GARAGE ENVY

My current photographic project –  http://chazimages.com/current-projects.php — is putting more meat on the bones of my Automotive Art Forms  http://chazimages.com/sculpture.php.  These classic cars are beautiful to look at, but they also all have interesting and unique histories.  That entails more research on new entries and sharing of that history along with the images.

So, just the other day, I was working in the garage when one of the neighborhood walkers stopped to chat.  I knew he was a kindred spirit when he identified as a Corvette Stingray the shrouded shape in the shadows of my garage.  He further validated his credentials when he listed some of his former rides (my favorite, a Fiat 500!)  My current neighborhood has not seemed as “car aware” as my last.  Cars here seem to be more like appliances or status symbols; where as, back in the old neighborhood a lot of the Saturday afternoon socializing revolved around cars and garages.   But now, a ray of hope!  I  don’t know if I will ever find a garage buddy to share beers and wrenches again (unless Peter Egan moves into the neighborhood), but at least I know there is “car talk” to be had.

Ray (the neighbor walker) was full of information about local car shows and other interesting automotive resources.  And most remarkably and coincidentally, he is the source of the “Hudson of Coincidence”.  He sent me a link to a You Tube automotive subculture http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FB6apYb5mJI&feature=email , “TheOriginalWheelsTV.  Chuck Derer, the producer, has recorded interviews with numerous car fans and made them available on You Tube.  They are at least as interesting as those by Jay Leno on Jay Leno’s Garage, but without the annoying lead in commercials.

The “Hudson of Coincidence” occurred when I viewed the You Tube clip on the Hudson Italia.  What an interesting, unique, and rare car.  And it so happens that I was at the time struggling with an image from an AACA (Antique Automobile Club of America) show of a couple of years ago.

Wouldn’t yah know it, it’s a Hudson Italia.  True to the You Tube clip, it’s in the original, and only factory color, Cream.  This is a very rare car; only 26 were built, and only 5 are known to exist today.  Luck would have it that I now have seen 2 of the 5.  There you have it; a lucky conversation, a fellow enthusiast, a cool new link, progress on my Automotive Art Form histories.

Warren Brown is an enthusiast with the unenviable job of writing about cars to an audience of mostly non-enthusiasts – Washington Post readers.  This is a newspaper whose only automotive sports coverage is the occasional NASCAR fisticuff.  Today Warren wrote about bottom feeder rental cars  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/01/AR2009050101603.html .  That got me thinking about my own experience with rental cars.

My favorite recollection is of the 1986 timeframe, when I was torn between buying a BMW 3 series and a Merkur.  BMW, back then as now, was considered the pinnacle of sports sedans.  I wanted one badly, but I had also read good things about the Merkur.  Sir Jackie Stewart had helped with the suspension tuning, and a friend had one he loved.  I discovered that Merkurs were available from a rental company, so I rented one for the weekend.  I took off to Pennsylvania and couldn’t stop driving!  The rental was on a fixed mile basis and I ended up with a big mileage penalty, but I also ended up buying the Merkur.  I loved that car, put 170K miles and 18 years on it, and only gave it up for a modern Mini.  Oh yeah, and with sales desperation discounts, I saved nearly $15K over a BMW.

Countering that experience was an early Hyundai my wife and I rented in Boston.  This car was so bad that we returned it to Logan Airport, driving thru terrible traffic in both directions, to exchange it for something acceptable.  And, in spite of recent great press for the brand, I still maintain a resistance against ever buying one.

Swinging back to the positive side, my son and I rented an early Chevy Malibu in Portland, OR a few years ago.  This was before the automotive press had discovered it.  We had a ball hammering it on the way out to the Oregon coast and then inland to Mt. St. Helens.  This was one of the few times I can remember crying Uncle! as a passenger.  But then I never have been a fan of steep drop offs.  Both of us concluded that this was a really nice, inexpensive, sporty sedan with plenty of pep (we had one with a 6 cylinder engine).

I also recollect a friend and I, each in our own rental Ford Fiestas, hanging it all out on Mulholland Drive, in LA.  Back then Mulholland had long stretches of dirt and we both felt like FIA World Rally drivers.  That was a car you could abuse terribly and it would still come back for more.

And, finally, who could forget the original “Rent-a-racer”, the Hertz GT350.  See my March 2009 blog entry on Marlboro Raceway.

So, Warren, bottom feeders may be the bane of today, but rental fleets of the past offered up some really great rides.

Even in these difficult economic times it’s hard to look at the current crop of automotive magazines and not conclude that it may be the best of times for an enthusiast with Garage Envy.

