But it's never bothered me

I'm Johnny Smith. I'm a reporter. And this is Smith and Sniff, a podcast in which two

friends talk about cars and many other things. Magic trees. You know about magic trees?

Yes. So when I say that, you're going to assume I mean the hanging fragrance that you put

in your car that's the silhouette of a tree. I see. That smells of I don't know cherries or

fake vanilla or I don't know a well-known car wash or whatever. Aren't they often misused because

you're meant to open the little sachet that they're in. Yes. Then you leave it on. You leave

it sheathed for a bit. And you just de-sheath. You gradually de-sheath, don't you? If you de-sheath,

the only time I've ever bought and used a magic tree was I had a Seat Leon long-term test car

from Evo and I foolishly lent it to a colleague at Top Gear who used it on a shoot and ferried

crew around in it and somehow TV crews can effortlessly make cars smell weird. Oh no.

And when I got the car back, it smelled weird. It sort of smelled of wet dog and mud and crisps

and I didn't like it and it was so offensive to me that I on the way home went to a petrol

station and bought a magic tree but then not being familiar with the magic tree system,

I unsheathed it all away immediately and then my car became powerfully, powerfully overwhelmed.

See, a smell of custard cream biscuits because it was a vanilla one. I didn't want anything too

complicated to smell. I went vanilla and it had this incredibly strong, it was like someone had

made a huge custard cream like the size of a double duvet and then slammed your head inside it. It

was so strong. I think the correct unsheathing, gradual unsheathing of a magic tree is akin to

maybe being an accomplished stripper. There's no point in you going out on stage and immediately

pulling pants and trousers or whatever you're wearing to the floor, stepping out of them and

just going tada. That's not going to work. That's not going to work. You have to build up. It's

gradual de-sheath comes into play. It's like, no, guys, let's do this over the course of

of a week or several days. But the same way, I guess a very good erotic dancer knows what pace

to set in order to build the mood. Perhaps if you are an adult dancer and you've used magic

trees extensively, do let us know if it is in fact the case that people of your profession

are the best at using magic trees. Yeah. Do you know, the recent live show that we did off of

Leeds at the Motorist. Great venue. I know we said it before, but great venue. I forgot to admit

to you and also the crowd, the paying crowd that were there, I forgot to admit that I was wearing

something, especially for the occasion that I was going to reveal and I completely forgot to,

then went to bed, woke up, realized I still had it on, then totally forgot to mention it again

the day after when we recorded. So for the purposes of the microphone, I mean, if only we

did this in video form rich like modern people, but for the purposes of ASMR, ASMR, listen to this.

That my friend is a medallion. That I was wearing a medallion on a gold chain

that's new old stock that I got from a vintage shop years ago. And when I moved house, I found

it and realized I bought it for a bit of a laugh and never worn it and then thought, oh, this has

got a bit of Smith and sniff about it. So I'm going to put this on and then I can talk about it on

stage. But because I'm a complain, because I'm a twat, I totally forgot to just one just wore

it under my shirt. But I have to say, I think it gave me a little bit of extra power.

I feel you just say thought it gave me a rash. No, I think that it's the equivalent of maybe

having a kind of stage two talk tune. So you're packing more talk. But just because you've got

more talk doesn't mean say you always have to use it, you just know it's there. So you can tap

into it at any point. So do you want me to describe this because this is a specific medallion. It's

not just a generic, I don't know, some Christopher or coin. It is a solid, probably not real gold

pack of 20 John Plur special cigarettes. I put it on social media. I got this new old stock.

And it is so 1970s, it's unbelievable. And that's why I thought, Oh, I've got to wear this. This is

great. You don't know any of the backstory. Like, did you have to sort of collect tokens?

I don't know. I don't know if it's real. As in, I don't know if it's an official

John player special piece of merch. I genuinely don't know. So yeah, that's, that's what I was

wearing. And I just am a bit annoyed that I never actually, I never actually revealed it.

Do you know what I'll do? I'll wear it another day. All right. I didn't get rash, felt pretty good

about myself. It really is special. Isn't it? Well, John player special. It's absolutely,

it's absolutely special. It's quite a ways to see if, you know, what these might be worth.

No, I haven't. I hope that it's worth. I don't know enough for me to buy another Boxster,

for example. That would be great if I could swap it. I'll straight swap it with a listener for

another Porsche Boxster, especially if it's a bit ghetto. I mean, I've just searched

John player special medallion and nothing is really coming up. What if I chase it to necklace?

It sort of is a necklace, isn't it? No, nothing, still nothing coming up. God,

that you can buy some genuinely quite terrible necklaces though, but not. It was from a vintage

shop and there were a couple of other new old stock medallions and necklaces. This guy obviously

found a horde of them. And some of them were seven inch miniature equivalent of a record,

a seven inch record with the name of an artist on it. So I guess you could pick your favourite

artist and they were really of their time, full disco era. And I nearly got carried away and bought

a whole handful of them, but I restrained myself and just bought the JPS one. So I hope you can be

proud of me for that. I don't know if this is sort of up your street. It's a vintage

Seiko chronograph watch from 1976. But it is a John player special promo version. No.

Now it doesn't, I can't see that it says John player special on it, but it just has a black and

gold face. What? It's quite subtle. It's on American eBay for $910. So it's not cheap,

but in many ways it would complement your necklace. I bloody need to have a look at this,

Richard. Are you still pursuing that citizen Honda prelude watch that you saw the other day?

