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April 15, 2010
Caption Contest: This Week’s Winner!
By John Coyle
Deputy Editor
This is one of those photos where I don’t even want to know what actually happened, because that would kind of ruin it. Anyway, this week’s winner is oneandonlydp33, who came up with; “This is why New Jersey still has a population… nobody can get passed these two idiots to escape.” No offense to anybody in New Jersey, but that was pretty funny. Nice work buddy. Tune in tomorrow for the next installment of our unintended acceleration prone Caption Contest!
Drifters Get in Street Fight in Long Beach
By John Naderi
StreetFire.net
We heard that Rhys Millen pulled a PIT maneuver on Vaughn Gittin Jr. at last weekend’s Formula Drift season opener on the streets of Long Beach. But we didn’t really believe it until we saw this video. This is essentially drifting’s Zapruder film. Okay, once, just once in our San Fernando Valley little league we boycotted the 2-4-6-8-who-do-we-appreciate concession cheer for our fierce rivals, the victorious Little Lebowski Urban Achievers. And we felt bad afterward. Wonder if Rhys feels the same way today? Special thanks to DaPixelater for the upload!
Photo Of The Day
By Jen Dunnaway
Editor
CarDomain member MoparRob07 says,
Here is a pic of the Charger at the Boone Hall Plantation in Charleston, SC. It is the most photographed plantation / driveway in America. The trees on both sides of the road were planted by Boone Hall’s son in the 1700′s. Was a great photo op!
Nice shot! How about you guys–ever photographed your ride in front of a cool historic landmark? Keep those Photo of the Day nominations rolling in!
Track To Street: The ZO6 Carbon
Bick66
In recent years, it seems the gap between racing and production is greater than ever. With our modern wave of pony cars, it’s nice to see that this seems to be changing. Still, with its 50 years of racing experience, the Corvette stands above the rest, but have you ever wondered exactly how components from legitimate race cars translate to their “track edition” counterparts in the showroom? The sixth-generation Corvette is packed full of technology developed by the C5R racing team, and the new 2011 ZO6 Carbon edition is a great example of a production vehicle that employs real racing hardware. Check out the Corvette racing series video below to see for yourself.
Malmsheim Airport
By Rob Einaudi
Editor-in-Chief
So after a day and a half of looking at Mercedes cars and talking about their design, we finally got to drive them. Mercedes took us out to Malmsheim Airport, which they lease for testing and demonstration purposes. We had the opportunity to take several of their cars on handling course, got to ride along for a demonstration of their “Pre-Safe” braking system braking system (check out my video of the demo on StreetFire), and finally they turned us loose on the back roads and the Autobahn.
Sadly, the new Gullwing was not available to test. And I just missed snagging the keys to the E63 AMG (you can read my friend Muamer’s take on this beast at Benz Insider). So I had to “settle” for a bright red SL 500 Roadster.
We don’t get this one over here. I think Mercedes understands that we Americans love our horsepower, so they send over the 382 hp SL 550. But the 302 hp V8 was plenty for this car. Not tire melting or anything, but definitely a solid and smooth performer.
In general it seems that all Mercedes cars are incredibly well-engineered and sorted out. Personally, I prefer my cars to be a bit more rude and crude. But it’s hard to complain when driving such nicely composed vehicles, and I really enjoyed taking the gorgeous red roadster on the back roads of Germany. Before going back to the hotel I also got a chance to drive the 231 hp turbocharged V6 diesel E350 CDI BlueEFFICIENCY Coupe. Definitely the nicest diesel I’ve ever driven, and it was smooth as hell at 200 kph on the Autobahn.
Overall, the whole experience was a blast (I’m not even gonna brag about all the food and wine I got to consume along the way). Thanks to the great folks in Stuttgart for having me out. Hope I can do it again some time!
King of the Trar-Maros
By Brian Lohnes
BangShift.com
You may have a personal, deep seated hatred of trars. We do not. In fact, trars like the fourth-gen Camaro featured in this video have our ultimate respect. This thing is a full on, bad-ass mud machine that sounds way good a full throttle and can throw the slop like a champ. Listen to this hood stacked monster when the throttle hits carpet. It sounds GOOD!
Upload a StreetFire Video, Win $100
By John Naderi
StreetFire.net
Greetings, CarDomain blog populace, I’m Nads, bearer of the world’s most unfortunate nickname and executive editor of StreetFire.net. I want to clue you in on a little promotion we’re doing over at StreetFire. Actually it’s a really, really big promotion. It’s our – cue dramatic pause to build anticipation – Weekly. Video. Shootout!
All you need to do is upload a video to StreetFire and click on the “Contest” link in the categories. If your video has the most views in a given week you can win $100. It’s that simple! Click here for complete contest details.
Last week’s winner of a crisp, clean Benji was StreetFire member, Driftgarage. While we would have preferred more Challenger and less Reggae Floyd on the soundtrack it probably won because it was the first look at this new drift car. It was also much better than my submission, which you can see after the jump.
Time Capsule JDM Civic In The Netherlands
By Jen Dunnaway
Editor
The three-door hatch is my favorite Civic from this era. And this perfectly preserved specimen, a 1990 recently shipped from Malaysia to the Netherlands, has only 7000 kms on the clock–that’s 4350 miles! Up until it was sold, it was even still running its original Bridgestones, a 20-year-old set of tires. Great find for whoever picked that one up. See more pics at VW Vortex.
It’s Tax Time: What Big-Ticket Automotive Purchase Do You Wish You Could Write Off?
By Jen Dunnaway
Editor
If you’ve had a rocky financial year due to the recession but came out of it basically in one piece, you’re grateful for the little things. Still, and especially if your ride had to bear the brunt of your economic turmoil, there’s some seriously ouch expenses you just wish you could just claim. For example, during the darkest days of ’09, I had to take a job at a tire shop north of Seattle while circumstances forced me to move way south–suddenly inflicting a 50-mile round-trip commute on my 29-year-old Eagle. For an older, hard-driven car, a daily run like that will bring out gremlins (no pun intended) you never knew you had. For my Eagle, at nearly 200K on the original drivetrain, that meant worn-out carrier bearings that nearly caused the the front differential to come apart on me.
Faced with a burly disassembly project, I decided, hell, why not just get both front and rear diffs rebuilt with steeper gears for better acceleration (I went from the stock 2:73′s to 3:22′s), and ended up dropping a hefty sum to have the job done right at Randy’s Ring and Pinion. I still kind of feel like Uncle Sam ought to chip in–I incurred that catastrophic repair bill because I was doing my part to stay gainfully employed, dammit!–but somehow, I get the feeling I’m not going to catch a break.
How about you? Any vehicle expenses that you think you should get to write off?
Seventies Elitism in Fiberglass
By Mike Bumbeck
Clunkbucket
Made largely of fiberglass. Engine in front with drive wheels out back. Not just one, but two flip-up fuel fill caps. Styling that hatches theories of Richard Teague getting a call from MI5 with a request to report to Norwich, UK in secret with the original plans for his 1968 AMC AMX GT concept. This is the Lotus Elite in all its 1974 splendor. Only about 2600 or so fiberglass-bodied Elites were made over the four year production run. This one belongs to one Dag Midtskog, who picked up the car in less than elite condition from a pal who had already parted the Lotus of a few spares for his own Elite. What Dag got was a transmissionless Elite missing more than a few parts. He’s spent the last five years locating a set of factory aluminum wheels, trim bits, missing glass, and a new-to-him transmission that’s currently bolted up to the original engine with only 38K miles of use. More Lotus Elite and a fiberglass tub full of photos over at Clunkbucket.
