SAmadei

If there is ANY gap, an RPG's explosive force open it and likely will lift the car. The limo does not have the ability to perfectly match the ground/pavement/other beneath it. If that was desired, you would need an armored, multisectioned skirt of sorts... preferably angled away from the car to deflect the force up and over the car. Well, for starters, a rocket attack can't be detected until its launched... and they move fast enough that you wouldn't have time to stop the car. Second, any serious attempt would not use a single RPG... so your scenario would turn into... Driving... Detect... Crouch... Slide... Survive Rocket Attack... Survive Rocket Attack... Survive Rocket Attack... Survive Rocket Attack... Survive Rocket Attack... ad nauseum. How many attacks can the car survive? This is why you need to MOVE FAST. Lets put this another way... we're not building our tanks to crouch to survive attacks. We build our tanks to go 70+ mph escaping attacks. No way. Assuming the designers have learned from world wide events, the underbelly is likely some of the heaviest armored. I'm sure it was designed to be able to run over mines and stuff. In general, the weakest points in an armored vehicle are at the door/window seams. Cadillac One is classified, of course, but looking on Google results in no links to crouching armored cars or anything like it. If it was a worthwhile defense, there would be armored vehicle companies advertising it. Well, we did just see a failure of some sort, didn't we? Had that been hydraulic, there would have been an fairly big spray or smoke had the spray hit something hot. I don't see where hydraulic versus air power would that big of a difference in reliability. I've seen both break. I'm just assuming air because so many modern heavy vehicles use it when comfort is desired.

Start ups twice a year for 8 years? Are they trying to maximize dry starts? Well, luckily, that's only 16 of them.

Who said one year? These are previous 7 series buyers... who happen to be in the market for a new car... who replaced it with a 5 series GT. There are a lot of E65 7 series out there and a lot more dating back to '77. He never specifies if the other 90% bought anything at all. Its a misleading, oddball number that in the end seems to be meaningless. I imagine Cali is tops... followed roughly by NY, NJ, FL, TX. Prob MA and IL next. Just my guesstimate... would be interesting numbers to see.

Probably for external travel like this, they use one of the older ones... This might be one of the older ones... I just assumed it was the current one. The article in the Guardian remarks that "the Beast" was stuck on a driveway ramp. A few months ago, there was a sweet documentary about the security on one of the Discovery Channels... the President does use the newer one outside the country. It is flown in by helicopters or on big airplane transports, along with a whole bunch of backups and support vehicles. The logistics of it all are quite impressive, especially considering the Secret Service are ready to change plans at a moments notice. Its very cool stuff.

If a collision is unavoidable, you want to hit the other vehicle with the beefiest parts... the bumpers, not relatively flimsy sheetmetal above it, regardless of the armor added. Typically going high works better, assuming you are trying to avoid flipping it. Going low suffers risking the other vehicle hitting the cage directly and also having some crush damage... could the attacked vehicle continue driving if the attacking vehicle was parked on top of it? In any case, crouching while driving would cause the vehicle to drag on the ground, risking losing control. Crouching would not stop a forklift or bulldozer from getting under the vehicle, as the seal would never be complete. I imagine plenty of things could still be thrown under a crouched car... it is simply better to drive away from threats like that. Which brings my to the first rule of car security: keep moving... crouching is not moving. A vehicle stopped will eventually be compromised regardless of armor. My final point about crouching is that it is hardly a good security feature if it can't be immediately uncrouched... but that's just my armchair quarterback's opinion of the situation. I'm going to stop there before the black helicopters are dispatched.

So, there are 3500 5 series GT buyers... there were only 35000 7 series buyers? Sounds odd to me. That was 10% of Florida buyers, not nationwide... Still doesn't make sense... divide by 50. Or 10, as I'm sure Florida is in the top 5 US States for 7 series... "350 5 series GT buyers in FL... there were only 3500 7 series buyers in FL?" Florida has to have 10x as many E65 7 series, I would think.

Good idea. Never occurred to me that the noise would come from the center... I thought the edges, as the steel wheel deformed slightly while rolling... as I have had solid hubcaps creaking and groan at the edge. Makes perfect sense though. I'll have to try it when I have another wire wheeled car in heavy rotation. All my wire wheels sit idle right now.

The wheels didn't pull off the ground... gravity crushed the car down on them. Certainly could happen if there was a sudden pressure loss.