The big auctions have done well so far this year, the autoshows have produced a reasonable outpouring of technically interesting new cars, and the car magazines are giving plenty more pages to desirable collector cars.  Autoweek has “Escape Roads” and the “Market”. Automobile has “Upshift”,  Road and Track has “Peter Egan” (a classic himself),  Vintage Motorsport has  “Racing Across the Block”, and of course Hemmings Motor News is cover to cover (more than 500 pages) classics.

There are plenty of classic cars surfacing these days.  But then again maybe that is a sign of the difficult times, with the owners in need of cash more than a dream ride.  However you look at it, there is currently plenty out there to look at and develop Envy for.  Problem is, some of them are actually beginning to look affordable.  Quick, put a lock on my bank account!

While your unfulfilled lust is threatening your bank account you should look at http://chazimages.com/sculpture.php if you want to satisify it without spending your next mortgage payment.

Luddites tend to get annoyed by all of the electronic intrusions on our driving experience these days.  They say take me back to the days of the AM in car radio.

I guess, then, a sign of the times is the attached view of a Formula 1 steering wheel.  The video game enabled among us are not intimidated  by these things, and technology in general makes Formula 1 racing uniquely interesting.  And this year, as the first race proved today, the driving looks like it’s going to equal the technology in interest.  The Speed crew had to work overtime to fit all of the technical tidbits in between the action on the track.

Note the big orange KERS button, F1’s version of  “push to pass”.   Driver feedback is pretty positive and I think you could notice a few times during the race where it was used to advantage.

It will be fun to watch the rest of the season and see how all of the technology plays out and how it affects the driver standings.

         Most of us gearheads have a favorite automobile race; probably impressed on our beer fogged memories sometime in the distant past.   And probably at a time when we were more concerned with whether we had packed in enough ice than we were for the great cars and drivers who were circulating right in front of our noses.  About this time of year, as most of the racing series are getting underway, those memories flood back.

         The Sebring 12hr., scheduled to run next weekend, happens to be my favorite race.  It will be run this Saturday, March 21.  And although I won’t be there in person, I look forward to watching the Speed coverage.

         Sebring, for me, serves as a link to the greatest race series ever: the CAN-AM.  Vestiges of those all powerful, no limits, machines remain in the LMP1 and LMP2 classes today.  I really enjoy the technical innovation that shows up in these classes.

         Like the Daytona 24hr., Sebring appears on the racing calendar before many of the other racing series are underway, so great drivers from all over are often attracted to the race.

         What could be better: great drivers and great cars.

         Twelve hours also turns out to be a perfect length for an endurance race; at least from a spectator point of view.  The Goldilocks length, not too short, not too long.  One gets the flavor of watching night racing without needing to stay up all night.  And the race is still long enough to severely test the endurance of man and machine.

Look for some personal experiences at Sebring in a future post.

Ford GT 40 at Sebring

For those of you who missed visiting Marlboro Raceway in Marlboro, Maryland, I found a taste of it for you. http://tinyurl.com/cam9qd

The article at this website from the Washington Post .com is a nice reminiscence of what it was like at Marlboro in the 50’s and 60’s.  There is also an excellent film clip from a race in 1957 and additional links to other early racing.

I remember attending several races there; and in fact catching my own “I wanta race virus” there.  My best memory is of warding off freezing temperatures at the Refrigerator Bowl, run in January, with a flask of Apple Jack.

Marlboro was a very tight track, more suited for time trials than racing, but it did produce some exciting races.  The longest straight ended in a sharp left turn; and that turn claimed many race cars.  A straight off took one thru trees and brush and eventually into a creek!  The start/finish line was located in a tiny oval bowl (maybe 1/16 mi.).  Entry and exit from the bowl often included airborne moments.

After racing ended in the 60’s, it was still used occasionally for time trials/autocrosses.  I remember the first Hurst Shelby Mustang renta car showing up there and being thrashed within an inch of its life.  My own experiences of autocrossing at Marlboro in a Corvette and a Sprite are treasures.  Think I still have a trophy or two around.

Some of the early racing greats like Roger Penske. Mark Donahue, and Bob Tullius raced there.  Marlboro doesn’t quite evoke the same public memory as Riverside, but, for sure, it was equally important to the development of popular sports car racing. 

Learning to love the new performance specs is going to take some doing.  Horsepower has always conjured up an image of dozens of stampeding Mustangs (the four legged kind) and Torque reminds me of a giant wrench levered by one of those muscular laborers you see in statues at the Commerce Department.  Now we need to consider Cells!  Makes me think of an Amoeba!  Voltage?  How about a flashlight.

Road and Track recently reviewed a handful of “Eclectic Electrics” and introduced a bunch of new categories in their Specifications box.  Things like Number of Cells, Voltage, Recharge time, and Energy capacity now appear along with the more traditional items like Cooling, Weight, Brakes, etc.  But even these familiar terms sometimes take on new meaning when they refer to battery care and feeding rather than internal combustion.

