Wednesday ORT: Unplugging the Charger, Restoring A Hitch, Crashing a GT3, Dreams of DOGE

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ah, the number of times this old weirdo called my boss at hagerty to whine about me. now that i am unemployed, to whom shall he whine when i pop out of a side alley and yell ‘run, coward’ like a fully assembled sinistar?

We’re so back! That’s what my friends are saying — and it’s also what some of my cats are saying. As the weather chills, some of the farther-ranging friends are re-establishing themselves closer to home. Tiger Dad has gained a couple of pounds and looks positively leonine. Albino Kitty showed up for the first time in months. I’m in the process of setting up six heated cat shelters, making me almost as big of a slum lord as Fat Brad, but something tells me I’ll have more than twenty potential occupants for them by December. Alright, let’s kick it off.

Here comes the story of the Hurricane

its about damn time

Credit the election, credit a parent company trying to stop bleeding cash, credit pure and simple common sense — but MoparInsiders says that

Initially, Dodge had planned a phased rollout of its all-new Charger lineup, with the all-electric 2024 Charger Daytona First Edition models set to debut first, followed by the ICE Charger SIXPACK in Q1 2025. Not long after the announcement, Dodge pushed the SIXPACK launch back to late 2025. However, with demand and regulatory priorities changing, Dodge has pivoted, accelerating the ICE models’ release timeline to bring the Charger SIXPACK to market sooner. This move allows Dodge to quickly address the demand for ICE muscle cars, especially as consumers continue to show strong pushback toward EVs.

At Allpar, they’re saying that this decision is also related to a decision not to offer the “Hurricane” twin-turbo straight-six in the 2025 Durango Pursuit. The initial plan was to build 5.7 Pursuits until the supply of 5.7-liter Hemis from Saltillo operations, which shut down in March of this year, came to a halt. However, it’s now felt there will be enough Hemis available to not require a switch to Hurricanes, which frees-up some engine inventory for the Charger.

Sixpack Chargers should have 550hp and 521lb-ft to push a 4200-pound two-door sedan. That’s at least 392 pace, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this car split the quarter-mile difference between a 392 and a Hellcat. Who’s stoked about this? I’m stoked. Not that I’d want to get rid of my lovely old-school 392C for this tough-looking new Mopar, but I can definitely see the appeal. It’s about time someone brought out a new middle-class-ish car that was faster and sharper than its predecessor.

There’s also a 420-horse variant on the way, but I’m not aware of any plans to equip the Charger with a Pentastar. That slot in the lineup was supposed to be filled by the battery-powered Charger. Wanna bet that will change?

It was a great project, with just one hitch

this is not the most flattering picture of my ass ever taken, i’ll tell you that. wait. that sounds wrong. let me start over

Back in 2017 I bought a six-inch drop hitch with 2” and 2-5/16” balls from Bulletproof Hitches out of Bradenton, FL. At the time, Bulletproof was doing all of their manufacturing in the United States. I have nothing but positive experiences in the 20,000-plus towing miles I’ve put on this hitch since then, but by the beginning of this race season it was looking more than a little ratty:

about as rusty as i will be at my next bmx race

So I did the obvious consumerist thing: bought a stunning new chrome BW Tow-And-Stow for “Commodus”, my Godzilla-powered F-250 Platty. Made in the USA to perfectionist standards, it’s a thing of beauty and a joy forever. If you’re in the market for a bumper hitch and you buy anything but a BW, you’re cheating yourself. And that’s that…

…except for the fact that my little race team is now a three-trailer effort, thanks to Mini Danger Girl and her Spec Racer Ford. I have three trailers, that’s no problem. And we have three trucks, that’s also not a problem. What we did not have: three decent trailer hitches. If only I had a shop in which I could re-finish the old USA Bulletproof… wait! I have precisely that! Didn’t I just restore a Hubbard sledgehammer to mirror-finished glory?

there was a lot more to do after this

My experience working on the Hubbard had taught me a lot about the different results from rotary sanding, composite wheels on a die grinder, and coarse wheels on a six-inch angle grinder. Om this project, however, I used a flap-disc sanding wheel for the most part. It was able to quickly get through the rust, which was much deeper in this hitch than it had been on the sledge. A four-inch composite wheel on a drill handled the rest. Then it was time to refinish the hitch to a factory appearance.

