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Su8overdrive

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  1. Cailyn, AuburnSeeker above makes strong points, just as it often proved safer to leave asbestos behind old walls alone. EVs are no panacea. The overarching threat to our i.c. cars, and the planet, are simply too many people, and as Sir David Attenborough points out, "The planet cannot handle millions of meat eaters." I refer you to my above posts. Meanwhile, gasoline is a terrific fuel, higher BTUs than alcohol, the latter a net energy consumer, unless produced entirely from agwaste as in Brazil, not corn as in the US. Agwaste ethanol is what Henry Ford wanted to power his Model T and Fordson tractor, which comprised fully half the vehicles on the world's roads and fields by 1920. But with J.D. Rockefeller controlling over 85% of all bulk oil shipping, gasoline as low as a 12 cents a gallon, Ford went along with the program. Otherwise, Maxwell, Hudson, Reo, the Dodge brothers, Auburn, Marmon, Studebaker, Chandler, Jordan, Hupp, Willys, Nash, GM, Packard, Pierce, and others would've likely followed suit. There are not enough raw materials for the world to swap all i.c. (internal combustion) cars for EVs. EVs run on petroleum tires, producing most of the dust in urban areas, and use six (6) times as many minerals as i.c. cars, including cobalt, lithium, nickel, copper, manganese, graphite, thallium, titanium, zinc, rare earths like neodymium and dysprosium, the latters' extraction requiring huge amounts of carcinogens like ammonia, hydrochloric acid, sulphates. Much of these minerals are imported from politically unstable regions. Do you expect cabals of young bureaucrats, narrowly educated strangers to technology, buried in student debt, perhaps still living with parents and so hating cars because they cannot afford a decent one, to connect thallium as a common ingredient in rat poison? That it's tasteless, odorless, and nearly colorless? While those who tested positive hadn't consumed poisonous levels of the metal, it was enough to cause fatigue, heart arrhythmia, nausea, digestive trouble, neurological problems, and hair loss. The scariest part is that even after patients completed detoxification regiments, thallium continued to show up in their systems. "We now know that heavy metals are additive and synergistic," says David Quid, the lead scientist at Doctors Data, PhD in nutritional biochemistry. "If you get a little thallium, and a little lead, and a little cadmium in your system, you've got one plus one plus one equals five or six, not just three." In other words, these metals do more damage when they're combined. "This stuff bioaccumulates," he added. "Down the road, it's going to kick you in the ass one way or another." Soichiro Honda produced an internal combustion auto engine the exhaust of which cleaner than the ambient Tokyo air. A Swiss engineer, Michael May, did the same at Jaguar 30 years ago. UN studies show animals raised for meat and dairy produce more greenhouse gas than all the world's cars, trucks, buses, trains, planes, ships combined. Meat eaters still coo over pets no more or as sentient, social, intelligent as the creatures facing a million daily Dachaus and Auschwitzes. And so, being vegan, having only "one or none," adopting, or being child-free, are our only hope. But it's easier to make i.c. cars the whipping boy, to "round up the usual suspects."
  2. Jon, cogent expansion, thank you, sir. Grimy, i'd be irate to get such a lame letter as they sent you, but remember, 'twasn't personal; you just popped up amongst the myriad DMV registrations with a car "of a certain age." I owe you an apology for not singling out you, and of course, the thoughtful author of this post, 1935Packard, when i alluded to reactionaries. Meanwhile, i meant to say i like your crisp response to the DMV minion, and would like to use it as template when and if they ask if i'd like to surrender my 78-year-old rolling alter ego. Happy New Year, sports fans.
  3. In their us/them zeal, it seems none of the above reactionaries grasp what 1935Packard explained; Aaron Robinson's column about CARB's effort being on their behalf. Bureaucracies being just that, such letters as Grimy received asking if he'd be interested in crushing his Pierce-Arrows are inevitable. So let's park the black helicopters, tinfoil hats, and Ayn Rand, give our computers a rest, and use the winter doldrums as opportunity to go out to the garage and finesse our survivors.
