SAmadei

Now you got me wondering... I haven't seen any like it in real life, so I assumed the picture was a vintage bus... especially since it only has red flashing lights. In Jersey, all our buses have the amber flashing lights first... the red flashing lights come on when the bus stops... I thought that was the same all over the country, so seeing the lack of amber flashing lights, I really thought it was vintage. Now that you bring up the question, I see it has some anachronisms. The white roof, the taillight lenses, the safety warnings and notations. I wish I could make out the badge on the rear to look up the company's website.

Apparently coasting at 55~70 mph in neutral with a 200-4R or a 700-R4 spins the engine enough that a hot engine can recatch. Both cars were part of my regular rotation and drove fine for tens of thousands of miles afterward. I still have all of my cars, if you want to inspect if I brainstorm to recall which two they were, but they likely are not running. There is a time and place to learn how to use all the pertinent features of a car... the parking lot... right after clicking the seatbelt and before adjusting the mirrors. Then there is common sense... which isn't so common anymore. As a matter of fact, I AM a traveling companions dream... I have figured out how to work EVERY rental/test drive/junker I have come across... and that's a lot. Plus I can read a map and repair it by the side of the road well enough to limp most of them home. I still have not completely figured out the track loader Dad left me... no steering wheel, just about 6 sticks and a 6-way joystick. I have narrowed down most of the features by following the hydraulics... but I'm not taking it on the road until I have it down pat, either. I said they would fear it exploding "Hollywood-style". I KNOW what a blowing engine is like... I still have the shrapnel. Not sure I'm getting this bit... Cars have had neutral lockouts for years... in fact, I think it's required to get through NJ inspection. I don't see how it would affect this... they would just push the button on the side or angle the lever left/right to get out of neutral.

Great point... I didn't even think of the rev limiter. They definitely could have put it in neutral and coasted to a stop and shut off the car with no harm.

Step 3 is iffy. While most modern cars aren't supposed to be able to be push started, I have found that some automatic transmission cars can restart coasting in neutral at higher speeds by just putting the ignition on. I found this out by turning the engine off after overheating, but trying to keep the electric fans running. Not sure why, but it sure surprised the hell out of me. Its happened in two different cars, but I can't remember which. You know, after thinking about this... I wonder if anyone has ever tested just laying on the brakes with a stuck throttle? During the Audi unintended acceleration hoopla, there was considerable testing of the brakes in the theory that the brakes should be strong enough to hold the car even at full throttle... which it did. However, they never tested holding the brakes at high speed and full throttle... where the brakes have to overcome the engine _and_ the stored kinetic energy of a car moving at 100 mph. Mythbusters?

Most cars can be turned off without locking the wheel... and if the wheel does lock, you still have the keys in the ignition and it take only a couple fractions of a second to unlock. For the record, I have had floormat jammed around accelerator enough times over the years, and at least twice had to kill the ignition, pull over, get out of the car and unjam it. They probably did that... and the engine redlined. Either fear that they would blow up the engine (and have to pay for it) or that the engine would blow up in a Hollywood-style explosion killing everyone for a quarter mile popped into their heads and they put it back in gear. Granted, I will blow up the engine before crashing into anything major... but I would have turned off the car with the ignition. Tragedy for the passengers... the driver should have had better sense or not been behind the wheel. This is why we need better driver's testing. In the end this boils down the same as the McDonalds hot coffee episode... big company hand clueless person a gun and person blows their own foot off. When my floormats jammed the accelerator, I didn't feel the need to sue anybody.

When I read the headline, I thought this was going to be an announcement that more GM cars and trucks would have manual transmissions. Bummer.

