@davesaddiction They'll have to rebrand as "Hz"

After nearly a full year of looking I finally admitted to myself I would not be getting another Echo hatchback. They're all gone, except for the ones that aren't, and the owners of those ones aren't selling.

I had a hard time deciding on a replacement, but then this Mazda came up recently and it checked all the boxes: Fun, reliable and economical. It's even a colour (but it still is not a blue Echo) It was only an hour's drive away, which was a bonus.

One owner, Krowned every year, 157K kms, no rust, Loaded base model. This thing is like a Rolls compared to the Echo!
The guy took super care of it. Even sold it to me with a full tank of gas.

It came with brand new steel wheels for snows, but as it turns out the snow tires from my Echo are an exact fit so I'll just run those until they are done and then put the next set on the new wheels. I might treat myself to some new wheels too. 4x100 should have tons of good options. The BBS my dad has on his Miata would be sharp.

Weathertech's were a nice addition by the previous owner.

See you in the spring, little Mazda!

Kitten says thanks for your time.

The Mazda 2 was an interim car. It was supposed to be my commuter, but I couldn't dig it. So I got this instead:

2013 Abarth 500 with 142k kms.

I'm happy to report the first tank yielded 6.66L/100kms, which achieves my goal of a fun car that I can commute in and not pay a fortune for fuel. Considering the Mazda got 6.5 I'd say that's a pretty weak showing on their part. I'll happily pay the extra for super to drive this instead.

Probably not the most responsible choice, but it makes me smile.

It's obnoxiously loud if you want it to be. It rides kind of firm, but not bad considering and it's pretty comfy. Here I am leaving a buddy's house last night. I didn't know he was filming, but I think it sums it up:

This is what I found on my workbench when I got home from work. From my oldest:

And in the kitchen when I got inside. From the other one:

Good to see the kids today can still appreciate a good ol' fashioned rickroll, and they were creative about it too!

So that's it then.

Edit: Best of luck @David-Tracy and Torch.

@i86hotdogs said in I Love Turo:

As a Ford engineer, and a big time fan of the Maverick, I am excited to see how the competition stacks up.

Owner requests that you do not disassemble their engine.

Got my new old truck last week!

This one had caught my eye before I'd even decided to take my 4Runner off the road. In the end, I went with my gut feeling on it and so far I'm very happy with my decision.

It's got 555k on it, so it's no spring chicken, but it has also been rust checked every year since new so the body still exists.

When I was researching it I discovered this truck has only had one owner. What I didn't discover until after I bought it was that the former owner spent 5 grand on a brand new engine in 2019 and it only has 27000kms on it! He also managed to change the oil 7 times since the new engine went in. That's the kind of surprise I can live with.

And full service records from day one. I keep good records on my cars and the records that came with this make my efforts look amateur. This truck was someone's pride and joy. I have to think they must have died because I don't know why they would trade it in after all the work they'd done on it right up until January of this year.

So far I've got new tires (on the winter wheels apparently. Guess I should have actually looked into the bags with what I thought were the winter tires. Whoops!) One day maybe I'll move the tires over to the nicer wheels.

I also ditched the class 1 trailer hitch and installed a class 4. And I spent the day today troubleshooting the 4wd. Pretty sure it only needs the pushbutton switch but either way now I have a good idea how it all works.

Now I can make use of my Father's day present!

Last shot of the fleet. It's outdated already though because I sold the Mercedes today.

Probably happening. Picked it up at lunch for an extended overnight test drive. I expect deals will be made tomorrow!

Edit: @MUSASHI66 is a good bad influence.

We lost Tony, our cat, yesterday.

One day 3 years ago my spouse went to a roadside antique shop and Tony found and claimed her. The proprietor said that he'd been abandoned there a couple of days prior and living along a busy highway he'd surely be done in by a car or coyote in short order.

