The Car Obsession Thread

[Chris]

You win! 🤣

 

[Miles Monroe]

So here's my ride, 2018 Triumph Street Scrambler, basically a Bonneville. I forgot to mention I lowered it 3.5 inches, and put street tires. Wasn't doing much off road, and was beating the shit out of my knee swinging it over the seat. More so with the 30cal ammo cans mounted on the sides at the rear of the seats. Didn't want to do another Kaf ( Cafe' Racer ) so styling is stock. Was originally black. Sand beige is better here in S Florida, I can park off road without being spotted as easily. Led headlights are way way to costly, so it has a nice led bulb with built on cooling fan. Also has 1 of the LED driving lights you saw on the 05 military bike., and LED turn signals. Skid plate is a Bonneville accessory, but bolts right up. Not enough coverage, but the good after market stuff again is off the wall money. Likely going to buy a coal shovel at some point and make a real skid plate the way we did back in the day for our dirt bikes. One of the best features of the scramblers is the ability to shut off the ABS and Traction Control. Common sense says why turn off safety features... Off road ability. Ya need to be able to lock up tires at times, and spin the rear. Makes it fun for the street, turning off the traction control... you can wheelie ! No, I'm not one of those pin heads ya see on busy roads doing stunts and shit, but out on the deserted roads, I do get the urge from time to time Triumph did a fantastic with the liquid cooled Bonnie engines...

 

[Ghost of Sarge]

 

[Ghost of Sarge]

There she is. 64.5 Mustang convertible. Born in June of 1964. 289 V8, four speed. Will get thru 70 in second gear

 

[riggins44]

Okay, my obsession has narrowed down so much over the years, but it been bikes since I was a little cuss. I'm not really obsessed with the visual as much as the nuts and bolts, and being creative about it.... it's building with low budget. For instance, my personal ride looks old and not well cared for, and that's just how I like. Been like that for years now. After I built the Military Bonneville, it became unenjoyable being everywhere I stopped, I'd get inundated with questions about it. Sure, it was cool having people gawk over my bike at first. So I fly under the radar with a bike that most won't give a second look. The nuts and bolts tell a slightly different story... Put in a set of larger / higher flow injectors out of a 1200, opened the air intake a bit, high flow air filter. Modified fuel map, and a wide open exhaust that barks. The exhaust is partly hand built. I can't justify 1600$ for a nice 2 into one exhaust, so it was a set of headers made for the 900 engine, and a 200$ slip on mid pipe & muffler combo also for the 1200 engine bikes. A little of this and a little of that to make it work, heat shield and crash protection for the pipe and muffler
, header wrap, and bingo... a bit of a sleeper bike.
Here's the 2005 Triumph Bonneville converted to a vintage military bike... lots of odd stuff on this one. Left side has a Nam era ALICE pack on it's frame, and removable to hike away with. Ammo bag on tank for Brit Sten gun. Right side has a faux "jerry can" which opens up at the top and rear. Under the top is 2 USB charging ports, Eu to US cig lighter adapter, and mini inverter that will run a laptop. The rest was storage for the camp kitchen. Leather ammo pouches, Russian Nagan. Horn is off a 34 GMC pick up. Vintage style headlight bucket to hold spedo, bar end turn signals, and led driving lights. The marker light on the front fender, and the rear turn signals are 1955 dodge power wagon license plate lights... leather solo seat on springs like the old days LOL... at the rear I used a replica Vincent tail / stop light and plate bracket. There is also a Swiss "volcano" stove tucked behind the Alice pack. Amazing little stoves... and a small fender rack made from this and that. The engine also had general mods.... removed the airbox, open pod filters, went from stock jetting (110 main 40 pilot ) to 128 and 45's. One tooth up on the countershaft sprocket for better top end at lower revs, a igniter from another model that raised the rev limit to 8500 from 7800. Of course an open exhaust, wrapped headers, and to finish it off I tweaked the camshaft timing to regain the torque lost in the gearing change. Still my favorite modern Bonnie engine, 790 cc, and nice cam profiles and duration. They went with those cams to get as much HP as they could under emission standards. I've taken those cams and put them into the 865cc engines as a hop up. So, that's the Bonnie build. Did it all in the garage, including paint work. Took a first place with it in the "retro" class a a vintage show. I'll post another favorite bike I had the pleasure of working with soon.
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Nice Bike

 

[riggins44]

I should have never sold my 65 Mustang. Biggest regret was not buying an all original low mileage 40 Ford Coupe when I was 15.

