Category: Jalopnik

In Case You Forgot, Here’s A Little Detail To Remind You How Much GM Sucked In The 1980s – Jason Torchinsky @Jalopnik

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Nostalgia is a potent drug and, like any old bastard, I’m highly susceptible to it as well. Hell, I work in a sort of idiotic shrine to a very specific kind of nostalgia. But there are some details of the past that, even with the rosiest-colored glasses, are still very clearly garbage. I’m talking about being a kid in the back seat of many 1980s GM cars, specifically the GM cars (and one Chrysler) that, somehow, didn’t let you roll down the rear windows.

These cars — which were GM’s A- and G-bodies from 1978 to 1983, and the 1981 Chrysler four-door K-cars — represented a *huge* percentage of cars on the road when and where I was growing up, in 1980s America. I feel like pretty much every family I knew at the time had at least one car from this lineup, and the reason I remember this so well is because of the painful memories of sweltering in the back seats of these metal mausoleums, in the heat of a North Carolina summer, with rear door windows that remained steadfastly and cruelly fixed.

The list of dirt-common cars that were like this is ample: Buick Centuries, Regals, Oldsmobile Cutlasses, Pontiac Bonnevilles, Chevy Malibus, and those early K-Cars. I think there were some others, as well, but these sorts of cars formed the backbone of the carscape of America at the time, which means the plague of no-open-rear-seat-windows was widespread.

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How One Man Turned The Busiest International Border Crossing In North America Into The Centerpiece Of His Empire – Erin Marquis @Jalopnik

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Manuel “Matty” Moroun died on Monday at 93 years old. That name might not mean much to you if you’re not from metro Detroit or Windsor, Canada, but around these parts, he was known mainly as the billionaire who owned, among other things, the Ambassador Bridge, which just happens to carry roughly 27 percent of all merchandise trade between Canada and the U.S.

General view of the Ambassador Bridge that connects Detroit and Windsor, Canada on March 18, 2020 in Detroit, Michigan. The U.S. and Canada have agreed to temporarily restrict all nonessential travel across the border after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared coronavirus (COVID-19) a pandemic

Image: Gregory Shamus (Getty Images)

That’s $400 billion in trade a year, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation with an average of $500 million in trade crossing the bridge daily. It generated $60 million in tolls for Moroun, according to the Detroit Free Press. At least 40 percent of trucking shipments into the US cross this bridge and the closest secondary crossing for big rigs is over two hours away, Forbes reports.

Not only is it the busiest international crossing in North America, but it is also the only one to be privately owned. Does it seem to you like this span is too important a crossing to be in private ownership? Because it always has to me! It spent two years as the longest suspension bridge in the world. How do you just own something so massive and crucial to the functioning of two huge economies?

I have lived with this strange fact in this strange town all my life and, no matter how it has been explained to me, it still boggles my mind. So I’m going to try and explain it to you, and hopefully, we can figure it out together.

First, how the bridge itself came to be.

What The Hell Is Going On With This Engine? – Jason Torchinsky @Jalopnik

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Recently, I found myself in the presence of an engine. This is hardly uncommon, but this engine was, uh, a little weird. The engine itself, a GM inline-six, isn’t that unusual but whatever the hell is going on with that valve cover is. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen one quite like that. What’s going on here?

The engine is a third-generation Chevrolet six-cylinder, an engine that was built for a long ass-time–from 1962 to 1988–and then continuing in Brazil all the way until 2001.

Most pictures of this engine I’ve seen online–and by “most” I mean “all”–have normal valve covers, without those two weird little upper stories stuck on the delightfully yellow piece.

https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/f_auto/imboals0cpgp64qmewjk.mp4?_=1

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Facebook Works For Once – Elizabeth Blackstock @Jalopnik

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Poor Üziel Valles has somehow ended up with a yellow hood on his otherwise white Silverado. It’s not one of those color schemes that really mesh together—which took him to the private Denver Dropped Trucks group to ask for a swap. Facebook Works For Once Hood Swap

Enter: John Payan, who just so happens to have an all-yellow truck with a white hood. Is this destiny? Proof that soulmates do exist? I can’t say for sure, but whatever the case, it’s still a better plot arc than anything that made its way into the Twilight series.

