Gearhead Thread

[Susquehanna Birder]

My next door neighbor put a V8 in his Gen II RX7. It's spend the better part of 2 years in his garage, but this winter he's finally gotten it to where it can at least move under its own power. Sounds like a beast. There are still some nagging details he needs to address...but he's almost done.

I think he took the project on to get away from his wife...

[mussa]

striped down my shtein motorcycle and my brother in laws old suzuki 650 last week. taking the aluminum to the salvage yard this afternoon for some cash. learned a lot about bikes from striping it down...

[Diomedes]

taking the aluminum to the salvage yard this afternoon for some cash.

watch your Tacoma while you're there...punks with cordless sawzalls be rippin' catalytic converters out of those trucks in like 30 second flat, don't even have to put a knee on the ground to it...

[mussa]

ha, i know right! just read that like 20 trucks got ripped off here in Lancaster the other day at a business overnight. i also just found out why they are so expensive, cause they are all platinum on the inside...

[Diomedes]

the Tacomas are particularly susceptible because the combination of ground clearance and converter location provides the easiest grab

but yeah, catalytic converters are being ripped out of all kinds of cars nationwide for that metal

[PhillyPhreak54]

Good, farg Cats.

Well at least on Mustangs - off-road x-pipe is the way to go.

[Diomedes]

you don't want to live in a world without catalytic converters on most cars

on a hot rod that you ride around once in a while, of course they suck.

otherwise, they are great things

[Susquehanna Birder]

I went with cats...but the high-flow variety.

[mussa]

i guess it's time to get that sticker for my truck

" nothing in this truck is worth your life "

[Diomedes]

NY Times on cat thieves...with bonus Toyota truck reference in first sentence!

Thieves Leave Cars, but Take Catalytic Converters
By SUSAN SAULNY

CHICAGO — Jose Fernandez said he decided some time ago that on his salary as a restaurant worker, he was better off without his 1996 Toyota 4Runner. He hoped to make a nice bit of cash from its sale.

Before he could do that, though, someone beat him to extracting value: A thief sneaked under the sport utility vehicle with a battery-powered saw, slicing from the Toyota's underbelly what may be one of the most expensive small parts of the auto world: the catalytic converter, an essential emissions-control device made with small amounts of metals more precious than gold. Who knew? Mr. Fernandez didn't.

Inside the lobby of the New Windy City Mufflers and Brakes shop, Mr. Fernandez said he had heard a rumor that catalytic converters had suddenly become the rage on the black market here, but he did not believe it until his went missing on a well-lighted North Side street.

Theft of scrap metals like copper and aluminum has been common here and across the country for years, fueled by rising construction costs and the building boom in China. But now thieves have found an easy payday from the upper echelon of the periodic table. It seems there may not be an easier place to score some platinum than under the hood of a car.

"This morning I woke up and walked out, turned the key and there was a noise like this," Mr. Fernandez said, grumbling the trainlike roar that cars make when they are missing their converters. "And now to fix it, I don't want to spend the money because it's really expensive."

The price of gold recently hit record highs, crossing the $1,000-an-ounce mark before retreating a bit. Less well publicized has been the fate of the even-more-rarefied metals platinum, palladium and rhodium, with platinum hitting recent record highs of more than $2,300 an ounce. People who may have thought their lives had nothing to do with the booming commodities market are finding out the hard way where their connection is — in their car's exhaust system.

The catalytic converter is made with trace amounts of platinum, palladium and rhodium, which speed chemical reactions and help clean emissions at very high temperatures. Selling stolen converters to scrap yards or recyclers, a thief can net a couple of hundred dollars apiece.

Exactly how much depends on the size of the car and its converter. But even a little bit is worth a lot. Converter thefts are the quickie crime du jour, not only in Chicago, where workers in auto body shops and other experts say it is increasingly a nuisance, but anywhere cars are, which is to say basically everywhere.

"These are definitely occurring more than they have in recent memory, and why that is is definitely tied to the price of precious metals within converters," said Frank Scafidi, spokesman for the National Insurance Crime Bureau.

Replacement converters usually start around $450. "When you start getting into the larger S.U.V.'s, it's $1,000-plus," said Don Tommasone, owner of Village Automotive, a car care center just outside the city. "The larger the catalytic, the more platinum. That's the ones they're stealing. It's also easier to crawl underneath them. They don't need to jack up the vehicle, they just saw it right off."

This month in Memphis, 140 children were stuck at their day care center after thieves stole the catalytic converters from the center's two vans. Recently in Columbus, Ohio, 25 cars in one parking lot were vandalized for their catalytic converters. And several states are working on legislation to make it harder to resell what up to now was a part little known outside the world of auto enthusiasts and mechanics.

Because stealing a converter does not involve actually breaking into a car, it often goes undetected. Alarms and other precautions, like parking in a well-lighted area, are scant defenses.

Last year in Minnesota, someone broke into the Ramsey Police Department's impound lot and took 19 catalytic converters off the vehicles there, a spokeswoman said. The Star Tribune in Minneapolis ran this headline about the break-in: "Thieves Show How Low They'll Go."

Jim Lyon lives opposite a police station in the Chicago suburb of Westmont, and can see his Jeep Cherokee from his window. Still, someone got him. "They'll probably get 150 bucks for two minutes' work. Not bad!" Mr. Lyon said. "As soon as I realized there was precious metal inside, I knew what they were looking for."

Legs sticking out from under a car were a tip-off this year for the Chicago police, who said they spotted a man in the Lakeview neighborhood just before he slithered from under the car and discarded a power saw along the curb. The man and three accomplices were charged with burglary and possession of burglary tools.

"When will this stop?" wondered Chris McGoey, an auto theft expert. "When they're not worth anything any more."

auto makers should be responding to this by manufacturing bolt on covers for the cats that limit how easily someone can get it out...but allow a home or shop mechanic access after pulling four bolts or some such

[mussa]

painted my wheels on my quad today...clean, sand, primer, 2 coats of spray paint. 3 coats of clear coat....came out pretty nice and they look great with red hubs.

[Diomedes]

nice..how long should that hold up before you gotta do it again?

[mussa]

thats a good question, i'll be sure to let you know. the outer part of the wheel will prob scratch, inside should prob last long. sure after my little atv trip in may/june, i'll prob need to re-spray or re-touch them. if they don't hold up well at all, i'll either get them powder coated or just buy new ones.

[Tomahawk]

I switched over to a K&N filter, even going as far to spend the extra fifty bones for a filtered lid too. I can't tell the difference between this assembly and the crappy Fram filter but since the K&N junk cost almost $100 total, I'll believe it really is better.

The 1972 Buick Riviera was driving fine, but I listened to a buddy and replaced the points type ignition with an electronic ignition and switched to a more modern and powerful coil. Dear holy mother of all creatures big and small, for not having any problems to begin with, the difference is absofarginglutely astonishing. It's so much smoother, in all aspects from starting to the entire range of the RPM cycle. By far the best $125 I've ever spent.

Now I gotta quit spending money on 8 track tapes and save every penny for a new intake, cam, headers, pistons, etc to build my own version of a badass Buick 455 (ideally my combination will give me about 450hp and 500+ft lb torque).

[mussa]

nice..how long should that hold up before you gotta do it again?

wheels holding up great btw, noticed a ding on the one wheel...prob last awhile