American engines of that era were notorious. Consider the C3 Corvette, over 400hp at one point, and later down to double digits, still from a big V8. Did they think people wouldn't notice? It really was flabbergasting.
But if my extremely limited experience driving something vaguely comparable to the Lochdown cars is anything to go by ('77 Thunderbird), I can completely understand why they fell so hard for those cars despite everything and (at least in Clarkson's case, not sure about the others in the end) decided to keep them. For all their many, undeniable, often inherent, and extraordinary flaws, they really do have bucketloads of personality. And if their rather particular, of-a-very-specific-place-and-time aesthetic appeals at all (like it does to me), they are beguilingly beautiful.
My '78 Ford Ranchero was a goddamn boat and it caught fire once and got like 8 MPG, no radio, and a ton of costly problems, easily the worst car I've ever owned, but it had a loud and powerful 351 Windsor and it was fucking beautiful and I miss it dearly.
I'm watching the Boat special right now and really like it. I like it when nature throws them the middle finger and they suffer a bit for real.
The end of that one is pretty scary. It isn't if you don't understand the difference in design between flat water and open water boats, but if you do.. man.
Yeah, if you've been at a boat and ended up in a shipping lane, it's a whole lot of, god we shouldn't have drunk that much vodka, and where can we get out of Chesapeake bay and back to the Potomac River.
I'm watching the Boat special right now and really like it. I like it when nature throws them the middle finger and they suffer a bit for real.
The end of that one is pretty scary. It isn't if you don't understand the difference in design between flat water and open water boats, but if you do.. man.
Yeah, if you've been at a boat and ended up in a shipping lane, it's a whole lot of, god we shouldn't have drunk that much vodka, and where can we get out of Chesapeake bay and back to the Potomac River.
I worked on a smallish (35-40") fishing vessel out of Alaska one summer. Still definitely a coastal vessel but one designed to deal with waves, and 3-4 foot waves don't sound bad till you are hitting them at 10+ kts and you think you are going to freaking break apart on those rock...er waves.
+1
webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
edited August 2021
Oh yea, I only joke because obviously they survived without being worse for wear. I've been in rough ocean before in a decent sized commercial fishing trawler. It was a roller coaster the entire time.
Now I have the Mongolia special on and it's another gem.
The first time when they are in the truck and spin the tires in the mud and it hits them all. Scripted or not their reactions were visceral when it happened.
I'm watching the Boat special right now and really like it. I like it when nature throws them the middle finger and they suffer a bit for real.
The end of that one is pretty scary. It isn't if you don't understand the difference in design between flat water and open water boats, but if you do.. man.
This was one of the few times during any of the TG or TGT specials where I thought “it doesn’t matter how many support/emergency personnel are standing by just out of shot, they could be maimed/killed easily here”.
Like letting/allowing them to do open water bordered reckless disregard for them and the film crews safety, and the only real reason I can think of for why they went ahead is that they didn’t know how dangerous it actually was.
+4
webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
I'm watching the Boat special right now and really like it. I like it when nature throws them the middle finger and they suffer a bit for real.
The end of that one is pretty scary. It isn't if you don't understand the difference in design between flat water and open water boats, but if you do.. man.
This was one of the few times during any of the TG or TGT specials where I thought “it doesn’t matter how many support/emergency personnel are standing by just out of shot, they could be maimed/killed easily here”.
Like letting/allowing them to do open water bordered reckless disregard for them and the film crews safety, and the only real reason I can think of for why they went ahead is that they didn’t know how dangerous it actually was.
I'd say the Bolivia special was another one. There just isn't a way to do that road safely.
American engines of that era were notorious. Consider the C3 Corvette, over 400hp at one point, and later down to double digits, still from a big V8. Did they think people wouldn't notice? It really was flabbergasting.
But if my extremely limited experience driving something vaguely comparable to the Lochdown cars is anything to go by ('77 Thunderbird), I can completely understand why they fell so hard for those cars despite everything and (at least in Clarkson's case, not sure about the others in the end) decided to keep them. For all their many, undeniable, often inherent, and extraordinary flaws, they really do have bucketloads of personality. And if their rather particular, of-a-very-specific-place-and-time aesthetic appeals at all (like it does to me), they are beguilingly beautiful.
