M2 CS Review; A Bad Car that Changed History?
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Company
Off the Record
This sponsor helps you deal with traffic tickets. Instead of just admitting guilt, they suggest getting a lawyer to represent you for the violation.
Company
Avants
Avants is a car community/media company. Their membership gives you discounts—here, especially on tires.
Company
Michelin
Michelin makes tires. The sponsor says Avants members get extra savings on Michelin tires.
Company
BF Goodrich
BF Goodrich is another tire brand. The sponsor says you can get extra savings on these tires with the membership.
Car
BMW M2
The BMW M2 is a small BMW performance car. They’re going to review how it feels both on the road and on a track.
Company
Dream Giveaways
Dream Giveaways is the company helping run the contest. They’re describing how to enter and that the money goes to charity.
Brand
Road and Track
Road & Track is a car magazine/website. The host is saying they wrote an article there and the editor changed what was shown in the headline.
Concept
paywall
A paywall is a subscription or membership barrier that restricts access to content online. In automotive media, paywalls often delay web publication until a print issue is released, which can affect when reviews and test results become publicly available.
Term
dyno
A dyno is a machine that measures how much power your car makes. It can test the car in a controlled way, but different dynos can give different numbers.
Concept
power curves
A power curve is basically a chart of how strong the car feels at different engine speeds. If you test a few cars on a dyno, the curves show who makes power earlier, later, or more consistently.
Term
536 horsepower
Horsepower is a measure of an engine’s power output. The hosts are quoting a specific horsepower figure for the BMW M2 CS and then correcting/clarifying the number as they discuss dyno results.
Term
pound feet
“Pound-feet” (lb-ft) is a unit of torque, which describes rotational twisting force. Torque is often felt as acceleration strength, especially at lower RPMs, and the hosts are comparing torque between the M2 CS and the standard M2.
Term
dampers
Dampers are the parts that control how the car bounces over bumps. Good dampers make the ride comfortable without making the car feel sloppy.
Part
ceramic brakes
Ceramic brakes are a high-performance brake setup. They can handle repeated hard braking better without fading, but they cost a lot more than normal brakes.
Company
Jim Farley
Jim Farley is Ford’s CEO. The hosts mention his podcast as a way to talk about what car people—especially racing drivers—are into.
Brand
Ford
Ford is the automaker being referenced here. The conversation briefly shifts to Ford’s CEO and a podcast about cars and driving.
Term
DCT
DCT means dual-clutch transmission. It tends to shift faster and feel more immediate than a traditional automatic, especially when you’re changing gears quickly.
Term
Willow Springs
Willow Springs is a real race track where people go to drive cars hard. When they mention it, it means they tested the car’s behavior on a track, not just on normal roads.
Term
PS4s
“PS4s” refers to Michelin Pilot Sport 4S, a popular street performance tire known for progressive breakaway and predictable behavior. The speaker contrasts that with how more race-oriented tires can become less progressive and more sudden when they lose grip.
Car
M2 CS
The BMW M2 CS is a special, more performance-oriented version of the BMW M2. The speaker is basically saying it’s the kind of car people want, so it should keep its value.
Part
end links
End links are small parts that connect the sway bar to the suspension. They help keep the car from leaning too much when you turn, and they’re often replaced as part of suspension work.
Part
steel fenders
Steel fenders are the outer body panels over the wheel area, made from steel. Here they’re being custom-made and fitted so the car’s shape and lines match the intended design.
Term
English wheel
An English wheel is a hand/bench tool used to shape sheet metal into smooth curves. It’s a classic fabrication method for custom body panels.
Part
thigh bolstering
Thigh bolstering is the part of the seat that supports the sides of your upper legs. It helps you feel more secure and can reduce fatigue, especially if your current seats are worn out.
Term
wood grain
Wood grain is the fake-wood-looking trim inside the car. People sometimes remove it because they want a cleaner or more modern interior.
Term
chrome delete
A chrome delete means getting rid of the shiny chrome parts, usually by covering them or replacing them. It makes the car look more subtle and modern.
Term
clear coat
Clear coat is the shiny protective layer on top of paint or a finish. It helps the color look deep and glossy and protects it from damage.
Company
HRE
HRE makes high-end aftermarket wheels. They’re known for premium designs, and the speaker is saying the wheels they want will look similar to that kind of style.
Term
powertrain
Powertrain is the whole set of parts that actually drive the wheels—engine and the stuff connected to it. They’re swapping the whole driving setup from one Mercedes into another.
Term
body color grill
That’s when the grille is painted the same color as the car instead of being shiny/chrome. They’re arguing about whether it looks good on red versus other colors.
Term
slats
Slats are the individual horizontal/vertical bars inside a grille. Different slat colors (like black vs silver) and shapes can dramatically alter the visual “contrast” of the front end, which is what the hosts are debating.
Car
Lamborghini Countach
The Lamborghini Countach is a legendary supercar with a very recognizable look. People love it because it’s basically a piece of car history.
Car
Lancia Stratos
The Lancia Stratos is a famous rally car from the 1970s. It’s rare and has a really distinctive look, so seeing one in a place like Monaco is a big deal for car people.
Company
Car and Driver
Car and Driver is a car review publication. They test cars in a consistent way and can report how loud they are at highway speeds.
Term
twin turbocharging
Twin turbocharging means an engine uses two turbochargers to make more power. It helps the car feel quicker without needing a bigger engine.
Company
Gale-Banks method
The “Gale-Banks method” appears to reference Banks Engineering’s approach to improving engine output by reducing losses and optimizing how power is delivered (the speaker jokes about not sending horsepower out the exhaust). Banks Engineering is known for performance upgrades and diesel/engine-related development, so this is likely a specific performance concept.
LIVE
What up, everybody? Welcome to the Smoking Tire Podcast. Today's episode is brought to you by
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Avants membership. And thank you to Avants for sponsoring the show today. All right,
folks, on this episode of The Smoking Tire, I have an update on both my Kuntosh and my Mercedes
E500 Cabriolet conversion project. Zach and I give a thorough street and track review of the BMW
M2, and I have a whole lot more details about my project E500 Cabriolet. It's the Smoking Tire.
Let's go. Guys, the Smoking Tire is giving away a 992.1 Turbo S in partnership with Dream
Giveaways. We're giving away a $275,000 car with some slick choice mods. The proceeds benefit
charity, and you don't have to buy any merch. It's a straightforward entry process. So hit
the link in the show notes and get entered to win today. But we're going. This is it. This is
the fucking show. It's happening now. Did anybody make anybody out there on the Patreon make Carl's
Motzeball Soup? A couple of people talked a real big game in the comments saying they were going
to make Carl's Motzeball Soup. I want to see fucking photos, photos or it didn't happen. You
was April 2nd. I didn't realize. Oh, really? Yeah, I didn't even realize that.
I probably should have. He was my friend. But you know, as one of my very best friends,
I'm bad at birthdays. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I just am. Yeah. But that's why I am also a lot of us are.
I I have made it with a species called the Hannah and the Hannah the best Hannah
fills in like most of the gaps in my personality and talent pool. You know what I mean? Yeah.
Yeah. Your Venn diagram between you two, like there's enough overlap where you get along. Same.
And this is true with my wife, too. But there's enough separation where she can handle and
thinks in ways you don't and vice versa. Yeah. Yeah, it's important. Yeah, it is. And so anyway.
Hi, everybody. Cars. Welcome to Cars. In theory, we're supposed to talk about cars, right?
I wrote that piece for Road and Track about the income inequality. They didn't write income
inequality in the headline. And they took out some of the more political stuff I put in there
in the edit. But it's probably not at the top anymore, because Lawrence Ulrich drove that
really cool thing. But that's that that's the artwork for Oh, no. Oh, they moved. They moved.
It's down in like the culture. Because someone said they read it. They said they enjoyed it.
Yeah, go down. Keep going. Yes, it's in it's in culture. Or if you scroll down, you get to the
culture section. Eventually. The fuck. Where'd it go? Maybe. No, that's fine, because I didn't
jump that car. What the fuck? Hey, what happened? Oh, no. Is it monthly column? It is. If you
click fair, how to road trip and then click my name, it should it's like it shouldn't it should
give you no, it just gives you that read full buy. Oh, there go. There it is. There it is. Jesus.
That thing was on the front page all weekend, but then they buried it.
They don't want people to know, man. I know that of you. So anyway, I wrote the piece that we were
debating about. You can go read it and road and track. I also put the dino tasting piece is up
on the web. It's in it's from the print magazine this month. I have not read that truly. And I
want the dino tasting piece. Yeah. Well, we can talk about it now. If you do you want to do you
want to read it first? So you read it first. Okay, I'll get some context for myself.
You and I, although I'm listening to you, you and I like consume content like in such
different ways like you watch videos that are made by our friends. Like I don't really watch.
And it's like it's not because I don't like our friends. Like we joke about this. Like
it's just that like, you know, some people that that we know who make good videos, you know,
they put a lot of time into the shots and the enter the narrative and whatever and
the dramatic build up and like, dude, if I, if I want to know what Henry catch,
Paul thinks about a car, like I'll text him and that sounds snobby, but like it's just,
it's just the way to get the information that I want out of my friend. If I have one, right,
whatever, fine. But you consume consume the information. So well, sometimes, I mean,
in those cases, a lot of times I'm doing it to see what our, you know, competition slash
colleagues are doing stylistically and often recognizing that we can't do that because they
have a team of six or whatever it is. So I'm doing a little bit of that. And also like occasionally,
I don't think I watch that many car reviews anymore. It's very like specifically chosen once
every few months, but I watch a lot of other like random content. Yeah, I guess you watch when Pete
went like our friends made content about their own cars and things like that. Yeah, yeah, that's
true. But yeah, it is, it was an interesting test, the dino tasting. I'm a little disappointed.
They didn't use my title dino tasting. I thought that was a pretty good fucking clever title.
I titled the fucking word document that I thought. Oh yeah, but they want, I mean,
they need to be very obvious. It's behind the paywall right now. Sorry,
because the print magazine just came out. That's sort of how they do it. You can get the print.
If you, if you're a member, I don't know how much it costs. I'm sorry. But if you're a member,
you can get the print magazine stories on the web the month before they come out. So anyway,
but fuck it, it's on newsstand. So I can talk about it. There's a, there is a, there is a spread.
But if you look at, you know, all the curves, you know, all the different dinos that we used
essentially measured the same curve, just the numbers were a little higher and a little lower.
