Tesla & Mark Rober Update; $$$ 1970 Chevelle Review; Cats; Q&A

We take a closer look at the Mark Rober vs Tesla video that's got he internet fighting; review the 1970 Chevelle built by Ironworks Speed and Kustom; and answer Patreon questions including: $30k weekend GT car for the mature gentleman? Do we hate the Corvette and Porsche transmission equally? Ferrari's new explosive hat design Used Kia Stinger or very used E55 AMG with some money set aside for repairs? Is double-bone suspension REALLY that important? New Morgan Supersport RWD EV vs AWD EV And more! Recorded March 19 , 2025 Recorded March 19, 2025 Mark and Tesla: https://www.theverge.com/tesla/631308/mark-rober-tesla-youtube-autopilot-lidar-fake-claims Get TWENTY PERCENT off your DeleteMe plan when you go to https://www.joindeleteme.com/TIRE and use promo code TIRE at checkout. Eat smart with Factor. Get started at https://www. FACTORMEALS.com/FACTORPODCAST and use code FACTORPODCAST to get 50% off your first box plus free shipping. To listen to DRIVE with Jim Farley, just search for “DRIVE with Jim Farley” in your podcast app. https://www.youtube.com/@Jim. Farley New merch! Grab a shirt or hoodie and support us! https://thesmokingtireshop.com/ Want your question answered? To listen to the episode the day it's recorded? Want to watch the live stream, get ad-free podcasts, or exclusive podcasts? Join our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thesmokingtirepodcast Use Off The Record! and ALWAYS fight your tickets! Enter code TST25 for a 10% discount on your first case on the Off The Record app, or go to http://www.offtherecord.com/TST. #cars #comedy #podcast Tweet at us! https://www. Twitter.com/thesmokingtire https://www. Twitter.com/zackklapman Instagram: https://www. Instagram.com/thesmokingtire https://www. Instagram.com/therealzackklapman Click here for the most honest car reviews out there: https://www.youtube.com/thesmokingtire

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Matt Farah?

  What's up everybody, welcome to the Smoking Tire Podcast. As always, today's episode is brought to you by Off the Record. We love Off the Record here at TST and we have a new code, people, new code. They want to keep the codes moving for every year, so they know who signs up in what year, you feel me? So, go to offtherecord.com/tst or on the app, use code TST25, TST25 at Off the Record. And if you're going, "Hey, what's off the record?" First off, welcome, thanks for finding us. Secondly, they're a service that helps you fight tickets, okay? No matter where you are in the country, they cover 97% of

• 0:41Matt Farah?

  the US. Their partner attorneys will work to fight that ticket, keeping those points off your record for all of the reasons you don't want points on your driving record. Go to offtherecord.com/tst or use code TST25 on the Off the Record app and we'll give you 10% off all legal services booked through Off the Record. I'm telling you guys, not a week goes by that someone doesn't hit me up in the DMs or send an email and say, "Man, Off the Record got me out of a big one," or "Off the Record was super clutch." These are, these are good people, they're working for you. So, go do it, offtherecord.com/tst or code TST25 on the Off the Record app.

• 1:24Matt Farah?

  All right, folks, on this episode of the podcast, many important things happen. We give an update on the FSD crashes into photo of wall drama. We talk about an upcoming car show with the Helms Bakery and an iconic delivery van, based on that bakery's history. Learn some things about the 992.2 and I learned some things about what happens in my home when I turn on Cat TV. Plus, Zach has spent a few days and I spent a few minutes driving a three-quarter of a million dollar 1970 Chevelle resto mod. Let's talk about all of that and a whole lot more. It's the Smoking Tire Podcast, let's go.

• 2:09Matt Farah?

  MyBok.

• 2:11Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 2:12Matt Farah?

  I really need to hire a driver for the week.

• 2:14Speaker 01

  Uh, hire Nino.

• 2:16Matt Farah?

  I could do like, uh, oh yeah, I could hire Nino. Oh, I should though.

• 2:23Speaker 01

  Might be kind of demeaning, but I don't know, or it's a goof.

• 2:25Matt Farah?

  It's a MyBok.

• 2:26Speaker 01

  Right.

• 2:26Matt Farah?

  It's not like, it's not like I was like, you'd be like, you'd drive me around in a shit box. Drive me around in like Rick Ross level of pimpin'.

• 2:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:36Matt Farah?

  It's got front massage seats.

• 2:37Speaker 01

  He could do that thing like in Die Hard where the limo driver's like calling up hoes while Bruce Willis is in the building.

• 2:42Matt Farah?

  Yeah, or I like the limo driver in, uh, The Lincoln Lawyer, the movie, not the TV series. The TV series is I'm fine with, but the movie, the limo driver's real cool.

• 2:51Speaker 01

  Oh, okay. I don't remember that movie very well.

• 2:52Matt Farah?

  Matthew McConaughey.

• 2:53Speaker 01

  I know who he is.

• 2:54Matt Farah?

  Yeah, yes. Playing a lawyer.

• 2:57Speaker 01

  For the second time.

• 2:58Matt Farah?

  Who's sort of constantly on the move in the back of a Lincoln Town Car.

• 3:03Speaker 01

  Cause his, what was his first movie with Sam Jackson?

• 3:06Matt Farah?

  Time to Kill.

• 3:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, that was his first movie, I believe, ever.

• 3:09Matt Farah?

  Killed it.

• 3:09Speaker 01

  And it was.

• 3:10Matt Farah?

  Yeah, no, you should watch Matthew McConaughey on screen and not listen to his personal opinions about shit.

• 3:16Speaker 01

  Some of his opinions are very fun and funny.

• 3:18Matt Farah?

  Some are fun and crazy, but he just did an interview that I heard that was the, it was just insanity.

• 3:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, fine. I watch his movies, not, I don't need his brain to back up all his movies. Sometimes you don't, you meet your heroes, it's not a great idea, sometimes.

• 3:31Matt Farah?

  Actors, man.

• 3:32Speaker 01

  Good idea.

• 3:33Matt Farah?

  Actors, it could go either way.

• 3:34Speaker 01

  Right.

• 3:35Matt Farah?

  Someone is a talented actor, like they could be a genius, or they could be a completely demented lunatic.

• 3:41Speaker 01

  There could be someone who has not had ideas professionally, because they've just been reading and taking direction.

• 3:46Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 3:46Speaker 01

  And then you ask what their ideas are, and they have just taken direction from the wrong people.

• 3:50Matt Farah?

  Well, and when I was younger, people that I knew who were actors and became actors were like, had like, you know... Mental and developmental issues and like we're really and and felt we're like looking to escape themselves by being somewhere. They were also the people that were like kinda like pathological liars and granted, this is a sample size of like people I knew growing up. But I find like in now that we live where a lot of those are, it's like 50/50. 50 is that and then 50 is like fairly well adjusted.

• 4:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, I have a bunch of friends that are like voice actors and stuff.

• 4:25Matt Farah?

  Yeah, voice actors.

• 4:26Speaker 01

  And they are very interesting, well adjusted.

• 4:27Matt Farah?

  Voice actors are, you wanna hang out with them.

• 4:30Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 4:31Matt Farah?

  They're the, they're the ones that you absolutely wanna.

• 4:33Speaker 01

  Some of them are some of the most well-read and spoken people I've ever been around. I'm like, wow, they know so many words.

• 4:41Matt Farah?

  Yeah, voice actors rule. Um, hi, welcome to the, welcome to the program today. Uh, it's out of, what, what episode is this today, Zach?

• 4:52Speaker 01

  996.

• 4:53Matt Farah?

  Six. Oh.

• 4:54Speaker 01

  Correct.

• 4:55Matt Farah?

  Shit, we haven't thought, considered the fact that we should have dedicated this to Porsches. I should do better about thinking to the, should we talk about water-cooled Porsches just like a lot?

• 5:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, the beginning of water-cooled Porsches, this takes a lot of water.

• 5:07Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 5:08Speaker 01

  I like the engine, I don't like the headlights.

• 5:09Matt Farah?

  And then we have to talk about like slightly better water-cooled Porsches like next week.

• 5:14Speaker 01

  Forever, yeah.

• 5:15Matt Farah?

  Uh, and then skip, uh, go back in time.

• 5:18Speaker 01

  Go back to 991.

• 5:20Matt Farah?

  Actually to 991, yeah.

• 5:21Speaker 01

  Which makes, that makes sense.

• 5:22Matt Farah?

  But then forward again to 992 and hopefully the timeline doesn't skew into an alternate tangent.

• 5:28Speaker 01

  It will.

• 5:29Matt Farah?

  Where Biff Tannen is.

• 5:31Speaker 01

  Where we swim in the air.

• 5:32Matt Farah?

  Powerful and married to your mother and it's, I mean.

• 5:36Speaker 01

  We're kinda there. So maybe we actually go back in time forward into a new dimension and Al Gore is president.

• 5:43Matt Farah?

  Right. And so, yeah, like, no, in terms of like movies that, that, that have changed meaning recently, Back to the Future 2 is on that, on that track for sure. Hi, everybody. I wrote things down to talk about for this show. How rare. Um, yeah. Um, and the first one, the most important one is, uh, the Johnny Lieberman is having a car show in Los Angeles. So I know California is our biggest market, shocker. So if you happen to be in Los Angeles on, uh, March 23rd, um, there's gonna be a car show at the Helms Bakery, um, which is also being, it's Johnny and then our friend,

• 6:20Matt Farah?

  Sang, uh, the chef who owns Father's Office and a whole bunch of other restaurants and is relaunching, um, the Helms Bakery Restaurant, which was an actual famous commercial bakery. And it's connected to cars because if you've ever seen like a big Barrett Jackson or Meacham, Helms Bakery had these very custom specific vans made to deliver their bread and shit. And it's a really unique van that almost looks like French, like one of those Citroen HY kind of vans. It's shaped like a baguette, like it's a long torpedo van? Like, not in, not like the Wienermobile, but kind of. It's just, it's a, it's a, it's a, look, just Google Helms Bakery van.

• 7:03Matt Farah?

  And they sell once in a while at the sort of muscle car kind of auctions, cause they're of that time. So anyway, bakery closed down, it became, the building became other things, and then Sang is relaunching the bakery as a restaurant. These are cool. Is the face cause of the vans? Yeah. The vans are sick, right? This? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 7:24Matt Farah?

  They're the Helms Bakery. This is very French. It is not, it's not shaped at all like a baguette. It says, this is like a personally driven trolley car. Yeah, yeah. It's a personal trolley car. Yeah, like imagine you took a trolley car and then chopped it down to be a two seater. Third size, yeah. Wow, with racks in the back for bread. Kinda dig it. Right? Like, don't you kind of wanna like cruise one around? Oh, yes. I think this would be a great Pebble Beach week.

• 7:53Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 7:54Matt Farah?

  I bet you could roll this stock at Burning Man.

• 7:57Speaker 01

  Uh, you probably could.

• 7:58Matt Farah?

  Show up on the playa with this.

• 8:00Speaker 01

  This is a great, that's a great idea if these weren't so expensive. You could deliver food out there and people would love you. But this, this seat, which is like a bicycle seat for people who are listening, sitting in traffic at Pebble Beach for three hours and you would, your spine would fall apart.

• 8:13Matt Farah?

  On a bicycle, and the people are looking at you at exactly 90 degrees from slightly below. It's not a complimentary driving position.

• 8:21Speaker 01

  This steering wheel looks fake.