That’s when foreign cars started really eating Detroit’s lunch. It’s like nobody wants your planned obsolescence. Did you think you’d be able to conceal that your cars performed worst and were much less reliable? I mean American consumers are dumb, but at one point you could buy a Honda that would last 200,000 miles or more and you’d be lucky if your ford/Chevy/Chrysler would get to 110,000 before the transmission would shit the bed.
In fairness to Detroit most the UK car makers were shit as well(just not in the massive engine land yacht way). I think Clarkson goes into it in his 'Who killed the British Car industry' special; a bunch of the cars wouldn't start in the cold. Not like deep negative arctic cold, like "some frost in the morning" cold.
I'm watching the Boat special right now and really like it. I like it when nature throws them the middle finger and they suffer a bit for real.
The end of that one is pretty scary. It isn't if you don't understand the difference in design between flat water and open water boats, but if you do.. man.
This was one of the few times during any of the TG or TGT specials where I thought “it doesn’t matter how many support/emergency personnel are standing by just out of shot, they could be maimed/killed easily here”.
Like letting/allowing them to do open water bordered reckless disregard for them and the film crews safety, and the only real reason I can think of for why they went ahead is that they didn’t know how dangerous it actually was.
I'd say the Bolivia special was another one. There just isn't a way to do that road safely.
The mountain pass road with a shear 1-2 thousand foot fall if you went off, and also there’s only room for 1 car at some parts, ignore the water erosion and pray you don’t get hit by a falling rock?
Yeah that’s up there too. Most of the other somewhat dangerous stuff they do really isn’t too bad, with the worst being “if this falls off the bridge or whatever and into the drink, hopefully they don’t get stuck in the car”.
American engines of that era were notorious. Consider the C3 Corvette, over 400hp at one point, and later down to double digits, still from a big V8. Did they think people wouldn't notice? It really was flabbergasting.
But if my extremely limited experience driving something vaguely comparable to the Lochdown cars is anything to go by ('77 Thunderbird), I can completely understand why they fell so hard for those cars despite everything and (at least in Clarkson's case, not sure about the others in the end) decided to keep them. For all their many, undeniable, often inherent, and extraordinary flaws, they really do have bucketloads of personality. And if their rather particular, of-a-very-specific-place-and-time aesthetic appeals at all (like it does to me), they are beguilingly beautiful.
That’s when foreign cars started really eating Detroit’s lunch. It’s like nobody wants your planned obsolescence. Did you think you’d be able to conceal that your cars performed worst and were much less reliable? I mean American consumers are dumb, but at one point you could buy a Honda that would last 200,000 miles or more and you’d be lucky if your ford/Chevy/Chrysler would get to 110,000 before the transmission would shit the bed.
In fairness to Detroit most the UK car makers were shit as well(just not in the massive engine land yacht way). I think Clarkson goes into it in his 'Who killed the British Car industry' special; a bunch of the cars wouldn't start in the cold. Not like deep negative arctic cold, like "some frost in the morning" cold.
Oh yeah, they were dreadful. As he says in Lochdown, at the time, the UK was making cars like the Austin Allegro. Hateful crap. At least those land yachts have some good points, however subjective. Very, very few of the cars coming out of the UK at the time could say that.
Funnily enough, I saw a gorgeous Rover SD1 the other day. Silver one, with a lovely rumble coming from the 3500 V8. Very rare to see one in the wild any more. Definitely one of the better (well, less bad) British cars of the era, no matter how many doors fell off Clarkson's one in that episode. And I still think it's a pretty good looking car, too.
And speaking of cars that don't like to start, my first car was a Citroen 2CV, and that hated starting in the wet. Had to blast WD-40 onto the plug leads to get the thing to start if it was a bit damp outside. But then again the design had barely evolved from the 1940s (mine was a 1987 car).
