Ace-Garageguy

Well, yes and no. States have overlapping jurisdiction as far as emissions equipment goes. Here, after a vehicle is 25 years old, it no longer is subjected to any form of emissions testing or inspection. Hence, it's perfectly legal by the letter of the state law to modify anything. There are so few 25+ year-old vehicles on the road that the state doesn't see the need to clamp down on the ones that there are...also possibly realizing that most of the old-timers aren't in daily use anyway, and add almost nothing to air pollution. This is a remarkably logical and enlightened stance from a government agency. I agree wholeheartedly with your statement that "the EPA is a non elected group of people that are writing "Laws"...". They, and NHTSA often don't really know what they're doing when they pass these things into existence either. As an example, the whole 5-mph bumper fiasco was found to actually cost much MORE money, both in initial vehicle purchase price and to repair vehicles after collisions, than it was intended to save. The 5 mph bumper "law" was based on flawed data, and poor interpretation of the data they had. But of course, they'll never admit to that. The standard now is 2 mph, by the way...based on findings in the real world that the 5-mph standard accomplished nothing but adding cost. The often knee-jerk actions of essentially uninformed, technically ignorant and lazy bureaucrats is a very real and widespread problem, not just affecting the automobile industry. As of 2014, the EPA employed around 16.000 people. 16,000. The agency exists primarily to continue its own existence by doing meaningless "work" that could be handled by a staff only a fraction of the size. Consider that the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), connected to Cal Tech in Pasadena, employs only 5000 or so folks...a bunch of pretty smart people involved in finding out NEW things (like interplanetary exploration and tracking of Near Earth Objects) that may be extremely important to humankind in the future, not just making up BS rules based on a foggy understanding of reality and political pressure like the EPA does.

Nice little car. The headlights are certainly in good condition for its age. Is that only 51,000 KM on the odometer? It's practically brand-new.

Great tip. Thanks. I mocked one of these up on the bench to go vroom-vroom, but hadn't yet looked at it from the standpoint of actually building. This info you've posted is good to know in advance. Thanks again.

Crazy kids today.

A-holes who ignore the almost state-wide summer burning ban and begin incinerating their trash at sunset. Burning household waste is illegal ALL the time, and releases many kinds of toxic stuff into the atmosphere, including dioxin (from burning plastic)...the MOST potent synthetic carcinogen (cancer-causing agent) ever tested in laboratory animals...and hydrogen cyanide. Choosing to tread lightly on the planet (for the most part...maybe to make up for my enthusiasm for non-emission-controlled vehicles) I cool my house by opening it up at night and pulling in outside air with a whole-house extractor fan. Right now, I'm pulling in plastic-smoke-stinking air that's making my throat raw. I don't pipe my damm truck exhaust into your window. How about giving me the same courtesy.

Hmmmm....I'm sure there's a logical progression from one to the other, but my tiny little mind can't seem to make the conceptual leap of faith.

Beautiful airplane, and it looks like you did a fine job with the kit. I was fortunate enough to see a few of these take off and land when they were operational out of Kadena AFB. Fell in love, still am.

.5mm (one half of one millimeter) isn't much at all. Trying to mark it on the tire will be an exercise in frustration. For such a small amount of material removal, i'd use a round object (like a wooden dowel) with sandpaper (180 grit, wet) attached, and twist it in the hole until you get a good (slightly tight) fit with the new wheel. Then sand the edge of the opening very smooth with 600 grit wet, the same way. Work slowly and carefully so you don't take too much material out and ruin a tire.

SOME kids WILL look around and find things that aren't right under their noses. Many won't...and it's the place of those who bring them in to the world, and those who get paid to "educate" them, to show them something other than phone apps and popular 'culture'. Again, it seems you're inferring I'm saying kids should be led to modeling, forced to build models, taught to build models, etc. I'm not saying that at all. Tell me how an inner-city kid born into a gang-banger thug culture is going to ever see model cars...or that it's possible to get a pilots licence, or be a chemist or engineer or astronomer or advertising executive... if someone doesn't show him?