If anybody can shed more light on that, I'd like to see if I could get my hands on one if they're

not extortionate. I'm getting back into my watch game. There are several of those Honda watches

for sale on Japanese eBay. Right. Last I looked they are about, I think, five or six hundred quid.

Damn. Okay, but can you send me the links and scramble the beat? Scramble the beat. Let's go.

Oh no, I beg your pardon. Sorry. Look, there's one here because they did. Also, I didn't realize

this until I looked on eBay. There's a silver one and a black one as in the case and bracelet

of those colors. These look like brand new ones as well. £314.61p. Oh my gosh. Send it over now,

you whore. All right. Here, get your eyes around that. But it's in Japan. I don't know if you

don't have to pay tax. Okay, I'll click and collect, Richard. It's fine. Click and collect from

Tokyo. I don't know if anybody's done that. Citizens do make that watch without the Honda

branding, but I guess you want the Honda branding because you've got a Honda. I feel like I,

yeah, I want it to be Honda-ish if that's okay. And it does say prelude on the back as well. It's

prelude in the same tough face as the badge. Okay, Rich. Let's have a free form ideas session

and remember, guys, in these sessions, there are no such things as bad ideas. What if I tried to

eat a wasp? There are some bad ideas, but in this case, it's really simple. I'm going to outline a

concept and I want you to say the first word that comes to mind. Okay. Extremely long-lasting domestic

feline pet. Dura cat. Apartment on Scottish Island, northeast of Islay. Dura flat. High quality,

interlocking floor tiles that are extremely easy to install and smarten up the appearance of your

garage or shed whilst providing a nicer surface on which to work on your vehicle and which our

listeners can buy with 10% off by visiting duramat.co.uk and using the code SSG10 at checkout.

Oh, duramat. Duramat. Duramat. Good. Now tell me more about this durable cat.

So, you know, last week we talked about Beckham's prelude, yeah? Yes. And we did actually have a

letter from somebody mentioning that this had been discussed on a TV documentary about Man United.

Oh, yes. And I probably can't find the story. That was, it's on an email. I'll see if I can find it

got reminded about was the fact that, you know, I might have told you, I've got a Matra Rancho,

Talbot Matra Rancho project and lots of listeners of Smith and Sniff seem to hail from the Netherlands.

Yeah. And some of them come to the live show because they're so committed. They come over to

the UK. So thanks guys. That's really good. Well, they said, well, you know that there was a rancho

that was extensively used in a children's kind of sleuth series called Basien Adrian.

This has been mentioned before, hasn't it? Yeah. This was the, yeah, a popular kid's show in the

Netherlands. That's right. But it seems there's another connection to this clown and man

the Dutch sleuth series. And are you going to love this? So they used to have a,

they used to have a Matra Rancho when they first started the series. The series started in I think

70, 78. So not long after the Rancho was launched and it went on to 1996. But when the Rancho got

a bit long in the tooth, guess what they changed it for? Not a lude. A fricking honda prelude.

Can you believe it? A chap called Rick, who got in touch with us called Rick Wileymaker or

Velymaker. And I'm trying to bring up his email now, but he sent us a letter and I could not

believe it. He said, yeah, they actually changed it to a honda prelude. Like no way.

It's a shame the show is no longer in production because if they were fully tracking cars that

we slightly obsess over on this show, where would they go next? Maybe a Julia Quadrifoglio?

Oh yeah, they would. Because you know why? Because they've probably made a bit of money.

Yeah, they've made a bit of money over the years and they're like, look, the prelude was quite good,

but we just need a little bit more refinement now and want to be a little bit more suave.

And yes, yes, he's still a clown, but he's a swarmy clown.

I found the email about Beckham's prelude, which is from a listener called Ewan, who is in New

Zealand. And he says, in response to your search for David Beckham's prelude, the car was covered

in 2013's Manchester United documentary, The Class of 92. His United teammates explained that

David paid extra for a leather interior in his lewd while they were happy with cloth to demonstrate

how he aspired to the finer things in life early in his career. David then reveals that the car

was stolen, so sadly it might no longer exist. Oh, well, Ewan, thank you for that. I remember

reading that going, that's cool info. Somebody else, now this was possibly in the comments on

YouTube said something similar in as much as Beckham's prelude was

conspicuously nicer than his teammates cars. And that's why I got the aftermarket alloys on it.

Oh, he wanted to stand out because even then he wanted to be, you know, extra special, just

a bit special. And he changed the loys on his prelude. And I think he told us this,

I'm sorry, I won't be able to find it, short notice, said that Alex Ferguson went nuts at him.

What for putting aftermarket wheels on? Well, Ferguson was famously a very strict manager,

and he didn't like his players having flash cars and spending their money on frivolous things.

He wanted them to just focus on football. So I could understand it, knowing what little I know

about Alex Ferguson and his management style, that yeah, I guess he would perceive it that

Beckham could have been at home thinking about different strategies in football, but instead

he was browsing a demon tweaks catalog. And that's a waste of time and focus in the mind, I guess.

Well, so going back to Bassie and Adrienne, the popular TV show,

Bassie, B-A-S-S-I-E-N-E-N, Adrienne, A-D-R-I-A-A-N.

Hmm. They were very, very popular in the day, back in the day. And he signed off his email,

Rick has, saying, every car guy from the 70s knows these iconic cars. Please see pictures.

And he's attached some great pictures of, oh my gosh, so the lewd. It was a pop-up headlight

prelude, which I'm guessing was, did that have four-wheel steering? Or was that the...

