reddsun1

And, more eye candy...still arguably the most beautiful and sexiest Lambo [and one of my favorites of the supercars], the Miura. Rumor has it that fans of retro designs may have even more reason to rejoice. Sketches of a "Miura" concept, based on the Audi LM GT platform have been spotted, and it looks pretty dang good...hopefully postable pics will surface soon...

Terry at www.MadMaxCars.com, I bought it in transit. They're looking for a few more to import right now I read, what with all the noises recently about a 4th Mad Max movie franchise they probably felt they couldn't afford to wait any longer. Let's see what they come up with and how much they cost. I agree that more coupes should stay coupe-ish. If I get another coupe I'd most likely add some Bathurst bodywork and a Cobra paintjob; Rod at www.madmaxparts.com has an amazing collection of racing bodywork he brought back to Indiana a few years ago. He also reported that coupes were routinely sent to the crusher up until 4-5 years ago without a second thought. That changed when Americans started buying them (they reached the 25-year EPA exclusionary limit). Some eagerly sold them as relics of a by-gone day, others started bemoaning their exportation (as opposed to their scrapping?). Well, that's market economics. 335866[/snapback] I need to check the member pages at the yahoo group more often; I should have recognized the Tennessee Falcon. I'm glad I got mine before the exchange rates went all to hell. Alas, any chance of getting my hands on another are slim to none though. I guess Rod will have the distinction of being the first Yank to take a Coupe vintage racing here in the states. I love what he did with the Brut 33, and I can't wait to see his Cobra replica.

Well, let's get back to the meat and potatoes of this thread: eye candy!

In my case, neither. I actually find professional drag racing boring more times than not. Give me a small tire, 1,000 + horsepower ,on the edge of control, tripping the 60 foot lights with the front tires still in the air, car on a sub 10 second pass on the 1320 any day. Melissa 335825[/snapback] Oh, by all means; don't allow this to be limited to the males only. Feel free to substitute your own favorite Hollywood/sports/etc. leading man, girls. But LOL, this is for illustrative comparison, only; please don't consider literally. I realize at 12 seconds, 12 minutes--neither one would exactly be getting rave reviews from the ladies.

A few years ago, I became more "enlightened" to the design philosophies of Australian auto manufacturers, and I kinda like what I see. It's like they followed the same vein as US auto makers on certain key "performance" design elements--i.e., a penchant for V8s, front engine, RWD--and skewed off in a slightly different direction with it [or stayed the course, depending on how you look at it]. Ford and GM in Oz offer hot rodded versions of their most popular sedans, the Falcon and Commodore respectively. So instead of ponycars being the predominant vehicles with muscle, theirs are usually "tourers" or 4-doors. Taking the practicality of a family sedan and stuffing eye-peeling-stump-pulling hoss motors [usually V8] in em? Seems to be a winning formula for them. Compared to their US counterparts [Chev Impala? Ford Taurus?], these vehicles would bludgeon the sh-t out of them, performance wise. Instead of working harder to bring them over here, or design something comparable, US mfrs [most notably GM] just don't seem to get it. What did Chev do? They take an already nose-heavy uninspiring pig of a fleet car that is the Impala, and attempt to give it a "hi-po" image by stuffing even more weight out over the front wheels with the SS V8 [my parents have an Impala, and having driven it, I can say I hate the fu--er, even compared to my 10+ yr old Camry]. It's a band-aid fix for what amounts to gaping, bleeding wounds in the sales market. They [the Aussies] did give us a new kick-ass GTO, after all. Detractors can call its styling "bland," but whenever I've noticed one in traffic, it immediately stands out, catches the eye. And letting the crack-smoking monkeys at Pontiac tack on extra scoops and tacky panel lines sure as heck ain't the answer. I think they'll be highly collectible 20 years from now. Drag racing not real racing? Well, it's not my cup of tea either, but I won't say it's all that bad. It can be somewhat captivating watching the pro-stockers and the top fuelers for a couple of rounds. But yeah, after a while, it gets a little bit bleh. Here's the best analogy/comparison of drag racing and road racing I can think of: If you could have a lusty, passionate encounter with [insert favorite movie starlet here], would you rather have it with her for 12 seconds, or 12 minutes?

As a GM employee....the financial troubles are tied to pension payments and health insurance costs. GM is waaayy too nice to its employees. And when you call NASCAR a joke, I assume you are not referring to its profitablility? 335592[/snapback] LOL, I've often jokingly said there's no way that Chevy/GM can justify their wanting 30K and more--for a galldang pickup truck; it all boils down to the fact that we're just paying to put some UAW worker's kids through medical school. But I'd wager it's more due to huge corporate salaries and benefits. And you can bet your arse these cats aren't getting their 6-figure-plus salaries docked when the companies sputter and underperform due to their general mismanagement. It's a disturbing trend that's coming more to light in this day and age: corporate managers who make obscene amounts of money, but when they don't perform, or are shown to be generally unqualified or downright incompetent, they stay on the payroll....WTF is that?