She convinced me to 'pick him up' which turned out to be me trying to catch a feral kitten and wrangle him into my car. "you gotta be fast!" was the refrain from the antique shop owner that still is an inside joke to this day. He disappeared into the rear hatch for the drive home. When I got home I gathered the family around and opened the hatch to reveal... nothing! Turns out he had driven home hiding under the driver's seat! The kids, particularly my youngest, were thrilled.

He lived outside at our house, quickly warming up to us and would spend a lot of time with me in the garage and out in the yard with the rest of the family. Sometimes he'd even be allowed into the house for a short time. I added a cat door to the garage so he could stay warm in the winter, but come and go as he pleased, which he did. He was always an adventurer and would sometimes disappear for days on end, but he'd always return 'home' to the drumstick or pork chop and neck scratches that would be waiting for him when he did. Sometimes he came home pretty beat up but I had confidence he could hold his own.

Contrary to popular belief, "Tony" was not a reference to "Tony the Tiger" but an esoteric reference to an old Kids In The Hall skit "Hotel la rut"

"I keep thinking about Tony. Where he is. Who he is with. What is he thinking? Is he thinking of me? And whether he'll ever return someday"

Yesterday morning I called out to him to see if he was around before I went to work. I hadn't seen him for a few days, but that was nothing out of the ordinary. Maybe he'll be here when I get home.

Unfortunately, I found him 4kms from my house. He'd been hit by a car along with another cat. I assume he was living his best cat life when he went. So in the end, he did return home even if I was the one who brought him there. I'm happy that I had the fortune to find him and bring him home for a second time. Otherwise I might still be wondering Where he was, and whether he'd ever return someday.

RIP Tony. You were a great cat, and I'm happy we could be part of your world.

The other day I changed my oil and then headed over to a friends house for a visit to see how his maple syrup season was going.

Heading home my car started running on 3 cylinders. That's a weird thing to happen from changing the oil. Drove it home and diagnosing the problem was a bad coil was straightforward. I replaced the coil the next day once the parts store was open.

I figured while I was at it I'd take a peek at the plugs. I know they were brand new. I mean I changed them when I got the car and that was only... um.. 130 000 kms ago. Oh. I guess you're supposed to change those occasionally .

I guess Toyota once again lives up to it's reputation of taking abuse. I measured one of the old plugs and it's gapped at .07. Spec is .043.

Kitten says don't forget to change your plugs!

Thanks for reading.

i

@save_the_milanos Well, I just got a 'new' ICE car, so perhaps when it's time to replace that one they will be more reasonable here.

@save_the_milanos Bolt in Canada goes for 38, unfortunately, with ~5grand off from the gubmint. So, about the same with rebates as US gets before rebates.

@AestheticsInMotion My spouse was telling me about this picture yesterday, by chance. Apparently it's from 1979, which looks about right for that Ford too

@davesaddiction GM employee executive price, maybe.

@drVanTraveler said in 90's mountain bikes are wild:

@HFV I like the Klein's. Not because I know anything about them, just because they are different.

I wanted this one so bad

Even Seinfeld got one, although I can't imagine this would have been a practical bike for NYC if you planned on leaving it anywhere.

His seems to be a lower spec, but he did have the sweet avocet gel seat by the look of it!

@drVanTraveler said in 90's mountain bikes are wild:

@ibRAD The AMP research forks are pretty cool

Looking anyway. A friend had one on his race bike back in the day and they get sloppy fast. I can't imagine it's easy to find rebuild parts these days!

@HFV Needs an AMP Research fork

@ash78 said in 90's mountain bikes are wild:

Cutting edge Cro-Moly frame!

Hey, steel is real!

@e90m3 Once upon a time someone was riding my ass with the 'move over' sticker. So I did. I dropped a couple wheels onto the shoulder and for some reason he backed off!

@Tripper said in EV base prices are BS:

I know she won't want a new car though, unless it's a yellow FD RX7.

She has good taste!