The Automotive Incomplete Pass

Being a "car guy" means constantly thinking about the next acquisition; What do you need? What do you want? What have you simply stumbled across? Watching the crazy Duke-Texas A&M bowl game on New Year's eve got me to thinking, what were some of the cars I had almost, but not bought over the years? Call them incomplete passes...

1960s VW Beetle

During the search that led me to the Mercury Capri, I seriously considered buying a Beetle that was for sale, if I recall, in a grocery store parking lot near my college apartment. I have no memory of the color or anything like that, only of the newer cassette deck installed in the dashboard. That may have been the reason I wanted the car, maybe the only reason. Anyway, luckily Dad was a VW aficionado and quickly talked me out of buying what was apparently a tired, rusty, clapped out Bug with a nice stereo. Thanks again Dad.

1983 Audi Quattro Coupe GT

You know how you can buy something even though a little voice is telling you, "this a bad decision?" Graduating from college I wanted a VW GTI, but could not find one in the Sacramento area. A used Audi coupe seemed like a decent substitute and I was actually test-driving one at Neillo VW-Porsche-Audi when I mentioned to the salesman what I really wanted. To be honest, the Audi seemed slow and heavy with only 110 horsepower. Well, the salesman  mentioned that they had an '84 GTI in the back. The dealer's wife had driven it for a few months and just returned it. An hour later it was mine. A close call for sure.

1991 Nissan 300ZX

In 1989 the all-new Z was a thing of beauty. And with 222 horsepower from a 3.0 Liter V6, it was fast too. Motor Trend's "Import Car of the Year," and Automobile Magazine's "Design of the Year," I wanted one badly. All that stopped me was the price... But then the salesman mentioned the idea of a lease. I had never even heard of leasing a car, and didn't actually care about the details. But then a hangup, an apparent problem with my credit. The lease offer was withdrawn and I left the dealership, tail between my legs. Later I discovered that one of the credit reporting companies had merged my history with my father's. Apparently Nissan Credit did not believe I had gotten a BankAmericard in 1962 - a year before I was born. It was however all a blessing in disguise, as a few months later I was transferred back to Europe. Most leases will not allow you to take the car out of the country and I would have had to buy out the remainder at a fairly big loss. So thanks for your incompetence TransUnion, I guess.

There have been other incomplete passes since the Z, mostly cars I'm glad I didn't buy. A 1992 VW Corrado for example, nice car but the interior just seemed cheap. And a first generation Honda CRV, I was all for it but Lynne didn't like the car. She thought it was too buzzy and thin-doored. She was right of course. Recently I missed out on a locally advertised 1968 Porsche 912. Underpriced for the current market and in original Irish Green with low miles, I could have made some decent money flipping the car. But just as I went to see it the seller received a significantly-over-his-asking-price offer and I was out. So close...

What was your automotive incomplete?

Yeah, I've Been Busy! (Car Surfing)

New house, grandchild, work, etc., etc... But it is time to get TCOR back on the road! Here is a short thought just to get me back in the habit.

I tend to spend an abnormal amount of time surfing car-related sites. My tastes are all over the place, with a little bit for everyone. Here's a quick sample of where I can be found:

AutoBlog - A good general automotive interest site. Particularly good coverage of auto shows and industry news.

Jalopnik - Originally this was a very snarky and occasionally rude site. It has now generally grown up, with breaking news, reviews, and a crowd of decent writers.

The Truth About Cars - Another older site with good, daily content. TTAC features one of my favorite bloggers, Steven Lang. A used car dealer in the Atlanta area,  I find his insights on the ins and outs of the trade, and particularly auctions, simply fascinating.

