Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Triumph Replacement?

What car am I looking at to replace the TR with? Well it is actually a few. Found a guy in South Carolina that has a few Austin Healey Bugeye Sprites that I am going to look at. He also has a Sunbeam Alpine, 2 Alfa's, a Lotus Elan and a Lotus Europa that he is selling. He had a Sunbeam Tiger but already sold it. Figure I will go up to see the Sprites and poke my head around whatever else he has lying around. I also figure I will finally be able to pick up the Nissan Patrol here in Atlanta and maybe try to get the one I found in VA to use for parts. More news to follow when I know if the TR sells or not....

Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Selling the Triumph??

Some news on the classic car front. I may be selling the Triumph. If you are interested drop me a line! Reason why I would sell it? Well, the classic British Roadster that I always wanted was an Austin Healey Sprite Mk I, commonly known as a "Bugeye" or "Frogeye" Sprite. I have recently found a few for sale around Atlanta that are affordable and figured that this would be as good time as any to make the switch. Depending on how much the Bugeye costs and how much I sell the TR4a for, I may even have enough left over to get the Nissan Patrol I have been trying to get for the past few months. Guess I'll just have to wait and see how it goes! As soon as I know anything I'll update my readers here!

Again, If you would be interested in buying my 1967 Triumph TR4a, drop me a line at clifclavin@gmail.com

Monday, November 19, 2007

1 Year in.....

Well, just realized that I've had this blog for just over a year. 72 posts so far. I've had a good time writing about my trips, adventures and side projects. Hope everyone out there in the world has enjoyed reading my humble ramblings. I've had readers from all over the globe, pretty sure I have covered every continent excluding Antarctica. I'm pretty impressed with that since I only set to have this as just some place to let friends and family keep track of me!

Some shout outs to countries viewing my blog:
New Zealand
Oz
China
India
Thailand
Philippines
Norway
Iceland
Canada
Mexico
Chile
Argentina
Brazil
Venezuela
South Africa
Egypt
UK
France
Germany
Italy
Spain
Greece
Romania
Hungary
Plus a few others. In all 34 different countries, pretty neat.

Anyway, looking forward to another year of writing.

Dodge Stratus Review

I was given an '06 Dodge Stratus as my rental for my most recent business trip to Virginia, Maryland and DC. When I first got the car I really wanted to hate it and dog it as much as I did the Chrysler 300 that I had while in New York. It ended up that I don't really hate this car, I don't like it either. It gets kind of a meh reaction from me.

I'll start with the minuses:

The car isn't a looker, still has the Dodge Cab Forward design language to it. It is one of those cars that you just ignore because it is so boring. The engine pick up was pretty poor, of course it only had a 4 cylinder and must weigh in at over 3000lbs. A lot of weight for a small engine to pull around and you can tell. The engine whines pretty bad when pressed to get up to speed on a on-ramp and dislikes any hills that you come to. Those where the only two big minuses but they present the biggest problem. I am reminded of a Saturday Night Live sketch in which Will Farrell is lamenting on the fact that he drives a Dodge Stratus (or maybe a Cirrus).

The Pluses (Or rather things that where not all that bad):
Seats where ok, radio was ok, cabin controls where ok (still don't know why the cruise controls needed 6 buttons to operate), space was ok, sight lines where ok, ride was ok....blah blah blah.

That is the thing about this car, it is just so bland. Dodge built this car to be just, ok. They didn't try to do anything special with this car. I still can't put it worse than the 300 (there where just so many things wrong about that car) but at least someone tried to do something exciting with the design to where it stands out in a crowd. Why did anyone buy the Status? Really why? If you did tell me. Was it price? Had to be because I can't think of any other reason to own one.

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Vegas!