Yes, some of them did, yeah.

Yeah, I think it's four-wheel steering era. And it's red with yellow splotches or patches on it

down the sides to match. It's pulling a caravan, Rich. The prelude is pulling a caravan and the

run show that they had was also red with yellow splotches on. So Bassie, maybe, Bassie and Adrienne,

they were actually prelude guys as well. So they might have done a spot of

kind of high V-Tech street racing in the spare time. Maybe it was just part of sleuthing.

Oh, I've just found a picture of Bassie and Adrienne. Oh, so wait, I think this is an earlier

pop-up light. This is like a second gen prelude. So no four-wheel steering for

guessing out of tight clown-related spots, but a nice car nonetheless.

Yes, yes. I need to watch an episode of this because I've never seen it. We didn't get it in

the UK, but I feel like it. Just a little background to Beckham that we talked about last week.

We've had quite a few messages from people defending the internal dynamic of wet leg.

Oh, okay. First of all, pointing out, we were rather rude and that we didn't acknowledge the name

of the other person in wet leg who isn't... What's the lead singer called? I can't remember.

She's called Rhian. Right, so the other sort of main member of wet leg is called

Hester. A lot of people pointed that out and said, don't do down Hester.

She comes up with a lot of their brilliant guitarists and things like that, and she is pulling

her weight in wet leg and she does want to be in wet leg, including a listener who...

Not asked us not to name him, so he's called Alex. He says a few years ago when I still lived in

cows on the Isle of Wight, I shared a house with one of my best friends and a female housemate

who was very, very good friends with a pair of young female musicians who we now know as the

front women of wet leg. Oh, brilliant. I witnessed many shenanigans I won't go into, but I did get

to know Hester and Rhian fairly well. I wanted to let you know that Hester doesn't hate everything.

She's generally kind and lovely, really quite shy and naturally wouldn't want to be up the

front at Glastonbury. So, yeah, we were perhaps unnecessarily judgmental about wet leg. We just

want to set the record straight. Hester is pulling her weight in the band and she does

want to be there. She's just not bothered about being up front. We won't be a gist of it.

Okay. Well, I totally accept that. I continue to really, really love their music style and

this is what I love about our listeners. There's always more intel, whatever we talk about,

whether it's clown sleuths, whether it's well-known bands, whether it's, I don't know,

Formula One champions, talking of which, the video that goes out this weekend is a car

cave with a fiat coupe in it. Okay. And I didn't know that Jensen Button had one. Did you know

that? I did not know that. No, there's a photo of him leaning on it when he was racing off of a

Formula One team. And yeah, he had a yellow fiat 20 valve turbo coupe. Maybe he's still got it.

Button likes cars, doesn't he say? He does. He's one of the people on our list, actually. We were

just talking about that. Is he on the guest wave list? He's on our guest wave list because

aside from being an SSG, because we have met him, haven't we? Aside from being an SSG,

I think he's just, he's got some good car experience, road car experience, I mean,

in road car knowledge. And I think he's quite down to earth for someone that's lived in that

stratospheric Formula One kingdom. So yeah. And it was also from Somerset. So that's where I pull

my Somerset card out and go, look, listen, guys, he's one of mine. Let him in.

Yeah. He's with me. Something I keep meaning to be a we keep

meaning to bring up and then forgetting is that we wanted to do a shout out to anyone out there who

is a professional semi professional designer who might want to work with us on designing

a new range of Smith & Sniff merchandise to go alongside the existing stuff.

Yes. Obviously, there is cash money involved in this. We're not asking for freebies,

but we are just looking for people who have got some new inspiration and can do a better

design job than we can, because we've got loads of ideas and we really want to actually make them

live and work and become things that will be feasible to put on t-shirts and mugs and

stickers and all the rest of the stuff that we do. So if you are a designer and you'd like to

help us to make some new merchandise designs, get in touch. Hello at Smith & Sniff.com.

You're supposed to ask people for a portfolio or something. No.

If you feel so inclined, we'd love to hear from you.

I'd rather let your ideas be your portfolio. If you listen to the podcast and you know the

kind of isms we come up with and you can envisage a design working as a really good sticker or a

isms like, I don't know, no-name full suspension mountain bike guy or on that side of things,

or sleeve valve, whatever. Or it could just be a reworking of our nameshield on something,

in something. I feel like I'm that guy going into a tattoo shop who says,

I just want something, but I mean, I like the word Smith, I like the word sniff.

If I'm a man, I'm not that weird, but I want something a little bit different.

What can you do for me, mate? However you see fit, get in touch if you fancy helping out.

When you say how do you see fit, what about if they turned up near your house in a homemade

helicopter and then lowered an easel down on a long piece of steel cable?

I would be up for that. I thought you were going to say something like they turned up at my house

and they've just scrawled I a designer on a bloodstained tank chief which they pushed through

my letterbox. It's certainly attention grabbing, but I'm not sure that we would be comfortable

working with you. I must stipulate that we are putting this shout out because A,

your support with our merch so far has been really, really good and we're always looking

to try and come up with new collections as designers would say, but also because we

don't want to use AI. AI's tentacles are continuing to creep into a lot of these

sorts of industries and I am very wary of it and I don't particularly like it. Maybe that takes us

into the AI we've recently seen, the one that you talked about the other week, that very weird car

advert. Yeah, which was censorous by a listener. Where the car shifted from. I'm still laughing

where it suddenly went from being a manual car to an auto.

