Well, good-it’s a white kid this time. Maybe something will be done about it.....

I was brought home from the hospital in a nearly-new 1960 Rambler, and my parents kept that car until 1973. Bench seats, push-button automatic, vent windows front AND rear.....But of course, AMC would never have been able to build that car that cheap; not in the US at least. That’s why Nash (an AMC forerunner) tried…

I own a 2019 Subaru Impreza Wagon Sport, which came standard with 245/40R18 wheel/tire. There was no way I was going to run tired with that low a profile through an upstate NY winter. My previous car was a 2010 Scion XD, which ran 205/55R16 wheel/tires. I dressed it up with used 2000-ish Subaru Outback aluminum rims…

I think I see Tracy’s next project!

Damn. I used to rally professionally when I was in my 30's, and that was tough. Rallying the Safari at 91? Wow.

No, I just have a problem with hiring a mechanical and journalistic ignoramus to write articles on an automotive website. I got 8 stars, and you and the next guy got 4 stars each, so I’ll take that to mean that 50% of the people here also wish Elizabeth goes back to whatever it was she did before coming here...

Well, you’ve bought it, so now let me give you the bad news:

The problem with Air B&B is that, after a long day of driving, the LAST thing I want to meet is an “interesting person”, much less a “character”. I’m a firm proponent of looking out for those ordinary chain motels in extremely rural locations (like, say, Effingham Il), where the confluence of major Interstate…

“Nothing she’s ever written (here or previously, IIRC) indicates that she works on her own vehicles.”

I’m assuming that this shop is ‘sucker charging’ on labor, quoting the book labor charge on each part as if it were a separate job. Probably also charging the ball joint and bushing jobs separately, even though they come connected to the entire replacement suspension arm. Oldest trick in the book.

To myself, it sounds like 2 things could be happening here, maybe both:

For fuck’s sake, David, the fact that any of your heaps are actually running is amazing in itself. Spending $100 for oil analysis on a $500 shitbox is a clinically accepted definition of insanity. Just run it ‘til it breaks, then replace it with one from a junk yard.

Brief synopsis for the “tl;dr” crowd: The door broke because it was poorly made. I grew up with AMC vehicles (Matador, Ambassador, Gremlin, Rambler, etc.). Anybody who has ever owned an AMC know that they are poorly manufactured vehicles.

It’s ironic (and yet strangely satisfying) that the extra 8" of clearance seem to have made things worse; before the added clearance, your average 12'6" box truck would stuff itself firmly into the bridge, creating excessive mayhem and a difficult removal. Today, most of them will sail through, hitting just enough to…

Drat! I was hoping it would be something weird, like still using kingpins, or maybe torsion-leaf springs inside long metal tubes.....

A couple pieces of drive-in trivia here: The first drive-in was opened in NJ, but as of about 20 years ago, NJ was the only state with ZERO drive-ins.

If I remember correctly, when the 85 mph speedometer first came out, at least one manufacturer still used their old-style speedometer, but just put a post at 85 mph. People would remove the speedometer, cut the post off, and put the speedometer back in. So, that’s when this revision of the law came out. Hey, at least…

Eau, mon dieux!

As it stands currently, all the cars entered at Monaco have been specially modified just for that circuit (mostly in the steering components). So, why not go a bit further with special width restrictions just for this circuit? Reduce the wheel widths and side-pod sizes, maybe even reduce the sizes of the front…

I’m surprised that an ‘automotive journalist’ would spell this model “Valient”.....