I can't believe this has come up again. In the '90s, wagons died out because people could not get a decent sized wagon (With the exception of the low production B-bod triples) with a good engine... gas was cheap, hence they bought SUVs... big Tahoes and Suburbans and Hummer H2s. CUV's are replacing the SUVs, but they aren't far from being wagons again... except that they are too heavy and flip over. Those are features, right? We wouldn't need the added height if everyone else didn't decide to drive in hulking SUVs... we wouldn't have a stigma if GM didn't build almost 20 years of their 1977 design with a bunch of smogger engines. It's nearly 2010. Gas is almost 3x the price it was in the '90s. Wagons... if built... and designed well... would be a potential market. Of course, next year, people will point to the CTS wagon as a dismal failure and proof that nobody wants wagons (well, I doubt more than a few want a $40K+ mini-wagon). But hey... GM, Ford and Toyota know it all, right? Its 1982... Nobody wants a LITTLE van. Do you see them on the road? No, because nobody wants them. Its not like they were never made... such as the VW Bus... but Chrysler was certainly glad they locked up the whole market for nearly a quarter century.

My writing style is similar... a hybrid... 80% print, 20% cursive... My cursive writing was always atrocious... some of my teachers explained that it can occur when ones mind is running faster than the hand can write... I do write fast... perhaps the mind is still trying to go faster. I do the same thing while typing... where I'll have words drop out or even phrases or clauses... but few typos. During my senior year of HS, we had a couple (IMHO) progressive teachers who were more interested in making learning easier than sticking to draconian discipline. One student asked the teacher if he could print, as he apparently disliked cursive. I've been doing my hybrid ever since. Of course, my writing also incorporates fonts, of sorts. The logic behind this is to create distinctive looking notes... as I usually do not actually memorize facts in some classes, but what the pages of notes looked like... then I would just visually read the notes in my mind's eye during the quiz. Pretty much the same here... I only cursive on checks and my signature. But now I do most of my bill paying electronically... so I am worried now that my my cursive writing will fall apart now, as I sign very few documents or artwork regularly.

Oh, it can be done... I'm just trying to impress that it can be _very_ messy. I'd do alot of masking. Or it might be possible to shoot some into a small cup and brush it on with a disposable brush. I don't recall how fast it got tacky. I would also recommend coming up with some kind of clamping set up. The best way to get this stuff to hold is to clamp it completely for a few hours.

Agreed. I think you are thinking of 3M's Super 77 adhesive. Its a bit pricy, but very good... even if the prep is not perfect. Super 77 is a spray adhesive, however, and might not work for just touching up a little trim situation without getting adhesive all over the place. Darn it, I burnt my pizza while writing this!

Interesting. My '99 Bonne's shimmy has been getting worse VERY quickly. Fast enough that I assumed I lost a wheel weight. I've already been under the car pushing and pulling bits, and its all tight. I have been wondering about the struts for a while, as the shimmy has come on during a period that I swear that the car has lost some height. I'll have to take a closer look at the struts.

Not being there, its hard to judge. I know that a lot of people do not react properly to things that they may have a overreaction to. As someone who drives many cars that have been sitting, I can attest to the WTF moment when a spider, fly, mouse, snake, hive of bees starting flying around the car. And if it happened at the exact right time, it could cause an accident. Fortunately, I recover from the shock quickly... but even a 1/2 second while driving a car, is an eternity. Is it plausible it caused the accident? Yeah. Is it likely... no. She was probably on the phone to her friend... "OMG Brenda! Theres a spider on my windshield. Eew! Its going to crawl on me. Where is a tissue?" *drops phone* "OMG! I dropped the phone! I need to twitter this!" Reaches for phone. "Wha..." *CRASH* *tinkle* *tinkle*. BS. Firefighters, Police, bystanders _always_ act like you should have been toasted, lacerated, crushed, etc. beyond recognition, since they all have PhDs in thermodynamics, applied physics, chemistry, etc... I think it helps stoke the "hero" angle. My local firefighters are like the ones in the movie "Pleasantville"... wouldn't know fire if their asses were on fire.

Same here.

Best part is when your "co-workers" wouldn't know "work" if it bit them in the ass. Years ago, Scott Adams (of Dilbert fame) convinced me to think of them as "cow-orkers". Use your imagination to fill in what orking might be.

I've learned over the years that almost everything is a basket case beneath the skin. Of course, it is a real talent to be able to turn a basket case into something workable. Especially career-wise if you do it can do it in short time.