And we learned one, one of the dino guys used, gave me the same run, like the same pull.
We did a pull and then he gave me four sheets that showed four different numbers. And he's like,
you can use four different weather correction factors and output four completely different
numbers on the same pole. And a trained eye would be able to tell you maybe which one they were
using, but on the print out, the print out that everyone wants to take that they then show their
friends, like there's almost no way to tell from the print out, which so like, so like there's,
there's effectively multiple ways for you to have a dino operator output you an incredibly
favorable looking result. If you using what are called weather correction factors and like
weather correction factors are very useful. They're not like for cheating on dino, like
they're essentially so that if you go, you know, a dino is useful so that if you're going to install
some parts or do a major modification to your car, and you want to know, is this going to
improve my performance? Or if someone is doing the same thing with an ECU tune,
you lay down a baseline pole, record it, catch put, do your mods, and then you run it again.
And then you go, I gained 50 horsepower, great. Or maybe I didn't, or maybe maybe I lost some
in the case of Jason Camisa and his cams and his BMW E30. And so, so that's what it's really
useful for. But a weather correction factor is like, what if I do my baseline pole and it's
85 degrees in humid, and then it takes me like, it's in the summer, and then it takes me like
three months to do my build. And now it's December, and I'm doing the same shop, but it's
like real cold. So you can adjust and normalize your numbers to a hypothetical optimized number,
which is the most common one is the SAE weather correction factor, which essentially optimize,
which essentially, if you don't have a California day, makes you a California day. That's like
in Southern California is remarkably similar to the SAE weather correction factor, which doesn't,
which you can tell it's like the temperature, the humidity, like 60 degrees, not too humid.
It's a specifically ambient thing. So, you know, sea level, correct. So, but there's a bunch of
other factors you could use. You know, this guy gave me four dino sheets. It was 100 horsepower
spread. Right. Wow. Like one car, like on the same car, same pole, like you can make you can make
a dino sheet, say almost anything. It's wild. If your goal is to. So if you were a bad actor in
the space, we'll say, and like if you if you're a dino shop that offers tuning services, your tuner
could, you know, let's just say they do legitimate tuning and the graph looks good, but then they
want to be like, Hey, our shop is the best tuner in town. And you just fudge with the weather
correction. And so you guys are always making 30 horsepower over john's shop down the street.
Well, it moves all the numbers and curves together. So I think, I mean, you'd have to be like you'd
have to be a piece of shit who also has exclusively dumb customers. Because not while not every
customer knows that dinos read differently, and that it's only a before and after on the same
dino that really means anything. While not everybody knows that like a decent number of
people do know that and you couldn't run a business, you know, not for very long based
on the on trying to get everybody on this. It wouldn't work. So I think most of the conversely,
like most of the dino shop owners were pretty aware of where their dino would output compared
to the other dinos. Like nobody was like trying to like make excuses. I'm just like, Yeah, this
one reads a little higher. This one reads a little lower like and they did and they did and but the
curves really for the most part all look to the same. And there might be reasons you want to use
one dino type of dino versus another. Apparently, a lot of modern cars will only work on the all
wheel drive dinos. And the only all wheel drive dino I used was the world motorsports one down
in Torrance, the wind tunnel dino that we tune my car on. As it turns out, that's the quote
optimistic dino. It does read a little bit on the other side. Will the modern cars only work
there because the front rollers need to be spinning because of the sensor stuff. Yes,
match match speed sensors. So and I don't have a way of knowing folks taking a break from the
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I don't know if it just reads higher because it reads higher. I don't know if it reads higher
because it's got the wind tunnel and somehow the combination of the, because all three of the other
dinos just had like little fans blowing at the radiator. This one has 87 miles an hour of wind
over the entire car. I don't know how that affects, you know, the car, like what percentage that
changes. I'm sure it's something, but I don't know how much. So anyway, that one reads a little
higher. Other one reads a little lower. It's a kind of interesting thing. Most people don't go
through the trouble of testing four dinos in once in one car. So it's interesting to see what the
spread is like and what the owners and operators of those dinos like have to say about it.
Yeah, I think it's a good article. It was fun. Yeah, you should, I mean, read it and tell
what you think. I'll read it. I think it's a cool concept that you did it. It was a good idea. Yeah.
And the dark horse that we used didn't, I really need to sign in with my fucking membership.
I believe this image here, Zach, is all of the dino lines put onto one graph.
Oh, from all, that's one car four places. That's one car at four shops and they're all on one graph.
Nice. Yeah. So that, you know, they, they all showed, you know, pretty similar power curves,
not exactly the same, but there is a little bit of a spread, you know, about 10% in how they read.
And three of them are really close together. You know, it's just the red,
whatever this red line is that's like significantly jumped up from the others.
Yeah. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Rad. Pretty cool. Cool. Cool article. Good story. And the dark horse did,
did perform well. One of the guys, one of the guys who owned, owned one of the dinos, like
absolutely insisted that we get an American car with a manual transmission. And he's just like,
it's just going to be way less headaches. So he's like, any, any other car that's above that,
you start having more and more. Cause originally we were actually going to get this BMW M2 CS,
which we'll pivot to in a minute. And he's like, the automatic gearbox is,
you got to have the all wheel drive. It won't work on any of the rear wheel drive ones.
Whoa. Yeah. Okay. So, so interesting stuff. Yeah, funky. Yeah. So the M2 CS,
CS usually means it's the best we can do in BMW speak, modern BMW speak, right? I mean,
that's the M5 CS, the M3 CS, right? Didn't put a better picture of it on Instagram,
because we actually have a video coming. You can see the camera gear ready,
because we were at Willow Springs ripping it. So Zach and I both drove this thing a bunch.
It's, it's got quite a bit more power, 536 horsepower, 32, 36. I think it's, I think it's
523. 523? And it's only like 16 horsepower more than the regular M2, I think. It's not a lot.
It's not a ton more horsepower, but what it is is 523. 529 pound feet. Thank you. Sorry.
What it seems like it is. Oh my bad. 50 more horsepower than the regular 2025 M2.
It has the M3 engine. Yeah. Like that's what it gets. It's the M3 engine, but
it, the last M2 I drove was a manual. It performs car of the year. And if you turn off
traction control in that car, it would spin the tires in fourth as a, as a six speed manual.
And it was crazy, but it was very nice to slide. And it, when, when it broke traction,
it did so in what I would say is a nice way. It was, it was, it, that car to me,
the manual gearbox M2 of this generation is like really a proper like Hooligan type car.
So I sort of thought that this would somehow be like even better. So like things that are better,
it looks very nice. I think it looks very nice. It looked for, for what they've done with this
design in general, I do think it's a good looking car. Profile is great. The paint color is great.
The wheel choice, wheels look awesome. And the little, the lip spoiler on the back is pretty rad.
Yeah. Yeah. Pretty good looking car. That's a carbon trunk. It's a proper carbon hood too.
Yeah. When I parked it at good vibes next to a regular M2, it looks way better.
It, the, the whole front end of the car is way better than a regular M2, in my opinion.
Other things that are good, the dampers. Oh, yes. The, like the same great
shit, like that made fucking Chris Harris and Jethro and all these guys like
shit themselves with Geely about the old M5 CS. This has that. This has those, it ride, it handles
like bumps and stuff like that one did. Yeah. On the highway, it was, it was fantastic how like
comfortable it was on the highway. I remember when we drove up, I said, I wish this is how
a new GT3 felt. Right. Because, because, and then in the canyons and also at the track,
like it was absolutely tight enough, lockdown had some things we'll talk about in a minute,
but the ride comfort was there and the sportiness was there. And it was a really good
breath of like softness for these shocks. Yeah. Like the spread of comfort to Sport Plus
is a pretty good spread, but when you dial it down to comfort, it's not sloppy. Right. No, no, no.
Like it's still nice. Yeah. In comfort. And in fact, I think, I think Sport Plus was maybe
a little too much, but on the track, I think I was in sport shock. Yeah, we were in sport most
of the time. We tried Sport Plus. What this did that the MC20 GT2 Stradale did not do,
is that in comfort mode, road softly, but it pulled all the dampers and that's what a lot of them
do, like, which means people like the shock is not doing anything. You're just basically riding on
spring is what it feels like. So there's more movement in the car, but it will, the tires and
wheels are more pliable. Think 2015 C63, like, like AMG cars from 2005 to 20, you know, in 2016-17.
Yeah. You just, you lose some of the control over the chassis, but the exchange is that the car
rides really nicely over certain kinds of bumps. Yeah. This, they don't take all the damper out
of it. So it's a really nice balance of responsiveness to bumps and potholes without feeling like
the thing is just, you know, all the spring, all the springs are cranked up and the dampers have
been removed. Yeah. And this has the ceramic brakes. They're optional. They're like nine grand,
which makes this $108,000 car. But they are very good. I mean, you know, no, no shit. They're good.
And, okay. So after that, is there anything else about this car that you absolutely love?
Guys, taking a break from the action because support is coming in fast, like Jim Farley,
the CEO of Ford, who's now got a podcast and you're always asking me what I'm listening to
when not recording this show. And right now it's this, the new season of drive with Jim Farley.
Internet, the Ford CEO talks to some of his favorite people about what they're driving
and what drives them to succeed. Like Formula One driver Daniel Ricardo. Listen, there's a
well-worn trope about racing drivers not being interesting to listen to. But if there is one
that is interesting to listen to, it is Daniel Ricardo. I think this guy's takes on stuff
and life are great. And look, Jim is a racing driver also. I personally raced against him
like two months ago. And for me, a CEO that drives race cars on the weekends
is about the pinnacle of CEOdom when it comes to car companies. So the two of them together
obviously have a lot of things to discuss on drive with Jim Farley, which you can get on your podcast
app. It's very easy to find. Drive with Jim Farley. Check it out.
I mean, transmission is pretty good. It seems like the same as the other ones. You know, it's
eight speed, fine. The transmission to me gets the job done, but not in a way that excites me.
Very true. And that's true of any good ZF eight speed. They've gotten it to a point where
I feel like if you're breaking really hard into a corner, you're not using the engine to
decel anyway. And the transmission will meet you when it's time to roll back onto throttle. But
sometimes the downshifts are just like slower than I want them to be. Whereas a DCT is like,
you know, snap a snap, a snap, a snap. And it's right there. Counterpoint, the Vantage S we just
had was as close as I could imagine it getting to be. It's not a DCT, but it's like a real,
it's real, real good. It's real snappy, but gearbox not inspiring. And then I sort of,
I couldn't get, now maybe I suck at driving possible. And you had, you had go on the track
as well as on the street. Now, let me just start with the street. I thought on the crest,
this thing fucking ripped. I thought it was great. I left the stability control shit on.
