Paul MacCready

The world lost a true visionary in August of 2007 when Paul MacCready died.  I was fortunate to have been able to meet and talk with him a few times and always found it to be a fun, entertaining, and thought provoking experience.

Please take the time to go to this site and view Paul’s presentation from the TED organization.

2007 – A Look Back

 There had been rumors that the price of oil might climb as the year began.  Few really expected it to be any more than the usual seasonal rise as the road travel season approached.  After all, the refineries around the gulf coast had recovered from Katrina, hadn’t they?  The Middle East hadn’t heated up any more than it had been over the last couple of years. 

But by the end of the first quarter of 2007 the cost of fossil fuels took on a life of their own without any intervention by the OPEC cartel.  People were getting pissed about the cost of gasoline and predictions were getting louder that it would not just be a seasonal adjustment.

The US and the EU were no longer the major consumers of crude oil.  Now China had a huge population of car owners and it was growing every day.  India was building a middle class that found itself with credit, steady jobs, and a yen for the western lifestyle.  By the end of 2007 Russia would become the Mecca for automobile manufacturers to target as the new growth market, and the US market car market would start to stagnate.

Ford and GM would feel the pain and Chrysler would become the plaything of investors as Daimler sought to divest itself of the albatross.  Toyota would rise to claim the US as its own kingdom just as the reality of an economy based on inflated house values and fantasy mortgages started to crumble.

In the 1980’s we saw muscle cars become emasculated pretenders and in the 1990’s car owners traded in their vans for sport utility vehicles and pickup trucks that could haul more stuff than Walmart could stock in a single aisle. 

There was a brief flurry of import muscle in the mid 1990’s with cars like the Acura NSX, the 3000GT VR4, and the Toyota Supra.  It all appeared to come and go until Subaru and Mitsubishi showed up with their rally bred street super sedans.  The WRX STi and the Evolution MR brought affordable performance to a level not seen since the hay days of the sixties and this time they could corner like a snake slithering in snot.  More performance came from the likes of GM.  Even though the Firebird and Camaro disappeared from their showrooms, the Corvette remained and evolved into a sleek super car that delivered performance at a level far higher than its price tag suggested.  For those with too much money there was the Ford GT.

By the end of 2007 we knew that Nissan would soon be delivering the GTR to the lucky few that could afford the insurance and fuel costs.  Corvette would soon be tempting wallets with the ZR1 and over 600 horsepower.  Could it get any better?

Maybe it could get a lot more confusing.

Gasoline priced dropped for a tantalizingly brief period and then continued to climb.  This time no one was predicting that it was just a temporary aberration that would “normalize”.  No, now you heard rumors that maybe OPEC’s reserve estimates were grossly overinflated.  We watched as the money from the Middle East was invested in American banks to rescue them from the rewards of mortgage greed – and add diversity to the income stream of the Arab states.

Not to worry though.  We would reduce our dependence on fossil fuels by converting to renewable sources like ethanol and biodiesel.  That is, until we found out there was no free lunch to be had.

The reality of E85 (ethanol fortified gasoline) was that it didn’t pack as much energy as gasoline so you couldn’t go as far without refilling.  It also cost energy to produce.  So much energy, that it was likely a net loss.  On top of that it contributed to the rise in corn prices.  This not only affected our neighbors to the south who count on it as a staple food, but the food giants in the US were unhappy to feel the pain of higher costs of high fructose corn syrup.  This might be the one way to remove this corruption from our diet.

So what about biodiesel?  The dream was to take all the used fry-o-lator oil from the franchised burger joints and turn it into clean burning diesel fuel that took care of the waste and reduced emissions.  This seemed to work on a small scale and European countries decided to bet on it back in 2003 with the help of tax incentives.  Similar tax credits have inspired the US producers of biodiesel.  Only biodiesel isn’t only being made from the waste from McDonalds, Burger King, and the like. 

After producing ten million metric tons of the stuff Europe’s producers have been able to unload only half of the stuff.  The EU has plans on replacing 10% of transportation fuel with non-fossil fuels by 2020, but today can claim less than 2% with plenty of supply.

