its interesting sitting here in CA looking at the traffic cameras up north at home thinking boy am I glad that's not me.

See, there was one good thing about being in the land of CA.

One we found one. Then again two the little hole on the wall Chinese food place is great.

When I was engine shopping for the crate engine I bought, most of the crate engines the web sites pushed were tons more HP than I wanted. It is easy to drop in a 500 HP or more small block 350. But then the transmission really needs an update. The rear end needs to be swapped out with a lot bigger one. The rear drum brakes have to be replaced with discs. The front disks need to be replaced with much bigger rotors and calipers, and the brake booster and proportioning valve need to be replaced and the steering really needs an upgrade and the suspension needs to be swapped out with a 4 link system. If I wanted to do all that I would just buy a modern car.

The only poor handling car I've owned for slickery stuff was the 90 928 GT. It had huge engine braking, one of the things that made it such a great GT highway car. With nearly wore out Bridgestone Pole Positions on slick roads it would swap ends if you let off the gas without pushing in the clutch. Put on some mud and snow tires and it did fine.

I see on the cayenne forums people swapping summer and winter tires. I don't see the point of the summer stickies on an SUV, sports car yes, SUV no.. All seasons work great for me. Maybe if we had more than 3 days of snow might want some Blizzacks or something.

I had a Mitsub 3000 GT VR4 in the early 90's that was surprising easy to control and drive in the snow for a twin turbo'd 300hp all wheel steering car.

Well, that was an interesting afternoon.

My wife's cousin has CP and is confined to a wheelchair. He stayed with me until 6pm.

He just turned 21. Having no use of his legs means he has to have help in the bathroom. I was secretly hoping he could just hold it until he went home but that wasn't the case. It was awkward but we managed.

I took him up to a tattoo place and he anodized some of his earrings. Lifting 120 pounds of human being into a vehicle is NOT easy.

It makes one appreciate being able to do simple things. :(

That will be good for your karma tank.

Good for you Wayne!
Know where you are coming from.
Had my brother with MS living here and in a wheel chair for years.
He was why I was driving a mini van.

Good Morning, and Burrrrr... 20°F here.

Yea, and the wind chill is single digit. I am glad I work in a windowless warm building.

Happy Friday y'all

Buongiorno, y'all.

No thanks bro, pass...........

My wife stopped by earlier and we drove over to my attorney to have our wills made up. My real plan is to never die and so far so good but since no one has yet lived forever I guess death and taxes are an inevitable thing. We each are having wills and power of attorney made up. We go back in 10 days to sign everything and make it real. It sucks acting all responsible and grown up like an adult.

We have 3 seasons on the Durango and Blizzaks for the winter. Mostly because all seasons don't work in the winter on a RWD truck (tried 3 different highly rated all seasons, they all suck) so we got summer tires that had a better mpg rating and have yet to get stuck with the Bilzzaks.

We just put BFG g-Force COMP-2 A/S on the Avenger. So far they are a far better tire than the crap that was OEM. As of yet I have not spun the tires unintentionally. Will see how they do in the snow, but they are rated pretty high in the snow. With the old tires if it was damp or under 50* the tiers had no grip.

The Rogue has all seasons and it does OK so far. They are CA all seasons though.

Glen, I remember the thread when you were picking out your crate engine. For what you use the car for it was a wise choice. I still think you can use washer fluid to break it loose to power slide. Or wait for rain.

I don't know why, but I thought of Vash when I read this.

Coffee and Tea | Field & Stream

We had to buy another battery for our airplane. Only $550!

It is 24 volts but because it is for an airplane the cost triples or quadruples.

Ah the ol' "airplane" tax. We know how that works!


Cold here but not bad. Of course, the weather tellers are saying we COULD get between 5 and9 inches of snow through Monday morning. That figures because we are having my son's birthday partay on Sunday with my family coming from the other side of MI.

He will be a teenager on the 14th. yay

Dumb question: How long do airplane batteries last and do they an alternator to keep it charged?

The last one lasted 26 months. The one before that was just 18 months. And yes, it has an alternator that looks much like a car alternator. It too is stupid expensive.

The biggest difference from a car is there is a dual magneto system that will keep the engine running even if there is total electrical failure. The radios and navigation system will quit, but the engine has a main and a backup magneto to keep it running. It runs to keep the propeller spinning and that wind keeps the pilot cool. If it stops he really sweats a lot. In the 70 years we have been in business we have never had an in flight emergency or off field landing.

It is a 1965 Cessna 206 that we bought in 1969.