It's so funny, but the worst thing is also it's like they're not selling something

really rare and exotic that they want to look sort of unnaturally well lit and shiny and they

can't be asked to do it themselves. Mark Ellis was the listener who sent us this. Thank you, Mark.

It's a high-end AI tent and you look at the pictures and there's something unnatural about

them from the off. It is recognizably a blue AI tent, but the number plate is the first thing.

The typeface on the number plate is wrong for a British number plate and the perspective is just

a little bit off as well. The perspective is a bit off. I don't think this is quite right

and then the interior shots are just rubbish because yet the car suddenly in one picture

magically becomes an automatic and then goes back to being a manual again. You just go,

the reason though that Mark sent this to us is because we've got a new car seller's

slightly aggressive phrase to add to the find another collection. Oh, this seller

says it's as usual as a reluctant sale, only selling as I need a van for work. Brackets

adulting unfortunately is I don't need to know that too much information.

This car is in really great condition for its age, drives spot on, starts first time, no warning

lights, no dramas. Of course, it's not brand new so it has the usual age-related marks. Well,

we can't see those because you've used an AI photo, you dickwit. You lazy, lazy swine.

Lazy. Listeners, if you find car classifiers which are either just terribly written or written by

Paulingly or not photographed at all and just dreamt up by chat GPT because you're too lazy to

go outside with your amazing 4k phone in your dusty pocket and take a couple of photos, which

if you can't be bothered to write two sentences about your own car and take one to four photos of

your own car in order to earn money from it, you deserve to get a terrible price for it or people

like me to come around your house and go, I'll give you 75 quid or I'm going to pull your trousers

down. This is what I was going to say, so instead of find another, this seller, now bear in mind this

hinders up for 1175 quid. Okay, seems cheap. This seller has said no scammers, no 200 quid cash tonight

mate nonsense, which I've never heard before, 200 quid cash tonight mate nonsense is an interesting

take on things. Hang on, he's calling people out for not wanting scammers and he's not even

photographed his own car. He's used bloody AI to represent his car, that's scammery.

Well, it is isn't it because yeah, I feel like we're going, sorry mate, just to be clear, is it

a manual or an auto because it seems to be both your lazy twat. Please, can you do that? I would

love you to do that. Please. Still for sale. Of course it will be because there's no photos,

you can't really tell if it's good or bad. But the worry is, are there people who wouldn't notice

this because they're just not particularly interested in cars, they just need a bloody car and this

one's close and they like blue and they're just fine, I'll buy it and they haven't noticed. When

they turn up and apparently it has got age-related marks, but you won't notice that until you see

it in person. What age-related marks by what falling asleep on your own driveway and then

accidentally just dropping the clutch and then smearing it up a flint wall and then you go,

yeah, it's all age-related marks, mate. See, I think if you're that lazy at a buyer and that

lazy seller, you both deserve to be done over by one another. That's my parting gift.

If you can't be asked to do your research on how to buy a car or even ask somebody who you know,

who knows about cars to help you buy a car and you can't be bothered to photograph your own car

and write two sentences about your own car and be honest about your own car, then you both deserve

to have your heads flushed down a lavatory at school's bag. Wow. Okay. Yeah. Not harsh,

realistic. It seems to me that this car is no longer listed for sale. Somebody's bought it.

Somebody's bought it. Perhaps an AI robot's bought it and they'll be

talking of cars this week. And when we say talking of cars, I mean loosely, loosely, don't panic.

I had an unprecedented amount of MOTs this week. Oh, yes. I thought I'd set a PB.

Okay. I booked three MOTs in one day yesterday.

Yes. It's extremely stressful. And one of them was for the Smith and Sniffsab.

Yes. One of them was for the Smith and Sniffsab. You're absolutely right, Richard.

Which can I just say, you drive so well. But you haven't told me. Did it pass?

No. Oh, shit. Really? Is it bad? No, it's not too bad. Although it's deemed dangerous,

but it's not really dangerous, depends who you ask.

I'm assuring you it's not dangerous. So, okay, let me paint the picture. I pull up at the MOT station.

My colleague Lisa has driven in my bargain Boxster because its MOT just expired too.

Porsche goes in. As I get out the Saab, I also go into the MOT station to see.

Heart, my friend Nick. Good old Nick. He's got the heating on in there, the little heater on

those little tiny heaters. He's got a stack of kit car owners club magazines for you to read

while you're having your MOT done. Oh, and he's got a depiction of a Cosworth.

What's the V8 F1 engine? Something V... DV? DFV? DFV. He's got a Cosworth DFV

huge high color poster on the edge of his reception booth. And as I go in and say hi to Nick,

and we have a little chit chat, I can hear just outside in the little industriously,

I can hear this. I'll try and do it if best I can.

