Better With An Automatic - DWA! Podcast Ep. #909

The Driving While Awesome podcast is recorded live to SD card at the Beeline

Motor Club in Santa Cruz, California.

Where am I?

And where are you?

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I can't see his little head.

Egocidal vehiculum.

There's no doubt. Courettes are fast.

What about the people that put in their fingers over the license?

Keiichi Tuchiya.

Those cars have such a cute little face, you know, it's like a little

like a little salamander or something, you know, I'm riding dirty right now.

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Welcome to Driving While Awesome.

My name is Warren.

I'm Lane and I'm Art.

Well, welcome to the show and tell convention on Mars.

What is that from Warren?

I'm going to leave it to the listeners.

If anybody gets that reference, I'll be shocked first of all, but maybe not

convention on Mars.

Oh, is it from the Arnold Schwarzenegger

total recall recall?

Yeah, I wish, but no.

Like Mars thing I could think of, dude, that's it.

That's all I got for Mars.

You know, usually people aren't usually in him, you know, inhabit Mars.

So it's not long where you out on the Martian with our boy Matt Damon, Matt

Damon. I mean, that's not Mars.

It definitely is Mars.

He's on Mars.

Martian Mars in the title.

He's a Martian.

Yeah, they're on Mars and he gets stranded there and it's a great movie.

Yeah, it's been a while.

I remember he like uses his shit to grow food or something.

I don't know.

Lane, Lane, he's the Martian.

Yeah, you can only be a Martian on Mars.

Okay.

I don't know.

Does that make sense?

No, it doesn't.

Not really.

It's in the it's in the word, M.A.R.

Mar.

Michael Allen Rosh.

Michael Allen Roshan.

Shout out.

Yeah, shout out.

Shout out.

Canon, Canon, camera, films and whatnot.

How you guys doing?

What's going on?

I'm hanging in there, dude.

My third starter just went out in the 911.

What the hell?

Second third.

What does that mean?

It's these Bosch remands or just garbage.

Yeah, so I went to drive it yesterday and just got a loud clicks.

You know, just like click.

Yeah, the solenoid is stuck.

Solenoids.

Well, yeah, I guess solenoids working, but the starters.

Yeah, the Bendix time for a time for an AC Delco.

You know what I mean?

Yeah, get one of those.

Yeah.

AM generals.

There's some high torque option.

Maybe.

Okay.

I guess there is.

What's the deal, man?

Well, I think the tolerances are so tight on that engine that, you know, you need something

with more oomph, you know, to get it going.

Does it start eventually or are you strained like it's dead?

No, it's just dead, dude.

Wow.

That is a super bummer.

Yeah.

And you push started.

Can you whack it?

Is it easily whackable?

I'm sure it's hard to get up there, especially without like you could jack the car up and

get to it.

Did you say no wacky something?

Is it whackable?

No wacky and he says you could jack it and get up there.

You know what?

I swear, dude, I'm not making this shit up on my way.

Um, to drive, I was driving my kids off at school this morning and my kids were singing

in the car and, um, and this is my, my stupid, uh, ADHD mind.

Um, I reminded her like to grab her jacket because she was like, you know, whatever.

And so she put it in the car.

We're like heading it to the school and I was thinking how, how did jackoff become

jackoff?

Like I was totally thinking about this.

What?

Yeah.

You know, like all this guy's a jackoff.

Like how did, what?

I think it's, uh, that's just like a dial.

How did that happen?

Yeah.

And so it's just like, it's just like kind of slurring it and then adopt it into the

lexicon and now a thing.

So, but that started somewhere, man, you know, some dude in Nebraska, maybe, or where was

it?

Hey dude, everything started somewhere.

No, that feels more like a Jersey thing.

Jersey, huh?

Yeah.

You jag off.

It's more, you know, I feel like it's a Sopranos situation.

Oh, interesting.

Okay.

Yeah.

You know, I don't know.

Hey, uh, speaking of, uh, nothing that we're talking about, um, Radwood, Austin, this Saturday,

this Saturday, um, of the Americas, I'll try to finish here before you jump in, um, Saturday,

circuit of the Americas, come on down.

We have, uh, we're sold out of car space with a ton of awesome cars, um, but room for

rad folks.

So Saturday, circuit of the Americas, Austin, Texas, be there, dress up.

We'll, we'll all be there.

Oh, and dress up.

Lane, I'll take your picture.

If you dress up, we will be there.

And, um,

Don't find me.

I'll be the guy with the hat with the propeller on the top.

Perfect.

The easy.

Um, art.

What do you, uh, what do you got here?

You were so eager to jump in.

Well, I was just so eager to like inform people about some of these heavy hidden cars that

we have.

And I was just texted by our homie, uh, who, the homie, the homie, uh, Michael, I always

can't pronounce it.

It's like forge.

I think is how you pronounce his name.

His last name.

He was the last customer for rad for sale.com and he bought teals, alpha, man, Milano Verde.

Oh, wow.

Yeah.

And do you remember that guy?

Well, I mean, do you remember the transaction?

I remember that transaction.

So I remember taking pictures of the car and you took pictures of the car and he said that

he is bringing, uh, because when he, well, let me, I'm getting all ahead of myself here.

I'm too excited.

He's bringing a W 123 pre-merger AMG, one of only five real ones and these are superset

cars, but I was going through all of the cars on Monday, like, you know, as, you know, just

for placement and curation.

And I saw that in his notes, uh, when he registered, he had registered with his alpha or male as

Z and that, but, but then he put a note in the, that said, but may bring another equally

rad vehicle instead.

And so when he texted me this as an alternative, I said it was a very worthy alternative.

So I was like, really stoked to hear that he's bringing that.

We also have a 993 RS that's going to be on display in a very prominent location.

Uh, and I'm not going to tell you what card is surprise.

