since its debut in 1961. The Custom was a slightly upmarket version of the Tempest, with creature comforts like an all-Morrokide interior and a convertible body style not available for the base Tempest. A 175-hp, 250-cubic inch inline-six came standard, much like the base Tempest. Those who wanted a bit more visual excitement could opt for the Tempest Custom Sprint, which added a hotter 215-hp inline-six and some GTO-esque styling.

Pontiac didn't change its stance much when it introduced the Custom S in 1969. It was still the cheapest way to get a convertible Tempest, still came with the 175-hp inline-six as standard, and continued to top out at the 300 hp-plus high-output 350-cubic inch V8, albeit with 330 hp for 1969. Essentially identical to the old Tempest Custom,


https://www.slashgear.com/1693706/rare-pontiac-models-might-not-know-about/

art by Jean-Marie Guivarc'h

 



rare all-original 1970 slant-six Barracuda that a woman bought in 1970 as a retirement gift to herself, and she kept it until now, when it's been put on Ebay, for 43k, obo. It's not likely to get more than 25k. It's rusty

 

Must be a strange thing to make better photos with the Corvettes you've rescued, than the best the wrecks you've found will ever become.



I don't think either the 54 or the 76 will ever be worth the trouble they went through to get them out of this property, but the photos are excellent! 

I didn't hear about the new Delorean "Time Capsule" until just now. Well, that's a month past the "open window" for registering to get one. There are only 88 physical time capsules


I just saw the video, whish is ridiculously slow, and only slighlty amusing, but do yourself a favor, set the video speed to at least 1.5x


the new Scout did a really cool promo video for the new reveal, with a CCR 8 track

Finally Nascar has ruled, that the 1971 Bowman Gray race was won by Bobby Allison! Why the contentious omission for decades as to who won? Because of Nascar's preference for Richard Petty!




The race at Bowman Gray was one of six events in the 1971 season in which Grand National and smaller Grand American race cars shared a track. 

Between 1968 and 1971, NASCAR promoted Grand American races for what were known as pony cars. These Mustangs, Camaros, Cougars, Firebirds and Javelins generally ran standalone events but often were invited to help fill Grand National (now, Cup) grids.

Allison was a competitor in both divisions and elected to drive his No. 49 NASCAR Ford Mustang, which was classified as a Grand American race car. Allison led 138 of 200 laps around the quarter-mile oval, and while he was awarded the trophy, the win was never officially recognized and did not count toward his victory tally.


Now that Allison has been officially credited with winning at Bowman Gray in 1971, he has 85 victories to his name, this breaks the long-standing tie with fellow Hall of Famer Darrell Waltrip. Allison moves to having sole possession of fourth on the all-time NASCAR Cup Series win list.

Allison only trails Richard Petty with 200 wins, David Pearson with 105, and Jeff Gordon with 93.


“For 53 years, the Myers Brothers Memorial was the only race run by NASCAR that did not have an official winner,” said Jim France, NASCAR chairman and CEO, in a statement. “As we began preparations for the upcoming Clash at Bowman Gray Stadium, the topic of that August 6, 1971 race returned to the forefront. We felt it was the right thing to officially recognize Bobby’s win and honor him as an 85-time NASCAR Cup Series winner. We are grateful for Bobby’s lifetime contributions to NASCAR.”

Understandably, Petty was unhappy with the grid and the results. “I figured something like this would happen,” he said at the time. “They’ll probably win all these (combination) races. (Cup) racing isn’t supposed to be filled with Mustangs and Camaros.”

Forty-six years later, he felt no different. “Bobby won, but shouldn’t have gotten credit for it,” he insisted at Daytona Beach in July 2017. “The cars weren’t the same; those cars were too different. I shouldn’t have gotten credit, but Bobby shouldn’t have, either. That was a Cup race, and he wasn’t in a Cup car.”

I did a LONG post about this in 2018

and I have no idea why, but I revisited the topic for a SHORT post 2 months ago
I can guess that I forgot I'd posted about it 6 years ago


Saturday, October 26, 2024

I always avoided reading Jalopnik and Hooniverse back when they started so that I wouldn't repost their stuff, because it would uselessly redundant to have their material on my blog, everyone was already reading their blogs.

 I just wondered a moment ago if Hooniverse was still even in business. Not really, it sold out years ago. 

How can a person tell? 

Here's the words from their origin post:

Hooniverse intends to be the dumping ground for everything that’s not going to generate enough traffic at sites where they care about such things. Posts will never be optimized to maximize search results. Word count is irrelevant. Hooniverse does not cover Automotive News in the traditional sense.

and look at it's posts lately, they are some useless garbage




New car reviews for traffic, lots of crap optimized for search results. Damn shame. It began as a fun site. 

It sure as hell was trying to avoid doing car reviews on boring new vehicles from Lexus, Subaru, McLaren, Genesis, Nissan and Honda