And I'm like, what on earth is that? It's not a car that much I know. It's not a car and it's not

a dog. So I'm going, hmm, what the hell's that? And Nick sees my eyes kind of looking towards

the roller shutters as if to go, what's going on outside? He goes, oh,

that's the guys down at Practical Classics. He said, they're trying to run up and down and

start this old moped they've just bought. And they were, you know, those pedal to push old

style mopeds with the decompression lever. I won't give the full game away because I think

they're about to do a feature. I don't want to skip on their feature, but Matt Tomkins,

who's a listener of this podcast, hi Matt. And it was also a sweet, sweet guy,

which I'll come on to. He was running up and down with this barn fine moped trying to get

his missing moped. I think he nearly gave himself a Sean Connery because he said,

I've done so much running and the pen has done so little actual starting. I'm going to have to

have a lie down. So when they're Saab filled its MOT because the passenger side rear handbrake

doesn't work at all. Nick says, he says, I have to, if it's under 4% of operation, I think,

or under 6%, it's classed as a dangerous fail. And he said, yours has no percent. It's absolutely

freewheeling when I put the handbrake on full. On the driver side, it's on the passenger side,

it's very, very strong. So I'm like, okay, let me have a look. It sounds like a seized,

sounds like something seized. So I quickly afterwards, I take it out of the unit and drive it

down to the three units down where practical classics are. I'm like, could you, Matt, could

you just lend me a jack? And I'm just going to have a quick look. Anyway, Matt was jumped straight

on it and we were chatting about various rotten cars and his grandpa's amazing Mark I focus,

which he inherited. And it turns out that, yeah, the cable, the cable is somewhere snapped.

And it's just not operational. But we don't think it's a big issue, Rich. So don't get scared.

It will have it sorted and one track rod end. But apart from that, it's very good and it drives

brilliantly. It's done 150,500 miles, which I thought was a nice number. So it'll be on the road

in the next week, I'm sure. I've already found the cable because a few people are, oh, I don't

know if you can get those cables, but I've already found it and I've already ordered it. So it's

done. And it wasn't much money either. So I had quite a low MOT success rate, actually,

sad face. Yeah, two failures, one pass. So you've taken the SARB, the Boxster?

SARB and the Boxster. And I was going to take the Eagle, but I knew it definitely wouldn't pass

because it has some rot. And it also, the exhaust, which we've patched for at least 18 months now,

is definitely, I'm not even going to entertain trying to take it to the MOT Center because

there's so much air escaping underneath rather than out the back. It's just, it's not funny.

So we do need to, whether we put the word out and treat it to a bespoke stainless exhaust system,

which it probably needs, or, and we also need to get that rot seen to on the middle of the

sort of sill area where the car was cut in half. And I want to do it right. So I'm going to do that

and try and get that booked in with somebody ASAP and then it's ready for spring action.

But yeah, so I instead, I took my girlfriend's Skoda Yeti, which is by far the most modern

car out of all the cars I took, and it failed the worst. So, oh, yeah. Yeah. I didn't know this,

but lower rear wishbones on that model and the, which is shared with a VW Touran, I think,

and the golf of that era. So it's a 2014 car. Apparently they rot badly. There's a hole in the

rear wishbone where the spring cup is about the size of a fist. And he said, I've seen this before.

I said, but the other side's okay, but yeah, the other side seems okay, but,

and it's just a massive hole. So I've got to replace one, if not both lower rear wishbones,

which is just quite boring, really. Yeah, I know. So there's my boring MOT triple,

MOT hat trick. And it's not a hat trick because I didn't score a goal on two of the three,

but you know what I mean? Triple MOT extravaganza. And while I was looking at rotten cars around

practical classics, I thought, we haven't talked about, do you remember ages ago,

on the podcast, we talked about Gulliver's Alphard. I still can't, still can't actually

remember why. Was it one of those fever dreams that I had? And I just decided to share it with you

about Gulliver, the giant size. Was Gulliver a giant? Or was he normal size? And there were

just lots of small people. It just went to an island full of small people. So he was normal?

I think so. But now you've said that. I'm questioning myself. I'm going to just cheat and

search. Gulliver. Was Gulliver a giant? You're listening to Smith and Smith, Britain's leading

literary Christmas podcast. Do you know what, though? You just made me realise that Gulliver

was... Of course, Lilliput, because the Lilliputians are small. Of course. I did know that.

Yeah, I was just testing you. He's a normal-sized person. Yeah.

Gulliver's long wheelbase. Gulliver is one of those words which, the more you say it,

the more foreign and confusing it sounds. Do you not think? I suppose so. If you say Gulliver

five times, you're lost, my friend. You're completely lost. Well, if you say Gulliver five

times in front of a mirror, does he appear? Gulliver does appear, but you're disappointing.

You're disappointing. You were summoning up a giant and just a normal-sized man appears and you go.

Okay. Should we go on some adventures or should we not go on it?

I'd much rather if Basie and Adrienne turned up, although I'd be freaked the hell out because

he, A, one of them's a clown. One of them's a clown and the other one's just now an old man.

Still don't know how I feel about clowns and they're in your room with you next to the mirror,

which is just not great. I'd also quickly look outside to see if they turned up in a car or not,

or whether they just teleported. Because teleporting, though mystical and amazing,

not as cool as just turning up in a prelude with some decals.

No. Something I just remembered I wanted to bring up when we were talking about car ads

is a point that was made by Matt Pryor on the AutoCard podcast the other week,

which I thought was extremely well-observed. I'd never really thought about it before,

and yet it is quite commonplace. What Matt was picking up on is when sellers list something

on the car that doesn't work and they'll be open about it, but they'll follow it with,

for example, air conditioning has never worked, but it's never bothered me.

Passenger side window has never worked, but it's never bothered me, and it's sort of slightly

passive aggressive because it's basically going, if you pass on buying this car because of that

minor fault, you're an idiot because I've lived with it and it's never bothered me.

And I suddenly thought, that is true, it is a kind of, there's something sort of like,

I dare you to say this is a problem, because it means that you're some kind of soft-centred

shite, if you do. One road wheel missing, but it's never bothered me.

