Showing posts with label info. Show all posts
Showing posts with label info. Show all posts

Sunday, September 08, 2024

there were 5500 car companies in the USA before 1942. There were only 60 automakers in 2021, owned by 14 massive global companies

There were only 60 automakers in 2021, owned by 14 massive global companies

I think this indicates how once anyone could make anything, with zero lawyers and govt regulations, and now, the only way to get anything done is to have massive millions of dollars of investment, destroy a couple dozen units in crash tests. 

Wednesday, August 23, 2023

stats, facts, and info on states and driving

Montana has the worst drivers in the country. Although most drivers in the state have car insurance coverage, the state ranked poorly for safe driving habits.

getting ranked as having the worst drivers, is because of factors such as:
 having higher rates of fatalities related to driving under the influence,
 driving while distracted, and speeding,
 lower rates of seat belt usage and
 lower percentages of insured motorists — 
 all factors that make roads more dangerous and put other drivers at risk.

New Mexico and South Carolina have the second and third-worst drivers overall, with the former receiving the lowest Safe Driving Habits score and the latter receiving the lowest Safe Driving Choices score in the country.

Mississippi has the highest percentage of uninsured drivers (30%) of any state.

New Jersey is home to the U.S.’s best drivers, receiving the highest score for Safe Driving Choices and having the highest percentage of drivers with insurance (96.9%). The state also has an above-average Safe Driving Habits score.

Minnesota has the highest score for Safe Driving Habits, meaning it has lower rates of unrestrained and distracted driving fatalities and higher rates of seatbelt use.


Sources:
Federal Bureau of Investigation. "Crime Data Explorer." Accessed May 31, 2023.
Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. "Fatality Facts 2021 State by State." Accessed May 31, 2023.
Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. "Fatality Facts 2021: Males and females." Accessed June 6, 2023.
Insurance Research Council. "Uninsured Motorists, 2021 Edition." Accessed May 31, 2023.
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. "Overview of Motor Vehicle Traffic Crashes in 2021." Accessed May 31, 2023.
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. "Fatality and Injury Reporting System Tool (FIRST)." Accessed May 31, 2023.
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. "Seat Belts." Accessed May 31, 2023.
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. "NHTSA Early Estimates for Traffic Fatalities in 2022." Accessed May 31, 2023.
National Safety Council. "Seat Belts." Accessed June 6, 2023.
U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Highway Administration. "Highway Statistics 2021." Accessed May 31, 2023.

Wednesday, July 26, 2017

the Jenks scale to differentiate between fake cars and real ones.

available on Amazon.com for 20 bucks

ORIGINAL
 A car is original if it is exactly such as on the day of its exit from the workshop. It is impossible today to find a car that deserves this qualifier. It would have had to be "put under bell" at the moment of its manufacture! The only one is perhaps the Trossi-Monaco which never took the start of the race for which it was built, the Grand Prix of Italy 1935, and which entered the museum the next day!

TRUE
 A car whose chain of owners is perfectly followed, which has never ceased to be kept in working order, endowed with its original organs, which has never been modified and which, when it is indispensable, Has been professionally repaired with original components without altering its technical or aesthetic characteristics.

AUTHENTIC
After having lived his life as a competitor, underwent modifications, the car was either restored to its original state thanks to its original parts that had been preserved, or put back in one of the configurations that had been his at a Time of his career.

RENAISSANCE
A rebirth is a car rebuilt from original elements and new parts, after the initial car was abandoned, dismantled, and of which there are only a few disparate elements left when an amateur decided to give it back to life . So it was rebuilt from its ashes ... some of which had already flown!

RECONSTRUCTION
A car born from the assembly of elements from different cars that had never been brought together before, possibly supplemented by remodeled organs.

INVENTION
An invention is a car that never existed. One copy in addition to the series produced, entirely realized with new parts. It can also be described as false, clone, copy, reproduction ...

REPLICA
Describes the name "replica" as an "invention" that was made outside the normal production period of the car, but by the same firm as the original cars (editor's note: they can also be called " Continuations "). They can sometimes be very difficult to detect

DOUBLE
 Evil was born among the Bugattists. Some unscrupulous collectors sold to two different amateurs the parts of the same car, batches mixing engine components, body parts and chassis pieces. The amateurs, in good faith, completed the puzzle with original pieces - it existed a lot at one time. One morning, two Bugatti of Grand Prix, each one hit, here and there, of the same serial numbers, appeared on a circuit ... Only way out of the situation: buy the two cars to recompose the original car, then sell The remaining organs on the market of the spare part"

Denis Jenkinson was part of the Grand Prix tour. " Jenks " spoke little, listened much, looked avidly, wrote intensely. When he raised his hand, drivers, engineers, mechanics, even Bernie Ecclestone stopped to answer the question he had not yet asked. Jenks was in his nineties, the oldest, most learned, most respected of all Formula 1 journalists.

