The Mazda MX-5, or Miata, is a small sports car that’s really fun to drive. The RF version has a roof that can open and close, so you can enjoy the sunshine or keep it covered. People talk about it because it's known for being a great car for driving enthusiasts without costing too much.
The Mazda MX-5 Miata is a small sports car that is fun to drive. The 2025 version is the latest model and is known for being light and easy to handle, making it great for driving enthusiasts.
The Buick Grand National is a fast car from the 1980s that looks pretty simple but can really zoom. It has a special engine that makes it powerful, which surprised a lot of people back then. It's talked about because it’s a cool example of a car that doesn’t look flashy but can really perform well.
Overspray is when paint accidentally gets on things that you didn't want to paint. It can make a mess and annoy your neighbors if you're painting outside.
Metallic paint is a type of car paint that has tiny pieces of metal in it, making it shiny. If dust or bugs get in it while it's drying, they can show up more than they would in regular paint.
Urethane paint is a strong type of paint used on cars that lasts a long time. It needs to be applied at the right temperature to work well, or it won't dry properly.
SEMA is a big car show in Las Vegas where people show off customized cars and aftermarket parts. It's a place for car lovers to see the latest trends and innovations.
The Dodge Road Runner is a classic car from the muscle car era, known for being fast and powerful. It has a fun cartoon character as its logo, which makes it stand out. People talk about it because it represents a cool time in car history when speed and style were really important.
Bumpers are the parts at the front and back of a car that help protect it in case of a crash. They also make the car look nicer.
Car
Oldsmobile Convertible
The 1968 Oldsmobile Convertible is a classic car that can be recognized by its open-top design. It's a symbol of American automotive culture from the late 1960s.
Remanufactured kits are parts that have been rebuilt or restored to work like new again. They're often used in older cars to replace worn-out pieces while keeping the car looking original.
Reproduction parts are new pieces made to look and work like the original parts of a car. They help keep older cars looking and functioning like they did when they were first made.
GM stands for General Motors, a big company that makes many different car brands. They are known for their classic cars and parts that help restore them.
An LS engine is a type of V8 engine made by General Motors. It's popular because it's powerful and reliable, making it a favorite for many car enthusiasts.
The Gen 6 vehicle is an older type of race car used in NASCAR before the new models were introduced. It was designed to be safer and faster than earlier cars.
A carburetor is a part of an engine that helps mix fuel and air so the engine can run. Some older cars and racing cars still use them instead of newer fuel injection systems.
Daytona is a well-known racetrack in Florida where many exciting car races happen, including the big Daytona 500 race. It's famous for fast cars and thrilling competitions.
Power to weight ratio tells you how much power a car has compared to how heavy it is. If a car is lighter but has a strong engine, it usually goes faster and handles better.
A road course racetrack is a place where cars can race on a track with lots of turns and straight sections. It's different from an oval track and is used for testing handling and speed.
The Toyota GR86 is a small sports car that is fun to drive and has a rear-wheel-drive setup, which means the back wheels get the power from the engine.
The Mazda 3 is a small car that comes in two shapes: a sedan (which has a trunk) and a hatchback (which has a back that opens up for more space). It's popular because it looks good, drives well, and is good on gas. People like to talk about it because it's a smart choice for a daily driver.
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Welcome to another in-wheel-time podcast. The 30-minutes version of the in-wheel-tune car. I guess we'll put that item away if you remember correctly. You didn't need it. I made a big mistake, didn't I? I can't let it down. I'm always reminded of these mistakes that I make, but whatever. Hello and good morning everybody and welcome to the in-wheel-time car talk. Shut up, shut up. In-wheel-time car talk.
Talk show, it is Saturday, September 27th, 2025. Glad you could join us today and we welcome you. Coming up, Painthouse's Randy Bortjeding, talking about his journey to become a successful paint engineer and mixologist. And those are my words today. Yeah. I'm going to give him a minute. Sure. Jeff has this week's motor minute. I'll also give you my thoughts on driving the 2025 Mazda MX-5 Miata. All of that more coming up in this segment of the in-wheel-time car talk show.