I left the shocks in comfort and let put the powertrain in kill. And I thought it was a great,
great Canyon car. I still hate the seats. I'm always going to hate these seats.
But at least in this car, it was the last car I drove with these seats. I can't remember if it was
the M3 or the M8. But the last car I drove with these fucking seats, the seats didn't quite face
straight at the pedals. And so I had to like offset my feet to the right, which this, this bucket
thing then left like a bruise in my thigh. So at least the pedals were right in front.
But getting it out of this thing was brutal. Yeah, it's annoying. It's tough. I mean, once you're
there, look, it's the CS. So yeah, I mean, in the canyons, like it holds you in place and then
your arms are just free to do what they want. Like my car or other cars we driven, we have that,
the F80 we rented for that video, like you have to hold yourself in place a little bit.
So this is a race bucket. But getting these seats in a car that's not going to be tracked
is real stupid. It's really, really silly. Yeah. The seats, like, you know, I don't know if you
can get this car without those seats, but that would be really delightful. If BMW, like whatever
their special wishes program is, does it, that would be kickass. So don't love the seats, but okay.
I and the canyons absolutely love this car. But I can't, other than the dampers and the ceramic
brakes, I can't really say that it was, you know, $30,000 better than an M2. And in fact,
if you throw in the fact that the regular one comes in a manual, to me, that may make it the
better street car. Yeah. Especially if we're talking about money being real. And we don't,
we're not playing car journalist fantasy. $30,000 is a lot of real money. And it's,
and it's 50% higher than the regular one. Yeah. Nearly, right? Yeah. So, you know,
we drove that light blue manual car that was when it launched, like we did a video on that and go
watch it. And for that money, that is a very good, very capable fast car takes over where the M3
has kind of abandoned because it's a four door now. There wasn't a ton I didn't like about that,
that wasn't just subjective aesthetics. Like even the screen, it's annoying. There's all these icons,
all that stuff. That shows some Windows 95 ass screen. It looks brutal. It's, I mean,
Hyundai takes the cake on difficulty in adjusting things, but different. So Hyundai has menus within
menus and menus that lead back to menus. And like the maze of menus is Hyundai's problem.
This shit is just an endless grid of same looking icons. Very true. Yeah, there's no like color
coordination. Think of what you like about carplay when you go, Oh, look, all the app icons are
different because that's how apps work. Not this. This is just a bunch of blue folders that all look
the same. This might as well be taxes 2024 PDF, you know, dads, dads of whatever resume PDF,
Brian's homework PDF, and it's just white fucking boxes of blue. That's very, very true. It's like
that. And maybe now I didn't mess with this car long enough. Maybe there's a way to do like
shortcuts and things like your most frequented folders. I'm sure there is. But, but that aside,
regular M2 is a very good capable car with the CS and the regular to it's this 30 grand more.
I mean, yes, you get you get a quote M3 engine. But I mean, some of the value people put on that
is like the mystique of it. And it's a real M engine. The regular engine is so strong anyway,
like I kind of don't care tires. It makes a lot of power. You can mod it to tons of power. The
manual is fine. The big thing was after we drove this on the track, I was like, I don't know what
you really get for the money. And in fact, let's talk about the handling is the first time you
the first time you even say tracks. So we also we actually, you know, take advantage of the
corporate Willow Springs membership here, took it to the track had a lovely day fucking willow
to yourself as well as the tits as it were. And they've got candy in there. It's crazy.
And we spent a day at the track with this car. I don't know. I mean, I just raced one of these
things like a BMW like that shaped kind of like this for hours. And we did pretty good. Like,
I'd like to think that I'm capable of driving this car in a decent way. I every corner really
when I started to push this car and started to go quick. It pushed all the way to the apex
and that of every corner. And then as soon as I started to get back on the gas,
just switched from push to like snap oversteer. And if you like left the traction control fully
on it wouldn't do that. But if you turn the traction control off, like that was like its
natural tendency, when I had the M2 it performs car of the year. If you turn the traction control
off, when you stood on the brakes and turned into the corner, it would rotate the back out under
braking. This car doesn't doesn't do that. Now that could be because it has cup twos and
the suspension setup just gives you that much more grip that its natural intent is not to slide.
But instead, its natural intent is to push a little bit, which once you start to feed in
throttle coming out of the corner, it then takes very little throttle to overwhelm the rear tires
and transition from a push to a big snap, which I did over and over and over in the video.
And again, if you leave the traction control on, okay, that's fine. I'm not anti-traction control
if you want traction control. But if you leave it on and you tried the multi-stage,
there was level 4 or level 5 where there was a pretty big drop off in stability. And I thought
even all the way down to like 2, or I forget is high, whatever the second.
It was from 0 to 10 and like one of the either 0 or 10 was off. I forget and I kind of explored
three or four of them. Yeah, the even the last one was like pulling more power than I wanted.
And so I don't know. I never found a balanced way through a corner. I never found a way to
really initiate a slide on entry. It took me too it. It took considering I shot the
fucking Valhalla video like three days before I shot the BMW video, you'd think like same guy.
Well, in MC20, we were there the week before. Yeah. And you did really nice slides on the same
tires. Yes. There were pilots board cut tubes on that car. Obviously mid-engine versus front
engine. But for most people, a front engine car is the easier one to fly. Yeah, front engine,
rear drive, 500 horsepower car. Do pilot sport cut tubes because I have not, I don't know that much,
that much experience on them. Do they normally snap like, you know, PS4s are known for being
really progressive as are a lot of other like street sport tires. But once you get up to like
cup race tire. They're not, it's snappy. But still, it shouldn't push like that at the front
and then transition to snap. It's weird. And I agree. I mean, I went out there and
it's just, I mean, the steering's numb. That's a BMW problem has been for a long time.
Steering wheel's too thick. Don't know why. But that means you don't get dialogue with the front
tires. So you're coming into the corner and you have to like listen or it's really hard to notice
that you've lost the front a little bit. And then yeah, you start to just lean on the throttle and
it's you feel it lean, lean, lean and then just kicks out. Oh, I just remembered. I'll tell you
what compounded this was that in the sixth speed with the B 58, the regular M2 is B 58, right?
Yeah. With the sixth speed with that engine, the torque curve and the gearing are matched
really nicely. Same as the manual transmission super actually. Whereas now you have with the
eight speed auto, if you want to do slides, second gear is too short and third gear is too long.
And so I found myself like in between these gears a lot in terms of pace. There's kind
of a big gap there. Not in terms of like the gear ratio, just in terms of whether
going through these sort of these corners, whether you're like in or out of boost,
it's like a pretty sharp spike of boost in this particular engine. Sorry, the engine in the regular
M2 is the S 58. Oh, okay. What is it? What is it in this one? It's an evolution of the B 58,
the code in this. Sorry. That's okay. I don't know my BMW engine codes that makes me
not credible in this scenario. Same. When Zach does this thing with his eyes. I know something.
I know something. So anyway, if you are a huge BMW nerd,
I totally get wanting to have this thing, especially if your spine can handle the seats.
And the dampers are fucking awesome. They really are. Like the tuning of the shocks is great.
The tuning of the brakes is really good. And we had a, you know, it was a very hot day.
High 90s, I think we was out there at Willow. It wasn't super hot. And the car behaved itself
just fine. Although after a while you could smell it dumping fuel into the cylinder head to like cool
itself. Yes, you could. But it did behave. It did. It had absolutely no issues ripping around a very
hot racetrack. We do have a video. It will be coming out soon. And I didn't like, I didn't not
like it. I just like for the extra money, I thought it would be a little more, a lot more fun on the
track than the regular M2. And I don't think it was. In fact, I think it maybe was a little less
fun, which is a kind of a bummer. Yeah, it would be interesting to see what the lap time would
be between the two of them on a track that doesn't reward huge power because 50 horsepower is a lot.
So like on streets, you probably make up some time on the straightaways. But if it was just a pure
like handling track, I wonder what the difference would be with these, you know, sophisticated
dampers and, and mostly if you turn traction off on both of them, you know, which one's actually
easier to manage and would that ease results in a quicker lap time? Or is the grip level like
really similar other than the tires? I don't know. I was kind of, I was shocked and disappointed
because I thought this was the one and with the old M2 CS, that was the one because it had the
adaptive dampers. But now, but you could also get it in a manual. You can get a manual also,
but like, we get a CS and a manual last gen and it was so pretty. I remember how pretty it was.
Blue and gold. Oh, all day, all day. Blue and white gold. It was fine. That was also 100 grand,
wasn't it? 92 93 with ceramics. Yeah. That was the first one to crack 90. Yeah. And now I'm
fucking pretty though, holding value. Well, I think for sure with a stick,
of course it is. Of course it is. It would be criminal for a car like that to not hold value.
That was a no brainer. I said in the fucking video, we drove that thing. I went, this is a,
this is an extremely obvious buy. Sure. Because it looks good and it's fast and it has all the
pieces because the new M2 comes with the regular one. You can get a manual. You can get it with
adaptive dampers. Yeah. But it doesn't have the styling of the old one. Right. And yeah.
Yeah. So that's the M2 CS. I spent today, what I spent today doing. I spent the day
doing a lap around Los Angeles to visit my cars. I didn't post any photos yet.
They're actually, they're, I'm waiting to do a little content strategy. No, I'm not.
But I went to visit the Kuntosh at Franco's European sports cars. Damien was there and the boys.
And the good news is, yeah, I have, the good news is I have an assembled rear suspension
minus a damper. My, excuse me, a damper's because the Kuntosh, if you recall, has
six shock absorbers. Right. Two in the front. Double rears. Double rears. Double rears and then one
in the front. And those six shock absorbers took a little Vacasiones to South Florida to be rebuilt.
Oh, okay. Yeah. Fortunately, they were present. They weren't lost, which is good because they could
be a bitch to fucking replace, but they definitely were shot. And so they've gone to be rebuilt.
They'll be back in a couple of weeks. Not the first old Italian to go there to get some work done.
And you, in this photo that you can see the, the rear hub, which was, has been re,
refinished and rebuilt. So all regreased. Good to know. And so they're doing the front hubs
and Damien's tool, the thing that he uses to remove the bearing from inside the hub,
it's a very specific tool. He says the tool is quote older than he is. It's my, my hub sheared it.
