All you Jack Baruth fans out there (*crickets chirping*) will be pleased to hear that I have NOT ONE! NOT TWO! BUT THREE! features in the October 2014 issue of Road&Track.
Page 37 has my “Avoidable Contact” column about Corvettes that’s currently available on the web.
The next two articles were sort of star-crossed in the sense that I wrote them after my January snow crash to describe events that happened before that crash. Both of them came out overly long and required a lot of back-and-forth to edit and fit into the available space. Now that I finally feel about 90% back to where I was before the crash, I wish I could write them all over again and make them as good as I think they could be.
On page 76, you’ll step into a Rolls-Royce Wraith with me as we take it to meet one of the greatest Duesenbergs of all time. Of. All. Time, as Kanye would say.
On page 86, I’m fulfilling a dream by teaming up with Le Mans champion Chris Dyson to drive the Caterham SP/300.R sports racer around Infineon Raceway, along with the Lotus Exige Cup V6 and a very nasty little 260-horsepower Caterham Seven. Unless your driving resume includes a stint in Le Mans Prototypes, nothing can prepare you for the SP/300.R’s ability to exceed two lateral g in high-speed cornering. The trackday happened ten months ago and I can still remember the violent beauty of it.
As always, thank you for reading!
I wonder if there’s a market for autographed copies. Will Hearst sell you them at a discount?
I’m in the middle of moving about 60 egg crates full of press kits, brochures and other automotive literature to higher ground (I didn’t get flooded like many neighbors did, but i don’t want to take any chance). Now that I know some of the folks who write for the buff books, I probably should save an autographed copy or three.
Ok, my arm’s been twisted enough. Just buckled and renewed a long expired subscription to R&T. Kindle edition this time.
One more thing. When does the embargo on buff mags’ publishing Mustang GT road tests lift? Obviously you have one for PCOTY… however, scouring the web, I see no published tests or review videos.
Jack, I enjoyed the article on the C7. I first sat in a C7 at the Frankfurt Auto Show in 2013 of all places. Speaking of the Frankfurt Auto Show, I also ran down a new 991 Carrera S in my C6 Z06 on autobahn A81 back in 2011. Given that the car had red dealer/shipping plates I speculate that car was returning to Stuttgart (as I was) after the Frankfurt Auto Show that year. I can’t verify it was one of the cars at the show, but that was the year of the 991 debut, and my impromptu chase did occur shortly after the show concluded. At any rate, I’m a huge corvette fan, but as a fan you learn some of the not so great things about these cars too.
That said, I’m curious if you ever heard about the valve guide wear issues in the C6 Z06 that would invariably lead to dropped valves in the LS7, or the concerns surrounding a growing number of catastrophic LT1 failures in the C7? Early speculation is that the crank in the LT1 is walking and ultimately causing bearing and rod failure.
I only ask, because I know from your other work that you were critical of issues like the IMS failures in Porsche and how the suits at Zuffenhausen handled it. By and large, GM seems to be honoring warranties when the aforementioned failures occur on stock vehicles with current warranties, but there are a number of people within the corvette community who are not happy with the relative silence and inconsistent explanations for the failures from GM.
It’s not uncommon for engines in this hyper-stressed era to have issues.
I’m critical of Porsche because they allowed the problem to continue for more than eleven years and blamed the customers all the way through. They’ve done the right thing in the past — when the original Boxsters turned out to have porous blocks, they handled it correctly. But the IMS/RMS issue was apparently too big to handle.
Like you, I’m hearing about LT1 problems. Crossing my fingers that’s it’s not going to be a problem that destroys the reputation and the enjoyment of these cars.
Thanks for the response. If you are ever have the time, and are so inclined to look into it, the LS7 valve guide wearing issue is pretty widespread even in the occasional low-mileage garage queen. The closest thing to an official GM response stated it was a machining error in the heads for a select number of ’08 through ’11 model years. The response also said GM isolated the problem in subsequent model years.; however, there are examples of extreme LS7 guide wear across all model years. I’ve become quite enamored with reliable GM push rod V8s, and I would hate to have my illusions shattered.