Sixty8panther

That super clean white Suburban with barn doors made me sick to my stomach! At least the Caprice Wagon got to do one last burnout.

The Aurora made me depressed, but it DID live to see almost a 1/4 million miles. The BMW on the other hand, looked in nicer shape than my wife's '88 735iL and might have had less miles. What sucks the most is the stories I'm hearing of perfectly respectable, safe & economical B-body wagons, No* powered Cadillacs & clean pickups being destroyed for the sake of giving Honda another Civic sale or Toyota more $$$ for some sh1tbox Scion.

Yes of course, all joking aside both of you speak the truth, esp. about a bizzare motor/trans/rear/fuel tank etc... swap like an M.B. diesel being the opposite of a BUDGET Hot Rod. I'm sure even attempting the swap would eclipse my entire cost of ownership thus far well before the car moved under its own power. I just think it would be insanely unexpected. Now If I was Jay Leno I might drop an inverted V12 from a German Bf.109 into the BACK of a B-59 wagon basket case... only after spending $500,000 on a rolling tube chassis. Not to worry.... haven't hit the lottery.... YET.

Buy something rare or unique if you MUST burn money on a 1980s classic. Coolest J-body of all time IMHO. ('86 hot rod of the year)

OR How about if i dropped a TWIN-SIX V-12 out of a BMW 760iL in the '59 'Sabre?

Haha-ha. So wait. We can applaud Neil Young's electric '59 Lincoln but keeping the B-59 internal combustion but adding a turbocharger while eliminating the need for ignition and boosting fuel economy & possibly mechanical longevity would be the end of the world.

Chest hair is irrelevant. Max was more of a TRUE American than two dozen average guys put together. Scarlet: There's been a few Speedvision/Speed Channel shows on him as well as about a dozen magazine articles about him. He's MY definition of a TRUE car guy. Not some fruit who buys a Honda cause C&D, R&T and Motor Trend said it had a great litte peppy Vtec.

Well, I HAD plans to spend time with the family but currently online #$%^ing off since my wife is driving me crazy with her nagging. Anyway. 233 years ago the seeds that were planted back in the 17th century finally bore fruit in the form of the greatest Nation in human history. Long live the USA, & may her enemies, both foreign (e.g. No. Korea) and domestic (e.g. those snakes & liars in D.C.) be completely decimated.

I'm able to save 50-80% off the "high" cost of maintenance & repairs on my three German cars by doing the work myself. That $1000 you pay for the brake job is prob. 80% labor. Call NAPA or AutoZone and you might be shocked to hear the parts add up to less than $300 or $250 or whstever

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I really can't pick just one. Narrowing it down to a top-5 is hard enough! I've long awaited the development & deployment of the (Y)F-22 Raptor and have been fascinated by the outrageous rumors & claims of the Aurora. But just like with cars, it always turns me off when the human element is almost eliminated. No matter how awesome & near-perfect the skills of a modern jet (fighter/bomber etc.) pilot are, I can't even begin to respect warfare through computers, drones & remote control on the same level as I respect & obsess over "flying-by-the-seat-of-the-pants", "no guts no glory" Aces of the first two World Wars. Open cockpit, rudimentary "guns" mounted within the wing or on a propeller operated camshaft so as to shoot "through" propeller, all the controls being either mechanical or hydraulic, not "fly by wire" this and smart-bomb that... I do respect modern weapons that save our soldier's lives while minimizing the civilian casualties but it's not what fascinates me the most. Anyway, without further delay, in random order... my top 5: 1. Messerschmitt Bf109 2. Supermarine Spitfire 3. B-17 Flying Fortress 4. SR-71 BlackBird 5. J7W1 Shinden

Very cool. Too bad these A-bodies never came in 2 & 4 door hardtop variety.

I'm with Camino. BTW: are you serious, they brought back the FE3 suspension moniker? WTF is up with GM? They must be on some kind of halucinogenic drug! One way to NOT impress Cadillac cliantelle is to allude to a has-been FWD p.o.s. Faux-REO-mobile with the proportions of a 2-door Corolla.

1. Born about a decade after the start of WWI. 2. Served in the European theater of WWII as a belly gunner in a B-24 Liberator. 3. Working at a coffee shop for $0.75/hour led to a passion for speed & car culture 4. famous quote: "We can replace anything with anything".

The goofy but lovable Kaiser DeLuxe sedan of the early late-1940s to mid-1950s. I'd love to someday see Kaiser's Faux-4-door-hardtop "Virgilian" http://auto.howstuffworks.com/1950-kaiser-virginian.htm Shame they didn't make the thin-window B-pillars drop down as to make it a REAL deal 4-door hardtop.