With Mike out of this world Mars, who if you're watching on video, you can see him over there on the right hand side of the screen. Is he frozen again? Yeah. Yeah, he is. And then over on the left hand side, live and in living color. There he is. Me and my pocket Jeff. And then they're at the bottom of the screen. Here he is, ladies and gentlemen. Our man of the hour, Randy Bortjeding. Painthouse. And good to see you, Randy. Thanks for joining us today. And I'm not going to get sidetracked today because the only reason that we had you back so soon is because
I, I got Armstrong forgot that we really originally wanted to talk to you about your history, your story, how you got into the paint business. How did that come about? It sounds cliche and kind of silly, but starting building models as a kid, you know, since seven or eight, nine years old, I don't know, but I always enjoyed painting them.
And coming up with interesting colors out of the old testers, spray cans to make them look interesting and enter a model contest and color out of springs when I was probably, I don't know, eight or nine years old, got a first place. And maybe that's where it happened. I don't know, but it's just been an evolution of that beginning.
Now, so we school hard knocks, if you will. So let me ask you this. Well, Mr. Mars fiddles with our picture quality here. I wanted to know, when you started painting cars, at least for me, when I was painting cars, they had little bit of spray cans that you could use to paint the car with. Is that what you used?
Yeah, absolutely. There are salts. Yeah. And back then, they even had a little little add on thing you could buy that was kind of a pistol grip. Yes.
Kind of felt like you were spraying with a spray. It was right. It was silly and plastic, but when you're nine years old, it felt cool.
Yeah. And you made sure that you didn't have, you know, you didn't do it in a dirty garage floor or something like that to get stuff in the paint.
Yeah, exactly. So let's bring it up to kind of the present day when you actually got into a real honest to God paint booth.
Well, certainly a different environment. And my first booth was homemade. It actually did pretty good work. We took cars to the Grand National Roaster Show that were painted in a homemade paint booth.
So don't feel like you can't accomplish something just literally in your garage or your backyard because you don't have a $50 or $100,000 box to put things in.
Yes. Now they have now they have those you can buy and set them up in your backyard. They're inflatable. Oh, yeah, all that stuff.
I've thought about that becoming this half gun slash booth will travel set up with one of those temporary inflatable booths. They're pretty fascinating.
When you started the whole paint booth stuff, what did you use for your first paint booth to call it a booth?
It was PVC pipe and plastic sheeting and a couple of those little cheap box fans to pull air through the structure.
Did you use a filter with the fans or no? Well, I figured that out that I needed air going in because otherwise you just sucked the thing closed.
Yes, air conditioning filters. It was truly a homemade thing and it was some trial and error. It worked.
I find all of that fascinating. I see some of that on television today where camera was the garage show that you several of them where they don't really have a real paint booth and they can't get the car into a paint booth.
So they build one and it's not really that big a deal with today's technology. Like you said, plastic pipes and some some cellophane, if you will.
Yeah, wraps on that. Yeah, right, right. It's yeah, it's not that big of a deal. What's the importance of that? Why can't you just paint it out underneath the tree?
Well, I would say two reasons. Number one is you don't want all the over spray going everywhere. It's your neighbors probably aren't going to like it and it tends to land on things and not want to come off.
And number two would be cleanliness of the paint job. You don't want. You want to keep as many things out of the film as you can. Bugs, dirt, leaves, teradactyls, whatever.
It's keeping the paint job clean. A lot of these finishes are very sensitive to that. Metallics and pearls. Any time you get something that lands in the paint, they tend to amplify themselves and you see them bigger than they actually are.
So the cleaner the paint job, the better. There's also temperature regulation when you do that too. You can't paint it too cold or paint it too hot. It's got to be like the the Goldilocks.
True. In the world of urethane paint, which is what I live in, it's a 50 degrees to however hot it is window, but you get under 55 or 50 degrees.
And a lot of these and actually all of them as far as I know, these catalyzed products, the clear coats, the primers, and now even the base coats, they won't dry. They won't catalyze. They won't do their voodoo and witchcraft.
What do you wind up with a sticky paint job after it's allegedly dry?
Or you end up with a half dried film that never hardens fully and it's just kind of mushy.
And in theory, it doesn't continue drying later. It just stays locked in that state and now you got a problem.
Wow. That's a major problem. I guess the only way to steer that is to remove all of that and start all over.
Yeah, I've had to. I've learned that lesson among others.
