Jim Kenzie's The Driver's Seat

Targa Newfoundland - I hope not...

The second car on the Kia team at Targa once again this year will be the Forte Koup, now in its fourth event.

For the third of those four years it will be driven by Trois Rivieres auto scribe and road racer Jacques Deshaies.

We've been kidding Jacques that he is also using his third navigator in those three years - doesn't anybody ever want to do that a second time?

Not really - it's a matter of finding someone with the time to do this event.

The new 'guy' is in fact a Guy - Guy McKenzie.

Despite the surname, Guy is Francophone. If he were my navigator, we'd be Kenzie McKenzie.

Which in fact is the name of a Nova Scotia folk singer.

I digress.

But no - in our Optima Turbo, now with fabulous racing brakes and suspension, I will stick with my Halifax co-driver Brian Bourbonniere for as long as he will keep doing it. He is simply the best in the field - he even reads my mood through my breathing in the headset!

Anyway, last night at dinner Guy showed us a YouTube video which is advertised as the "World's Funniest Rally Video".

I concur.

Watch it here.

And I can assure you that this scene will NOT be replicated in either of our cars this week.

Oh - if the ad you get before the video happens to be for "Poo-Pourri", don't skip it - it's almost as funny as the rally video...

Porsche 911 Turbo 'Active Aerodynamics'

Porsches have featured deployable rear spoilers for some time.

Here's how the one on the new 911 Turbo looks:

Porsche 911 Turbo rear spoiler deploys

This happens automatically at speed, but you can also deploy it manually as we obviously are doing here!

What's new for the 2014 911 Turbo is a front spoiler that also deploys automatically or manually (ditto):

Porsche 911 Turbo front spoiler deploys

Porsche claims these devices cut a couple seconds off the car's Nurburgring Nordschleife time.

The obvious advantage of the deployable front spoiler is that when retracted, it is much less likely to get whacked when you pull into a gas station.

Even Rick Mercer is After My Job

Motoring TV has been on TSN for 25 years.

For 24 of those, I've been doing Kenzie's Korner, beefing about something or other.

Did we steal the idea from Don Cherry?

Hm-mm - no comment.

Did we steal the 'walking rant' concept from Rick Mercer, initially with This Hour, and now his own Rick Mercer Report?

I dunno - how long has he been doing that? I'm too tired to do the math.

Let's just say that all three of us have fun doing what we do.

Now, since I got my PVR, two things - I never see TV ads any more, or the boring parts of sports events (I've got the quickest fast-forward digit in town - I can watch a baseball game in 20 minutes); and, I can catch up on older stuff I haven't seen.

So while some of you may have seen this particular Rick Mercer Rant when it first appeared back in 2008 (or caught it on one of many car fori on this InterTube thingee where it has been posted) it was new to me when I stumbled across it recently. Maybe it'll be new to you too.

We'll forgive him for calling them 'snow tires' - they're 'winter tires' because they work better in winter even when there is no snow.

But the rest of it?

Spot on.

Check it out here.

 

Big Brother is watching you......

...from all directions.

It's not bad enough that we drivers have to waste precious brain synapses scanning the sides of the road in two dimensions, watching for police officers skulking behind road signs, hedges, bridge abutments, on their unending quest to enforce an unenforceable speed limit.

But now we have to pay attention in three dimensions, because cops are standing on bridge overpasses with their radar guns.

Like we don't have enough else to do?

I don't know if this tactic is all that new, but I've only seen it recently myself, and some readers have observed it too.

As I've said a million times, the entire exercise is futile, because 100-plus years of speed limit enforcement has obviously not had any effect; otherwise, they wouldn't have to keep on trying.

The exercise is also pointless, because speed simply is not the issue in traffic safety. Seat belts, impaired driving, and lousy driving skills are the issues.

Any police resources we devote to anything else are completely wasted.

Why are they still doing it?

You'll have to ask them.

 

Why don't we see more of these?

Yes, just a simple Yield sign, this being one of a consecutive pair near the exit of Toyota Canada's Head Office in Scarborough.

Private property, so I guess they can do what they want.

But good on them, because Yield signs make so much more sense than Stop signs.

More municipalities - including Scarborough - should have more of them.

In fact, virtually every 'controlled' intersection should have a Yield, instead of a Stop.

Ever since the advent of synchromesh first gears on manual transmissions (and of course automatics), the vast majority of drivers treat Stop signs like Yield signs anyway.

And in the vast majority of cases, that's all that's necessary. You can almost always see if any traffic, pedestrians or cyclists are coming while rolling through at a couple of klicks per hour - there's just no need to come to a full and complete stop.

That only puts extra wear and tear on your brakes, and of course wastes fuel because it requires more fuel to launch a 2,000 kg weight from a dead stop than to just accelerate it.

Creates more pollution too.