  4. Edinmass well sums the Pebble Beach cracker's abomination, the "look at me crowd," empty money; deep pockets but no depth. Charm, history, the feel of the times, all lost. It's bad enough to see old Fords, Chevies, prosaic fare retro rodded, Frankencars. But when crate V-8s, Turbo HydraMatics dropped into L-29s, even what were once senior Packard 8s and V-12s, all the more heartbreaking. Automotive Covid. What's odd is we've heard some of the most active members of the Horseless Carriage Club of America, for pre-1916 cars, are in their 20s, early 30s. Yet these young folks are entrenched in not just preserving originality, but the spirit of the unaltered, carefully, authentically rebuilt cars. Meanwhile, senior Packards of the '30s and L-29 Cords are butchered, become parodies. How do we cure this disease? Our K-12 trails at least 16 other modern industrial democracies. We don't see fine old cars in Europe, Britain, Scandinavia butchered, retro rodded. Happy New Year and 10th day of Christmas.
  5. Thank you, sir. T h a t was one of the first things double-checked. Which is why we remain flummoxed. I shouldn't hijack a Lincoln forum with my peccadillo as my focus coming here was to get info on my longtime friend and neighbor's '38 Zephyr gas tank plug. Hard to imagine a nice, upper-medium-priced barouche would use iron and steel together, but apparently figured tanks not often drained? My Packard had a steel plug, which i replaced with brass hex. For all my vintage knowledge, my mechanical skill limited to polishing metal, routine maintenance, working a grease gun 'til it airlocks. There's a dearth of knowing old car mechanics in the East Bay, as throughout the nation, hence all the "retro rods" and Frankencars w/ ubiquitous SBC 350/Turbo Hydramatic. Charm, history scrapped, lost, forgotten. Curiously, i've heard some of the most "devout" members of the Horseless Carriage Club (pre-1916 automobiles) are those in their 20s, early 30s. Happy New Year and 10th day of Christmas to you and the other gentlemen on this fine site.
  6. 19tom40, t h a n k y o u, Sir! I'm a Packard guy trying to help my ex-Navy long-retired offline neighbor, whose immaculate '38 Zephyr town sedan this is. Once this plug out, he's on easy street. I envy his soft life. My '47 Packard Super Clipper despite rebuilt engine, good camshaft, new rebuilt WDO-531SA carburetor, new timing chain, good power, revs smoothly, easily, all that work, but only 12 inches vacuum idle. In fact, because of the low vacuum, the idle's set at 850 rpm, over t w i c e what it should be. And it still dies every other intersection, so is undriveable. Once on the freeway, you could drive it coast to coast in overdrive 75 mph at only 2,500 rpm all the way. Wit's end. I also thank GD & 40ZephSedan for their comments. I long ago had a '40 Packard One-Twenty sedan. Zephyrs get a bad rap simply as their engines need clean oil and open road running; appropriately named cars because with their short stroke engines, they can run like the wind, same top speed as unblown 1936-37 Cords, which several friends had. Zephyrs put out less torque per cubic inch than every engine of their day, Crosley included. They are not low speed luggers. But i knew of a fellow who drove his Zephyr back and forth between NYC and Boston in the day; 80,000 miles without major work. Atalanta in England built some Zephyr-powered road cars, and three Jensen Model Hs used Zephyr engines instead of ohv nine-mained 260-ci Nash inline eights. All these cars used Columbia rear axles, being built before the war. You know how well Lincolns did in the La Carrera Panamericanas. Uncle Tom McCahill liked them. Pardon the ramble. Trying to distract myself from yesterday's drive, taking advantage of most people staying home, hung over, watching football. New Year's Day and Stupor Bowl Sunday the only two (2) days a year in the greater Bay Area you can drive an old manual shift car relatively relaxed other than before 9am weekends. But mine, per above, undriveable, and we are all stumped. Happy New Year and thanks again.
  7. Thanks, but............................................................................. what s i z e is this square '38 Zephyr gas tank drain plug? No one's giving us the s i z e.
  8. No, crescent wrenches will not work on this one. Not snug enough. We've tried a couple. We know to replace with brass hex. But for now, need to know what exact size is this four-sided/square fitting.