I am a Ford guy.

 

[SkinsFTW]

I should have never sold my 65 Mustang. Biggest regret was not buying an all original low mileage 40 Ford Coupe when I was 15.

I am a Ford guy.

Must have been nice to have had that kind of money when you were 15.

I think I was 17 when I finally bought a car and that was just taking over payments on one of my parents cars. That was a mistake too, so many speeding tickets lol.

 

[riggins44]

I was only like $800.

 

[Mark The Homer]

Can't say I'm a car guy, but I got some memories of my dad's 1971 Porsche 911E. He ordered it custom and picked it up at the Porsche factory in Stuttgart because he (we) were stationed in Bremerhaven at the time. So he picked it up and then drove back north to Bremerhaven. He had to take it easy on that first trip due to the break-in period for new vehicles.

I was 14 and had braces. And the only authorized orthodontist was in Frankfurt. Something to do with Champus? I dunno. Bottom line, I had to be transported from Bremerhaven to Frankfurt every six weeks to get my braces worked on. And so my Dad was happy to do it. But Frankfurt was 400 miles away. It's okay. He'd do it on the autobahn. 400 miles in four hours, including traffic, a gas stop, etc.

The orthodontist had a Ferrari, so they were trading stories. And I was listening.

On the autobahn, you're supposed to flash your high beams when you want to pass. And when you're doing 100+mph, it's a good idea to flash them well in advance, like a quarter mile before you get to a car in the passing lane, or to warn cars in the right lane NOT to pass because you're comin', and you'll be there in a few scant seconds. I remember the orthodontist bragging about how the Ferrari had a high beam that would just flash constantly. Blink blink, pause, blink blink, pause, like that. It was a built in feature of the Ferrari. So whenever he was on the autobahn, he'd turn that thing on, and it was just flashing constantly. Blink blink pause, blink blink pause. He said he achieved speeds over 180 mph.

My Dad's top speed was 134 mph. The 911E was rated at 137, but he didn't get above 134. Probably because I was in the car. But I'm not talking about hitting 134 and slowing down . I mean, driving at 120-130 mph for ten or fifteen minutes at a time. The engine is in the back on a Porsche, and it sounded and felt like a rocket engine when it was flat out. It was this loud ROAR and crazy vibration. Your adrenalin is running just sitting in the seat from the loudness of the engine and the vibration. Going through the overpasses was like a suction, you could feel the air being compressed as you blew through. There would be people, pedestrians, watching from the overpass, watching the high speed sports cars screaming down the autobahn. They'd watch you approach, then run to the other side and watch you as you left.

And then there was the acceleration. The Porsche, because the engine was in the back, was not apt to spin the rear wheels because of the weight of the engine. So the acceleration was unnatural. You would get pressed back into your seat as if you were being thrust into space from a Saturn Five booster. It was really quite an experience.

We moved back to the states about nine months later. My dad, because he was into foreign sports cars, made friends with this one guy who owned a business that sold Ferraris, Lamborghinis and what not, here in the states. I was there with my friend at this showroom and were told "Look, but don't touch!" We made him nervous. It was the paint. You don't place a finger on the paint job, it might get smudged. He was a fanatic. He was completely obsessed with foreign sports cars. He told stories about how he'd get people to drive ahead on the Dulles Toll road and warn him of cops by radio. When it was clear, he'd drive whatever car he was in at super high speeds. He ended up in prison because he smuggled, or tried to smuggle drugs into the US by hiding drugs into the foreign cars he was shipping from Europe. He needed the money to feed his obsessive habit.