It's the 24 hour of Daytona winner from the early eighties.

So leave a vague, uh, is going to be on display, um, also in a very prominent way, maybe on

a ramp truck, maybe on a trailer, something like that.

This guy can't help himself.

This guy can't help.

He's going to dangle care of this and go, maybe it'll be on a trailer, maybe on a trailer,

maybe it's a dangling from the roof, car ceiling, maybe a fat car.

I don't know.

We'll see.

It's a, but it's a, it's a cool one and I'm really excited to see it there in person.

And yeah, the, I mean, Austin always brings out the heavy variety.

It's crazy.

You know, like we always initially assumed it was going to be all trucks and Chevy's

and it's, it's, yeah, it's all over the map.

I mean, like, of course you have your, you know, great heavy hidden Ferraris and Lambo's

and all that, but also just really cool JDM stuff, a lot of really cool obscure Euro.

Um, yeah, it's a really good motor home stuff boats to, uh, yeah.

Yeah.

To super cars, to super cars.

Yeah.

So yeah, it's a, it's a, it's a fun way to wrap up the year and historically this show

has been, um, in the spring for us and we moved it to the fall due to some issues with

our, uh, the other venue that we're looking at, but, um, I think this may be the move though,

moving forward.

Um, I like this ending with the bang with Texas bang it out dude.

And I thought it'd be really, you know, super good weather, like 60s, 70s, no, it's 85.

It'll be 85 in November folks cause Austin is such a great place for weather.

Um, world renowned, but at least, at least it's not windy.

Oh wait, no, it'll always be windy too.

Do you guys want to answer some questions?

Let's go on to, let's do it, let's do it.

And Swedish Cadillac says, what years or year car do you consider the sweet spot old

enough to be analog, inspirational, nostalgic, new enough to have worthwhile engineering

characteristics without getting into auto trans touchscreen, hell auto trans.

Well, you mean like CVT or just bad transmissions, maybe bad transmissions.

Um, I think I'm still in that like early 2000s, uh, there's still some inspiration

to be had.

They've gotten fairly safe and modern-ish, but late nineties, I mean, there's tons of

late nineties cars that also check those boxes.

What do you guys think?

Yeah, I mean, if we're talking about a fun car, I'm talking, I'm thinking more, I'm

more 80s guy.

Oh, it's a, yeah.

I mean, that's what I, I made that decision with my, with my wallet, as they say, right?

It's as new and new enough to have worthwhile engineering characteristics.

Yeah, exactly.

So you have like modern, you have like good fuel injection, you have all the kind of

stuff you want.

You have transmissions that work well, they're not, you know, they don't have a lot of like

apology, apologies to be made and they run reliably and yeah.

Is this the same question as peak car, which has been asked before?

Kind of.

Yeah.

And it's hard to say if he's talking about, you know, he's talking about a performance

car.

I'm guessing it's not like something you would use as a daily, but analog and inspirational

nostalgic, but worthwhile engineering.

I also want to throw in safety into that.

Like where does the safety get, get in the way or is it helpful?

I'm going to go to 1994 or five pre OBD two.

So you have some of that safety you're describing and also just from an actual, like structurally

the car, right?

Is, you know, that you have like stiffer chassis, like, you know, you can, you can tap into

a lot of the driving dynamic stuff.

I'm like thinking of specific cars, right?

And it's like, you go down the list of like what are sort of like the best enthusiast

versions of each manufacturer.

And so like your, I would be pretty happy with that.

You know, those couple of years, 94, 95, some cars were introduced in 95, some were, you

know, at the end of their lifespan, 94.

Um, but I don't know, for some reason, I have this E39 M five in my head also as like

peak car as like all the boxes, which is technically 2000.

So I'm kind of jumping around, uh, because there you're now tapping into, um, old enough

to be analog, right?

Uh, inspirational nostalgic.

It's got the looks.

It's comfortable.

Uh, it's not quite enough nostalgia, but hit enough of that.

Like, hey, jump in this thing and like, it's more just, uh, it's more utilitarian

than it is nostalgia.

Well, to me, it's like, I'm thinking, uh, what was that series called the, um, the

BMW film series.

Yeah.

Yeah, of course, rich stuff.

Yeah.

It was by Guy Ritchie.

Cameron wrote it.

Well, there's, it's not Guy Ritchie, but only one of them is Guy Ritchie, but

still, yeah, that one, right?

That was a 39 and 51.

Um, so, but I think, yeah, it's like, we talk, talk about radar graph again, right?

It's like, yeah, the nostalgia on there is maybe like a six out of a 10 versus like,

you know, uh, Coontosh or something, which is a 10 or an F 40 or even F 355.

But again, that's where my mind goes.

F 355, like that's, you know, one of my favorite cars and that's like, again,

checking a lot of those radar graph boxes.

Now we're talking nostalgia, um, all the analog engagement, uh, for

sensitive occasion that we talk about, but zero, uh, on the auto trans because

the F one trans is fucking terrible.

So like, I don't know.

I'm not thinking about that in terms of, um, uh, I don't know.

I guess like, because he's asking for everything, right?

Like, and so is there a place where you have good automatic transmissions

with minimal screens?

Um, you have to go ZF eight speed really, right?

Like why are you looking for an automatic transmission, dude?

It's a fun car.

I know enough to have worthwhile engineering characteristics without

getting into auto trans and touchscreen hell.

Yeah.

You're just saying cause everything turned into automatic transmissions and stuff.

It's like, it's like, where is that sweet spot?

Okay.

Like be pre pre F one, everything.

Okay.

Yeah.

I'm trying to figure out, okay.

I'm, that's why I'm confused.

Yeah.

I was trying to go too deep into it.

You are, you're going too deep, dude.

You just got to like think about like, are you an Enzo more shallow or are you,

are you an F 40 guy F 50?