Like ethanol, biodiesel is being held responsible for expanded farming of fragile land in Asia to grow palm oil for the raw material to produce biodiesel.  Rapeseed is used in 80% of Europe’s biodiesel and criticism is growing that this has lead to the inflation of land and food prices.

Meanwhile California (Schwartzenagerland) attempted to impose fuel economy standards on automobile manufacturers that were countermanded by the EPA.  President Bush signed a 600 page energy bill that mandated a new CAFÉ standard of 35 miles per gallon by 2020.  The EU has produced its own standards based on carbon emissions rather than fuel economy.

In addition there are standards being proposed for mandatory rolling resistance of tires.  Not only are tire pressure monitors going to be mandatory on cars and trucks, but in order to stretch fuel mileage tires must contribute by becoming less of a drag.  That could mean higher tire pressures, narrower tires, and certainly less tread life. 

Do you want to know how to get great fuel mileage?  Don’t burn any.

If you must drive then drive something very light.  Nothing improves gas mileage faster than reducing weight.  American drivers have been living large with their SUV’s but with every 10% reduction in weight you can count on a 6% improvement in fuel economy.  Unfortunately cars have been getting heavier and heavier, even the “small” ones.  I think this is the result of more stringent crash standards as well as market driven demand for quiet luxury.

These new mileage standards could mean that we will see aluminum and carbon fiber become common elements of car construction.  Gee, what will the exotic cars use next? Titanium?  Kryptonite?

Unfortunately burning fuels, fossil or otherwise, in our vehicles is a losing proposition.  I suspect that electric vehicle technology will evolve into vehicles that will make it possible to not only have zero emission cars and trucks, but also have performance.  Quite a few examples of electric sports cars have come into being that have zero to sixty times in the sub four second category and sporty handling is not fuel dependant. 

With electric cars you have some great battery technology and power management technology to look forward to.  The source for electricity doesn’t have to be coal or oil either.  Nor does it have to be nuclear.  There is plenty of wind power and solar power to be had.

The military has several prototypes of electric and hybrid vehicles that are being developed for the battlefield.  They offer stealth, low or no heat signature, and plenty of power.

Maybe my next car will be a titanium-framed, carbon fiber skinned, electric, all wheel drive (separate motors for each hub), computer-controlled rally car that accelerates from zero to 60 in less than 4 seconds and stops in 90 feet from 150 mph.

Road Trip – B-Mac’s

 

This week I took a short road trip to visit a restoration shop in the Raleigh area.  You hear a lot about places like Chip Foose and Boyd Codington, but there are some very talented shops that don’t get national attention and B-Mac’s is one of them.

After a few decades of working in the corporate world Bill McDonald felt it would be a good time to retire and kick back.  A stint in an auto body shop introduced him to the amount of interest in restoration work and muscle car customization that existed in the Raleigh area. 

Since the body shop was more interested in focusing its business on insurance work Bill decided to jump into the restoration business.  Two years later he has more work than he knows what to do with.

It is a family business with his son, Bill, Jr. and grandson, Blake.  They also have several talented technicians that specialize in custom bodywork and fabrication.

One great example of their work is a 1962 Corvette that spent over two decades in a barn in Burlington, NC, until someone decided to let B-Mac’s do their magic. 

This frame-off, period correct restoration has resulted in a beautifully transformed barn relic. 

This place is currently working on four Camaros in their body shop as well as several project cars from the sixties. 

Every customer I talk with is not only impressed with the meticulous work, but the customer centric attitude of B-Mac’s.  The customer’s budget is never ignored and customers are welcome to come and see the progress of their project car at any time. 

Enjoy the photos.

Filling Tires with Snake Oil

The original set of tires that came on my Evolution MR lasted to just under 13,000 miles (12,812).  I had heard the stories about how little mileage to expect from the Yokohama Advan A046 tires.  Many Evolution owners quickly looked for another option.  I also knew that the car’s suspension was literally designed around the Advan A046 tires and that while it was certainly nice to get more mileage out of a set of tires much of the thrilling cornering capabilities would be diminished with another tire. 

