Ace-Garageguy

Absolutely. Many pre-war hot-rods had a similar look. A 4-banger model-A engine with a trick head under the hood of that little T would make a pretty potent car for the day. This little T was built by a SoCal mechanic, and was reputed to have smoked Clark Gable's Duesenberg. The story goes that Gable tried to buy it repeatedly and was refused. In frustration, he's said to have had a similar car built by someone else, but the performance just wasn't there.

Not all hot rods appeal to everyone equally, and in the absence of real originality and outstanding design, quality of workmanship is often the factor that determines a winner. Originally known as The Oakland Roadster Show more than 60 years back, the Grand National Roadster Show has given the overall winner's title "America's Most Beautiful Roadster" to some incredible cars, and some so-sos. This year's winner also instantly made me think "topless California kid", and looks nice, but doesn't do much for me in the "wow" area. The Ardun-headded V8-60 powered '27 track-nose car of a few years back is, to me, the high point of recent winners, and is the epitome of what the AMBR title meant in the early years. Problem is, once it's all been done 100 dozen times, it's really tough to be original.

or, How the Third World Deals with the First World's Cast-off Toys, Sometimes it's maybe good to put things in a little perspective, when we think we work so hard. Anybody who's ever done anything with a cutting torch will appreciate the incredible hazards of this way of making a living...$3 a day...

Looks beautiful to me. Hope you have a nice big pile of dry firewood and plenty of warm blankets. I don't see any power lines. Do you have underground utilities there?

Extra tasty goodness.

I was more concerned with the woman losing control of the vehicle and rolling it if the tire blew and came off the rim completely, possibly killing herself and a few carloads of innocent moms and kids in the process.

Similar story...I was on the interstate, looking disreputable and driving my old beater truck. Happened to notice the young blond lass with the phone stuck to her head passing me in the shiny big Ford SUV was running almost on the rim...right front tire totally flat...and I'm frantically waving and pointing to the tire, trying to get her to understand it's impending doom. She flipped me the universal finger signal of love, so I just slowed down and let her go on her merry way. You just can't help some people.

That's what the "off-topic lounge" is for. Anything goes except politics and religion, right? Yes, she's the Iowa. Happy news is that she was rescued from the probable scrap-line in Suisun Bay, and has been restored as a floating museum in LA. The top picture in post 29 is of her being towed to her permanent home in 2011. It's good to know that even these days, there are people who understand the value of preserving magnificent bits of our collective history. As far as that muzzle-blast goes, check out the shock-waves visible in this overhead shot...

Yeah, if I had money to burn, I'd take one of each. And put a PV array on the roof to generate electricity to charge the Tesla, and crack wastewater into hydrogen to run the Dodge (not that hard to do...just a little expensive). ALL the power, true ZERO emissions. If you're gonna dream, may as well go all the way...

Agreed entirely. I imagine she'd have a pretty tough time up against a WW II battleship with 16" guns, too. Probably would have a lot to do with who has the fastest-targeting-to firing time, and projectile speed. Survivability with such total dependence on onboard electronic technology and continued ability to fight the ship after taking heavy fire...hmmm. Still seems like a sub is just inherently more "stealthy" by nature, and that money might be better spent developing submersible capabilities than flogging big surface vessels. Whatever, I think she looks pretty cool, and I hope she works as planned. Kinda reminds me of Nemo's Nautilus in "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen".

Yeah...but they get out of the way. You just have to be a little patient, just like running this stretch of road for real. It's fairly close to me, in NC, with 318 curves in 11 miles. Tons of fun if you get there during off-peak times. It's also stupid to push it too hard, as there are other people around, and the occasional totally clueless Lexus or Winnebago driver who pulls in front of you without looking.

There's still ongoing debate about the effectiveness of stealth technology under real-world conditions. One insider critic of current US military aircraft "stealth" claims that, while some planes may have a very small radar signature visible to our own radars, some of the Russian radars (based on slightly different and older technology) can see the things lit up like houses at Christmas. The idea of the angled, slab sides of the ship shown here is to reflect much of the surface radar's signal up somewhat, instead of straight back to the installation. A reduced reflection size translates to the search radar thinking it's seeing a smaller vessel...or so the theory goes. I'm sure this ship also has sophisticated electronic countermeasures that can process an incoming radar signal and send back a falsified reflection, possibly even placing the vessel in a different apparent location.