  9. Need to remove the rusted drain plug from '38 Zephyr. It is the factory original, four sides/square, not hex. What is the exact size? I need to put a lot of leverage on the wrench and don't want to round it. What wrench did you use? I've rapped it with hammer after repeatedly squirting rust buster. Need to drain tank yesterday. Thanks
  10. Why are we critiquing this fellow's asking price? It's none of our business. Are any of you going to buy it? No. Worry about your own cars. Jaysus, these forums are like a bunch of nosy old gossips, Madam Defarges. How much would it cost to replicate the amazingly sound original interior? Maybe it drives well despite an engine that could externally use at least a good scrubbing with kerosene-dipped towel, etc. It's interesting to see the sort of cars we don't often see posted. When someone does, the shut ins camped by their computers chime in like a Greek chorus. Hilarious. Appreciate the fellow's car or don't, but his price is of no concern unless you personally are negotiating purchase with him.
  11. Right. If you had a job, you pulled out all the stops, whether working on the line, in the boardroom, or design studio.
  12. Always interesting to see automotive historical records, but where does the amazing come in? The nation was devastated by a financial crash that quickly crossed the Atlantic. Few had money for huge, fancy cars. Unemployment in the Eastern and Midwestern US reached 25%. John Bloom raises a good point, about those able to keep their jobs in those dark days. The "shovel nose" Light Eight was not at all profitable, which is why the next year, planning for what became the One Twenty began in earnest. Oft wonder what Pierce's proposed, Hayes-bodied 25,000 1938 juniors at their higher price point of $1,200 base would've been like, had Buffalo been helmed since the early teens by ex-cash register and Hudson executives as Packard was who knew how to better milk tooling and retain higher profit margins, Packard the most widely held automotive stock before the war after only GM, Ford not going public 'til New Year's Day, 1956. BTW, what became the '32 "Twin Six," Twelve 1933-on, was never intended to replace the big 385-ci Custom Eight. The initial 376-ci Packard V-12 was meant as a FWD Buick 90 contender, sub-luxe. Packard's most profitable year would remain 1929, despite the funky little six of 1937, and bucket milling all their products but a few leftover Twelves from 1939-on, guided by former GM big B-O-Ppers brought in to cost the excellent 120, even Chevrolet's sales mgr. Bill Packer recruited to teach Packard dealers how to sell on credit. Cadillac unveiled, to Packard's chagrin, after years of crowing over their V-8, essentially a straight eight with the firing impulses halved for less crankpin loading, the V-16 simply as more power required to move custom bodies approaching three tons and a bigger V-8 would only present increased torque, vibration, and thermodynamic woes, yet able to share the existing Cad V-8 driveline. Packard couldn't be outdone -- the Six that comprised 84 or so percent of their 1920s sales had been slickly one-upped by Cad's crisp '27 LaSalle -- so hurriedly dropped a stroked V-12 into the existing Custom 8 chassis, with resulting initial cooling problems. Packard's thorough engineering and refinement were so ingrained that even with four main bearings, their 1932-39 Twelve was one of the finest luxe engines of the decade, tho' it used Cadillac's fiendishly complex hydraulic valve s i l e n c e r s, while Pierce-Arrow's robust 385-ci straight 8 and 462-ci V-12 their own patented hydraulic valve lifters Pierce's V-12 was designed from the outset to launch massive luxury barges as seven mains attest. But Packard's chassis was nonpareil, and allied with Werner Gubitz's crisp, understated bodies, retained a sculpted look Cad, the big Lincolns, Pierce, Marmon and the others could not match, and so retained up to 42% of the minuscule fine car (above $2,000 FOB) market through 1936, when Cadillac downsized all their product, increasingly sharing components with lesser GMobiles, and the rest of the industry went "junior." But remember: Even when Packard dominated what remained of the fine car market in the '30s, their styling was also thanks to a pair of outsiders, Count Alexis de Sakhnoffsky and Ray Dietrich, just as their sole hit of the '40s thanks to a theme presented by Dutch Darrin, who the Company stiffed. So, interesting, of course. But amazing? The party was over, and engineering improvements meant a new breed of "pocket luxury cars" as they were called, could outperform the earlier juggernauts, which in any event were seen as "high hat," old school pomposity by younger, hipper buyers. You could argue that all engineering is cost engineering else we'd be serfs to this day. Rolls-Royce was disassembling a new Buick Limited annually in the years just before War II to glean the latest Detroit production tips. Some here gathered get so swept into buff book, coffee table book paeans to expensive cars they lose industry perspective, let alone an understanding of the times. Anyone can build a cost-little-object super car, but it takes real skill to engineer affordable quality and performance. Equally, it's easier to make any long wheelbase barouche look elegant, it taking advanced artistry to do so on a wheelbase of 120 or so inches. There were still a few who could afford, and thought they needed, sheer size and a certain craftsmanship then and now. The paucity of prewar sport and grand touring cars among the CCCA's accepted list suggests size is as much virtue as anything. Not complicated, TPH. No money, no sale. Autoholicism. Should be in the kitchen helping my girl bolt together Christmas eve repast. Happy New Year to you and all on these forums, and have you ever tried to explain the visceral pull certain old cars have on us to enquiring "civilians" at the dinner table? Oh, they might grasp the shiny, imposing, impressive part, but not what it is to drive, to feel the quality; to enjoy wiping down an engine with a 100% cotton rag dipped in a bit of kerosene a day or two after a run.
