About Snailish

Snailish

See I have a sick fascination with those PT converts. Google "goofy roadster mickey and the roadster racers"

Snailish

The Predictor is not attractive to me, but it is predictive... Now some of these things maybe were on other concepts or vehicles (i.e., Euro) at the time but in 1956: -we see that nose perhaps in the Edsel, but it really looks like the late 60s Pontiacs (and a few Fords when Knudsen moved there) -it's low and long like the 58-64 GM full size offerings -Those front bumper sides could be off a 62 Impala -upper front fender is very 60s Vette -era of fins of course (aside from the little Caddy bumps, begins in 57 for most USA cars but at a show in 56 this would be wild to the public) -hubcaps 62-64 Impala SS is similar (more of a spinner on the Impala) -as the article says Ford and Mercury did rear windows like this, later -article says, early version of T-top and I have to agree -opera window! -interior is very mid 60s super sport -Dashboard could be any production late 50s nice car space-age wacky -dog leg A-pillars are typical of 55-early 60s, this windshield is just taking it farther

Snailish

Maybe "The Big 4" could have worked, but in hindsight Studebaker should have steered clear of Packard. It was a misfit marriage... pretend Mercedes was in trouble today and got Mazda to bail them out (that likely has a better shot actually). Studebaker did some brilliant things, but trying to be a mass market car maker beyond the 50s when they didn't have the purchasing power of the Big 3 was a doomed effort.

Snailish

It's interesting to me and makes me wonder if a factor is the imprinting of the "GM Family Ladder of Cars" which I suppose is based on 30s-50s legitimate difference in most of the brands actually being run like separate companies that seems to skew North American perception (as well as non-domestic bias???). Even though in reality there was overlap (sometimes illogical) on that ladder. But by the time Mazda was trying this 929 we were 20+ years into GM corporate uniformity. Should they have called it the "Amati Sentia, A Japanese Luxury car at your Mazda dealer" --yes. Considering Mazda ties to Ford at the time should they have just badged a Crown Vic and saved the development costs... probably. (I get the 929 was supposed to be "better" than a Crown Vic... Mazda USA likely would have done better with a Vic level offering.) Fast forward to today and Mazda is aggressively pushing up-market luxury wise. The GM ladder (and Ford's) is a lean version of its former self and Mercedes is telling shareholders it is time to cut the bottom rungs off the ladder.

Snailish

That 1935 restyle is the rare instance of the revision far exceeding the original (to my tastes). The rounded fenders make more sense with the boat tail to me. I also had that Hot Wheels in gold and brown!

Snailish

Would love to see photos of this side-by-side with the jelly-bean style Crown Vic and/or Buick of a similar era. The hubcaps for example are nearly identical to the ones my dad's 93 (?) Vic wore.

Snailish

As a teen Valiants of that era might of been called ugly by peers, maybe even me. But that was immature looking back at it. "Polarizing" styling for sure, but one that has aged very well. Though still love it hate it for most I would guess. They look insane as a wagon. They are memorable and stand out --something many cars designers of the past 30 years can only dream of.

Snailish

Get him into the Studebaker Driver's Club. Long running and connected to the Studebaker National Museum in South Bend (aka home of Studebaker). One issue of Turning Wheels (the club magazine) probably has enough vendors in it to do the entire restoration of your son's Champion.

Snailish

I will be surprised if anyone makes or carries 6 cyl engine mounts. You're swimming opposite stream to the v8 swap world here. A 50s Ford club might have a member that has a parts car or did a V8 swap and kept the mounts they removed. Some of the big wrecking yards (Flatla) such as you see on the desert junkyard shows should have something with your mounts in it so you may be ahead going that route.

Snailish

I'm not sure the 1350 will be interesting to watch or not. If most of them never/hardly drive then they are just baseball cards getting traded like baseball cards. Why do people buy baseball cards? Once you get to a certain price point it is just to show off perhaps? (not sure... I can't afford baseball cards at an auction or a Ford GT). I guess I'm just more interested in the story of a person that does real things using a Ford GT.

Snailish

Many urban areas everyone being in golf carts would work... if everyone was in golf carts. There's no good punchline to the joke "what happens when a VLV (or golf cart) meets a cement truck at 50 mph"

Snailish

yeah it seems inconsistent today at bleeping. shut shout sit sith sits

Snailish

Interesting... I was always told there were no small block Pontiacs. Shrugs. Someone deeper in the lore than me could explain if the late 70s-81 301 is a true extension of the 326, 389, etc. family or something else. I do know that my father swapped a 301 into his C10 in the 90s and that engine got no respect from anyone. Ran fine for years.

Snailish

sarcasm.

Snailish

An article about dreams not being out of reach, mentions a Barchetta: "A brilliant red Barchetta from a better vanished time..."

Snailish

s-h-i-p or whatever word you are trying to do will fix your post until they get this software figured out. words with letter s and letter h seem most problematic.