Dinosaurs they may be, but to those of us who love the sound of a V8 engine working up and down through the gears, there's nothing sweeter... (no, this isn't me)

What accounts for that great acceleration has to do with the fact that electric motors make peak torque at "stall", which simply means at zero RPM, when the vehicle is trying to accelerate from a dead stop. The motor doesn't have to "rev up" to get to its torque-peak like an IC engine does, so it's at maximum-power as soon as the throttle pedal is floored.The Tesla does away with the transmission, as it simply takes less power to maintain speed than it does to accelerate, and accelerating from standstill takes the most. The motor is capable of 14,000 RPM or so, and its speed increases as vehicle speed increases. In most cars, a correctly designed transmission will hold the engine or motor as close to peak-torque as possible as acceleration continues. This is why an "infinitely variable" gearbox could become a big plus (or not...I'm sure they've done the numbers to see if the added complication is worth a possible range increase) eliminating the "steps" as a normal trans changes gear ratios, and could possibly allow the Tesla motor to stay closer to its torque-peak at all speeds. Naturally though, rapid acceleration puts a massive drain on the charge in the batteries, and vastly reduces the range of the vehicle between charging cycles (just as flooring your big-inch gas-hog on every start can take your fuel mileage into low single digits). The point is that, as attractive as electric propulsion seems on the surface, there's no magic-bullet free lunch. PS. I'd like the see the same crew's reactions to a full-tilt launch of a 289 FIA Cobra. To this day, it's still the most "scary" thing I've ever had the pleasure to drive.

Big smile here. Love seeing an old kit built up simply, for no-stress fun, and looking so good. I think I may have to try doing one like this.

Yes, I believe the cat was the pet of the guy who built the copter, and it was hit by a car. Cat's name was apparently Orville...appropriate, eh?

I think you may be painting with a little too broad a brush there, Tom...

Thanks for the Weld-On #4 heads-up. Didn't think of trying Grainger. Last time I tried to get a small can from the local plastic sign fab guys, they wanted $30 haz-mat packing fee plus shipping. EDIT: I'm not finding it on Grainger yet, but Amazon has it for only $4.90 shipping.

Couple points about shooting the Testors Metalizers. 1) Lots of guys tend to shoot them too dry and orange-peely. That actually works very well if you want a rough-cast appearance, but not for polished. To get a good simulation of polished metal, you need to shoot the stuff wet, so it flows and self-levels. I find 3 coats gives me enough to polish on fairly aggressively without burning through edges. 2) You also want to give it plenty of time to dry, both between coats and before you polish. All day is usually about right, after the last coat. 3) I haven't shot it over resin parts, but on styrene, I really recommend a thorough scrubbing with Comet or other abrasive cleaner, a toothbrush, and hot water. This removes surface contaminants that can make the stuff fisheye, and also scuffs the surface nicely for better adhesion. 4) You want to use something soft to polish it. I've had the best results with the inside surface of old fleece like sweatshirts. 5) It's a very thin-bodied material, and doesn't fill imperfections at all. Any tiny flaw or pinhole or seam in your part will look worse when it's been Metalized.

Once you've established the correct forward voltage across whatever LEDs you are using, the practical solution to determining the amount of dimming-effect you'll get with a load resistor on the running light power supply side is experimentation. Too much drop across your resistor and your LEDs won't light up at all. Not enough drop and there won't be enough difference in intensity of the light output. I usually cut the prefboard with a cutoff wheel (full size or Dremel) and finish trim with right-angle die-grinders, etc. Makes nice clean edges. This circuit uses multiple 220 ohm, 1/4 watt resistors to maintain the correct forward voltage across the LEDs and one more to provide the dimming effect in the tail-light power supply. Unfortunately, the specifics of the LEDs aren't shown. As no two custom installations are going to be identical as far as number and type of LEDs, trial and error is going to be your best bet. Used to be a little easier to do this stuff when Radio Shack actually sold electronic components, but all of my local ones are just toy and phone stores now.

Well, I'd rather be stuffed and flown around as an old-man-copter than put in a hole in the ground to rot. Guess it's all in your particular point of view.

Please don't anybody get all outraged. I love animals, especially cats, but you have to admit this is just plain funny.

Here's a bizarro ride with another Allison, from 1954. The "Cramer Comet" was obviously influenced stylistically by Harley Earl's LeSabre concept car. I have black and white article on it in an old "little pages" mag.