Jenks had studied engineering, and raced in motorsports on two and four wheels - always alongside the biggest. Without having the financial means to pilot, he co-drove or navigated, even was the monkey alongside sidecar world champion Eric Oliver in 1949, and Stirling Moss won the Mille Miglia of '55 with Mercede thanks to Jenks' inspired navigation notes, one of the most fantastic victories of Moss' career.

But more to the point, and the expertise about race cars, Jenks was a freelance journalist at the end of World War II for the English reference magazine MotorSport , a zealous observer of the starting grids, an attentive reviewer of the engagement sheets and a pugnacious interviewer. He lived seven days a week on the circuits, in contact with the stables, at the drivers' table. And, above all, he noticed everything, threw away nothing, methodically classifying his notebooks and the images he took during his encounters, races he attended - with special attention to everything that touched Maserati, on which he had written reference works.

Exasperated by the increasingly frequent appearance of more and more fake cars in the English historical meetings, Jenks opened his enormous archives.

In 1987, he published the masterpiece of his work under the title " Directory of Historic Racing Cars - The Survivors- Genuine, Authentic and Fake ". This little book, at 190 pages, had all the main vintage racing cars that could be seen on the circuits, describing their degree of authenticity, modifications, recreations, and deceptions ...

Seismologists have the Richter, sailors the Beaufort, and collectors now have the Jenkinson scale

http://www.aonclassiccar.fr/2016/07/vraies-et-fausses-voitures-de-collection-l-echelle-de-jenkinson/

coincidence that this topic was something I recently hit on http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2017/07/how-many-parts-can-be-replaced-before.html

Wednesday, May 03, 2017

Cars 3 behind the scenes stuff, and info on stock car racing legends characters revealed


Lightning decides to return to his roots – recalling the wisdom imparted on him by his beloved mentor, the late Fabulous Hudson Hornet. Ultimately, he turns to his coach’s coach—Smokey, who was there during Doc’s heyday—for guidance and inspiration, and eventually realizes the power of mentorship.

Pixar consulted NASCAR veterans, including four-time NASCAR champion Jeff Gordon and Ray Evernham, who served as Gordon’s crew chief for three of his championships. “We did a lot of research,” says Fee. “We looked at athletes in other sports, but really focused on NASCAR drivers. They start at such an early age and their lives are centered around driving."

Then in March they held a media event for Cars 3 at Pixar Studios in San Francisco and then brought the press to the Sonoma Raceway.

Was I invited? Nope. I just learned of it. Sigh. It was probably only for hardcore Disney old blue blood press. http://www.chipandco.com was invited. I gotta see if they can tip me on who to bribe, blackmail, or pay off, in order to get on the approved press list.
“Cars 3” pays homage to four real-life stock car racing legends.
Chris Cooper voices Doc Hudson’s crew chief Smokey;
Junior Johnson lends his voice to Junior “Midnight” Moon;

The plan was to have an actor voice this part, then Pixar met the Last American Hero, the only living member of the legends. “They weren’t run off by my accent, I guess,” says the 85-year-old former moonshiner, who now pushes legal corn squeezins, also named Midnight Moon. “They gave me one line to read where my car says he discovered how to use the draft at Daytona. I looked up at the movie folks and said, ‘Yeah, that’s true. I did.'” (I just learned this last week and hadn't posted it yet)

Isiah Whitlock Jr. is the voice of River Scott.

“We did so much research on NASCAR history, and these four jumped out as these incredible stories of inspiration,” director Brian Fee says of the Cars 3 dirt-track quartet. “Lightning is at a place in his life where it’s about overcoming obstacles. No one faced longer odds than Wendell Scott, racing where he did, primarily in the South, during the era when he did it, in the 1960s, and with little money at all. It really is amazing.”

Margo Martindale provides the voice of Louise “Barnstormer” Nash; (Margo is a favorite actress of mine from enjoying her performances in Dexter, Justified, and 28 Days - terrific cast in that movie, the Rocketeer, and Nobody's Fool where she was working with Paul "Doc Hudson" Newman... crazy connection huh?)

