They say that the Cougar Ace is as water tight as a ziploc baggie and that 4,700 Mazdas aren’t headed to Davy Jones locker. It seems that a ballast adjustment gone awry is what caused the ship to tip. While the extent of the damage isn’t known, it would seem likely that there is little if any damage to the vehicles. Ocean going cargo ships are designed to withstand some pretty big waves, that often roll ships up on their side momentarily and cargo (like cars) are usally secured in anticipation of this. I suspect that there will be more damage while they figure out how to unload. Let’s face it, they’re going to need something a lot bigger than what Bob’s Towing can offer to pull this thing upright.

Mazda press release after the break

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Yesterday, Nissan announced that they have now produced 100 million vehicles. Since it’s beginnings in 1933, the Japanese manufacturer has built 76,640,000 cars at home and 23,500,000 abroad.

Nissan press release after the break

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We’ve been working on a few new features to make The Garage an event better place and it seems some of the new features don’t want to play nice with some of the old features. We are working away on solving some of these issues and all of the functions you are used to will start working again soon.

Those crafty marketing guys over the big pond at Opel have hooked up with Disney and Pixar to create animated versions of real life Opel models, just like the stars of Cars the Movie. They’ve even created a micro site similar to the Cars site, with screen savers, wallpapers and a colouring book for the kids.

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It looks like our boy Tony Stewart is looking to start picking up the goth chicks! The guys over at Unique Autosport have tricked out this swingin’ hearse for the NASCAR Champ.

Now, all we need to do is get some real details on this beast from the man himself. We’ll see if that Ranta guy can pull some info outta Tony one of these days.

Thanks to Racedriven via the Carnival of Cars

This morning, due to an organizational misfunction, we opened late this morning and had about 10 customers lined up to drop off their cars when we opened the doors. Of those 10, 6 had never been here before. It was pouring rain and not a single one of those folks thought to bring their ownership inside with them. It may seem like a simple thing, but the ownership holds all the keys to who you & your car are. Of course you know who you are, but I bet you don’t know your car’s VIN number (clue, it’s that 17 digit number at the bottom left corner of your windshield). Your service advisor needs that number to enter your vehicle into the computer.

When a new customer and car is entered into the system, it takes close to 10 minutes for the average advisor. Add in 3 or 4 minutes for the advisor to run out into the rain to write the number down from the car and you now have a wet, agitated service advisor.

If you come into the dealership prepared, it will make the service advisor’s job that much easier and your visit that much quicker.

More tips on How to get good service

It’s been an interesting beginning to the Canada Day long weekend. As I was leaving the house at 6 am this morning, I headed into The Garage to get out some bags of old clothes that were headed to the Sally Ann or some such organization. A couple of these bags were inside the old Volvo Turbo. One of the last times I drove the poor old girl, a rock hit the left 1/4 glass and shattered it. Fortunately, the glass never fell out, so we’ve just left it alone. Until this morning, when I inadvertantly pushed on the window instead of the door to close it. There is now a 6 inch hole in the middle of the 1/4 glass, where my hand went through it. Following this stroke of brilliance, Mrs G and I had to spend the next 15 minute picking tiny glass shards out of my mitt. What a spaz!

Tonight was the night. The pre release preview of Cars at the Varsity theater in downtown Toronto. Of course this is the new Toronto, so our evening began with a few waves of the metal detector wand. It’s ok though, I’d rather know that no misguided open wheel racing fan is going to blow up the screening of the biggest oval racing flick this side of Days of Dunder.

As the story begins, our hero is introduced as the self absorbed rookie who can do it all, but prefers to do it all by himself. The young whipper snapper is dressed down by The King (none other than King Richard hisself) for his attitude, as his crew is abandoning him. A sleep driving incident by Mack the transporter lands the arrogant little dude in Radiator Springs, a sleepy little town that travellers forgot when the interstate bypassed Route 66. In Radiator springs, we meet a wonderful cast of characters and watch as they teach young Lightning Mcqueen what it means to have friends. Along the way, we get to see the Cars version of cow tipping and watch Ramone the low rider change paint more often than I could count. Paul Newman is perfectly cast as the grumpy old guy in town who turns out to be the legendary Hudson Hornet who won the Piston Cup 3 years in a row way back in the Fifties. Perhaps my fave moment in the movie is when Lightning sees Doc Hudson proving to himself that he’s still got it. That cartoon stocker can drift just like old Mr Newman himself when strapped into a Super Mod. The Pixar folks have outdone themselves with the animation this time. The desert scenery is stunning (not to mention imaginative, check out those buttes) and some scenes look quite real. When Filmore raises the Stars & Stripes, I thought it was a real flag.
As one would expect, “Stickers” finds his way as the movie unfolds and becomes a true racer. I don’t want to spoil any details, so you’ll just have to head out this weekend to see Cars: The Movie.

The Garage rates Cars as 5 spark plugs out of 5.

Last week, the Provincial government here in Ontario announced that they would be working to make street racing a criminal offence. Within days of this announcement, a couple were killed on the way to celebrate their 17th wedding anniversary when they turned left in front of a street race in action. Investigators estimate that the Civic that hit them was travelling in excess of 150 kmh, or just under 100 mph. The 18 year old driver will be facing criminal charges when he is in more stable medical condition. Of course the timing of this tragedy was perfect for the media and the politicians and this kid will spend years in prison, because he was a moron who thought he was invincible.

Of course the biggest tragedy here is the 7 year old who has no parents. Why? Because 2 delinquents didn’t have the smarts to take it to the track and (here comes some controversy) because the parent who was driving didn’t look properly before turning into oncoming traffic. Yes, sometimes people die because they too made a mistake.

The purpose of this post though is to ask the question “when does street racing become a crime?”

Any warm blooded male (and many females for that manner) would be lying if they said they had never left a light a little bit faster than they should have when there was an opponent of some sort in the next lane. Last night, while returning home from a kid’s baseball game, Mrs. G ran her Protege5 through the gears to “beat Daddy” at the urging of our 2 boys, while Miss Shelby sat beside me and asked why Mom was racing us. Just to have fun. People have been having impromtu street races since we’ve had cars. Before there were cars, there were bicycles and even horses. Unplanned, uncontrolled races are nothing new, nor are they ever going to stop. It is the competitive nature of humans. Modern pop culture owes a lot to the hot rod culture of the 50’s. Where would we be without the Beach Boys or Jan & Dean. But wait…as we groove to the tunes, it is really a song about death from street racing.

The very lawyers who are campaigning to make steet racing a criminal offence show up at the courthouse in Audi S4’s and BMW M3’s, not to mention the odd CTS-V. Are we to believe that each one of them hasn’t lit their beast up when leaving a light even once?

Obviously it is tragic when someone dies of any cause, even more so when it is a result of someone’s selfish misbehaviour. That is not my point. If someone dies, it seems pretty basic that the racers involved are guilty of criminal negligence. But what about the 2 guys who make eye contact at a light, notice each other’s sweet ride and launch the car when the light turns green, only to stop at the next light, wave and drive away normally. Did they just commit a criminal act?

Where should the line be drawn? What can we do to add some element of control to the more extreme street racing?

It’s Thursday, which means that we’re all anxiously awaiting tomorrow’s Carnival of Cars reviews by Mark Tapscott. Each week he slaves away to ensure that all the car blogs get their few moments of glory & we all appreciate the effort.