In today’s VM-heavy IT world, it’s like the old server-room adage: There’s no substitute for hardware. I been telling people it’s an honest 12’s car with the right driver and locking diff. All I can say about this one is thank gawd for electronic traction control, or I’d have been gone long ago. I got run down at the finish too, in the only race I lost with it. The insane torque delivered by these things put them ahead off the line every time they hook.
I’ll temporarily rescind my ongoing uToob® link-back policy, to support that claim, since it appears they have rescinded the ad-blocker policy. Good for them. It’s better organizing ur own viewing anyway. Instead of going after the ad-blockers, they’re just inserting them in the streams. Kinda sucks the 2nd half of clips won’t get watched, but it is a time-saver and at least I can see my history!
I don’t know who designed these things, but the manufacturer application in alot of vehicles I have owned over the years really sucks. Soft crimped-on lead connectors coupled with enhanced corrosion potential in certain environments simply doom them to premature failure.
I finally decided to repair/upgrade the Dodge’s terminals one last time after they failed me for at least the 4th time. Not difficult to wiggle the dang things for a start after they come loose, but it gets old after awhile. These are done with a piece of sheet copper formed to shape and soldered into the cables with fail-safe clamping pins.
Hardened top posts and brass clamps seal the deal.
I wanted Tesla to do well, as one of the promising EV makers with a real shot at putting a dent in the fossil fuel industry. Then somehow, for whatever reason, the Cybertruck marketing people convinced Musk they needn’t take into account a significant portion of the buying public who actually work with these things and use them for real truck stuff all day long.
Certainly there’s also a market for suburbanite Cybertruck drivers with little more than Costco requirements. I’m no automotive market guru, but I suspect there’s more money in the former.
Tesla’s woes are also a sign that the company’s recently released and long-awaited Cybertruck hasn’t exactly ignited renewed optimism. It’s clear by this point that the EV maker has had to make major compromises to bring Musk’s pet project to life, with the truck disappointing fans with a lackluster range.
Only the biggest, most glaring entry on a list of things new owners are already griping about.
Have sticker-price cuts and stock-market skid tarnished Elon Musk’s and Tesla’s reputations?
There’s one in the Bimmer. Horaitu’s article scratches the “comprehensive” surface. I have to admit falling into the M57 purely by chance. We needed another car after the girls started driving. Perusing Car-and-Driver one day, I happened across a gushing review of the then new 6-pot diesel BMW had recently foisted upon an un-suspecting driving public here in the USA. Found a good used example down in Castle Rock, initially appalled and eventually amazed after finishing up the roadworthy mods it needed, because BMW nearly choked it to death with emissions controls.
I’ve become more-or-less familiar with a few engines over the years, certainly nothing near a representative cross-section of what all’s available. But there’s a feel for the moving parts and clatter emanating from one of these things, regardless of who designed it. The M57 exudes the most buttery smooth quiet (for a diesel!) mechanical serenade I’ve ever come across, with unparalleled efficiency and power wholly uncharacteristic of an oil-burner. Properly tuned sans emissions equipment, the car runs 42MPG at 70MPH nominal, pumping out around 600 foot-pounds of torque with zero twin-turbo lag – a true wolf in sheep’s clothing. Best part: After tooling around down in Texas for a week last month, clocking 160k miles now, feels like it’ll probably outlast me, at this point.
Gearheads gotta race everything. I’m guilty as the next guy. Longmont Popo got me at 78 in a 55 couple weeks ago in the old Dodge. He was complaining about the black smoke, too. I just looked real surprised and said “78?!! I didn’t know this thing would go that fast!” It does have 4.10 gears, so plausible in factory trim with stock-sized tires. He was cool about it. White privilege, baby – I’m milkin’ it! 😉
The analysis of Tesla’s own promotional material and additional information obtained by Engineering Explained via MotorTrend refutes Tesla’s Cybertruck performance claims entirely, implying that Tesla is misrepresenting the performance of its electric pickup to potential buyers.
I would assume it’s not the only thing they are misrepresenting.
Don’t forget Starman. Then there’s the Starship. We’re gonna need either better batteries and/or on-the-fly charging. How about some photovoltaic paint? Make different body panels anodes or cathodes, whatever. I could get behind something like that. I’m all onboard the EV train, but it hasn’t left the station yet, as far as I am concerned.
Munster, however, said that at its current production level, Tesla (TSLA) – will probably lose $40,000 on each Cybertruck before they intensely scale up production.
Building on the 2nd gen TorqueLink, the final iteration of the ultimate leaf-spring pickup truck traction bar is finally here, once again eliminating that annoying clutch chatter. Solid axle trucks are mostly gone now because let’s face it: The massive hunks of cast iron were just too heavy, inefficient and difficult to manage from a suspension perspective. But they’re nearly indestructible and will last forever with an occasional oil change, so pick ur poison.
They don’t do well on lifted trucks with lots of power due to a phenomenon called axle wrap, where torque literally twists the leaf springs causing wheel hop and other un-desirable effects. Combined with an early hydraulic clutch and balky Getrag stick inspiring songs like Gear Jammer, pulling out through 1st and 2nd gear could be tricky. Anything less than precise engagement going into 2nd would hop the back wheels clear off the ground under power and chatter like a mariachi dancer at anything less if you weren’t real careful with it.
