Conveniently Misplaced

Behold, the most expensive gas in Metro Detroit today:

Behold, my 1988 Chevy Caprice.

With this not being the most fuel-efficient car on the planet and gas getting more and more disgusting, I started looking into ways to increase gas mileage. I did all the standard stuff:

• Lighten your load.
• Inflate your tires.
• Clean up the air filter (this sucker is carbureted after all).
• Drive properly.
• Avoid rush hour, etc.

I tried all of this with a few more things and saw no results. Here’s a few facts about my 1988 Caprice:

Style: 4-Door full-size sedan
Seating: 6 (max)
Drive: Rear wheel
Engine Size: 5.0L V8
Engine Type: 305 small block with feedback fuel system
Tank Size: 20g
Carbon Footprint: 10.8 tons of C02 / year
Petrol Consumption: 20.1 barrels / year

It’s not a small car by any stretch, but on gas it’s not too bad. On average, I can pull 350 miles out of a single tank. That’s 17.5mpg, which still sucks but considering my last 2 cars got 12.5 mpg, only 250 miles out a of a single tank.

Behold those gas-guzzling beasts of burden:

And in the same breath, shitty gas mileage was never so ugly, or pretty (save for the 700 series BMWs of the same era).

So with gasoline getting disgustingly expensive, I decided to test out something that seemed shaky at best and engine devastating at worst: Acetone.

Acetone, for those who don’t know, is the active ingredient in nail polish. It is also said to be an octane booster for gasoline and, in something that’s probably been on Myth Busters that I failed to watch may increase gas mileage.

The idea works like this: pour the right amount of acetone into your tank after fill up. It works its magic, gives the car a little octane boost, should clean out parts of the fuel system, and in theory, increase your mpg.

But there’s 1 catch: the use of good gasoline. What is “good” and “bad” gas? The difference in what kind of Oil, how it’s refined, and who sells it. A lot of the best oil comes from Nigeria and who drills in Nigeria? 3 big players, Dutch Royal Shell, ExxonMobil, and Chevron.

Lets go down the list here. There are some Mobil stations in Michigan, and even fewer ExxonMobil stations. Their gas isn’t considered any better than anyone else’s by performance standards. Chevron many gearheads will swear by. GM does all their testing with it. Except, there are 0 Chevron stations in Michigan. So that’s out of the question. Then there’s Shell. The countryside of Detroit is littered with Shell stations, except they’re usually 10-15 cents more than every other gas station. Which means that the cost of the extra gas would cancel out any gains I made in MPG unless they were substantial gains. Since if I got any gain, with my car I would expect at most 10-15% increase, it would not be worth it. Any money I’d save on MPGs would instead to to Shell instead of my pocket.

So I had to make do and used random gas stations from around the area. I picked up a jug of acetone from Meijer along with a funnel and a measuring cup (2-3 oz / 10 g recommended dose) and I was off on my way.

I first recorded my data with how well I did during my fill-up:

343 Miles / 19.089g = 18mpg using crappy Speedway gasoline.

However, I was unable to find even a decent gas station to gas up with my acetone, so I had to use Valero, which is equally as crappy. These were my results:

355.3 miles @ 20.4 gallons = 17.41mpg. That was a mix of 5oz of Acetone in my 20g tank.

Next I tried BPAmoco. Then Mobil. Then Sunoco, costco, etc. I’m not going to post the results because I stopped recording them. It was all the same stuff. 20g ~= 350m depending on how much of it was freeway and how much was highway. With or without the acetone, my car fits the bill doing just as well a the EPA estimates on it are: 15mpg city, and 22mpg highway, for an estimated overall figure of 17mpg (according to FuelEconomy.gov), although I can usually to 1-2mph better than that.

Let me say this again: Acetone didn’t do a damn thing for your gas mileage. Of course YMMV on this one, and maybe it’s that my car has been running at peak performance because it’s been well maintained (mostly in thanks to the previous owners). However, it may be different for you. The web is littered with people who swear by Acetone for their fill-ups. I don’t share that sentiment, and am not willing to offset the cost with criminally expensive gasoline.