Well, you just got to go like, you can't dissect the question so much.

And I think it's just like, what's your like, like what, if you were going to,

I know, I think you're three 55 guys.

So like, if I think that's kind of your ultimate, like, I think art nailed it.

He said 94 95.

That's it.

But you, I'm with you.

McLaren F one NSX, you know, E 36 M three, E 34 M five, uh,

integrity bar in Japan.

We didn't get them here.

Uh, LS 400.

If you want a luxury car, yeah, there's, there's a lot going on.

But, but I would, I would argue for me at least, I think I would like to step a

little further back because I want a little more of that seventies feel,

which brings me into the eighties with like more modern reliability,

fuel injection, stuff like that.

So that's where I would, I would go because I want less of like the plastic

bumpers and stuff like that.

I want a little bit of, I want a little more analogness.

So I want no traction control.

I don't want any of that kind of stuff, which brings me into the more of the eighties.

And you're, you would prefer that style over like a nine, six, four,

which is plastic bumpers and more cost of the little safer.

That's a good one.

That's a perfect example.

Yeah.

I would go nine, six, four over, over G body for sure.

So, and that's like, but it is definitely, there's a difference there.

Yeah.

It's the, they definitely feel different and, and the, the G body feels as you're

describing like a seventies car because that's more, that's what it is.

Yep.

Matt Schuers says, just watched, uh, Jason.

Camille says new video for Hagerty.

It's a E 90 M three RS four versus C 63.

He mentioned that the manual was actually a weak point for the M three for

typical BMW reasons, rubbery long throws, et cetera, which got me thinking besides

that M three, are there more cars where manual isn't the right option?

When given the choice bonus, which of those would you pick?

And where does the Lexus ISF fit into the equation?

Uh, well, I mean, first off, the manual is the right choice.

Let's just, let's just get that.

Let's just get that out of the way.

It's not the, it's not the best manual transmission.

It's typical BMW, but it's still the, the right choice for that car.

And it's all remediable too.

Like there's aftermarket options that will tighten all of that up in, in make it a

better shifting transmission.

Um, but yeah, stock, yeah, it's also a way better experience than the DCT.

I mean, DCT is good at full tilt, like full going after it, but what are we

doing? Yeah, I, I've always felt that AMG cars don't benefit from a manual

transmission. I feel like they're muscle cars at heart.

I haven't driven an AMG car with a manual transmission.

I don't think they've ever made one.

They did.

When they did, but, um, did the C 63 get a hammer manual?

You can get a C. That's a pre merger too.

So you're like, I mean, we're trying to think of they made a and how rare they

make. Well, I mean, but yeah, I mean, that's, but that's a clear distinction,

right? Like if you're doing a go with the C 126, like if you have a manual

option, my argument was Warren said, I prefer manual, automatics over manual.

I've always felt like you're ever driven one. Right? There's like, I don't

exist, dude. I should have said Mercedes, forget AMG, Mercedes bends when given

the option. Sometimes I've only driven a few, uh, SLKs and, uh, I drove an old SL

with that, you know, and obviously like the diesel stuff from back in the 70s

and 80s. Um, I've never been super like eager to get a manual.

However, I've never had a performance version like an AMG that was manual.

So like we've had manual swapped, um, modern AMG engine SCC's at Radwood.

Like what is that like? Is that a pain in the ass? Would you just rather have an

automatic? No, SCC had way rather of an automatic, right? Like that's where I'm

at. I'm like, I don't know if that's a bonus, but in this case, like, you know,

an M three, I'm definitely going to pick a manual. Like that's not a, not a tough

choice, but I'm saying when you get to a, like a bigger, heavier, like GT style

car, are you, do you want that? If you have enough torque, I don't know if I

really do. Well, it's also heavy. Like the way yeah or Mercedes are made is not

they're not lightweight, like nimble cars. So it's like you're more in the

muscle car thing. And then what would you rather have? Would you rather have a

like most of the time? Would you rather have an automatic or do you rather have

a manual? Right? That's exactly. Yeah. I guess that's what you're doing with

the car right in like sort of the driving style, like especially with the

with one of those, as you're describing, like the C 126 being the SEC's, those

are like Autobahn bargers, right? Like they're, you're not really like kind of

like rev matching into a tight corner and like, I mean, you can do it, but it's

not necessarily its happiest place. I can see a case for that. I think, you know,

manual always offers more engagement. It's just, you know, whether or not that's

something you want. I think CLK 63 black is a good example, right? Like, you know,

definitely don't want that transmission. I would want a manual. Yeah, for sure. Yeah.

So, but I only want, but I also, would you want a manual if it had like a good

ZF eight speed? That's, that's where I'm at. I want to try them. I need to drive them

to know that, but you drove a seal. You drove a CLK black series. Yeah. And the

transmission was definitely like a low point of that car. Totally. So I think a

manual would fix, would fix that. Yeah, exactly. The only low point really.

Yeah. Yeah. So I feel like, yeah, there are definitely some cars. I mean, I,

I don't know if I'm totally on board with like all, I feel like that like a W124

hammer would be sick with a manual. I would, I think it's small enough and agile enough to

like warrant that. And it's like, it's more Hooney for sure. It's not necessarily a Miata,

but like I would want a manual in that. And they did offer that versus, you know,

in the pre-merger cars. But I think at some point I'm, you know, I can go either way and I

see what you mean, you know, like an R 129 SL, you know, you can get a six cylinder with a manual.

They were very rare. They're, they never made a manual V eight or V 12 in the U S. I don't

know if they did in Europe, but I don't think I wonder if the manual VA is would be desirable.