My dad sold the Porsche here after a few years because he couldn't keep it tuned. The mechanics said the only way to keep it tuned correctly was to periodically run it at high speeds and high RPMs, which was impossible in the US. So he was forced to sell it.

 

[SkinsFTW]

LOL. That is a nice write up. I remember back in like 1978-1980 my father sitting me on his lap and telling me to press the pedal and go 80-90 between Newport News and Richmond. I was 6-7 years old, the car was probably a road runner but I can't remember specifically. I think I did 90-100, but I'm not sure exactly. We never got pulled over either.

Now days, I have a Quattro Audi S5 and I can get over 100 easily without my wife even noticing, and she's watching it all. Eventually she tells me to slow down. This car is so quiet and so fast. The tires are as wide as semi truck tires so that is probably why it's so easy to get away with the speed. I'd like to try to max it out but I think it'll go close to 200.

 

[riggins44]

I am by every definition a car guy. I was raised in the car business. We had a huge back yard at our house. Every August or September dad would bring the new models up and put behind the house to store until intro day. People would ride by our house slowly to try and get a peek at the new Fords. I got to play around new Mustangs, Torino, Fairlane, Thunderbird and Galaxies. Back years ago dad would get an assortment of model cars for the new model year showing the colors. I still have several at home. My favorite is a Silver Blue 65 Mustang GT Fastback. I won't part with that one. My brother and I unfortunately customized and tore most of them up.

 

[Chris]

Like this?

 

[riggins44]

That is the model I have. My son had a 65 T-5 that needed a lot of work. He sold it to the Mustang Museum in Alabama. They have it on display as a barn find documented T-5.

 

[Chris]

That is the model I have. My son had a 65 T-5 that needed a lot of work. He sold it to the Mustang Museum in Alabama. They have it on display as a barn find documented T-5.

Beauty! ❤️

 

[purbeast]

I am dropping my car off tomorrow to get the front windows tinted to match the rears and to get a ceramic coating on. It takes 10+ hours to do it all so they will have it overnight and all day Friday too.

I'll post some pics after it's done. I wish my car was clean now so I could get some true before/after shots.

 

[purbeast]

I am VERY happy with the results. Pictures don't really do justice of just how shiny/reflective it is. I felt like I was seeing just so many more reflections off my hood when I drove home from the shop. I wish I got a behind shot from inside their shop too since the lighting was ideal.

 

[riggins44]

Has anyone here gotten their car ceramic or graphene coated? Overall how do you like it and do you feel it was worth the cost?

I have friends and customers that have done this and others want to do their own waxing.

 

[purbeast]

Bruh...

 

[Ashburn Dave]

Grew up in the 70's with some big blocks. My favorite teenager car was a Pontiac LeMans 350 with a 4-barrel carb and dual exhaust. About as close to a GTO as you could get without owning a GTO.

I'm too old now to deal with the rumble anymore so my latest car is a little more sophisticated and quiet. I bought this Jag sight unseen from a Chicago dealership. It was second hand and I fell in love with the pictures. I researched the car as much as you can remotely and then spun the wheel to make the deal. Fortunately, it is a great car and I got lucky. Spent less than 30k on it, probably due to Jag's rep at the time.

The coolest part was them delivering it directly to my house.

 

[Skinsfan1311]

I've owned a few different cars and trucks.....Datsun 710, '75 Volkswagen Beetle, '73 Monte Carlo, '68 Olds 98, 81 Chevy Caprice, '86 Toyota 4WD, '84, (I think), Olds Cutlass, 94 Dodge Mini-van, 2007 Chevy Silverado, and a 2010 Nissan Altima. My favorite is still the Monte Carlo with my current ride, (2022 Ram 4WD), a close 2nd. It took me almost a year to find one with the color and options that I wanted. It was worth the wait.