So he has to have another tool made. Whoa. So we're a little bit stalled. Yeah, you can see,
this is the rear, but if you're looking at the photo, you can see in the center in the inside
there, that little bit, there's a, there's a tool that removes those. So. And your Lambo thing broke
it. Well, we have three out of four are good to go, but we're on a holding pattern for the fourth.
So hopefully the tool comes back around the same time the shocks do. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. So the good
news is my bill was much, much smaller this month. That's good. That's good. So these end links
look so nice. Dude, these are such this color. It's like a bronzish color on these end links.
Every bit of that is brand new. All of those hardware, all that shit is brand new. It's just
the, the hub is the only thing that's, that's left from before. Wow. So that's cool. Very,
very cool. So some, we have some things, there are, there are, in fact, the frame of the subframe
of this car that it's just tubes. I mean, it's just, which is cool. It's race car shit. It's just
so different from today's, you know, super cars, carbon or, you know, pressed aluminum. And this
is just, just tubes. It's just tubes, hand-welded with speed holes in like the fucking weird plates.
Yeah. It's great. So then I went to go see Mr. Schaunt over at CMS Motorsports to talk about our
powertrain plans, but also to get a look at this, this photo is from the other day,
but now all the fenders are on the car and they've been blended.
Whoa. Yeah. So this dude is hand, we, they're hand-making the steel fenders.
So they do like English wheel style or whatever. Wow.
Yeah. I mean, it's, I don't think it's necessarily wheel. They have, they bought an E500 donor car
and they're, they took a mold off of the car. I mean, not even like a mold. They literally,
he molded this one off of that car. So it's like, it's just molded off of an E500.
I don't think he has to English wheel it. Okay. It's just, because it's a relatively small part,
but he was hand like he was tacking and fucking blending it in. So it's going to look exactly
like an E500. Like it's pretty, it's pretty sick. Super cool. So I ordered the fabric.
Dude, it went on sale. Hey, the fabric I wanted went on sale in between when I was looking at now.
How did that happen? I don't know, but it's half price. Lucky me.
I mean, it wasn't like that expensive anyway, but it went from $62 a yard to like 26 fucking score.
Yeah. So I got myself six yards. I think I should only need like four, but you know.
Yeah. I bought weight. I bought 10 yards from my car and I have five yards left over. Yeah.
It's too much. Yeah. So I'm going to do, I'm going to do six should be enough
because I'm just doing front seats, back seats, and door cards.
Okay. Yeah. Six should be just right on. Yeah. Yeah. Just, yeah, for just inserts.
And you can always, where's it from? Where'd they send it from?
It's from modern fabrics. It's from the same place I got the Fox body from.
So it's easy to get more is what I'm saying. It's not, I could get more.
No, I could get more. I don't know what country it's in, but I can get more.
I don't know what it's coming from, but, but I, I can get more. Yeah. Yeah. So
this is going to look rad. I can't believe it's happening so quickly.
Yeah. And the powertrain we're getting, we bought a 2002 E55 donor car for $6,000.
Wow. Yeah. It looks fucked up, but the engine works.
Crashed. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Cool. Use all parts of the buffalo.
That's rad. Yeah. So it's going to be, it's going to be really interesting.
Top down, glug glug. Yeah. I think, what did Sean say? Super sprint makes the exhaust?
He has an, he has an actual E500 with a super sprint exhaust on a sound nice.
And we were originally talking about getting those crazy recaro seats with like all the
buttons and shit. They are so expensive. 20. 20 Gs? No, no, no. No, but they're like,
but they're like 35 hun just side. Okay. So you end up with, yeah, that's a lot. That's a lot.
Yeah. No, no, no, that's a no, but, but there's a seat rebuild kit from Mercedes
that Sean says, we should, we should just get him on the show next week. But he says,
basically they can turn my old tired seats with the rebuild kit and into
factory looking and feeling new E500 seats using the same frames. All right. So like he,
and I sat and hit because I was like, look, my back, the reason I can't drive old cars
without putting brand new seats in them is that my back is fucked up. He goes, okay,
go sit in, in my wife's car, whatever it was. And I was like, oh, this is, this is good. It has
like thigh bolstering and like long and like all this. And I was like, can you, you can make this
out of my seats? And he's like, yeah, for, and it's cheaper than getting the other seats.
Brad, perfect. Great. Perfect. Great. Cool. So we have to choose
exactly what we're going to do the dash inserts because we're pulling out the wood grain.
Yeah. No go. We're also doing a full chrome delete. I wonder if you can get some sort of
mother of pearl panel. It would be probably fake and it would be trashy. Maybe.
That would get into like Japanese VIP. That could be cool.
But it would be fake though. Yeah. Is the problem. We were just going to do aluminum.
We just thought just keep that because there's already crazy pattern.
That's true. Like in seats. That's true. You don't want to clash patterns. Okay. You don't
need to go, you don't need to go nuts on the pattern. And so we're just going to do just the
aluminum, the brush, like the brushed one, which I think will work. It'll work, especially if your
wheels are aluminum. Yeah. The wheels, we're going to do silver, you know, but like,
I want like, like it's got, I want it to look like bright, like liquid, like liquid, you know what
I mean? Like icy fucking bright, but not not chrome. You know what I mean though? Yeah. Where
they put that clear on it where it gets that real apex does that. They have like, they have a brush
silver and then they have whatever the other ones call where it's got a thick layer of clear coat
on it. It's incredibly bright and shiny without being chrome reflective. Yeah. Because the, because
the wheels, they're, it's, they're 17s, 17 and 18s. We're not even, we're not even doing it. We're,
we're using the exact size of a factory E 500 wheel, like just like Mercedes would. It looks like a
monoblock, the HRE, but we got to do it in 17s to make it like look right. So because it's small,
you know, you want to do it in a, in a bright color. So it looks bigger effectively. Yeah, that's
true. Especially with the red, red with like bright clear coat silver is sick. That looks hot.
Yeah. This is red. Be really fun. The coolest fucking cruiser. But we're going to do the, the OE
E 500 suspension, which if you were getting a replacement kit today for like a factory car,
it's an H&R spring and a Bilstein damper that's just the, the OE replacement. So
it's going to sit at the EVE, the stock E 500 height. And apparently the brakes that you want
to get are the ones just off the, off the R 129 SL, like I had, they're effectively
just as good, but like they're way cheaper. So those are just available. We can just get those
for fucking nothing. Nice. And then the rest of it, the complete powertrain comes out of the E
55, the gearbox, the rear end, all of it. So they just, they just make it fit. Yeah, they rebuild
it and clean it up and, and make it fit, but it's going to be a five speed automatic and, you know,
it'd be, but the M 113 engine that is the E 55 engine is like smaller physically. So it was like,
you know, either you'd have to fucking knock back the firewall and shit to put an actual E 500
engine in there. And that's a worse engine than the E 55 engine. Like you might as well just use
the fucking E 55. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So the firewall work is that was significant too. That's
serious work. And rather than trying to figure out how to make the pedals and, and the throttle
by wire work, you just take the pedal box from the E 55, you just use the complete pedal box.
Apparently you just have to make like a bracket and then it just works. So cool.
Do they give you a time like, is there an estimate now? Because he wants to bring this car to
fucking car week. He said that. Yeah, I don't give a shit. So four months, he said that. So,
but he said the bodywork will be done by the middle of next week. Wow. Yeah. I mean, they're,
they're on it. Yeah. This isn't like we're doing yours for a little bit and then we're doing this
other car in this other car. No, he's, he's on it. So cool. I don't have any photos to share,
just, just right yet. But the other debate is
the 80s, Benzos, like the pre-merger shit, the, the, you know, the, the wide body stuff,
they did a body color grill instead of like shiny grill.
My car, we have to replace the grill because it's fucked up. Your car's red. My car's red. Yeah.
I don't think a body color grill works at all on my car. Yeah. Because those cars were gray,
right? The ones you're talking about, they're like, well, there are some that were red that in
the 80s, it's different. And the SEC grill, the wider grill, some of those work in red, but like,
like what about that? Is that, is there a red one? Do you see any reds? No, not yet. These are
silver, gray. These are all like dark gray hammers. We're looking at for people listening.
Did you Google red? Yeah, add the search term red.
So, okay, now what do we think?
I think some, I don't think it's terrible. It's better than I expected, but I,
I would still want to see it with at least like, if the slats were black. Is that like red and black,
really? No, I mean, every, no, the black here in the center is where the actual radiator fins are,
I think. What about, what about the, this is bad. That's so bad. Yeah, that's too much. That's what
mine would look like. That's not good. That's not good. No, we can't do that at all. If you have,
that's an 83 different shaped grill. And they, and one might even say that that's too much.
That's, I don't think that's great. I don't, yeah. Is there one, is there one with a silver grill?
Let's see. There, just look at that one, the 500, the 300 CE. Yeah, look at that.
So I think that's better. That's just the stock silver grill.
There's also different headlights. I mean, there's a different year. I think,
I kind of don't hate, like if the grill surround was red, but then everything inside was black,
I might like it better because it is kind of a smooth shape. Oh, that's kind of interesting.
This silver stands out and I don't like that it kind of goes back up the hood a bit. It's so bright.
So this might be too much. What is that? The 300 CE, yeah, the one there, 300 CE, 3.2. What is that?
So that's red surround silver slats. Yeah, slats.
Tough. I don't know. Red surround with black could actually work. Is that like,
like that? Is that red, black? That's kind of red, red, gray. Yeah. The red surround,
I think, is a starting point, isn't it? Yeah, it's not as bad as I thought. Like this is body
color, right? That's just great. That's sort of silver, gray. Hmm. Very interesting. I'm going
to have to do some more homework on this one. You know, I guess, I think in the 80s, and granted,
like you're making a car that, oh, here you go. So that's different though, because it's the wider
grill. It is, but it is red and black. Yeah. Just to look at how that would. I think that works,
doesn't it? I think it's better. I think it's a great compromise. I think the all red is very,
like, it's going to be awesome. Everyone's going to know what I am when I roll up. You know what I
mean? You know what I mean? You know what I mean? It's a lot of that, because you got to stand out
from your boss who also works at the firm, but you're not coming in like that, you know.
Oh, it's like, fuck it. Oh, go, go. So go up a little bit to that blue one. See that?
