Jeremy Clarkson, His Books, and The United Kingdom Location.

Jeremy Nutt 2 Comments

Pop Quiz:

1) Do you watch Top Gear UK?

2) Do you enjoy Jeremy Clarkson style humor?

3) Do you know the difference between the UK, Great Britain, and England?

If you answered “yes” to number 1 & 2 above, you will definitely enjoy this book.  If you answered “no” to question 3, don’t worry about it, we’ll cover that in a few minutes.  I’ll save you from lying when somebody asks you if you know the difference.

The Book:

I was recently in a used book store (so what?), and I spotted a copy of “Motorworld” by Jeremy Clarkson for $2. My first thought was: “Jeremy Clarkson writes books? How did I not know this?” I grabbed it and hoped it wouldn’t be a giant letdown like my 59 ounce “half gallon” bottle of orange juice.  I got the book home and flipped through a page or two to get a little taste of what it was like.  Hysterical gasping-for-air laughter ensued, and before long, I was done with half the book.  What I’m getting at is that it’s a pretty flippin’ funny book if you read it with Jeremy Clarkson’s sarcasm and panache.  It’s covers Jeremy’s thoughts on 12 places around the world that build cars, yes, even Detroit. It’s rich to say the least.  Grab it online for cheap cash monies if you get the chance, it’s worth your time.

Now The World:

While reading this book and watching TGUK, I often find myself (embarrassingly) saying “I have absolutely no clue where in the world these guys are”.  I mean I knew that they were in between the United States and Russia, and probably close to Ireland.  However,  as far as UK vs. England vs. Great Britain, I was lost worse than a out-of-state’r in Boston.  Let’s dig in deeper so that we all can act smarter. Read More

Stinky Twinkie: "Driving Mad Miles Since 2008"

Jeremy Nutt 4 Comments

Christmas shopping this weekend at the mall was the exact opposite of fun.  It was a day filled with screaming children, overly agitated people, and “sales” that you know aren’t really a sale at all.  I grasped at anything that could make the day more bearable.  I thought about how delicious warm pretzels are, I polished my sneakers on the way up and down the escalator (on the side bristles), and even watched teenagers throw change off the 2nd floor on to the people below (AKA, me). Fortunately,  there was something amazing waiting outside in the parking lot, an attention grabbing black hole of a vehicle.  The very first moment that I saw it, I knew it was special.  As I meandered to the back of the parking lot dodging all of the cars that were deliberately trying to run me over, I was finally able to read the side of it.  “Stinky Twinkie” – “Driving Mad Miles Since 2008”. Heck yes, instant mood improvement.

It was parked just a couple spots down from me in the mall parking lot, and nobody around me seemed to even acknowledge its presence.  With so many mad miles, how could it be possibly be ignored??  I have no idea.  Was it a figment of my imagination? Read More

Chevelle SS Hood Pins: Why?

Jeremy Nutt 6 Comments

First off, I love Chevelle’s in a very bad way, especially the front end of a 1970, and the back of a 71-72.  Combining those two aspects together would make the ideal A-Body in my mind.  But anywho, that’s not the topic at hand.  I want to know why the heck GM decided that the SS packages so desperately needed hood pins?  Was there really a chance of a hood flying up?  The Chevelle hood weighs in at just less than 400,000 lbs, do you really think it’s going to fly away?  Maybe the latch just wasn’t able to handle the job alone?  Or maybe it was done strictly for the mean muscle car look?  I don’t know, I’m probably alone here, but I just think the hood pins take away from the clean Chevelle hood lines, and they make it look like a factory installed hack job.  Hey, just my 2 cents.

Somebody please school me.

Oh yeah, here are some pictures of an absolutely mint ’70 SS with a 582 cubic inch engine, pushing out ~750hp, through a 5 speed manual transmission at the 1A Auto car show. MMMMMM,

Your Opinion: Most Beautiful American Car Ever Built?

