SAmadei

Its hard to describe in a few words... its been around since the Quad4 used it, IIRC... here's a description... Wiki

Immediately noticed and it makes the rear end of the car look 10x better. No Flavor-Flav eyewear look to them. I would hope that LEDs bulbs would still be in place under the plastic, but I doubt it. These end up looking like Japan/Aussie export Corvette lenses to me. Edit: Too bad the Eco version doesn't trim the 1995 Chrysler Cirrus trunk lid bump off. There should be no trunk above the lights, IMHO.

I just don't get it. When the first SRT Jeeps popped up, I figured it was a GNX-type fluke. Cool, but short lived. The sport compact respected Neon morphs into a lousy CUV and the Cherokee morphs into a muscle station wagon. What ever happened to doing what you're good at? Will the next Challenger sport 4x4 and a 10" lift? Seriously, I just see this making Jeep look as wasteful and uneco as the Hummer.

Those effects can be duplicated with fiber optics-style plastics and side lit plastics... the source of the light can be centralized and the source of the light LED or incandescent. Brightness is not really an issue, as I feel taillights are already WAY too bright. I'm fine with LEDs... but I agree with Balthy in that blatant LEDs as points of light dropped willy-nilly as a tailight are ugly and overused. Everything seems to have JC Whitney lighting glued on it from the factory. I don't think Balthy would have any problem with those examples... as the LEDs aren't just piles of little dots. Well, maybe the Volvo. Personally, I'll be putting LEDs behind the lenses of anything I restore because they FINALLY have LED's that trump the 1157s, they do last longer and they light faster. Behind the lenses, though, they look like old school incandescents... the best of both worlds, IMHO.

Yeah, but that was fixed in later revisions... most of the problems were with gaskets and the overheating of the plastic near the EGR stovepipe. Perhaps they did it to placate popular opinion... but it seems a lot of money to dump into a engine that was constantly on death row. Its possible to crack/smash thin alloy intakes... I've seen quite a few in the junkyard. With weight savings becoming a top priority, I imagine composites will come roaring back.

When you go up in the mountains, you can't always get the octane rating you expect. 85 octane at high altitude would test like 87 _IF_ the test was done at high altitudes... but since the tests are done for sea level, and there are laws about octane ratings, they have to sell it as 85, even at high altitude. This was covered recently as a question in one of the auto mags. Remember, the octane rating on gas has nothing to do with octane the chemical... and the rating changes with altitude. In BK's example, the acceptable octane rating for the Challenger is 87. I still think he got bad gas, as the mileage was SO far off.

Having two names will make it easier to sell Buick/GMC to the Chinese.

National Herbarium of Victoria? National Health Video? The NVH reduced by lighter connecting rods is likely negated by the composite intake. NVH was why the series III 3800 switched back to an alloy intake, isn't it.

It does because there is less air... so the air/fuel mix is less likely to preignite.

Hmmm... I could imagine a trip to Cali... that would be good Challenger driving territory. Probably all V6s, though. Yeah, that was IL. They missed it when it was gone. The 3.5 is a great motor both in terms of respectable power and reliability. I know a guy with an `01 300M that got more than 400,000 miles out of the original engine. IL? I'm not too worried about the engine... all engines nowadays seem to be able to handle 150K with a touch of care. I worry about the other things... tranny and rear setup. I know a lot of these parts are Mercedes-based or are fairly new design, since after the breakup and rejoining with FIAT, many parts sources have changed. And obviously, breakdowns in this area are showstoppers. I would probably fancy a R/T in a heritage color. Like Plum Crazy. I tried to get a GTO in Cosmos Purple.

From the article... The new composite intake manifold saves about 5.5 pounds (2.5 kg) compared to the current aluminum intake. A lighter-weight structural front cover and lighter-weight, high-strength connecting rods bring the total weight savings to 20.5 pounds (9.3 kg), which helps the vehicle's fuel efficiency and improves the car's handling and driving balance. I'm impressed... 20lbs is significant... I would've guessed block, crank or heads. I was also surprised that it didn't already have a composite intake... I mean, GEEZ, even the old school SBC has a composite intake available for it now... ;-) Edit: typo.

I'm interested in seeing how this holds up. Once resettled financially, the Challenger is on my short list... I think the Camaro is out because of atrocious ergonomics and because having one will always remind me of the Firebird that could have been... but I have so many reservations over Mopar quality... Whats nice is that one of the motorhead magazines has had a great series recently called "Whats going to break" for the Mustang, Challenger and Camaro. I might need to rent one of these sooner or later and see if I could live with one.

I would try again later on a tank of 87 from another station... that one may be iffy in a way not related to octane, such as water in the fuel.

GM is doing the same thing in their cars... if the Sunfire has it, I'm sure most GM cars have it.