• 8:22Matt Farah?

  The steering wheel looks fake. The cockpit is a ham, aluminum box.

• 8:28Speaker 01

  There, there's, this is the largest dashboard I've ever seen. Other people could sit up there.

• 8:32Matt Farah?

  Yeah, no, like, you know what it would be great for? If you had a really big dog. If you have a Great Dane, you could throw a Great Dane bed on the dash of this vehicle.

• 8:42Speaker 01

  Dear Jeff Swart. But there you go.

• 8:44Matt Farah?

  Oh, and it's got a huge rack for cakes in the back.

• 8:47Speaker 01

  It's got wo- wooden racks. It's like cakes with glass windows so you can see your cakes as you go down the road.

• 8:54Matt Farah?

  Oh my God.

• 8:55Speaker 01

  How much do these sell for?

• 8:56Matt Farah?

  I don't know.

• 8:57Speaker 01

  It's on Subways.

• 8:58Matt Farah?

  Yeah, you're, this is an auction page. What, what, does it show the result or did it show an estimate on this one? And you know what? I jokingly said Meacham and Barrett-Jackson. This is for $246,000. This is RM Sotheby's.

• 9:11Speaker 01

  Nope.

• 9:12Matt Farah?

  246 grand.

• 9:14Speaker 01

  Not bringing that to the play.

• 9:15Matt Farah?

  This sold at Pebble Beach three years ago, dude.

• 9:19Speaker 01

  Taxes, people. Pay, please pay them. This is where we're at, okay? It's not even a fun, it's fun for five minutes and it's a goof.

• 9:27Matt Farah?

  You know what this is? You gotta throw some studs on it and then it's your Yellowstone Club. Fucking ski trolley.

• 9:34Speaker 01

  My previous statement remains.

• 9:35Matt Farah?

  Straight up.

• 9:36Speaker 01

  But it only carries one person. There's no room in the back for people.

• 9:39Matt Farah?

  Oh no, you have to, you would have to modify it for two.

• 9:42Speaker 01

  You know what you got there? You got a bus.

• 9:44Matt Farah?

  No, will you put a rear face, a rear facing chairs on the dashboard?

• 9:50Matt Farah?

  The driver looks through their legs.

• 9:52Speaker 01

  And their legs hang over the steering column and you crash because you can't see.

• 9:56Matt Farah?

  And they're singing like Puff the Magic Dragon while you drive.

• 10:01Speaker 01

  This is a mystical place you've entered.

• 10:02Matt Farah?

  Yeah, man, if you've, ugh.

• 10:05Speaker 01

  These are magic cakes, they are.

• 10:09Matt Farah?

  I bet, oh man, 148 of these were made. Dude, think about how big fucking Helms Bakery was to have 148 of these dumb little things made. That's a bunch!

• 10:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 10:22Matt Farah?

  That's, it's...

• 10:23Speaker 01

  I agree with you.

• 10:24Matt Farah?

  It's enormous. Yeah.

• 10:26Speaker 01

  I wonder, I wonder what are they built on?

• 10:28Matt Farah?

  Accompanied by delightful accessories. Oh wow.

• 10:30Speaker 01

  I mean, they clearly took a truck frame.

• 10:32Matt Farah?

  Uh, wait, hang on, let's see. Keep going down, flat nose vans. Okay, wait here. "Twin coach of Kent, Ohio to produce 148 of these vans. A stout Hercules four-cylinder engine while wooden cabinets in the back house. Delivery items." I mean, it's probably just like a...

• 10:48Speaker 01

  No coach holder.

• 10:49Matt Farah?

  A square ladder frame of some kind, right?

• 10:52Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 10:52Matt Farah?

  Yeah. It's pretty pimp. I mean, that's, that is like a real billionaire's toy.

• 10:59Speaker 01

  It really is. And they drive around their housing division and bring out, and deliver cookies. That's what it's for. Yeah.

• 11:05Matt Farah?

  Yeah. Like, if their dau-, if their daughter is doing Girl Scout cookies, you're just crushing in this.

• 11:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:11Matt Farah?

  Rolling around Bel Air.

• 11:14Speaker 01

  You're like, "Oh, we needed a vehicle to deliver the cookies because our normal vehicles wouldn't do such a thing. So we bought this. Isn't it fun?"

• 11:21Matt Farah?

  I'm, I'm pretty sure Sang has one, though. Like, there is one at, there was one at the Helms Bakery. I don't know if it runs or anything, but like, there was one there.

• 11:32Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 11:32Matt Farah?

  So like, Sang may actually have one. And if he does have one, he might be the kind of person who could, would make it run so that he can go drive around in it.

• 11:43Speaker 01

  This one looks museum quality. So maybe, like, I could see if he bought the Helms building, there was one just included.

• 11:49Matt Farah?

  Yeah, it was like inside.

• 11:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:50Matt Farah?

  Yeah. There's another one in the furniture store there. Uh, it's called HD Buttercup. It's like a big furniture store in LA that's like right next to that building. There's one of these in, inside there, too.

• 12:01Speaker 01

  You can use it as a closet in your house.

• 12:04Matt Farah?

  Yeah. Well, now that they know what it's worth, it's worth just keeping in there.

• 12:08Speaker 01

  I think the market can only support maybe four of these. You know, you put too many of these on the road in this condition, this market's gonna tank.

• 12:15Matt Farah?

  Well, you certainly wouldn't want to sell them in the same decade. Right, that's what I'm saying. Well, because you know what happens in the collector car market, right? One, you have one big, big hit. You know, you have one car comes to market. Yeah. An unexpected big sale. You know, the first. Skyline. Yeah, the first skyline to cross a million or whatever, right? And then the next year, there's like six. Yeah. And then it comes back down 25%. Yep, so, but there... Are there enough of these for that to be a concern? I don't, I don't think so. Because 246 grand means that multiple people were interested in this. If one of these came up, you know what I mean? Yeah, it was only one person, it'd be like 10 bucks. The opening bid wasn't 245.

• 12:59Matt Farah?

  So, yeah, so anyway, Helms Bakery, Cars and Coffee, Johnny and Sang. And of course, I'm going to be there. I've decided to bring something that's not my car. I'm going to bring the car that we were just talking about earlier. Like 20 minutes ago before the show started. The one that's in the front, right now? The one, no, no, no, no, no, not, not, not Rick Ross. No, no, the other car, the gold car downstairs. Doesn't matter. Oh, I know what you're talking about. Yeah, we'll bring that. Cool. That'll be different, interesting. So, anyway, that's Helms Bakery in Culver City, 8 to 10 a.m. And there's going to be coffee and probably food. Come on down. I will be out of the state. That's why I won't be there.

• 13:44Matt Farah?

  Yeah. Just want people to know. Also, I got a text this morning from our friend at Porsche, who was driving a US-specified 992.2. We've only driven Euro-spec cars so far. US-spec cars, a bunch of the ADAS features. Guys, got to take a quick break because today's support comes from Delete Me. They're making it easy, quick, and safe to remove your personal data online at a time when surveillance and data breaches are common enough to make everybody vulnerable. You put your data out there. It's not your fault. It's really not. You bought a thing online. Wanted that Rainbow Brite doll off of eBay.

• 14:29Matt Farah?

  You wanted a car somewhere. You wanted a ticket to a concert. And then what do they do? They turn around, they sell your data. And now you're getting spam. You're getting all kinds of garbage phone calls and texts. And now you need to get rid of that information. Take back your data. So Delete Me, it's a service, right? You sign up. You give them all the information that you want taken off of these data broker websites. And then they go to work. You don't hear from them for a little bit. They come back and they go, I found these hundreds or possibly thousands of instances of your information on these sites. Here's what we've deleted automatically. Here's ones you need to like approve for us to delete. And then these ones like we can't do, but you can fill out this form and have it done yourself.

• 15:13Matt Farah?

  And then every month, they keep working for you, sending you more reports and keeping all these new instances of your data off of these websites. It's awesome. And if you are tired of the spam, you're tired of the calls and texts, you're tired of the idea that your privacy isn't private, you want Delete Me. And we can give you 20% off of your Delete Me plan. When you go to joindelete.me/tire and then use promo code tire at checkout. That's joindelete.me/tire and then use promo code tire at checkout.

• 15:51Matt Farah?

  The only way to get 20% off is to go to joindelete.me/tire and enter code tire at checkout. That's joindelete.me/tire code tire. And thank you to Delete Me for sponsoring today's episode. Also brought to you today from Factor, loving the factor. If your problem is time, energy, or just really any reason for not eating healthy gourmet nutritious meals this year, right? Factor is your solution. They've got dietitian approved, ready to heat and eat in two-minute meals. So you can fuel right and feel great, no matter what life throws at you. Factor arrives fresh and fully prepared, perfect for an active, busy lifestyle.

• 16:38Matt Farah?

  They've got the keto meals, they've got the calorie smart, protein plus, the chef, uh, the chef selections. All this stuff is delicious. They've sent us so much food. We've tried everything from pasta dishes to protein and veggies, to breakfast, to smoothies, grab and go snacks, everything. You can refresh your goals this year with ingredients you can trust and convenience that can't be beat. My problem is I don't schedule time in my day for eating. And then when I finally get time to eat, I'm actually like too hungry and then I make bad decisions. I eat whatever's around. It may not be healthy. I eat whatever I can get quickest, may not be healthy. I don't want to cook. Cooking's the healthiest option, et cetera, et cetera.

• 17:21Matt Farah?

  Factor, when it's here, I can heat it up quick, two minutes in the microwave and then I'm having a healthy snack. I'm back on my game and you can too. Get started at factormeals.com/factorpodcast and use code FACTORPODCAST to get 50% off your first box plus free shipping. That's code FACTORPODCAST at factormeals.com/factorpodcast to get 50% off plus free shipping on your first box. Thank you to Factor for sponsoring today's episode and now let's get back to it. US spec cars, a bunch of the ADAS features stay off.

• 18:05Matt Farah?

  Like, like if you turn them off, they'll stay off with restarts.

• 18:09Speaker 01

  Oh, cool.

• 18:09Matt Farah?

  Including all of the really annoying ones.

• 18:12Speaker 01

  Great.

• 18:12Matt Farah?

  Like all the lane keep, steering intervention bullshit, like emergency braking, rear blind spot detection, shit like that.

• 18:20Speaker 01

  I like that feature, yeah.

• 18:21Matt Farah?

  Stuff that really doesn't bother most, the lane, the steering, the steering shit.

• 18:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:27Matt Farah?

  Is what bothers most people.

• 18:28Speaker 01

  Well, because the rear thing doesn't matter when you're going forward. It never interrupts how you're driving. Yeah, great.

• 18:33Matt Farah?

  But, but like, he just wanted to be clear that you, not every ADAS feature can be turned off and kept off with every restart, but the most annoying ones can.

• 18:44Speaker 01

  Cool.

• 18:44Matt Farah?

  So, uh, you can, or fear not, order your US spec 992.2s. Uh, and, and the things I said about the ADAS in the European cars will only... 30% apply to you.

• 19:00Speaker 01

  Be funny if someone out there is screaming right now because they bought a 992.1 after your video. They were like, "This is the last one with no ADAS."

• 19:06Matt Farah?

  The last one with no ADAS. Yeah, um, so that's good news, right?

• 19:14Matt Farah?

  What? Okay. After we talked about the Mark

• 19:20Speaker 01

  Mark Rober.