With all due deference to the beauteous Julie Bowen in her Emmy-winning role as Clare Dunphy on the brilliant TV show Modern Family (a recent plot point had her trying to get a Stop sign erected at an intersection near their house), the only purpose of a Stop sign appears to be to give police a chance to run up some tickets.

If someone runs a Yield and fails to give right of way where it was required, the cops can still easily ticket that.

But nailing someone for going 5 kph instead of 0 kph for a nanosecond?

Pointless.

Except for the points on your licence.

Most jurisdictions around the world utilize more Yield signs than we do. What makes them so special?

They're just smarter, is all.

Of course, all those 'controlled' intersections should be roundabouts - again, like many jurisdictions around the world.

One step at a time...

Roll Up Your Damned Windows!

On a press preview for a Mitsubishi something-or-other a few years ago, a representative from the Rockford-Fosgate audio company was describing the wonders of the sound system in this particular vehicle.

It generated some unconscious number of watts of power. If you cranked the volume up to 11, the car would probably go 50 km/h without the engine even running.

It made me think of the very clever feature in Ford’s high-end stereo systems which automatically switches the volume setting to the middle of its range every time the ignition is switched off and back on again, so Mom and Dad won’t be blasted into the back seat when they fire the car up after Junior has last driven it.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I own a tee shirt which reads “If it’s too loud, you’re too old.”

My rock ‘n’ roll band (“The Compleat Works on their Mid-Life Crisis Tour”, free plug, and yes, we are available…) has been known to crank it up.

But I suggested to Mr. Rockford-Fosgate that any car equipped with a sound system this powerful should have an interlock that prevents the volume from being turned up more than half-way unless all the windows are rolled up.

How many times have you sat at a traffic light beside some slammed Honda Civic, the kid driving it is sitting on the floor, with some misogynist gansta rap bellowing out, the bass causing your eyeballs and ears to start bleeding - because the kid has the damned windows open?

OK, I understand he has already lost his hearing (seriously; this IS becoming a genuine problem amongst our young people.)

But does he need to inflict that crap on the rest of us?

I’d make up a big sign reading “Thank you for sharing!”, but I doubt he’d get the sarcasm.

It’s not just that what he’s listening to happens to BE crap. If I’ve got Bob Seger or The Eagles turned up to at 11, I try to remember to roll my windows up because maybe there are musical cretins out there who don’t appreciate true artistry. It’s not my job to educate them.

I confess; most of the passengers on the Boston - Toronto flight the other day were getting pretty cranky about me drumming along on the tray table to Clapton’s Greatest Hits. But as soon as it was pointed out to me, I stopped.

What’s it going to take to get the backward-baseball-cap crowd to do the same?

Targa Newfoundland - Day One

It was an eventful day to start the Tenth Anniversary Targa Newfoundland.

Several serious "offs"; I'll direct you to the Targa Newfoundland web site for more details on those.

Our electrical gremlins returned with a vengeance. The car started fine this morning, and ran to and through the first stage without problems.

OK, other than the slow driver...

But in the second stage, the dreaded Check Engine light reappeared, and we lost what felt like about half of our power.

The light went out again, the power returned, and it was OK the rest of the morning.

OK, other than that slow driver...

The car started fine again after lunch, but following a 40 km transit stage, the car would NOT start. We bump-started it, but began getting various other warning lights. We tried jamming the battery from the big X5 Diesel tow car into the MINI - again it started, but only ran briefly.

So we missed the last two stages of the day.

Crew members from Bob Pacione's team and the Soldier On team jumped in to help. On one side of modern technology, these gallant warriors were downloading wiring diagrams via satellite phones, accessing diagnostic web sites through computers plugged into portable battery packs - all pretty amazing.

Then again, if the car had a points-and-condenser ignition, we probably would have got going again!

As it turned out, the last stage of the day was washed out due to some of those 'offs', so we're 'only' one stage behind. We won last year's Open Division missing two stages.

But the competition is much tougher this year!

Still, it's a long week, and it's way too early to give up.

As I type, crew chief Alain Lauziere is heading to St. John's on a parts chase. We'll let you know tomorrow how successful he was.

*****

I have updated yesterday's blog with the link to the web site where you can learn more about Darryl Deagle, a Targa Newfoundland veteran who died this year in a tragic parachute jumping crash, and about the Registered Education Savings Plan that has been set up for his 10-month old daughter Sophia. That link is here.

Are good habits contagious?

Are you seeing more cars these days parked with their windshield wipers sitting 'up' in the 'clean the windshield' position?

(Assuming the cars' wipers can in fact be extended that far up, and will stay there - we seem to have some car designers or wiper engineers who've never used a squeegee to clean a windshield. Lots of wipers these days can only be lifted a few cm off the glass, making cleaning the windshield a real pain.)

Maybe it's mere anecdotal evidence, but it seems to me I'm seeing more of this recently.

The point of doing this of course is that if it snows or - worse still - if there's freezing rain, your wiper blades don't stick to the windshield.

