balthazar

Hmm…. day opened up tomm; work on carpentry for customer…. or Cab Over for me?

Gotcha. Some factors are obviously grandfathered in, but I would imagine primarily it's safety code violations...

Some great progress today. Took the headlights off- the buckets are on 'stalks' (see the pics in Post #86), which had integral parking lights. 1939 & prior, the parking lights were incorporated into the headlights, '40 is the first year for sealed beam headlights, so the PLs were installed on the stalks for '40. However, my PLs were in rough shape- one lens fell off on it's own and the underlying bucket looks like it'll never come off. After removing them from the fenders, one mounting bolt was MIA. According to my state's vehicular code, they have an equipment mandate for trucks built after (what sure sounds like a wildly random date of) July 2, 1954. As long as all existing lights are functional, I believe I'm in the clear. There's no mention of PLs for vehicles prior to '54. I have a pair of rough spare fenders and they had PL-less stalks- they're either '38s or '39s. Shot everything up with Kroil, took both sides apart and swapped out the stalks, eliminating the PLs up front. The stalks are black, but they blend in fine Cleaned everything up, checked all the grounds, cut new rubber gaskets, ran new wires from the headlight sockets thru the dimmer switch and to the headlight switch- everything checks out continuity-wise! I've yet to buy a 6V battery, as 2 ganged 6V lantern batteries don't have enough juice to run 2 headlights, so we didn't test them. Tails, brake & headlight wiring is all done & checked now. Also fabricated the new fuse block. Old one is the most sparsely-equipped fuse block I've ever seen. 2 fuses & a circuit breaker:

That a requirement of the Fed program (I didn't read the link)? If so, that's very unusual in my experience.

My buddy has been an amazing help on the truck. He's thrown himself completely into the process of learning automotive electrics. We have a semi-generic, Ford-created wiring schematic, and he's been tracing wires, identifying circuits & continuity testing everything. He works on it at least 3 days a week now. Taillights are temporarily wired & work. Headlight assembles have both been removed to get the original wiring out of them. Headlights & their sockets all work. Gauges are out, so is the fuse block. Lots of jury-rigging has occurred on this truck's (estimated) 35 years of active service, including questionable wiring 'splitting' and added toggle switches. 97% of the wiring has to be replaced as it's in terrible condition, but I happen to have 3 spools of 10 & 12 gauge stranded wire on hand. I have much nicer replacement gauges that I'm going to use, and tomm I plan of fabricating a new fuse block… pics to come. Meanwhile, here is the current state of wiring affairs :

Material items. Saw an article that claimed the average household has 300,000 items in it/on its property, and I fear I am wildly over that number, by a factor of many.

2016 is, officially, the Year of the Purge! (I started early...)

I've heard one shouldn't push the DIC oil life recommendation down so low --IE: I think below 15%-- tho I don't recall who said so. Seems reasonable that there well may be some degree of 'pressure' to increase service/oil change intervals per modern customer expectations...

I'm still operating under the premise that (conventional) oil should be between $1 - $1.29 a quart.

>>"According to Tesla Motors Club estimations, as of August 31st, Tesla had around 27,000 Model X reservations. There could be over 31,000 reservations, but for various reasons it seems that over 4,000 Model X reservation holders cancelled…"

I've seen at most 4 i3s, and zero i8s. I say 'at most' because 2 very well may have been the same car twice.

Silverado 2500HD, 6.6L Duramax TD. Shell Rotella-T 15W-40, 10 qrts, Wix Gold oil filter #57202. Always same in & out. Changed 11.16.15, 7805 miles on oil. I shoot for 6000 miles, but sometimes it runs a bit longer (obviously). Have always done my own oil changes.

Certainly nothing game changing, segment-wise, but looks generally competitive. I'm finding less & less aspiration coming out of upper tier luxury segment, IMO. The tails, tho, scream '11:55PM', IE; VERY last minute, and I predict a Year 2 revamp back there. I believe my spur of the moment comment after clicking the pic was 'Yikes'.

No one buys the "i" cars; why throw more money down that hole?

I for one found the concept palatable, visually, but the production car; not. I liked the stubbier nose & bigger wheels on the concept. And I'm already sick of the 'split C-pillar' trick.

I actually contemplated sleeping at a customer's home 2 nights ago. They've been out of town for 3 weeks, and that way I could just wake up & go to work & cut out the 1.5 hr round trip commute. I need a vacation.

House I pass regularly has a gray Aston Martin in the driveway, always parked right next to a mint red '70 Chevelle SS for protection.

Just saw a pic of the current Maxima a few days ago. I thought it was a photoshop at first. Then I remembered this is the brand that brought us such treasured designs as the juke & cube. And the murano. :]

Ew, dude, so sorry.

They should've benchmarked the ATS...

VW isn't, exactly, the model any car company should be looking to for business practices. The reason Audi cannot eclipse Cadillac's ATPs is half their model line-up uses VW engines. Or so you might say… were you remotely objective.

In 2010, Cadillac was behind BMW & MB in ATPs, and about $5K above Audi & Lexus. Now Cadillac is still above audi, has increased it's ATP lead over Lexus to $10K, and has surpassed BMW.

Profit is calculated on cost of doing business subtracted from revenue from said business. I only define this because smk seems rather unsure. SMK, why would you care how much profit Cadillac makes?