I'm not sure how crouching would be that beneficial... unless its an anti-tornado feature. LOL. I assume the car has some sort of air suspension... perhaps when the body dragged, it popped an air line. It does. Bizarre. Hardly anything in the news about it... just that he abandoned the "the Beast" for another car.

Its called Cadillac One. Anyway, that's really scary. I'm shocked that the Secret Service was not aware of the limo's limitations in this aspect... especially since limos are well known to get high centered. I'm also very surprised that the Secret Service driver did not gun it a little more to have enough momentum to get it over the hump... it appeared to me to almost make it. I do not want to think of how this could have turned out if this occurred at an embassy in a politically hotter part of the world than Ireland... Sure the agent following the limo could have attempted to push it... but that limo probably outweighs the big GM SUV. Edit: I thought that was a SUV behind it... what is that? Another Cadillac One? To my knowledge only one exists... unless that is one of the older limos... but it doesn't look like one. Seeing the US flag on it, it still could have attempted a push if this was an emergency. Sure, its funny... but it just has severe security implications. I also question if mechanical failure is to blame... in the second video, that tire is pushed into the fender pretty hard considering the weigh of the limo is sitting on the body. I guess the next limo really will sport 28" bling rims and an Air Ride adjustable suspension.

Lesson here... wagon owners want wagons. No wagon, no sale. Same thing for people wanting coupes or convertibles... a sedan is not a substitute for those. No extra body styles, well, you might as well chauffeur your customers to the competition. So, there are 3500 5 series GT buyers... there were only 35000 7 series buyers? Sounds odd to me. The real good news... BMW doesn't need to learn the same lesson over and over again before changing their ways. GM would immediately build a 3 series wagon that had incredible performance, comfort and style and could cure cancer... then cancel it 6 months later, replacing it with a 3 series GT, as recommended by Dogbert, their consultant. Then a 7 series GT would come out and a Mini Cooper GT would come out.

Cool. I used to have no end to those noises with wire wheels... used to drive me nuts during the summertime (with the windows down). I used to rotate the covers and put dabs of grease on the tabs... with limited success. I never thought to tighten up the locks. I had the brackets on the wheels and the key, but IIRC, the car doesn't have the actual locking bolts.

I can't weld without gloves... the damn UV just effs me right up. I hate the gloves... especially since I have super cheap gloves and giant hands. Just got done my latest welding project... four pieces of flat iron into a square tube. Its a hitch for a lawn trailer I'm slapping together. I desperately need to start using an inert gas. Splatter Splatter! Add metal... grind 90% of it all off. :-(

hot grease from the bacon has a habit of flying all over the place Yeah, had a taste of that about 45 minutes ago... welding in your shorts is a bad idea, as well. Wouldn't try that naked.

I'll start... I have the Sunfire hanging around the house lately, so I thought I'd put the long needed power window motor in the driver's side door. first surprise was how difficult it is to get the window out of the door. I had to take the top stops out... and once I got the window out I was horrified to realize that all the clips and guides holding are broken. All the broken parts are long since out of production. I think I have all the pieces gathered from the bottom of the door... going to be using a lot of epoxy. GM has decided to thwart me at every bend by riveting EVERYTHING to the door. Nice, giant rivets that I can't easily replace and ones that like to spin as you try to drill them out. So after killing all the rivets in the door, I was happy that I only damaged one hole slightly. Luckily the regulator came out of the door easily. Of course, 6 minutes after the hardware store closes, I realize I don't have bolts to put things back together... and my rivet gun is too small... so I have to prop the window back into the door so the car doesn't get wet if it rains. After a few hours, I open the new motor box... and surprise... it comes with bolts. Who'da thunk? Since the regulator is spring loaded, I got smart and I put the regulator in my vise to hold the spring in place. Drilled the couple rivets and I had the motor swapped on. My next step was for advanced users. Since the rivets are generally too big to replace, the regulator came with bolts... but I know that unless I have pixies working with me, there is no way to hold the nuts in place. In the past I used clip nuts... but they are real easy to knock off as you put the regulator in the door. So I put the supplied nuts/bolts on the regulator... and tack welded the nuts to the regulator. Hey, GM, you could have done this for me! Now I can easily bolt the regulator in place... Tomorrow I need to put the regulator back in... and see about epoxying the plastic bits together. I'm feeling good that I can get this window adjusted to try to stop some of the leaks.