It's just never bothered me.

The entire interior on fire, but it's never bothered me. If it bothers you,

then there's something wrong with your brain. Yes.

Burly man in backseat keeps stabbing me with carving knife, but it's never bothered me.

Glove box, full of inappropriate pornography, but it's just never bothered me, so I've never

bothered me. Got Pedo written in big letters down the off side. It's never bothered me.

Previous owner painted tailgate with Badger's tail and tar, but it really never bothered me.

Smeared actual badger musk on the headrest, but it's never bothered me.

I dare for it to bother you. Come on, come over and see if it bothers you. I will fight you.

In fact, this leads me to think, if anyone listening has spots say,

particularly good, it's never bothered me, send it to us. Hello at smithandsniff.com.

One of the four wheels is actually not circular, it's square, but it hasn't really bothered me,

and I've never had a puncture yet.

Entire glass house smashed off after driving under articulated lorries like in a film,

but it's never bothered me. Windscreen washer filled with synthetic oil, but it's really never

bothered me. Stinks of piss, but it's never bothered me. As soon as Matt said it, I was like,

oh God, that is so true that that happens a lot in used car ads. Radio jammed on maximum

volume playing racist rap music, but it's honestly never bothered me. I dare for it to

bother you. Come on, you weakling. Anyway, there we go. And hello to Matt and Steve on the Auto

Car Podcast, SSG's the pair of them. Sweet guys, lovely sweet guys. That's a podcast where you'll

actually learn stuff about cars on, I think. But yes, I've actually was going to talk about

something which involved real car news. Sorry, everybody. This thing about Jaguar Land Rover

on the brink of building Chinese cars in Britain, it seems. Did you know about this?

Yes, I did see this and I am puzzled by it. Do tell.

Well, because the story is that Jaguar Land Rover has a relationship already with Cherry

in China because they work together building cars in China, like building JLR cars.

And they got a good chunk of the market as a result, right?

I don't know, but I think China is JLR's second largest market. So US is first and then it's

China. So I'm sure they do all right there. I don't know what percentage of the sales there are

the ones that are made locally versus, you know, like Range Rover's shipped in from the UK. But

anyway, the story says, and this is all a rumor, like as far as I work out, no one's confirmed

this yet, but that Cherry could build cars in the UK using, and the quote in the article,

this was what I saw this on Auto Express, using spare capacity within Jag Land Rover's UK factories.

Now, what spare capacity? Because the factories are Solihull, which makes Range Rovers. So the

Range Rover and the Range Rover Sport and the Range Rover what? Sorry, Spon. They seem to be

selling pretty well. And the new Jaguar is going to be built there. They're refitting a section

of Solihull to build that as we speak. Now, I know there's not going to be a massively high

volume car, but there are other Jags to come. And I assume they might be built there too.

The Defender and the Discovery are built out into the facades. They don't count. But in the UK,

they've still got Hailwood, which is, again, being rebuilt, I think at the moment, to build the new

generation of EV cars. So there'll be a Velar replacement and then a new Evoke and this Defender

is supposed to be all electric. And I assume that will be built at Hailwood because that is also on

the EMA platform. And Hailwood is, I think, going to be the centre of building those cars.

So that leaves Castle Brom, which has been empty since they stopped making all Jags.

So is that what they're going to use if this story is correct? I assume so, because Castle

Brom had some modernising work done in, I think, ahead of building the electric XJ that was then

cancelled and which had a sister car. There was a Range Rover, an electric Range Rover that was

sort of sometimes called the Road Rover. Apparently a really nice looking car, but that was cancelled

as well. I assume that would have been built at Castle Brom alongside the XJ because they were

related. The Road Rover? Yeah, I don't know if that would have been what had been called.

Also known as a Rover? Yes, well, exactly. Well, it's a historic name because before the Range

Rover there was a project to make a car called the Road Rover, which was extremely ugly and

unpleasant and was cancelled shortly before production because they realised it probably

wasn't going to work. Oh dear. I don't know if the space at Castle Brom is what they're talking

about here because as far as I can work out at the moment, JLR don't use that. And maybe they

need it if all of their models already have a happy home somewhere else. But it's an odd one

because Cherry is not a big name in the UK at the moment. No, not at the moment. Is this part of a

push to make them much bigger and if they can build cars locally, it also ducks any possible

tariff shenanigans that may hobble them now or in the future.

Which is why as we record this, our Prime Minister is in Beijing right now, right?

Yes. Trying to do UK, China trade related deals.

So that's it. I'm still puzzled by it because I just don't know how

accurate it is. No one's confirmed it, but I assume that if it has any grain of truth to it,

it must involve the Castle Bromwich Factory because I don't think there are any other

Jagdhunter factories now. Brown's Lane's Longog.

What about if they've got a spare factory that they forgot about?

And they went, oh yeah, I hate it when that happens.

Yeah. You know, like Soviet era where they got people making stuff that nobody really wanted,

but then they just sort of walked off and left it. And then they came back 10 years later and

people were still churning out things. Oh no, we forgot to tell you to stop making alarm clocks.

And now we've got seven billion alarm clocks.

Yeah. Nobody actually needs them anymore. Really sorry about that.

We probably should have told you eight Christmases ago.

I'm keen to see where that goes.

Yes. Well, if it, I suppose, gives Jagdhunter over another income stream,

I mean, you know, they are making money again. And obviously,

they were hit hard by the cyber attack.