This character is an homage to Louise Smith, the “First Lady of Racing,” who competed in NASCAR from 1945 to ’56, winning 
38 races across four divisions
In 1947, Smith drove down from Greenville, South Carolina, to watch the races on Daytona Beach. But she hated being behind the fence and entered her husband’s new Ford coupe. She wrecked out, hopped a bus home and conjured up a lie to tell Mr. Smith about the missing car, only to find out a photo of his smashed Ford was in the local papers. “We’ve all got great stories,” Johnson says of Smith. “But hers might be the best one of them all.”

http://www.chipandco.com/cars-3-introduction-next-generation-pixar-animation-maintaining-deep-roots-past-266824/

and the concept art design for Jackson Storm? By the very talented former head of Ford Global Design and Chief Creative Officer, J Mays.... most famous for designing the Audi TT, the new Beetle, and who also designed vehicles in Zootopia  http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2016/02/vehicles-in-zootopia-movie-by-pixar.html

http://www.chipandco.com/lineup-new-characters-pixars-cars-3-266917/


An homage to the famous beach races of a century ago? Pendine, Ormand, Daytona, 90 Mile Beach... ?

Wednesday, February 22, 2017

Dodge 8 3/4 axle preferences

the 3rd member has a casting, and the 741 gets a lower rating because it has a 1.375 rear pinon bearing
the 742 has 1 3/4
the 489 has 1 7/8

Since all Mopar 8 3/4 use the same diameter pinion U joint flange hole (either coarse or fine spline.) The weakest link if there is one is the same spot for all three.

But, there isn't much of a weak spot, the hemi was using the 8 3/4 so, that's pretty damn good.
http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/dodge-8-3-4-strenth.458086/

Wednesday, December 14, 2016

Bob Hope, investor, or race car enthusiast?

What was originally known as the Riverside International Motor Raceway was built in early 1957 by the West Coast Automotive Testing Corp., which was headed by Rudy Cleye of Los Angeles. 

As so often happens with planned race tracks, the organizers ran out of money and the track did not become a reality until industrialist John Edgar bailed them out with a hefty bankroll.

In 1960, oilman Ed Pauley, investor Fred Levy and comedian Bob Hope bought control of the raceway property for an estimated $800,000 and shortly afterward hired football star Les Richter to run it.

Nine years later, American Raceways, Inc., obtained nearly half of the track's stock for $1.25 million to be used in improvements--something Riverside needed to compete with the $35-million Ontario Motor Speedway a few miles to the west.

http://articles.latimes.com/1988-08-07/sports/sp-405_1_race-track/4

Tuesday, July 14, 2015

Fuji Speedway


Fuji Speedway was originally established in 1963, as Japan NASCAR. At first, the circuit was planned to hold NASCAR-style races in Japan. Therefore, the track was originally designed to be a 2.5-Mile high-banked superspeedway, but there was not enough money to complete the project and only one of the bankings was ever designed. Converted to a road course, the circuit opened in December 1965 and proved to be somewhat dangerous with the banked turn ("Daiichi") regularly resulting in major accidents. After several deaths, the turn was closed in 1974

Friday, March 27, 2015

I had an idea, that my blog is often on the Google 1st page results.Looks like it's just my computer getting these results from Google. Damn. I was going to use this on my resume!


It's always been a big deal for an event to get on the newspaper 1st page, above the fold. Failing that, to get on the 1st page below the fold...

So pardon my astonishment, and fast happy dance, for checking to see what car terms result in my making it onto the 1st page of Google results. I'm above the fold on the word Mustang, Ferrari, Hot Rod, Challenger, Chrysler, Jalopnik, Nissan


Chevelle, Camaro, Z/28, Corvette, IROC, LeMans, Le Mans, Ford, Buick, Cadillac, Viper, Barrett Jackson, Bentley, Maserati, New York Times, Plymouth, Barracuda, Charger, Model T, Civic, SRT. Mopar, Chevy, Petrolicious, Hemmings, Edmunds, Fiat, Mini, Vovlo

and even Hot Rod



What is strange, is that I've never done SEO, or paid or gotten free SEO (search engine optimization) so, is SEO all bullshit? Obviously I did something to beat a billion other websites to the front of the search results. It wasn't meta data, key words, or tricky sneaky computer stuff. I think either the way the results get displayed is not what all the unsolicited SEO spam emails I get every week are telling everyone, or having kept my site online since 2006 might boost my result ahead of websites that haven't been online as long.

Or maybe, it's just that everyone who pays Google to get advertising on the Google search result page for key words is wasting their money