Like if it was out there, is that something that people were would be seeking out? I bet it

would be. Yeah, people would seek it out because it would be rare, but because it's rare, but it

would also be an actual use case. Yeah, that's a weird one because like people, you read the

articles about nine twenty eight and they're like, oh, you want to automatic because it suits the

nature of the car, which is Autobahn Cruiser. I would always want a manual nine twenty eight.

I think it's like it's a, it's kind of a hoon mobile, so it's fun to just get like

sideways from every stop sign and it's more like a muscle car thing where in a muscle car,

I think it is a sense of occasion car and it is about like roasting the tires and doing that kind

of stuff. And I think the nine twenty eight is that kind of thing where you're like SL has a

different characteristic and like old R 107's I've had, we, we had, you know, where I used to

make car and we had like manual transmission ones. I'd way rather have an automatic in that car.

Right. I think so that's the, I don't know, but that being said, if this, it's all you also use

case. So like that car, maybe I'm just driving it to a coffee shop or cars and coffee. A manual

is kind of fun, right? Like so yeah, yeah, or doing a rally. It's like kind of nice to be able to

downshift and yeah engine break and stuff. I wouldn't want to take those cars on a rally anyway.

So hey, take it easy. How might be doing that? So I mean, you'll be chilling, but yeah, I'll be

chilling. I'm a big fan of ISF's. I feel like I am too. Yeah. I mean, out of all those though,

yeah, where does it rank? I mean, RS fours are super rad. I have had the chance to drive one

in anger in Marin County and I was very impressed by that car. And yeah,

you know, the E 90 M threes are super cool too. I actually, I feel like I would rather

have an ISF than a C 63. You know, it is C 63. I would like that's probably where I would rank

it third place over the C 63. I don't see 63's don't do much for me there. They,

they feel like the cheap Mercedes with an engine. Yeah, but they are very cleanly styled.

They don't, they're just too, I'm almost too much. They're almost too boring. Yeah,

they're boring. They don't have enough. Yeah. They're not muscular. They're kind of like

bland almost. I don't know. Yeah. I could see that. I do like ISF's though. I think they're

kind of underrated. I agree. Don't seem all that. They hold their value really well, by the way.

They're still, they're, they're, you know, a good driver is still 30 plus K. Like they,

they have not depreciated yet. Jesus.

Bobby Reed with the car says, what's your hot take that if we read without context,

we would immediately know it originated from you. Mine's super easy. Oh, yours is exhaust note. No.

No front wheel drive. What is it? No front wheel drive. Okay. Although you are kind of like the

you're the guy that preaches and Tegra type are all the time. That's the only one. That's the

I know, but I feel like that speaks louder than your no front wheel drive. Yeah. Oh, I see. Yeah.

Well, you know, actually speaking of which I was on a call with Honda PR yesterday and

at the end of the call I said, Hey, I would still love to have a go in that, you know,

super low mileage showroom fresh one that you guys. So I can get access to that car,

but I cannot get it up to the Bay Area. So we have to coordinate. If you guys want to,

we should all do a little gang bang. I don't know about that. But yeah, I mean, we'll have to

figure something out. Obviously it's an easy flight for you guys. But yeah, we, or we can figure

something out, but I can definitely get the car for a week or two and we should do something around

that. It's cool to do. And we call the dude like my E 30 in that car. Like we should like do like

some back to back drives in that because it's because it's like a rear wheel drive type R,

right? So we can kind of look at that same ethos. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. LFG dude.

Gee, dude. I don't know what hot take I have. I'm sure the list. Well,

Warren used to be way anti modifications, but he's kind of lightened up in over the years.

I've never been. I've never been anti modifications lane. Totally untrue.

I've been anti modifications. He preaches anti kind of keeping things, but

OEM plus baby. Those are modifications. How about oh shift? No shift. Don't never change your shift

knob. There you go. How's that one? No shift knob. No, you can do that too, but not modern shift

knobs and older cars. Well, there you go. Is that your hot take right there? Boom. No modern. Yeah,

that's that's a hot take. Hotest take ever. Dude, you're fucking sizzling right now. Dude,

I'm fired up. No Momo. Calm down, Warren. No Momo ergonomics shift knobs on Long Hood 9 11's

crazy. I know. What if you reverse them? Could you put them backwards? Oh, I see reverse cowgirl.

Yeah, you can do that. That's a popular horrible steering wheels on old Mercedes Benz.

You know, no 90s AMG steering wheels on 70s cars. Yeah, these are these are hot takes folks.

So hot reasonable lane. I don't know, dude. You guys tell me I probably I'm sure I have some,

but I just don't know. I mean, how bad she have a ton. Yeah, I'm just there's so many. We're

inundated. I know. I just don't I can't think of any like off the top of my head.

Fuck. What are some hot takes I have? Oh, I hate the I don't like the Z 8. Oh, yeah,

that's a good one. Hot take. Yeah. How are you on Z one? Is it? I like Z one. I'm a fan too.

Yeah, I like they're so weird. You see a V. Yep. Ten one. Yeah, I don't like that.

I'm not. I don't think I like that. It makes me feel weird. Really? Yeah, I don't like it. You're

like why? I would like to just go really lightweight with one of those things and that

seems like a frickin just a just a boat anchor. I think that's one of those cars that it's like

never going to be a great car to drive. It's like it is what it is and it's a cool thing.

It's like a it's a it's a flimsy or e 30 right with it with it. Yeah, but it's it looks really

cool. Yeah, as you said, and it's got yeah, the the cool doors and all that. Yeah. Try and think

of your hot takes there, Lane. I mean, there's I know I have some dude wheelbase something about

wheelbase. Oh yeah. Yeah. There's a city interior. Do you hate that one? That's a hot take or you

just not or you're fine. I don't hate the one. I think it's like the most overblown thing ever.