Edmunds Long-Term  Road Test Updates - This mainstay of Internet car coverage is of course primarily focused on providing information for prospective new car buyers. I don't find much value in the traditional short road test popular on many car sites. But I like this feature, where staff members post short articles about their daily adventures with the wide variety of cars in Edmunds' long term fleet. And it is not all Camcords and SUVs, the fleet currently includes a Porsche 991 cabriolet, a Tesla Model S, and a new C7 Corvette. They just sold their long-term '87 Buick Grand National! These year long log book comments give readers a much better idea of what it is like to live with a car, rather than simply test drive it.

Curbside Classic and Daily Turismo - Both are fun sites to quickly slide through, aggregating found by the side of the road photos and Internet sales listing for interesting, usually older cars. Often a journey down memory lane, where suddenly a '74 Maverick is kind of interesting simply because you haven't seen one in a couple of decades.

Bring a Trailer - If you have not been to BAT, go now. As addictive a site as a car person can stand. Just go look.

CarGurus - This is my current go-to site for car shopping, particularly related to fairly accurate pricing.

So... Those are the sites that make up my almost every evening Internet car surf. I also tend to wander around Rennlist, the Pelican Parts Porsche board, and a few other spots on occasion. 

What are some of your favorite car websites?

#5 - 1988 Ford Mustang GT, Part 2

When we last saw our intrepid hero (that would be me), he was crashing his brand new Mustang...

Actually, and sadly, true. The simple fact was that I had an attack of stupid that night, spinning the car on a wet cobblestone street in Bremen, Germany. Eventually the car came to rest against a bus stop sign, creasing the passenger side door. A badge of stupidity.

The GT on a 1988 trip to Holland

My friend Joel was along for the ride, the first time he had been in a car with me since I had totaled the GTI in Denmark the previous Easter. After we stopped spinning, he turned to me and quietly said, "Man, I don't think I want to ride with you anymore."

Now that was funny, but also more than a bit ironic as Joel wrecked his share of cars while we served together. You see, that is sort of the deal with being a young combat-arms officer. With the expected lifespan of a tank platoon leader in combat against the expected Russian onslaught actually quantified at less than five minutes (thank you Rand Corporation), we really did not spend much time contemplating the future. I drove reckless and fast, caroused wildly, and lived to tell the tale. And that Mustang was a big part of the adventure.

It took a lot of paperwork to get past this sign.

While there are many Mustang tales to tell, I'll keep it to a minimum, beginning with driving it through Checkpoint Charlie and into Communist East Berlin. Under the agreements that governed post-war Germany, members of the Allied Powers had free access to all of the occupation zones. So while East Germany and East Berlin were behind the "Iron Curtain," my friends and I could visit there in the Mustang—and cow the evil Commies into submission with my American muscle car.

And people said Reagan won the Cold War.

Transiting the Iron Curtain was a complex task, involving lots of paperwork and waiting. The communist border guards would make you sit for hours before stamping your paperwork and allowing you to enter. But once through you had surprisingly free access to most of East Berlin.  Due to exchange rates, shopping and dining in the eastern zone was very inexpensive... I'm talking five star meals for a few dollars. Flaming deserts!

The Trabant - the cutting edge of East Germany automotive technology

The sheer size and looks of the Mustang GT combined the V8's rumble on the narrow cobblestone streets would draw a crowd whenever I parked. Stunned "Ossies" literally stood and stared, jaws agape. Considering the average East German car of the time, that was actually not so surprising. Glasnost hell, the Mustang brought down that wall.

Back on the side of democracy and freedom the Mustang was not completely unknown. Several German teams raced Fox-bodied Mustangs in the popular DTM racing series and the cars sort of held their own against BMWs and Mercedes, sort of. Perhaps because of this I continually found myself challenged on the autobahn by M3s and 190 2.3-16s.

A Mustang GT chases an M3 in a 1989 DTM race at the Nurburgring.

It was on the autobahn that the aerodynamic inadequacies of the Mustang's many spoilers and wings became disturbingly apparent. These parts were designed for looks, not downforce. The Mustang could hit about 140 before running out of breath just short of redline. But at any speeds over 120 mph the GT got light and scary. Downhill sweeping corners were terrifying at high speed, as the car lost traction and began to float.

