ROTL Public Service Announcement. (1.3.2011)

ROTLites-

First off let us say Happy New Year to you all. We'd like to sincerely thank you all for your consistently strong readership/viewership over the first five months. It's been a fun 2010 and we've done nothing over the past several weeks but brainstorm expanding the entertainment variety we provide here. Publishing primarily original content (oc) is what was aimed for initially, but until we get a hell of a lot more time outside of 50hr+ work weeks and/or some flow from this project there's no way to really accomplish that with the existing standard of five new posts a week ha. So instead of flying toward the sun with wax wings, we're going to do all we can to get the hardware needed to take on more creative ROTL/AREPATmedia projects. This workflow will presumably then be integrated with our existing content varieties.

This ROTL experiment can no longer be labelled as such in our eyes; a nice rhythm has formed regardless of vacations, weather, carshow weekends and lifes' adventures. Before we go as far as formally advertising this site, we'd like to work the word of mouth angle further. This site is free and that's what makes the Internet great. While we won't be asking for monetary contributions we do want you all to continue telling your friends about this site; facebook, twitter, iphone, android, windows mobile, palmOS, RSS, morse code, email, sms, stanley cups connected by string, etc. Please spread the ROTL link(s) and give us more pressure to perform. In addition, link/patronize the hell out of the people, businesses, artists and contributors that help make up what you see on here. And lastly, please visit us here on the actual website as well as the FB page to let your presence be known. We enjoy hearing from you all on the things you like and enjoy all the comments and posts received thus far.

If you're new to the site, welcome. If you're a repeat offender, welcome back. We'll continue to deliver the goods in 2011, so grab a spot on the couch and grow with us.

-ROTL Staff

White Wagon: day one.

Well, it's here.

The 91 passat wagon has come home,
and it's time to get to work.

And do i have a lot of work ahead of me. Front suspension is mostly toast, and the motor needs a complete teardown. There are also small issues in the interior, mostly broken trim pieces that I'll scavenge over the next several months. A full and complete scrubbing in and out is also in the cards.

First, however, was to get rid of the grime on the corrado "sebring" wheels. They won't be on long, but they need to be serviceable while they're there. A quick acid wash (I love the 80's!)and a high pressure spray down was enough to get about 90% of the years of baked on crud to relinquish its devilish grip. However, there's quite a bit of stains leftover, so it looks like a spray down with some generic oem-wheel-silver-in-a-can is in the future. With the clamp on wheel weights on the outside of the wheel, however, this step will have to wait until i can have them rebalanced. The crubbage is great, as well, so a mild scuff down will commence immediately prior. In the meantime, a quick blowover on the centercaps got it looking respectable enough from ten feet.

Next on the list will be a repair to the passenger control arm. The rear bushing is almost completely shot, due to the oil/coolant mixture pouring itself onto the original 150,000 mile units and wearing it out even faster than normal. A temporary setup will be dispatched immediately to remedy this particularly annoying situation as I clunk down the road.

A complete 16v refresh will start probably in December, as well as a full suspension refresh. OEM +/- is the order of the day, with upgrades as I go along. Until then, here's a pic or two to tide us all over.

before:


after:


Little things!

an introduction

So by way of invitation, I welcome myself to ROTL.
Like our other internet overlords here, I, too, am a car dude.
Starting back with early fuzzy memories of my dad's beetle, to later early fuzzy memories of the Plymouth Valarie my stepfather rolled around in, to that great menagerie of minivans that paraded themselves through my parents garage, I've always possessed an intense interest in all things motorized. I sent Ford several renderings of "future" vehicles in the late 80's to try and entice them into hiring my then 8 year old self straight onto their design team. I have documented evidence that I personally invented the Drivers Side Sliding Door(tm) from somewhere around that time period.

Cars are in my blood, too. I have a fantastic photo of my maternal grandfather on the back of an 18wheeler with a 21 stud flathead on a hoist smiling at me from beyond. I really oughtta scan that so I can show it off. Perhaps I'll make that a little project for here. One of my uncles was also a Ford fanatic, so much so that he became a master tech for them, before striking out on his own!

I'm not sure why I didn't become more of a Ford Fan, after all the evidence presented to me about how great they are, I somehow managed to find my way to the German persuasion. Perhaps it's my given name. Or my surname? Or my immigrant grandparents on both sides? Who knows. I still appreciate a good domestic motor every now and again (hell, my blood is blue, just not sure if it's the VW or Ford hue-ishness).