Jeremy Nutt 4 Comments

Personally, when I think about beautiful American cars, I always turn my brain right back to the 1930’s.  That was a period in time when cars were endlessly classy and smooth.  They were longer, lower, and more luxurious than any other time in history (my opinion).  Many of them were hand formed by master coach builders using wooden bucks, planishing hammers, and english wheels to shrink and stretch the metal into the right shape.  Not to mention they welded metal panels together with torches (Read: insanely hard), and could make it flat when they were done (…which is even harder).   A good coach builder’s work is absolutely amazing even in raw bare metal form.  Oh yea, so if I had to pick the most beautiful American car, I would likely go with an old coach built Duesenburg, like this one built by their in-house shop known as LaGrande.  mmmmm….

coachbuilt

coachbuilt1

In your opinion, what is the most beautiful American car that was ever built?

Picture credit:

http://www.coachbuilt.com/bui/l/lagrande/lagrande.htm

Hydraulic Clutches Are Just Better, So I Swapped It.

Jeremy Nutt 5 Comments

Sometimes vehicles are just not made the way that you want them to be, so you are forced to take matters into your own hands and correct it.  Today’s blog is one of those situations.  See, my truck came with a cable actuated clutch, which works absolutely great for a stock clutch.  Unfortunately, I inserted Frankenstein into the equation and ruined all chances of clutch cable survival.  To be honest, I feel like all clutches should be hydraulically actuated. I know, I know, mustangs are yadda yadda, and they work fine. I know, it’s just my opinion.  Anyway, the firewall of my truck was not up for the challenge of a cable pushing harder than normal on it.  The truck is likely made from recycled beer cans (sometimes the truth hurts), and would have destroyed itself if I had used it that way much longer.  Not to mention, my left leg was getting an unnecessary workout, which made driving in traffic miserable.  I knew that there was a better way – hydraulics.

I started by commandeering a hydraulic clutch system from an early 1980’s Dodge Ram turbo diesel (yes, they really existed).  This pile of parts included a bell housing cutout that would need to be hacked into my non-hydraulic bell housing.  Cool right?

I knew that the only way to keep ambition high all day was to start off with easy stuff.  Naturally installing the clutch pedal and clutch master cylinder was the first step.  The cool thing about this was that the firewall already had a spot for the clutch master cylinder to be mounted because the V6 models came with hydraulic clutches. Sweeeeeet Action!!  Some drilling, grinding, and bending happened, and Poof!  It was done.

Next up was the transmission itself.  I pulled the transmission out, and chased it around with a sawzall and a cut-off wheel.  The TIG welder made a brief appearance on the scene, and then two pieces of aluminum became one.  It was as if it was meant to be.   The next issue was that factory 2.0L KM132 transmission didn’t have a spot for a pivot ball to be mounted.  Uh Oh…. Luckily I had some old 2.6L transmissions hanging around waiting to be stripped of their valuable parts.  Off came the front case that can be seen in this picture, some grinding ensued, and VIOLA!  Pivot ball in place  Hydraulic lines were plumbed, and fluids were topped off.  Time to celebrate? Nah.

Once wrapped up, the clutch felt better than ever before.  The pedal was about 100x easier to push down, it engaged and disengaged perfectly, and sure enough, the firewall no longer flexes at all.  I will officially declare this as the 2nd best upgrade that has been done to the truck.  The only thing that it falls behind is the engine swap itself.

Now You Too Can Own Your Very Own Colani Lambo!

Jeremy Nutt 1 Comment

Every once in a long while I catch a show on TV about Luigi Colani.  He is a designer of a variety of  things, cars being one of the more prominent ones.   He is ridiculously talented at what he does, and is always thinking outside the box with his nature-related design.  His automotive concepts are always WAY beyond anything that current manufacturers are ready for, but they are thought provoking nonetheless.  Try doing a Google image search for his name sometime when you’re bored and check out his work.

One of his lost vehicle concepts from 1970 popped up on eBay the other day.  It’s known as the “Lamborgini Miura Le Mans concept prototype car”. It’s based on a Lamborghini (surprise), and it’s quite futuristic to say the least. It toured around Europe for several years when it was first built, then oddly enough it traveled 30+ years into the future to an estate auction in Indiana (clearly hitting a few bumps along the way).  A totally awesome car no doubt; it’s really too bad a car as cool as this has been hidden for so long.  Hopefully it will be restored and driven or put on display so that it can be enjoyed by the masses again.

Quicky Sidenote: Be sure to look at the green picture below.  It looks like he designed the car to comfortably seat two bears. lolzzz.

eBay Item # 270670824212