Ace-Garageguy

I do actually rather like the McLaren. There seems to be some reason to most of its "aero" styling, other than just an overly nervous CFD program. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computational_fluid_dynamics

Of which I'm well aware, and which is a very clear indication that allowing the Fed to establish arbitrary emissions and fuel economy standards for decades is ludicrous. One reason manufacturers pushed large trucklike vehicles was because the fuel economy standards for them were easier to comply with. Now, with an all-trucklike fleet on the horizon, to get the CAFE numbers they need, small engines in big vehicles will be the norm. There is simply NO ONE looking at the big picture, and if you try to enlighten most people, they treat you like a Luddite crackpot. Go along to get along. All technology is wonderful. Buy whatever the marketers tell you to buy. The Fed knows everything about everything, and always does the rational thing. Don't think. Baaa baaa baaa. Not to mention destroying the second-hand vehicle marketplace. How many buyers of used vehicles are really in a position to cough up an additional $8,000 when the trans quits a few months into ownership? (To the best of my knowledge at the present time, there are NO rebuilders of the 8-speed automatic boxes; you buy a new replacement, or you park it forever) There will come a time when the high cost of repairing this overly complex excrement will make it impossible to even get used-vehicle extended warranty coverage for anything like an affordable price. But the Fed and the manufacturers and hordes of mostly uninformed consumers go on their merry way singing "lalalalalalala I can't hear you..."

I agree heartily. Though I was fine with everything through algebra, I struggled with calculus my first quarter. The instructor was a pure-math enthusiast, and had little interest in helping us grasp how it could be applied to real-world problem solving. Once I understood how it could be used as a tool, everything changed.

Pretty cool, Ray. Looks like overall you're doing a very respectable job. Fascinating model.

I didn't think you could get any uglier than the last Bug. I was wrong.

Small, highly-stressed engines wear out much more rapidly than larger engines that can produce plenty of torque at low revs. It's common sense if you're an engineer. Small, highly-stressed engines with turbos are vastly more complex as well. It's stupid. Period. Even MORE stupid to use one to drag a heavy pickup truck around. A LOT of these things will be non-repairable junk by the time they're on their second owners. Have a look at the failure rate of GM /Chrysler/ ZF 8-speed auto gearboxes (insanely complex with lotsa itty bitty highly-stressed parts) if you need corroborating evidence. http://corvettec7fiasco.blogspot.com/2017/07/as-2018-model-year-comes-8-speed.html And the only reason this stuff is getting foisted off on the public is because there's nobody with any nads within the companies to stand up and say it's stupid...and these days there's probably only one engineer in 100 (if even that many) who's ever actually opened a hood. The K.I.S.S. principle came about for a reason.

I would use exactly whatever is called out in the service manual. Different fluids, though all "hydraulic" fluids, have different effects on seals. Use whatever the engineers who designed the thing recommend.

Not an album, but when this girl grows up, look out...

Remarkably restrained and relatively clean for something built recently. I could suffer through owning it, somehow.

The Monogram 1/24 kit builds up beautifully. The Pyro / Lindberg 1/25 kit is only suitable for hacking up as a custom.

Yup. The better option these days is a complete electronic distributor that uses GM HEI guts. Less than $100, one-wire hookup. I put one in my '89 GMC after the computer controlled ignition and EFI went away. Cheap Summit brand, 2 years and still going strong. And modules and caps are available just about everywhere. If the engine checks out good, he'll probably want to replace the carb with something that isn't jetted for emissions, too. The cam that's in the thing also most likely has pointy little low-performance lobes and emissions valve-event timing too. Again, if the rest of the engine checks out solid, a change of cam and lifters would be wise (always replace flat-tappet (non-roller) lifters when you replace a cam, and be CERTAIN to use a break-in oil with plenty of ZDDP). It's also wise to run a ZDDP-containing oil in general service on any old flat-tappet engines. Shell Rotella-T used to be a go-to, but I haven't checked its formulation lately.

It is cleaner. Look carefully. Many lines and volumes are considerably different.

Wire gauge refers to the size of the conductor INSIDE the insulation. Insulation thickness, and therefore OUTSIDE diameter, can vary. In 1/24 - 1/25 scale, for older stock wires, a good diameter is around .013". Later-model and high-performance wires will look about right at .016".