• 19:20Matt Farah?

  Rover video yesterday.

• 19:21Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 19:22Matt Farah?

  Which was two days ago. Sorry, it was actually two days ago.

• 19:25Speaker 01

  It happened two days ago. We talked about on the show. Neither of us had watched the video at that point.

• 19:29Matt Farah?

  Right.

• 19:29Speaker 01

  We were reacting in real time, basically.

• 19:32Matt Farah?

  Yes.

• 19:32Speaker 01

  And then we both went home and watched the video in its entirety again.

• 19:36Matt Farah?

  Correct. Um, I think there are a couple of things that probably, possibly could be considered. I don't know Mark Rober first. Is he like, you've watched his videos.

• 19:49Speaker 01

  I've watched three of them.

• 19:49Matt Farah?

  Okay.

• 19:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:50Matt Farah?

  Do people look at him as a, like a scientist?

• 19:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, because I think he's an engineer by trade.

• 19:56Matt Farah?

  Okay.

• 19:56Speaker 01

  Um, I think he worked, did he work at NASA? Let me look real quick.

• 19:59Matt Farah?

  Like, are they, are they, they're holding him to a scientific standard?

• 20:03Speaker 01

  I believe so.

• 20:04Matt Farah?

  Okay, well, if that's the case, there are-

• 20:06Speaker 01

  He worked at NASA before he did his YouTube channel. Well, he started making viral videos while at NASA. So, yeah, engineer by trade of what I would call a high degree.

• 20:15Matt Farah?

  All right. So in that case, I think there are a couple of problems with the video. One is the title. I think it's irresponsible to have 65 million subscribers and even imply a Tesla is a self-driving car. I think that's a problem. I know why he would do it. Makes absolute sense why he would do it. I still really disagree with the use of that. Um, and I think there's probably 20 different ways to write a great title to this video that don't refer to a Tesla as a self-driving car. Particularly, a Tesla that he admits is not using FSD.

• 20:59Speaker 01

  Right.

• 20:59Matt Farah?

  Right, so it's not even, it doesn't even meet Tesla's standard of self-driving car.

• 21:05Speaker 01

  Right, right, true, yeah.

• 21:06Matt Farah?

  Which is a bullshit standard.

• 21:08Speaker 01

  The most broad reaching attractive thing to the masses. But I completely agree with you.

• 21:14Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 21:14Speaker 01

  And the fact that he didn't use it in FSD, which we'll get to. But you call it SD essentially.

• 21:20Matt Farah?

  If your credibility is based on being a scientist. Then I don't think misleading titles are to your benefit. Even if your job is entertaining 65 million people.

• 21:34Speaker 01

  True, especially when the crowd of people that will come in support of Tesla.

• 21:41Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 21:42Speaker 01

  With merit or without. And I don't like, there's a lot of minutia in that, but 10, like if they find a problem, a single small problem in your methodology.

• 21:50Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 21:50Speaker 01

  It's gonna get exploited, magnified, etc.

• 21:53Matt Farah?

  Right.

• 21:53Speaker 01

  So you really need to be buttoned up.

• 21:54Matt Farah?

  Right, and then, and the other one is, you know, he was using autopilot and not FSD.

• 21:59Speaker 01

  Right.

• 22:00Matt Farah?

  Now, I don't actually think that in a practical sense, it makes any difference at all for this test. They're, they both used the same cameras and sensors. And the cameras don't get more powerful because of FSD. They, they just don't. And in either sense, the car should have had automatic emergency braking.

• 22:18Speaker 01

  Right.

• 22:19Matt Farah?

  Which did not activate.

• 22:20Speaker 01

  Because, because in this test, if you haven't watched the video, like they do a couple of things before they crash through the wall. And we should talk about the wall also. But they did tests like putting a man, a, a mannequin running out into the road like a kid. And it did not always stop in time, which that would be automatic emergency braking.

• 22:36Matt Farah?

  Right.

• 22:36Speaker 01

  So.

• 22:37Matt Farah?

  So, so yeah, so those I, those I think are the actual problems with the video. He didn't use the latest available car software. Or at least one of the, the most recent, you know, thing that they're selling, right? That's one problem. And then he called it a self-driving car. Those are my only real problems with what Mark did in the video.

• 23:02Speaker 01

  I would add.

• 23:03Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 23:03Speaker 01

  That, and he would probably do this in hindsight, is.

• 23:08Speaker 01

  You know, there's a lot of quick cuts in the video because that's how you make a video exciting. I think when you're doing stuff like this, having a camera that stays locked like on the dash screen to show people it's in autopilot and then it clicked off like he had to explain later, here's the raw video. You have to kind of do a follow-up to explain it.

• 23:24Matt Farah?

  If it was the smoking tire, it would be three cameras synced together and you would see them all at the same time.

• 23:29Speaker 01

  Right, because then it's just basically

• 23:30Matt Farah?

  Sure, but I don't, I'm not trying to say, um, I think that with, other than those two oversights from my perspective, and I'll give you that, that one I think might be with, with, with, uh, with doing a single cut, I would probably want to show it uncut.

• 23:49Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 23:49Matt Farah?

  But like, again, you know, 65 million views and you understand why he would have done it in a way like I don't, I don't really agree, but like I could kind of maybe give him that one. In general though, I think this entire video is made in 100% good faith.

• 24:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:06Matt Farah?

  Um, I, I don't, I didn't see anything that looked like shenanigans at all. Um, the criticisms that we saw in the comments about the thing being, it looked like he ran, crashed into the wall twice, horseshit. He cut the shape so it looks like the fucking cartoon.

• 24:23Speaker 01

  Exactly. To not, to not understand that is ridiculous. Or maybe cartoons have changed and you don't crash through walls, but like that is straight out of Looney Tunes.

• 24:31Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 24:32Speaker 01

  And it's pre-cut, obviously.

• 24:33Matt Farah?

  And then the, the autopilot disengaging 17 seconds before the wall, either

• 24:39Speaker 01

  Millisecond, right?

• 24:40Matt Farah?

  Uh, 17 frames, excuse me, not seconds, excuse me.

• 24:42Speaker 01

  Less than a second.

• 24:43Matt Farah?

  Yeah, 17 frames is two thirds of a second.

• 24:46Speaker 01

  And that many frames per second?

• 24:48Matt Farah?

  That's a very good point. Good, very good point, very good point. Uh, I assume if someone was counting frames, then they know how many frames per second it was.

• 24:55Speaker 01

  We shoot 30 frames, it's pretty standard on YouTube, so that's half a second.

• 24:58Matt Farah?

  Yeah. So that either says a couple things. One, he, you know, did sort of what a natural human reaction might do, which is panic, hit the brakes there, or touch the wheel in a way that he maybe shouldn't have done. Or the car disengaged right before in order to be able to provide some air cover to saying, well, it was not engaged at the time of the impact.

• 25:22Speaker 01

  Right. And he said in his Twitter post, I believe, like he did not hit the brake, it did this. And I saw comments supporting that argument saying, I saw someone said, "I have a Tesla. It was exiting an off-ramp once and it got confused, so it just disengaged." And that's why they say you have to be paying attention all the time. But, as we've talked about, it's been shown to do that before accidents, and it may be to prevent lawsuits from sticking because they go, "Well, autopilot was engaged."

• 25:49Matt Farah?

  Well, they've...I've read lawsuits where it's both ways. I've read lawsuits where they accuse the car of disengaging right before in order to say it wasn't engaged. I've also seen ones where the driver, panic brakes, or panic tries to steer, is unable to avoid an accident, and then they blame...they say, "Well, it wasn't engaged. The driver disengaged."

• 26:17Speaker 01

  Because if you act...if you move the wheel, it will probably disengage.

• 26:20Matt Farah?

  Right. Like, if it's about to have an accident, you're gonna do what you can do to avoid an accident. You may successfully avoid the accident, you may not. But if you can't avoid the accident that the software sets you on a literal collision course for, and they go, "Well, it wasn't engaged at the time of the accident." Well, fucking no shit. I was trying to save myself. Of course it wasn't engaged. So it's like...

• 26:46Speaker 01

  True.

• 26:46Matt Farah?

  They've given themselves all these if-then's...

• 26:50Speaker 01

  Right.

• 26:50Matt Farah?

  That always end that it's the driver's fault.

• 26:52Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 26:53Matt Farah?

  You know, so...I don't know. I found the video to be made in good faith, and I found the Forbes article to...that criticized it to be, in some ways, quote, you know, valid criticisms, in which case, one, the full self using autopilot rather than full self-driving. But again, I think the argument doesn't change the outcome of the video at all.

• 27:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, the Forbes article was kind of light on acknowledging the successes the other car had versus the Tesla car. So like, people seem very focused on this was using autopilot, not FSD. Therefore, the argument is completely dissolved, which I think like there's, I mean, what, they do five different tests, right?

• 27:35Matt Farah?

  I think the test is also more about LiDAR versus camera only.

• 27:40Speaker 01

  Right.

• 27:40Matt Farah?

  It's not about that Volvo isn't marketed as a self-driving car.

• 27:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:45Matt Farah?

  That's a Volvo with a LiDAR system on it. It's not, this isn't about, you know, is one of these a self-driving car and is the other one?

• 27:53Speaker 01

  Right.

• 27:53Matt Farah?

  The test is camera versus LiDAR.

• 27:56Speaker 01

  Right.

• 27:57Matt Farah?

  And so, using autopilot versus FSD, it fully qualifies for a camera-only test.

• 28:06Speaker 01

  That's true. I, I don't know enough about the difference in programming and whatever between FSD autopilot and like their radar cruise control. Like, I just don't. So, maybe that's where some of the crowd's criticism comes from, but they did a lot of tests of like person walking in the roadway in daytime, nighttime, they did a water test, right? The headlight, the brightness of the semi-trucks obscuring the cameras and fucking with them, which the Tesla passed, which is impressive. And then, of course, detecting the wall. But it, what, he only got two out of five tests? The Tesla successfully did, or was it three out of five?

• 28:41Matt Farah?

  The Tesla did two out of five. It did the blinding lights and it did the wa, um, I don't know. It did one of the other ones. I forget which. The kid running, the kid running out?

• 28:54Speaker 01

  It stopped well.

• 28:54Matt Farah?

  I think it was the kid running out that it stopped for. But, um, I, you know, if it was us, I would have put a gauge cam, a gauge cluster cam, and I would have put a pedal cam to demonstrate that I'm not touching the pedals. But like, nevertheless, I think, I think it's a good faith video.

• 29:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, I agree.

• 29:11Matt Farah?

  Other than the title, which drives me insane, but he's not the only person that does that.

• 29:15Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think, I agree.

• 29:16Matt Farah?

  Yeah. Um, do you want to talk about the Chevelle that you were driving this morning?

• 29:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, sure.

• 29:22Matt Farah?

  Guys, support for the Smoking Tire comes from the podcast Drive with Jim Farley. You know Jim Farley, he's the CEO of Ford. Not only that, this guy has a GT40 and a Cobra and all kinds of amazing vintage American metal that he races wheel-to-wheel.

• 29:39Matt Farah?

  At places like Goodwood. He's a boss and you gotta check out this show. It's where Jim talks to some of his favorite people about what they drive and what drives them to succeed. They just started season three with some sick new guests, including Vicky Butler Henderson, the British racing driver and fifth gear personality, Randy Nonnenberg from Bring a Trailer, and T-Pain, the musician turned drifter. Guy's got skills, actually. Um, I listened, uh, I listened to it the other day. It is great. Jim is a great interviewer. He's insightful. And, uh, it's interesting hearing these folks open up to him. I really am about it. I support Jim's venture here. To listen to Drive with Jim Farley, just search Drive with Jim Farley in any podcast app.