Hmm, that'll pretty much make Toyota the company with the most prolific factory racing programs of any of the major manufacturers, won't it? Let's see, they've got: --IRL engine program --Formula 1 --NASCAR [trucks, and soon Nextel Cup] --FIA World Rally [do they still have an active 'works' team?] --Sports Cars [at least, 'locally' w/the JGTC] and I'm sure I've missed a bunch of other series. They've pretty much covered all the bases, haven't they? From open wheel to sedans, on road and off. And yet, they STILL manage to claim profit margins, while the other big mfrs all claim they're in danger of losing their shirts. They must be doing something right. I'm just not inspired by any of their new product, IMHO. I find them too sterile. The design direction seems to be "upright, tall and egg-like" if you had to sum up the overall "feel" of their vehicles...bleh

They're getting rare alright; even down under, from what I understand. The Aussies are apparently getting uneasy about so many Yanks taking their coupes, and the past couple years have seen a sharp rise in asking prices. Rolling shells are going for as much as 6-8K now. Who brought yours over? Terry at madmaxcars.com? Or perhaps Cameron at Aussiexport.com? So many people here in the states want BoB replicas, we may see a new movement start up, one to keep some coupes unaltered.

Ah yes, the last of the RWD Celicas. No barn-storming performers by any means; but I remember back in the day, they were the shiz-nit. I seem to remember seeing a magazine article once way back--Motor Trend or Car and Driver, can't remember--that did a comparo with the then new Celica GTS and the BMW 3-series Coupe. Apparently the Celica did surprisingly well in that one, posting perf. figures quite even to the Beemer.

Hmm, looks good...if you've got an expensive pin-striped suit you really want to match.

Toysport is a good place to look, as well as LC Engineering [they're more likely to have items specifically for the 22RE]. But the 22RE wasn't exactly the most popular 'yota engine, and items for boosting performance on this much un-loved motor are pretty damned expensive. I used to drive an '84 Celica GTS, also equipped with the wheezy little "truck motor" 22RE. Fun car to drive, one of the better looking little compacts from the 80's. LOL, but the damn thing wouldn't break a buck-twenty on the speedo unless you dropped it from a high flying plane! By the time it got to 4 grand on the tach, it was screaming bloody murder, like it was all it had to give. Not a high winder as 4-bangers go, due to the relatively long stroke, I believe? You say your truck is an '86? By the time all is said and done, you will spend more on the turbo kit, etc. than the vehicle itself is worth...it's largely what made me wind up going with a "muscle car" with a V8--comparatively speaking, the cost-per-horsepower isn't as high as with a 22RE. I've heard 300+HP is well within reach; IF you're willing to spend the bucks...

Over the top? Perhaps. Do I apologize for saying it? Nope. That's how I feel about war, that's all. Inevitable part of human existence? Probably. But there ain't a godda-n thing "cool" or "glorious" about it. All of us here profess to share a common love for Macross, do we not? Have we gleaned nothing from that groundbreaking and memorable show? or for that matter, even the chopped and hacked ver. we know as Robotech? Have we fogotten the underlying message at the heart of the story that Kawamori and co. tried to convey to us all those years ago?

You can't possibly have the foggiest fu--ing notion of just what WAR really is about, or what WAR is really like, can you? No, you couldn't possibly. Otherwise, surely you wouldn't have said something that fu--ing stupid.

In a display of the depths of tackiness that some people will sink to--and this from "sophisticated" Europeans, no less--I give you these photos of appaling taste at work. These are from the entries in this year's Gumball 2005; apparently more of a corporate marketing junkett than the foot to the floor "outlaw" race of lore...still, it looks like it'd be a helluva ball to drive in. The entire spectrum of automobilia was represented it seems; from lowly VW microbuses, to the latest super exotica. But this paint job? Bleh! I'll admit--I liked the old show, I even dig 69 Chargers--but on a Maranello? That's just wrong, man!

Yeah, I checked out the official site. Pretty cool stuff. He had some kick ass collections--cars and toys.