I am slowly making my way through Jezzas Farm. And it is an absolute blast. Now at the episode where he tries to build a pond. The amount of people who keep telling him how stupid his ideas are is breathtaking. Kaleb and Cheerful Charlie really are the stars of that show. I sat here giggling a few minutes at them needing 3 tractors to get ANYTHING out of that mess :biggrin: .
As someone who ran a farm, a much smaller farm, for 8 years, it is very easy to get a tractor stuck. It is way easier to get it out if you have a bucket though, I think I only needed help once and it was because I went too far into a ditch pushing snow and the road was icy so I couldn't reverse.
Because if you're going to attempt to squeeze that big black monster into your slot you will need to be able to take at least 12 inches or else you're going to have a bad time...
American engines of that era were notorious. Consider the C3 Corvette, over 400hp at one point, and later down to double digits, still from a big V8. Did they think people wouldn't notice? It really was flabbergasting.
But if my extremely limited experience driving something vaguely comparable to the Lochdown cars is anything to go by ('77 Thunderbird), I can completely understand why they fell so hard for those cars despite everything and (at least in Clarkson's case, not sure about the others in the end) decided to keep them. For all their many, undeniable, often inherent, and extraordinary flaws, they really do have bucketloads of personality. And if their rather particular, of-a-very-specific-place-and-time aesthetic appeals at all (like it does to me), they are beguilingly beautiful.
That’s when foreign cars started really eating Detroit’s lunch. It’s like nobody wants your planned obsolescence. Did you think you’d be able to conceal that your cars performed worst and were much less reliable? I mean American consumers are dumb, but at one point you could buy a Honda that would last 200,000 miles or more and you’d be lucky if your ford/Chevy/Chrysler would get to 110,000 before the transmission would shit the bed.
In fairness to Detroit most the UK car makers were shit as well(just not in the massive engine land yacht way). I think Clarkson goes into it in his 'Who killed the British Car industry' special; a bunch of the cars wouldn't start in the cold. Not like deep negative arctic cold, like "some frost in the morning" cold.
Oh yeah, they were dreadful. As he says in Lochdown, at the time, the UK was making cars like the Austin Allegro. Hateful crap. At least those land yachts have some good points, however subjective. Very, very few of the cars coming out of the UK at the time could say that.
Funnily enough, I saw a gorgeous Rover SD1 the other day. Silver one, with a lovely rumble coming from the 3500 V8. Very rare to see one in the wild any more. Definitely one of the better (well, less bad) British cars of the era, no matter how many doors fell off Clarkson's one in that episode. And I still think it's a pretty good looking car, too.
And speaking of cars that don't like to start, my first car was a Citroen 2CV, and that hated starting in the wet. Had to blast WD-40 onto the plug leads to get the thing to start if it was a bit damp outside. But then again the design had barely evolved from the 1940s (mine was a 1987 car).
The whole thing with basically unchained car models for multiple decades is just such a weird thing. Like the equivalency would be me going to a dealership today and buying a new Ford Escort that would be more or less identical to the first one made is just wild.
American engines of that era were notorious. Consider the C3 Corvette, over 400hp at one point, and later down to double digits, still from a big V8. Did they think people wouldn't notice? It really was flabbergasting.
But if my extremely limited experience driving something vaguely comparable to the Lochdown cars is anything to go by ('77 Thunderbird), I can completely understand why they fell so hard for those cars despite everything and (at least in Clarkson's case, not sure about the others in the end) decided to keep them. For all their many, undeniable, often inherent, and extraordinary flaws, they really do have bucketloads of personality. And if their rather particular, of-a-very-specific-place-and-time aesthetic appeals at all (like it does to me), they are beguilingly beautiful.
That’s when foreign cars started really eating Detroit’s lunch. It’s like nobody wants your planned obsolescence. Did you think you’d be able to conceal that your cars performed worst and were much less reliable? I mean American consumers are dumb, but at one point you could buy a Honda that would last 200,000 miles or more and you’d be lucky if your ford/Chevy/Chrysler would get to 110,000 before the transmission would shit the bed.