So that is, if you imagine that as a convertible, that's pretty much how my car is going to look.
I mean, the fender flares are great. Yeah. That's my car as a convertible, more or less.
And let's try to find a shot of the grill. This is blue. It's a terrible website. Blue, blue.
It's a broad arrow. It is clunky. Oh yeah, those are the seats I'm not getting.
So that's blue surround with a stock insert. Yeah, the stock insert looks faded. I think you
might get away with black. Red, black. Yeah. Wow. I never would have thought it started.
I wouldn't have either, but I'm on board now. But let me look how, by the way,
sold price, $885,000. Dude. It's a six liter. That's why, because it's an actual hammer coop.
But that's, in terms of the bodywork and shit, like that's picture that in red, and that's exactly
what my car will look like pretty much. I'm looking for, there we go. I want to see how
far this hood kind of, sorry, the grill draws up the hood. Oh yeah. This seems like it less,
the one we looked at that was red. It's like this huge wave of silver was crashing up the red hood.
So maybe yours is smaller like this. Mine is, what year is this one? What year is this car?
1991. Mine's a post facelift. Mine's a 94. So I don't know, but I think the red surround
black insert could be where it's at. Cool. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Good times. Fun.
Yeah. I think that'll be a really neat cruiser. Yeah. Fucking hell. Is that it? That's it. We're
giving away a Porsche people. Did you know that? You probably heard me say it in a sting I recorded
earlier today at the beginning of the show, but we are. You can go to the link in our biota to
get entered to win. You can read all the rules and regulations. Please do. You can enter from
other countries besides the U.S., not every country, but there are some countries, I think,
including Canada that you can enter. It ends August 20th. There is a charitable component to it,
which does make your tickets tax deductible. Just saying. Just saying. And yeah,
then go use the link in our bio, use the link in the show notes, and you can win. I
would like to take it to the people, to the patrons. What do you say, Clapman? Let's do it.
Let's do it. Get the part of the people. Can you talk about what they get? I think I might pour
myself a Japanese whiskey. Would you like one? It's an evening show. No, I'm good.
Are you going to the gym already today? I did already, but I had wine last night,
and that's enough alcohol for me. Dude, I just don't drink that much anymore. My brain does not
like it. Okay, mine does. Yeah. I wish I was who I was five years ago. I just enjoy it more.
If you are not a Patreon member, what you get are things that our crowd asked for vehemently,
constantly bugged us all the time before we had a Patreon. They wanted the show early.
They wanted the show without ads. They wanted to be able to post questions,
and we were getting too many of them. So if you go to patreon.com slash the smoking tire podcast,
you can join our amazing, friendly community of patrons. Tears start at just three bucks.
You can watch the show live there. You can get an ad free show. You get an early show,
and pro and champ tears get one extra show a month that the public will never, ever hear.
Never. They'll never hear it. That's where I spill the goods.
It's that in the Epstein files. That's where I talk about the people I know in the Epstein files.
What's that? All right, we'll go to the fucking people. Let's do it. Now that I have my Japanese
whiskey, I am ready. Smells good. Dude, we're like halfway through the rum.
Really? You're? I mean, I'm not sipping it by myself. We've been people. I hosted,
I cooked four meals for people this weekend, and I hosted, and I'm telling everybody
there and where we're going through it. You know what we need to do, buy a couple cases,
keep telling everybody like the Dino guy, pump the market, flip. Yeah, for sure.
Flipsky. Ferrari Lucidora says, Kenin from Cars and Bids sold his SL65 to a buyer in Dallas.
It seems like the right place for it. High speeds and no curves. I gotta say, every time I've been
to Dallas, all I've done is sit in traffic, but you do you. If you sold each of your cars,
what's the perfect landing spot? Oh boy. That's a lot of cars and a lot of landing spots,
so I'll pick a couple. If I sold my Lamborghini Countach, I would like it to stay in Los Angeles.
It's a Hollywood car. Yeah. It's got the Cindy Crawford Pepsi. It's been in commercials and shit.
It's been in Hollywood for a long time. I'd liked it to stay in LA. Remember I sold the
DeLorean and went to Germany, and the guy was like driving it around with like on the California
tags in Germany and apparently getting huge cred for that. That's pretty cool. It's dope.
Yeah. Where would you like your M3 to go if you sold it to somebody?
Oregon? Good roads. No rust. I don't know. It's green. A lot of forest up there, maybe that would work.
If I sold the Delica, I think it should go to Nantucket. I think it would be a good,
a great Nantucket vehicle. Doug would probably point at it and you could park it next to his
convertible G-Wagon thing. Nantucket is all about weird vintage SUVs. That's the move there,
so I would, I think that would be good. I think the POW would be really fun in Monaco.
Oh, of course. You know, because it's almost like a Fiat Jolly, but I bet you in Monaco,
they see more Fiat Jollies than they do fucking POWs. I bet you the POW would be proper exotic
in Monaco. Yeah, and it would work there. That's the biggest thing. It would be a fucking vibe.
Practical exotic. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The Manx would also work in Monaco. It would. That would be a
fucking vibe. Park in front of a casino would be very cool. Wow. I mean, you do not want to drive
around Monaco during Grand Prix weekend, but like, that would be a baller ass move to bring
your Manx to Monaco for Grand Prix weekend. I can just leave it on your yachts. We can look at it.
My buddy's in Monaco right now. Oh, it's not doing anything.
Uh, uh, Chach, my bachelor party. Shout out to Chach. Oh, he's there. He's there. He's in
Monaco right now for his, his buddy is having, uh, I forget what he was calling it, but it's
effectively, it's, it's the, it's the, the mirror of a bachelor party, which is a divorce. It's a
divorce party. Somehow I knew, somehow the way you looked at me, I was like, this is a divorce
party of all the places to go. So, so my, my homie from high school, he's over there and he's
sending me, you know, photos of cars. He's not, he's not sending me photos of hookers. He's sending
me photos of cars. Um, but, uh, he's like, you know, there's like a, there's like a T 50 parked in
front of this and a Veyron and this and that. And I'm like, I'm kind of like yawn. And, uh, and
then finally he sends me a picture of a street parked Lancia Stratos. And I'm like, now we're
talking now. That's the Monaco I know and love. T 50 is pretty cool. No, it's T 50. It shows some
taste. Yeah, of course it does. There's nothing wrong with that at all. But like, of course,
there's a T 50 in Monaco. There's probably 12 T 50s in Monaco, you know, but, uh, yeah, the
Manx would be good in Monaco as well. I bet they haven't seen shit like that. I had, um,
you know, I had over, was one of the people I cooked for this weekend was Max from, uh, from,
from Manx, Max from Manx, but Max is from, uh, Bespoke who makes the radial engine and he was
with them before Manx acquired the company. So he's been there for a while and they're doing
like a bunch of other stuff. Like I sort of thought that once Manx acquired the company
that it was just all about engines for, for cars, but are there still, they're doing a bunch of
shit. They're doing like, I don't want to accidentally speak out of turn and talk about
something that I'm not supposed to, but like they've got a lot of other things they're doing with
radial engines, which are very fucking cool actually. Uh, aviation, aviation stuff and military
stuff and all kinds of interesting things. Um, and I like, I'm not trying to like tease and then
not say, but like, uh, I just, I heard that I was listening to the story telling about how, uh,
what the company was like, you know, before they got involved with Manx and like sort of how they've
pivoted a little bit, but also how they've gotten some other interesting contracts and, uh,
commission because it is, it's literally a company for building weird engines. And so
like, do you want to build, you know, uh, a flat 12 out of three Subaru four cylinder engines?
Like in that kind of thing, like Rob Dom would love these fucking people. Yeah. So, so they're,
doing weird engines and, uh, for a variety of applications, which is pretty fucking cool.
Uh, wheat city night court says it's a trope with car guys, uh, to eventually get old enough
that realize dailying a finicky car is untenable and then they get a daily. Does the same happen
in the watch world? Do guys settle down with a nice courts or two as regular wear watches? Well,
people have their own like really interesting habits for watches. Like I
don't, unless you're talking about, about stuff that's like either like so artistic and weird
and fashion obla that you're like, you couldn't pot, like you can't wear MB and F like just
if it's your day job, you look like a weirdo, you know, if you, unless you're Pharrell, like you
can't just wear something like that around like $150,000 watch outside of shit like that.
I don't know. I, me and my friends are not, uh, are not necessarily, uh, afraid of wearing
our medium to high end watches every day. That's like, that's an okay thing for the folks that I
fuck with. And so we don't really have like a daily. Um, at least that's, that's like my people.
I know a lot of people, Zach, Zach has a daily. You're the fucking G shock. Yeah. Is the daily
and you wear something nicer for a nicer occasion for sure, which is fine. I just like that. It's
super light and I don't have to worry about it. And I, and I also really like wearing it. Like I
look at it and go, just comics. I really like it. So it's kind of good, but I wore, I wore my, my
black watch yesterday or that on the Rolex. Good. I mean, I just, uh, it's, and I'm not,
it's not about like being like afraid or whatever. Like it's, it's not for every occasion, but, um,
I, I do try to match my watch to my company. If I'm hanging out with certain people, like,
cause it does project an image. Sure. One way or the other. Sure. So, um, you know, it depends on
your personal vibe though. I don't think it's a, I think it's just like how you're feeling, you know,
even if you have nice watches and if you're like your boss, like, you know, maybe you don't want
to wear a watch, it's like nicer than your boss. But like maybe if you have like pretty dope watches,
like maybe you and your boss like bond over that. Like I could, that could see that going both ways.
Yeah. If you don't, uh, overstep or outshine him or them, uh, but it shows, especially if you wear
something that's like a little bit, uh, off the beaten path and it shows you into the hobby.
And that's how you guys can, that's when you get down with the micro brands,
the lecturers, watches and all the weird stuff. Yeah. Obviously you're not a golfer.
That's a good one. That's fucking fabulous. Um, okay. I'm looking for
a less than five year old car for long road trips and parking in LA, but I really care
about a quiet cabin. I basically want a Lexus LS the size of an A three, but even the luxury brands
seem to have a lot of road noise at 80 miles an hour for their smaller offerings.
Current front runners are a McCann and a Genesis G 70, anything smaller or quieter in your experience.
Now that's very interesting. Very specific. It is very specific. Also, you can quiet your car down.