I've said a bazillion times before...and been misunderstood every damm time...that parents and teachers have a DUTY to expose young people to as wide a variety of interests and possibilities as is humanly possible. This does NOT mean they should cram their particular interests down their kids' throats. It simply means that if children see nothing of the world but what they get from their myopic little pack-running peers, they're going to have a very narrow and pathetic world-view...and make poor-performing, uninformed, ignorant adults. SOME kids WILL look around and find things that aren't right under their noses. Many won't...and it's the place of those who bring them in to the world, and those who get paid to "educate" them, to show them something other than phone apps and popular 'culture'.

Modifying emission-controlled vehicles emission-control devices and systems during the first 25 years (or so) after manufacture has been essentially illegal for a very long time. This proposed law (the RPM Act) simply STOPS the EPA from banning production cars from being turned into pure racing cars...which they've been trying to push through with NO BASIS IN THE EXISTING LAW. Two entirely different concepts...and I seriously doubt you're going to get the Fed to overturn the old thou-shalt-not-modify-emission-controls-on-the-street doctrine.

I'm sure we've all done something like that at one time or another. Could you post a photo of the problem? That would make it easier for us to give you worthwhile advice.

The drag queens must look a lot different in your neck of the woods than they do here.

Man's got a point...or three. And some kids exposed to model building will love it and stay with it, some will drift away and come back later, and some just won't give a rats rear.

My new favorite automotive writer: Sam Smith at Road and Track. In the same league as the old classics like Bedard, Van Valkenburgh, McCluggage, Purdy...

I couldn't seem to focus on her face.

Lets face reality. Car enthusiasts have always been a small minority of the population. Cars were intended to be, from the get-go, transportation appliances. Consider this: of the 15 MILLION model T Fords built, how many do you honestly think got modified for speed, or raced? Most people simply do not get the fascination some of us have with machinery, including cars, aircraft, guns...anything mechanical that's loud and scary to someone with the mind of a stand-in-line-do-like-everyone-else little sheeple. It's always been the lunatic fringe that has seen a car and wondered how to make it faster, or, when confronted with two cars, wondered which one was the fastest. And again, MOST people just don't give a damm. Never did, never will. The emasculation of the American male in popular culture hasn't helped, with women having more than half the money (and gaining) and wanting their own balls too...and they usually keep their man's dangly bits in the pocket away from the bucks. Think it was really different in the way-back? Then explain why the Chevette...possibly the most insipid zero nothing of a mediocre car ever built...was the number one selling small-car in the USA in 1979 and 1980. Also consider: in the early days, racing was all about "win on Sunday, sell on Monday". That philosophy sold a lot of me-too cars to people who wanted to identify with a sport that they had neither the nads nor the bucks to indulge in. The cars racing were much closer to what you could go into the showroom and buy, too. It makes a difference. But racing gradually has evolved into an industry that provides fast, loud rolling billboards to the marketers of the world, and costs boxcars full of dollars to participate in at the upper levels. It's just not accessible any more...and even I, about as hard-core a car-enthusiast as you can get, find racing that's so far removed from reality kinda pointless and boring. But there are still a goodly number of grass-roots participants in motor-sports and guys (and even a few women) who are greasy-knuckles car enthusiasts...but probably not in the percentages there were in earlier decades. There are also fewer people who know what a steam locomotive is (or would have any interest in modeling one) or who could build a birdhouse with simple tools, or change a flat tire or their own oil. Unless there's an app for it. It's jus' the way it is, and I'm glad that for the foreseeable future, I'll be able to pick from the widest array of kits and components and materials in the history of Man. Kids not interested? Fine. More for me.

A beautiful woman. 100%. (Lizabeth Scott...only fair to post a shot of her in her prime.)

Yup. Good job so far.

Help prevent EPA Overreach and Support the RPM Act The future of racing remains at risk! Support "The Recognizing the Protection of Motorsports Act of 2016" (RPM Act) to make clear that the Clean Air Act does not ban the modification of street vehicles for use in automotive competition. Help give the public and the racing industry much-needed certainty re: how the Clean Air Act is applied.CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE SEMA SIGN-UP PAGE https://www.votervoice.net/SEMA/campaigns/45394/respond

Happy anniversary and congrats on your successful software project live intro.

Excellent proportions, clean, looks fast, everything about it works. Love it.

Nevermore...

Nice to see the little BRE race-box returned to stock. Looks good, as does the Laurel. I guess the fuzzy dice in the back window are a nod to its lowrider origins.

El Poncho. Maybe El Ponchomino? There's already an El Poncho.