C6 Z06 Corvette

I'm not a big Corvette fan and I have no idea what the different variations are. Today, I had lunch with a colleague. For the longest time, he had an E30 convertible that he loved. He even had the engine rebuilt at 185,000 miles. Alas, it was simply falling apart so he sold it to his mechanic. It is now living a happy life in sunny San Diego.

This is a good story. He had a client who was cash-poor but car-rich. So the client paid my friend with this C6 Z06. Needless to say, he loves it.

Here is Tiff's take:

Translation of my grandfather's bio completed

I am going to do a more in-depth write-up this weekend, but here are some highlights:

• He joined the Chinese Communist Party in 1924, making him somewhere between the 421st to 899th member.
• He got booted by the Party in 1927 for being "proud, arrogant, arbitrary, and took matters into his own hands." There has to be a good story here.
• He was the last KMT governor of Hebei Province before the Communist takeover.
• He was a member of the first National Assembly in Nanjing in 1948 and elected Chiang Kai-Shek president.
• Once he fled to Taiwan, he continued to serve in the National Assembly and was Deputy Transportation Minister.

I find it funny that when I lived with him, we got around almost exclusively by bus. Very proletarian.

Gleaming the Cube

I finally watched this 1989 Christian Slater flick. I was told that the school scenes were shot at my alma mater, Woodbridge High. I can now confirm that it's true. It's very cheesy and 80s. I would recommend it only if you were into skateboarding as a kid.

The World's Fastest Cars (6): BMW M3

This car has been written about ad nauseum, so I'll just post this Motorweek review. I do want to note that the oil temp gauge replaces the mileage gauge in the non-M3 cars.

Rchen: Anything to add? Driving impressions? Useless trivia?

The World's Fastest Cars (5): BMW 750iL

I've told this story a million times, but I'll tell it again. It's the late 1980s, maybe 1990, and I'm spending the summer with my father in Japan. This summer, his underworld friend offered him a job as a nightclub manager in the beach resort town of Atami. Because I can't speak Japanese, but I still wanted to earn money for my first car, my dad got me a job at a bento delivery joint. I worked in a HOT kitchen with around half a dozen sweet old ladies. It was an assembly line, and we put various entrees and sides neatly into bento lunch boxes, which were then delivered by moped all over the town. The problem was, I was an American teenager with no dexterity. The boxes I prepared were always messy and I suspect the owner got a lot of complaints from customers. Nevertheless, I got paid generously for a summer's work.

Anyway, back to the BMW. The nightclub owner had two brand new cars, a black on black BMW 750iL and a black on black Fairlady Twin Turbo. He let his girlfriend drive the Nissan. I remember him taking my dad and me out onto the street where the big Bimmer was parked. He sat us inside and showed us every feature it was equipped with. Even at a standstill, the car felt like a friggin' tank. For a brief moment, I wanted to be a nightclub owner. I also wanted to date his hot girlfriend.

From my book:

• $70,000 MSRP, $1,850 gas guzzlers tax;
• BMW offered the V12 because it got word that Mercedes was also going to offer a V12;
• it has a better power-to-weight ratio than the M3 and the M5, but not the M6. 

So Edvin, how's that E32 project of yours?

The World's Fastest Cars (4): Bentley Turbo R

To this day, I would still like to actually own one of these. According to my book:

• 5,270 pounds (my '05 Phaeton weighed 5,194 pounds),
• 328 hp at 3800 RPM, 487 lb-ft of torque at 2400 RPM (335 hp at 6500 RPM, 317 lb-ft at 3500 RPM for the Phaeton),
• wheelbase of 120.5" (118.1" for the Phaeton),
• one Garrett T04-type turbocharger,
• there was no room in the engine bay for an intercooler, and
• the "R" stands for Roadholding!

Vertical side vents

Range Rover: Right.

Jaguar: Makes sense.

Chevy Captiva: What the heck? I saw one kitted with these vents today on the road.

RIP Eric Garner

F'in' booshit. No indictment.

The World's Fastest Cars (3): Aston Martin V8 Zagato

Back when these came out, I thought they looked kind of fugly. But now, it is bordering on a work of art. So muscular, and it looks sort of like a Japanese car.

Aston Martin was in real financial trouble and this car saved the company. They promised just 50 of these would be made and quickly received 50 $27,000 deposits, based solely on some pencil drawings. 

The Zagato was equipped with a 5.3 liter V8 capable of producing 430 horsepower, which was significantly more than the already powerful regular AM V8. Plus, because the Z was 350 pounds lighter and more slippery through the air, it could achieve a 300 km/hour top speed. Note the hood bulge for the four Weber carbs. No, it wasn't fuel injected.

The Zagato sold new for $150,000 in 1986, and by 1989, had appreciated to $500,000!

Aston pissed off Zagato coupe owners when it announced that it would sell 25 Zagato convertibles. The drop tops only had 305 horses but retailed for $220,000.

No luck finding my grandfather at the library

Over Thanksgiving vacation, I sent a book request to the Northern Regional Library Facility. It's a huge complex in Richmond that holds 6 million "infrequently used" books for the UC and CSU systems. I thought I'd hear back from them in a couple of weeks. I got an email on Monday morning that the book was ready for me to look at. I had a couple of hours between appointments so I zoomed over to the library and parked next to a white Saab wagon.

As soon as I entered the lobby, the guy behind the counter knew who I was and handed me the book. Now that's service!

Here is the book I wanted to look at. Alas, my grandfather's name was nowhere to be found. It's got about 40 pages of names and an index with everyone's telephone and telegraph(!) numbers.

The last time this book was checked out was in 2005.

Pardee Lowe was a Chinese-American who survived the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake.

Unclassified.

Page 1.

My grandfather shared the same last name of Yu as Yu Yu-jen. However, I could not find my grandfather's name or his alias (which I didn't discover until last week) anywhere in the book.