In fairness to Detroit most the UK car makers were shit as well(just not in the massive engine land yacht way). I think Clarkson goes into it in his 'Who killed the British Car industry' special; a bunch of the cars wouldn't start in the cold. Not like deep negative arctic cold, like "some frost in the morning" cold.
Oh yeah, they were dreadful. As he says in Lochdown, at the time, the UK was making cars like the Austin Allegro. Hateful crap. At least those land yachts have some good points, however subjective. Very, very few of the cars coming out of the UK at the time could say that.
Funnily enough, I saw a gorgeous Rover SD1 the other day. Silver one, with a lovely rumble coming from the 3500 V8. Very rare to see one in the wild any more. Definitely one of the better (well, less bad) British cars of the era, no matter how many doors fell off Clarkson's one in that episode. And I still think it's a pretty good looking car, too.
And speaking of cars that don't like to start, my first car was a Citroen 2CV, and that hated starting in the wet. Had to blast WD-40 onto the plug leads to get the thing to start if it was a bit damp outside. But then again the design had barely evolved from the 1940s (mine was a 1987 car).
The whole thing with basically unchained car models for multiple decades is just such a weird thing. Like the equivalency would be me going to a dealership today and buying a new Ford Escort that would be more or less identical to the first one made is just wild.
In East Germany, the cars developed there in the 60s were top of their class for their time - but they weren't developed any further and were build the exact same way for 25 years. Any new development was just shelved because "why bother? Its not necessary".
As someone who ran a farm, a much smaller farm, for 8 years, it is very easy to get a tractor stuck. It is way easier to get it out if you have a bucket though, I think I only needed help once and it was because I went too far into a ditch pushing snow and the road was icy so I couldn't reverse.
Yeah, you can have approximately one billion horse-torques and it's worth nothing if you have no friction to work with.
As someone who ran a farm, a much smaller farm, for 8 years, it is very easy to get a tractor stuck. It is way easier to get it out if you have a bucket though, I think I only needed help once and it was because I went too far into a ditch pushing snow and the road was icy so I couldn't reverse.
Yeah, you can have approximately one billion horse-torques and it's worth nothing if you have no friction to work with.
that's what she said
+5
webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
American engines of that era were notorious. Consider the C3 Corvette, over 400hp at one point, and later down to double digits, still from a big V8. Did they think people wouldn't notice? It really was flabbergasting.
But if my extremely limited experience driving something vaguely comparable to the Lochdown cars is anything to go by ('77 Thunderbird), I can completely understand why they fell so hard for those cars despite everything and (at least in Clarkson's case, not sure about the others in the end) decided to keep them. For all their many, undeniable, often inherent, and extraordinary flaws, they really do have bucketloads of personality. And if their rather particular, of-a-very-specific-place-and-time aesthetic appeals at all (like it does to me), they are beguilingly beautiful.
That’s when foreign cars started really eating Detroit’s lunch. It’s like nobody wants your planned obsolescence. Did you think you’d be able to conceal that your cars performed worst and were much less reliable? I mean American consumers are dumb, but at one point you could buy a Honda that would last 200,000 miles or more and you’d be lucky if your ford/Chevy/Chrysler would get to 110,000 before the transmission would shit the bed.
In fairness to Detroit most the UK car makers were shit as well(just not in the massive engine land yacht way). I think Clarkson goes into it in his 'Who killed the British Car industry' special; a bunch of the cars wouldn't start in the cold. Not like deep negative arctic cold, like "some frost in the morning" cold.
Oh yeah, they were dreadful. As he says in Lochdown, at the time, the UK was making cars like the Austin Allegro. Hateful crap. At least those land yachts have some good points, however subjective. Very, very few of the cars coming out of the UK at the time could say that.
Funnily enough, I saw a gorgeous Rover SD1 the other day. Silver one, with a lovely rumble coming from the 3500 V8. Very rare to see one in the wild any more. Definitely one of the better (well, less bad) British cars of the era, no matter how many doors fell off Clarkson's one in that episode. And I still think it's a pretty good looking car, too.
