As I’ve learned about engines by being involved with rebuilding hundreds of them, I’ve learned that most people have very little understanding of what kills them.

Without seeing inside this engine, statements like this are just… ignorant.

Empty road, elevation change, decreasing radius, increasing radius, on camber, off camber, blind exit, perfect sightline, mid-corner dip, mid-corner bump, view for miles, opens into meadow, exposed, walled, no guardrail, dirty, clean.

This is my favorite most of the time.

Empty desert, washboard, dry lake, jumps, whoops, articulation, ledges, rock garden, side angle, feels endless, makes you feel small, brings you closer to Earth.

85 degrees, windows down, reeling in the horizon, passing saguaros and joshua trees, dodging potholes, 97-year-old road, jet age diner, art deco filling station, dead town, bygone era.

Top down, heater on, sea salt, loved one at side, waves crashing, kites flying, wetsuits and sweatshirts, surf boards, pelicans above cliff tops, charcoal fires, sun breaking through marine layer.

Top down, AC on, bird songs, decomposing plants, flowers, canopy above, driving slowly.

These are all nice.

Bretherans

I feel a powerful urge to pull a Charles Dance and correct you strongly.

Have you seen a dyno chart? In a Hondata video, the engine makes more than 220lb-ft at 2000rpm, 355lb-ft at 2900rpm, peak torque of 359lb-ft at 3400rpm and stays over 300lb-ft between 2500 and 5600rpm.

The character isn’t high-strung, so maybe it’s the boost level that you’re concerned about. 27psi peak boost sounds high until you realize million-mile semis are pushing up to 32ish psi daily.

Short trips kill cars.

Cars are meant to be driven 15-20 minutes at minimum. The oil needs to get up to temperature, the exhaust system needs to get up to temperature, you need enough time at temperature to vaporize water and fuel out of the oil and let crankcase pressure move those vapors out of the engine.

I work with classic cars and I tell the owners to never let the cars idle more than a minute or two and never take short trips.

Not necessarily a reliability issue, more an issue with the engine having excessive wear due to reduced oil film strength.

The cars I drive on the street blend in because I sometimes drive quickly.

The cars I build for others and have waiting in the wings don’t blend in, because they don’t need to.

Thinking of people as NPCs shows a lack of compassion and empathy and will get you nowhere in life when it comes to personal development.

Pocket rocket?

Who has pockets this big?

It’s 0.9” shorter than my E36 M3 sedan and weighs only about 50lbs less. It’s 4.8” longer than a Golf GTI. More than a foot longer than a Fiesta ST, and 400lbs heavier.

It’s neat but goddamn, it sucks there’s no “hot hatch” as light as the GR86.

There have been cars I owned because, as you said, I thought they were what I wanted. I thought my Miata was what I wanted, but it turns out I’d prefer a Lotus Elan.

Everything I think I want has a more focused version. It turns out, I wanted that instead.

I’ve never said that unless verified by either my knowledge (with backup documentation if there’s money or a trophy at stake) or manufacturer date code. Bosch has a three-digit code (although it’s alphanumeric, and could be only two characters before 1964), SWF has an alphabetical code, Hella has an alphanumeric code, Blaupunkt used alphabet until 1970, then made the switch to numerical.

My E30 had its original cap and rotor, both dated 1988. My E30 also had its original block because the block had the VIN on it. Most of the suspension bushings were original, as evidenced by condition. The fan clutch and fan are both original based on date codes.

My E36 still has its original radiator; the date on the radiator is older than the car.

Within my niche, vintage German cars, I can usually tell with a high degree of accuracy as to whether or not parts are original because I’ve seen a lot of original parts. Some of it even boils down to sealant application and selection; I can always tell when an early 911 engine case has never been split.

A lot of cost cutting/homogenization, as well as materials progress, has happened in the parts world, and original parts may have used, for example, a unique sheathing with a tracer (that may have originally been to increase burst strength), but modern hoses don’t need that reinforcement and the lines are now just rubber hose. Could that hose have been reproduced? Sure, but no one does that surreptitiously- there’s value to high-level restoration and reproduction.

And of course, there’s always the matter of witness marks on hardware. Look on the flats of the bolt heads and nuts- are there discolorations? Patterns in grease? Are the corners rounded?

I know this is much more in-depth than trying to figure out if a 2014 Traverse was driven gently, but it was nice to put out there.

A tool is only as useful as its user.

If you’re going to talk about how big cars are getting, you need to look at the generations side-by-side. Compare Tahoes to Tahoes: Tahoes are illustrative of little length gain from the '90s GMT400 to the early '10s GMT900 but show a not-insignificant increase in bumper/hood height, and the GMT900-GMT1YC shows a significantly higher hood and a more significant increase in size.

If the hood height was related to cooling system efficiency, the GMT900’s 8,500lb max towing capacity should be increased- but instead it decreased to 8,400lbs (and yes, I know the GMT900 wasn’t initially engineered to SAE J2807).

Whatever you do, don’t use the Lotus Elan to compare to anything modern.

To properly set up ABS for a modified car takes skill and knowledge. It’s also a system that adds complexity and weight.

Brake boosters made driving cars easier. Not everyone wants an easier-driving car, and advances in braking technology mean that you can have incredible brakes with no booster. That said, there were many cars with incredible brakes and no booster in the mid-1960s.

One thing I notice about crash videos online is how many cars with ABS lock up badly. The system requires cycling and frequent flushing to be effective; I had my ABS pump rebuilt and you wouldn’t believe its internal condition. It was seized and filled with corrosion and sediment.

Doesn’t BYD make underwear?

Xpeng’s a digital design studio, right?

Nio’s that stuff you add to water to make it taste like cherries, right?

MG made cars my grandfather wanted… in 1955.

Geely’s a character in the new Disney movie, yeah?

GAC is the sound of retching, or a toy marketed to kids in the early ‘90s.

How long did it take for Hyundai and Kia to achieve anything worthwhile in the States? 30 years?

How’s Chinese phone market penetration doing?

Do any of these brands use tech by Huawei or ZTE?

Is China even going to allow integration of RoW tech with Chinese cars?

If our cars already read our texts and know our contacts, do Americans really want that information going to the Chinese government?

How can an industry already hurting for good technicians train and provide experience to technicians in the next seven years?

How can an industry already hurting in terms of supply chain logistics absorb several new brands?

Yep. That video is phenomenal because it’s two men appreciating the others’ capabilities- Richard, Chris’ driving, and Chris, Richard’s creation.

I love it when I have a chance to ride with/drive my clients after finishing a car for them.

Tuthill 911K

There’s a lot to engine design, and something as relatively simple as bearings requires advanced knowledge in tribology and fluid dynamics.

You can design for a certain oil with a certain dilution rate but if the oil standards change or the real-world dilution rate is different, you may have failures due to cavitation. You can design for a certain dynamic clearance but if someone else changes the rod bolt spec or something as “simple” as thread fit changes, you may have failures.

Then there are things like manufacturer errors in fatigue strength or embedability or conformability, things that can only be known with a strict quality control regimen.

IMO, his argument is that the 964 shouldn’t be turned into something it’s not, not that it shouldn’t or can’t be improved upon. The Workshop 5001 car improves upon it and doesn’t turn it into something it’s not, like the Singers do. The Singers are great cars, works of art, but they have their own follies and foibles.

The only 964s worth driving are the RS America and Carrera RS. The Carrera RS is too stiff, stock, for broken SoCal pavement, though.

Negative points for Barghest colorway.

IMO, it’s not a great build because of the skill of execution, it’s a great build because of the devotion to the theme. Most cars wander a bit, struggle to live within their supposed theme.