ZZ Tops Billy Gibbons

If you grew up in the 80’s it’s hard not to like a band such as ZZ Top,and if you’re a car guy the cars in their videos were the icing on the cake.

Lead guitarist Billy Gibbons has an amazing collection of hot rods which include the famous 33 Ford Eliminator coupe, Cadzilla, and a 58 T-Bird just to name a few. I’ve also seen him do some pretty amazing pinstripe art on anything from guitars to hot rods, which takes a ton of skill and patience to perform.

Read More

MIG after the test. (FAIL!)

Experimenting: TIG Welding, Balloons, and Advice?

I have been MIG welding since I was about 15, which is darn close to half of my life.  I really wanted to step up my welding game,  and after saving forever, I finally bought myself a TIG welder about a year ago.  The welder came with a pressure regulator and after some trial and error, I decided that much like MIG welding 15-20 psi seems to work alright for most TIG welding situations.  I have since used up what seems like an EPIC amount of Argon & Argon/CO2 mix (compared to MIG welding).  I assumed that was normal…

So I’m talking to my friend the other day who is also new to TIG welding, and using what seems like an exorbitant amount of gas (sound familiar?).  He told me that his welding supply store just informed him that he was supposed to be using a FLOW meter not a PRESSURE meter.  Ooops.  They told him that once he swaps over from pressure regulated (only) to flow regulated, his gas tanks would last far longer. They even gave him a free tank filling.

I was confused by this because why would both of our TIG welders come with pressure regulators if we really needed flow meters?  Seems stupid right?  I decided that I needed to do a test.  I got my tank filled, because it was obviously empty again, grabbed some party balloons at the local pharmacy, and into the garage I went!

I began by attaching the balloon to the TIG torch with a zip tie.

TIG torch before the test.

Then I attached the Flow meter to my newly filled tank, and set it to flow 15 CFM with the TIG pedal fully pressed.

TIG flow meter

I then grabbed the stop watch and hammered the foot pedal to the floor for 5 seconds.  The welder was set to 3 seconds of post flow for the entire test as well for a total of 8 seconds of gas.

TIG torch 15 CFM for 5 Seconds.

Then I swapped balloons, zip tied it the same way, and hooked up the Pressure regulator to the same new tank. Read More

Video: Supercharged Nailhead Ford Falcon Gasser

When I comb through eBay and Craigslist for cars that I can’t have and can’t afford, I’m really looking for two specific things.

1) I want to see barn finds.

2) I want to see race fuel huffing, hell fire spraying, tire-hanging, M/T smoking, YouTube-video-filled listings that make me want to rip the exhaust off my snowblower and hit it with a 100 shot of nitrous.

The Ebay listing I came  across today is pretty darn close to an exact match of my second request.  It is tough to wrap my brain around it to be honest.

Here are the highlights: Read More

Current Poll Results: How Often Are People Changing Their Oil?

Last week we had a poll called “How often do you really change your oil?”.  Now that several hundred people have taken the poll, I figured I’d post up the current results.  Note:  The poll didn’t specify whether each person was using synthetic or non-synthetic oil, so think of this as a baseline, not the “end all / be all” test.

It looks like 3001-5000 miles is the winner at about 50%.  I was actually pleasantly surprised by this, because there have been many articles floating around the internet claiming that you don’t need to change it that often.  While I agree that synthetics can handle longer oil change intervals, I believe that going more than 5000 on the non-synthetic oil (and filter for that matter) is pushing your limits.  This result gives me hope for all of the non-synthetic engines out there.

The second highest result was the 5001-8000 mile range.  My best guess is that this is where many of the synthetic oil users are landing.  Many synthetic users change it around 7-8000 ish, that seems to be the “norm”.  If you are running non-synthetic up to 8000 miles, you are bold.  I won’t judge though.

Next up is where I fall, in the 17% range. I realize that I’m not in the majority, and I could go to 4000 or maybe in 5000 for my oil changes and probably not see a difference. However, I will spare you because I already cover my thoughts on this whole subject a short time ago.

The “whenever my car tells me to”  was the biggest surprise for me because I expected that to be far higher.  Is it that many vehicles on the road don’t have this feature or do drivers not trust their dashboard?  It’s something to think about for sure!

Newsflash! 1% of people don’t know that oil needs to be changed.  Note to self: Do not buy a vehicle from that 1%.

For what it is worth, I’m going to keep the poll open and review it again in a month or so to see how / if the results change.

One For The Dogs

Lets face it if you have a dog, old spot likes to hang out while you turn a wrench on your muscle car. While you are working  on your Mustang, Cuda, Camaro or making a sleeper out of the family beach wagon, all this excitement makes a dog hungry.

It was this combination of man vs. machine, and dog vs. lunch time that lead to the birth of the dog dish hubcap. This is basically how they got their name. While guys were out in the garage working on the car (back in the day), they would take the metal hub cap from the Road Runner, Mustang, Camaro etc. and fill it with water or put dog food in it for the pooch.

Read More