Friday, November 01, 2024
Thursday, October 31, 2024
A guy tracked down a 67 Camaro, and built it to look like the one that his dad sold for diaper money way back in 1983.
in 1983 a guy learned that his young wife was pregnant, and knowing the financial needs coming, he made the decision to sell his beloved Camaro.
39 years later, his son tracked one down, took 2 years to fix it up, restore it, and then presented the 67 Camaro to his dad on his 65th birthday dinner. It's NOT the exact one that his dad had, it's similar, and better. He even found a brand new set of Cragars, identical to the set his dad had on the car in the early 80’s!
His dad, has been a parts guy at O'Reilly's since about age 18! He knows cars!
the UK govt decided that effective April 2025, all double-cab pickups will be considered cars for taxation purposes, significantly increasing costs for those running them as company vehicles
Capital allowance rules will also change in April 2025. Businesses have been able to claim capital allowances on vehicles that are not cars, expensing up to 100% of the cost of a double-cab pickup. The new rules will place pickups alongside cars, limiting the allowance to just 18%. Reclassifying pickups as cars might also affect a business’s ability to apply vehicle expense deductions from profits
The change in definition follows a legal case between Coca-Cola and HMRC, which concluded that a vehicle should be clearly suited to one task or another and that no decision should be based on a narrow margin. In cases where it’s not clear if a vehicle is primarily suited for carrying goods or people, it should be classified as a car.
UAW members who build General Motors' popular full-size pickups at Fort Wayne Assembly in Fort Wayne, Indiana, have voted to authorize a strike because of six or seven managers at the plant working on the assembly line in union-designated jobs
GM wanted UAW Local 2209 Shop Chairman Rich LeTourneau to sign a letter agreeing to keep those 253 people designated as part-time temporary employees. But LeTourneau had been negotiating to make those people full-time temporary employees, if not permanent employees, saying there were openings for them.
According to GM's website, it employs 4,149 people at the plant where it builds more than 1,300 pickups a day.
When LeTourneau refused to sign a letter extending their status as part-time temporary employees, GM said it was required to release those 253 workers, citing provisions in the national UAW-GM contract. The people were let go on Sept. 30
GM then moved 42 seniority people from their jobs on first shift to assembly line jobs on second and third shifts, to fill in part of the void from losing the part-time temporary workers, which LeTourneau said violated the local contract.
"They're 50-year and 60-year-old men and women, GM stuck them on the worst jobs in the plants," LeTourneau said.
Strike not wanted, but 'this is our work'
GM has since moved those people back to first shift, but not to the jobs or departments to which they were originally assigned and had earned through years of seniority, he said.
But his real gripe centers on the company now allowing plant managers to do line repairs and other union-designated jobs rather fill those jobs by hiring full-time temporary or permanent workers.
"The minute these temporary employees left the plant they put all these managers in jobs and they won't stop doing it. There's a manager doing repairs right now on my line," LeTourneau said Thursday morning. "They are getting paid to manage and do our repair work. They do the cherry-picking jobs too, the ones that don't hurt them."
"They're 50-year and 60-year-old men and women, GM stuck them on the worst jobs in the plants," LeTourneau said.
Strike not wanted, but 'this is our work'
GM has since moved those people back to first shift, but not to the jobs or departments to which they were originally assigned and had earned through years of seniority, he said.
But his real gripe centers on the company now allowing plant managers to do line repairs and other union-designated jobs rather fill those jobs by hiring full-time temporary or permanent workers.
"The minute these temporary employees left the plant they put all these managers in jobs and they won't stop doing it. There's a manager doing repairs right now on my line," LeTourneau said Thursday morning. "They are getting paid to manage and do our repair work. They do the cherry-picking jobs too, the ones that don't hurt them."
"I want management off my jobs. That's what I want," LeTourneau told the Free Press on Thursday morning. "They're doing repairs, inspection, hot parts chasing. They're doing everything they can to keep the line running and those used to be our jobs."
won't get much posted today, there was a fire in the next neighborhood over 2 hours before rush hour, and that, in a city? Means all roads get gridlocked heading in that direction... and 1/2 the interstates head in this direction in rush hour, the 805, 8, 94, 15...
so, there was an extra two hours of commute today, normally it's only about 30-40 minutes.
I live down in the lower righthand corner of this map, and all that area in light green? No power when I drove through at about 7pm, and it smells like a wildfire all right. Everyone knows that smell in California, we have them too damn often. There was the 2003 fire that came into San Diego from the Ramona/Julian area, and came down the river valley, even branched off into Rancho Bernardo, and jumped the 15. Ash was floating around everywhere, even as far south as Chula Vista... anyway, there have been many others, but it's been a couple years since one was in this neighborhood.
Wednesday, October 30, 2024
Not the usual way to see the alphanumeric characters on a license plate, all on the left side, with empty space on the right
plus, I can't figure out what the hell XSDX means
I really doubt some apartment complex corporation has a security patrol car, that's a Lexus,... with a Japanese front license plate. But it makes for an interesting photo
it's not uncommon to see a car with a German front license plate around the city, but Japanese? That's rare. I checked the back, and it's got a California plate on the back. Weird combination
The GoKart Pro 2, which made its debut at CES 2024, is now one of TIME Magazine's Best Inventions of 2024
It is touted as far more than the average e-mobility solution in that it can also be used as a racing simulator for PC gaming when not going at up to 26.7 miles per hour. It can also convert into a detachable Ninebot hoverboard at need.
Tuesday, October 29, 2024
a 1985 Plymouth ‘Cuda concept car, based on the L-Body Shelby Chargers of the mid-80’s, one of 2.... I've never heard of this until now
Shelby halted the Barracuda project as soon as he discovered they were using parts from the Shelby Charger in its development. An article from March 2000 in Mopar Collector’s Guide revealed more details about it.
https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=1123898235758598&set=pcb.1123898402425248
A tram came off the tracks in a bustling commercial neighborhood of Olso on Tuesday, smashing into a phone and computer shop, it jumped the rails, continuing straight ahead when it should have curved left. Only four people were lightly injured.
I find the reasons that some things were built they way they were, interesting when it turns out that there were design decisions made based only on getting around tax laws (three wheelers) or import laws (the famous "Chicken Tax")
I just learned why it had those rear seats in the bed!
It was a way to get around the 25% “chicken tax” on trucks; with four passenger seats, it was no longer a truck, but an open air tourer, or something like that; a passenger car, in any case.
If you haven't heard of the Chicken Tax before, I posted about it in 2011 https://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2011/09/chicken-war-and-chicken-tax-and-what.html
Subaru’s center-mounted “Passing Lamp”... something I've never heard of until now
69 Mustang Mach 1 Fastback will be at booth #11861, Full Throttle Garage booth, at SEMA
Started out looking like this
turned out looking great!
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!
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
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
Squareback spotted in traffic the other day,
thanks to you guys that quickly reminded me of the name of this model!
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
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