Harry P.

Ok, when the chat room was down a few weeks ago some of you guys had an absolute fit! Several of you even said that the only reason you come here at all is for the chat room. Well, the chat room has been back up and running for a while now, and it's completely empty 99% of the time. Obviously there has been some sort of concerted and organized effort to stay out of the chat room. I almost never went in there, and I don't have any "chat room buddies" with the inside scoop. So my question is pretty simple: What's the story behind the chat room boycott?

Yeah, hydrogen powered cars were going to save us all... unlimited fuel supply, zero emissions. Sounds too good to be true, but they were all over the news a while ago. I also wonder what ever happened to that idea.

From Wikipedia: Frenching is the act of recessing or moulding a headlight, taillight, antenna or number plate into a car body to give a smoother look to the vehicle. The name originates from the end result looking like a French cuff of a shirt sleeve, which has a ridge at the end. Also known as tunnelling, it is a common modification used on leadsleds and customs since the 1930s. Frenching a headlight or taillight is done in one of two ways: either removing the bezel, mounting the light deeper in the car's head or taillight nacelle and using the headlight rings from another car (or an aftermarket kit) to mount it deeper into the body. Or it can be done by modifying the light's mountings so that they can be removed from behind, welding the bezel to the body once the chrome plating is removed and painting it body colour. This gives the effect of visually lengthening the car, as well as smoothing out the body. Many customs have lights from another car transplanted in place of the original factory items, but even these are frenched as well. This modification is seldom carried out on late models, as newer cars have flush-fitting headlights. This is a styling cue both influenced by customising and a means of improving the aerodynamics of the car.

Can I vote in my own game? I'm pretty sure it's real.

I know. But I mean expand that into personal vehicles, not just commercial.

The last time I was in Phoenix, the cab driver said that cabs in the city run on natural gas. If they can run a fleet of cabs that way, why not expand into personal vehicles?

Another point... electricity doesn't come from magic pixie dust. It has to be generated somehow... and these days a lot of our electricity is still produced by coal-burning plants. So driving an electric car is not necessarily some sort of total "green" nirvana. You're still charging up your eco-mobile with electricity that had to be generated somehow. And then there's the cost. I don't know what the average KWh charge for electricity is, but it would seem to me that if your Volt or Leaf has to be plugged in for 8-12 hours every 40 miles or so, the cost of all that electricity isn't exactly cheap. Cheaper than gas? Probably... but a lot less convenient. All-electric cars aren't going to be a viable solution for most people and how they need to use a car until we have as many electric charging stations as we have gas stations... and they invent some sort of "quick charge" technology where you could pull into an "electric station" and actually charge up the car in a reasonable amount of time... say, 5-10 minutes, instead of needing that overnight charging time. And then there's unforeseen traffic jams. Say your Leaf can get you to work on a single charge. What happens when you get stuck in an unexpected traffic jam for an hour? What happens when you're just about out of power and you're stuck sitting in the middle of a jammed expressway? Time to get out and walk home? If you drive a "regular" car you can get off at the next exit and find a gas station pretty much anywhere. What do you do when your eco-mobile is "out of gas?" Abandon the car on the highway and walk the rest of the way???

Great stuff!

Are they still married?

Primer/sealer.

Thanks, Bob! Yeah, I don't think I'd ever try and sell them. Too many memories...

Yep, the $40K Volt that gets a whopping 40 miles per charge is not exactly "cutting edge" technology. It makes you wonder why today's electric cars are no better than the ones we had a hundred years ago...

Well... when I myself posted the answer, then well... yeah!

Everything Johan ever did was my favorite! When I was a kid and Johan was active, I loved their kits! I wish all their old tooling still existed and some deep-pockets operation somehow managed to reissue all of their kits. Man, that would really be something!

http://www.modelcarsmag.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=45506&st=60

Yeah, the "stock car" part of stock car racing disappeared a looooong time ago...

I'm pretty sure it's "real"... but not positive. So... I didn't realize you even ever played this game. Sorry to disappoint you...

Patience, grasshopper. Mike has been building for years. You're only 13! Time is on your side...

I own two Dean Z's from the '80s... back then, Dean Zielinski hired me to create some custom artwork and they made decals from my art and applied them to the guitar bodies. They were sold as a line of "custom artwork" guitars. That was a looooong time ago! I don't even know if Dean Guitars is still in business! But I still have those two Dean Z's. They're actually "pre-production" prototypes. Hmmmmm... wonder what they would fetch on ebay? BTW... back then Dean was married to a Playboy Playmate. True! I remember meeting her, but I don't remember her name. But I do remember that she was, uh... quite attractive...

I thought you only build MOPARS!!!

That's not a better shot... that's the exact same one I used (I just cropped it a little).

They may be retouched, but those are not images created from scratch... they're photos of either a real car or scale mockup.

No, that's not an image... it's either a real car or a full-scale mockup. I think it's the real thing, but there's no way to be sure.

Not guitar, but I'm pretty good at playing the radio...

Final vote: 22 REAL, 36 MODEL. And the answer is... I'm not sure! See for yourself... http://www.italiaspeed.com/2006/cars/maserati/05/mc12_corsa/2605.html