Bulletproof uses baked enamel on their hitches, and that’s the most durable choice, but out of sheer laziness I chose Rust-Oleum “Farm and Implement” paint. This is remarkable stuff that gets a lot of use around the shop up to and including the frame of my Radical SR8. It doesn’t need primer, and it’s resistant to both wear and heat. Three coats over the course of four days handled it.

I’d lost the keys to the original Bulletproof locking pins, and they were pretty trashed anyway, so I zipped ‘em off with a cutting wheel and replaced them with Harbor Freight T-handle hitch pins. This will speed up the process of swapping the ball around for my enclosed and open trailers, which have different size clamps. Here’s the finished product.

“too black. too strong.”

Total cost of refinishing was about $22; total time was about an hour and a half. My consulting rate for tech work now is between $150 and $200 an hour, so in theory I just could have done my job a bit more and gotten a second BW hitch instead, but I can tell you that the time spent in a little project like this sits very lightly on my mind compared to actually working in my field. One walks away feeling better for having done it.

Something I didn’t need to do, but did anyway: removed the Bulletproof logos and plaque during the refinish process. I have no desire to publicly endorse or support a company that moves production overseas. So if you’re shopping for hitches, look at BW…

…or if cost is no object, consider the almighty Pennington Flagship. I’ve been thinking about this thing more or less nonstop since one of you decided to be cruel enough to bring it to my attention. How lovely that such a thing exists! I really should get one. If you’re Christmas shopping for me, I’ll take the one with the 2.5 inch receiver and six inch drop. In the meantime, however, this refurb will handle the job.

The car just, like, spun, man, I ain’t do nothing

Speaking of the links that you hell-spawned demons in the ACF paid subscriber group send me entirely against my will: this morning I was made aware of a story titled Crashing My Dream Car: The Day I Totaled My $200,000 Porsche. It’s a tale as old as time: dude gets totally involved in the porsh, lives the porsh lifestyle, buys the gt3 porsh, crashes the gt3 porsh, buys another porsh, writes about the porsh. Well, how did it happen?

By this point, the rain had picked up, but I still felt confident. I wasn’t pushing it. I was short-shifting, keeping the revs low, staying cautious. I’d done this plenty of times before.

I was on the back straight, one of the longest stretches of track at COTA. Normally, you’re tempted to really open up the car there, but I wasn’t taking any chances. Another car gave me the signal to pass, so I moved over to overtake. And that’s when it happened.

As soon as I got in front, the rear end stepped out. The car just…went. No warning. One second I’m in control, the next I’m spinning. I’ve lost control of cars before, but this was different. It was instant. I must’ve hit a patch of standing water and hydroplaned, because the car snapped sideways without any time to react.

Is this a teachable moment for the ACF readership? Yes it is. I don’t think this goober hit any standing water on the back straight of COTA, which drains pretty well. But if he did, it’s on him, because during a rainy session you should have your eyes a couple hundred feet ahead looking for the mirror.

When there’s water on a racetrack, it usually appears in one of three forms. There’s dark water, which means the track is wet but not wet enough to build up a film of water on the surface. Most of the time, and especially with street cars on street tires, you really don’t have to cut much, if any, pace in that situation.

After that comes shine water. This is where the track has a distinct shine to it. You can still see the actual surface of the track, but now it looks shiny or polished. The more gleam you get off the water, the less traction you’re going to have. Those of us who do a lot of racing in the Midwest have to be reasonably competent at distinguishing the correlation between “amount of shine” and “amount of grip”.

Then, of course, you get mirror water. This is standing water. Which is far from instant death if you have a 200tw race tire like the excellent Bridgestone RE-71RS, or one of the Michelin Pilot Sport Cup models so beloved of rich mooks who dither around racetracks on the weekends. If you’re driving a formula car or sports racer on slicks, that’s a different situation, of course.

Now here’s the important part. Any reduced traction surface tends to exaggerate what you were doing when you arrived to it. If you’re going around a corner, you might spin. That’s obvious. What happens when the standing water is in the middle of a straight? Well, it’s going to exaggerate the inputs you already had in the car.