They were posterior-wipes for doing it the way they did, but allowing the abuse of free accounts to go on so long was stupid too. Anything worth having is worth paying for, and the adblockers run by folks who wanted the service for free BUT who resented the advertising intrusiveness, WHICH WAS A CONDITION OF GETTING FREE SERVICE, was what brought about the unpleasantness. I have zero sympathy for people who get mad when something they've been getting for NOTHING is withdrawn, even though PB did it in a despicable way.

Any "scale" is simply an expression of what fraction of the size of the real anything a model of it is. For instance, 1:25 scale is the same as 1/25 scale, and they both mean that the real thing in question is 25 times larger than the model. All other scales work the same way. Let's say you have a model and you don't know what scale it is. Measure its length in inches. Then google the length of a real one, in inches (or in your case, as shown above, multiply the length of your real boat in feet by 12 to get its length in inches, 14 X 12 =168). Divide the real dimension by the length of the model (or in your case, the length of the model you want to build, 14 inches). You'll get a number. Put a "1" over it in a fraction, and you now know the scale. 168 divided by 14 = 12. Your scale is 1/12, or 1:12. Now, let's say you wanted to build a model of your real boat in 1:25 scale. Take the length of the real one again, 168 inches, and divide by 25. You get 6.72 inches, so that's how long a 1/25 or 1:25 scale model would be.

Another one I didn't play, as the image was back-searchable.

This one's considerably cleaner stylistically than other versions, and I prefer it immensely.

Kool as the Kookie Kar. Ridiculous as whatever misguided mess somebody made from it later. It just sold at Mecum for $440,000. Hopefully, somebody will return it to its original look. https://www.autoclassics.com/posts/news/kookies-kar-hot-rod-jim-street

You never did. The site itself has been accessible for removal of your images even after the great debacle.

That carbon chassis is a thing of beauty indeed, but I'm opposed on principle to all the "aerodynamic" frippery that seems to be so prevalent in car design today. Though it MIGHT have some validity in CFD (computational fluid dynamics) based aero modeling, it flies in the face of the demonstrably MOST EFFICIENT AERODYNAMIC DESIGNS humans have created to date. Notice, NO bulges, blisters, scoops, splitters, or extraneous styling gobbledygook. Just clean, clean, clean:

This all strikes me as terribly funny, as a lesson in being cheap. I had a paid account from very early on, so I never lost access to anything. And with a paid account, you're not screwing them out of revenue by running adblock, and expecting something for nothing. Granted, they said several times my grandfathered-in account was ending and I'd have to pay a higher (though finally not exorbitant) rate, but so far, they've been leaving my old account alone...and the $2.99 monthly fee just came out of my bank account again. And so far, it's been WAY easier to just leave things as they are, rather than running off to a new server and having to re-post hundreds of pix. So glad I PAID. Should be interesting to see what happens next.

What you have is pretty much the same thing. The reason they say to remove the paint is because the bond won't be any stronger than the strength of the bond between the paint and the plastic. This is why you need very thorough prep of the area surrounding the "glass", and thorough drying, in order to give your paint the maximum possible adhesion. IF the paint is very well-adhered to the body of the model, the white-glue bond to it should be as strong as it would be to bare plastic...but it's imperative the bond between paint and plastic is as good as it can possibly be. There's typically very little stress on a window, so once the white glue has dried thoroughly as well (it's NOT a solvent-type glue, and doesn't penetrate either plastic or paint), it should be fine forever if it's not handled roughly.

Thoroughly scuff the perimeter of the window opening for good paint adhesion, and preferably using a "self-etching" white primer, paint the area. Actually, if you prep the area very thoroughly for the best possible paint adhesion, and let your interior color dry very thoroughly, you should be OK using a PVA glue to mount the window directly to the paint film. Then, use this (or a similar "PVA" polyvinyl-acetate white glue) to attach the "glass". The resulting bond will be plenty strong, and the PVA glue dries completely clear. It's also very easy to clean up any excess with a damp cloth or Q-tip before it dries.

Same system:

That is, of course, the hydraulic pump in the center of the rear panel in your photo. There are, of course, two hydraulic cylinders on either side of the car. The seals are well known to leak, and as already noted, the plastic lines can rub through over time. Also as noted, wetness will be obvious at the source of the leak, but you need to have visual and physical access to every fitting, and the rods where they go in the cylinders. Be very wary of over-tightening the fittings, too. It's easy to strip brass threads.