Somehow I am having difficulty picturing a garage collection of vintage battery packs and electric motors, volt meters, and recharging stations as something that will invite “Garage Envy”.  On the other hand there are already individuals who collect old Macintosh computers; so who knows?  For now, I think I will do my best to OD on existing collections of vintage cars and memorabilia and hope that the era of electrics brings an as yet unrevealed charm to the car collector world.

Dodge EV

Henrick Fisker and the Karma

If Barack Obama can say, “I screwed up”, so can I.  A couple of missives ago, I lamented the boringness of being green.  Basically I felt that “green” cars were technically interesting but boring from a driving excitement point of view.   The Fisker automobiles http://karma.fiskerautomotive.com/ may change that opinion quickly.  The models displayed at the Washington Autoshow certainly created the aura of driving excitement just sitting on the display floor.  These are totally sexy looking automobiles, and if all of Henrick Fisker’s enthusiasm and charm translates into driving excitement, we have a great start on a green revolution that will light the fire of any “Garage Envy” fan.

I was totally impressed that Fisker himself was on the floor of the Convention Center and willing to talk to all who visited about the features of his great looking cars.  If he can actually deliver these cars for the $88K that he is quoting it will be one hell of a deal.  The fit and finish of the models on the floor (a Karma sedan and a Sunset convertible) was first rate.  Fisker stated that he penned the exterior design.  The interiors were excellent as well.  Fisker out sources all of the components and will do the assembly of the early models in Finland.  He claims that this manufacturing method is what allows him to price it at $88K and also has enabled him to get the car to market so quickly.  Fisker is developing his own US dealer network – about 40 dealers.  Very interesting car and manufacturer, I can’t wait to read some driving impressions.

There were many other green production and concept cars at the show and their presentations were very interesting.  There were lots of cutaways, component displays, and talking heads to inundate one with information about green options.

From a Garage Envy point of view, one had to look hard for interesting driver’s cars.  Many of the exotic car manufacturers like Ferrari and Lamborghini were not there and manufacturers really had toned down the performance models in their lines.  For example GM lined up their Corvette Z1 with all of the rest of their Corvette models and didn’t even highlight it.  I would have thought they would have put it on a rotating dais.  Guess they were afraid of a congressman blasting them for misusing taxpayer bailout funds.

My bottom line is that the autoshow in your neighborhood is worth going to this year.

Google “Truth in 24″ and watch the trailer.  This looks like a great movie for gearheads.

Too bad this won’t air on ESPN until March; I need a racing booster right now.  The real racing season will be in full bloom by then, but now all we can get are a couple of ticklers from Florida.

And what do we get at the car shows this season, but a bunch of mostly boring (from the drivers seat) “green” cars.  Don’t get me wrong.  I find the new propulsion technologies endlessly fascinating, but in their present form there is not much to offer from a driving excitement viewpoint.  Not much Garage Envy there.

January, a crappy month for car nuts.

How can this Garage Envy blogger resist tuning in to at least a few minutes of a Barrett- Jackson, or a Russo Steele auto auction?  He can’t.  This is Garage Envy in full bloom.  These enthusiasts are living out each or our fantasy’s  of owning a piece of our own automotive past.

Car auctions go on all year long, but without major racing series events to distract me, now seems to be the time that I pay most attention to auctions.  I was first dismayed to see the continuing trend of emphasis on American  muscle cars in the broadcast auctions.  If you read the collector rags, the full gamut of cars are changing hands, but muscle cars are apparently what draw the TV audience.  It’s really awesome to watch the prices some of these cars are pulling down this season; there seems to be no recession in the car collector  community.

One thing I am having trouble sorting out is that many of these cars are too nice.  They get pushed onto the auction block with gloved hands, doors and hoods are gently opened and closed, polishing cloths are always at hand.  These cars are “garage queens”.   They deserve to be driven.  Maybe only gently and on sunny days, but they need to be out there burning up some miles.  Preferably at yours or my hand.  That’s why Jay Leno’s brand of collectorship is at the core of Garage Envy’s  focus; his cars get driven.

I have a personal prescription for the “too nice to be driven” restorers, emulate the ancient Navajo rug maker strategy of allowing a small mistake to remain in the finished work.  That way the result isn’t too perfect to use.  My own  Navajo experience at restoration included an Austin Healey with a “perfect” paint job that had a rocker panel rust breakout shortly after completion and a Karman Ghia that nicked the door jam when being backed out of the paint garage.   Believe me, those restorations rolled up plenty of miles after completion; probably aided by their lack of perfection.

So I stand by waiting for a call from any of those successful auction bidders.  If they want a bit of that perfection to be rubbed off of their “garage queen”, I’m their man.

Less than “perfect” Austin Healey