To The Metal

The detailing of the engine bay is 99.9% complete.  I need to prime/paint one last bit that was missed due to my over-masking, as well as clean off the plastic shield around the drive shaft.

The clear-coated fender wells are installed, and the clear coating of the frame is complete.

I also installed a new washer bottle and coolant overflow bottle from LMC truck.  I’ve also picked up new radiator fan cowling, as well as installed a plastic bit that was missing from around the hood latch.

Also picked up a K&N cold air kit, as the Edelbrock air cleaner, while it looked cool – was only good at sucking in hot air from the engine bay.  Speaking of engines…  If all goes well, the engine goes in TOMORROW!!!

I was in total disbelief after I watched the advertisement for Windows Vista…  A group of people and a Microsoft kool-aid drinking trunk monkey are being shown a “new” operating system, Windows Mojave.  Microsoft has collected these people because they love XP and hate Vista.

So at the end of the commercial, after all the ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs’ have subsided, it is revealed that they are ACTUALLY LOOKING AT WINDOWS VISTA.

Are you serious?  I don’t think anyone can argue the point that Windows Vista is not nice to look at.  My primary argument against Vista is that I don’t have a Cray supercomputer powerful enough to run it in a way that’ll be as FAST and EFFICIENT as Windows XP!

This is like Dodge trying to recover the Minivan market by getting away from the aerodynamic modern vans and returning to the boxy styling of the 80’s… oh, they actually did that?

Crap.

Have they considered putting the new interface on XP, rebadging it, and selling it as Vista?  Might work better.

Here’s a before and after on the engine mounts, haven’t put in the new Energy polyeurethane mounts yet. Won’t set those up until I’m ready to drop the motor in. I media blasted the mount and bolts, and then (not shown here) primed it with the Krylon anti-rust primer, and then a couple coats of plain old Krylon gloss black. They look pretty good.

Here’s a shot of the engine bay with the completed firewall paintjob, and also a complete primer job on the subframe. I wire-brushed as much of the rust off as I could then put on 2-3 coats of the Krylon anti-rust primer.

Ideally I’d have removed the entire doghouse, as well as the front driveshaft, steering, etc… but I don’t have the time or $$$ for a frame off just yet. 🙂  Next pic is the same bay, but I’ve added the gloss black Krylon to the frame.  Tomorrow some gloss black PPG and some clearcoat is joining the paint job.  Should look beautiful with the new fender wells and motor.

Once the detailing is done, the motor goes in, the trans goes in, new fluids and filters all around, u-joints, pumpkin lube, etc…  I’m hoping to have her running by the weekend, and on the road by next weekend.  I’ll keep y’all posted.

Oh yeah, one tip if you’re detailing an engine bay and aren’t removing the hard lines, pick up some of those bendy drinking straws.  Flatten the straw out, slice it down the spline with a razor, then slide it over the line like a loom.  The bends work great on just about every bend I’ve seen in my bay so far, and once the painting is done, they come off and the lines have no paint on them.

Now when the folks at RockStar started raking in cash hand over fist with the success of its sandbox style Grand Theft Auto series, it didn’t take long for the concept to spread. One of my favorite sandbox style titles on the original Xbox was “Mercenaries.”

It placed you in a foreign land as a soldier for hire, you had full freedom to make money, destroy, steal, etc… Each mission would either ingratiate you or make you a target with certain factions. Different factions brought you different tools of the trade, weapons, vehicles, et al. It was a short game, almost too short – but the gameplay was good enough that I could go back and play it again and again.

Yesterday I picked up the sequel, made for the Xbox 360. Mercenaries 2 follows the same concept as the original – however as I played it I could only think how much it reminded me of another game…

Where in Just Cause you were a CIA operative hired to stir up a coup in a completely fictional (Venezuela) environment – in Mercenaries 2 you are an independent mercenary hired to make money, blow shit up, and get vengeance for being shot in the ass… in Venezuela. Tack on the ability to grapple nearby helicopters, and all the game is missing is an unlimited supply of parachutes.

Now I won’t go as far as calling Mercenaries 2 a clone of Just Cause – as Mercs is shorter (2 days of gameplay and I’m 47% complete), more destructable (everything can be destroyed), and doesn’t have nearly as much useless space as Just Cause… That and the tacky cinematics of Just Cause are nowhere in sight.  The shooting aspect isn’t that great either, as unless you’ve got high explosive or a sniper rifle, expect to spray gobs of bullets before you kill just one little bad guy.

It’s a good game, but IMHO – I’ve seen it, done it, and I’m pretty sure that in another 2 days when I’ve beaten the game – I’ll be trading it in for something else. If you enjoyed Mercenaries, you’ll like this game. If you enjoyed Just Cause, you’ve played this game. Not worth $60 in my opinion, but then again – what is these days?

That brings me to the second disappointment of the week, Burnout Paradise.

I’ve been a fan of the Burnout series of racing titles since its inception. The concept involves violent races where all the cars are fully capable of being destroyed. Traditional races are available, while other special races which tally the destruction are truly the highlight of the game.

There was nothing quite like figuring out just how fast to drive, just where to aim my race car, so I could exact the maximum destruction in any race. It was simple, uncomplicated, and FUN! Then we’ve got Paradise.

Hardly.

They took a great concept and turned it into a sandbox racer. Where previously there was a simple menu system to navigate from race to race, now you’ve got miles upon miles of open road where you must waste countless hours driving when you could be RACING.

Burnout Paradise is a prime example of a game that did NOT need to be a sandbox style game, but for some reason – was made into one. I get the whole “immersion” aspect, but immersion only works if the environment actually adds something to the gameplay. I have no desire to perform extra jumps and crash through billboards if it really doesn’t get me anything. I just want to turn the system on, start the game, and race. Progress peaked with Burnout Vengeance. If you were waiting to pick up Paradise – don’t bother.

Ok John, you’ve got my vote.  Just don’t fuck it up.

Back on the 7th, this is what the engine bay looked like.  Beat ass engine, grease, grime, ick.

A little Lestoil, a little pressure wash, and lots of scrubbing later… Holy crap, there’s a white spot!

Just wasn’t white enough though, didn’t have that showroom shine.  Hell, I don’t think it had a showroom shine in ’89…  So I spent some time masking off the parts that shouldn’t be white…

This is after 2 coats of white paint, same color the rest of the truck will get.  Tomorrow the clear coat goes on, then I mask off the white, pull out the old fender wells and tires, then get to sealing and painting the frame with a nice gloss black.

More to come…

John McCain:

Col. Saul Tigh:

I knew it. John McCain is a frakking toaster.

…and you’ll always find it.

I had to bring the VW to the local dealership a month or two back because it was making a noise in turns. After 4 visits, I finally got someone at the dealership to experience the same problem – and they ‘fixed’ it.

I used quotations because well, in the process of the repairs it would appear that they also screwed up the camber so bad that my tires were completely bald in oh… a month or two. So I ended up going to Sears yesterday to get a new set of Kumho Solus tires put on. I wasn’t overly thrilled with the V-Rated Conti’s, and generally have better experiences with the H-rated variety.

I’m hoping that these tires hold me until the lease is up, then I’ll decide whether to return the car or buy it.