It's overrated. Okay, so that's a hot take. People love like the most overrated thing. It has like

no sizzle. No sizzle. That's pretty hot takey because that's a very popular car. It's held its

value. It's still cost the same. It's new. I know zero depreciation on the one. I know it's

crazy, right? Is there another car that isn't like 997 GT3 RS? Well, I've said that isn't a very

expensive car and 993 GT three nine, nine, nine and nine eleven GT three RS did go down below.

It's it's a price at one point. So that's that's the weird part about that car. I never

yeah. You have to go money. Yeah. Like the 4.0 immediately like skyrocketed, right?

Yeah, for sure. But there's only like like 30 of them or something like that. But even like

yeah, like an M2 dipped and then it yeah, like so every yeah, what is like a $50,000 car that

never depreciated? That's a good question. I don't think it exists besides that. Yeah.

Yeah, but I don't know. I'm sure. I know I have some hot takes. I just can't. I'm no bro.

Oh dude, my ultimate hot take. I got one to 75 GTB ugly. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Although people

agree with you. People hate me, but but some people agree with you. I think only Kurt. What's

Omnivore says we're going to miss John and Austin. He can't make it unfortunately, but

we'll he'll be there in spirit. Lane is going to come dressed as Magnum PI, which is good for

everyone. He says he got to drive a CX 52.5 as preferred and was quite impressed drives like

you hope a Mazda will and even with a lot of tech, it's pretty intuitive. Real buttons and knobs

seems to be holding their own in the touch screen wars. Well, for now, they're actually,

I think announcing they're going to go to full touch screen. Anyways, Warren, how's

yours been long term? Excellent. An excellent car. Ours is not a 2.5 as preferred, but

it's a slick top four cylinder non-turbo. Pretty damn good. I think it's at 26,000 miles now.

That's a lot. Open the hood once to refill washer fluid. It's fantastic. It's a great car.

I really, really like it and I could not recommend it. Dude, Moses are so underrated

still. I we need a we need to preach the Mazda gospel because they need to continue to be

successful and like, you know, like people seek out like even with my Nissan Pathfinder post,

right? I was like, everyone's always at Toyotas are awesome. Yes, we like Toyotas, but like

Moses are fantastic too, right? Like there's other greater. They're more concerned on driving

too. They're like, they're like, I got that CX-5. I was like, oh, it feels like something,

it feels like a budget Porsche or BMW in their heyday. Zoom, zoom, dude. Yeah. And you look at

the suspension build and just the way that it's driver focused to the cockpit and

simple dashes and yeah, it's really great. I can't recommend them highly enough. And I,

my neighbor was in the market for a new CRV replacement and they bought a CX-50. So I've,

I've converted them and then my, my wife's parents both bought Mazdas. Dude, you guys,

are you guys going to meet little cars and coffee style like Parker CX-50? No, when we take,

when we drive to my in-laws house, there's three, three new Mazdas in the driveway. Oh yeah. So

it's a little, little embarrassing. You guys are pretty cool. Dude, you're an ambassador.

Yeah, exactly. Just want to drive says, have you guys tried KG barbecue on your trips to

Austin? If not, I highly recommend it. It was the highlight of my previous trip to Austin.

He's a master of Texas barbecue and adds a unique Egyptian flair. Super down. The answer is no,

we have not. And barbecue, we were just talking about it before we started recording. It's tricky

for us because we're not just hanging out all day looking for barbecue. We are working and then

we have nights to eat and barbecue is not great at night. It's either sold out or a really long

line and still sold out. So, uh, but maybe we could work this out. I'm guessing this is like

the cool hot place. It's 107,000 followers. Check this out. It's a Michelin guide on Google.

That's pretty high. That's very high. And yeah, so yeah, it looks like the spot. It is,

it has a huge outdoor area. So I mean, that could be beneficial. Oh, what the hell? Dude,

is this a freaking, it's a trailer. It's not even a full brick and mortar. It's a food truck

ish situation, but, uh, I mean, that's okay. No, I mean, I'm just thinking just from a service

standpoint, that means long waits typically, right? So, um, could be tricky. I'm looking

at a picture of a, it's like a maybe brisket kind of plate and on top of the brisket is

pomegranate, cashews, and maybe a little yoghurt. Oh my gosh. I'm starving immediately now.

Uh, dude, I'm in KG barbecue. It's at KG barbecue on Instagram. If anyone's interested,

we'll report back if we have any chance of eating there. We'll see. Uh, the real John

Webb says it's almost that time. What garage related items will you be looking for during

the annual holiday consumerism extravaganza deals, deals, deals. God, we need to talk about that

because we always last minute we're like, we should do a gift exchange or a gift guide or, uh,

uh, something. Yeah. Um, what should we do? Should we do one gift again where we do like

$100 limit? Yeah. $100 limit. Yes. Each person. Yeah. We used to do a gift guide and I think

that's what this ties into that, right? Yeah. We do like top three gift guide. Yeah. Let's do

think we did five last year and it was hard for me to come up with everything that I want. I have

like all the essentials, everything that I want now is like very, very expensive and it's like,

I, I'm going to do it probably this coming year. I've been budgeting for it, but like

I want to epoxy my floors and I want all new cabinets. So like, yeah, that's everything

else is like, yeah, I don't need any more tools. My compressor is sitting at B line when I need

to pick up like there's a bunch of little things like my shop back is up there too that I, um,

when I moved it somehow ended up over there, but, um, yeah, I mean maybe a few air tools here and

there, but the main thing now is just sprucing the place up and being able to organize all my

shit. It's like, I haven't like, yeah, yeah. Moved her two years ago and like, I still have a ton

of bins like just stacked up in the garage and it's a garage life dude. Yeah. We actually have a

garage rehab project on the, on the calendar for like December, January, which I'm going to hope

to do, but same thing, like get the floors figured out. I think I've talked about on the podcast,

but yeah, little stuff, but it goes a long way. And for us, we walk through or use the

garage a lot. It's not just, uh, um, you know, place the car sit, but we walk through it to get

to the backyard and all that stuff. So adding a fridge, like finally a freaking garage fridge,

which I know, but man, it's, it's tough. Like my wife likes to just save like Costco

stuff, like frozen food from Costco. And all of a sudden our fridge is full, like full freezer.