So let's talk about color because obviously you have somehow perfected the art and that it is of coming up with your own unique colors, not only for the cars that you paint, but for other people to use in their paint booths.
How did that come about?
It was truly through a customer that had a color on an OEM vehicle.
He said, I like it, but I want to change this about it. So you add and you subtract.
You take this thing out, maybe you put a different thing in.
And next thing you know, you've got a custom color.
The important part is to document what you did. So it's repeatable down the road and it started with one blue pearl and has evolved into now.
I probably have, I don't know, 50 or so repeatable colors that.
But for the most part, I'd say 80% of what colors we sell are probably four of our mixes, reds and blues.
There are some reason those are the most popular.
That's interesting. Do you find that guys that are looking for a custom color, do they ever use new style factory colors?
Randy, I really like this silver that they've come out with this on the Corvette.
But can you start there and let's customize it a little bit? Do you do that?
I have, yes sir. We're doing one for 34 Plymouth right now where the art that was drawn, the rendering features two,
either Honda or Toyota colors, kind of a sage green and a darker green, very pretty two tone.
But there were things he wanted me to change in those two colors, which I did.
And he gets his own personal color, but they were based off of an OEM starting point.
Yeah. Do you name it after the customer that's requesting it or you just come up with a name like a pen?
It depends. There's times when I personalize it for the customer.
Other times it's my quirky sense of humor. Most times it's probably that.
Yeah. I don't know. I find you know you have a sense of humor because you keep appearing on this show.
Or my cousins for punishment, one or the other. Yeah.
So these model cars that you built growing up. Did any of you take any of those to SEMA?
The big model cars. The big one. The big cars. Yes, we take them to SEMA all the time.
We got one that we're about to pick up from a poultry later today actually.
MTI up in college station has done a beautiful job on the 68 road runner.
It's a I'm going to call it a hot pink. The name for it is Ransbury.
You know, because you can get away with that with a mopar that had pinks and greens and bright colors purples that no other manufacturer seemed to get away with.
So I came up with a very loud color and put it on this road runner and hopefully it gets people's attention. We'll see.
Now the SEMA that I am familiar with happens in October and then this is you're talking about taking it coming up next month.
Correct. And you're just now gathering it up from the upholsterer.
Right. But in this case, in this case, the upholsterer was about the last thing.
Okay. There's a few items that still need to go in the car, front rear bumpers, some lower trim panels, a general just overall clean up of the paint.
Well, for the most part, I'd say right now after a poultry, it's 95% done.
Cool. Now, that doesn't mean we won't have challenges. And this last three and a half weeks won't be stressful.
But I feel like I only want to say it outside. I am not ahead of the curve. I'm not saying it.
There. I did not say it.
Okay. Yes. And we totally get that. I know my dear friend Bill Sites helped me with my first car show after a custom paint job in the 77 Corvette.
And I had the thing disassembled as far as I could get it. And Bill helped me put it back together. And of course, you know, two nights before we were going to do the move in, it was still on jack stands.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I know that you're familiar with that. And it was. I am. Yeah. It was a rush. It was nervous. Nelly. And I somehow, Bill and I somehow got that car ready.
I had completely done the interior in it. And I did get the first place on it. It's called use in caffeine.
Pretty much. Yeah. That's exactly right. And late nights.
And I got the caffeine I've run out of the youth. Yeah. Well, haven't we all did you have to go there? I did.
But so you have a gun to take it out there yourself with your truck and and and hauler. Now the hauler is only a one car hauler.
Correct. It's 40 feet long. Holes holds one car, but it gives me some extra room. We've got a bathroom in it. It's a ATC trailer.
And I've had smaller trailers. Yeah, they're a little easier to maneuver. But I like having some room to move around. If I need to haul some extra stuff, it's not so cramped.
Yeah. Got it. Let's talk briefly here about what you got in the shop. Obviously that's a good looking oldsmobile behind you convertible.
Sixty eight. What year is that? Sixty eight. It's on a art Morrison chassis has a retro decorated LS three, but it looks like an oldsmobile engine.
It's shot wheels. It's about to go to a poultry next week, but it's going to get a more action original poultry that they did not want to go the full customer out.
So this car will have a much more traditional look and feel about it, but still drive like a modern hot rod.
