RideLust

The Holy Grail: a six speed manual, waiting to be mastered.

I spent a few hours last Sunday morning teaching a friend how to drive a manual transmission. What follows is my version of the story, interspersed with her version of the story. I’d say that the names have been changed to protect the innocent, but you already know my name and you’ll meet Jen Stadler soon enough. She knows cars and she’s got a wicked sense of humor, so I though she’d fit right in with the rest of us at RideLust. Consider this her debut article, and expect to see more from her in the not-too-distant future. Read More…

Unless it's part of a Halloween costume, pass.

Nowhere on earth does the old cliche “you get what you pay for” ring truer than when it comes to motorcycle helmets. There are safe motorcycle helmets, there are cheap motorcycle helmets and there are comfortable motorcycle helmets, so go ahead and pick any two of those three choices. Want one that’s safe, comfortable and affordable? Good luck with that, because in all my years of riding, I haven’t found one.

I’m going to start with some advice (and a disclaimer) up front. First, I don’t recommend anything other than a full face helmet. They’re structurally stronger than an open face helmet, and if you should happen to find yourself skipping across pavement face first (like I did), you’ll come to appreciate the wisdom of your choice. Are they uncomfortable in the summer heat? Not if you spend the money on a helmet that vents properly, and even a little sweat is a whole lot more pleasant than skin grafts. Call me weird, but I don’t want a plastic surgeon making me a new chin or nose from ass skin. Read More…

That's really going to hurt...

As much as I hate posting motorcycle crash vids, this one’s got merit because it shows exactly how NOT to take a corner. You can’t tell much from the normal speed footage at the start of the video, since the crash happens quickly. Watch the slow motion footage (which starts at about 1:04 in), and you can see exactly what this rider did wrong. I’ll make a few guesses here: he was a returning rider and hadn’t owned the Buell for long. He entered the turn faster than he was comfortable with, so instead of leaning the bike over further (and he had plenty of lean angle left), he hammered the front brake. The wheel locked, the tire broke traction and Mr. Knee met Mr. Pavement up close and personal. Read More…

My dog possesses a remarkable talent – the ability to projectile vomit. I’d put him up against any grade schooler or member of GWAR in terms of quantity, color and surprise factor. My dog will do it at any time most inconvenient for me – while I’m eating dinner, when I’m walking him past a school bus full of kids stopped at a red light, on my pillow at 3 a.m. – you name it. I’m a conscientious dog owner and had the vet check him out numerous times, and there’s never anything wrong with him. Normal dogs vomit every now and then – he just does so like the Bellagio fountains.

As car rides are one of my dog’s hallowed activities, I was rather concerned that the back of my WRX would wind up looking like a frat house bathroom. My car has cloth seats and although my dog will happily “clean up” after himself, his vomit leaves stains and odors that linger. Additionally, as those of us with cloth seats know, dog hair sticks to cloth like Velcro, which is particularly annoying for me as my dog is white and the interior of my car is black. Suffice it to say, after my dog enjoyed a few trips in the WRX, I did some research on preventative measures, which I detail below.  Please note that these are my own recommendations and I did not receive any compensation from the manufacturers listed. Read More…

If you like to turn wrenches, chances are good that you have a compression gauge in your tool box. I do, and I used to use it to log compression readings both before and after races, just to give me early warning on developing engine problems. I’d also use it to check out any used cars or bikes I owned, simply because I wasn’t the person who’d broken in the motor. Like the video shows you, they’re easy enough to do, although I’ll admit to not removing spark plugs from all cylinders in advance. I was always more paranoid about sucking dirt and grit into an open spark plug hole than I was about running down the battery.

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This is your idea of a dream house.

Let’s face it: all of us on this site, writers and readers alike, have a passion for cars, bikes and pretty much anything with an engine. If I’d have invested all the money I spent on cars, motorcycles, tools and racing over the years, I’d be writing this post from my island estate instead of from my office in Jacksonville, FL. Chances are I wouldn’t even be writing, because I’d have a staff of people to do that for me. Buying Microsoft stock in 1984 would have yielded much better results than buying a 1977 VW Scirocco and a 1977 Suzuki GS 750, but it probably wouldn’t have built as much character. Would I be the man I am today if I hadn’t learned the joys of changing a VW water pump in an apartment building parking lot on the coldest day of the year? I think not.

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Want to invest in a car you can drive now, but still (possibly) use to fund your retirement in the future? Do you wish you would have dropped $88k on a Ferrari 288 GTO in 1984 instead of wasting it on college? Are you wondering if your neighbor’s Suzuki X90 wuill have the long term charm of a Nash Metropolitan? Hagerty Insurance, a company that specializes in insuring collector cars, fells your pain and wants to help you guess correctly. Hagerty publishes an annual list of cars they believe will be future collectibles. Better yet, they restrict the list to cars under $100k, which puts them in reach of those of us with more modest incomes, willing to cash in a 401k or sell a kidney on the black market.

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I’ve driven in most of the 50 states over the past few decades, as well as quite a few foreign countries. American drivers are tragically bad compared to the Germans or Japanese, but our sense of self-preservation makes us more skilled than the French or Brazilians. One thing is clear when you travel around the United States, though: there are more cars on the road every single year, and the ability of people to drive cars seems to decline with each passing month.

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The correct answer should be, “not much at all”. Wheel locks, like any other component of a layered security system, simply slow down thieves or make it more inconvenient for them to steal you wheels and tires. As the above video shows, they can be defeated with simple hand tools and little bit of practice. The good news is that hammering a socket onto a wheel lock creates more than a little bit of noise, so you’ve got a chance of hearing someone trying to steal your rims. On the other hand, they could just use a master key, which really doesn’t make any noise at all.

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Wouldn't it be good to know what a repair should cost?

Wouldn’t it be cool if there was an app that told you, based on local rates in your area, just how much a specific repair should cost? Wouldn’t it be even better if it broke things down separately by parts and labor? How about if it gave you steep by step directions, compiled by mechanics and complete with photos, on how to do the repair yourself?

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