And there's nowhere to get anything. And I'm like, this is not working. Like I,

I can't get to anything in this damn thing. So we'll see drinks too. A nice drink fridge.

Yeah. Just get efficient ones here. Go most efficient. Cause like, yeah, good call. I made

the mistake before of using an oil used fridge. And it was just like drawing so much electricity

where, yeah, it was bad. No, that's, that's a really good call. I was going to get something

like fancy and I'm like, I don't need like glass door and stuff. I'm like, I don't need that

shit for the cats. Yeah. For the cats to look at. Yeah. Um, yeah. What else? Anything else on

your ex? I asked Andrew this morning what he wanted for Christmas and he just has like the

generic answers. It's not even stuff you really want. He's like, he's into trading cards, like

basketball, baseball cards. And, uh, he's like, oh yeah, like a cool card. I'm like, why? What are

you going to do with that? You have a fucking bin full of trading cards. Like you've got a binder.

At least it's cheap or it can be unless he wants like some Charizard limited edition hologram

thing. Uh, that's like seven figures, which is a thing I learned recently. No, no. I mean,

they're, they're relatively cheap for sure. And he'd be stoked on something like even under 50

bucks, but it's also nice that it's small. It fits in a, you know, a little folder basically,

but it's just so pointless. Like what do you do with that? You know, I'm all about experiences,

but we've done so much stuff like kind of running out of ideas. So I don't know if you guys have

any experiential gifts you're giving or doing or I mean, Lane just got back from Japan. You both

got back from Japan with your families and we're going next week. So that's checking that off the

box off the list. So yeah, I don't know. John, if you have any ideas for the consumerism extravaganza

shouts out. Actually, you know what? One thing that I could use is a new torque wrench. I have

a really old one and I don't even know how good it is anymore. I have two of them, but like my big

one and I was torquing my lug nuts recently and I'm just like, yeah, I have no idea. Like, you

know, if this is accurate at all, I've never recalibrated a really good like electric. I would

love like a snap on electric. Yeah, that that would be the move, but even like a good harbour

freight one. That's electric is probably good for you. Like it's going to work dude Chineseium

he just said your harbour. You're just harbour fray. It's all you need dude. He's also making

you and he's also making me support the foreigners. I mean, like when I could just support an

American. Hey, I think all Americans work there. Americans are working there. You're earning a

paycheck. No, they're not. They're Chinese. I saw them, but you're just not using it every day.

And also electric is great until you go to use it after it's been sitting for eight months and

the battery is dead. Yeah, but the other ones aren't reliable. Yeah. See you Lane. Thank you.

I've had good luck. We were able to test them and mine. I forget. I think I have a craftsman,

but it's analog. Yeah. And you just I unload it every time I use it. Yeah. So it just sits there

and then I set it back to what I need. I don't know. You're not running a formula one team here.

Dude, I'm not. Fuck. I know you think like if you do a little extra torque, it's heavy.

It's going to add more weight. Like, you know, you got to go less, less confided torque, right?

Cause that's yeah, more, more weight. I mean, I don't know, man. I also, I like nice stuff,

right? Like it's like just like with like a no way sort of like shit this whole time.

Harbour freight versus like a real for it. Just how it feels in your hands, but as you get it,

as you tighten it up, as you set the thing, you know, all of that stuff, man. Oh, I know.

I know dude. I'm going to scrape off this. Dude, my neighbor like walks by,

sees me with a fucking Ryobi or a harbour freight thing like that. No call. Dude,

judging you just judging totally. So bad. Don't use Ryobi dude. I will tell you that much.

Yeah, dude. Yeah. I have support you. You should get a Matco gold plated $10,000 torque.

Or what is the one that, uh, the schnuffenhausen or whatever the one that Lane has?

Schnuffenhausen. The German tools that Lane has schnuff. Has it? Oh, has it. That's what it is.

Yeah. Has bro. You don't want. You can't afford that dude. I know, man. Well, it's a gift. I'm

requesting, right? So this is what. Oh, I see. I see. Yeah. Uh, Dia dobro says looking to spend

about 20 K to replace my fiesta ST daily. I need more space because I'm in a band and need to haul

gear. Don't really want to lose the fizz of the fist or sacrifice too much in terms of fuel economy.

What should I be looking at? I don't really want to go much older than 2016. I have no idea why he

has that year in here and keep miles under a hundred K. So I'm not trading into an older,

more used vehicle. Sorry for the normie question. Shouts out to the normies. All right. I got one

for you. Okay. Considering he's a Ford guy already a transit connect 2016, 2017 transit connect.

They made a pretty good looking model with like alloys and body color, all the things. He's already

a Ford guy. You're crazy though. He said he doesn't want to lose the fizz of the fiesta. You put

a sway bar on that. You're crazy. You put a sway bar on that. And some good rubber and up to you

choose your own adventure on engine mods or exhaust or whatever you want to do there. But

some sway bars, some rubber, um, you can go with, uh, yeah. I mean, you can go like, how about you

go the other way and go length versus height and go with like a BW all track, uh, like golf based

wagon that much better. Dude, hell yeah. It's really me. Have you driven seven golf all track?