• 30:22Matt Farah?

  That's Drive with Jim Farley, and thank you for supporting this episode. And then I just had a quick spin in.

• 30:29Speaker 01

  Drive, where's my picture at? Here we go.

• 30:32Matt Farah?

  It is a, it is a 1970.

• 30:36Speaker 01

  1970 Chevelle. This is built by a company in Bakersfield, California called Iron Works. Um, they've been around for over 20 years, but this car is the third car in what they call, uh, Legacy Series, I believe. So basically, it's their most expensive line of cars. Um, they've done a lot of stuff. They have done some seven-figure cars for like one-offs for, that people compete in like Riddler Award or stuff like that. And they've also done cheaper muscle car parts and custom builds and things like that. But this is a very expensive car.

• 31:09Matt Farah?

  But like you could call them and pick a color and get this. Say, I want a Legacy Series.

• 31:15Speaker 01

  Yeah, totally.

• 31:15Matt Farah?

  Chevelle, and this is basically what you get in your choice of color.

• 31:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, and you can send them a donor car if you want. And there's a lot of customization and things you could choose from. But, but what's interesting is like, the first two cars, one, the first one was a Buick 442. The second one, I think, was a 70 Chevelle with a vinyl roof. So it's like the Legacy Series, and they're all G-body cars, but.

• 31:35Matt Farah?

  It's like any G-body car, because they're all basically the same?

• 31:38Speaker 01

  Exactly. They're all pretty much the same car.

• 31:40Matt Farah?

  Dude, sidebar. Right now, uh, TST Book Club, a lot of people have been asking me about books. Um, I, I really should make the whole list, but this month's book, uh. On a clear day, you can see General Motors. John, the John DeLorean, didn't want it to come out book. Bro, he just like, he just like flamethrowers the entire fucking executive floor of GM. I understand why he wouldn't, halfway through the seventies, he's like, oh shit, I need money to build this DeLorean. I better fucking not burn every bridge I've got.

• 32:13Speaker 01

  Oh wow.

• 32:14Matt Farah?

  And he didn't want this thing to come out, because he was about to be like, fuck you, I'm out.

• 32:18Speaker 01

  It's all about everything they've done, they did wrong and...

• 32:20Matt Farah?

  It's just like, his like, hit piece on the inside workings of General Motors while he was there.

• 32:27Speaker 01

  That would be, that's probably pretty interesting.

• 32:28Matt Farah?

  I'll give it to you when I'm done, it's fucking wild.

• 32:30Speaker 01

  Did they ever talk about door cards and the complexity of that and why they feel so cheap?

• 32:33Matt Farah?

  I mean, he basically admits they're selling exactly the same car from the late fifties through like the middle seventies.

• 32:39Speaker 01

  That's great, yeah, yeah, not a lot changed.

• 32:41Matt Farah?

  Yeah, yeah, so anyway, if you can get it, you know, used somewhere, buy it, don't, don't, you know, don't get it on Amazon, but get it somewhere else. But I'll give you my copy.

• 32:50Speaker 01

  That's a good thing to bring up, because, I mean, this car is very expensive and they did try to engineer as much Detroit out of it as possible. Like, doors and things like that, things that rattle, although there are some things that sound a little weird once you're moving. It's got a supercharged LT4, it's got a bigger blower on it, it's got a built transmission, IRS, which is pretty interesting. I mean, they do a chassis that's supplied to them that they customize a bit. It's got, I think, JRI shocks on it.

• 33:19Matt Farah?

  Wait, JRZ?

• 33:20Speaker 01

  JRZ shocks, sorry. JRZ shocks, remote reservoir, big willwoods, like, there's a lot of stuff done. And they cut like the entire floor out of the car and dropped the seats, like, they do a ton of metal fabrication. And that's a good thing, because this car costs a lot of money. What we learned on the drive is that like, there are some refinements that are needed. There's some choices that were made that are not what I would choose, it has manual brakes, I would go power brakes. So the owner said that, the owner does track work and does some club racing things. He wanted manual brakes to have like the connection to driving. Sure, I get it, but this car is forty, one hundred and fifty...

• 34:01Speaker 01

  And like I drove this car pretty quick in the canyon stay, but definitely well below what I've driven any modern car. And slowing this thing down when it's like just getting off a very 800 pound feet of torque like. I'm using a lot of leg muscle like I don't do legs every other day, but I do it enough and like it requires a lot of pressure.

• 34:23Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 34:24Speaker 01

  And the other thing I didn't like about it is that the suspension is really stiff. I think it's the damping. I think it's just a couple clicks wrong. So when you jump on the brakes, there's almost no dive in the nose. Same way like I know you drove around here, but in the corners. Uh, there's very little lean. There's very, very little body roll. So it sticks like a motherfucker. But you don't have the communication of grip left.

• 34:48Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 34:49Speaker 01

  And you don't have the communication of how well am I stopping other than like looking at your, the rate of deceleration.

• 34:54Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 34:55Speaker 01

  It's just, there's not a lot of, um, sorry, like sensory feedback on the momentum of the vehicle, cornering or stopping.

• 35:04Matt Farah?

  When you have heavy cars and then you have hardware designed to make those heavy cars stay flat. What you end up with is a car that responds quickly.

• 35:15Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 35:15Matt Farah?

  But also runs out of both feel and talent quickly. Because you don't have that gray area between grip and slip.

• 35:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 35:23Matt Farah?

  Or where you're loading up the nose to find out how, how hard you're, you're braking.

• 35:29Speaker 01

  Right. And this is very agile because of the stiff springs and everything else.

• 35:34Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 35:34Speaker 01

  You can, you can adjust your corner, mid-corner like modern sports cars can. I mean, it's really impressive with the steering rack is quick. The big front tires are wide, but they don't actually tramline on the highway, which is fantastic. Like there's some really good things about that.

• 35:51Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 35:51Speaker 01

  But you don't get any of that communication because it's so stiff.

• 35:53Matt Farah?

  Yeah. Uh, I just drove it for 10 minutes around here. I have to say, I didn't love it.

• 36:01Matt Farah?

  I liked certain elements of it. It felt like it was built well by muscle car standards. Uh, not the best I've seen, but pretty good. Uh, the seats were comfortable. I, I liked the steering wheel and the shifter and, and the seating position.

• 36:16Speaker 01

  The ergonomics of it are really good.

• 36:17Matt Farah?

  Were, were pretty good.

• 36:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:19Matt Farah?

  Uh, obviously it sounds great.

• 36:22Matt Farah?

  But, and the, the gear, the, the gearbox is like a Tremec of some kind, right?

• 36:26Speaker 01

  T56, but it's like a custom one, yeah.

• 36:28Matt Farah?

  But, you know, you, you, you, so many cars have a Tremec that if I tell you, oh, it's a T56, like you know what the shifter feels like.

• 36:34Speaker 01

  Totally.

• 36:34Matt Farah?

  Nothing wrong with that.

• 36:35Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 36:36Matt Farah?

  Good shifter. But like, there were some like, some, some, like the, so the steering. I did a couple of corners, just highway on ramp. When, when you're in the corner and like you said, making those adjustments, it was good. But on center, going from five degrees left to five degrees right, like, what's happening there? Like, there is something very, very strange happening right there. And then it's got a tilt steering wheel. As you tilt it from up, up, uh, Helm's Bakery truck, down, you know, down to Formula One car, GT car, that actually changes the steering ratio.

• 37:18Speaker 01

  Oh, I didn't adjust the wheel at all.

• 37:20Matt Farah?

  Yeah, the angle of the wheel changes how it steers, which is weird as hell.

• 37:25Speaker 01

  Well, that's, so when you brought it back, I think, no, no, when I was driving, so I had to go look for parking to go to lunch, which actually was great because I had to do a lot of slow maneuvering and a lot of center to 90, center to 90. And, and I told the owner of the, the shop three days ago, like, hey, this does something weird from off-center to,

• 37:42Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 37:43Speaker 01

  let's call it steering on center. But maneuvering around the neighborhood today. The column was actually like moving up and down slightly. I think something's loose in this column that they installed. So it needs some tightening up there.

• 37:56Matt Farah?

  Okay, well, maybe something is broken, but it didn't.

• 38:00Speaker 01

  I agree.

• 38:01Matt Farah?

  I wouldn't call that good.

• 38:03Speaker 01

  No.

• 38:03Matt Farah?

  Certainly not.

• 38:04Speaker 01

  It was a little disconcerting.

• 38:05Matt Farah?

  Yeah. And then the pedal spacing, you can't heel toe. The brakes, you know, the power brakes, in my opinion, are mandatory for a 4,000 pound car with 800 horsepower. Every fast car I've ever driven that didn't have power brakes, most of which were driven by Pizziboto, built by Pizziboto, who I love and who gives me shit about my choices, as like I give him about his choices all the time. Uh, cause he's building like a lunatic EVs now, but every fast car I've ever driven that didn't have power brakes was awful. I mean, it just, they have good power brakes now. I don't, that I just don't get.

• 38:43Speaker 01

  And I, I think they, their only benefit is if it's a race car where you're, you, you are always decelerating at your highest rate. And therefore the G-forces of slowing down are pushing you into that brake pedal even more. Like that's the only time I go, okay.

• 38:59Matt Farah?

  And if it is, it's not, it's not a 4,000 pound car. 4,000 pound race cars have power brakes.

• 39:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, true.

• 39:05Matt Farah?

  They, I've driven them. They do. Like little Formula cars that are 800 pounds have manual brakes.

• 39:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:12Matt Farah?

  Or rally cars that are going sub 50 miles an hour where your left foot braking and that's the, that's the thing.

• 39:18Speaker 01

  Now, they might've wanted to keep the engine bay really clean and not have a big booster, but now you have, uh, I think the aftermarket has electric powered boosters that are much smaller. So if you can give it some electrical current and use that instead of having a giant brake booster, then you keep everything tidy, but you also get the benefit of power brakes.

• 39:36Matt Farah?

  Yeah, well, I mean, and I hope there's a, there's a modern solution to these brakes so that they feel more like modern car, you know, brakes than old ass Chevelle brakes.

• 39:44Speaker 01

  Right.

• 39:44Matt Farah?

  But, and then the last one was although the throttle response, in gear, if you, you know, 2,500 RPM, you roll in the throttle, roll off and roll back on it again, like that response is pretty good, but blipping a down Shift the throttle response is awful.

• 40:00Speaker 01

  It's really slow.

• 40:01Matt Farah?

  It's so slow.

• 40:02Speaker 01

  I think is bigger blower situation, you think?

• 40:04Matt Farah?

  It could be, but it doesn't spin up. It's got no response.

• 40:08Speaker 01

  So the blower on this is 2.7 liter and the stock LT4 blower is 1.7. So it might be a lot bigger and therefore has more inertia and just has to spin up. Um, the other thing, so, okay.

• 40:19Matt Farah?

  Oh, and then the clutch.

• 40:21Speaker 01

  But.

• 40:21Matt Farah?

  The clutch is a different story. No, this made no sense to me. If you're, you put the clutch to the floor, put it in first gear. You lift off the clutch, the first like inch or two off the floor. You can feel it catch and the car starts to inch forward.

