There were dozens of GT-Rs, C6 Corvettes, C7 Corvettes, Mustangs, new cars, old cars, custom cars and everything in between. I took a lot of photos but here are some of my favorite cars from the meet.
Today was probably the biggest gathering of the year for the Cars & Croissants crowd. They filled the streets of Summit, NJ to the tune of probably close to 500 vehicles. It's amazing how desensitized you get to vehicles that would normally be 1 in a million. As Syndrome from The Incredibles once said, "When everybody is super, no one is, " or something to that effect. There were dozens of GT-Rs, C6 Corvettes, C7 Corvettes, Mustangs, new cars, old cars, custom cars and everything in between. I took a lot of photos but here are some of my favorite cars from the meet. There were several license plates that made me laugh including one on a Leaf that read UBUYGAS, but this was my favorite:
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It may only be the beginning of June, but car show season is in full swing. I've only been able to attend one so far which is disappointing, but there have been other obligations this year. I was able to visit the Touch of England show today and saw some newcomers as well as some repeats from other shows. I've seen both of these Minis before. The one on the left is a very nice original Cooper S and the one on the right is a 1996 Rover convertible...very grey market. In addition to the Minis (of which there are never many), there were some nice cars at the show. It's not often you get to see a D-type. Unfortunately the owner was just leaving as soon as I arrived so I couldn't get many details. In addition to the D-type, there was it's equally cool road-going cousin, the XKSS Apart from the Jaaaaaags, there were a number of number of very nice cars this year.
It seems Lego has answered the call of Mini fans everywhere and has decided to produce a Lego Mini! I will be lining up to order it when it becomes available August 1. You can find more information about it here
I just had to check in on my Mini as it patiently waits to be released from storage. It shouldn't be much longer now as I am close to owning a home for it...I mean me. A home for me...
Hopefully when I get settled I can start work again and I will have a flurry of activity. It's been so crazy I haven't been able to get out to any of the shows this year which has been extremely disappointing. In keeping with yesterday's theme of 21st century upgrades and my mention of rewiring the Mini, I thought I'd take the time to introduce some of the research I've found. I've come across a couple different companies that sell components, but I've yet to find anyone that makes a new harness specifically for the Mini. British Wiring will sell a new harness, but it is based on the original harness. Auto Sparks will also sell those harnesses in addition to other wiring components
My intention is to use a more modern power distribution center with fuses when I rewire. I posted a walk-through in my technical section, but I didn't really discuss the options available to someone that wants to tackle this themselves. I'll go through this in several sections. I was leafing through the Febraury 2013 issue of Mini Magazine and a reader had asked about over heating issues. The expert pointed out that many times the radiator fan gets installed backwards. Now I've been through enough parts websites to know that the plastic fans are normally labeled 'Engine Side' to indicate the direction of installation. "There's no way mine could be backwards," I thought. But on reconsideration, my Mini does tend to spew molton hot coolant over the engine bay after a long drive, so maaaaybe... For reference, this is what a plastic radiator fan normally looks like. As you can see, the smooth side is supposed to face the engine and the ribbed side faces the radiator. There is also a slight cupping to the blades that is supposed to face the radiator like so: engine ---(--- radiator Now I can't be certain, because a) my Mini is still in storage and b) all my pictures of the radiator fan are terrible, but I'm fairly certain my is backwards. I'll let you be the judge. I knew I needed a new fan anyway and I was thinking of getting a whole new radiator and cowling so maybe this is the excuse I needed!
Transformers 4 features a Mini. I've just been given a reason to go see this movie. Ok, I was going to see it anyway... You can see the Mini 19 seconds into the trailer here
Please produce this immediately! And it runs! You can find more information on Nick Barrett's amazing creation by going here
My wife took some photos of the Mini on its way to its temporary home. I liked a few of them. More to come...
Well my Mini is officially in storage until I have a new home with space to tinker with it. It's a very sad day but I'm hopeful this will be a temporary situation and that it will come out the other side to a much better equipped garage. Since my current garage was shared with other tenants of my complex, I was never able to fully spread out. I'm hopeful my new home will have enough space for a work bench and a place to put an air compressor. In a dream world, I would be able to install a lift as well, but that's a bit of a dream.
However, the world continues to turn and my brain keeps on churning. Along with my hopes for a better equipped garage, it means I can hope to be more ambitious. I've talked for a while about rewiring the Mini to hopefully solve some of the issues I've had with my horn, turn signals, guages, wipers, headlights and so on and so on. Today's inspiration comes from mtymous on The Mini Forum and his excellent post on HID retrofitting. He was able to modify a set of crummy eBay projector lenses with some Acura TL bi-xenon projectors. This is a project that I would love to tackle and just adds to my list of things to come. I have done some research and found The Retrofit Source to be an excellent starting place. They offer for sale numerous HID compatible projector lenses. It seems to be a pretty managable project for a weekend. I imagine I will still want to upgrade the wiring before I tackle this project, but it gives me something to look forward to during the next couple Mini-less months. I will just have to continue updating my magazine archive. |
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