That's the best. Now when you do this, you don't you don't go outside an outside source to do like, you know, remanufactured door cards and stuff like that.
We do. In this case, there are good, you know, repop or remanufactured kits out there, particularly in the GM and forward world, where you can get a very nice reproduction of the original and it's quality stuff.
And you can find the actual a poll street that goes on the seats and the other trim in there that matches that color.
They've got matches for the original. It's it's a it's a pretty well fleshed out industry.
In that there's some good products out there. If you want to stock interior. Yeah.
And there's some junk too. You just got to know which is which. Right.
Did the Chinese make that? I don't think so. I think it's actually made here. Thank God. Yeah, exactly.
A big fan of that. Yeah. So when will the old be done?
I'd say late this year. You know, we'll have it up and running. We just got under its own power last week.
So we're in the test driving and working out the bugs phases. Right now. Did you do the engine yourself?
We didn't build the engine. We installed it and we did all did wiring via a friend of mine. He's a mobile.
Electronic sky and he's just a wizard with this stuff. Mike swan. He's phenomenal.
That's a beautiful job. Looks like an aircraft mechanic laid it all out.
And it makes it easy to service, which is one of the things I'm a stickler on.
Well, I'm curious as to the look that you achieved the stock look under the hood with an LS engine.
I got to assume that there are parts out there that you can get that if you want. I'll list the hood here real quick and show you.
Yeah. I'd love to see that.
Because I'm all about that. The reliability of an LS engine, but also have the have the stock look of the original.
Yeah. Don't scratch the paint. I know. All right. Here we go. I'm going to grab the camera.
I'm trying to look at it while I'm showing you, but oh my gosh. Yeah.
So it's got the original old mobile gold paint crossover intake.
Yeah. It's got headers on it. And now we're the those those valve covers.
They look like the old Corvette valve covers that I used to have.
They're a little stout, aren't they?
They are the they're often house brand. So it's a traditional hot rod valve cover that I don't know.
It just look kind of cool. A little decorated, but not not too fancy. It's not all chromed out. It looks it looks like old mobile might have put that there.
Does it have often houses are on it on the valve cover? Yes, it does.
Yeah. Yeah. See not a lot of not a lot of overdone bill it because a lot of folks have a lot of bill it on there. And it looks like trash being that they were sticking with a more traditional certainly interior.
I didn't want to go off the reservation on this one. So we kept it very OEM stock looking the only thing it's missing is a distributor and if you're not looking for that, you'll never know.
Now did this car actually have a hood blanket underneath there?
It would have, but we just we just paint it and get this under there. Just a matte finish. Just clean it up.
Ah, matte finish. So it is a little bit different, but it's clean.
Yeah. Yeah. We didn't smooth it. We didn't make a bunch of panels to hide something. It is what it is. You just try and you'll go level up if that's the right way to.
I'm real attracted to that look. That's my kind of stuff right there. Yes, sir. Right. Right.
Well, how much? Yeah, very cool. We're very impressed and best of luck to you at SEMA this year. You know, you don't want to hear from us before you take that track out there.
Well, thanks, fellas. Yeah, thank you very much. It's always a pleasure to talk to you. Thanks for the history, the story, and we love you, man, and take care of yourself.
Take care, guys. Thank you. Thank you for letting me on. Yeah. Thank you. Bye, bye.
Mr. Morris is going to say goodbye to Randy. I think he just did. He just did. And he's going to hopefully put himself back up in that.
I think maybe he's still working on some technical issues. Is he? I think so.
Okay. Well, that's what I was. Well, that's the case that we're going to be able to play the commercials.
If he said his end, he can do that. I know. Well, we can't. Okay. I don't have any control over that. Do you want to pod me down and I'll go get that device?
Yeah, that'd be great. Okay. Do that. Okay.
Wanted to remind you that just ahead, we're going to have a review of Toyota's new Mazda MX-5 Miata anniversary edition. And we'll also have Jeff's motor minute when the in-wheel time car talk show continues after this break. Stay with us.
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What the heck?
Something to wake you up there early in the morning.
How about you, live and direct, they're not frozen.
Mr. Marsa, did you finally figure out why you were freezing up there?
Well, no, but I did contact Mr. Ainsley, and he pointed me in a direction, and we went that way, and we're going to find out what happened now.