Snailish

Shortage of human drivers and you have to pay human drivers. Hub to hub is 24 hours a day 365 days a year with no rest breaks. It's the obvious place where the $ trail makes sense for self-driving. Add in that you can repurpose existing highway lanes, what you are moving towards is a train network made up of individual cars with individual routes. Biggest flaw is anywhere this "train" needs to intersect with real traffic. I won't be surprised to see completely walled off lanes and/or elevated routes.

Snailish

The theory (not saying I agree with it) is that we will be in the small pod things that draft super close to each other at high speeds with the computer managing all the lane swaps and stops thus realizing perfection.

Snailish

That's how I feel about drag racing... the speeds of the 60s into 70s was watchable. Cars are too fast and tracks are mostly short and you missed it with a blink.

Snailish

It's messed up (the software not you). There isn't a lot of logic to what is being bleeped.

Snailish

The software that filters these boards has been on the fritz for a few days. It's bleeping out things it shouldn't be. Not sure why the software provider hasn't gone to a "last version that wasn't doing this" yet.

Snailish

Best in sale, worst in sale often just sums up as "sold in the right (or wrong) place at the right (or wrong) time. The Nissan would have done better on Bring a Trailer. The various generations of Thunderbird are an interesting individual study. It would be interesting to see the Hagerty policy breakdown of people that own them based on 10-year age brackets. Of the few old birds I can think of in my area all the owners are 60+ for example.

Snailish

the bad word filter... had an update? ...a disgruntled software employee? Anyways... words with s and the letter h in them, especially if around 4-5 letters long seem to get bleeped the most consistently. If it was a software update circa the day this started... roll it back? Otherwise who quit at the software company the day before!

Snailish

Tomato Soup is an odd colour choice, but if we are getting not grey/black/silver/white I won't complain.

Snailish

Build the cars wherever, install all batteries in home country. Battery picks are easy to take in and out of completed cars right? Note: Ford is building/built battery factories in the USA to my understanding. If Carbon Footprint is really why government types are regulating this... then local battery install and reducing cross-ocean **bleep** of the equation, no?

Snailish

Look into companies that supply prop vehicles for movies. Depending on where this was deployed it could be attractive to them. It's also strange enough to be easily reworked into non-historical movies as well. I know a guy that says he does quite well renting out a few of his military vehicles is the reason I suggest this.

Snailish

See this is where I am a simpleton that doesn't get it. For me, you don't get to trade with my country unless you are willing to align on some key laws, copyrighting being one of them.

Snailish

That 64 looks great! As a kid I fell in love with the 59. The later Chevelle and Monte based ones have all grown on me. Studebaker Coupe Express is more of an ancestor to the El Camino than the Cameo in my opinion... and Ford did get the Ranchero out before the El.

Snailish

Keep in mind this article was penned in 2014. Boss Hogg from Dukes of Hazzard likely influences "Gen X" just as much as the mob movies that most of that generation would have been too young to see in-era. Reruns of Dallas even... I expect old Cadillacs are "up" since then, even pre-pandemic boost to all vehicles values. I know a few people with 70s Cadillacs. Some strange engine components (early efi???), rudimentary computers??? and the filler pieces between bumpers and tail lights seem to be the annoyances they talk about. I'm pretty sure I read about someone repopping the filler pieces in fibreglass though, so maybe that isn't an issue now.

Snailish

Very good point on the Mercedes garbage trucks and vans. I'm curious if perception varies on locale? In my part of Canada we didn't see the vans until after the Daimler-Chrysler divorce so it was jarring to see a Mercedes badge on a Dodge Sprinter. They are a lot more common now. The big industrial Mercedes I feel like I never see. So 70s to 2000s Mercedes was pretty clear in vision here. I would even say that most people don't filter between the cheap Mercedes and the posh ones, but the cheap ones are out there and making a name for themselves (you paid a lot for that badge on that) and the idea that Mercedes has gone downhill has gained traction here as a result.

Snailish

The moment any of the "storied" sports car or luxury brands exists under the umbrella of an all-markets company the need to sully the brand to pay the bills argument no longer holds merit to me. Daimler-Chrysler was wise with the 300, Charger and such Mercedes component sharing. Overlapping Mercedes with any of the price bracket offerings of the less-premium brands in that company was not necessary, and I feel ultimately detrimental to Mercedes.

Snailish

I remember watching/reading that Seinfeld was a numbers guy. Arguably one of the most data trivia filled people for Porsche (that's his jam I think? --this was a while ago) was the premise of the article/**bleep**). A different kind of car person, and actually a type that is really important to have too. Someone that knows what a particular car is supposed to be/have is handy to have. Passionate in a different way is another wording.

Snailish

Seems most words with **bleep** the bleep. s-----h---- if it is around 4 characters your word is probably edited often taking half your post Only pattern I have found is the s and letter h being in there. Haven't tried to crack the code with other forum-naughty words.