• 40:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:36Matt Farah?

  But that, so that's where your friction zone starts, right? And the friction zone ends when you're fully engaged, right? The, it's all the way up here.

• 40:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:45Matt Farah?

  The friction zone. The friction zone is the entire length of the clutch pedal travel.

• 40:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's weird.

• 40:51Matt Farah?

  At why does it catch so low, but not let go until the very top?

• 40:56Speaker 01

  And it made it hard to drive, um, up the ramp. The guys were saying this too, like you start to slip the clutch out. And you think you're underway and you can let the clutch out all the way. But then there's almost a second catch point. And because there's so much torque, like I did this, starting from a stop sign, not on a hill. And it would like chirp.

• 41:13Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 41:13Speaker 01

  Cause it was getting like another sudden dose of torque that was getting sent to the wheel.

• 41:17Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 41:18Speaker 01

  So like tuning that, I guess you can tune a clutch or tune the friction point. Cause the clutch has 400 miles on it or whatever.

• 41:24Matt Farah?

  Yeah, I don't know. I, I, I, all I can tell you is what the car did, not what's wrong, but like it was weird. So like the elements are there, but like it's all, it, none of it felt confidence inspiring at all.

• 41:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, like the bones and, you know, I do want to say nice things because I did like parts of it. Like it felt like a muscle car and it was exciting in that way. Cause I liked that shit from high school. Like it had a lot of attitude, it looks cool and. Like the seating position's great. They got rid of all the cheap interior shit. Like the whole dash now is milled aluminum or it's carbon fiber and it feels really solid. The door cards are all leather and like billet aluminum. Like the things you don't see have been attended to. Which is kind of the hard thing about cars like this though, when you get to this price point. Unless you know that stuff.

• 42:14Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 42:15Speaker 01

  You don't, you might not notice it. You have to really know Chevelle or honestly interact with every single thing and maybe A B compare before you'll go, oh wow, this door card feels a lot better. Or this door doesn't rattle like a bucket of bolts like the old ones did.

• 42:30Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 42:31Speaker 01

  So it's whereas like Singer, you know Singer attends to all those things also, but you usually know as soon as you look inside.

• 42:38Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 42:39Speaker 01

  It's very obvious. Like this is very clean, but it's just black. It's got nice badging and stuff and all that stuff has been like milled from aluminum.

• 42:46Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 42:46Speaker 01

  You won't really know unless you start touching stuff.

• 42:49Matt Farah?

  I, I, and I, and you know, things being handmade, you know, and, and bits that were plastic being replaced with an identical bit that's metal, like that kind of stuff costs a ton of money and I, so you can tell where the, the cost of that adds up.

• 43:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:05Matt Farah?

  But for the price of this, which is high six figures, it needs to be everything.

• 43:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:11Matt Farah?

  It needs to be a hundred percent. There's not, you, you, we can't be talking about the steering's weird. We, you know, we can't be talking about stuff like that.

• 43:19Speaker 01

  Right.

• 43:20Matt Farah?

  That's, that's, this, this, this should be fucking extremely dynamic for that kind of money.

• 43:27Speaker 01

  It should and I'm optimistic like the owner of the shop wanted to hear all the feedback. And they're like, you know, it seems like he wants to do the right thing and build the best car possible.

• 43:37Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 43:37Speaker 01

  And so this is stuff like some of it is suspension refinement. It could be valving in the shocks or it could just be as simple as like reducing compression and rebound a little bit because it's just. Too stiff right now, because on high-frequency bumps and cracks and things, it's really stiff. But when you hit rollers mid-corner, it's actually really good. So I go, okay, well, I think it's just too stiff on those high-frequency compressions, high-speed compression.

• 44:02Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 44:02Speaker 01

  But on low-speed stuff, it's fine. So some of it, I hope, is adjustable or at least fixable. Like, I like where the steering column lives so much, but, you know, this on-center thing is a problem.

• 44:14Matt Farah?

  Yeah, no, I liked, I liked how it felt in my hand, but like, having the steering change because of the angle, that's weird.

• 44:21Speaker 01

  That's very weird, yeah. I didn't mess with the tilt column at all, because it just, it was where I liked it.

• 44:25Matt Farah?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 44:25Speaker 01

  But yeah, it seems like there are, it's like this is the R&D car or something, and it just, they need to smooth these things out before they send it out.

• 44:33Matt Farah?

  Yeah, and because Chevelle start at such a lower point than, say, 911s.

• 44:38Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 44:39Matt Farah?

  You know, like...

• 44:40Speaker 01

  This is a big thing I thought about today, is you are starting with a worse product, you're starting with a body, I mean, no disrespect, like, you're starting with a body on frame.

• 44:48Matt Farah?

  You're starting with a, you're starting with a product that was built so badly, the fucking executive in charge of it wrote a tell-all book. That's what we're dealing with here.

• 44:58Speaker 01

  He did cocaine and he got real honest in front of the typewriter.

• 45:00Matt Farah?

  Let's be honest, these are shit piles. A stock Chevelle is a terrible, terrible thing.

• 45:05Speaker 01

  I, I, it, what's so interesting to me about muscle cars is that the driveline can feel absolutely indestructible and is in many cases overbuilt. Like, they have axles and transmissions back then that people would kill for, to put on their Wrangler project today, right? They're like, I put Dana 44s on it.

• 45:22Matt Farah?

  Yeah, like a Muncie or whatever the fuck.

• 45:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly, Muncie 21, you'd be like, that...

• 45:26Matt Farah?

  Didn't they have a transmission called a Rock Crusher?

• 45:28Speaker 01

  Yes, they did, exactly. They had stuff like that, but everything around the car was like made, like, Timu before Timu existed.

• 45:37Speaker 01

  Oh, but, so your starting point is junk. And body on frame.

• 45:42Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 45:42Speaker 01

  So you can spend so much time and money addressing those things. Whereas if you are modifying a Porsche, you, the unibody is great. You don't need to fuck with it. You can then, then you can spend time setting up suspension perfectly, setting up the way these tangible things feel perfectly.

• 45:58Matt Farah?

  Yeah, well, your horsepower costs all the money.

• 46:01Speaker 01

  Well, this, I mean, well, that's true. This is a crate engine LT.

• 46:03Matt Farah?

  Yeah, an LT4, an LT4 don't cost fucking nothing compared to a Gunther or a Singer engine, or even a, you know, even a BBI-built 3.8 or something. That's a fucking $70,000 engine.

• 46:18Speaker 01

  It's, it's a, that, the stuff like this is hard because I feel like I can have a really good time in a muscle car that costs five grand.

• 46:25Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 46:26Speaker 01

  Or you can get in something like the Revology, which costs half as much as this. I will say, when I drove the Revology, that I, and I liked it, and the drivability was a 10 out of 10, I went, this, if I close my eyes, this feels like a new Mustang.

• 46:41Matt Farah?

  It doesn't feel like a new Mustang, but it feels a lot better than an old one.

• 46:44Speaker 01

  It, it feels very close to one, and I, I do feel like it lacked some of the character that muscle cars have. This had all that, but with a modern engine. And I, but it also had these other like little issues that you have to, you have to address for this amount, this amount of money.

• 46:58Matt Farah?

  Yeah, I think with muscle cars, it's all about expectations. You buy a cheap one, your expectations are pretty low.

• 47:06Speaker 01

  Very true.

• 47:06Matt Farah?

  And it's pretty easy for the car to exceed them. When you're buying something for this kind of money, your expectations have to be very high. And, I mean, granted, if something like this is tailor-made, and the, the customer that this is built for, if it's exactly what they want, fucking great.

• 47:24Speaker 01

  Right.

• 47:25Matt Farah?

  But you're, you're lending it out, like.

• 47:27Speaker 01

  Right, I mean, like, there's, there's decisions that were made by the owner, not the shopper.

• 47:31Matt Farah?

  I hear this a lot. We hear this all the time. I, we drive a, a custom car from a, a talented group of people, and they go, listen, you know, the customer said we wanted this, and the customer said they wanted that, and we wouldn't have done it that way. And this is why, shout out to Jonathan Ward, will, when it comes.

• 47:51Matt Farah?

  Comes to how the thing drives, you know, he'll put some weird ass leather or whatever the guy's daughter wants. You know, she, oh, I want palomino, like have at it, you know, whatever. But when it comes to the mechanics and how they drive, like, he won't let this kind of shit out the door. He'll tell people no to their face. I like that.

• 48:09Speaker 01

  I do, I think, I think this also though, highlights for me. And I experienced this with the Grand Wagoneer too, like the Grand Wagoneer built by Vigilante, like they're on truck, I don't know. Early, they've made like a few dozen, right? John's made how many hundreds of Broncos?

• 48:25Matt Farah?

  Yeah, over a hundred.

• 48:27Speaker 01

  So he's, he's like at the very front of this, him and Singer and Rod Emery, like they've been doing it a long time. They've done all the R and D, like they really know how to do things. And Vigilante and shops like, like this Ironworks thing, like they're starting that journey to try to crack into that kind of market. But they haven't learned all the stuff and the advantage of Revology is they go, we make one car.

• 48:47Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 48:47Speaker 01

  And they tear the whole thing apart and they know exactly how it fits together. And that really shows in how fucking solid those things feel. Because this, this is different than the car number two, which is different than the car number one. And then like a few years ago, they made a 32 Roadster that cost all the money, but like that's a completely different vehicle.

• 49:05Matt Farah?

  Yeah. So it's hard. Remember Alfa Romeo a couple of years ago? All of a sudden their QC went from like dead last to fucking, you know, near the top.

• 49:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 49:15Matt Farah?

  Why? Oh, well, instead of making every car tailor made to spec, we now have four variants pick. And all of a sudden, because they didn't have to make every single car different, they were able to have some kind of a quality.

• 49:29Speaker 01

  I think if, if, if Ironworks is able to keep going on this path, I hope they get to that point. And I do want to end on some good things. Driveability of this with, if they fix the steering issue is really high. Like you could daily this car because the engine works, the turning radius is as good as my M3, which doesn't make any sense with 285 tires, but like. I'm telling you dude, you can U-turn on a two-lane road, it's crazy.

• 49:52Matt Farah?

  Now, now I think I know how to, it feels like, it drives like it has an angle kit on it.

• 49:57Speaker 01

  It does.

• 49:58Matt Farah?

  That's what it drives like.

• 49:59Speaker 01

  It drives like that, but it doesn't have an angle kit.

• 50:01Matt Farah?

  No, I know, but that's that, when I, that on-center wonkiness. The last time I felt that was in a drift car with an angle kit.

• 50:09Speaker 01

  Really?

• 50:10Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 50:10Speaker 01

  Interesting. I wonder if it has giant, giant.

• 50:13Matt Farah?

  I don't know.

• 50:14Speaker 01

  I don't know, but I like that for, for doing U-turns in the canyons and stuff. Compared to some old cars I've driven, or like a Crown Vicar, it was really good at that. So, if they can just fix those little things, the owner should be very happy.

• 50:27Matt Farah?

  Yeah. I mean, I'm not, I, I don't wanna, I don't wanna be shitty about it. It does, I mean, look, by muscle car standards, it's built very nicely. It looks great, it sounds great, it clearly go, it goes fast. I, I went through a couple gears, it, it goes fast. It just like, it's felt unfinished. And try again, let's try again later.

• 50:51Matt Farah?

  Should we go to the people? It's time, time to go to the people?