And you still showed up. I'll be nervous.
There is that. Still made it.
I'm going to invite everybody to join us for the live in-wheel time car talk show every Saturday, 10 to noon, central time on inwheeltime.com, YouTube, and Facebook.
Get one today. It's free.
And you get your in-wheel time, what they call that, the device, never mind, moving on.
Okay, well, whatever, I don't know where you're talking about this.
But I'm sure it was good, whatever it was.
Well, I'm trying to get some other stuff working here.
Okay.
For instance, the show open.
It's in that computer.
But I need to get that.
I'm going to do this while you're doing that.
I do.
That's what I was going to talk about my motor minute here with the grandioso introduction.
NASCAR is rumored to increase horsepower to 750 in the next gen cars in 2026.
Check this out.
NASCAR introduced the next generation car in 2022 season, and the horsepower changed comparatively to the Gen 6 vehicle instead of 550 horsepower and 750 horsepower, depending on the package and the track.
The next gen car is going to have 670 horsepower every week, standard.
NASCAR drivers have pushed for more horsepower, and it seems they might just get their wish come true.
According to Brad Keselowski, evidently he's a spokesman, he was on a podcast with Corey LaJoy.
NASCAR intends to increase the horsepower in the next gen to roughly 740 to 750 for the 26 season.
That's a lot, which I had it.
It looks like NASCAR is going to change the rules next year where they likely the 740 to 750 horsepower because you know right now technically they're at 670, but realistically they're about 685 to 690.
So there's a little tweaking, there's a little cheat going on.
NASCAR will increase the size of the spacer, which is good.
We get a lot of horsepower too.
And the next gen cars size of the spacer, you mean underneath the carburetor?
Right, but I didn't I thought that they were fuel injected.
Is it still a carburetor?
No, it's a fuel injected, but there's still spacer elements involved in that carburetor, how they have that brought in.
So we'll see, I don't know either, but it's one of the most controversial topics of NASCAR over the last few years is on track products is falling short compared to a few seasons back in 2022.
So they're tweaking it. They're always trying to do something.
It's they're always there's nobody in the stands now.
So there's a problem there.
There is and it's how they market themselves.
Well, it's how they market themselves and I will tell you that I think that the majority of the fans have gotten older.
They don't want to go to the race track and I don't think that they really like the new formatting.
No, no, all of that all of what you said is true in a lot of respects to a lot of fans.
I know that absolutely.
At least I heard rumors that the Dodgers coming back.
That's a good thing.
Well, that's hopefully that will bring more seats, you know, to be filled.
I don't know.
You never know.
Yeah, I don't know, but they've got other issues besides horsepower.
They do.
And that's getting butts in the stands.
Would you go if you had free tickets to go to Texas Motor Speedway up before or would you go?
I probably would.
If I had free tickets.
Yeah.
You know, the tickets nowadays are like anywhere from 50 to several hundred dollars depending where you go.
But it's not just the ticket price.
It is getting there.
You got lodging.
You got a lot of walk in.
You got a lot of, you know, stuff going on.
So yeah, I would go.
I mean, I've been to Texas Motor Speedway a dozen times.
Been to Kansas.
They're racing in Kansas.
Been there several times.
I've been to Talladega.
Yeah.
Love Talladega.
Went to the final in homestead, Florida.
The Grand finale for NASCAR a few years ago.
I've been to Texas and I've been to Charlotte.
I've actually been to Daytona.
But there wasn't a race there.
I took a tour.
Yeah.
Because Amy was going to school right there across the track.
The other side of the tracks on the other side of the tracks.
That's it.
All right.
So let's do this hour's car.
Are you showing?
Mm-hmm.
Had a chance to drive the 2025 Mazda MX-5 Miata.
Final assembly location.
Hiroshima, Japan.
Yes.
Home of the atomic bomb.
Available trim levels come in sport, club, grand touring,
and 35th anniversary edition.
If you're watching, what you're seeing there is the 35th anniversary edition car.
This is a two-seater.
It's classified as a two-seater.
And exterior changes from last model year.
Well, it is part of the fourth generation that was originally introduced in 2016.
This is the best looking Mazda MX-5 Miata that has ever been in existence as far as I'm concerned.