If you are under a different circumstance and want to try it for yourself, you have nothing to lose. My total materials cost was about $9 for everything, so you don’t have a lot to lose. Just don’t go expecting a great leap in mpg, any increase is good, and be smart about it, and do your research first.

Just be a realist about it.

I’ve seen some pretty interesting server errors on all platforms, and they always come up when you don’t suspect it. Take for example, me at Meijer the other day. I go to price check an item only to be stopped by a price scanning system that has failed under windows server for a “Incorrect string input”. wow.

Click for full size.

So apparently there’s a new wannabe paypal on the block, called Revolution Money Exchange. It was started by one of the dudes from AOL and if you have a problem with paypal (which a lot of you do I guess) it could be well worth the effort to sign up. So if you do, please use the link below.

I get $10 for the referral and you get $25 for signing up. Don’t want to use it? Sign up anyways then just send the money to john@cruzweb.net, I get some cash for about 2 minutes of your time and I will love you unconditionally forever.

Meet the 1977 Ford Grenada.

It’s not sexy, edgy, or by any stretch of the imagination, something you want to admit that you are affiliated with let alone own (or let anybody else know that you own for that matter). This is a car that few ourside of Ford are willing to admit that they liked. As a matter of fact, I hadn’t even seen on in person until a year ago when some mexicans were selling a serious beater. I spend a couple hours looking up this car because I couldn’t find a whole lot on it or anybody in person willing to talk about it. I was literally beside myself when I saw one in mint condition in the movie No Country for Old Men.

However talks about the fabled Ford Grenada made the front page of the business section of the Detroit News last week, which I noticed as I was cleaning the papers up. Of all the important things to cover in the world of business, this is not it. For whatever reason beyond my understanding, staff writer Manny Lopez wrote a column titled Obama’s rip on auto infamy is a clunker. For even more reasons beyond my understanding, editors approved and printed it.

Now it’s not uncommon that as Americans we read things that we find rediculous. Same for stuff on TV, the radio, internet, etc. However this article is something that’s beyond pointless and absurd.

The article blasts Barack Obama’s claim that the Ford Grenada was “the worst car Detroit ever buit”. The article flow looks like this

1. Claim that no matter how bad the Grenada was, Detroit has made a lot worse cars.
2. France and Yugoslavia have made worse cars.
3. Quote Obama again re: how much the car sucked and he thought it would fall apart.
4. Say that all cars suck compared to what Obama drives.
5. Mention that few cars from the 70s were good enough to survive.
6. Talk about how almost ALL cars from the 70s sucked and were a pain.
7. Talk about how Ford is a different company now.
8. Claim that this is a failed campaign tactic by Obama.

That’s if you don’t feel like reading the article, and I don’t blame you. I’m not a fan of Obama’s, however I don’t see the point at all in writing this article. The grenada WAS a bad car. So how is anybody, be it the next guy on the street begging for change or the guy running for the presidency begging for change at fault for making this statement?

Not only that, but the article is all over the place and doesn’t really even make sense as there isn’t real sense to it. The right defense to “your car sucks” is not “we’ve done worse and I can prove it”. There’s even a quip in there attacking Obama’s environmental views because at once point in his life, he drove over 80mph by his own admission.

The article is pointless drivel that goes all over the place and doesn’t accomplish anything. I know that the Detroit News tends to be a little more right leaning than left, however if you want to make a point about a presidential candidate, actually make a point.

Make it a good point.

And don’t make it a point about the Ford Grenada.

And if you do, at least write a decent article about it.

So yesterday I got myself up early in the morning to make it to Oakland University for John McCain’s town hall meeting. I got up specifically just so I could ask some questions, I’ve seen enough of him on the news to know how he stands on most things. Some of it I like, and some of it I don’t. I’m not going into specifics, but I’m not exactly a support of his (and you all know how I stand on people like Obama). Anyways, I had 2 questions I wanted to ask regarding:

1. The value of the dollar
   and
2. If his temper would be an issue as president

Apparently the rest of the meeting was so boring that my temper question raised a few eyebrows over at places like MSNBC, FOX, CBS and was even a featured story on CNN. Google news even gave it it’s own section. City newspapers such as the LA Times and the New York Times also had their say.