You can take virtually any car and have a custom shop add dynamic like in places that will actually
make your car no little bit quieter. Very true. You also can change the tires and make your car
quieter because a lot of these cars, it may be the tires that they're sold with. If you look at the
reviews and the decibel level is whatever, some of that could be tire noise. A lot of the noise
that comes into cars is either like the wind buffeting or wind noise from its drag and
wheel well sounds. So that's some things you can address. So let me think.
Volvo XC40 could be a good one. That wasn't bad. That wasn't bad. That was pretty good.
I think that was quieter than the RAV4.
Small. My recommendation because I don't stay up on kind of the normal commuter cars and the
decibel levels. I would go look at a car and driver or similar magazines. Car and driver
specifically does a lot of like here are 10 commuters and we're testing all of them and
they do a lot of data and they will have all of the decibel readings for 70 miles per hour
and that might get you where you want to be. So also they mentioned an A3. I have to feel like
an A3 has got to be one of the quietest cars in its class. I hope so.
I feel like there's also, well there is that new Lexus that's like the size of the Prius.
Oh yeah. That's like the Lexus Prius. There's that thing.
Honestly a Prius might be quiet. A Prius with a dynamite would probably be very quiet. It's
super slippery and if you put some like softer tires on it that might be pretty hush hush.
You're not, well you don't want a fucking, you don't want an electric car. Long road trips I
imagine you're not going to want an electric car. Gas, Macon, Genesis G70 are good options.
They both are and if you optimize for tires like either of those would be very nice. I think
possibly a Volvo XC40 would be maybe worth checking out. What's that? What's the smallest
Lincoln? The Nautilus? Oh it's a pretty good looking car too. The small, Lincoln's are quiet.
They're fucking tuned, tuned real quiet. The Corsair. The Corsair. That's the small one.
The Corsair, yeah. I would maybe check out a Lincoln. A Lincoln Corsair. Maybe, right?
P-car photos. In 10 years what car is going to be the new Altima? Clapped out, paper tags,
bumper hanging off, fucking swangin' down the 405. This is so easy. Model 3, Gen 1 obviously.
First Gen Model 3s are already like so far on their way there. Yeah, and driven like
psychopaths. I am starting to see some really, you know, for a while people like,
people who bought Tesla's like tended to like keep them up pretty nice. I'm starting to see
the beaters. Oh for sure. They're now old enough and there's enough of them that I'm really starting
to see some beat Model 3s. I've gotten picked up in some that are real haggard and, you know,
the powertrain feels fine. They still ride like garbage, but they are trashed inside.
A Model Y with blown out dampers is a terrible thing. Oh boy. Don't Rob me says,
fuel crisis. I read the first sentence in my head and I was like, I better read the second
half of this before I just read it out loud. This motherfucker will read anything we write.
Even though Zach does pre-read, Zach would probably keep me from reading anything too
terrible. Yeah, I did look at these. Okay, fuel crisis and spikes have brought us Japanese
Econoboxes, the right turn on red and hybrids, but also reduced speed limits. By the way,
also fucking twin turbocharging and a bunch of technologies that now deliver a thousand horsepower
pretty easily. Right. The second part of this question basically leads to where you are.
Yeah, what is a positive that the current fuel price spike could bring about and something
you hope it doesn't? A positive is people might decide EVs are a pretty good idea after all.
Look, EVs, I have been pretty well convinced that EVs in general are a good idea. And so
our government's decision to effectively abandon all support for EVs is fucking insane. It's
just backwards science. It's like climate denialism. We had already agreed on this,
motherfucker. You know what I mean? I don't mean that Biden's 2030 ban on internal combustion
cars was realistic. That wasn't either. But I'm talking about the funding to build the
infrastructure network that will help us get to more EV adoption, the thing we need to get to
the place, whatever. Anyway, I think if the price stays where it's at or continues to go up,
I think people will consider new EVs as well as used EVs for the further next car and maybe,
hopefully, they'll consider a down size in some way, shape or form in terms of the physical size
and displacement and fuel economy of their view. That would be amazing and miraculous. I think,
look, directing injection is one of the most amazing and powerful automotive technologies
of the last 20 years. And it came about because of mandates both from the public and from the
government of saying, hey, we need cars to be more efficient in a bunch of ways. So they said,
okay, how do we do that? How do we burn the fuel more completely? And the result of that is all
the crazy horsepower we have mixed with turbocharging. And mixed with vastly improved efficiency
if that's the goal as well. They went out with like, we need to burn more of the fuel more
completely. They did that, but then you also get more power. So maybe we'll end up with the
Gale-Banks method. Yeah, stop sending all the horsepower out of the exhaust pipe or the smoke
stack. So maybe we'll get more power from smaller engines. But I also think it'd be great if people
rethought how they consume gasoline and for people yelling like the grid that can't handle it,
the grid can respond if the market demands the grid respond.
I thought about the fact that I took the spider out on Friday and I went to the car
meet up the hill and I had a lovely drive by myself and I filled up my spider with $6.99
a gallon gas and I went, I'm about to burn this off for fun. And I was like, I'm very fortunate
and even if gas gets pretty expensive, I'm in the car business. Gas isn't going to affect our
bottom line. I realize it's not the same for a lot of people. But I did it for perhaps the first
time ever. I was like, I'm about to burn off a whole tank of this just recreationally and all
I'm doing is... You're about to drop $70 in three hours. Yeah, just to drive. So it's like, oh boy.
So someone emailed me our DM or something from Europe and said, I've done the conversion and
like my everyday gas is like the equivalent of like $875 US. So I think if gas stays,
my friend, my boy Brandon, shout out to him back east, said the average is like four something
in New York where he lives in the suburbs and I'm like, I'll be $6.99 over here. If the rest of the
country starts to see what we're getting in California and California starts to get to $89,
that's the other half of that person's question was something you don't want to see,
which is just that people that cannot afford to pay more for gas and their fucking
lives fall apart because they have to decide... Well, I mean the article we cited last week,
for most people this increases their gas cost by 300 bucks on average. Some people more or less
follow blood. But if it starts increasing people's annual spend on gas by $500,000,
I mean there are people that do not have $500 in a savings account, they can't handle that kind
of swing and like that'll put a ton of pressure on a lot of people and that would be really horrible.
Yeah, this is a very hard question. I saved a bunch of money on insurance by selling my BMW,
says was there one car that if it was never made cars as a whole would be in a much better place?
Now, what car has inspired some kind of industry-wide adoption for the worse?
Like I... I think this is a really hard butterfly effect question because
like when we would make a mistake in production, you know,
the mistake would lead to people the next shoot going, let's not do like let's not do a
Clapman, like let's not do that again, whatever that might mean. It might mean forgetting to like,
you know, format your car, it might mean don't roll over the ATV. But like everyone was probably
a little better at their job because of that error. And I think I am sure that when like the Aztec came
out, there were meetings happening. Aztec was like 12 years ahead of everything else. Everything's
in Aztec now. Yeah, I'm sure there were meetings happening around town that were like, okay you're
going to draw a crossover, but please don't draw that. You know, so we might have cars might have
improved their design because someone had to really fall in their face. I don't know. I don't
know what you could get rid of and in the whole car community would be net positive. All right,
I have one. I actually have one, I think. The first generation Ford Explorer. The first generation
Ford Explorer pretty much created what the modern SUV is. And that began the shift away from cars,
sedans and wagons and minivans to everyone has an SUV or what is now called a crossover,
but an SUV shaped thing just in a different size packaging. And like that may have happened
eventually, but it was really the fucking arrival of the Ford Explorer that did it. Maybe I could
say the second gen Explorer, the 95, because the first gen Explorer was a huge success, but it was
also like a fucking truck. The second gen was when it was like, let's make this into a car. Right.
That it looks like a truck. You know what I mean? So I would say maybe that. See, I don't know if
that's net negative though, because I think the buyers have shown they'd rather have a crossover
and we talk as we age like getting into low cars kind of sucks. And so if the if the Explorer led
to a new kind of car that has the efficiency of a car and the ride comfort of it like a car,
meaning a sedan or a coupe, but it has a hip point of like a truck or an SUV, then people kind of
got a product that they actually prefer. So I don't know if that's a net negative. Now as car
enthusiasts, we go, well, the sedans are going away. The wagons are going away. Yeah, bummer
for us. Right. But I don't know if it's a bummer for anybody else. I agree. But I don't know of a
car. I don't know the car that is net negative for society, but also like, all right, how about the
Hummer H2? Right. Because the Hummer H1 was a military vehicle clearly. Right. They made it
legal for the road, but it was still always going to be stupid and niche. But the H2 was like
huge for everybody. No? No, I think that's a good one. That's a good one. Because it was really
a Tahoe. Yeah. But it might have led to like TRX wrapped or other stuff like that. I don't know,
Cybertruck? Yeah. I mean, Cybertruck. Yeah, but I but so far I can't see anything that it's inspired.
I mean, our lives would be better because we wouldn't have to look at Cybertruck. But it's not
like people are copying. I hate to say it, and people would call me a hater because I would say
the Model S. Because I like what the Model S did in terms of making EVs a desirable thing and cool
and refined and sleek and all that shit. But at the same time, I can poo-poo it because of the
tablet. Oh, so like it did give the world tablets. Right. It gave the world tablets and touchscreens
for 10 years. But it also like it also gave the world sexy EVs. It's a mixback. Yeah, that's true.
It's a mixback. Yeah. Yeah. Good question. Good question. Murray Long, last name. I like that
better. Thanks Murray. Keep going. I want to complete. I'm contemplating replacing my GR
Corolla with two cars, a fun car and a daily EV. I get this. I've narrowed the list to a Maki
and Ioniq 5 and a Polestar 2. Is there a reason to go for the performance variant of any of these
if my fun car is a BRZ or Miata? My commute is 30 miles round trip and I can L2 charge at Worker
Home. I do not think there is a good reason to go for the performance version of this,
of any of those cars for your commute. Do you? No, Zach. I don't think so. I think if you need,
if you really need all-wheel drive for the winter, get the all-wheel drive. But if not, rear-wheel drive
long range is the sweet spot for all these cars when it comes to commuting. Yeah. And then rip
your BRZ or Miata. Exception, if they'll make you a great deal for a Maki rally. Yes, because that
also rides better than like the Maki all-wheel drive. That one had the stiffer suspension we
didn't like. So the rally rides really nice. But yeah, put comfort over those other things.
Your poorest patron. I somehow doubt it, but I'll let you call yourself that and I appreciate you.