I love the peaks on the fender wells up front.
Notice how it's almost a Corvette-like look up there.
Long hood, short deck, classic sports car shape.
Crisp top of the front fender, low to the ground grille,
bulging rear fenders to carry the rubber back there.
Yes, sure.
Unique tail lights fit its unique overall design.
What I liked about it, everything.
I love the fact that the shape of it, including the grille, all proportionate.
Nothing is overdone.
But what is there is really outstanding, I think, interior highlights.
Love your passenger because it's very tight confines on the inside.
And six footers, beware, oh boy.
Modern infotainment system and instrument cluster.
Clean look dash design with no passenger side glove box.
The tiny storage area is behind and between the two seats.
It's interesting.
You can't actually look in there if you're driving.
You just got to kind of feel around in there and hopefully remember where you put whatever it is that you put in.
Trunk room is tiny.
One overnight bag, that is all.
What I liked about it, the easy to use top.
It's a one click thing for the top.
And you put it down manually right behind you.
And the same thing to put it up.
There's no electric top or nothing like that.
It's manual, but it works so well, it's unbelievable.
Nice.
The manual shifter that you see there, it is butter.
It works like butter.
I have never driven a car with a shifter like that.
It's so smooth, unbelievable.
What could use improvement?
Well, it is what it is, it's tiny.
I remember when they came out with this car,
and they sent all the press out there to debut the car.
And everything about it.
There is a name that they used, and it's a Japanese name.
I can't remember what it is.
For instance, it's like the steering wheel.
Where the steering wheel is placed in the car.
It's a dead center, in front of the driver.
If you will notice your car.
Offset.
Offset.
The steering wheel is a little bit offset, one way or the other.
To accommodate the mechanics underneath the hood.
It's a bit of trivia.
Two-liter four-cylinder engine turns out 181 horsepower,
151 pound feet of torque.
But let me tell you this.
That is all about the fact, power to weight ratio.
It car weighs nothing.
And 181 horsepower, it feels like it's got a great big block,
Chevy 400 horsepower motor.
Because you're in a small environment and you're loaded the ground.
And the car doesn't weigh any.
Yeah.
Toe rating?
No.
Toe rating?
It hauls butt.
How about that?
Manufacturers set up as far as miles per gallon is concerned.
26 city 34 highway for combined at 29.
I got 34.5 miles per gallon over 453.1 miles.
And I liked about it.
Power to weight ratio is awesome.
What could use improvement?
This is a purpose-built sports car that can cut a rug
around a road course racetrack.
And if you want to go and have some real fun,
get yourself one of these.
What I liked about it, handling on this thing is awesome.
What could use improvement?
It may be a bit too stiff for those looking for a highway cruiser
because that it is not.
It will cruise the highway.
There's no doubt about it.
But the ride, well, it's a sport car ride.
Here's the pricing.
Base trim price is $37.485.
Price is tested.
$37.485.
Now, I don't know what happened to the $50 there.
Just by looking at it, I guess they want you to say,
I like the car.
Base model price.
You can get in one of these for $29.530.
I like it.
Yeah.
So here are the competitors.
The Toyota GR86 starts at $30.400.
It's cousin.
The Subaru BRZ starts at $33.210.
Well, the other competitor, if you want to call it that,
the Mini Cooper is $28,950.
That's my review of the 2025 Mazda MX-5 Miata.
Love the car.
As far as a six footer person is concerned, it's a little tight.
I was going to say, so when you go to a amusement park,
you have to be taller than this line.
That's far.
Yeah.
And with the car, if you're taller than this line,
you can't drive it.
Yeah.
Well, I will tell you this.
So I have my buddy that I work with.
Matt.
Matt got in it.
Matt is a little heavier set than I am.
Okay.
By golly, he could fit.
Now, his knees did touch the dashboard, but he could make it work.
So I'm telling you, if you really want it, for no other reason,
go out, take a look at it.
I think that you'll really have a good time looking at the car
if you don't want to buy it.
You're going to step up from that.
It would be what the Mazda 3.
To be a little bit larger.
Yeah.
I guess.
But if you lose the whole two wheel thing though,
when you do that.
Yeah.
Hey, if you'd like to get in touch with us,
send us an email.
The address here is info at inwheeltime.com.