Quite a few forums have an on-going thread pinned that allow everyone to post what work they did recently on their rides. I didn't see one here on C&G, so I thought I'd try to start one here. Post what you did today or during the past weekend... regardless of how tiny of a job. Let us know your victories and disasters.

Wow... that really turns my stomach.

Uh, oh... time to set up a C&G Smackdown Cafe.

Meh... get a '71 or '72. The '73s have a lot of one year parts and are not nearly as cool as the earlier ones. The car in 'Crank' is not a '73. It wouldn't surprise me if this is the same brown '73 that was owned by the guy I bought the '70 Bonneville parts car from. Note he says he has all the paperwork going back to '73... but he doesn't say he owned the car the whole time. Why would a brown car have green carpeting? $3999 is probably a good price if its solid. I wonder if they had the original motor rebuilt.

SUVs are trucks. You might be able to argue some Jeeps are CUVs, whose truck status is questionable... but I usually just go by what the EPA says... They don't have a SUV catagory, only "light duty trucks". There is some overlap... but not much. Yeah, you should have. I knew exactly what you meant... but we're here to keep you honest. ;-)

Ram and Jeep are Chryslers two truck brands... and since Chrysler is part of FIAT now, I'm sure I could add quite a few more truck brands to that... FIAT Professional (FIAT's trucks), FIAT Industrial (Iveco and numerous minor brands). So FIAT-Chrysler has at least four truck brands. Diamler, has like 6 truck brands and had about 9 with Dodge Trucks and Jeep.

Why would this be a big deal, platform-wise? Typically, V6s, especially GM's narrower V6s easily fit into a space where a longer inline 4 has been intended. Assuming that Alpha's engine is longitudinal, not being able to fit a v6 would indicate an awfully narrow car. Of course, reading between the lines... I don't see V8s mentioned here. If the next Camaro is Alpha based, has GM already nixed the V8? Again, this is what I feared when Alpha was announced... a small platform that will be twisted and perverted to fit every application under the sun. Except in this case, I figured GM would have gotten Alpha to market as the ATS before GM started trying to use it for mopeds, boats and cubevans. GM has not learned that the one size fits all approach results in cars that are compromises before they can even get off paper. The electrical harness is considered part of the Alpha platform now? I imagine the electrical harness used on most cars changes constantly over the course of the years. And what does the aerodynamic shutters have to do with the platforms?!? I simply don't see how this is specifically related to the platform. GM added these to the Cruze after the platform was designed. I can only assume that the platforms have to be engineered specially for each color the cars are going to come in, as well. That would explain why GM is so limiting on the colors your car can be. Well, that don't surprise me. I'm sure one way or the other, Zeta will look good compared to Alpha because it suffered from less design-by-committee and more was-finished-5-years-ago. You would think by now GM would realize that a bird in the hand beats a bird in the bush.

That's not a backing plate.

I hear ya. Its just when you hear A-body rear discs referred to as 'unicorns', you can put that dream on hold. LOL. Its interesting how the A-body parts (which were based on X-body parts 8-0) funnel into H-bodies and U-vans. In fact, there is some research being done by A-body enthusiasts to use '05 U-van disc brakes on the older A-bodies, as the beam axle and its bearings seem to fit. You don't want the '06-08 U-vans, as they have 6 lugs. Of course, I hear this and start thinking about converting my Celeb coupe into a modern V6 powered AWD beast. ;-)

I'll take that bet. Only the 6000 appears to have ever had rear discs... '84-'86 is one type... 2075... '87-'88 is one type... 2103 '88 and '89 (AWD only) is 2120... and all three are unique to ONLY the 6000. I would say these are rare as hens teeth... though Autozone is showing listings for the replaceable parts, you would still need the backing plate. Luckily, the beam axles are interchangeable... so you only apparently need the brake parts. These are all likely STEs. Even the late Cieras and Centurys were all drums. Master Cylinder is actually the same as the drum cars in '84-'86 non ABS... 753B... but in '86-'89 ABS 6000's the master cylinder is unique... part 891. Hopefully, this would be a stand alone ABS system. In either case, I have no listings for proportioning valves, so that would likely need to be grabbed from the donor car. There also may be some sort of add-on residual pressure valve on the 753B master cylinder. Drum MCs usually do not work on drum/disc without some slight modification. Again, I don't think they would help performance enough to make up for the parts rarity or hassle.