  13. Good point, JV. The above is abetted by young folks who can no longer afford a new or even decent late model used car, often still living with their parents while in their 30s, so it's all the easier for them to make i.c. automobiles a convenient whipping boy. They're going to hate what they can't have. There's that, and our K-12 trails at least 16 other modern industrial democracies, our STEM classes woefully lag as we produce only a quarter per capita the engineers, scientists, doctors as Pakistan, China, India, and spend more on high school concussion ball player than math or science student, witness the sole day of the year many of us can drive a vintage car in a relaxed manner during the entire day being Stupor Bowl Sunday. We're grooming young people to glom onto EZ answers to complex problems. Also, it's easier to attack i.c. automobiles than examine our own actions. Again....despite 8.1 billion people globally, 350 million babies onboard domestically, all burning some sort of carbon on a planet so small the towers of suspension bridges out of parallel to reflect the earth's curvature, something's gotta give. Such younger folk are even taking fertility drugs, witness the prolificacy of tandem strollers. Twins used to be a rarity, now common. They do not get it. Nor that according to the UN and other studies, animals raised for meat and dairy produce more greenhouse gas than all the world's cars, trucks, buses, trains, planes ships combined. These, JV, are the elephants in the room, the 800-lb. gorillas the consumer-driven media avoid for fear of upsetting advertisers who see more people as more buyers and cheap labor. Their business model is that weak, and they ignore that every nation with declining birthrate enjoys higher per capita GDP. Of course such folk are unable to grasp that EVs are no panacea; that gasoline is a terrific fuel, higher BTUs than alcohol, the latter a net energy consumer, unless produced entirely from agwaste as in Brazil, not corn as in the US. Agwaste ethanol is what Henry Ford wanted his Model T and Fordson tractor to run on, which comprised fully half the vehicles on the world's roads and fields by 1920, but with J.D. Rockefeller controlling over 85% of all bulk oil shipping, gasoline as low as a dime a gallon, Ford went along with the program. Otherwise, Maxwell, Hudson, Reo, the Dodge brothers, Auburn, Marmon, Studebaker, Willys, Nash, GM, Packard, Pierce, and others would've likely followed suit. There are not enough raw materials for the world to swap all ICE cars for EVs. EVs run on petroleum tires (producing most the dust in urban areas), and use six (6) times as many minerals as i.c. cars, including cobalt, lithium, nickel, copper, manganese, graphite, thallium, titanium, zinc, rare earths like neodymium and dysprosium, the latters' extraction requiring huge amounts of carcinogens like ammonia, hydrochloric acid, sulphates. Much of these minerals are imported from politically unstable regions. Do you expect these narrowly educated strangers to technology to fathom that thallium has been a common ingredient in rat poison? That it's tasteless, odorless, and nearly colorless? While those who tested positive hadn't consumed poisonous levels of the metal, it was enough to cause fatigue, heart arrhythmia, nausea, digestive trouble, neurological problems, and hair loss. The scariest part is that even after patients completed detoxification regiments, thallium continued to show up in their systems. "We now know that heavy metals are additive and synergistic," says David Quid, the lead scientist at Doctors Data, PhD in nutritional biochemistry. "If you get a little thallium, and a little lead, and a little cadmium in your system, you've got one plus one plus one equals five or six, not just three." In other words, these metals do more damage when they're combined. "This stuff bioaccumulates," he added. "Down the road, it's going to kick you in the ass one way or another." As will our not knuckling down, urging Congress to revise our antiquated, agrarian tax codes from when more babies meant more hands to work the family farm, half of all children not surviving past age four, to instead have only "one or none," or adopt, and getting more people to adopt a