And speaking of cars that don't like to start, my first car was a Citroen 2CV, and that hated starting in the wet. Had to blast WD-40 onto the plug leads to get the thing to start if it was a bit damp outside. But then again the design had barely evolved from the 1940s (mine was a 1987 car).
The whole thing with basically unchained car models for multiple decades is just such a weird thing. Like the equivalency would be me going to a dealership today and buying a new Ford Escort that would be more or less identical to the first one made is just wild.
It's not something you see much of anymore but it was very common in previous decades with cash strapped companies. See the joke about the Masarati bi-turbo being the same car as several other Maseratis with different badges.
It still sort of lives on today in platform sharing a great many cars these days are mechanically identical to each other but companies usually put a bit of effort I to making the bodies and interior cosmetically distinct to make up for it. My first car was a Toyota ago, which except for the badges and a couple of panels was the same car as a C1 and 107.
And everyone's favourite car the Dacia Sandero is a reshelled twenty year old Clio.
Citroën even used platform-sharing with the 2CV itself, with cars like the Ami and even their H-Van, as well as more direct 2CV variants like the 4-wheel-drive Sahara (that had another engine in the back to power the back wheels, I'm not kidding).
I'm not sure how much platform-sharing there may have been with the Dyane, which IIRC was intended to replace the 2CV but the original version just remained too popular.
It was definitely a primitive vehicle but it was great fun. You had to really drive it, hard, and it was easy to work on too; it taught me a lot, so it was a great first car.
Ok - so here are a few things that came together in one (well, two) videos, the YouTube algorithm decided to present me today.
- I still need to watch the rest of Clarksons Farm (I am in the middle of the sheeping episode)
- its Top Gear
- I play a lot of farming simulator right now :biggrin:
Clarkson was in this news segment, but more importantly it gives you an early peek at season 2
+6
TexiKenDammit!That fish really got me!Registered Userregular
Please trim your eyebrows Jezza.
I fully support this arc of him becoming the old guy with the resources trying to keep british agriculture continuing and keep it local.
+4
TexiKenDammit!That fish really got me!Registered Userregular
Full first episode of Wrecking Ball's Discovery+ car shop peko. In typical Hamster fashioned a bit too set up but at the same time much more like an old TG segment than the other boffins's'ss series. I approve.
Clarkson was in this news segment, but more importantly it gives you an early peek at season 2
I know Clarkson enjoys his hyperbole, but is he fucking serious about British farmers losing their subsidies in 5 years?
If that's true, I can't fathom the lunacy involved in that choice with the consequences of Brexit fucking the place sideways. The nation can support itself on good food it grows itself and it's just going to... throw that away? Put itself completely at the mercy of foreign economies and farming when it's already made that support a totally undesirable proposition? I know WWII was back a ways, but have the people running the country truly forgotten that nation was almost brought down simply because it gave up growing food once already?
And I do feel for poor Caleb. Here's somebody young, extremely keen on farming, extremely knowledgeable of both the actual farming and the rules for it... and he literally cannot fucking buy a farm because, again, the prices are getting driven up so much by rich, greedy assholes. Such a fucking depressing international issue at this point that the rich are reaching the point of owning literally everything worth owning and the rest of us are stuck renting all of it.
On the flipside, it's kinda typical Clarkson that he asks the question "what would this land be like without farmland?" and misses the part that, if it were allowed to revert to wild land, all those species being protected could simply go back to flourishing instead of being hunted or populations kept apart because farmers see them as pests or obstacles. But still, it's completely insane that the government there seems hell-bent on making their own economy so immensely vulnerable by just telling farms and farmers to fuck off.
Does seem bizzare even by their standards though since if there's one thing that could actually threaten the Tory one party state it's having the countryside turn on them. But this isn't the UK politics thread so I'll get back on topic by saying it'll be crazy of its Jeremy Clarkson of all people that brings this issue to people's attention. This show is teaching a life long country boy like me stuff I don't know about farming so I can't wait for S2.
