My mother recently visited and at the airport rental counter was given the only remaining choice between a Volvo electric car that would have run out of range by the time she go to our house (and spent the next three days charging for the return trip on the fourth) or... a Camaro SS. Lets just say, it's not her style, but boy howdy were the grandkids happy to go for rides. Then I took it for a spin. First step, right there on the center console, was to find find the "Mode" button and traction control button. I put in track, turned off traction control and explored the limits of grip on my around the house on my motorcycle roads. All was as expected until I got out on the 55 mph highway and set it to "Tour" Mode where she probably should have had it. I felt the same toed-in tire feeling until I realized that i was lane assist, which wasn't really helpful on a state highway with faded paint and an afternoon sun. Overall, I was impressed with the engine. I was impressed but not enamored by a transmission that handles that kind power and abuse, but in normal driving it seems to have too many gears. I am NOT impressed with the nannies. Traction control and ABS I need to be able to turn off. We live where you need to be able to spin your tires sometimes to find traction sometimes even in dry weather. But the rest of the nannies- I don't need them, and I don't want them. And it turns out my mother spent most of her driving time in "Snow/Ice" mode. Apparently that switch is right where her hand rested on the center console and she didn't realize she bumped it there. ... View more

Since I was young I liked cars.  I would grab every vehicle booklet whenever Dad went to a car dealership. I would go through them and choose every single option I wanted on that vehicle. Now I wonder why we were even at those dealerships because Dad ended up coming home with a well-used 1987 Nissan Stanza wagon!  That Stanza taught six kids how to drive while earning the nickname” Spud”.  It was shaped kind of like a potato, was just as practical as the humble tuber, and was every bit as bland and uninspiring.  Spud had to be push started for two years until we replaced the starter, a repair experience which I still remember as both emotionally and physically scarring.  My wife learned the same lessons by driving cars given to her for free.  What teenage girl doesn’t want to roll in Bonneville’s, LTDs, and Caprices with rust holes, bearings that catch fire, or engines that diesel so badly the car is still running in the morning? We learned a lot from our cars, and not just how to push start, basic diagnosis and repair, or learning the limits of what a car can and cannot do.  So despite a horrible introduction to actually owning cars, my wife and I both still like cars. My kids need to learn these lessons.  I need to teach my kids how to deal with disappointment but also how to make the best of it.  This Volvo could help teach them to inspire themselves and to appreciate that which is not glamorous or popular.  We would give this Volvo a good home and when it meets its end, it will have done so teaching and inspiring another generation to be capable, adaptable car enthusiasts. ... View more

I saw the title of the article and immediately thought "LX and Panther platforms" and sure enough there they were. I am lucky enough to have a wife that also enjoys cars. Her one complaint about her CLK320 convertible is that as the kids get older, they do not fit in the back seat, and I have not found another modern convertible with larger back seats. A full size convertible car with adult sized back seats would be a car we would consider buying new. ... View more

My kids and I have a video channel with basically family and a few friends watching. Our subscriber count recently went from 40 to 38 after I posted a video of our family going to a corvettes and coffee event at our local dealership. A few days later I notice the drop in subscribers and through the grapevine heard that one person quit because they didn't like our "celebration" of the "gas hog muscle car for not quite rich men", And according to the grapevine, a second person unsubscribed because in the video I recounted a story of when our family had electric car for a couple weeks and we had a pleasant experience with it and the person thought I was endorsing our government forcing electric cars on us. I'm not sad about losing either subscriber. Get back to the basics and a car is a tool. If it can perform that job well, I can appreciate it. Some work better than others. The Bolt we had would be a fine second car, but it would not work for us as a primary vehicle. I have cordless tools, corded tools, and gas powered tools. It works for me. I'm glad what for works for you. It's nice to have options because not everyone's needs the same tool. Do I like what the government is doing? Mostly no, but I don't hate the cars because of politicians. If people voted the same way as they hold a grudge against types of cars, we'd probably have more political turnover and we'd all be better off. ... View more

I feel that way about my 02 Dodge Ram 2500. Last of that body style, and all of it's options were driveline associated. After 13 years of kids and having worked with the truck enough it paid for itself three times over, the floor and most of the seats look the same as they did a decade ago. The wife loves her A208 convertible, but I'm the one that has to fix all the gadgetry that is failing. Power seat failure, power mirrors go berserk, auto climate control failure, and most recently- kids pushed the SOS button which uses now non-existing 3G cell service to contact emergency services so it endless redials and disables the stereo. ... View more

I've rebuilt the Hemi in my 05 Magnum twice (first rebuild ended in rod failure after 4k miles). A cam is going to be your best bang for the buck if you want a difference in power you actually get to feel in daily driving. Anymore than the 30-50 hp gain from that and you are on the edge of unreliability. The 6.1L that the the SRT model of the time utilized had forged and hardened rotating mass to maintain reliability 420 hp and torque, and you'll want those parts if you are thinking of supercharging (reference my rod failure necessitating a 2nd rebuild). I'm not saying the 5.7L can't make more power, it absolutely can. But my own cost/benefit factors in my use of the car as a daily driver/road trip/hardware store hauler need for reliability. ... View more

And suddenly I am back in high school, one town away from the Smyrna Nissan plant where these were made. Thanks to a new factory with good paying jobs and a significant employee discount, a solid 25% of my school parking lot had a some model of the Nissan Sentra. It was a "perfect" first car for many family's teens, or third car for families at the time. Add in the influence of all those cheap, base model Sentras hitting the used market, and I don't think I'm exaggerating much if I credit the Sentra as being the car that opened the door for Nissan in the US South. I agree, someone at Nissan in Smyrna needs to whip out the company credit card and start a North American Nissan Heritage Museum. Put in in a nice little building out by I-24 as a tourist stop. ... View more

I imagine a site with a searchable database of digital copies of service and owners manuals pretty much any type of vehicle- cars, trucks, tractors, bikes, etc. A for sale section could be available for users to sell their printed media of magazines, FSMs, owners, manuals, etc, dealer provided papers, etc. Another part of the site could be for "reported tips" linked to back to the time stamps of the source videos. You could have some sort of visual check showing that other users verified the link was accurately described, dead links, etc. I imagine kind of a cross between a forum site and Wikipedia but without all the chitchat of a forum site. ... View more

I'll vouch for the Lane Museum in Nashville and I also recommend the AACA Museum in Hershey, PA. Both are places I can or do visit with my family multiple times a year. The Curtiss Museum in Hammondsport, NY is also a delight with bit of everything to see- bikes, motorcycles, planes, boats, a few cars, and campers (while not as automobile themed as others, its very close to Watkins Glenn Raceway, so you can easily add it to your weekend). ... View more