plant-based, vegan diet, without which health insurance public or private will never be affordable, since every study not overtly or covertly funded by meat, diary, egg industry comes to the same conclusion: The single best way to prevent heart disease, cardiovascular ills, hypertension, inflammation, high blood pressure, diabetes, cancer, macular degeneration, dementia (now termed class 3 diabetes), and Alzheimer's is a plant-based, vegan diet. Realizing there's some unrequited testosterone among those owning automatic transmissioned, power braked, power steeringed "muscle" cars, "retro rods," reskinned Falcons, etc., if not generally....in better educated vintage car owners having broader knowledge of culture and history, it's worth reminding many here gathered that unlimited cage fighters, NFL players, and the world's leading Formula One driver, Lewis Hamilton, are vegan. Already, we have drilling, mining, lumbering "access" roads in "our" national parks Teddy Roosevelt wisely set aside as untrammeled America the Beautiful. JV, I've brought up this pair of overarching juggernauts on these forums before, reasoning that unless narrowly educated, insular silver spooners, that many with the wherewithal to own fine old cars also were exposed to higher education, critical thinking, only to get hooted down by characters living in the hinterlands or gated communities unable to see past their own hood ornaments, dismissing anything they don't want to confront as "politics" or "I'll be dead by then" or otherwise beyond them when it's so much easier for them to play us/them, regurgitate Fox 'n' tawk radio, blame "the bureaucrats" appointed by "the government" that we elect. As said too many times, JV, our solution is simple, but not EZ, so the head in the sand of those who'd prefer to lament the good ole days that never existed, or when population a third, even a quarter of today's, continues. You could argue that 120 years ago, 40% of all automobiles were quiet, readily understandable steam, 38% noiseless electric, only 22% internal combustion, so we've only come full circle. But some of us are able to be unrepentant autoholics a n d environmentalists, as arborist late publisher, formerly with the New York Times Review of Books publisher of Hemmings Motor News Terry Ehrich, Paul Newman, James Garner, Steve Allen (co-owned an LA motorcycle shop), Dave Garroway and untold others. Certain old cars are to us a powerful visceral pull; we've decades of experience, effort, time, money in them, and would like to ensure a nation, a world, in which they might still be freely enjoyed without special permits and fees. It wasn't EZ restoring them, it won't be EZ working toward a world which will still welcome them. In short, this is a man's job. Adult focus, drive, ability, reason required. Not juvenile finger pointed and snarls, bar room rants. Add the above to the reasons every poll of scientists, including 2,000 UN in 2013, 11,000 in the 11/5/19 Bloomberg News, shows them agreeing overpopulation by far our biggest problem, their words, "bigger than climate." The Union Pacific Railroad manages to operate three massive steam locomotives of the late '30s, '40s while last year issuing $600 million in green bonds. So, do we continue parsing, equivocating, whining, slamming one state over another, yeah butting, settle for Band Aids on the patient hemorrhaging in the ER, or act?
  14. Aye, lad. A truer thing never surmised. My Miata-driving girl thinks crossovers look like wheeled hamsters in heat. "Crossover," like "sport... utility... vehicle," another bit of marketing whimsy for the having-it-all crowd. Pick up trucks with four doors. "Muscle" cars with automatic transmission, power steering, power brakes, some even with power windows. Faith and begorrah. Abundantly content with my 77-year-old dragon. But perhaps some here gathered might turn one of the below into a Lincoln KB, Pierce, or Stutz DV32 this Thanksgiving, but we trust not in the circus wagon colors prevalent these days, perhaps free of white walls, radiator gargoyle to boot. Understatement, less is more, weight is the enemy seem lost constructs with so many of the janitorial d' nonelegance bling set:
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