The Libby Quaid of the Associated press picked it up as well, so it’s been popping upon all sorts of places from Yahoo! News to every other news palce you can think of. The blogosphere also started reacting, placed including the Pensito Review, Hot Air, and Weasel Zippers (although I’m sure there’s others).

I’m working right now on getting the full question(s) up on here so I can respond with my reasoning in a better fashion, but for now we’ll have to do with the CNN / WDIV video (which is better than the youtube one), which they don’t let you hotlink so you have to go HERE to view it.

Now, I don’t like the video at all. It completely cuts off the first part of my second question, initially adressing the issue, and hearing a response from him. However it starts with my response from what he said which was something along the lines of “I get angry because I have passion”. It makes me look like I opened my statement praising his passion, which I didn’t do. That was not my intent.

I do however, respect the fact that he is passionate about what he does. I feel if you’re going to be one of 2 people representing a state, you damn well better be passionate about it.

I also highly respect the fact that he is actually taking audience questions, which has monumental potential for catastrophe. But I think it’s something that every politician should do, and the audience should not discourage that. Which is why I asked the question I did in the manner that I asked it. He’s giving us the chance to talk to him one on one, no reason why we can’t do it like civilized people. (That, Trish at the Pensito Review is why I asked the question nicely. And for the record, no, I didn’t lose a bet).

Besides, I did a good job of seperating myself from the protesters who I hung out with before we all went over in a group to the meeting. I didn’t want to spoil my assimilation by attempting to make an ass out of McCain and instead make an ass out of myself (which I’m sure some will argue I did anyways).

There were tougher questions I could have thrown at him. About the war, the economy, how he always votes party line when things matter. I could have gotten into an argument with him about his response, as it wasn’t exactly what I was referring to. I don’t care that he gets angry about a bridge to nowhere. That’s not special, so do I. But I don’t get into it and scream “fuck you” to show how angry I am with other senators of the same party. That’s just rediculous, and he knew damn well what I was talking about and chose to ignore the basis of it and talk about how he’s angry with the status quo.

The more I sat there contemplating asking this question, the more I thought it would end like this. His straight talk is more of a straight and narrow line for what he wants to address, which I think he proved very well yesterday if you listen to his responses on a lot of these questions. But that’s neither here nor there.

It also identified me in the papers as a “concerned republican voter”, which I did say. Which was more of my way of identifying myself as someone who does not support Clinton or Obama, as with a question like that you can almost hear the crowd under their breath go “here’s more liberal hippie bullshit”, so I had to put that to rest quickly.

So in all, I felt the answer was unsatisfactory, and of course he played politics with it. If your essential response to “Will you temper be a problem” is “I’m an angry guy”, then you’ve raised more questions than you’ve answered.

OK So I haven’t been posting much lately. I’ve been super busy with a million things and had to take a few weeks off. My sidekick is in the shop. My Macbook Logic board died and had to get replaced. I renewed my NAPP membership. I renewed my LP membership. I got an xbox 360 so I could play GTA4 (now you know where my time has gone).

My loft looks like shit. There is garbage and clothes all over the place. I need to clean it. And I will soon, but things have been going back and fourth from GTA, Homework, School, and hanging out. Not neccessarily in that order. But I have found time for some other random stuff that will work it’s way over into the Photoshop section of this website at some point. I’ve been posting up in the NAPP battleground, here’s some of my stuff

This is a CD cover, we had to make the band name a random wikipedia entry, the album name the last 4 words of a random quote generator, and the cover had to be a random SXC.HU image.

Here someone posted an eyeball and we were supposed to do whatever we could with it. This is what I got:

And this sucker is the result of battle for week 114. The image was a shield with crossed swords, and we had to make what we wanted out of that. I was a little unorthodox in my methods.

More posts and ramblings coming soon.