I forget who it was, but first time I hear the term coke bottle used to describe auto body design, it was an interview with one of the big '60s designers, perhaps John Z, but I can't remember. Their definition of "coke bottle" was that looking down on the car, it would appear to obviously bulge out at the wheels... like a coke bottle laid on its side... so that can happen above or below the beltline. Now, almost any car might bulge slightly at the wheels, but the idea here is that its not a subtle curvature. Bel Air ended in 1975. Biscayne in 1972. According to the owner its a '72 Bel Air. Perhaps its a bumper swap... but on that particular year, I can't recall seeing a different bumper treatment. Wiki and Standard Catalog claim/show no 4 element lights. At this point the Bel Air and Biscayne were clearly on the way out... something like 6% of total production, it hardly seems worth eliminating the 2 elements. In '71, '73, '74, '75 I have seen the 4 light alternative... some are REALLY hard to find photos of... they are not common cars anymore. If we can find a photo of one, I'd be a believer... but I have 40 years of photographic memory recall on taillights (the '58 is a bit before my time). Chevrolet Celebrity 1st gen Lumina 2005-2011 Mustang. It can be done, assuming the individual elements were not huge. I think it would look VERY distinctive to put 6 lights across the back... 2 on the body, 4 on the trunk. I see there are different terms of definitions here. One could call this 4 taillights, another could call it 10. I call it 2: You say "6 tails" and I picture something like this; distinct & separate : I agree and disagree. In general , I would consider the '59 to be 2 lights... but I consider the Mustang, Celebrity, Lumina to be 6 because the divisions in the lens match up with 6 individual light bulbs and reflective buckets, whereas the '59s are just ribs... for example, I consider my '81 Bonneville to have 2 lights, because the 12 individual boxes per side are just an overlaid design... even though some might argue it also have 6 elements... since 4 boxes of the grid matches up with the buckets... but I wouldn't. The thing is the later Impalas/Caprices had similar molded together "elements" to the Mustang, Celebrity, Lumina... and people consider them to be 6 elements... then other lighting, such as the '74 Nova, appear to have separate elements, but actually are one lens/bucket molding per side... so its all splitting hairs. With 72" of car, I think 3" lights, 1" separation... takes up 12" per side... plenty of room and a license plate could still fit inside... it would be a distinctive setup Chevy could tweak for years.

You know, this picture is not helping me see the coke bottle... it looks like instead of a coke bottle, the rear of the roofline is slightly boattailed, allowing the trunk lid to wrap around slightly.

Sorry, the '59 was a typo. I meant '58. I got that tidbit from Wikipedia, and a quick Google search quickly turned up a couple of these... I gotta tell ya, I have NEVER seen a '58 Chevy with 4 lights, so that was a real shocker for me. 1959 was a bizarre year for the lights... as they all seem to have 5 segments... so that doesn't count. As for the '72... I have never seen anything but the 6 element...

I'm sure that once GM has a 8 speed tranny, it will be a transverse and longitudinal version and GM will be stuffing it into everything it can to keep up with the competition. The 6 speed tranny eclipsed the 4 speed trannies pretty quickly... except on a few platforms where the 6 speed was unable to fit, IIRC.

Different markets. Buick is attracting Lexus buyers and this Impala is attracting old school types who value power, interior space and RWD. For this reason, I'd cut a bunch of the luxury features. I think some of the extras Dwight is piling on are just exuberance. Adding the 50 hp to the non-AWD LaCrosse is going to overwork the Traction Control light.

Can't fool me, Balthy... my yellow/black top Catalina Convertible "Banana Boat" is a '68.

Interesting, I might try that next time... I'm under the Sunfire. How much slack did you have to remove? I'm thinking if I disconnect the two halves, I could use a cable clamp and a turnbuckle to make an adjustable loop.

You might want to think about putting some gas in that thing, or you're going to be walking again.

Yeah, close your eyes. Don't read this either. Put your fingers in your ears and dismiss anyone who disagrees with your view. BFD...I've read WSJ and various business/tech pubs on and off for 30 years. Its your library, mailbox or internet connection somehow different than mine? I'm not trying to pigeon-hole your expertise, but for many its easy for someone to open a WSJ for the first time, found at the doctor's office, in 2011 and think that science research is just going absolutely gonzo. The problem is the WSJ, Popular Science, American Scientific, etc. is not presenting the historical context. Its always about the now... and its because a lot of this "news" is PR fluff at some level... get people excited... get them to invest in us. Not me. I feel the Volt could have been built a decade ago and would have had passable performance... but perhaps not the same exterior design. Tesla has been at it since 2003... but I suppose they are another token, aborted EV attempt. Nissan has been working on it since 1997... amateurs, right? Going to the moon is NOTHING like building an EV. You love to mix and match your analogies. Lets say Kennedy offered up a cure for cancer, not a run for the moon. It would have gotten the same funding and it WOULD HAVE FAILED. Its 50 years later and cancer research has had the benefit of all the other medical advancements (and the research valve applied to them) and easily has had as much money thrown at it as the Apollo program, plus the benefit of 40 extra years and a couple generations of extra minds to chew on the problem. Wheres the cure for cancer? Its had investment... but its a HUGE problem... we may have only scratched the surface of the understanding needed to cure cancer. Accepted. Sure, next year a GM battery tech might build a perfect battery... I'll eat my hat... but I doubt it... because in 100+ years of serious development there have been few huge jumps in battery technology. And for all we know, someone may already have the tech... but nobody wants to license it... "Not invented here". In the end we are dealing with a limited set of compounds and the physical and chemical combinations of the three basic parts of the battery to discover. If you didn't read this, I'm fine with that, too. Back to the topic at hand.

I would argue that only the Impala got six and therefore only the Impala should get six in the future. Caprice got 6 as well. So did the Biscayne and BelAir in '59 and '72. Celebrity and Lumina... the precursors to the Malibu also had 6 at times. Of course, Chevy screwed it all up by putting 4 lights on the 1997-2003 Impalas. Chevrolet Celebrity 1st gen Lumina 2005-2011 Mustang. It can be done, assuming the individual elements were not huge. I think it would look VERY distinctive to put 6 lights across the back... 2 on the body, 4 on the trunk.

Really like the '67 and '68 B-bods. Do you remember roughly how much they wanted for them? I also think its interesting how the '68 Poncho B-bod has ICH-848 and the Lincoln Continental has IHN-345 license plates... so wierd to see two Ixx series plates in teh same series of photos... I would guesstimate the plates where issued in 1963 or 1964. As for the reverse canted window in the Continental convertible... I imagine its easier to engineer that than a normal forward canted window, as the window would just collapse between the folds, hinged on the rear bow, as opposed to falling into the convertible pit. Edit: So where was this?