Snailish

Maybe some model of Mercury matched Ford. Canada got different cars than US from Ford so there might be a strange match there too. We need to know what model you are trying to match and what seat style. If you are willing to put incorrect make seat covers in (nothing wrong with that) what about just getting an older fabric? Sites like this (link at end) have early 60s Ford stuff, 63 Mercury is the oldest 60w listing. If you are hunting material, knowing the colour you want helps because some random place might have 1960 Mercury Houndstooth purple and just been waiting 72 years to finally unload it. https://oemautofabric.com/

Snailish

Tingeofginge your comment is worthy of an article analysis if not someone's thesis. If everyone retreats to their "most profitable margins" what does that landscape look like? There is waste and costs in the many platforms overlapping products version of things we have now. At the same time, I like dealing with my local Ford dealer but they have no new car to sell me that has 4 doors. I'd buy a rebadged Accord from them no problem...

Snailish

The stand-up arcade version of "Super Off Road" with the 4 steering wheels. The home console version wasn't as fun.

Snailish

it did s-h-u-t for me earlier. So it is too granular towards words that are close to the bleeps you want to bleep. If no one ever bypassed bleep filters the no-post list would only have to be the actual swears or offensive words. testing: s-h-i-f-t = **bleep** s-h-o-r-t = **bleep** s-h-u-t = **bleep** b-o-t-c-h- = botch

Snailish

This was brought up in the thread about the earlier Ford/Honda no SEMA announcement --that if the OEM are moving away from participating in the aftermarket (or just want to look like they are) then why go to SEMA?

Snailish

I enjoy car stories told like this. The pictures really added in this case as well.

Snailish

hey, the auto bleeping is now just taking a word out instead of half paragraphs... I guess that is better. s-h-u-t I can almost see why it is bleeping, but obviously that is still not fixed.

Snailish

The scary idea is building fully optioned vehicles with various options **bleep** off via subscription. This is so they can upsell the next owner on everything you didn't want, and they only have to make one spec of everything at the factory. Makes great sense to their accountants. I forsee the nightmare of options no one has ever activated breaking in my off-warranty car and disabling my vehicle from working. Even though I don't need that option I will have to pay to upkeep these idle parts.

Snailish

It's cool that you are doing your dad's Galaxie. I'm not sure that grown-up kids 40 years from now will be scraping the underside of Chevy Volts and Tesla roadsters (10 year old tech devices don't have a great track record right now of being usable/repairable) but if it is possible to succeed at it I would predict it does happen.

Snailish

"geo-fenced areas" will be the no human trucker lane on the interstate. This is the one that makes $ (by taking the human labor out of the equation). Politically, we probably get a few areas committing lanes to self-driving as well. Similar to cities that have streetcars, the problems will be where regular drivers, cyclists and pedestrians intersect with these routes. Who knows, maybe we go full-Jetsons and get elevated self-driving car networks criss-crossing major cities. More of a riff on a subway system. Public transit is a great money maker everywhere right???

Snailish

2nd post as I am not trusting this auto-bleeping forum at the moment... And if the brands truly pushed identity (or identities... as you know Chev will go back to having several across the models) then it would be easy to articulate why you don't like a particular one such as Audiobycarmine pointing out how "The Economics of Desire" isn't going to float all boats.

Snailish

The asterisk headlights are a fun idea (Benz logo). But it does look like a cartoon character when they die and they draw the eyes funny.

Snailish

It's a catch-22. Nothing is duller than boring "aerodynamic" soap blobs of vehicles sold on their passenger assist merits and fractional mpg differences. Vehicles sold for their coolness, cutting edge styling, you need this to fit in, exclusivity, straight line performance, etc. are going to be offensive to some. It's the motorcyle "you get it or don't" thing. I would much prefer brand identity mean something again and we get some truly different options. Mitsubishi make the rally/off road inspired aggressive I will watch all the Fast & Furious movies again vehicles, Dodge give us the colourful muscle (oh wait...), Mazda make the zoom zoom smaller things that excel as day 2 track toys, Mercedes go super posh show off... and so on.

Snailish

It's hard to tell from the pictures how good the paint is. Pretty easy to spend too much money on a good paint job on a car valued at the reasonable end of the market though. Unless the dream is the perfect Hornet --then have at it.

Snailish

The random drop of a kudo to the 77 Cutlass made me smile. I'm not old enough to have appreciated them when new, but did grow up with 70s Cutlass and such being on the streets. My family didn't have any --I have no nostalgia for them. I love them and think they are one of the best pure 70s designs. And one that holds up. My younger than me wife disagrees and thinks they are ugly.

Snailish

There's been some random part post replacements with bleep the last day or so.

Snailish

Vehicle pricing has not matched inflation (until perhaps recently). Yes there are a few options (air bags, back up cameras) that add cost vs. your 1980 vehicle, but the simple truth is vehicles cost more so some of us have to run older daily drivers. Besides, it is income vs. the cost that is the lost ground moreso than just applying the inflation rate to currency.