Clearly, you're still a patron. 36 bucks a year? I will take it and I promise I will spend it wisely,
not on something frivolous like drugs or alcohol or gasoline. As you sip whiskey.
This was given. That was paid for by a different patron, probably. This was paid for by someone.
The one above or below. No, it was paid for by those other people. Yeah. It's crazy.
Okay, really enjoyed the R&T article about car companies abandoning rail cars. Yes. Do you see
this as being a potential whole, the aftermarket fills where enthusiasts are able to tune, build
rest-o-mod cars to satisfy the itch? I mean, yes, I do, but hand-building cars is expensive too.
Yeah. And so I've had multiple people email me in the last six months about do you think there's
a market for a six-figure rest-o-mod X, 80s, 90s cars, fairly obvious candidates.
And maybe, but still very expensive. And then you also don't have a warranty. You don't have all of
the technology that a new car comes with. You don't have OEM support, dealership support,
all that stuff. So that is something that we all have lost by car companies moving away from
affordable sports cars. Yeah. And right now, anybody with a lot of talent who's building
cars and stuff, they're having trouble finding folks who want to come work for them. So maybe the
market will sort itself out and people will realize, hey, there's some money in building
cars for people. There's some money in restoring and modifying and whatever. And I'm going to go
and do that. But I mean, buy an enthusiast car now, I guess. I don't, I do think it's possible,
but also those cars are expensive. Dre from Houston, did we see the video of the Cybertruck
that tried to self-drive a woman off of these freeway interchanges here in Houston? I did
see it. Me too. Yeah. I mean, over and over. FSD is great right up until it isn't. And that's the
problem with it because it lulls you into a false sense of security. It fucks up at the
worst possible time. You're not prepared and then the crash becomes your fault. Yeah. And this was
broad daylight, by the way, like a well-marked highway. What was very funny about this is one of
our mutual dear friends, Matt. Today sent me a video of a Tesla avoiding an accident on a highway
at night where there was just smoke. You couldn't see anything, but the Tesla somehow knew to go
around with the vehicle in the shoulder. And he's like, isn't this impressive? Jump ahead three hours
and someone's like, here's a video of a Cybertruck crashing into a stationary K-rail in the middle
of the daytime and just, you know, Tesla giveth and Tesla taketh away. I mean, something can be
impressive and almost and also be problematic when used in public. Like, yes, it's impressive that it
could do one thing, but that has nothing to do with how it might handle this other thing.
Right. And ultimately, in these L2 systems, like, you're responsible for what it does.
Like, I got in kind of an argument with a guy the other night and he was like,
he's, I guess, a pilot. He's a pilot's license, whatever. And he basically was like, he uses it
all the time and he is not concerned. And he basically says, it's the least of all the things I
do. I ride motorcycles, I flay. It's like, it's less dangerous than that than any of those things.
And I go, well, I mean, yeah, okay. But like, you know, it could also crash into somebody else.
It could also cause another problem. And like, it's ultimately, it's on you to monitor it.
It's like, it's just not, until the company making the software and operating the software
takes responsibility for it, like, it's not real. Like, it's your fault still, if something happens.
And I think some people are just more than willing to do that math and go, okay, well,
it's my fault. But like, also, I don't really like driving. And so if it's like,
it's worth your friend in Miami, right? I'm a shit driver. This is better than me. And that
person's willing to accept that so far it's worked out fine. And that's, I mean, human thinking is,
it's worked out fine so far. Why change anything? There was a, there was a very funny, I mean,
it's not, it wasn't supposed to be funny. It was only funny to me about a guy, an article written
by a guy who was on the, one of the Uber self-driving car development teams. And his, he has a Model
X on FSD. And it crashed with all those kids in the car. And he was like, I used it, you know,
all the time. And it was fine. And it was good. And it, and I just like, assumed it would be fine.
And then I like woke up in the hospital. You know, and he's like, the problem with being
99% good is that like youth, you treat it like it's 100%. Like you, me, you, me, and a guy who
works in the fucking industry, like treats it treats 99, like it's 100. And there's such a big
gap from 99 to 100. Anyway, my third leg can't touch my third pedal installed some new tires,
but they squeal a lot mid corner at a moderate pace. I still have grip. I can continue to
turn it harder, but they squeal a lot. Should I be, I'm not sure what the last sentence is,
is it a result of a noisy tire or am I driving badly? Some tires just squeal a lot.
Yeah, that's true. Especially like all seasons. All seasons squeal like a bunch more as compared
to the softer compounds of the summer tires. Yeah, it can, and it can be well before you're at
the limit of grip. Or sometimes it's the surface you're on, like around here when they have those
the freeways that look like they were, you know, pressed with a comb and just like all that stuff.
So it could be a mix of both things. But I don't know, if you're turning at a normal speed,
because this person's driving a Chevy Bolt, like if you're not speeding through the corner and
it's doing it, it's just the nature of the tire. Right. When it gets leaned on, for some reason,
it squeals way before it. Let's go. I don't know.
Dismoldering rim said people started buying the Pontiac Aztec ironically. How cheap does the
Cybertruck have to get to be, to be in the same position? So good question. But we have to contextualize
when did people start buying the Aztec ironically? It certainly was not when they were fucking new.
No, it was when a show was made. Breaking bad. About meth. Yes. Right. So the question is what
piece of media will canonize the Cybertruck as what the depressing car of like a failed,
you know, teacher, like of a not failed teacher, but like a broke teacher in Albuquerque, you know,
like the irony of that, of the Aztec came much, much later once like a Aztecs, once the world
became Aztecs. You know how Billy Corbin, the documentary, Billy Corbin says if you want to
see what America will be in 20 years, look at Miami. Miami is America in 20 years, which is not
fucking good, but he ain't wrong. The Cybertruck, it's like that. You know what I mean? The Aztec was
America in 20 years. The Cybertruck will be that, maybe. But the Cybertruck is politically toxic,
whereas the Aztec was merely a failure that ultimately wasn't that ugly or that terrible
because the world just sort of bent back to it. Then it needs, then the Cybertruck needs at least
20 years because I think that's about how long it took before you started seeing 9-11 jokes on
Instagram. It needs a huge amount of distance, but also the distance hasn't begun yet actually,
because it's still politically toxic because the owner of Tesla is still politically toxic
and operating. He would have to depart and then you need 20, 25 years before people can go,
oh, remember that thing? That was a weird idea and they're going to start buying it for 10 grand.
In 25 years, maybe everybody involved with Back to the Future will be dead. I'm not saying that
I'm looking forward to that, but the reality is probably that in math. Then someone can remake
Back to the Future because Bob Gale and everyone involved says no remakes. It's a perfect movie.
You cannot remake it, which I believe. I agree. Actually, cannot, should not. Once they're dead,
someone's going to. And then the Cybertruck will become ironically cool because Doc Brown
will turn one into a fucking time machine because it's a joke. That's a great call
because he could also make fun of its past. In 1985, when Back to the Future 1 came out,
the DeLorean was a joke. It was a failure. We were children and now it's a cool-looking car,
but it was a failure. He would have bought that thing for nothing that in 1985.
I think Doc Brown would use a different car, but they would then travel back to 2020 and they would
see Cybertrucks and make fun of them. There's a goof. And then people start buying them ironically
because they were like the villain car in this new Back to the Future reboot from 2015.
Yeah, whatever the, whatever Biff, Young Biff, Young Biff would be a manosphere
influence. Oh my God. He will absolutely be that person. Gramps. Yeah. Nobody can turn this yoke
with me. That's exactly right. That's good. Dungeons and Datsons. All right, Freaky Friday
garage swap. Zach, if your budget was similar to mine, what would your garage look like? And if I
was down to a two-car household, what would my garage look like? You go first because you have fewer
things to describe. I mean, look, if I... How many cars do you have right now? Six and a half? I think
like eight. Oh, okay. I honestly don't recall. I don't want to do it out right now. I think it's like,
all right, wait, the Taycan, the Taycan, the Spider, the Manx, the Pau, the Delica,
the Mercedes, the Lamborghini, the Aston Martin. Are there more?
I don't recall. I don't think. I don't think there's more. Yeah. Oh. I think it's eight,
but it might also be nine. I don't know. The point is, but you don't have to come up with nine cars.
I'm going with six. I can't be on time for nine. Yes, six is ridiculous. If my garage was two cars,
I mean, genuinely, I would be very happy to have the Taycan and the Spider. What do you need past
that? That would do it. I mean, those are both very, very nice cars, but if I had to choose two,
an EV, nice EV for every day, it's a wagon, holds shit, and then the Spider for weekends and road
trips and fun activities. I'd be happy with that. Okay. I forgot that you have a Kuntas.
Did you forget that too? Did you say that one? I don't call. I just realized my budget could go
up quite a bit, but yeah. Okay, then I'm just going to go three, six, Pau, Delica, Mercedes, Aston.
All right. Yeah, that's nine. It's nine. Okay. I would have an E90 M3, a 65 Pontiac with just a
decent engine and, you know, four-speed reliving high school, a four-runner for camping overland
stuff, a Maki rally as my EV daily, a C5 drift car, a 360 Modena with a manual swap, and then a V8
Vantage S. Zach has very expensive taste. Well, but if we take the Kuntas and we divide it by its
parts, you know, I can sell some of those organs. What a coincidence. What a coincidence. It's already
divided by its parts. Who wants to buy a hub? That's frozen. Oh, I bought that hub twice. Okay,
reeducation through liftoff oversteer, scrolls it down. When thinking about trading a car in,
do you fix small blemishes and cracked windshields, or do you just trade it on as the dealer can fix it
for less? Trading in is a tough one. I would only fix something that's real big on a trade-in.
They're wholesaling that motherfucker out. Only, like, if you're trading a same brand, if you're
trading like the kind of car that they're going to put back on the used lot, like if you're trading
an off-lease Panamera for a brand new Panamera, and then you've got a two-year-old like real nice
Panamera, and they're going to put that back on the lot, you maybe, maybe, maybe fix things.
If you're trading in a Camry to a mini dealer, they're wholesaling that fucking thing out. Just
whatever it is it is, right? I don't really believe in fixing stuff before you trade it to a dealer.
There's value in knowing what it costs to repair those things. If the dealership goes,
oh, windshields ding, we got a place that's $800, and you go, I know that it's $350,
and then maybe just so that way you don't get fucked and they don't start deleting numbers
from the total. Yeah, that's like a lease return. If you're going to get fucked on a lease return
for a scratch or a chip in the windshield, then maybe you want to do it yourself. But if you're
trading the car in, they're usually not going to hose you for like the amount.