But I've arrived at the conclusion of my short car-dude resume, at least as a result of genetics. Nothing quite does it for me like something that came from Bavaria, or the black forest, or near the Rhine, Stuttgart, etc... and thus, I've arrived here.
Allen has summed it up well, and I'll be happy to follow in his orbitaling footsteps.
Neo-Vintage. Dang.

You'll find posts from me ranging from the cool and interesting to the totally foppish and non-car related. I'll be posting occasional updates to my personal project these days, but I don't know if this site can handle the power. There will be the occasional insight, but we'll have to leave most of that to Allen and Ethan. Please continue to enjoy to this little corner of the internet, and we'll keep trying to entertain you!

The sickness.

Anyone who is a true carnut has had something similar to the following chain of events happen: "I need a car just to run around in as a daily, so I can stop driving my project car around." "I'll just get some coils for it." "Coils and wheels, breh. That's all I'm doing." "I'm just gonna respray the front bumper, it's got some road-rash on it from the previous owner." Next thing you know, a car you thought you like has been sold, proceeds are quickly dumped into parts, swag and bodywork for the new car. And you know what the problem now is? The new car is way too nice to drive everywhere, so you need another gd daily.

Back in 98' I had no car to call my own. My car was always the car I borrowed from my parents to run around in. Then that June I had an opportunity to buy something with my parents assistance (read "credit & down payment"). It had to be cheap so I could handle monthly payments as I was a semi-jobless college student. I got that car, was quite enamored with it. I got a little more into show going, bought a couple more enthusiast magazines than before and next thing you know I had a grandiose plan of how I was going to blow the rest of my money until I built my perfect version of that car. Time slowly grinds by as I had little money to modify it. As broke-ness kept me from major purchases over the years, my tastes adjusted themselves; I wanted my car fast at first, then I realized my limitations on funding and focused on looks. Fast forward to 06', I'm now gainfully employed, and I found a place that could take care of the bodywork my beloved aging car needed as well as make my vision come to fruition. There was one problem that I didn't think of before I was a month away from dropping it off, "what the hell am I going to drive around in while the bodywork takes place?"

This was the beginning of the end...in a way. I bought a second car, for the "interim"; it was an even older car, albeit nicely restored. I learned something very important about myself when I bought this second car; I can't have things that were beat to sht before I got them and if I could, I'd buy everything new. If I had a more agreeable disposition I could just buy a cheap import hatch with good mileage and just get through life with a mp3 stereo for the road trips and regular maintenance; but I'm not built that way. Everything I have must be at a certain level of niceness and I'll do whatever it takes to keep that up.

As I've gotten older, playing the game with stuff I've put together, buying assorted jewelry for my cars over the years, selling my last project (the second car) and replacing it with a new one this past winter (the third car), I've matured slightly. I've gotten a bit more realistic with my goals, I've lost a bit of the steam on my relentless pursuit of finishing things right now, and am doing a better job of not blindly spending on cool parts n' sht. Of course there are things that make my slight maturation a necessity now; I'm married and own a home (I miss not owning a mortgage) with a lovely but small garage for my first car; I also have a gang of joint bills to pay every month and there are bigger and better investments to throw money at. But when I think about it...if I didn't own a house right now and slept in the ol' twin mattress at my parents house and still had my current job, I would be on the same high-speed pace as before. I would be made fun of by my coworkers, but I would have dopeness as far as the eye could see...all on my parents (and gf's uncles) driveway. My parents would be periodically (read bi-weekly) harassing me to grow up and get out of the house. I'd probably still be married, but under constant verbal assault from Beth on when we're going to buy a house; I'd use the "this market is terrible, we need to wait" defense for a year or two, then it'd be right now as I type.

I guess what I'm getting at, for all of you out there with this sickness, is to keep things reasonable and think long term. It's just a car. If you don't own a home how can you have a dope garage with all your dope sht in it? Mid-life crisis purchases make up for this time of light cash flow. You will buy something better than your current car 3-5 years from now. And you may ask yourself, "Is spending ten grand on upgrade parts, bodywork and a respray a good idea?" Well, I can't answer that question for you, but if you live with these questions, you've come to the right place.

Here's an e-beer to everyone who has a car or three that won't stop yelling at them for money, and are happy to provide it. I'm gonna go blow a couple grips on another set of wheels and write a post about it.