Got back from the wonderful city of Las Vegas Sunday night. We had a great trip out there with a couple that we are good friends with. We flew out Wednesday night and did not get in until almost midnight thanks to a bad door on our original aircraft. This continues a streak with my buddy that we went with of almost every flight he goes on with friends being delayed. Anywho, after staying in Wednesday night we got up pretty early Thursday and grabbed a nice cheap Vegas breakfast at the Ellis Island Casino. They had a special on an 8oz steak and eggs plate for $2.99! I got the french toast and sausage ($3.99) and was very happy with the food. Word to the wise about this place, service is not the best but the food and prices make it worth it. So we then proceeded to walk the strip since Kim (the other girl that went with us) had never been to Vegas. Went in the Venetian, the Wynn (which is incredible), TI, Mirage ect. All in all I think we figured that we must have walked about 6 miles that day. Only stopped to gamble in on place, Bill's Gamblin' Hall (only place we could find with $5 blackjack). After Ping (the asian Mariano Rivera like dealer, she was throwing heat) cleaned Chris and I out in 30mins we decided to call it a day. Picked up some beer and got changed for dinner and the show we where going to see (Ka). Ate dinner at Smith and Wolensky's, great dinner. Best part was our waiter was hilarious! He is a part time Chris Farley impersonator and gave us a great time at dinner, dare I say his antics where a lot better than Ka was. Check out his site at www.kenasfarley.com. As stated, Ka bombed. Too much theater type stuff in I guess Japanese and not enough crazy stunts. If you are going to a Cirque show go to "O", now that is a great show.

Friday:
Friday stated off innocently enough, getting up and finding breakfast at the Luxor. Walked around Excaliber, Luxor and Mandalay Bay most of the morning before deciding we needed a beer. Stopped at the Burger Bar between Mandalay Bay and Luxor to grab a pint, or in this case a boot (if you have seen the movie Beer Fest you know what I mean). Chris and I proceed to start downing boots, Kel and Kim headed off to shop and sight see some more. Before too long Chris and I find ourselves at a Blackjack table in NY NY. To make a long story short: 8 hours later, a few jack and cokes, many hands of blackjack, a whole other story involving Chris getting lost between the restroom and the table, we leave NY NY and walk back to our room (the Wyndham Grand Desert half way between Plant Hollywood and the Hard Rock). Leaving NY NY I discover $150 in chips in my pocket and ended up breaking even for the night.

So Saturday starts with Chris and I out of action and watching football. In the afternoon we walked around some more, got dinner at an Sushi place in the Mirage, saw the volcano show, the TI show and then cabbed it to Fremont to look around. I played a bit more at the Golden Nugget, broke even again. We headed back because we where all petty tired (getting old sucks don't it?). Then we flew out Sunday morning. All in all a great trip, wish I would have played a bit more blackjack but I started off slow and the next thing I know it was time to leave.

That is about it, I am in VA this week and will have a new car review by the weekend. The car, a Dodge Stratus.

Monday, November 05, 2007

MINI Cooper Review

Sorry for not updating much in the last week. Not much going on to talk about.

I did take my Cooper S in for some service and received a MINI Cooper as a loaner for the day. I had only driven a standard Cooper for about a day when I first ordered my Cooper S so it had been a while. I had forgotten just how great a car the regular Cooper is. Even with out the extra power as the S the Cooper is still great fun to drive. You get to keep the revs up, has as much pull off the line in 1st as an S and the noise the engine makes is as good if not better than the supercharger whine on my S. The only time you really miss the extra power is in when you try to floor it mid gear. When done on the S the supercharger adds the extra omph to put you in the back of your seat where the regular Cooper just doesn't have it. With gas prices where they are the regular Cooper is a great buy for a car that gets great mileage and still has a fun factor to it.

Heading to Las Vegas later this week for a quick getaway. Should be fun. Get back on Sunday then it is back out on the road for work, this time to Virginia, Maryland and Washington DC. Hopefully I'll get a rental I've never had before and will have some thoughts.

TR is driving well but feeling the colder weather. I installed a 160 degree T-stat last spring to keep the engine cool in the summer, it now has the opposite effect and keeps the engine a bit too cold in the winter. I have to keep the choke out just a bit in order to keep the engine running smooth when it is below 55 degrees out. Thinking of ordering a 180 T-stat and new gaskets so that I can switch the T-stats out between the spring and fall.

Think that is about it for now.