Facebook Works For Once Hood Swap

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How I Got My Free Jeep Grand Wagoneer Running After It Sat For A Decade – David Tracy @Jalopnik

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How I Got My Free Jeep Grand Wagoneer Running

Back in June, I used a 2020 Jeep Gladiator to tow a free Jeep Grand Wagoneer 250 miles from Dayton, Ohio to suburban Detroit. Since then, the Woody—which, as you might imagine considering its price, is a rodent-infested piece of crap—had languished in my backyard. But last weekend, the heavy SJ-platform machine moved under its own power for the first time in over a decade. Here’s how I pulled that off.

One of the greatest joys in the whole of automobile-dom is firing up a vehicle that hasn’t started in many years. It’s a great problem-solving exercise that teaches you how cars work, involves physical exercise, lets you hang out with friends to work towards a common goal, and appeals to whatever part of the human brain is so captivated by things like mysterious shipwrecks.

How I Got My Free Jeep Grand Wagoneer Running

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Related – Nevada Train Derailment Claims Dozens of Jeep Gladiators

What It Was Like Driving The Last Full-Size Pickup Truck With A Manual Transmission – David Tracy @Jalopnik

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The Last Full-Size Pickup Truck With A Manual Transmission

The Ram 2500 represents the end of an era in which farmers, construction workers, and even suburbanites could shift their own gears in a brand-new full-size pickup. That’s right, the Cummins diesel-powered heavy-duty Ram was the U.S.’s final full-size truck with a manual transmission, and after having driven it, I can say: My god are we now deprived.

When I set out to buy a classic pickup years ago, I wanted three things: a practical bench seat, a smooth and torquey inline-six motor, and a fun manual transmission. These desirable attributes, once common among American trucks, have been disappearing at an alarming rate. But my friend Michael Douglas, an engineer at Fiat Chrysler, owns a modern truck with all three.

The Last Full-Size Pickup Truck With A Manual Transmission

In some ways, it truly is the holy grail. This is a 2017 Ram 2500 Laramie Sport Mega Cab outfitted with the optional 6.7-liter Cummins inline-six rated at 350 horsepower and 660 lb-ft of torque at a low 1,400 RPM (that’s 20 horsepower and 140 lb-ft fewer than the automatic model, in case you’re curious).

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Related – Arguably the world’s toughest & most beautiful truck ever created

The Wild Pontiac Tojan Was the F-Body Supercar Made to Kill Ferraris – Patrick George @Jalopnik

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As someone who’s been working at this glorious website for the better part of this decade now, I don’t often run into total surprises anymore—especially overpowered American ones from the Radwood era. You can be forgiven for not knowing what the Pontiac Tojan is. I didn’t either, until this Carfection video dropped yesterday. But it is a truly bananas machine that deserves more attention.

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Man Finds Wedding Ring Lost Inside Oldsmobile Engine 45 Years Ago – David Tracy @Jalopnik

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Great story from David Tracy at Jalopnik

A 93-year-old Iowa man just got his wedding ring back after losing it inside the engine of his 1972 Oldsmobile 98 over 40 years ago, local Iowa news station KCRG and ABC News report. It’s a sad story, but it has somewhat of a happy ending.

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Fremont Police Replaced an Old Dodge Charger With a Tesla Cop Car- Andrew P Collins @Jalopnik

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The police department in Fremont, Calif., the same Fremont where the Tesla factory is, just bought a used Tesla Model S 85 to replace a retiring Dodge Charger. The car has been fitted with all the standard cop-spec accessories and will soon go on duty as part of a pilot program to see if a Tesla is up to the task of police work