Wednesday Open Thread: Suddenly It's 1980!

All subscribers welcome

here’s what’s not back: your dad

This is a big weekend for your humble author: I am one of twelve prototype-class entrants at the Mid-Ohio Super Tour. Unfortunately, I also have by far the worst car — in a field of Runoffs-spec Stohrs and Elans, I’m a carbureted Radical. The weather is supposed to be abysmal, however, which might keep me out of DFL. That being said, it doesn’t really matter how I finish, because I’m super-encouraged at the surge in P1 and P2 entries, and I’m committed to continuing this momentum. Consequently, the ACF publication schedule will be as usual, but I might be a little light on the comment responses from Friday afternoon forwards. It’s not you; it’s me.

Classifieds

Brother Bark has a few Monsters to sell, described below.

Five examples of watches from Shinola's Monster series. For anybody else, I would ask 65% of retail price, as four of the five are in like new condition (we'll get to the fifth momentarily). All are 43mm in case diameter, hand assembled in the USA, and all are powered by the 26-jewel automatic Sellita SW200-1 movement, which is a Swiss made workhorse that is typically found in watches ranging in price from $1500-$3500. It is difficult to find watches this nice for prices anywhere near what I'm asking. 

Ice Monster: Titanium case and bracelet. Clearly inspired by the Grand Seiko SBGA413 Snowflake, this is one of the lightest and most handsome dive watches under 2K available. Retails for $1950. Will sell to ACF subscribers for $900 including box and papers. I'm the original owner. 

Bronze Monster: Bronze case, both NATO and leather straps included. Didn't wear it enough for it to gain much patina. Very reasonable substitute for a Tudor Black Bay Bronze, which will run you north of $4k. Retails for $1850, will sell to ACF subscribers for $875, including box and papers. I'm the original owner. 

Harbor Monster: 316L steel case and bracelet. Beautiful red dial and blue bezel. This is honestly my favorite and has seen a bit more wrist time than the others, but is still in like new condition. Retails for $1650, will sell to ACF subscribers for $825, including box and papers. I'm the original owner. 

Lake Michigan Monster: 316L steel case and bracelet, as well as blue rubber strap. Flat blue bezel and dial, can be worn with almost anything. I am not the original owner, paid $1000 second hand two years ago. Will include several additional NATO straps, both Shinola and other brands. Retails for $1650, will sell to ACF subscribers for $800, including box and papers.

Lake Huron Monster: 316 steel case and NATO strap. This one is rough, can't lie. I bought it second hand for $700 two years ago, and the crystal and bezel are both damaged. I tried to have the crystal polished out, didn't work. If I were keeping it, I'd replace both crystal and bezel, which Shinola quoted me $150 to do. If you'd like a project watch that will be a fantastic piece when you've fixed it, here's your chance to get one cheap. Retails new for $1450, ACF subscribers can have it for $450, no box or papers. 

Although these are all already super discounted fo subscribers beyond what you'd find on eBay and the like, I will also entertain further discounts if somebody would like multiples. 

If these watches could only talk… he’d have to kill them, not sell them. Let’s hope the next owner enjoys them just as much. Interested? Comment below or chat me in Substack. Want to sell something similar? Let me know, or put it in the comments.

Casey’s at it again

deleted faster than all of casey’s nasa race registrations

It’s always nice to see “Racin’ Casey” making waves. You may remember him from the time when he got Hagerty to delete my article about him, or the time he quit the business and asked drone pilots to fight him outside a children’s hospital. As part of his “retreat from the business”, he’s got most of his personal automotive property listed on Facebook Marketplace with ultra-vague notes as to location and ownership. As Margot Timmins sings, however:

I've heard a man in crisis
Falls back on what he knows best
A murderer to murder
A thief to theft

so it’s no surprise that Casey is once again begging for marks, er, suckers, er, victims, er, new mechanics to work with him in his enterprise, under terms to be settled later! Bottom line: If you’re a mechanic, I suggest you not do that.