PCS: You, unlike true AUTOMOTIVE enthusiasts, put your personal agenda, vandettas & personality conflicts AHEAD of your LOVE of GM/Ponitac. I love BMW and have wanted for years to own one. Julie's fascination with the brand gave me that excuse when I recently bought the 735iL that suited her need for a large 4-door interior with a spaceous back seat & easy egress provided by big rear doors in what she called a "smaller than the Fleetwood Brougham" package. The BMW needs a lot of small cosmetic fixes as well as a new driveshaft very soon but over all I love it and so does she. That being said, how funny that you went to work for BMW, months after GM (FINALLY!!!) made a production ZETA based sedan for the USA market a reality under the Pontiac banner, which you bitched about, had snide remarks about & like a cartoon villain snickered at its eventual, innevidable death in the shadows. Any TURE enthusiast living in the USA in the 21st century can agree that our choices of affordable RWD family sedans are non-existant. So now we have the (IMHO AWESOME!) G8-GT & it can make the M5 go all frantic trying to out-gun or even keep up with it for half the $ & 20% fewer cylinders, yet you're somehow moving up in the world by switching over the BMW. I personally agree that GMC is more redundant in its finest hour than Pontiac ever was but you're quite the blatant hypocrite to agree w/ that when you revel & bask in the glory of the axe loping off Pontiac's head & Holden's right arm. If I was a GM employee in the 1996-2008 era, esp. a high ranking one, I would have bent over backwards to get my personality conflict out of the way of ANY earth shattering products like the Zeta Pontiac. Zeta was (is?) IMHO the last glimmering hope of a possible marriage between economic prosperity & timeless greatness for GM. If I had to say here's three examples of a GM that "gets it" I point out: [1.] CTS lineup: sedan, wagon & coupe [2.] 5th gen. Camaro "coupe" [3.] Pontiac G8-GT The awesome & exotic Corvette as well as the lovable Sky/Solstice are all well & good but I'm into cars I can enjoy with my wife & 2 daughters. A two door certainly works as long as the back seat is reasonable and a 2+2 big body-Benz seems to PERFECTLY fit my needs in a Family car while keeping me happy with its mechanical perfection, rugged, sturdy & durable chassis & reasonable fuel economy. The need for reasonable MPGs is the only reason why the '84 M.B. does not get traded on a (good weather) daily driver 1961 Cadillac 2-door or 4-door hardtop or B-59 Electra 225 hardtop. Now as far as YOUR reasons for buying certain cars & your reasons for working at GM and/or BMW or even your intent at accomplishing nothing positive just to suit your needs versus trying your hardest to be positive despite personality conflicts.... well it leads me ONCE again to say you're a fair-weather GM/Automotive Fan.

This one certainly comes to mind: It was no dolled up clone, heck it was a "standard V8 hardtop" that left the factory with a column shifted 327 / TH350 combo. But it was MY 1968 Camaro. And after a lifetime of dreaming of 1st Gen. F-body ownership this car was the coolest car on the planet to me. It insulted, pissed off & embarassed many exotic car owners & had a few run ins with the "Law" but never anything beyond a citation/impound. I had my fun with it for 4 years and when I had to sell her to buy a '64 Olds Super 88 Holiday not only did I have a somber moment but my G/F CRIED! God Speed Sixty-8. Where ever you are!

Whatever... I'll decide foir myself. Leaving work RIGHT NOW to meet up with wife for dinner after which we;ll be seeing it on an IMAX screen.

I wish you luck with it. The Turbo-Diesel W123 I bought recently to fix up & resell s patiently awaiting a couple quick fixes but has been another example of a German car built to stand the test of time. It may look gross & ugly not to mention the wear & tear a 1/3 of a million miles have resulted in. But it is still a car with a lot of life left in it. There's a part of me that wants to make a Cuban Hot Rod out of the B-59 and drop the M.B. 5-cylinder turbocharged diesel in the old half-century old girl to essentially almost double my fuel economy. Balthazar would probably hunt me down & bop me over the skull with a 3/4 inch box wrench, but I think it would be a very cool "hybrid" solution. Anyway. I've owned four German cars so far: 1982 Mercedes Benz 240D sedan (diesel i4) 1984 Mercedes Benz (w126 series) 500SEC hardtop coupe (gasoline 303 cu. in. SOHC V8) 1988 BMW (e32 model) 735iL (inline/slant 6) 1982 Mercedes Benz 300D sedan (turbo diesel i5) And I can tell you without hesitation that there will be many more German cars in my future... Someday I'd love to replace my W126 hardtop Benz w/ its successor:

That's PCS, a gentleman & a scholar.

Nothing sux more than paying $80 an hour for someone else to do a half-assed job. I'd much rather use some zip ties, bolts, lock-washers and nuts from the hardware store for a temp. fix or just improvise a quick fix than pay way too much of my hard earned $ to a mechanic to wham-bam-thankyoo-mam my car. Besides, it's very satisfying fixing ones own car... well it is to me anyway. Granted if/when I win the lottery I WILL have aprofessional work on my '35 Cadillac V-16 Dual Cowl Phaeton ("Tiger Hunt" Phantom) and if me & the wife buy a 5th gen. Camaro, gently used CTS-V or a Pontiac G8-GT than I might have the dealer do a select few things I'm not fond of.

Tell the dude with the skinny tie to move out of the way so I can admire that gorgeous Impala 2-door hardtop!

Oh, & here's a few Sixty8Panther shots from one of my all time favorite junkyards. Certainly the coolest junkyard in New England that still exists. Dodgefan took these 2 photos w/ my cell-phone. That's a mid-1930s Cadillac Limousine FYI. Notice the partition window. (motor was MIA... could have been a V-16!?)

And just in case that's not enough for a lifetime:

PCS's wife is such the Cougar in that photo! (didn't mean it as an insult FYI) Anyway, here's some photos of me.