Massively. Can I just say a little owed to Tesla Model S?

Oh, because it's dead or dying.

They're calling time on it this summer. It's actually been around a long time.

I mean, the Model S is obviously the first mass produced car and my favorite.

And the X and the S are ending this summer and the S launched in 2012, which in EV terms is

100 years ago. Yes.

And it's bizarre whether you like Tesla's or whether you don't.

And when you look at the, well, all of them, but I'd say the S and the X in terms of packaging,

like passenger storage packaging, they are amazing for that sort of thing.

Well, you say that, but I sat in the back of your Model S the other day.

I've never been in the back of an S before and the headroom was terrible.

You think it was terrible?

Well, I couldn't sit up straight. I mean, I'm six foot three,

so I appreciate that if you're less tall than that, it may be okay.

Oh, yeah, you've got more hair than me. I've just realized.

I do need a haircut.

No, my head was up against the roof. I had to slouch a bit and I was,

well, this is a big car and that's disappointing. And I've not noticed this before and I've sat

in the back of Model 3s because they're used as taxis quite a lot and they're fine.

Albeit, they have a crossbeam between the front and rear in the roof and it's a glass roof.

But with the crossbeam and then where the glass roof ends at the back,

the Model 3, it does feel if you're tall, like your head is sort of slightly up in a dome in the

roof. And the Y is fine because it's one big piece of glass from the rear and they've got

loads of headroom. When you sit in the back of cars, do you prefer driver's side or passenger side?

Passenger side.

Okay, I'm going to Stanley knife out some of the padding of the squab

on my Model S. I'll do it straight after this podcast. I'll do it in the next 30 minutes.

Great to you. Thanks.

I'm going to Stanley knife an inch out, okay, frisbee it into the bin,

and then I'll take a picture, send it to you. And then when I advertise the car at some point

in the future, I'll say it's never bothered me, but there is a Stanley knife down a huge square

of foam coming out of the back seat. Never bothered me. Yeah, it's on the passenger side.

Who would voluntarily sit behind the driver in the back seat rather than behind the passenger seat?

I don't know. That's a good question. I wouldn't.

Because no, I want to see what the driver's doing and just somehow I don't know. It doesn't work.

I want to have eyes on the steering wheel somehow.

Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. I would want the same, I have to say.

Yeah, so yeah, the old S is coming to a close and it's still, I'm just trying to think, yeah,

the Plaid version with over a thousand horses is still, it's probably the fastest four-door

car I've driven, quickest, fastest. There is a bit of a contention. What is quickest,

what is fastest? I do pick people up on this. But yeah, it's definitely the quickest.

So the reason for Model S and Model X production ending this year is, according to Elon Musk,

because they need the factory to build their humanoid robots. Obviously, that's complete

horseshit. Like a lot of what he says, he's just trying to make sure that the stock price of his

company keeps going up. The real reason, obviously, it must be because 97% of all Tesla sales last

year were Model 3 and Model Y. So the Model S and the Model X are almost not wanted by anyone and

it can't be economical to keep building them, I would assume, at any scale. So it just makes

sense to wind them down. But the idea that the last Model X or Model S will roll off the line

in California and immediately a load of biddy, biddy, biddy, biddy robots will come down is

absolutely bollocks. Well, I will go along with that. I think what's bizarre is you could just

admit that both those cars, S and X, over their time have been hugely, not just pivotal, but also,

mass produced, mass sellers, mass popular cars. There's nothing wrong with saying,

hey, we've been making these for a really long time now. It's just time to discontinue them,

full stop. But it is a mark of how amateurish Tesla is as a car company. As regular listeners

will know, I currently have a Tesla Model Y and I think in many, many ways it is an excellent car,

thanks to a lot of very clever engineers and uncredited folk working at the Tesla Automotive

department. It is a very useful car. You sense the benefits of it being designed as an EV from

the ground up because they make great use of all the space. It doesn't have to

accommodate an internal combustion engine in other forms. So, you know, it's got that good

storage thing under the front, loads of storage places in the interior and a flat floor because

there's no need to think about where a prop shaft might have to go on a version with a petrol engine.

And then a massive boot with a huge well underneath it as well. So, it's a really practical car for

its size. It drives quite nicely. I think most of the tech is, works as well as anything I've

driven. There's a few shitty decisions like the wiper controls. The other day I suddenly

realized I've never used the rear fog lights in that car because you rarely do, do you? But

I suddenly realized to get to them while you're driving is a multiple press thing and I cannot

understand how that has been allowed. It's multiple press. You have to go into the lights menu. So,

you have to press the little car icon to bring up the general menu then to lights and then I think

you sort of flick down. It's just, yeah, considering that's kind of safety critical and you're going

to be in a stressful driving environment. If it's so foggy, you need your bright rear fog. Yes,

not a good idea, is it? They should not be in any way hidden. That to me is just baffling and I wonder

whether it's because... Yeah, that's the same as my Model S actually, which is what just over a decade

old now or so. Stupid, just stupid. And the wipers thing. But apart from that, I'd say

that tech integration and the effectiveness of it and the way in which your phone as a key

works is superb. It is in many ways a very useful car. Ours is on, it's got a year left on its lease

or just less. And I honestly don't know what we'll replace it with because the way that that car

drives, I think it would be better if the steering was a little bit slower. It's kind of

inexplicably quick for a family car and it doesn't need to be. And the ride just needs to be a bit

softer. And on the facelifted Model Y, they've made the steering slower and the ride softer and

it's like, well, there you go. If that's as good as it sounds, then it's going to be a genuinely

good car. But I don't want to have another one because I think musks are pricks. So I'm already

thinking what to replace it with. Plus the charging now, like, I mean, bloody hell. Well,

it's so much better than anything else. It's irritating. Well, luckily you can use that with

non-Tesliers, can't you? It's true. But again, I bet the integration is just not quite as slick.