IMHO, in many disciplines, "prevent" is a much more intense process than "detect". For example, its fairly easy to detect a server hacking... its really tough to keep every hole closed on a production server as prevention. I spend time on both times of the equation... personal life and career-wise. Funny on the Stonehenge thing... I think I might be using some of his ideas to lift my 55KW generator... damn thing is heavy as hell, and has few good lift points.

GM did take into account the compression ratio, its just that it seems that too much gasoline engine DNA stayed in the gene pool... i.e., the gasoline engine's 10 bolt head pattern. The 1981-on engines offered completely tapped head bolts to help keep the heads on. As I recall, the biggest problem with the early diesels were not the head gasket, but the bottom end... which failed in spectacular fashion... damage when you ran over your own crankshaft and put it in your fuel tank. The 1981-on DX blocks were definitely beefier... seeing it apart in the garage and the 350(or 403) gas engine before it was put in. As I recall, the DX blocks were converted to gas and used by engine builders during the '80s, bored out beyond 455 inches. Of course, even before the DX in the Cutty blew its gasket, it was clear that driving a diesel car was not the same as a gas engine... and I imagine even good diesel engines got ripped out in favor of gas engines to favor driveability... especially as gas prices stayed low(ish).

Yes, supposedly the Diesels after 1981 were fine. Beware the '78-'80s... of course, if it was a junk engine, it would not have made it to 2009 intact. Parents' '81 Cutlass Supreme was a diesel... got it dirt cheap due to the Diesel in 1984... dad was a diesel mechanic, so it made sense... however, a few years later it blew the head gasket, even though it was an better engine. It was easier to swap in a gas engine... so it got a '78 Olds 350 4bbl out of a fullsize... car hauled ass after that, so I think it was actually a 403. A biodiesel Toro would be pretty cool.

I've somewhat got what you need. My Hollanders cover 1964-1979 and 1980-1989... however, the latter set does crossref into the early '90s. What year Tahoe is it? 4x4? 4x2? Number of lug nuts? Number of bolts on the cover? VIN model (K)? If I had to guess, you likely have rear axle (part type 435) 1513... which covers Blazer/Jimmy '92-'94, Tahoe/Yukon '92-'94 and Tahoe/Yukon 2door, 4x4 '95-'98. I really need to pick up a '90-'03 Hollander... but they are so damn expensive. Luckily, I have a pretty nice automotive (GM biased) library at this point... better than the lame section at Borders and the only better one I've seen is at a garage. ;-)

Apparently so... www.ncausa.org Interesting... reminds me of the broccoli.com website years ago.

To me, its twisted... While it is quite grim and horrific sight... at the same time it is quite humorous. Unfortunately, it is one of those things where only a cool car would suffer such an ironic fate... you won't see an Aveo torched after a donut/burnout gone bad.

Camino, your Ute appears to be ready. Its a little overcooked, though. Ouch.

Definite proof my Caddy skills are lacking... Actually, I first was just going to leave it as a Coupe DeVille... but then thought a convertible would be better, even if they are pretty rare (IE, too valuable to enjoy)... then forgot to fix the Coupe part... Caddies are just too low in numbers to have ever gotten my scrutiny beyond major year to year changes... I'm a BOP guy!

This is a really tough question. On one hand, for most GM cars, if I want one, I just go track one down. On the other, for the rare GM stuff... like '69 Trans Ams, I'm not sure I would be able to enjoy them without fearing that something would happen to destroy their value. Also, in this era of easy 400+ hp engines, I'm not sure that a '69 Trans Am experience is that much more visceral than a '69 Firebird with a LS3/T56 combo. That said, if I was going to try to find a middle ground, I would have to say a '71 Boattail Riviera with a 455. Its a badass design that I have liked ever since seeing one for the first time, and I have have purposely NOT bought one until I can find a worthwhile example. Other fairly high on the list... 1967, 1969 and 1970 GTO 1968 Olds 442 1966 Olds Toronado (In black... "High Toned Son Of A Bitch") C3 Corvette 1959 Coupe DeVille Convertible

Their fuel injection cleaner was unimpressive for me, as well. I tend to be happier with the STP cleaner... in higher quantities. I don't use too many additives anymore, as I'm usually not real impressed.