We're back after this quick break.
Steve was.
You own a car you love.
Well, why not let Gulf Coast Auto Shield protect it?
Houstonian John Gray invites you to his state of the art facility
to introduce you to his specialist team of auto enthusiasts.
We promise you'll be impressed.
Whether you're looking to massage your original paint
to a like-new appearance, apply a ceramic coating,
install a paint protection film,
nano ceramic window tent, or a new windshield protection
called ExoShield.
Gulf Coast Auto Shield is where Houston's car people go.
Curved your wheels?
Instead of buying new one, I'd have them repaired.
How about a professionally installed radar detector?
Gulf Coast Auto Shield does that, too.
Get a peek inside the shop
and look at the services offered by getting online
and heading to GCautoshield.com.
Better yet, stop by their facility
at 11275 South Sam Houston Toolway,
just south of the southwest freeway.
And get a personal tour.
Gulf Coast Auto Shield is your place to go for all things exterior.
Call them today, 832-930-5655,
or GCautoshield.com.
Rev up your engines as time to roll back in style
at the back to the past car show.
Join the Spring Branch Senior High School Foundation
Saturday, October 18th at Cornerstone Academy,
1916 Westview Drive in Houston.
Classic cars, trucks and motorcycles,
family fun, food, music, and memories.
There's something for everyone,
proceeds benefit local students and programs.
Don't miss the shine, the chrome, and the nostalgia.
10-2 Saturday, October 18th, back to the past car show.
Springbranch bears dot com slash car show
for more information.
In real time, we'll be there, too.
That's it for this podcast episode of
The In-Wheel Time Car Show.
I'm Don Armstrong.
Inviting you to join us for our live show every Saturday morning
on Facebook, YouTube, Twitch, and our In-Wheel Time.com website.
Podcasts are available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify,
Stitcher, I Heart Podcasts, Podcast Addict,
Tune in Pandora and Amazon Music.
Keep listening, and we'll see you soon.
About this episode
Randy Borchiding from Painthouse shares his fascinating journey into the world of automotive paint, starting from childhood model building to becoming a successful paint engineer. He discusses the evolution of his craft, the importance of a clean painting environment, and the art of creating custom colors. The conversation also touches on the challenges of painting cars, the significance of temperature control, and his latest projects, including a unique 1968 Oldsmobile. Listeners will gain insights into the intricacies of car painting and the creativity involved in color mixing.
Randy Borchiding's colorful journey from model car enthusiast to custom paint specialist unfolds with charm and practical wisdom. What started with Testors spray cans and a childhood model contest victory evolved into a full-fledged career creating custom colors for show-stopping vehicles.
Randy pulls back the curtain on his early days, revealing how he built his first professional paint booth using nothing more than PVC pipes, plastic sheeting, and box fans with air conditioning filters. "Don't feel like you can't accomplish something just literally in your garage because you don't have a $50,000 box," he encourages, sharing how cars painted in this humble setup went on to compete at prestigious shows like the Grand National Roaster Show.
The science behind the art proves fascinating as Randy explains the critical role of temperature in modern urethane painting. Working in environments below 50 degrees can leave paint jobs permanently sticky or mushy – a costly lesson he learned firsthand. His process for creating custom colors evolved organically from customer requests to modify OEM shades, resulting in approximately 50 signature colors that he can reproduce consistently.
Currently preparing a hot pink 1968 Roadrunner (aptly named "Ransberry") for the upcoming SEMA show, Randy shares the pressure and timeline of readying show cars for major events. His other project, a 1968 Oldsmobile convertible, demonstrates his versatility – maintaining period-correct aesthetics while incorporating modern performance with an LS3 engine disguised to look like an original Oldsmobile powerplant.
The episode also features Jeff's Motor Minute discussing NASCAR's potential horsepower increase to 750 for the 2026 season, followed by Don's enthusiastic review of the 2025 Mazda MX5 Miata Anniversary Edition. Despite having just 181 horsepower, the Miata's exceptional power-to-weight ratio delivers thrilling performance with remarkable efficiency.
Subscribe to the In Wheel Time Car Talk Show for more automotive insights, expert interviews, and honest reviews every Saturday from 10-noon Central Time on inwheeltime.com, YouTube, and Facebook.
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
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