Funny thing, 140 (225 kilometers an hour) was about the top end for the M3 and Merc as well. Nobody would win these races, but nobody lost either. Occasionally we gave up and all pulled over to check out each other's cars. Maybe it was during these impromptu meetings that I began to realize that much of the fun in car enthusiasm was other enthusiasts. Funny that it was my Mustang that probably started me on the road to PCA.

And the Mustang GT? I brought it back from Germany in 1989 and promptly got three speeding tickets in as many months. Faced with losing my license, I traded it in on an Acura Integra. I never really missed the car, but in hindsight it was the perfect car for that part of my life. It was also the last V8 engined car I would ever own.

1988 Ford Mustang GT
Owned: 1987-89
Music: U2, Bananarama, and always, Elvis Costello
Rating: 4/5 (If it just had better aerodynamics I could have beat those darned Germans)

Neil Hyland and his BMW

In a change of pace, I want to tell the story of a non-car enthusiast. In fact, my friend Neil really could have cared less about cars. And yet some of the funniest automobile stories I know revolve around Neil and his BMW. Mostly these stories are funny because of Neil, not because of the car.

We first met at Fort Lewis, Washington in about 1990 when both assigned to the 9th Infantry Division. We lived in the same apartment complex in the little town of Steilacoom, overlooking Puget Sound. With a common interest in Depeche Mode, history, and quality furniture, we became fast friends.

Neil was unlike anyone I have ever known. He grew up in Los Angeles and New York City and attended Notre Dame. After earning his degree in English Literature he entered the Catholic seminary, only to decide that the church was not his calling. Casting about for a purpose in life he somewhat suddenly joined the Army, eventually graduating from Officer Candidate School.

Neil would hilariously imitate his mother's reaction to his joining the military, "You have ruined your life!" He served in Germany, the U.S., and Hawaii and commanded a company in Operation Desert Storm; Neil of Arabia we joked. An outstanding officer, he was serious about his profession. He was also serious about friendship.

Once Neil accepted you, he was your friend for life. Even after I was reassigned to Germany we kept in touch. Every once in a while, usually late at night, the phone would ring. "Telephone cocktails" he called these conversations and they would go on for hours, covering every subject under the sun. Laughter was a major part of any time with Neil. He was funny in that droll, sophisticated way that I have never mastered. It was like having a young Noel Coward in the living room.

Neil in Heidelburg, Germany about 1995

Our adventures are too numerous to recall, but a furniture buying trip to Seattle and a wine tour of the Yakima Valley stick in my memory. Truthfully, alcohol was a staple of any Neil adventure. Lots of alcohol.

Oh, Neil's car... A 1989 BMW 325i four door with automatic transmission. Its trunk was inevitably full of empty coffee cups, rolling around. He took a cup to work each morning and when they piled up in the car he would simply transfer them to the trunk.

And that famous Yakima Valley wine tour? The air conditioning in that damned car failed on the way home. 110 degrees, badly hung over, and the AC goes. Misery. Hilarious misery.

I visited him in Washington, DC in 1996 or '97 and he still had the car. It wasn't running and I asked him why he didn't get it fixed. Neil explained that with plenty of public transportation available, he had applied for a AAA membership and planned to call a tow truck once the card arrived! Soon afterwards he transferred to Hawaii, and so telephone cocktails got a bit more expensive. In 2000 he was reassigned to Washington, DC.

Lieutenant Colonel Stephen Neil Hyland, Jr. was killed when American Airlines Flight 77 struck the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. He is buried at Arlington National Cemetery. On the back of his headstone is this epitaph, a phrase I remember him mentioning from time to time.
                   

                    He was born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad.

I dearly miss my friend. I also wonder what happened to that damned car. If I knew where it was I would buy it and never let it go. I'd probably put some coffee cups in the trunk.

Nooooo!