I swallowed hard and replaced the OE tires with another set of Yokohama tires.  I was religious about rotating the tires front to rear every 5000 miles as well as monitoring the tire pressures.  I also enjoyed the heck out of the cornering capabilities of this fun rally car.

Hardly 11,000 miles later I had to get another set.  Ugh!  The prices weren’t exactly going down either.  Even through Tire Rack they were nearly $300 plus shipping and installation. 

It just so happened that this coincided with the start of my 8000 mile road trip out west in June of this year.  As an experiment I decided to try nitrogen instead of air for this set of tires.  There was a NitroFill dealer close by and for $40 they evacuated all the air and replaced it with nitrogen at the pressures I requested. 

To be quite honest I was prepared to find that this was a bit of a “snake oil” product that promised a lot, but really wouldn’t provide a significant difference.  The fill up of nitrogen allowed me access to top offs or pressure adjustments country wide as well as a year’s worth of road side assistance.  With the long road trip in mind I thought that $40 was not a bad deal.

My driving style hasn’t changed and I certainly ran the tires on a variety of road surfaces from here to California and back.  If you remember, I avoided the Interstates and made a point of hitting the scenic routes as I crossed from state to state. 

I maintained the car pretty much as always with 5000 mile tire rotations and checked the tire pressures in the mornings.  While I was in New Mexico I stopped by a NitroFill dealer and had the pressures checked only to find that they were right where I wanted them.  They commented that seemed typical for the cars that they had filled.  I smiled, thanked them, and had my own opinion.

Once of the differences I had noticed was that when I started out each morning that the tires did not exhibit the flat spot period of warm up that I had been used to.  What I mean is that it was not unusual for the Yokohamas to develop a flat spot from being parked overnight and that the first two or three miles would be used to warm the tires up enough to get rid of the set they had taken over night.  That no longer occurred.

Anyone who has driven with the Yokohama Advan tires knows that they are noisy tires.  Part of the price you pay for all that traction.  What I did notice was that the tires didn’t get any quieter, but the tone did change.  They got kind of a ring to them.

Now it has been nearly 17,000 miles on this set and I am not even near the wear bars.  I am astonished.  Could nitrogen make that much difference?  After all air is about 77% nitrogen anyway, isn’t it?

What nitrogen is not is moisture, nor is it a corrosive gas like oxygen.  It is also said that its molecules are bigger and therefore find it harder to escape through the tire itself. 

The SR71 used nitrogen in its tires that had to land at excessive speeds.  The B2 bomber still uses nitrogen to inflate its tires.  Nitrogen is used to inflate race car tires in several forms of racing.

In the near future the government has mandated that tire pressure monitors will be standard on all cars sold in the US (Gee, thanks Uncle Sam from preventing me from being an idiot again) as our big brother prevents us from hurting ourselves.  From what I’ve seen anecdotally the monitors do their job, but end up confusing most motorists.  They still don’t know what their tire pressures should be or which tire is having a tough time.  I heard one frustrated owner talk about checking all their vehicle’s tires and still got a warning.  Frustrated they brought it to the dealership where it was determined that it was the spare that was underinflated.

No, I don’t get anything from NitroFill for using their system or telling you folks about my experience.  But I find it nice to know that when I do have to replace this set of tires I can drive over to the NitroFill dealer and get the new ones evacuated of air and filled with nitrogen.

Snake oil?  Not from my driver’s seat.

Mistubishi – What’s New

Several reports support the news that Mitsubishi will be releasing a Ralliart version of the Lancer that sounds like an enthusiasts affordable Evolution.  No, it won’t have quite the power, but it will have AWD.  In fact, it will use Super All-Wheel Control (SWAC) just like the Evolution models.  At 236 hp and certainly a bit lighter than the Evolution X, it will also have paddle shifters to go with the twin clutch SSt trany.

An aluminum hood, Recaro front seats, sports steering wheel, rain-sensing wiper, HID headlights with washers, and a special Ralliart grill.  This sounds more exciting than the Evolution X GSR.  I hope that the tuners can find a way around the engine management system.

Also on the drawing boards is an AWD version of the Eclipse with a turbo four for power.  This could bring the import right into the forefront of sports compact cars.