TexiKenDammit!That fish really got me!Registered Userregular
Wrecking Ball's Workshop has been good, solid programming. It's not as scripted as I thought it would be, or Hammond's become a better actor (ha! I make myself laugh with my brilliance sometimes).
He's doing the whole thing the right way, and realizing being on the working end, when not doing it for a TG special, eats away at some of his ideas for simple flip jobs as he tries to get a big fancy restore job.
And while I find it hard to believe he doesn't have at least $150k lying around to facilitate the move/tools for the new shop, which is probably the amount he's being paid for this TV show, he did sell a lot of his car collection to foot the bill. I guess he wasted all his money over the last 20 years on teeth whitening.
I really do recommend the show, it's not Clarkson's Farm good but it's better than James' cooking show. You can find the episodes on youtube before they get taken down or moved around.
Wrecking Ball's Workshop has been good, solid programming. It's not as scripted as I thought it would be, or Hammond's become a better actor (ha! I make myself laugh with my brilliance sometimes).
He's doing the whole thing the right way, and realizing being on the working end, when not doing it for a TG special, eats away at some of his ideas for simple flip jobs as he tries to get a big fancy restore job.
And while I find it hard to believe he doesn't have at least $150k lying around to facilitate the move/tools for the new shop, which is probably the amount he's being paid for this TV show, he did sell a lot of his car collection to foot the bill. I guess he wasted all his money over the last 20 years on teeth whitening.
I really do recommend the show, it's not Clarkson's Farm good but it's better than James' cooking show. You can find the episodes on youtube before they get taken down or moved around.
Ye im sure it was pretty well publicised at the time when they took up the GT contract with Amazon that each of them was getting over a million a piece, unless I'm misremembering?
0
webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
Wrecking Ball's Workshop has been good, solid programming. It's not as scripted as I thought it would be, or Hammond's become a better actor (ha! I make myself laugh with my brilliance sometimes).
He's doing the whole thing the right way, and realizing being on the working end, when not doing it for a TG special, eats away at some of his ideas for simple flip jobs as he tries to get a big fancy restore job.
And while I find it hard to believe he doesn't have at least $150k lying around to facilitate the move/tools for the new shop, which is probably the amount he's being paid for this TV show, he did sell a lot of his car collection to foot the bill. I guess he wasted all his money over the last 20 years on teeth whitening.
I really do recommend the show, it's not Clarkson's Farm good but it's better than James' cooking show. You can find the episodes on youtube before they get taken down or moved around.
Ye im sure it was pretty well publicised at the time when they took up the GT contract with Amazon that each of them was getting over a million a piece, unless I'm misremembering?
I'm betting part of his money is tied up in investments and other means. In the sale video he mentions he has to keep money around to support his wife and kids, so he has probably set up trusts or the equivalent. Can't blow it all on cars! Also the 150k was to finish the move and to keep people paid. It sounds like he has been pouring money into it for a while (which would make sense in a business like this).
New season of Top Gear is good so far. A showdown in F1-inspired track day cars with current F1 drivers, an emotional tribute film for stuntman Eddie Kidd, and a caravan trip with neat modern caravans and electric SUVs. Coming up there's an Icelandic rally expedition in second-hand British cars, a tribute to the DeLorean, and "old cars for new drivers" starring the Lada Niva, MGB GT, and Volkswagen Beetle, which promises to be a lot of fun.
I'm still not sure exactly how the dynamic between McGuinness, Flintoff, and Harris works as well as it does, but it does. It's obviously at least a little different to Clarkson, Hammond, and May, but also in a similar vein it's a combination that just works.
Far better is "The Reassembler". BBC4, nothing but ~30m of James May putting something fiddly back together while rambling on about it and the history thereof. Lawnmower, electric train set, stand mixer...
Far better is "The Reassembler". BBC4, nothing but ~30m of James May putting something fiddly back together while rambling on about it and the history thereof. Lawnmower, electric train set, stand mixer...