It's Friday the 30th. I thought Friday the 13th was supposed to be the bad one. Apparently I was wrong, as today Road & Track announced that Peter Egan was stepping away from Side Glances, the monthly column he has written for... well, forever.

It was just two months ago I wrote this prophetic paragraph, in a blog post about how I turned from a Hot Rod kid to a Road & Track adult:

I doubt I've missed more than a handful of Road & Track issues over the years, mostly when the Army sent me to places with only vague mail delivery. I still read every issue–and will until Peter Egan retires. Best automobile writer working today.

What happened? Did I tempt the automotive gods once too often? Is this somehow my fault?

Yes, it's autographed... What's your point?

Peter Egan began writing Side Glances in 1983 and his life and mine have been curiously intertwined ever since. At times our core automotive directions coincided in an almost bizarre fashion. Just after I bought my Mustang GT in 1988, he bought a 5.0 LX. A few years later as I bought a Miata, Peter bought a Miata. And then around 2001, as I returned to Porsche ownership... yup, you guessed it, Peter bought a Boxster S.

I relate this not to imply any cosmic oneness of souls (I voted for Reagan for goodness' sake), but to put into perspective how Peter Egan's observations and musing so directly affected me. It felt at times as if he was writing just for me. A column he wrote in the early '90s about maps, "Charts," spoke to me in ways that only a kid who spent hours pouring over the pages of an atlas and then later found himself on the East German border with a British Army of the Rhine 1:100,000 map tucked in the .50 caliber machine gun mount of his M1 tank could understand.

But I suppose all good things must come to an end. And though Peter will continue to contribute to Road & Track and Cycle magazines, I will truly miss that moment 12 times a year when I eagerly opened a familiar magazine to see what my friend was thinking about this month.

You can read his final Side Glances column here. You should do this now.

Post script:

Peter's column titled, "The Right Tool for the Job" is another classic. Here is an excerpt.

Hammer: Originally employed as a weapon of war, the hammer nowadays is used as a kind of divining rod to locate expensive car parts not far from the object we are trying to hit.

Mechanic's Knife: Used to open and slice through the contents of cardboard cartons delivered to your front door; works particularly well on boxes containing convertible tops or tonneau covers.

Electric Hand Drill: Normally used for spinning steel Pop rivets in their holes until you die of old age, but it also works great for drilling rollbar mounting holes in the floor of a sports car just above the brake line that goes to the rear axle.

Hacksaw: One of a family of cutting tools built on the Ouija board principle. It transforms human energy into a crooked, unpredictable motion, and the more you attempt to influence its course, the more dismal your future becomes. 

Vise-Grips: Used to round off bolt heads. If nothing else is available, they can also be used to transfer intense welding heat to the palm of your hand.

Zen and the Art of Car Washing

I am not a great iPhone photographer...

August has been a blur. Between work and life I have barely been home. I've had little time for fun, much less cars—or car blogs. The fleet is dirty and neglected. This afternoon I finally had a chance to get the red car out for some much needed scrubbing.

As I went through my car wash routine it occurred to me that I have a car wash routine. It's not rocket science: I start with a good rinse, use decent soap, wash from top to bottom, and have a different sponge/mitt for the lower panels. A thorough rinsing, a little water blading for the flat surfaces, the small leaf blower to get water from the nooks and crannies, and then a good soft toweling and I'm done. A routine.

Friends have been influential in the routine's evolution. From my army buddy Eddie I got the two different sponge strategy. From Jerry I got the leaf blower (my neighbors love that part - cements their opinion of my insanity). Tom at EP recently convinced me of the importance of good soap. In my case these days it is P21S. I tend to stick to Griots' products, along with a few other solutions that seem to work well (If you don't use Griot's Speed Shine there is no hope for you). I moved pass the mass-market/parts store crap years ago, but I'm not willing to spend big money in search of that perfect shine.