It's all wheel drive. It's not a GTI. Dude, it's still you can also go. You have to modify. No,

but it's still pretty good. I drove a TDI every day and it was pretty. It's pretty good. It's way

better than a van. Yes. This is a transit connect. Actually, it's not a very well drive. It's not

a bad thing. That's a just a tall wagon. We're talking space for gear. German STI vibes in a wagon

form. All right. So you're under 20 grand for a 2017. Sure. All track. Oh yeah. Wait, wait. I mean,

they have whatever the what's the, the not or what are they making all track sport wagons,

the manual or not. I'm sorry. Was his number 17 grand. You said he said under 20 under 20,

but it's going to be 2017 and newer 2016 and newer. Yeah. All right. That's my recommendation.

He's already a Ford guy. You make a cool transit connect and you can haul your gear.

You make a cool VW wagon, either the sport wagon, which is a two wheel drive one or

an all track, which looks cooler and has some ground clearance and makes it easier for you

to load in your shit. And you can go, you know, beefy turbo on that. You can do some golf, our

mods, it's a known entity. Yeah, I like that. I like that choice. I mean, a GTI would be a

little bigger, I guess, but probably not big enough. Actually, maybe it would be big enough,

dude. Then his fiesta. Yeah, fiestas are tiny. They are tiny. They are pretty tiny, but I mean,

yeah, what is the? I mean, this also depends on what his instrument setup is, right? Like,

if he's a drummer, that's more difficult than a guitarist, which maybe requires some

money feels like it feels like he has to be a drummer. If he's like talking about

fitting plays guitar for the Glenn Glenn, the band. He plays guitar and I'm imagining he's got

amps. I got some amps here dude. Yeah, I feel like a GTI would be a good choice. I mean,

it's kind of like the you know what's also nice about the transit connect is you can sleep in it.

Yeah. Yeah. Ask Peter me how rad those things are to drive.

Pretty rad drives that every day. Have you seen the rear suspension on one of those? It's like

a steak with like bar. I think it might be leaf springs back there too, right? No, no, no, I don't

think so. Wayland Smithers is asking Lane how many episodes of Finding Mr Christmas have you

watched? Dude, I don't know about Finding Mr Christmas, but I have started. I have started

the Christmas movie quest and I mean there is so many to be seen and I've seen. I just saw

no sleep till Christmas last night. Dude, exactly. The dorky boys. I want dude. I've seen

so many Christmas movies already and there's a new one that dropped today on Netflix with

Alicia Silverstone that I'm really amped on watching. Watch a one with a Sloan from entourage

the other day. It's pretty good. So yeah, this is like any of this is the season is miss finding

Mr Christmas. Is that like a hallmark soap opera? Dude, I don't know. I'd be pretty good.

It sounds pretty soap opera. It sounds rad. Oh, dude, I watched one at ballroom dancing the other

day. Big ballroom dancing competition in Paris called the you log classic. I believe

big. How do you watch the tons? A lot at stake. You know how do you watch? How do you like get

into like ten minutes ago? I go. I'm not watching this. So good finding Mr Christmas is this is

like. It's like the bachelor two men compete in a series of festive challenges that will

showcase their holiday spirit. By the way, have my wife was watching it and I

did watch a little bit of it. But Lane, here's the most important part. Jonathan Bennett hosts

while these lovable guys vie to become the next hallmark leading star. Yeah, exactly.

Oh my gosh, pretty sick dude. I did watch a little bit of it. So thanks Amelia for watching out for

me. Just don't watch any of it. You know what I watched the other day so good that I really liked.

I don't know if I had no. It was completely off my radar. It was Godzilla minus one. Okay,

never heard of it. It's the new Godzilla and it is all in black and white with subtitles

and looks like it's shot in the forties. Hmm. Okay, really killer. So it's black and white

and is it shot with film stock and suffer is it? I don't think it's film. But man,

it is like the way that it's structured and the camera moves. It's all very old fashion,

yet they're able to use like modern effects in a way that's like very natural. I can't,

it's hard to explain, but really killer Godzilla minus one. Check it out. Okay. Oh,

I do want to throw here's, you know, these Christmas trees I'm talking about. I love them

because they're a part of it as I love how cheesy they are and I just, you know, there was a check

out this line in the dancing one. She again, he goes, so he goes, so I'm going to get like

Gerard Depper to whatever to choreograph our dance and she goes. Oh, is he the famous dance

choreographer? What right there, dude? So good. We're talking like this is made for the

dumbest people in the world and I love it, dude. I think it's right up your alley and this is

probably also, this is probably also a good time for you to watch Kim Kardashian's new show.

So did you, did you have fun fact? Is that too educational for you? Have you seen

Gerard educational? You're an absolute garbage. So I figured Gerard Depper do

he famously drank like 10 bottles of wine a day or some shit. Do you remember this?

Yeah. Yeah. He's like a super gnarly drunk real quick Godzilla minus one rotten tomato score.

I have no idea. I just pulled it up. 50, 40, 46.

Where do you think it worn? I don't know. I really liked it. So I'm going to go with my heart.

80 99% Wow. Thank you. Holy shit. So I will be watching this. I have never heard of this

thing. That's crazy. I hadn't either. It was a totally like I said off our radar was looking

for a movie to watch with Andrew. It popped up and like, that's looks kind of cool. It's

black and white, but yeah, and he, we watched the shit out of it. Did he like it? Yeah. He did

like it. He didn't have much context. We haven't watched a lot of Godzilla, but it was pretty funny

to be like, Oh, that they're in Ginza. Like we're going to go there and get destroyed or whatever.