Yeag, there is no way ...in the world... that show should work. But it does. Brilliantly.
For the uninitiated, that car they're dropping from a great height? I had one of those, as my first car. Only mine was white and red. (There were a bunch of two-tone special editions.) I even drove a mate's one that had actually been used by Clarkson himself for a film. Not sure how many other people here can lay claim to having driven a car that Clarkson once drove, but I can.
Posts
My '78 Ford Ranchero was a goddamn boat and it caught fire once and got like 8 MPG, no radio, and a ton of costly problems, easily the worst car I've ever owned, but it had a loud and powerful 351 Windsor and it was fucking beautiful and I miss it dearly.
I worked on a smallish (35-40") fishing vessel out of Alaska one summer. Still definitely a coastal vessel but one designed to deal with waves, and 3-4 foot waves don't sound bad till you are hitting them at 10+ kts and you think you are going to freaking break apart on those rock...er waves.
Now I have the Mongolia special on and it's another gem.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
This was one of the few times during any of the TG or TGT specials where I thought “it doesn’t matter how many support/emergency personnel are standing by just out of shot, they could be maimed/killed easily here”.
Like letting/allowing them to do open water bordered reckless disregard for them and the film crews safety, and the only real reason I can think of for why they went ahead is that they didn’t know how dangerous it actually was.
I'd say the Bolivia special was another one. There just isn't a way to do that road safely.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
In fairness to Detroit most the UK car makers were shit as well(just not in the massive engine land yacht way). I think Clarkson goes into it in his 'Who killed the British Car industry' special; a bunch of the cars wouldn't start in the cold. Not like deep negative arctic cold, like "some frost in the morning" cold.
The mountain pass road with a shear 1-2 thousand foot fall if you went off, and also there’s only room for 1 car at some parts, ignore the water erosion and pray you don’t get hit by a falling rock?
Yeah that’s up there too. Most of the other somewhat dangerous stuff they do really isn’t too bad, with the worst being “if this falls off the bridge or whatever and into the drink, hopefully they don’t get stuck in the car”.
Oh yeah, they were dreadful. As he says in Lochdown, at the time, the UK was making cars like the Austin Allegro. Hateful crap. At least those land yachts have some good points, however subjective. Very, very few of the cars coming out of the UK at the time could say that.
Funnily enough, I saw a gorgeous Rover SD1 the other day. Silver one, with a lovely rumble coming from the 3500 V8. Very rare to see one in the wild any more. Definitely one of the better (well, less bad) British cars of the era, no matter how many doors fell off Clarkson's one in that episode. And I still think it's a pretty good looking car, too.
And speaking of cars that don't like to start, my first car was a Citroen 2CV, and that hated starting in the wet. Had to blast WD-40 onto the plug leads to get the thing to start if it was a bit damp outside. But then again the design had barely evolved from the 1940s (mine was a 1987 car).
Steam | XBL
I'd forgotten how damn funny lambs can be. They're hilarious at times.
Steam | XBL
The whole thing with basically unchained car models for multiple decades is just such a weird thing. Like the equivalency would be me going to a dealership today and buying a new Ford Escort that would be more or less identical to the first one made is just wild.
In East Germany, the cars developed there in the 60s were top of their class for their time - but they weren't developed any further and were build the exact same way for 25 years. Any new development was just shelved because "why bother? Its not necessary".
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
Yeah, you can have approximately one billion horse-torques and it's worth nothing if you have no friction to work with.
that's what she said
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
It's not something you see much of anymore but it was very common in previous decades with cash strapped companies. See the joke about the Masarati bi-turbo being the same car as several other Maseratis with different badges.
It still sort of lives on today in platform sharing a great many cars these days are mechanically identical to each other but companies usually put a bit of effort I to making the bodies and interior cosmetically distinct to make up for it. My first car was a Toyota ago, which except for the badges and a couple of panels was the same car as a C1 and 107.
And everyone's favourite car the Dacia Sandero is a reshelled twenty year old Clio.