• 50:53Speaker 01

  Oh, sure, yeah.

• 50:54Matt Farah?

  Is it already?

• 50:55Speaker 01

  Oh wow, it's 45 minutes.

• 50:55Matt Farah?

  It is, it's time to go to the people, and by, and I'm out of things on my list anyway.

• 51:01Matt Farah?

  I did, dude, I, I, this morning, I'm really trying to be a really good cat dad. Especially because Hannah's not here, especially because I was out of town.

• 51:11Speaker 01

  Are you worried you're not a good cat dad?

• 51:13Matt Farah?

  No, but I'm trying to be an exceptional cat dad. When you have four, you can't just like, come home from work and then not like, play with them and engage with them. So like, we're having outside time for, you know, for an hour, lots of play. And then today, I was like, I wanna try this, so I, I put on cat TV, uh, for the first time.

• 51:33Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 51:33Matt Farah?

  On YouTube, live, 24/7.

• 51:37Speaker 01

  What is on cat, is the cats?

• 51:38Matt Farah?

  It's birds. No, it's birds. It's birds flying in, birds flying into a scene and feeding.

• 51:43Speaker 01

  Do the cats jump at the screen?

• 51:44Matt Farah?

  So, the first thing I did was in my living room, and I turned it on, and within 30 seconds, all four cats are sitting there staring at the screen. Monty's trying to jump, jump, you know, the, the, the unit that we have made on it. Monty's jumping up on that. I'm like, oh shit, Hannah's got her like collectible toys there. So I clear all the collectible toys out. I'm like, cat can't fall. So, couple more minutes, they're watching, the birds are coming. And then Finn jumps up there, and Finn's my biggest boy. He jumps up there. You probably killed the TV. He's up, he's now pawing at the TV. This is, that's it, 24/7, live cat TV, no ads. And you send her cards, just birds and squirrels. That's it. That's the whole shit, dude.

• 52:27Matt Farah?

  And, and I go, okay, no, I can't have it on a TV that the cats can touch. You know, that they can get to, right? So I, I turn it off. It had only been on for like, three minutes. I turn it off. All four cats just like, slow turn and stare at me like, what the fuck? Like, like. What, you're a monster? Yeah. Why would you take away such a joy? They, they looked at me like, like I said, okay guys, it's time to get fed to the lions. Like, they looked at me like, what, uh, dad, we were. Turn it back on, we were watching. They're like us when we were kids, when you're like, we're almost done with this show. Yeah. So I, alright, alright, calm down. So I go in the bed, in my bedroom, where the TV's up higher and it's on the wall.

• 53:12Matt Farah?

  And there's like a unit, or like a little table basically, under the TV. So I move the table out. Like five, six feet back from the TV. So it's basically like halfway between my bed and the wall where the TV is. And I put a blanket on the thing, and then, and I put the cat TV on there. I don't think it took 90 seconds before all cats were in the bedroom. And I'm like, I'm kinda concerned. It's like a beautiful day out, they can go out to the catio. I think I will have been gone for like, seven hours, and I'm gonna go home at four o'clock. And I think Monty's just gonna be sitting there like, fuck. Fucking zombie eyes staring at TV.

• 53:51Speaker 01

  Wow, it's like a kid addicted to the iPad. Wow, this is an interesting experiment. Oh my god. Cause it's just activating there like, I need to kill that thing, but I can't get it.

• 53:59Matt Farah?

  So on the one hand, like, you know, if you read, you know, on like Reddit, like, you know, cats or whatever. If you do, if you live in an apartment, or if you live somewhere, you know, long winters, or, or whatever darkness. You know, it's, it is enriching for a cat. Like, it's, it's not bad for the cat, but like, my cats have like, a beautiful outdoor area. There's birds and squirrels and all kinds of shit for them to see, like, for real, like, can I accidentally turn these cats into fucking crackheads, like TV crackers?

• 54:32Speaker 01

  There was a time, like, I love mountain biking and I grew up across from a trail, like, I could have gone and played in the creek. But once a Playstation, or a Sega, rather, arrived at my house, my parents were like, we need to restrict this child.

• 54:44Matt Farah?

  Yeah, that was the end.

• 54:45Speaker 01

  I had, we had to do chores to earn video game time. Our house was clean.

• 54:49Matt Farah?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. I will, we're, we're gonna see what happens. I'll let you know what happens when I get home today.

• 54:54Speaker 01

  Take a picture.

• 54:55Matt Farah?

  If Monty is still.

• 54:56Speaker 01

  We're like, will you video when you walk in? Just, when you walk in the door, just to see if you catch him, I wanna see that picture.

• 55:02Matt Farah?

  Coming in the door might interrupt them. Like, I, it may, you know, I'll, if I sneak in through the garage, then maybe I can.

• 55:11Speaker 01

  If they're truly dedicated to this addiction, coming in the door won't bother them.

• 55:15Matt Farah?

  Yeah, right, right.

• 55:16Speaker 01

  They'll be, they'll be disappointed you come home, cause they know you're gonna turn it off.

• 55:20Matt Farah?

  Yeah, I'm gonna take him outside, though, when I get home.

• 55:22Speaker 01

  They don't wanna do that.

• 55:23Matt Farah?

  They don't wanna really go outside. They're just gonna like.

• 55:27Speaker 01

  It's like playing a skateboarding video game. Your parents are like, go skateboard outside. Like, but this is different. I could fall down there.

• 55:32Matt Farah?

  I can do a 1080, 1080 kickflip here. Of course, let's go to the Patreon. Patreon.com slash the smoke and tire podcast, the best website in the world. You can ask us questions for the show, watch us live, catch us before everybody else. In fact, patrons already have episode 999 up in their feed with a special guest. That was pretty fun. And get an extra show every month, and on, and on. On and on, and now we get to take their questions. The Smoldering Wheel says, um, helping my dad find a nice weather daily driver for the summer. He's in his sixties and wants a sub thirty K GT car.

• 56:13Matt Farah?

  Doesn't want the hassle of a stick, wants reasonably reliable. Although I fear he fits into the Corvette owner stereotype a little too well. A C six does seem like an obvious choice. Anything else that would perform as well or better in this area? Oh, I hate to say it, but Corvettes are where you're at, but like thirty K. You can get a nine nine six Porsche automatic. Nobody wants autos. If you, if he wants an auto, they are out there and they are cheap.

• 56:43Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 56:44Matt Farah?

  Right?

• 56:44Speaker 01

  And, and.

• 56:45Matt Farah?

  Do the autos have IMS bearings? Or are those only manuals?

• 56:50Speaker 01

  I don't know.

• 56:52Matt Farah?

  I think they do. I think they have IMS bearings, but, but, um, yeah, C six Corvette. You could also look at, um, how about a BMW six series used? Or even possibly a BMW eight series new, used, and a, a, a recent one. Or how about, um, an Audi A five convertible? Those are nice.

• 57:16Speaker 01

  That is a nice car.

• 57:17Matt Farah?

  That's a nice GT car.

• 57:18Speaker 01

  You get S five convertible too.

• 57:20Matt Farah?

  You could probably get an S five convertible as a matter of fact, yeah.

• 57:23Speaker 01

  Um, I like those options because if he's really just grand touring. I think having a quieter engine or engine in the back.

• 57:31Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 57:31Speaker 01

  It's kind of a nice idea.

• 57:33Matt Farah?

  Or how about an Audi TT Roadster? With a DSG.

• 57:37Speaker 01

  Yes, but as we talked about recently, it's really hard to get parts for those cars.

• 57:40Matt Farah?

  Not, not like a very old one, like a thirty K will get you one that's like, you know, two years old.

• 57:45Speaker 01

  That would be pretty nice.

• 57:46Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 57:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 57:47Matt Farah?

  That would be.

• 57:47Speaker 01

  They didn't make a TTS Roadster, did they?

• 57:49Matt Farah?

  They did.

• 57:50Speaker 01

  Remember the TTS? We took it to the Spring Mountain and stuff?

• 57:53Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 57:53Speaker 01

  That was a really good car.

• 57:54Matt Farah?

  Oh, that was a TTRS. And those are rad. Yeah, TTRSs are sick.

• 57:59Speaker 01

  If he doesn't need a convertible, that's a good car.

• 58:00Matt Farah?

  Mm-hmm. William Ray says that we've complained about Porsche's 7-speed manual in the Carrera, saying that 6 speeds is the right number. Do you dislike the C7's 7-speed just as much? Yes.

• 58:13Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 58:14Matt Farah?

  It is garbage too. Sloppytoppy5000 says, "Thoughts on Ferrari selling jizz hats?"

• 58:22Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 58:22Matt Farah?

  I can't wait to see what a jizz hat is.

• 58:25Speaker 01

  I had the same feeling, and I looked at the link and I went, "Accurate description."

• 58:28Matt Farah?

  Oh. It looks, yeah, it is a trucker hat. It's red, it's got a Ferrari logo on it, and then it looks like you've either been... Well, I would say it's either jizz or an albatross, except did you see the shorts?

• 58:43Speaker 01

  Oh, no.

• 58:45Matt Farah?

  I don't think the jizz hat is the problem. I think the jizzed-on shorts are the problem.

• 58:51Speaker 01

  Well, this is like where detectives go, "Oh, the shot came from over here."

• 58:56Matt Farah?

  Yeah, no, that's, that's pretty bad.

• 58:58Speaker 01

  This is, it looks like, yeah, it looks like ropes of white paint. Like, an albatross would hit you with one big glob.

• 59:06Matt Farah?

  For those who want to fellate Lewis Hamilton, just, just get ahead of the game.

• 59:11Speaker 01

  For those of you old enough, I'm just gonna say Peter North.

• 59:17Speaker 01

  Think he designed this hat.

• 59:19Matt Farah?

  Yeah, you have either been shat on by an albatross, or...

• 59:23Speaker 01

  An albatross that ate a spicy tree.

• 59:25Matt Farah?

  Or jizzed on by a puma.

• 59:26Speaker 01

  What do they say? They say trucker hat?

• 59:28Matt Farah?

  Featuring bold, eye-catching graphics.

• 59:30Speaker 01

  True.

• 59:31Matt Farah?

  That's all it says. Are there comments? Tell me there's comments on this page.

• 59:34Speaker 01

  No, they wouldn't allow such things.

• 59:36Matt Farah?

  You've turned off comments.

• 59:37Speaker 01

  I just wanted to know.

• 59:37Matt Farah?

  Wait, are there other jizz products, though? I mean, we saw the shorts.

• 59:40Speaker 01

  Do they call it the rain division?

• 59:41Matt Farah?

  Are those the jizz shorts? In that other outfit?

• 59:46Speaker 01

  Those seem too dark. It seems like these.

• 59:48Matt Farah?

  Is it? How do? No, those are just graphic. That's the T-shirt. No, there's no jizz on those. Wes, Wes. This is so dumb. Do they have jizz shoes too? Uh, they've got it. Go down to the shoe. See, those are jizz shoes on the left, aren't they?

• 1:00:05Speaker 01

  These? I think these are just.

• 1:00:06Matt Farah?

  No, this is a regular shoe.

• 1:00:08Speaker 01

  Let's zoom in.

• 1:00:09Matt Farah?

  And no jizz.

• 1:00:11Speaker 01

  He didn't hit the floor. It's all in the hat.

• 1:00:14Matt Farah?

  Caught it on the brim.

