Friday, April 23, 2010

Summer's Here and the Time is Right....


A great photo of a prototype 1959 Eldorado convertible at the GM design center. GM always shot their prototypes in this private walled yard, in some photos you can see the car is sitting on a sunken turn table.

Think I stole this from http://www.deansgarage.com/ check it out a great automotive design site.

I think I am posting this an encouragement to myself and anyone else out there who has yet to get their pride and joy out of winter storage. My 59 series 62 has been gathering dust and is in need of some tinkering. Time to clean out the garage and belatedly celebrate earth day by running its high compression 10.5 -1, tri-powered 390 cubic inch V8.

May the biggest carbon footprint win!

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Corvette vs Tesla
















The 79 L82 Corvette received a new dual Magnaflow system a few weeks ago and she sounds great.

Yesterday evening I had to return a Tesla press car, actually very impressed. The best thing in electric cars since my Strombecker slot car track, but I am not here to sing the praises of electric cars.

When dropping off the Tesla I had to park my Corvette on the street in snobby Yorkville. I know the area well as I used to work at Bay and Bloor in a previous life and often took clients to lunch at one of the many expensive restaurants in Yorkville.

The street would invariable be lined with exotic cars, Bentleys, Ferraris and 911s. No different last night, even spotted a Lotus Exige (a close relation to the Tesla). The Corvette looked totally incongruous but cool amongst the euro trash. I am also proud to report that it got more than its share of attention. While I stood with the hood open, to let the engine cool off after a high speed highway run then stuck in a traffic jam on Bay St, I had strangers come and compliment the car or take photos.

Even driving up Bay in heavy traffic pedestrians pointed out the Corvette and seemingly ignored the new Tesla, worth about ten times more than the Corvette.

To be fair if one could time travel back to 1979 the Corvette would be the perfect poser car for Yorkville but age and timeless styling....plus that great sounding exhaust has served to make her the last word in cool....at least for a few minutes last night.

Thursday, April 8, 2010

Back

No I didn't go missing in Detroit....great show by the way. I even wrote an article on the Autorama for the magazine World of Wheels, gotta find out if it has gone to print yet.

Despite my absence from the blog, I have been busy in the driveway. The 76 Lincoln became a daily driver for almost two weeks until I could not stand the annoying OEM radio and vacuum leaks from the headlight system.
I did manage to rebuild the passenger side power window motor successfully and even made my own aluminium 'barrels". See link to see what I am talking about.


If you have a seventies or even eighties Ford product with power windows you will immediately know what I am on about.

The dash is currently apart awaiting locating replacement original radio and auto dimmer head light switch. I managed to correct most of the leaks but the head light doors still only stay down for about 45 min. Shop manual says they should last 18 hours...like my 72 Mark IV but that is a post for another day.