In this fellow’s case, he had some inputs in the car. He was steering to go around the car ahead, and he was increasing throttle. So he was likely depending on the front tires to control the yaw that he’d just induced via his pass maneuver, and depending on the rear tires to impart some acceleration to the track surface.

Once his traction decreased, the objects in motion tended to stay in motion — and in this case the object was the back of his car, which was likely already moving laterally a bit. I see this a lot in novice drivers — they’re always putting useless input into the car, steering it when it doesn’t need to be steered, pinching off turns, and jerking the wheel on the straight for no God-blessed reason at all.

Let’s be clear about this. If you have zero input in the car, hydroplaning doesn’t do anything to you, because the car wasn’t changing direction when it hit the water. This remains true if you have no input in the car besides mild acceleration. Especially in a 911, which is very capable of keeping traction on the back tires.

When in doubt, steer the car less. If still in doubt, accelerate or brake the car less.

I called my wife. “I crashed the car,” I told her. She asked if I was okay. “Yeah,” I said, “but the car’s not.” She came to pick me up in our minivan. Driving home in a minivan after showing up in a GT3? A humbling experience.

Eventually, I had the car taken to a specialized body shop, where they confirmed what I already feared. The frame was bent. The car was totaled. And because it happened on the track, insurance wasn’t going to cover any of it. The loss was all mine.

Ah yes, the famed 911 GT3 frame. Those fuckers will bend every time. Let’s take a moment to appreciate the minivan comment. This dude really thinks he’s a different person in a GT3 than he is in a minivan. Maybe he’s right. They say that your testosterone will improve if you put your shoulders back, level your head, and walk like a gorilla. In my case, it caused me to walk right into a testicle-crushing parking post, which reduced my testosterone, but I digress. Let’s get back to the story.

Fast forward to today. Eventually, yeah, I took the plunge and bought another. It wasn’t exactly an easy call. Same model, same year. I know — it sounds insane. But once you’ve driven a GT3, everything else pales.

Does this fellow know that there’s a GT2? Maybe it’s best not to tell him. The rest of you: think about what your hands are doing in the rain, and you might not have to buy two automatic-transmission hand-holder midlife-mobiles in a row.

Many reduction, such efficiency

Elon Musk plans to turn his newly appointed role slashing U.S. government bureaucracy into a game.

Appointed to run the newly created “Department of Government Efficiency”, or DOGE, the Tesla CEO aims to make the experience both transparent and interactive by enlisting the help of the American taxpayer. This would include a virtual suggestion box as well as ranking some of the worst examples of federal waste.

 “We will also have a leaderboard for most insanely dumb spending of your tax dollars,” Musk posted. “The entertainment value will be epic.”

The federal government is spending $1.83 trillion more than it collects. And as Fortune notes:

Typically two-thirds of federal spending is mandatory, including Social Security and Medicare. A much smaller chunk classified as discretionary is approved by Congress every year, with the single biggest line item going towards defense. Finally, about a tenth of the budget is earmarked for servicing the national debt.

Let’s take a moment to appreciate the fact that we now have memes in the government. And why not? Could they do any worse of a job than the fabled, much-self-admired “adults in the room” from 2020?

Fortune’s implicit point, that a DOGE can’t really do much to address the government’s biggest spending issues, is empirically correct but morally vacant. It still matters how this country spends money, and it matters down to the last cent. A thrifty and thoughtful government inspires confidence in its citizens. It even inspires them to vote for higher taxes, because nobody likes giving their own hard-earned cash to the bureaucratic equivalent of a junkie.

Wouldn’t be ironic if Donald Trump, of all people, ended up increasing our trust in the government? Frankly, I’d look forward to it. I don’t personally envision the United States as a libertarian paradise. I want to live in a country where we help the most vulnerable among us while accomplishing the most possible with whatever is left. For me, that doesn’t include military adventurism, significant foreign aid, or a permanently-employed “deep state” that furthers its own parasitic interests at all costs. Bill Clinton understood all of this; that’s why the country ran in the black under his leadership. His successors need to understand what he did plus the necessity of maintaining a manufacturing base in the United States. Here’s one reason:

Given that I have a son who is in the business of eventually learning how to deploy the above-mentioned systems, I’d like them to all be as “Made In The USA” as, say, a BW hitch. Any objections?

Come back later this week, we will have a delightful John Marks guest post. Until then…