Just the fact that you just pull up, plug in and fuck off for a bit, go and have a wee and a coffee,

and it's just all taken care of is having driven lots of other EVs. I just know that

nothing else works as well. I think Elon should just suddenly go, right, we're saying goodbye to

these really successful cars that I'm immensely proud of, the S and the X. And I've had to think

about what I'm going to do. And I'm going to start producing Lotus Elyse's. I've just decided it's a

really cool idea. Lotus are having a few problems. I've got some cash. What the hell? My car life

started with modified Lotai. I'm just going to start making Lotus's. So that's what he's going to do.

I think it'd be a great idea. And that offsets his electric cardam with a little bit of piston.

Where's he getting his engines from?

There's good questions in negotiations right now, Richard.

The Rover K series again.

He might use some of his vast engineering workforce to take the guts of the K series

and rework it so that it's much more reliable, much, much more efficient,

and faster, more powerful than ever before. And maybe just shrink the whole design down so it's,

I don't know, 600 cc or something. What was the size of the V16? Is it the BRM V16?

Oh, yes. Yeah, yeah.

The capacity was tiny, wasn't it? The overall engine capacity, like a lot of old F1 cars or

pre-F1. Yeah, was it like a 1.6 or something?

Yeah. Yeah, I think it was.

It's tiny. Each cylinder's like a little thimble. But also, there's a V16 coming back because

the Bugatti Tourbillon's got one in it.

Oh, that's right. The third billion. That's right.

So I'm really fascinated by those. So I think that's what you should do. It should come back with a,

I think he, oh, he'll get the rights from Mazda to bring back the tiny V6.

Okay.

And he says, look, we're selling loads of electric cars, but I just,

I want to do some sort of interesting piston thing. So that's what we're going to do.

We're going to bring back a V6 of 900 cc.

I'm sure that if he thought it would help to boost his share price, he would say any old

shit, as indeed he does. Bringing back lotuses. Yeah. So the stock market is incredibly gullible,

isn't it? Because as long as a company appears to be growing still, they'll just still assume

that it should be revered. But anyway, Tesla's profits are down 24% as well, incidentally.

So this is probably why Musk has decided to say something ridiculous about robots.

Imagine if he bought all days and onions motor vehicles. That would be good, wouldn't it?

This is probably why we don't run all days and onions and Elon's. Yeah. We got sent a really

lovely old all days and onions cutting from a paper by David Gilley, who is a serial in his

back then, Rich. Did you know that if you wanted a five-seater torpedo model? How much?

It's 335 guineas. I'm not entirely clear on what a guinea is in modern money, but that sounds like

a lot. It's sort of Victorian Bitcoin, isn't it? Speaking of scams. Okay, right. This time to wrap

this up. So let's do that before we go of three things to tell you. The first one is that Johnny's

engaged in a strange project to force the former lead singer of Merlion to create a global computer

information and communication network under the working title Fishnet. If that's not to

There is, of course, the late break show, which has got things on it.

Yeah, yeah. Well, like I said, there's a car cake. Well, there's two things. There's my

road drive of the Kia PV5 MPV, which is also a van. So it's their first modern-day van,

all-electric, and crucially, as an MPV, it's half the price of an ID buzz. It might be even

more than half price. So it's fundamentally the same, really, in terms of size and range

and warranties, but it's half, it's £30,000 cheaper than a Volkswagen ID buzz. So I take

that for a drive. That video's out. But also, I do a car cave of a sweet, sweet guy in Devon

called Alan. Well, he won a Jurimat garage flooring competition that Jurimat ran, our sponsors.

And he is decked out, or he's going to be decking out his garage in spring. And I thought, I'd go

and have a look at it first, because he's got not loads of cars, he's got like five, six cars,

but he's got very interesting car taste. He's got everything, you know, a DeLorean and a Fiat

barquetta. And the rarest car he's got, a Fiat Punto convertible.

Bloody hell. Apparently, there's 14 left in the UK.

Mark 1, this is. Good. All right. Second thing got to do is that I have various books out. I was

looking the other day, and I noticed that a boring car Trivia 4 hasn't sold anywhere close to the

sales of the other ones. So, could you go and buy a boring car Trivia 4, please,

either from our merchandise shop at Smith & Sniff.com or from Amazon. But yes, would it help if I did

an Elon Musk and told you that every copy of a boring car Trivia 4 will at some point in the

future come with a free robot. So, just buy it now and we'll sort it out later. And I'm sure

that's all fine. Oh, I've got a piece of extra trivia. Francis Delacour, the very, very talented

Helmsman driver. I've noticed that he looks a lot like a guy in my local village that was a

painter and decorator, that was a serial womanizer. I feel like this is not a piece of trivia so much,

it's just a local tittle-tattle. No, this is trivia. I'm going to call this, it's a fact.

Well, it's better than what I got. So, there we go. Let's call it there. We'll be back on Friday,

answering more questions and we'll have a regular show on Monday. Until then, goodbye.

Bye.

But we were told to ask for this.

Oh, sorry, too many JPSs.

But it's never bothered me

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