Embarrassingly I am not a big waxer. Sure, I do a thorough clay bar and decent paste wax every few months. But that's it. Not even the red car has seen a proper buffer in years. Actually, buffers kinda scare me.

Some of my car friends are far more fanatical. I've watched them disassemble Corvette dashboards in search of dust, wash their Porsches in the garage to avoid drought restrictions, and commit various other acts of car care obsession. Their cars do usually look better than mine.

I find that there is something about handwashing a car that appeals to some primal need. I enjoy it, even in the wonderful humidity of a Southern evening. Like just now. I think my blood pressure actually went down as I used polishing compound to get a slight abrasion off a bumper. Or maybe it was the beer—a car washing staple that I do not skimp on.


What are your car washing tricks or obsessions? What beer goes well with a clay bar?

Cars for Kids

There is a strange point in the life of an auto enthusiast when practicality and safety suddenly overrule power and design... When you have to find cars for your kids. And there has been a sea change in this field of endeavor with Gens X and Y. They don't care nearly as much about cars as I did when their age, and when they do their values seem sadly twisted. I shudder to hear a 17 year old who cares more about the environment than about looking cool or going fast. Kids today!

A few years back when it came time to expand the Moore motoring fleet to account for teen drivers I found myself in a strange position—buying cars I did not necessarily want, and was not going to drive much. My first choice (or should I say our first choice, as my wife had an important say in all these decisions) was a Mazda Protege. That was tough as we traded in our beloved Miata M-Edition to buy the Protege. For the first, and perhaps only time in my life, I did not have a performance car of any type (that didn't last long and was actually how I got back into Porsche—another story sometime).

The Protege was a very good car. It had the classic three box shape of a BMW 2002 and the 1.8 liter engine from the Miata. As it was for our daughter I went with automatic transmission. And there was my big mistake, making assumptions

Anna Lea was different than most of her peers. Not only did she want her license the day she was eligible, soon afterward she announced that she wanted to learn to drive a stick shift. Hallelujah! There was an enthusiast in the family!


Of course we already had the Mazda. So we waited a year or two. But just as Anna was about to head off to college she somehow conned me into trading in the Mazda on a Jetta GLS with the 1.8 turbo, sport suspension, and a five speed manual. She named the car JJ and the rest was history (I'm not sure I have actually ever said no to her, come to think of it).

JJ the Jetta

Brother Rob also got his license and his grandparents kindly gave him their 2004 Chrysler PT Cruiser GT. It seemed like a nice car, at first. But eventually the Cruiser showed its dark side, going through ball joints, tires, wheels, and other parts with a reckless abandon. While it served Rob fairly well and really never left him stranded, it was a poorly designed and badly built car.

A Chrysler manufactured in Mexico. Say no more.

This last week, with only 72,000 on the odometer, the Cruiser was done. Facing thousands of dollars in computer and suspension repairs it was dumped at Carmax in the middle of a horrible rain storm. The appraisers missed a lot, dodging the deluge, and offered us far more than hoped. I think they were sort of surprised we took the offer, and then they were startled to see the car up close in the delivery lane. I suspect some other poor customer got low-balled later that evening to make up the difference.

And so I was off on the inexpensive, used car hunt. At first I looked at a 2006 Saab 9-5, then a 2004 BMW 2004. If it had been for me I think either would have worked. But it wasn't for me, and that shopping is actually harder. An inexpensive Camry was also considered, but it had too many miles.

After much thought - and discussion with Rob about his priorities - today we helped him purchase a 2008 Honda Fit Sport. I already like the little thing... Even with only 109 horsepower and automatic transmission. The 1.5 liter VTEC spins willingly and the paddle shifters (!) help keep the engine in the torque band. The cargo area is cavernous, with origami rear seats that fold into the floor. Rob liked that it gets 35 mpg—and has an easily accessible AUX jack.

I guess he sort of cares about cars after all, his parameters are just different than mine.


What cars have you bought for your children—and have you managed to raise car enthusiasts?