• 1:00:15Speaker 01

  I don't know what. And I was expecting to see something that's like, this is to honor the rain race of 2023.

• 1:00:21Matt Farah?

  Oh.

• 1:00:22Speaker 01

  I don't see that anywhere.

• 1:00:23Matt Farah?

  Do you think it is?

• 1:00:25Speaker 01

  If it is, they need to put it in the box. That needs to be on the description yesterday.

• 1:00:32Matt Farah?

  That's really funny. Straight up. That's gross. Justin Hobbs bought an ND Miata and wants to get a vanity plate that says hardtop, but worried it might be misconstrued.

• 1:00:44Speaker 01

  No, definitely won't go for it.

• 1:00:45Matt Farah?

  Not only will it not be misconstrued, if the word hardtop isn't taken already in your state, I'd be, that would be a miracle.

• 1:00:52Speaker 01

  You're gonna make so many friends.

• 1:00:54Matt Farah?

  Yeah. That's pretty funny. Chris N. liked the story about my cigar smoking alpha guy. Any other funny personalities you've ran into in the car scene, like any homeless looking guys driving crazy expensive cars? Um, Magnus. Magnus is the most, the biggest spread between homeless looking and expensive cars.

• 1:01:18Speaker 01

  I saw a guy two days ago on the highway. He was driving a yellow 550 Maranello and the plate said 550M, of course. And he was just like an 85 year old, just staring out the window.

• 1:01:28Matt Farah?

  Uh, he had to have gotten that car, that plate, probably when that car was new. I bet, yeah. Um, I mean, there's, there's folks, there's, you know, there's like car dealer folks that are kind of moving and shaking and then there's like.

• 1:01:43Speaker 01

  I don't want to dismiss anyone's eccentricities either, like, cause people roll up sometimes looking in fashion I could never pull off nor think of. And then someone's like, oh, they design everything for Versace. I'm like, oh, I'm not gonna talk shit to them.

• 1:01:55Matt Farah?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I mean.

• 1:02:01Matt Farah?

  Most of the other notable personalities, let's just say, are not people I want to talk about publicly.

• 1:02:07Speaker 01

  Correct.

• 1:02:08Matt Farah?

  Mainly because they're assholes. No, not because they're celebrities.

• 1:02:12Speaker 01

  I mean, I know someone who dresses very eccentrically, but they work for a company that's well-known, so I don't want to talk shit all the time about them.

• 1:02:19Matt Farah?

  Oh, I know who you're talking about, and that's not who I'm talking about. I'm not talking about dress or anything like that. I don't care. It's LA. Who gives a shit how anybody dresses? It's more just like the people who stand out. They don't stand out because I want to hang out with them all the time. We have some great friends that we see in the canyons and at car things, but most of them are just regular folks that love cars. Bad Gardner has a 50-mile round trip commute on highways and then does monthly weekend trips out of state thinking about used Kia Stingers for 25K. How stupid would it be to buy an old E55 Mercedes with cash on the side instead? W210, is that the first E55?

• 1:03:03Speaker 01

  I think so.

• 1:03:03Matt Farah?

  Or the second? I think that's the first one, right?

• 1:03:07Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 1:03:07Matt Farah?

  The naturally aspirated one?

• 1:03:08Speaker 01

  Where the grill was a little too small for me and, yeah.

• 1:03:12Matt Farah?

  So, here's the thing about those. I get it, but if you drive them, they're not particularly interesting. I mean, sort of just like all other Mercedes of this era. They're made really well. They're comfortable, they're stately and all that things, like generally reliable if you buy one that's been cared for. What do they sell for?

• 1:03:37Speaker 01

  Eight grand.

• 1:03:38Matt Farah?

  Really cheap.

• 1:03:39Speaker 01

  Or less. We're on Cars and Bids. I mean, sold for, let's see, 8,300?

• 1:03:42Matt Farah?

  The one at the top right, the white one, I would say is considered a great one. 49,000 miles and that's 17 grand.

• 1:03:49Speaker 01

  I mean, that's a very comfortable vehicle for that money. I would look at... I think you need to do the research on Kia Stinger reliability versus these because we've had people in the chat before that were texts for Kia and talk about how they have frequent problems when they get later in life. I would look at Consumer Reports.

• 1:04:10Matt Farah?

  If you ask me what car was more likely to last 35 or 40 years, an E55 or a Kia Stinger, I'd tell you an E55.

• 1:04:19Speaker 01

  I totally agree with you. I think both of them, you're going to have like an inflection point because the cost to maintain the Mercedes, the parts cost will be higher, but it may have fewer issues and the rest of the car may last longer than the Kia. I don't know.

• 1:04:34Matt Farah?

  I think these E55s are built pretty well.

• 1:04:36Speaker 01

  Well, it's a simple engine, right?

• 1:04:37Matt Farah?

  It's a 5.5 liter V8, non-supercharged.

• 1:04:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, I can't remember the engine code. I used to know it. It was a really simple, stout engine, so it might last a pretty good amount of time. I like the Stinger and it's a pretty good performance touring bargain as long as it's running cheaply.

• 1:04:52Matt Farah?

  Yeah, it's the M113 V8. Yeah, it's not... I'll tell you what, if you don't need the backseat, I assume because they're asking about Kia Stinger and E55, I assume they do, but if you don't, get an R129 SL 500 Sport instead because at least that's like prettier and whatever and you could drive that for a couple of years for the cost of gas and maintenance if you keep it nice. That's what I would do. But I get it, but E55, same with the E500s before it, they were fast for like the 90s. They're just

• 1:05:37Matt Farah?

  like not that fast and not that interesting.

• 1:05:40Speaker 01

  And they have a bad 5-speed transmission. That sucks. And I think the next gen E55 was way better looking. This was the infancy.

• 1:05:47Matt Farah?

  Yeah. Guitar player in 1999 is really struggling choosing a 911 paint choice. Well, there are a lot of them. Are there colors that we've seen in the real world that we've loved or hated? A lot.

• 1:06:02Speaker 01

  I hate yellow. I almost universally dislike yellow.

• 1:06:05Matt Farah?

  Porsche has three or four yellows and there's one I like. Speed yellow is the only one I like.

• 1:06:09Speaker 01

  It's the richest one, I think.

• 1:06:11Matt Farah?

  Yeah, it looks the most like egg yolk-y.

• 1:06:13Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:06:13Matt Farah?

  That's my favorite one.

• 1:06:15Speaker 01

  And it needs to be on certain cars.

• 1:06:16Matt Farah?

  Yeah. There's a guy I know with an air-cooled car who's a G-body car that is. It's great.

• 1:06:20Speaker 01

  That's the color that was on the roof CTR we drove, right?

• 1:06:23Matt Farah?

  Yes, yes. That's lovely. But like that, that pale yellow is the worst. Um, I love Dalmatian blue. I love, um, South Seas Blue Metallic. Obviously Frozen Berry is my jam. And Casse's Red. Um, I love, uh, what else do I love? I love, um, some of the, some of the, like GT Silver Metallic actually looks really good. A lot better than their like regular silver. Um, the, a bunch, they have like seven great greens. Oak Green, Aventurine, um, Goodwood Green, which is what my dad's Cayenne is, um.

• 1:07:06Speaker 01

  Genji and Blue's nice. They're, um.

• 1:07:08Matt Farah?

  Oslo Blue is great. Moonstone is great. There, there's so many fucking colors.

• 1:07:13Speaker 01

  Even Ruby Stone, which I didn't like that much. And then I, when I drove that ST, I was like, this is actually pretty hot.

• 1:07:18Matt Farah?

  Yeah, but don't, you can't get the white wheels and shit. White wheels on, yeah, it's no good. Well, like that Boxster Style Edition that's Ruby Star with white wheels and white graphics. Yuck. That is no good.

• 1:07:30Speaker 01

  No. They did the Boxster America one, which is like.

• 1:07:34Matt Farah?

  Oh, no, the 911 GTS America. Yeah, that's the worst. Nothing should ever be called the America Edition.

• 1:07:43Speaker 01

  Wheel, wheel color choice is almost more important than body color. Cause like.

• 1:07:47Matt Farah?

  White wheels.

• 1:07:49Speaker 01

  White, there's just colors that, red wheels are bad. I don't know.

• 1:07:53Matt Farah?

  Yeah. Um.

• 1:07:56Matt Farah?

  All wheel drive biased law many words. What do you do at WCCS to prevent deterioration of vehicles while they sit for so long? What we do is, you know, they're kept on battery tenders. We use fuel stabilizer if they're going to be sitting for a while and we start them up and warm them up to operating temperature once a month and we move them around so they don't get flat spots on their tires. We don't use those tire pad things. People have tried to sell us those tire pillows so many times. You need these tire pillows. Like, no, we move the cars around so you don't, yeah. You don't want your tire to feel comfortable? You don't want it to be Drive up onto a Resting on velvet?

• 1:08:36Matt Farah?

  Uh, I can't read that username. That username is Tim A. Do you think in the future all 911s will adopt double wishbone front suspensions? Interesting. You know, I don't think most drivers can feel the difference between a strut's front suspension and a double wishbone front suspension. I don't, I think if you're a racing driver or on the track, or you've really driven a lot of Porsches, you can feel the difference. But if you've driven a couple 911s in your history of living and you get in one that's strut or double wishbone today, I don't think you feel the difference. I mean, there are

• 1:09:18Matt Farah?

  differences, but like, I don't think it's as big a deal as a lot of people make it out to be. I mean, the strut, it's not, did the 991 dot two not handle well? Like, was that, was that an ill handling car? GT3, like a bus. My Spyder GT4 RS, like, do those not handle well? I didn't want to tell you, but It sucks. No, it's a great point, yeah. And, and so, I don't, I don't know, I don't know if, I don't know what that means in terms of the structure of the car if they'd have to change. This is true of, I think, average consumers will very rarely be able to feel

• 1:09:55Speaker 01

  The difference of over generations, like when they switch to solid mounted rear subframe or something like that with BMW. I mean, the dealerships might tell you, if you're that customer, I had a friend of mine who used to sell cars and he's like, "One thing I had to learn was some customers want to know X, and some, if you tell them that same information, will walk away." So if you go too nerdy with one person, it might work. You go as nerdy with the next customer, they might leave because they're either disinterested, they think you're talking down to them, they don't give a shit, whatever it might be. So that's the lesson.

• 1:10:25Matt Farah?

  Jim Kana, "Have we crossed the CarPlay Rubicon? There's so many older cars that came with bad infotainment but are otherwise attractive. Is there enough aftermarket support now that you should buy an older enthusiast model under the assumption it can be upgraded to a CarPlay unit at a manageable price?" In most cases. Yeah, I mean, your BMW, which basically means all 2000s BMWs. I think a lot of 2000s Mercedes. I don't know about Jag and Range Rover, but, I mean, you know, as long as you can make your phone play sound out of your car, you know, you could have a dash mount and use

• 1:11:07Matt Farah?

  the screen for your GPS, like, your phone mounted on the dash isn't that different from CarPlay, to be honest with you.

• 1:11:14Speaker 01

  We have like a 14 or a 15 Pro X or something.

• 1:11:18Matt Farah?