Every now and then, SPEED Channel will do something cool; over the w'end, they aired the original Gone in 60 Seconds. I can say I finally got to see the classic original, and all I can say is dayum! I already thought the remake probably wouldn't be as good as the original in some respects--now I know why I was right not to like the new ver. Sure, there's plenty of cheese in the original, but compared to "Toby" Haliki's vision, the Bruckheimer ver. sucks ass lint. Mrs. Haliki probably wouldn't like the analogy, but this movie could be considered "porn for car-guys." All the pre-requisites are there: it's from the 70's; the acting pretty much sucks--there are no professionals, just Toby's friends, IIRC; there's the bad 70s "boomp-chicka-boom-boom" soundtrack barely audible in the background; and the plot? we don't need no stinking plot! all we need's a story just flimsy enough to push us along to the next big money shot! [i.e. crashes, chases, and lots of badass cars!]. After seeing the final chase scene [over 40 minutes long! whew!], I felt like I needed a cigarette. And I don't smoke.

That looks wicked cool. Although arcades seem to be going the way of the dinosaur here in the US with home consoles/PC being so popular, I've been wondering when they'd start making the transition to more "immersive" visuals in arcade gaming, i.e. 180+ deg. viewing screens, for more "3D" feel and interaction with elements from the sides as well as in front of the player. Oh well, at least it isn't by SEGA. Then it'd suck ass, rest assured; it'd cost the equivalent of $5 for 2 1/2 minutes of gameplay, or something crappy like that "...Please insert 30 quarters to continue in 10...9...8..." I remember I HATED SEGA's arcade games for that crap when I was younger. Fu--ing money-takers was all they were...

I'll say that I concur. Although my anime intake of late is extremely limited, I just like the old stuff that got me hooked better. Likewise with British TV. Even 30+ years on, I think Monty Python is still funny. Benny Hill, too. Guess I'm just nostalgic for Robotech, Area 88, Golgo 13, and stuff that impacted me when I was younger.

As a sign that things are totally off-kilter [or just that these people have more money than sense], this Ferrari 275 GTS/4 NART Spyder sold at the Pebble Beach auction for $3.96M. But a fuggin VW Campmobile for $99,000?! Now the Ferrari's got some significant race history, is ultra rare [1 of 4 made] or something like that, and the Prancing Horse usually commands high figures like that. But $99K for a little camper--and not even a good one at that? Is there some sort of rich historical significance or something I'm missing here? Doesn't exactly look like the kind of vehicle that "put the world into RV'ing" or anything like that. I mean really--would you want to try to sleep in the da-n thing? Doesn't look at all hospitable. What is this world coming to?

"1. Feels grandiose and self-important (e.g., exaggerates accomplishments, talents, skills, contacts, and personality traits to the point of lying, demands to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements); 2. Is obsessed with fantasies of unlimited success, fame, fearsome power or omnipotence, unequalled brilliance (the cerebral narcissist), bodily beauty or sexual performance (the somatic narcissist), or ideal, everlasting, all-conquering love or passion; 3. Firmly convinced that they are unique and, being special, can only be understood by, should only be treated by, or associate with, other special or unique, or high-status people (or institutions); 4. Requires excessive admiration, adulation, attention and affirmation — or, failing that, wishes to be feared and to be notorious (narcissistic supply); 5. Feels entitled. Demands automatic and full compliance with their unreasonable expectations for special and favorable priority treatment. 6. Is "interpersonally exploitative", i.e., uses others to achieve their own ends; 7. Devoid of empathy. Is unable or unwilling to identify with, acknowledge, or accept the feelings, needs, preferences, priorities, and choices of others; 8. Constantly envious of others and seeks to hurt or destroy the objects of their frustration. Suffers from persecutory (paranoid) delusions stemming from a belief that others are envious of them and are likely to act similarly; 9. Behaves arrogantly and haughtily. Feels superior, omnipotent, omniscient, invincible, immune, "above the law", and omnipresent (magical thinking). Rages when frustrated, contradicted, or confronted by people they consider inferior to themselves and unworthy." You sure these are the diagnostic criteria for a personality disorder, or aren't they just the job requirements/ideal traits for a position as CEO of just about any corporation in America today?

In deference to the suggested direction change of "unattainable supercars," I'll simply submit this photo of my candidate [well, one of 'em anyway] and let the picture do the talking... *drools over keyboard*

You got it all wrong, gay dancing spidey. Karl Rove is Palpy, Cheney is Vader, and Bush is just some guy that gives speeches. 326606[/snapback] Isn't his avatar just the lamest thing ever? Must be an M7 fan. And as it seems we are getting political here: Having a pussy avatar and being a flaming liberal usually go hand in hand. 326609[/snapback] What? You guys don't like his avatar? I thought it was hilarious the first time i saw it. It looks like an idea for a bad cameo on an episode of The Tick or something... "Evildoers cannot withstand the might of my justice dance!" http://www.starterupsteve.com/swf/gayspiderman.html 326631[/snapback] LMAO!