I mention the 'contagious' issue because on two or three occasions in different parking lots in different parts of the city, I've noticed clusters of several cars parked near each other doing this.

Are people learning from each other?

Reminds me of Russia some years ago - just about every car you'd see parked on the street had no wiper blades at all. Turns out - at that time, anyway - rubber was so valuable that the half-life of an unprotected wiper blade was about ten minutes, so cagey drivers would remove the blades and lock them in the glove box.

Which reminds me yet again of an old Russian car joke:

Dimitri says, "Comrade Ivan - I got a new pair of wiper blades for my Lada!"

Replies Ivan, "Comrade Dimitri - good trade!"

I digress...

Back to learning from others:

It's the same with backing in to parking spots, easily the safest way to do it (unless an even safer 'drive-through' spot is available). That too seems to have a bit of a 'pack mentality' to it, although I know some companies teach their employees to do this (General Motors used to; don't know if it still does).

I once complimented the Hugo Boss company for enforcing this procedure, only to find out subsequently that the motivation wasn't primarily safety, but to ensure that employees' windshield-mounted parking permits were easily visible - and yes, violators would be towed.

Hey - I'll accept the right result even if it's for the wrong reasons.

Now, if we could only get 'the pack' to correct its collective behaviour for my two major (and yes, on-going) pet peeves:

- Drive Right, Pass Left. This means YOU;

and,

- TURN ON YOUR FRICKIN' HEADLIGHTS, preferably all the time, but at the very least when it's cloudy, foggy, raining, snowing - any time really when visibility is compromised, and other drivers need to see your taillights as well as your front DRLs.

Like, well, at night?...

Pigs, Planes, and Automobiles

John Candy, Rest In Peace...

Following the sad pig-transport roll-over a few days ago, last Friday night we had an airplane on the 407.

An apparent fuel problem meant that a single-engine Piper private aircraft was not going to make it to Buttonville Airport. The obviously skillful pilot managed to land it on the westbound lanes of the 407, dodging hydro lines, overpasses, and, according to The Star's news report, a GO transit bus and one passenger car.

That's also a clever way of dodging the toll.

At least two countries I have driven in make their major highways part of their aircraft infrastructure.

Sweden, which as far as I know hasn't been at war with anybody for three hundred years, nonetheless has an air force, and a home-grown military aircraft industry (which is more than Canada can say).

SAAB, the automobile company, began life building airplanes - the letters in its name stand for "Svenska Aeroplan Aktiebolaget" (Swedish Airplane Company Limited). It designs and manufactures some of the most sophisticated jet fighters in the world, as well as a range of commercial aircraft.

While I doubt a Swedish pilot has ever fired a shot in anger, you can't say they aren't prepared: there are a couple of spots on major highways in Sweden where signs warn you that aircraft have the right of way - in case of emergency, they use the highways to deploy their jet fighters.

I mean, you never know - those pesky Finns might just try to sneak across the border.

South Korea is a different matter - that country was founded in war, remains officially at war with the North, and faces the very real prospect of a military strike from that, um, 'unstable' dictatorship just across the 38th parallel.

On a visit there some years ago (the first time we were ever allowed to actually drive on public Korean roads) we were told to be on the look-out for a place where the two-lane highway turned into about a twelve-lane highway - in each direction.

All of a sudden, asphalt everywhere.

The idea again is to provide the South Korean Air Force with an alternative landing site should the North bomb the air fields.

Korean drivers aren't exactly shy at the best of times. Faced with this option, they figured, "Who's going to be running radar here? At least for cars?"

So foot-to-the-floor it was, not that that meant a whole lot when most of them were driving Ponys.

I forget what car we were test-driving - maybe the Hyundai Scoupe? - but it didn't take us long to figure, "When in Seoul..."

So, a twelve-lane-wide drag race.

It obviously was an semi-active runway, because you could see the tire marks from where the planes touched down.

The cars probably should have had mirrors pointing at the sky as well as to the rear.

Where it got interesting was when the runway ended. No signage, no merge lanes, no twelve-into-eleven-into-ten - just all of a sudden, twelve lanes became one lane again, everybody was aiming for that single 'hole' in the landscape through which to put their car, and nobody wanted to be the first to yield.

Those tire marks weren't all from airplanes.

2005 Acura EL Owners' Manual - redux

Thanks to the several readers/viewers who sent in hints for finding an old Owners' Manual. Actually, the very first suggestion - good ol' eBay - proved to be the solution for this reader.

Ah,the power of the Internet.

Others suggested junk yar - er, 'recycling depots', although I don't know how many wrecked cars still have the manuals in the glove box.

George Zapora, who looks after Vintage Vehicle Services for General Motors of Canada suggested Ken McGee literature in Goderich Ontario (1-888-275-2666), or Faxon Literature in Riverside California (1-800-458-2734), both of which specialize in automotive literature.

Again, she thanks you all for your help.