Ace-Garageguy

Masses of bacteria, fungus, and algae in diesel storage tanks can clog fuel systems.

Vehicle design has progressed past the point where cars are actually getting "better", but they're "market driven", different just to be different, with a lot of add-on silliness.

Bbbbbbbuttt...LOGISTICS !!!!!!!!!!!

I have to think that whoever is doing the beta-testing for all these so-called "smart" systems must be a bunch of yes-men who either have zero critical-thinking ability, or are just afraid to speak up and say the-emperor-has-no-clothes.

Sure. They're kinda horrible cars. I'm finishing up a complete rewire on one now, including a full custom instrument panel, and even if it hadn't been previously mangled by chimps, the OEM wiring would be almost as bad. They don't make much power for the complexity of the engine, and they're kinda tail-happy due to being rear-engined (65% rear weight bias, where a comparable 911 is around 60%) rather than the originally proposed mid-engined. They're prone to overheating and a wide variety of other failure modes. The urethane bumpers get warpy and wavy over time, and the bodies are almost impossible to repair and have the repair be undetectable. On the positive side, the fiberglass structure and stainless steel skins don't rust, the Lotus-designed suspension works about as well as anyone could ask (from a handling standpoint), and they look cool. How's that?

Franklin Mint 1/24 W-196R Merc. Plans are to use it as the basis for a heavily upgraded model (wheels/tires, panel fit, etc.), but that swoopy body is so pretty just as it is...

Yeah, I'm only seeing two big turbos and two wastegates in this view...

Whoa...THANK YOU !!! I have several old '36 kits from AMT, and have never seen one single perfect wheel. Guess I better get an order in to Norm pronto. Ex-moderator and resin-caster extraordinaire Casey (Forward Resin on feePay) used to do a set that he'd mastered from (I think) the Revell '37 Ford pickup rims (that lacked the wide-5 center details) with the wide-5 centers from the AMT wheels added. I have several sets and they are exquisite...but fragile, and I believe too many ham-handers ruining them influenced Casey to stop offering them...at least that's how my increasingly foggy old brain remembers it.

Very nice, all of them.

Mind games played by neurotic narcissists can ruin your focus on actually accomplishing things if you let them.

Last time I was at the place in AZ, there was what appeared to be a huge communal nest in a big pine close to the house. Always full of them, cackling and cawing, flying around having fun, and soaring almost motionless over the property when the winds were steady out of the west. I want to build a high feeder for them, make some friends without attracting rodents. Hear them talking to each other here... https://www.audubon.org/field-guide/bird/common-raven

Thank you, sir. I'll have to find that. Tichy kits and parts have been leaders in HO-scale quality for decades now. Anyone who's never seen their work is really missing something. This kit is, in a word, spectacular.

It has been my intention to build this thing full-scale ever since I saw Chris Drysdale's beautiful illustration, and his design work that put my rough concept cobble-up way over the top. Back then I had no idea I'd still be working almost full time this long, and both the model and planning for the big one fell by the wayside as I honored other commitments. But those are finally coming to a close, and I'm hoping to revive the full-scale project late this year in my shop in AZ. In the interim I've acquired multiple Cord kits from Pyro and Monogram to hack up while striving to match Chris's proportions exactly, and a couple of the AMT 1/12 kits to do a large-scale model to pull measurements from. If I live long enough, and stay healthy enough, a real one will get built.

If we're looking at the same things... ...the "bright red bracket" is the water pump, and the "dark blue thing" under it is the lower coolant hose. Turbos have to be fed hot exhaust gasses, and as all 8 header primaries appear to merge into collectors that dump into the over-roof pipes, I can't understand where two more turbos could possibly be.

I agree entirely.

You are correct. It is indeed exhaust wrap. My duh. https://www.dragzine.com/features/car-features/this-no-prep-chevelle-has-a-wild-turbo-setup/ But I'm still looking for the other two turbos... EDIT: The heat and energy lost through the long pipes TO the turbos has to be pretty huge, and there's a thing called "pumping losses" that affects the charge air coming FROM the turbos back to the front of the car as well, and those have to be pretty high too. There are reasons that turbos are usually positioned as close to an engine's exhaust ports as possible. But MAYBE the losses aren't great enough to significantly affect the power this rig produces. Somehow. (I'm much more familiar with turboed road-racers and street installations; I know a lot of drag turbo setups look nothing like road-race setups, and are asked to provide boost differently, like bringing the revs up while on the trans brake, allowing the turbos to spool up...and which is why drag cars can run such huge turbos that couldn't possibly work in road-racing applications.) HOWEVER...one of the reasons the old Potvin-style front drive mechanical blower setups fell out of favor was because of the pumping losses in those blower-output pipes. And they're not very long. Then there's the old adage among aircraft and race-car builders "if it looks right, it is right", which is not always true, but IS true enough of the time that most successful high performance cars and aircraft are clean-lined and beautiful too. And if anybody spots the other two turbos referred to in the title of this thread, let me know.

Motives for denying objective reality are quite fascinating.

Saw off that limb you're sittin' on, jus like this internet expert here...

Finger out an arithmetic problem by counting on your digits.

Yeah, their human resources are, let's just say, somewhat underwhelming, and the automated "responses" and chatbots are usually useless.

Yeah, definitely among the smartest creatures on the planet. Some of their problem-solving skills are almost beyond belief. Absolutely positively capable of conscious thought, and understanding and using concepts like water displacement. They're reputed to be able to recognize human faces, and remember them for years. They soar like raptors, too.

Yup. Kinda bites I haven't moved on it before now, and I need to have a talk with you. Expect a PM in the next few days.

Massive heat and energy loss going back to the turbos through those ridiculous flex-pipes too. The single-strut wing mount doesn't inspire confidence in the overall engineering either, but what do I know?

Well, here's the thing. A competent 3D-scanner operator could easily digitize all the parts, trees, or whatever. Zero design work required. Then 3D print injection-molding dies. METAL that can withstand well in excess of the temperatures required to injection-mold kit styrene can be printed today. I've already posted (years ago) how short or medium-run injection molding can be done for a fraction of the cost whined about by mass producers who want to "offshore" everything and make thousands of units in matched metal dies. If we (the USA) could make this stuff "affordably" in the 1960s, the only reason it's not done today (with vastly advanced tech) is a lack of WANTING to, not because we "can't".