Articles
-
Unimog driven to new high-altitude record
/
Two Unimogs supported an operation to install four emergency radios on the Ojos del Salado volcano. This is the tallest active volcano in the world measuring 6,893 meters tall (22,614 feet). The Unimogs are U 5023 models that feature crew cabs and a soft top covered cargo area on the back of each truck. In…
-
Maserati Ghibli SQ4 Gransport …pretend the Alfa Romeo Giulia QF doesn’t exist
/
This is the Maserati Ghibli SQ4 GranSport. It looks nice. It sounds fine on the outside. And it’s comfortable enough inside. And none of that is really good enough based on how much Maserati wants you to pay for this thing. The biggest problem the Maserati Ghibli has, is that other better options exist… and…
-
2013 Miata Club: Mid-winter musings
/
Few on-road antics are as satisfying as passing endless struggling crossovers and SUVs in the snow in your dimunitive rear-wheel-drive Mazda Miata. This winter has been mostly snow-free here in Connecticut. A recent 4” snowfall marked the most we’ve gotten thus far. But even in the cases of street-coating dustings, the Miata shines. It’s true:…
-
This Piaggo Ape snow drift trike is three-wheeled perfection
/
You’ve heard the term “Full send”, right? If not, allow us to illuminate your send-less world. You send it, when you’re doing something nuts and awesome at the same time. Here is a great illustration of this concept; a heavily modified Piaggio Ape. It’s now a drift trike, and it’s amazing. It’s powered by a…
-
Hooniverse Asks: Did you watch the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona?
/
The Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona was this weekend. It was 24 hours of strong racing action, good weather, and relatively predictable winners. Wayne Taylor Racing continues to kick butt. The team won its third Daytona race in the last four years. The winning #10 Cadillac DPi race car was piloted by Kamui Kobayshi, Regner…
-
NASA Built a High-Performance Pontiac in the 60’s to Test the Predecessor to the Space Shuttle
/
In 1963, NASA needed a car. Specifically, one powerful enough to tow a thousand-pound prototype aircraft at more than a hundred miles-per-hour. It wasn’t a regular aircraft they were towing, and it wasn’t a regular Pontiac towing it. What is a lifting body? The car was meant to tow a ‘lifting body’. A lifting body…
-
Oldsmobile’s Strange Yet Valiant Last Stand in the 1990s
/
I’ve said before that when Oldsmobile got canned in 2004, no one really cared. Heck, I didn’t really care. However, several different threads have suddenly found themselves woven together in my automotive awareness. I’ve changed my mind. Oldsmobile did some strange yet cool stuff in the final years of their existence. It’s all very 1990s,…
-
International Travelall – the Suburban Alternative
/
I have been looking for a Suburban to put my family of four kids and two adults in. It is not a lot of fun to continually look for one specific make and model of vehicle. I know about the Ford Expedition Max, but those are too expensive currently for our budget. I wish there…
-
Mahindra completely redesigns the Roxor to look less Jeep-like
/
Some time ago Jeep got pissed off that the Mahindra Roxor looks too much like the Jeep CJ/Wrangler, because it sure as hell did. Lawsuit, judge, legal crap, blah blah, AND now the Roxor has been TOTALLY REDONE (emphasis mine) and it no longer looks like a Jeep. Job done, Mahindra. Job fucking done. Beers and…
-
What was your automotive news for the week?
/
I suppose it’s another one of those weeks where there just isn’t much for me to talk about. It was a fairly quiet news week and I’m in the middle of prepping for a weekend at the Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona (the real one this time), so I can’t go all that deep in…
-
Is the Corvette’s Flat-Plane DOHC V8 Related to Cadillac’s Blackwing?
/
Not a ton of information has been released concerning the DOHC, flat-plane V8 that is likely going in the production Corvette–a version of which is already in the C8.R. What we do know is that it displaces 5.5 liters, has four camshafts, and the crank is of the flat-plane variety, more often found in four-cylinder…
-
Tanak crashes at WRC Rally Monte Carlo
/
The WRC Monte Carlo Rally is underway and it was going well for Estonian rally driver, Ott Tanak. He and co-driver, Martin Jarveoja, were running in fourth place on SS4 when some undulations in the road unsettled their Hyundai WRC entry. The car veers slightly to the right, drops the right-side tires off, and hits…
-
The Genesis GV80 has an airbag between the front occupants
/
Genesis, the luxury arm of Hyundai, recently introduced its first SUV. The cleverly named GV80 is a large, three-row vehicle. And it looks great, even if the design feels somewhat influenced by the Mercedes-Benz GLS. Love or hate SUVs, the larger three-row is a great way to enter this market, as demonstrated by the Volvo…
-
![iRacing 24 Hours of Daytona Race Report: Bringing Home the [Virtual] Hardware](https://i0.wp.com/media-cloud-hooniverse.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/04135018/photo_n00366_s1-30-smooth1.0-1920x1080-300x169.png?resize=300%2C169&ssl=1)
iRacing 24 Hours of Daytona Race Report: Bringing Home the [Virtual] Hardware
/
This past weekend was the first major iRacing Special Event of the year, the iRacing 24 Hours of Daytona. I unfortunately had to sit this one out, but my friends and teammates at TURN Racing Sim Tools eSports drove four cars to the finish and all posted stellar results. If you have no idea what…
-
Off the Road Again Podcast: Episode 2 – Electric Power to the People
/
Welcome back to the Off the Road Again podcast! We’ve missed you. The focus is on off-road adventure but we also dabble in all things SUV and truck, maybe even some rally cars. Ross and Chris discuss the latest from Jeep’s 4xe plug-in hybrids, the potential 300-series Land Cruiser twin-turbo V6 hybrid powertrain, GM bringing…
-
Wayback Machine Allows a Peek into Defunct Detroit Automaker Websites
/
The WayBack Machine is an archive of the internet. Not everything is available, but many websites from even the nineties can still be accessed. That got me thinking; what were the websites of defunct Detroit automakers like Pontiac, Oldsmobile, Mercury, and others like right before they went out of business? I have some answers. Pontiac…