Jonathan Livingston Tariffs

Our cherished and vital journosaurs are busy this week sucking the dick right off the Mercedes Electric G-Wagen, with various Steven-Ewing-like creatures pronouncing it SO GOOD and THE BEST EVER. As one insider noted to me, “The electric G-Class is the anti-Cybertruck circle jerk they’ve been waiting on.” It doesn’t hurt that the Mercedes events are so lovely to attend compared to… renting a Tesla.

The rest of the media, however, is focused on the BYD Seagull, which supposedly costs $11,000. It’s described (by people who have never touched one) as “well-built” and “a nightmare for Detroit”. Just to be clear, this is a 75hp car with a top speed of 80 (eighty) miles per hour, not to mention a real-world range likely to be in the 110-mile range. Americans can currently get a “car” like this wherever golf carts are sold, but the chattering classes are just thrilled at the prospect of forcibly yeeting American proles out of their their F-950 Jim Crow Editions and shoving them into something that makes the Chevy Bolt look like a YF-12.

Unfortunately for would-be Seagullers, however, President Biden is slappin’ em with a 100% tariff. I’m not particularly opposed to this, and would also be fine with domestically produced EVs getting a 100% interstate commerce tariff or something like that. Alternately, Ford could just take the reported $100,000-plus they lose on every EV and put it back on the sticker. Don’t care either way. It’s a Band-Aid over the real issue, which is that China is the largest currency manipulator in history.

The irony is that as far as I can tell, the EV tariff was a last-minute addition to the real star of the show: semiconductor tariffs. President Biden’s people aren’t thrilled that Intel, TSMC, and others are backing out of the USA manufacturing commitments they’d made in the context of the CHIPS Act. Why are they backing out? Because CHIPS is a diversity nightmare wrapped inside a pork barrel. Now, however, the administration is going to punish them for not playing ball. How dare they not want to ensure that the construction workers on their sites are women?

It’s all so tiresome. Could be worse, however. You could have a BYD Seagull ahead of you on the road — or parked next to you in a garage.

Let’s close this section with a great quote sent to me by a reader, regarding the GaytonaUSA Potemkin China article:

The real story is that the moronic legacy automakers are in a race to ape the Chicoms with more screens, etc, ceding the design and engineering leadership they inherently possess. They need the Chinese brands blocked because they’re pivoting to the same shit, only more expensive.

Hilarious to see these luxury brands crow about pillar to pillar screens and such when that shit is table stakes for entry Chinese crap. The clown show continues uninterrupted, calliope volume stuck at max.

Stunting On The Normies, Parts 400-403

Everybody’s talking about the “Return Of Pontiac” ad from this month’s print issue of Car and Driver, pictured at the top of this article. My best guess is that the magazine lost an ad commitment or a single-page content piece at the very last minute — any magazine that employs Elana Scherr has to be continually prepared for either circumstance — which gave the motley crew of third-tier castoffs currently in charge at C/D a Really Funny Idea!

I’ve never owned a Pontiac but I am very aware of how important the brand and its history have been to many, many people. This ad is the equivalent of the Hanson Nirvana shirt, only it’s not funny. The purpose is to express disdain for something that someone else loves, and thus feel superior. Which is fine — if you’re not operating a magazine that, in theory at least, caters directly to those someone-elses.

It would be nice to say this sort of conscious and deliberate contempt for the readers is rare in the business, but the truth is that a majority of autowriters feel this way. In fourteen years of attending press events, I basically never heard a bad word spoken about the PR people or the event staff — but the grousing about readers was constant. The readers were stupid. They were poor. They had racist, backward opinions. They denied the reality of climate change. They were old. They wore shorts and sneakers. They refused to get with the program. And so on.

Of course, many highly-privileged journosaurs were immune to those complaints, because they had few or no readers. (Think Kimatni Rawlins, or the various low-follower-count mommybloggers.) The majority of color-rag veterans, however, just couldn’t wait to tell you how much they despised their readers. Shouldn’t be that way, but it is. And it explains why a magazine that once mattered to so many of those readers now derives cheap thrills from poking fun at them. It also explains why Doug DeMuro and his copycats do so well. Their affection and respect for their consumers might be 100% feigned and inauthentic, but… as Shockwave famously said…

“Thanks anyway”.