TorqueLink-I & II solved the forward axle wrap problem nicely, but it was a regression back into clutch chatter on the 2nd go. 3klb die springs solved that. More than a few grease monkeys like me made the mistake of bolting something like this more-or-less hard into the frame, not taking into account fore/aft suspension flex of a half inch or more. Die-hards claimed the longer you made them the less of a problem it was. Scary creaking and crunching noises were common and cracked frames not unheard of.
That ’07 got a set of custom Caltracs and was quite happy with them. But it’s an automatic – whole different animal. I only just recently found out you can get lifted trucks as dealer installed options these days. Oh well, it was fun anyway.
I originally built the truck as a road warrior – PACbrake, Gear Vendor overdrive, sway bars. The 1st set of tires I bought for it were road treads. It performs well in that capacity, sipping fuel going down the highway at sane throttle openings. It always got around 20MPG used mostly as an urban commuter until I retired. I imagine it would drop to 15 hauling a full load, but I never checked it and only ever made a very few trips with the car trailer.
It’s got way more pulling power up front now, as the name suggests. These 1st gen Dodge Cummins trucks are notorious for how stupid front-heavy they are. I normally carry around 800lbs of fuel, water, tools, whatever in the back just so it handles somewhat safely. The bad conditions traction coefficient just doubled. Here’s the Google review I left for the guys down at Country Truck.
Steering stabilizer’s gonna need re-organized. The new cover protrudes at least an inch more.
Quad copters reach critical mass. Corporate and Military aviation might be the biggest contributor to carbonizing the atmosphere. Once again, USAF takes the lead.
Six rotors. Ahead of schedule? Never happened before.
Spent the afternoon yesterday installing a rear sway bar disconnect on the old Dodge. The upper mount needed significant re-work due to the bigger new part and my insanely close manufacturing tolerance policy. Bottom mount needed a small brass bushing to stabilize the old, tapered press-fit joint. Front will probably be an all-day job with both mounts needing rebuilt for a new link.
CTD will be fully off-road capable once that’s done and a locker is installed in the front Dana. I’m going with the OX Manual Cable unit. Country Truck down in Ft. Lupton will be getting the call on that. They did a great job fixing up the ’07 for Phoebe and Tanner a couple years ago. Nothing will stop this truck unless I break it or drive it off a cliff somewhere.
I can still do the little nit-noid stuff like sway bar links, but even that wears me out pretty quick nowadays.
Took half the morning to get it loaded. Got $18 for 400 pounds. That covers my time and fuel + it’s getting recycled.
LATE UPDATE: Took two days up front. It’s a Jeep CJ link adapted to fit with a custom bottom mount. It was within a gnat’s ass of fitting on the inside stock position in a straight bolt-up with no fabrication needed, but that didn’t happen. It’s easier to reach the release pin on the outside this way, but it was alot of work hand forging that part.
If I cannot be absolutely confident in the vehicle’s capacity to run all day long anywhere in the country, then I don’t want it. Sorry, but it just doesn’t meet my needs. Not too long ago I saw a uToob vid of somebody with a hitch-mounted gasoline generator driving around in one of the national parks in a Tesla somewhere. Those small utility and lawn mower-types are the worst polluters.
Her advance team realized there weren’t going to be enough plugs to go around. One of the station’s four chargers was broken, and others were occupied.
Somebody got shot fighting over one right here in Denver just last May. I’m sure they’re great for commuters and localized transportation of all kinds. I encourage all those type drivers to get an EV ASAP.
At close to 150k miles, Bimmer went in the shop Monday for all the long term stuff needed to hopefully get at least another 100k out of it by the time it reaches true unicorn status. I scaled back attempting much more than the light-duty car stuff myself in 2019.
Interesting twist on the story – they didn’t remember me from the coilover job a few years ago, so I got the “new customer” treatment. As expected, after getting it opened up and evaluating the box of parts I provided, they were terrified. There’s any number of factory parts missing with custom stuff they’ve never seen before added. Some of what they were going to be doing involved significant tear-down to replace most of the vacuum system, so they’re rightfully skeptical. I get that. Took three phone calls with the service manager to get through it.
This most recent maintenance episode stands in stark contrast to when I drove down to Atlanta for the exhaust update. There’s a little small business performance shop in the Dallas suburb, not unlike Bimmerhaus here in CO. Drove around back and parked on a lift, popped the hood for Andrew while he looked it over and started pointing at things asking “what’s that?” Numerous times. I’m just standing there thinking “crap, he’s not gonna want to work on it.” After about a half minute he said “Cool. You’re gettin’ the new 2.8 rev. This car’s gonna be fast.”
Nothing against Bimmerhaus. To be fair, Andrew had a little better idea what he was getting into. This is just an example of how the same type engagement can work very differently with different people. Bill ‘n the Bimmerhaus gang seem like a great bunch, and they have my respect for doing things right. I’m sure we’ll be seeing them again sometime. Just not for quite awhile – but I bet they remember me next time. 😉
Only lost one race to the ringer that day. They weren’t gonna let some out-of-towner drive off with their money in a car. I caught him sandbaggin’ but with nobody watchin’ ur back, what’cha gonna do. Car racing is just a highly technical, high-maintenance multi-risk-vector form of gambling. 3-dimensional chess for gearheads.