It's classic. All right. Last question. 62 roadsters says

what must have rally or road trip item improves the journey so much that you'd recommend giving

or asking for as that Christmas time of year approaches. This is a hard one. So a road trip

rally item. Gosh, I mean, I feel like a broken record, but a peak design phone mount and phone

case is like the best thing ever because you don't have to do any kind of squeezing thing or

anything like that. Just a magnet mount is so nice to be able to just throw your phone at your dash

basically. And then any kind of stereo with either Bluetooth or a solid connection to the stream,

you know, to, to play your stuff on your phone is like a great thing. And then some kind of solid

cup holder. Yeah. Yeah. If your card is not a cup holder, that's pretty important. I'm still using

the one that we made or that I think yeah, we've had it for now. When did you make the rally blankets

Lane? I don't even know dude. So I've used it a lot like beyond the rallies. I use it in my

garage and stuff and I'm actually like starting to wear it through in a spot. And that would be

my one like a like a beefier version of that. Like I know that this was something that we included

as part of the rally and like, you know, it was like decent quality, but like, like a, like a nice

rally blanket that rolls up and you can, you know, throw down when you want to get on the ground.

Like I used it on the most recent rally twice. And I was, I mean, you saw when

as an enemy, those hazard tools, I was on the rally blanket. So yeah, that's a really fun one

that you don't have enough on a really cool usable thing that you don't really think about. And it's,

it's lives in your trunk. It doesn't take up a lot of space. It doesn't clunk around. And if you

don't use it, it's something that you can have like, you know, available to help someone else out

too. And you're not like kneeling on gravel, you know, so that's a really good one. I like that.

I also think after this last rally, especially that we use radios so much that a set of radios

is cool to have. And you don't have to use it just for rally, but that's a pretty nice one.

And there's a lot of uses for it. So I don't know, that could be one decent set of

Motorola or Baufang two way radios. Yeah, maybe you step it up to, if you're just getting one

or a set, just get the good or good or ones, get the better ones, get like motor rollers,

dude, because things are fucking annoying, dude. They're so annoying. I was so frustrated on

this last one. I'm tempted to upgrade our system, dude. I know. I know I am too.

All right. That's it for questions. Anything else you guys want to cover before I get to trivia?

Okay. As you've seen, and I'm sure the listeners have seen,

Hoonigan is back on the scene with a Subaru brat. Pretty cool. Travis Pastrana is going

to be ripping around in a fully insane Subaru brat. My question to you is, what does brat stand for?

Oh, shoot. I never even thought there was an acronym. I know. I kind of forgot to once I read

this. I was like, Oh yeah. The Hoonigan one is called the Brattaru. So recreational activity

truck. You got recreational truck. Yeah, not the rest and not recreational is the R not truck

active terrain. Nope. Terrain. All terrain. Okay. All terrain is the A. Okay. All terrain.

Did we get terrain too? The T is not terrain. All terrain. Oh, you would think truck, dude.

Transportation. Transporter. Okay. I'm going to give you that. Now you got the B left here.

Easy. This is what you'll never get. Bratt. Hold on. Let us get it. Brattie recreational

all-terrain transporter. No. Any others? It is by drive. What? Whoa. Crazy. By dash drive.

So by drive recreational all-terrain transport. What does that mean? Bratt.

What is by drive? By drive art. Come on. You know what it means. By drive. It's like

just goes both ways. I guess it's their version of four-wheel drive before they had all-wheel

drive in the in their lexicon. Yeah. It was released in the late 70s, right? Or was it?

I think so. Yeah, this is the really. Yeah, 78 is the Hoonigan version. Okay. I don't know how

much is left of it. It seems like a totally, it almost looks too big. Dude, I feel kind of bad

for like totally all cramping a Bucky style, dude. Like Bucky made that really sweet one with

daughter. I know. I thought, dude, like they should like have Bucky drive this thing.

By drive. Super. It's full carbon fiber. You know, I don't even know what is left

of a super Bratt in this thing. The taillights maybe, but it's pretty cool though. It's very

cool. I'm glad they and they kept the seats in the back. Obviously you want to keep those

right, dude. So I just, I mean, as far as I can tell from a super quick search here,

they only use the by drive nomenclature for this car. Like the Subaru never used it because it's

it's all focused on trippy. Yeah. So weird. Yeah. It's odd. I guess just to make the Bratt acronym

they needed to get creative with all wheel drive. Yeah, exactly. It's a Pistano is quoted as saying

it's hands down the craziest Jim Conner car we've ever built, which is saying a lot because every

car they've done Jim Conner and is insane. I mean, other than the first ones, which was

just straight rally cars, but all these purpose built, you know, the truck and the Mustang and

the Audi like dude, so gnarly, crazy as it gets. So yeah, we'll see. This thing has like active

arrow and it's supposed to like control it through like through the air with jumps and

stuff like that. So wow. I don't know. Remember he did that. He did that wagon Pistano. Yeah,

they had the active arrow that was pretty sick dude. Totally little wings and fins that came up

like on the hood and stuff. I like that. That was a fun one. I just, I appreciate that they're

going retro on both of these, right? Like this is interesting. Both. I mean, I know this is the

70s, but definitely Radware is still, you know, these. Oh yeah. No, this definitely applies that.

Yeah. All the Bratz look about the same. Yeah. I mean, the previous one was owned by Super,

because I remember working with them on trying to get it to Philly. So this one is owned by

Hoonigan. I imagine. I don't know who's over there now. Who is that? Hoonigan? Isn't Scotto

still there? No, he's long gone. So it's in that. It's the same company that owns. What is it? The

wheel pros, right? Wheel pros. Yeah. I don't know who's over there. I just saw Scotto unveiling

this car at SEMA. He's probably, I think he was there. Well, he made a very, I thought he,

like, didn't he make like a super public exit and made a whole video about it and everything? Like

with, yeah. Yeah. No, I'm tripping out. Maybe I saw someone that looked like Brian. I think he's

still, I think he's still associated. Is it Mr. Zachary? I don't know, dude. I feel like Scotto

is still somewhat. Yeah, we'll look into it. Call in if you guys know. All right. That's a podcast.

Thanks for joining us. We'll see you at Austin. Take it easy. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.

Better With An Automatic - DWA! Podcast Ep. #909

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