Because they're already hosing you on the price. They're already hosing you on the price. They're
not going to hose you that much. Okay. Hitting a deer at the speed limit says,
of all the cars you've tested, are there any cars that are one flash away from greatness, such as
meaning like, I don't think that's a software flash. I just think it's like, if you changed one
thing, it would be perfect. Like both that Volvo Sian thing and the Alpha, the Totem GT,
both had that weird steering thing where they didn't unwind the steering properly.
Right, because the castor angles wrong. Yeah. Like those were both almost perfect,
except for that. Well, if they take a new M2, a new M3, well, one flash, I mean,
the design is one thing, but dynamically, like if you could add steering feel somehow and
David Tuig has explained this is a very complicated thing to get steering feel,
but that is like the biggest complaint. Just add steering feel. Yeah, put it back.
It needs it. Just put it in. Car's not there. Handles well, is comfortable. This is a problem.
But it has no steering feel. So yeah, flash that.
Well, I mean, there's so there's a lot of cars like like three liter 911s, for instance.
It's not, it's not super problematic because you can just flick it and it's clear that sport mode
in three liter 911s is the mode that the car is supposed to be in. And then normal mode is like
eco tune, quiet sound, fuel economy, bullshit. So like all 997.2, excuse me, 991.2 and 992,
the twin turbo three liter, all the Carrera line, you have to flick it in sport mode. And then you're
like, oh, yeah, that's how it's supposed. Like it literally like bogs the shit out of itself. It
just sucks in normal mode. So you put in sport mode, it's fine. So a flash from greatness is just
making sport mode the normal default mode. Like they've invented, sorry, Zach, they've they've
done the whole hybrid system to solve for that. Right. Like you don't need the hybrid system.
It works, but you don't need any of that shit. Just started in fucking sport mode and like
I recognize fuel economy standards and all these things and it's better for the environment. But
a Carrera S with like none of this hybrid shit is like, you know, 200 and something pounds lighter,
way less complex, all this other stuff. That's raw material. But you don't have to, but you have
to do the sport mode thing. Whereas the other one, you don't have to do it because it fills in all
the bottom end with the electric motor to cover for the fact that it's just not revving the other
motor that has so much power. It already has the both the gas and it has so much power. It just
won't rev it for emissions and noise. So it has a whole other system to get around having to rev
the engine it's got. Damn. Let's, I don't do, I don't want to pull that one up, but twin cam,
twin cam Homes says, I just sold my RS5 and Audi A3 TDI and bought an Audi A4 all road
on the quest to get down to two cars with a dedicated sports car. So you've got the all road.
I've driven a Boxster or Cayman, a GTS 4.0, a Mira V6 manual GT350 manual Supra,
and a 981 Boxster. Besides a GT4, is there anything else I should try? I mean, these are all mid-engine
cars. No, they're not the GT350 and the Supra or not. Sorry. You should try. Well, I mean, you should
try a Corvette, I think. Yeah. It's like a C606 or a C8. Sorry, Gransport or yeah, or a C8.
You should try this. If you're doing a Mira new, then yeah, then you should do try a C8. Oh,
try to get a U06. A U06 is in the wheelhouse. You should try. You should maybe try a Viper,
just for funsies. Depends on your height, but yeah, you should try it. It's a thing. It is
definitely a thing worth experiencing as a car person. Yeah. And you could probably get a Ferrari
360 for the kind of money you're talking about as well. So maybe take a look at that.
Keel and Toe says, will Jaguars transition to full electric work for them or is it the beginning
of the end? Let's wait out and see how gas prices work out. That's true. I don't know. I mean,
I think Jaguar is not an American company. It's a fucking British company owned by Indians.
The rest of the world is going electric with or without America. Yeah, but America is such a huge
customer for all car companies that I think without, it would be really amazing if they could survive
without a strong American base. I don't know if it's a huge chunk of money. But on the other hand,
if Jaguar is selling to people who don't care about a tax incentive because they can afford
the $7,500, then maybe- It doesn't exist anymore. Right. No, I'm saying. It went away. So people
who need that money, they say, well, now I'm not going to buy an EV because it's not as cheap. But
if someone's buying a six-figure Jaguar, they go, yeah, all right, fine. Seven grand. Do I want it
or do I not want it? So we'll see. But it's tough. Yeah. It's an EV Sedani wagon in an era of hybrid
crossovers. Well, I think we've seen kind of the limit of what most people are willing to spend
on an EV right now. Most people are willing to spend, you know, 120 to 150 hard tops, right?
Even like Tycon, like Tycon Turbo S's and she's like, those don't go out the door at full sticker.
Yeah. They just don't. Yeah. So I don't know. Project BRZAT, like where your head's at,
would it be, am I nuts to think it would be a great trip to drive my BRZ from Dallas to
wherever the fuck that is? I'm going to Google that on the Arctic Ocean. I love long road trips,
but this would push things well beyond anything else I've done. Okay. So can you make a, make
a Mab's route to fucking there from, from Dallas? From Dallas. Let's see how far this is to
tuck Toyuk tuck, to tuck Toyuk tuck. Well, that's really far. It's super far. Wow. Yeah. For people
listening, this is the top of Canada. Is that like drivable? Just east of the Alaska border?
Can you drive to that? Is there a fucking road? I mean, yeah, there is. Tolls,
ferries, you cross the border and you're in a different time zone. There is a way. Go up to
the Yukon part of it, the Northwest Territory. Like, okay. So we know, we know this is paved,
you know, all the way to, you know, whatever the northern part of, but what is the, is there a
street view of what this road like looks like? Is this, is this a road? It just says Yukon
Canada. Street view. Can you zoom in enough to see satellite view if it's, if it's paved?
Fuck. Is that dirt or is that tarmac? That looks like dirt. That looks like dirt, doesn't it?
Yeah. No street view though, huh? It's called Dempster Highway. Yo, yeah. I'm pretty sure that's,
that's dirt. So where does pavement end? What's the nearest like town?
I mean, this is, this is Eagle Plains. So what's up with Eagle Plains?
There's a hotel. All right. Let's get a photo of the Eagle Plains. Can we just click on it?
And let's, oh, that seems very... There's three things in Eagle Plains. There's
a restaurant and one hotel. All right. Let's get a photo of it. Oh, yeah. Looks great.
4.1 stars. Oh boy. We need a view of the road.
Can't, you can't just spin around, huh? Oh, that's tough. I don't think so. That's tough.
Wow. That looks like a Wes Anderson couch, doesn't it? All right. So we don't know. It's,
we think it's dirt. Okay. I mean, dude, like people do it, right? Like it's far and it's dirt.
This would be awesome. I mean, this would be absolutely a trip of a lifetime. 4,000 miles
and you end up at, you know, the Arctic Ocean Circle. Yeah. Like, don't do it in the winter
because you won't make it and you'll die. What is up here, dude? Hunters B&B top rated. You
should absolutely do this. Let's look at this place. What does that house look like? Holy
shit. Look at this fucking thing. I mean, it actually looks, looks lovely. Looks beautiful.
Look at the view. Wow. I mean, do it in the summer. Top of the world. Top of the world.
Driving. I drove, I drove through Canada once for Hyundai. Stunning. I mean, absolutely memorable
drive and foliage, all of that stuff. It's pretty hardcore. It's very hardcore. And if you're doing
it in a BRZ, is that what you got to go back? What? You got to turn around and go back once you've
got there. That's a two way drive, right? Or you got to somehow ship the car home from there.
Best of luck. No, he's cancelling headphones. That car is not that quiet on the road in a BRZ.
But that would be really cool. I would do it. Yeah, that's awesome. Absolutely. Yeah, that it?
There's more. Oh, there are. Oh, okay. Um,
she, she likes choke to get started. She likes to choke to get started. Do your cars have any
quirky features? For example, I find the visors on my 1989 11 SC to be very large. I mean,
my Coontosh has a Coke mirror. Like the vanity mirror comes out.
Yeah, so that's four. No question. That's rad. That's 100% what that's for. I mean,
it's what I've used it for. I don't, I don't, but I know you don't, but that's like,
that's what people used it for. Yeah. Talk about meeting a market need.
The POW has all kinds of fucking quirky features. The POW has a SUV like tailgate or like a hammock
in the back. It's got all kinds of crazy shit in it. My car, like in the trunk,
where the CD changer used to be, I just have this weird felt cubby and I kept
lifting chalk in it and fad found it. It was like still wrapped and it's from like eight years ago.
And it just looks like I'm transporting bricks of cocaine. Last one. What does the Fox body say?
2022 Mach 1 or 2020 Camaro S1 LE?
Am I living with it or am I tracking it? I'd probably go Mach 1.
If I'm living with it, it's Mach 1. That's a fantastic car.
Yeah, I'd go, I'd go Mach 1. Thank you everybody. We appreciate y'all very much. Y'all are good
people out there. Thank you to our patrons for asking such good questions. And everyone,
go check out our, our portion on 11 Turbo S giveaway. The link is in the video description.
Get your entries in for that. And we will see you guys next time. Bye.
About this episode
BMW M2 CS gets a street-and-track reality check, with the hosts praising its adaptive/ceramic-brake feel and comfort-to-sport balance, but questioning whether the $30k premium truly adds fun versus a regular M2—especially given the divisive seats, numb steering, and an auto that doesn’t always “snap” like a DCT. The discussion also dives deep into dyno testing and weather correction factors, plus a detailed update on a Mercedes E500 Cabriolet conversion project. The rest is listener Q&A on quiet road-trip cars, EVs amid gas spikes, and FSD safety.
Original notes
Matt Farah and Zack Klapman review the 2026 BMW M2 CS; Matt has updates on both of his exotic projects; there's a wrinkle with on an E500 Cabriolet build; and Patreon questions include:
- What BAD car changed the world?
- Lotus vs Supra vs Boxster vs GT350
- Will Jaguar survive?
- Is this 4,000 trip a crazy idea in a BRZ?
- Perfect environment for each of our cars
- Do people buy "appliance watches" like they do cars?
- Quietest compact commuter
- What will be the next Nissan Altima?
- Performance EV or naw?
- Why restoring performance cars doesn't fill the hole
- My tires squeal a LOT
- When will the Cybertruck be an ironic purchase?
- Freaky Friday garage edition
- Trading in: fix the small things?
Recorded April 6, 2026
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