You got it all wrong, gay dancing spidey. Karl Rove is Palpy, Cheney is Vader, and Bush is just some guy that gives speeches. 326606[/snapback] Isn't his avatar just the lamest thing ever? Must be an M7 fan. And as it seems we are getting political here: Having a pussy avatar and being a flaming liberal usually go hand in hand. 326609[/snapback] What? You guys don't like his avatar? I thought it was hilarious the first time i saw it. It looks like an idea for a bad cameo on an episode of The Tick or something... "Evildoers cannot withstand the might of my justice dance!" Anyways. Ladies and gentlemen--and everyone else--we have witnessed a monumental event in our nation's history. I think it's safe to say that it will be debated, on so many levels, for generations to come. Unfortunately, many will try to profit from this tragedy, be it politically, economically, whatever. There's plenty of blame to go 'round for this colossal fu--up, but now's not the time for that. Too bad so many of those stuffed-shirts on capitol hill don't get that. The finger pointing and blame game has already started. I don't think anybody in Mississippi or Louisiana really gives a frog's fat ass about just whose fault it is, at least right now. Right now, they just want to be able to rebuild their lives...

I agree with a lot of what you've said. In regards to pt. 1: I try to see it from all pts of view before rushing to judgement, though. True, there's no reason that so many able bodied, otherwise healty people should have stayed in that situation for so long. But bear in mind, these people were told in effect "this is the evacuation plan; if you're at the Superdome, we'll send in buses to get you out..." and they waited and waited and waited, and the buses never [for 5+ days, was it?] came. Do you risk leaving everyone you know and strike out on you own, only to be left behind if/when the buses do come? When I looked at some satellite photos of the area around the Superdome, it appears that nearly everything was flooded around that area--if you strike out on your own, where in the world do you go? Should they have just sat around like sheep waiting to be herded? Probably not; but I try to remember that a lot of those folk probably didn't have any idea of where to even try to go. Pt. 2: yeah, Nagin's gonna catch hell for that rant, as well as the city's being caught with their pants down. A lot of people seemed to have dropped the ball from a planning/preparation standpoint. Pt. 3: true, true, 'nuff said. Pt. 4: Hear! Hear! I couldn't agree more. Trying to get nourishment is one thing, but anybody stealing ATM's, money, starting fires, and stupid sh-t like that ought to be dealt with appropriately. Deciding just who is looting becomes a much more cloudy issue, though [as shown by the pics above] especially if you're depending on the media for your viewpoint. I just saw the clip of Kanye West. LMAOROTF! He looks like he's in an insomnia or drug induced rant, like he's ready to strip naked and run off the stage, screaming. The looks on Meyers' and Tucker's faces was gold! But seriously, that was not the time or the place for such personal tirades. Totally inappropriate, Kanye. What an absurd thing to say: "George Bush doesn't care about black people." That's not accurate at all. George Bush doesn't care about poor people; he doesn't bother about what color they are... I'm sorry Kanye, but you can only take that argument so far. After some point, that dog just won't hunt. While I try to understand the desparate situation, I can't help but be embarassed and infuriated by some of what I saw reported. I think "all the world is looking at this, and we as a people [Americans, not just black Americans] are being set back 20 years in the eyes of the world by this iganant sh-t." Do I expect to see a decidedly skewed view of the victims in regards to the color of the faces that flash across the screen? Yes; that's simply because that's 65-70% of the population make-up of the area they're covering. But to see folk behaving like godda--ed fools, when they need more than ever to stick together...to think that rescue workers, helicopter pilots and cops are refusing to continue rescue ops, to go into certain areas because ignorant muh fuh's are attacking them and shooting at them. God that makes me mad. Of course, the media focuses in on those sorts of displays of foolishness with laser-like intensity. To paraphrase that classic tome of hip hop, The Chronic: "It don't take but one ignant black muh fuh to fu-k it up for 25,000 other black muh fuhs..." Stupid bast--ds re-inforcing the stereotypes, making it harder for the rest of us... Nobody seems to be raising one blaringly obvious question: if it was so difficult to mobilize and get aid into the affected regions, how is it the news crews got there so damn fast, and in such numbers? "We need help, we need the army..." Oh there was an army there, alright. The army of the press, armed to the teeth with their trusty cameras and microphones, hunting out misery and trauma for their next segment. Anybody else notice, all the news networks were there, with numbers of idiot reporters there sufficient for round-the-clock coverage? You muh fuh's can stick a camera in somebody's face and ask asenine sh-t like "your house and belongings just washed away; what were your thoughts?" But you can't buy some godda-n bottles of water and put 'em in your news van to hand out to the people whose suffering you so vigorously seek out?

well, at least they worked a BFG-ish type gun into it...but dammit! It ought to be plastering the walls with whatever it hits! Oh yeah, this is gonna suck. But the 1st person camera angle is pretty neat. What the hell--keep it in the final cut, I say.