I'm not sure how much platform-sharing there may have been with the Dyane, which IIRC was intended to replace the 2CV but the original version just remained too popular.
It was definitely a primitive vehicle but it was great fun. You had to really drive it, hard, and it was easy to work on too; it taught me a lot, so it was a great first car.
Steam | XBL
- I still need to watch the rest of Clarksons Farm (I am in the middle of the sheeping episode)
- its Top Gear
- I play a lot of farming simulator right now :biggrin:
Clarkson was in this news segment, but more importantly it gives you an early peek at season 2
I fully support this arc of him becoming the old guy with the resources trying to keep british agriculture continuing and keep it local.
I know Clarkson enjoys his hyperbole, but is he fucking serious about British farmers losing their subsidies in 5 years?
If that's true, I can't fathom the lunacy involved in that choice with the consequences of Brexit fucking the place sideways. The nation can support itself on good food it grows itself and it's just going to... throw that away? Put itself completely at the mercy of foreign economies and farming when it's already made that support a totally undesirable proposition? I know WWII was back a ways, but have the people running the country truly forgotten that nation was almost brought down simply because it gave up growing food once already?
And I do feel for poor Caleb. Here's somebody young, extremely keen on farming, extremely knowledgeable of both the actual farming and the rules for it... and he literally cannot fucking buy a farm because, again, the prices are getting driven up so much by rich, greedy assholes. Such a fucking depressing international issue at this point that the rich are reaching the point of owning literally everything worth owning and the rest of us are stuck renting all of it.
On the flipside, it's kinda typical Clarkson that he asks the question "what would this land be like without farmland?" and misses the part that, if it were allowed to revert to wild land, all those species being protected could simply go back to flourishing instead of being hunted or populations kept apart because farmers see them as pests or obstacles. But still, it's completely insane that the government there seems hell-bent on making their own economy so immensely vulnerable by just telling farms and farmers to fuck off.
Steam | XBL
Steam | XBL
He's doing the whole thing the right way, and realizing being on the working end, when not doing it for a TG special, eats away at some of his ideas for simple flip jobs as he tries to get a big fancy restore job.
And while I find it hard to believe he doesn't have at least $150k lying around to facilitate the move/tools for the new shop, which is probably the amount he's being paid for this TV show, he did sell a lot of his car collection to foot the bill. I guess he wasted all his money over the last 20 years on teeth whitening.
I really do recommend the show, it's not Clarkson's Farm good but it's better than James' cooking show. You can find the episodes on youtube before they get taken down or moved around.
I'd imagine that's an opinion entirely down to someone's taste.
Ye im sure it was pretty well publicised at the time when they took up the GT contract with Amazon that each of them was getting over a million a piece, unless I'm misremembering?
I'm betting part of his money is tied up in investments and other means. In the sale video he mentions he has to keep money around to support his wife and kids, so he has probably set up trusts or the equivalent. Can't blow it all on cars! Also the 150k was to finish the move and to keep people paid. It sounds like he has been pouring money into it for a while (which would make sense in a business like this).
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
Clarksons farm is the best solo project so far. I haven’t seen Hammonds new one yet though, but I’m excited.
I'm still not sure exactly how the dynamic between McGuinness, Flintoff, and Harris works as well as it does, but it does. It's obviously at least a little different to Clarkson, Hammond, and May, but also in a similar vein it's a combination that just works.
Steam | XBL
Very good trailer
Far better is "The Reassembler". BBC4, nothing but ~30m of James May putting something fiddly back together while rambling on about it and the history thereof. Lawnmower, electric train set, stand mixer...
Yeag, there is no way ...in the world... that show should work. But it does. Brilliantly.
Steam | XBL
For the uninitiated, that car they're dropping from a great height? I had one of those, as my first car. Only mine was white and red. (There were a bunch of two-tone special editions.) I even drove a mate's one that had actually been used by Clarkson himself for a film. Not sure how many other people here can lay claim to having driven a car that Clarkson once drove, but I can.
Also, that title is *French chef kiss*
Steam | XBL