Great Drivers – Lewis Hamilton

No, he didn’t win the formula One world championship in his rookie season, but he certainly made people stand up and take notice of his incredible talent.

The world renound BBC program Top Gear let him loose on their track to see what he could do in the “reasonably priced car” challenge.

Most telling is how much self-commentary you hear from Lewis as he drives the course in an oily wet surface.  Talk about smooth.

Great Roads – Tail of the Dragon Going Crazy

Great Drivers – Randy Pobst

You can debate whether or not great drivers are made or born all you want, but you cannot dispute when you come across one, and Randy Pobst is one great driver. 

This year he raced in two championships and nearly won them both. 

How do you comprehend the difficulty in going from competing in a front wheel drive Mazda 6 Touring Car to competing in a rear wheel drive Porsche 997 GT3 Cup car.  He won the GT Cup and would have won the touring Car title if it had not been for a last lap at Road Atlanta where he was needlessly bumped by a competitor.  Randy has come in second in that series for the past three years and had won the GT series for the second time.

Randy got his start in autocrossing.  He was 19 and went to watch the Indian River Sprots Car Club put on an autocross event.  Randy watched two events but the third one he entered his Datsun 510 and beat the class champion.

I had a chance to meet Randy in the spring of 2004 at a track event at Virginia International Raceway where Audi was sponsoring a HPDE (high performance driving experience) weekend and Pobst was campaigning an Audi RS6 that year. 

Randy wasn’t driving his race car that day, instead he let drivers sign up and he would jump into their car and drive them around the full course for two laps.

That weekend I had my 1997 Mitsubishi Eclipse GSX that I had modified quite a bit.  It had the suspension completely revised and the engine was pushing 425 hp at the flywheel.  I had been doing well at track events and knew the VIR course pretty well by that time.

I waited my turn as I watched Randy jump into completely different cars, take them out for two laps, and head for another completely different car.

Finally I was going to be next.  I had already taken the GSX out and got it warmed up.  Now I had to stage myself on the false grid and wait for Randy. 

It was different to be sitting in the passenger seat instead of behind the steering wheel and I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from Pobst.  The next thing I knew he had his helmet on and was sitting in the driver’s seat next to me.  He was very personable and commented that he had expected to see a twenty year old driving my car instead of a mature guy like me.

I let him know that the brake pedal might be a bit low but the brakes were still fine and that the car had some understeer.  He said that understeer was fine and took off, commenting that the car had a lot of power and that the shifter was nice.  Then he took turn one smoother and faster with an inside line than I had ever dreamed with a perfect outside line.  On we went through turn two and three and he asked me if I had street tires.  I told him yes and what kind they were.  Then at turn four we hit the apex a little early and fast and he corrected nicely.  From there on it was amazing as he zipped through the course and took the climbing “esses” faster than I ever thought possible.  Down we went to the turn known as Oak Tree and he pulled away in third gear commenting that maybe it should have been a second gear turn.  I agreed telling him that is what I ended up using to get the rotation needed.  We blasted up the long hill and down through Roller Coaster and Hog Pen to get to the front straight.  Turn one came up faster than I had believed possible and he commented on how much boost I was running which was almost 22 pounds.  We took turns smooth and quick yet with a certain level of aggression.  This time I could hear Randy cackling with amusement as he took the climbing “esses” even faster.  We came around Oak Tree nicely and listened to the sound of the waste gate ricocheting off the concrete wall to the left of the car.  Pobst took the Roller Coaster one handing the steering wheel as we were going to pull back into the pits right after Hog Pen curve.

He let me know that he was impressed at how strong the Mitsubishi’s 4G63 was and that if I went to racing tires I would see the understeer disappear.  I thank him sincerely for the experience and then he was off to drive another lucky person’s car.

Randy is one class act that can drive the tires off just about anything.  If you ever get the opportunity to watch him at a road race don’t pass it up, and if you ever get the chance to have him drive your car a couple of laps at a race track you will have a hard time wiping the smile off your face having had the experience.

Mark Donahue – Early Telemetry

A friend sent me this photograph of Mark in a test car with what looks like an early attempt to use an on-board computer to gather data.   Does anyone know if this is true?

Driving in the MidEast