  Yeah, so, I mean, to me, what's important is, the phone produces a signal that then comes out my speakers. Once we get there, that's all I really care about, but in many, there's a lot, a lot of ways to upgrade your old car to work with CarPlay. They got the flip-outs, they got the small screens, they got... We were just at, I don't know, fuck it, I'll say it, we were just at Jerry Seinfeld's place, recording episode 999 yesterday, and he had, among a bunch of other dope shit, a mint-conditioned, low-mile, old Mercedes S-Class sedan from the 80s that had the Porsche CarPlay-capable head unit put into it, which is a boss move, but it did work, you know,

• 1:12:03Matt Farah?

  so. Ryan Morris says, "What crossover would be best suited to a manual gearbox, in your opinion? Not sure why, but I feel like the X3M with a stick wouldn't be the worst thing." A Macan or an X3M, I think would both be fine with a stick. It's funny, I'm not like motivated to want to drive those types of cars with a stick though, you know?

• 1:12:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think like the X1, I feel like it's sat lower than the X3. Granted, it's an older car, but that was basically like so close to being a wagon, they should have just called it one. And that one suited the manual better in my opinion, because it just seemed like a car. X3 is like drifting into tall SUV hatchback territory, in which case the ZF8 Speed is not too bad. I mean, I don't know. If I was gonna get an X3M with a stick, I would just get an M3 sedan.

• 1:12:56Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 1:12:56Speaker 01

  No, just, I don't know, just get a car.

• 1:12:59Matt Farah?

  Yeah, I mean, I think it's a hypothetical. I don't think he's actually talking about project carring it, but yeah. Miguel says, "My dad is giving me his old Mazda B2000." That's a Ford Ranger. "And I have a question on how to register it. He lives in California, but a part that requires smog only when selling it." And I live a part of, in a part of California that requires smog every two years. "Is there a way I can take legal ownership while keeping it registered and not smog it? I suspect it won't pass." Well, he has, if he has to sell it to smog it when he sells it, I guess if he sells it to you, he doesn't have to smog it, because you're not gonna narc on him for selling a car that won't pass.

• 1:13:39Speaker 01

  Well, unless, but if Miguel goes to register it.

• 1:13:42Matt Farah?

  Well, for sure.

• 1:13:43Speaker 01

  Then, yeah.

• 1:13:44Matt Farah?

  No, yeah, yeah, assuming it's not registered now, and assuming Miguel doesn't intend to register it for a long time, then it doesn't need to pass smog.

• 1:13:52Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:13:53Matt Farah?

  Because you're not gonna, you're not gonna sue your dad for selling you a truck, or giving you a truck that won't pass smog.

• 1:13:58Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:13:59Matt Farah?

  But like, I mean, what I would do is ask him if he would keep it registered in his own name and just let you have it. And then add your name as additional insured, or you get, you get insurance on it, and I would do that.

• 1:14:13Speaker 01

  That's the most.

• 1:14:14Matt Farah?

  You want, the insurance need to, needs to cover you. That's, that's more important than who or where the truck is registered.

• 1:14:22Matt Farah?

  Stu Dog, go down please, Stu Dog watched my video with Teddy Baldassar the other day. Please go check it out.

• 1:14:32Matt Farah?

  Yeah, his eyes glaze. Yes, okay. Uh, sorry, I should have read. There wasn't a question there. Um, my name is Lane, but I identify as a street. What is the best tool or accessory to keep in your car?

• 1:14:44Speaker 01

  I used to think jumper cables, which then led me to thinking battery, but I think my battery is stable enough that I would go plug in or like battery powered Fantic air compressor.

• 1:14:54Matt Farah?

  Yeah, tire inflator?

• 1:14:55Speaker 01

  Tire pressures change more than we think and we let them go far too long before we actually adjust them.

• 1:15:01Matt Farah?

  Yeah. If you can feel your car handling differently, your tire pressures are too low. Um, yeah, that that portable Fantic tire inflator thing, I use all the time. That thing is good. Um, big bad cam fad. I hope that doesn't mean something terrible. Thoughts on the new Morgan Supersport? Uh, when will you be coming over to the UK to have a go? I have not been invited to go have a go in the UK, but but um, I am excited to see it when it gets here. I think it looks cool in some ways. I think it looks a little strange in other ways. Um, I don't love that rectangle bit in the lower half of the front.

• 1:15:44Matt Farah?

  Um, I don't like that it's automatic only. Uh, it's not manual.

• 1:15:49Speaker 01

  I wish it had a different shifter from the BMW, but I've I've heard, I forget, I talked to a tech that said like to make a new shifter, but using all the BMW software and computer chips in there is a massive pain in the ass.

• 1:16:00Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:01Speaker 01

  And it cost them a lot of money.

• 1:16:02Matt Farah?

  Yeah, that was what Ineos said.

• 1:16:04Speaker 01

  That's right. That's right.

• 1:16:05Matt Farah?

  Cause they do the same thing. Um, but in general, more Morgan is good. I will take all the Morgan they will give me. Um, Paul says craziest thing you've seen someone do at a gas station?

• 1:16:20Matt Farah?

  Let's see.

• 1:16:22Matt Farah?

  Oh, I mean, I was driving in a Ventador back from Vegas with Thad and some like family in a Ford Taurus like hoarder car loaded up, rolled up right next to me and said, how about you fill us up?

• 1:16:36Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 1:16:36Matt Farah?

  And like meant it seriously. And I was all fuck out of here, yo.

• 1:16:43Speaker 01

  I saw a man getting a mouth hug, but that was at a gym parking lot when I was sitting in a stoplight and I looked over and I was like, "Oh, they're having that kind of evening right in the parking lot."

• 1:16:55Matt Farah?

  Mini Finny, "After dailying the Taycan 4, do you still think the rear-wheel-drive Taycan is the better EV than the all-wheel-drive version? Do you think rear-wheel-drive being better than all-wheel-drive applies to all EVs?" I want to be very clear about this. I've always said this, if you don't need all-wheel-drive for winter weather, then the rear-drive car is better. It has plenty of power, speed, plenty of grip, and the steering will be better because it's not powered wheels. And all those front wheels do is steer. I think the rear-wheel-drive Taycan drives great. It drives like a Cayman,

• 1:17:37Matt Farah?

  which is very, very good, and it also has more range for the same battery. It's more efficient because it's not only powering one motor. So if you live somewhere, and I don't mean somewhere where it rains, I mean somewhere where it legit is like snow and ice, then get all-wheel-drive, but get snow tires too. And if you don't, then the rear-wheel-drive, I think, is excellent. And that goes to every EV that I have experienced. The rear-drive version drives better in all of them. Okay, sorry. Nathan Reynolds says,

• 1:18:17Matt Farah?

  "I've heard the question of what cars would benefit most from the availability of a manual, but I've never heard the answer raised in the Maserati Gran Turismo. I actually think that the Maserati Gran Turismo would be a nice car for a manual."

• 1:18:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's a good point because it's a great 810 car and it sounds good. I think the question is, would the market support that? Like, you know, the Ferraris that we convert, you could spend 15 grand converting it and you'd probably make the money back. I don't know if you would on the Maserati.

• 1:18:49Matt Farah?

  I agree, yeah. I'm pro-Maserati manual conversions. That sounds good. Bus Stop Hair, we're going to go two more. Bus Stop Hair says, "All my cars are green over tan. I love the way it looks, but I definitely paid a premium to get my cars in this spec." Do you think enthusiasm for this color combo is a fad? Or is it wise to continue anticipating a premium for my love of green cars?

• 1:19:19Speaker 01

  I feel like greens have come back a lot. I'm seeing more new cars in green, like brand new M3s, dark greens, brand new 430 or something like that, also in a dark green. It seems like more of the press cars are coming in greens.

• 1:19:31Matt Farah?

  Lots of Porsches greens, so many oak greens, so many, I've seen so many greens. But a green over tan is a pretty classy combo that's been around for a long time and appreciated for a long time. So, I mean, I think that, you know, it will always be a desirable and tasteful color combination.

• 1:19:52Speaker 01

  And I think the supply usually is less than the enthusiasm for it. So that's why I tend to command a premium.

• 1:19:58Matt Farah?

  Right, right. Nice cams, one for Zach. How much has your interest in watches gone up since working with me? And are you shopping for watches now that I won't shut up about that?

• 1:20:09Speaker 01

  I'd say it's gone up a little bit and my appreciation for the math and everything involved in them has gone up, but it's still like not, it hasn't hooked me.

• 1:20:17Matt Farah?

  A couple of weeks ago, you asked me where I would park 20 grand.

• 1:20:20Speaker 01

  That was a different situation, yeah. There are reasons for, I see a lot of utility in watches.

• 1:20:27Matt Farah?

  How do I leave the country with 50 Gs on my wrist?

• 1:20:30Speaker 01

  You have got to stop putting the escape business in the street. When we go to the marina to flee one day and all the boats are gone, that's your fault. I'm going to say it was all Patreon members that took the boats.

• 1:20:41Matt Farah?

  Yeah, we're going to have to find a different marina.

• 1:20:44Speaker 01

  Uh, yeah, that's true.

• 1:20:45Matt Farah?

  It's okay. I mean, look, it's not my fault. It's really easy to steal a boat.

• 1:20:52Speaker 01

  That's true, but it's your fault that we told the city that we're going to steal a boat.

• 1:20:56Matt Farah?

  Right, yeah. If we have to steal a boat, nothing matters anymore. We're fucking outsy, dude. Uh, that's our show, folks. Thank you, everybody. Thank you to our patrons. Zach is going to play dirty with fucking Sam Smith in Tennessee and then going to go do some road and tracking in Texas. And I will be here. Running a brick and mortar business and hiring a new employee. Yay.

• 1:21:25Speaker 01

  Cool.

• 1:21:25Matt Farah?

  Sounds fun. I'm playing golf on Friday with Corey. Got my new clubs. First new golf clubs in 20 years. I'm ready to, yeah, I haven't, I, I love golf and I play a few times a year, but I have not felt like I deserved a new set of golf clubs. You know, everyone's like, everyone blames their bad game on their clubs. Oh, you got the new driver and so, you know.

• 1:21:47Speaker 01

  Fix the slice.

• 1:21:48Matt Farah?

  And it's such a deep, and I'm all, I've already got nine rabbit holes. And I'm like, look, for three times a year, four times a year, I don't deserve new clubs. That won't make me a better golfer. Last time my dad was here, he was like, today, just play out of my bag. Cause we're the same, same height.

• 1:22:04Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:22:06Matt Farah?

  I just smash, you know, I'm smashing the ball, you know, and I'm just like, all right. It's been 20 years and I think I do deserve new golf clubs. So I got new golf clubs.

• 1:22:17Speaker 01

  I did that with snowboard bindings.

• 1:22:18Matt Farah?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:19Speaker 01

  When I got new bindings, I compared the weight and I went, why are these a quarter of the weight of my old ones?

• 1:22:23Matt Farah?

  They carbon?

• 1:22:24Speaker 01

  No, but they were just better made. The other ones were metal. Technology advances, not, it doesn't advance every year, but you know, every decade or so.

• 1:22:32Matt Farah?

  Yeah. Now there's, for skis, there's now a third measurement. The is, the measurement is the length and then the, the width at the widest part and the width under your foot.

• 1:22:43Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 1:22:44Matt Farah?

  Because like, some skis are more like parabolic and some are more like straight and like wide under your foot.

• 1:22:49Speaker 01

  That makes sense.

• 1:22:50Matt Farah?

  For powder.

• 1:22:51Speaker 01

  Yeah. Okay.

• 1:22:52Matt Farah?

  Yeah. Anyway, that's our show. We will see you all very, very soon. Goodbye.