Car Thread

[chuck]

Murph asked:

160mph available? Why?

Back then you were lucky to get three forward gears, maybe four? Now it's pretty common to have four or five forward gears and on some have even higher (new vette has eight).

The instrument cluster gauges are generally set for whatever the highest end vehicle being offered in that product line are, aka a TOL version with a V8 and a spiffed up transmission might get to 140 on a track BUT the ECM and other safety devices will probably have the car top out at 110-120. Unless you have tires rated for that kind of speed/heat AND you can handle a car at those speeds (even a twitch of the steering wheel will probably lead to disaster) 110 is probably plenty fast enough.

We recently drove from Michigan to California. You can legally drive 80 mph is Utah. I set the cruise at 83 and watched people pass me (we had turned south onto I 15 and were on a straight and level area.) My previous car was not pleasant to drive above 80/85 mph. Current car had no issues. At one point I disabled the cruise and was just keeping up with traffic (not that there is much traffic in that part of Utah). I looked down and we were floating along at 90 mph. I immediately backed off. I did note that the tach still had about 2000 rpm in the "safe zone" when I backed off the gas. The car has a V6 and a six speed automatic with overdrive. BTW, at 90mph we were still getting about 25 mpg.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

The speedometer had markings right up to 160mph.!! When did that happen in cars?!

Long time ago - my Saab had meter up there 15 years ago.

160mph available? Why?

To escape from bears on those motorized scooters.

[rogruth]

The speedometer had markings right up to 160mph.!! When did that happen in cars?!

Long time ago - my Saab had meter up there 15 years ago.

160mph available? Why?

To escape from bears on those motorized scooters.

I can;t think of any better reason so that must be right.

[healey36]

Back in the mid-1990s, before I absolutely hated overseas travel, I would tag along with a buddy of mine who made a living of publishing and photo-journalism for the dreaded military-industrial-complex, specifically the "trade" shows held annually at various places around the world. He seemed to think I had a knack for framing a good photo. That's still left to be seen, but at the time it was a good excuse to load up with a bunch of great camera gear. The big three every year was the Paris Air Show, the IDEX show in Abu Dhabi, and the AAD show in South Africa. For about seven years we hit those and a few others, had a lot of fun. He continued on for another fifteen years, long after I baled.

My mate sadly died a couple years ago, and his wife, at wits end, sent about forty photo albums and twenty-or-so boxes of negatives over for my consideration/disposition. He did an abysmal job of cataloging the stuff, so twenty years on it's tough to make sense of much of it. Hell, I can barely remember what I had for lunch. Much of it is going into the bin. Still, quite a few were familiar, and those I'm saving. A few of the interesting ones I'll post as I go through them (but only if you guys also find them interesting).

A privately-owned Mustang, formerly of the South African Air Force:





I recall having the opportunity to talk to these guys. Seems the South Africans flew late-version Mustangs as their front-line fighter for eight or nine years after the war, then rotated out for another North American product, the F-86 Sabre Jet. That wasn't the end for the Mustangs, however, as a number of them were employed in counter-insurgency operations, while the rest were sold off. This one seemed to have found its way into private hands, about which the owner was rather glib.

A Saracen armored personnel carrier:



A product of the British in the early/mid-1950s, this one had been employed by the South African army until the early 1990s. A number of these had been purchased by a third-party company that refurbished them, intending to resell them (to whom I've no idea). Never ceased to amaze me how much of this stuff was still floating around some forty years on. I recall a guy in Baltimore who was importing Ferret armored cars, offering them for sale to the public. One of the great regrets of my life is not having bought one. I remember asking Jeff why he took this picture - he said he had a Matchbox model of it when he was a kid, and thought it was cool.

I remember taking this picture in the UAE:



Figured something like this would be handy while searching for a space on the parking lot at Walmart. Ram-tough...

Anyway, for your weekend contemplation...

Healey

[rex desilets]

Why not?
My 1990 Taurus SHO had a reputed top speed of 152mph. Once upon a time, on a good-but-back-road highway I got it up to 125 and climbing before my wife made me shut it down.
I suppose if you have a car good for 160mph, at normal highway speed, the engine is hardly working.

[chuck]

Rex said:

I suppose if you have a car good for 160mph, at normal highway speed, the engine is hardly working.

Yep. Across Iowa and Nebraska doing 75-78 mph the tach stayed around 2K and the fuel consumption was 29-31 mpg. Instantaneous occasionally hit 33 mpg.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Rex said:

I suppose if you have a car good for 160mph, at normal highway speed, the engine is hardly working.

Yep. Across Iowa and Nebraska doing 75-78 mph the tach stayed around 2K and the fuel consumption was 29-31 mpg. Instantaneous occasionally hit 33 mpg.

Yes, I was routinely getting better 33-36 mpg on the highway in my Saab and it was barely working at all at 75 mph.

[E7]

Healey, Keep the pics coming!

Rich

[v8vega]

Winter is coming so don't forget to reverse your cars battery so the heat comes on instead of the air conditioning.

[rogruth]

Winter is coming so don't forget to reverse your cars battery so the heat comes on instead of the air conditioning.

I hope you are saying this with a big and a .

[HONDO74]

[HONDO74]

Steve McQueen received this 1963 Ferrari 250 GT Berlinetta Lusso V-12 from his first wife Neile Adams.

[rogruth]

Looks nice and always will.

[rex desilets]

Back when Ferrari made beautiful cars, as opposed to the tortured excesses of plastic & metal that distinguish today's super cars.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Back when Ferrari made beautiful cars, as opposed to the tortured excesses of plastic & metal that distinguish today's super cars.

Tastes change and some of the older cars are just a delight to see, and some are just terribly dated. Sort of like the people that drive them. Same applies to modern (last 30 years) cars. Might go double for the drivers though,