UnknownPilot

Nice! Finn MiG-21's. Those bare metal skins are simply awesome. That, plus the Finnish markings make an already cool looking plane look even more awesome. Just a shame it is such a pig. lol (I downloaded a cockpit for the 21MF and tried it out, while the AI seem to zip around in it, all I could get it to do was stall and flounder and be a target)

Could not agree more. As I said in the other thread about the F-105 in the SF General Discussion forum - this is not to brag, the the LOMAC guys dreaded us IL2 guys coming in because "you prop guys know how to dogfight". And it makes them do a double take then you gun down their Flanker in an Eagle, because they think it shouldn't be possible. (but all they do is BVR button pressing, or rely on their rides' better agility and slam the throttles and pull back on the stick till they get a kill - actually not so unlike the VVS guys in IL2 with their Yak3 and La7s) I've done similar experiments and it's fascinating. A friend of mine, who is now hooked on SF2:V at my place, has been my guinea pig and observation experiment. He loved LOMAC to death too, but just couldn't get on with IL2. In fact, I tossed him into a P-39 cold (with virtually no sim stick time at all), explained the Cougar profile to him and let him have at it. I figured the Airacobra with it's tricycle landing gear would be a bit easier to move into (and I didn't find it difficult at all, personally... lol). He could barely get it off the ground. And after getting passed that, it was a struggle to get him to look around and attain SA. He wanted to do everything through a HUD (which wasn't there of course). And combat was exactly as described - bank and yank and wait for the kill shot (which never came). When he was flying A2A in SF early on he still wasn't looking around, but I was guiding him and telling him what the AI was doing when it left his FOV, and it helped him quite a bit (one particular instance that came to mind when writing this was a rolling scissors broke out when he overshot the AI). It wasn't that I had 6th sense, just that I was familiar with those close in situations. He later acknowledged how much it helped him and how he needed to get feel for that. He's finally using the view control and is getting better with SA now, but I still can't get him to turn off the red boxes yet. Regarding WWI, did you know those guys are really no different than the modern button pushers? Just without the buttons. lol What I mean is when I got into FS-WWI, I was doing some online stuff and was frustrating them as well. They didn't seem to understand how I managed to stay above them all the time and be faster. I remember talking to Argon and some others about it (when helping them with the Dr1 and Camel tuning, among other things). Even some IL2 guys who loved biplanes got argumentative when I suggested that the romantic notion of angles fighting never really existed and that you could E-fight in those crates too. (I mean, read Richtofen's comments or the Dicta Boelcke, or note the success of the SPAD - the Jug of it's day, it was all about the Energy Fight, as it would later become known) If I can find my CFS3 I might just have to get OFF, but I worry about it. Even FS-WWI was lacking in some of the dynamics. The planes just don't have the nasty habits and difficulties they should. :( .....but I digress. Oh, another interesting thing, my friend that I mentioned, I don't think he even uses the pedals as even a footrest. He says he uses them, but I've never seen it. I use them all the time and even then still probably don't use them often enough. I love a plane with good rudder authority, especially if it doesn't have too much induced roll. There are countless times the rudder is useful or even vital, but if you don't think like a stick and rudder guy, you are left out and struggle, even in your mighty missile armed afterburning jet.

Hmm... I wish there was some way to jack up the AI and make it dangerous, not just squirrely. One thing that seems to work is putting them in US fighters. F-16 and F-14 AI seem pretty aggressive. AI Su-27s... so-so. Another weird thing is that it seems to get more aggressive over time. Not sure that's true and I can't really prove it, but I swear they are using their weapons and coordinating more and actually shooting me down now. A bit of a surprise (and very welcome). But that might be Feb patch too....

Absolutely. A2A is "sexy" and "fun" and makes for great movies, but it's dropping iron that really gets the job done. A2A isn't a pipe dream though, whether observing or bombing, you want to knock the enemy planes out of the air, and they want to do the same to you and you both want to protect your own assests as well. So, in the end, A2A is a support mission, and once air superiority is attained, it doesn't really have a use. Thunderbolts FTW (P-47 and A-10 ).

Well(!)....... the F-14A is actually QUITE agile. Those straight wings, combined with full length leading edge slats and full length flaps really make a huge difference. It certainly IS underpowered, but that's really it's only drawback, and that was known from the outset and was only intended to be interim, but politics and finances got in the way, so the B never materialized as intended, so the D ended up as the definitive version. As I mentioned elsewhere here today, the planned upgrade, the ST-21, would have been an upgrade of existing airframes, resulted in more agility, lower take off and landing speeds, higher take-back loads, and an all around better job of meeting the requirements the Navy is using the Super Hornet for, however it would have been done for pennies on the dollar in comparison. Not only that, there is a thread here F-15 vs F-14 that is a real eye opener on just what that heavy 2 seater can really do. And finally, the F-14 is lightyears ahead of the F-111, which had already been eclipsed by the MiG-23 in terms of performance. So, IMO, you seem to be selling it a bit short, and it is actually a great example of taking a good bomber and making it into a great fighter. I had come from the F6F in CFS2 and was getting my ass handed to me regularly in the 109, and getting very frustrated by it. It didn't help that I REFUSED to fly a commie crate. hehe Eventually I tried the 190 and chose to find a way to make it work, and I did. And then branched out from there and suddenly found success in the 109 as well (even though they are completely different in every way in terms of how you use them). It became a running gag after awhile. The guys I was flying with would say things like 'look out, he's diving on you', "yeah, I know, he's always diving on me", and.... 'I'll dive down, he won't follow me into the weeds' "Uh, tally" 'is he diving?' "no, he's re-entering!" And like you said, Thud or Phantom, it's the same as 190 vs Spit, except that in this case it would be more like 190 vs P-11z or J8A. Well that's just it, put a burner can on the 'hawk and it would be a different story. Didn't the Argentines do something like that? The FightingHawk or something? It was fast and turned great. E-retention is more about piloting than airframe. Airframe would come into play for things like drag, and you generally don't retain in a turn. And if the slats were coming out, it sounds like he was getting slow in the first place (which may have just been a result of low thrust - ie, lack of A/B). Regarding the F4U, it was a better turner than the Jug was. And in truth, the Jug isn't all that bad either, it's just a matter of relative perspective. However, the reason it "took over everything" was because Grumman chose to replace the Hellcat, rather than upgrade it, and they went in the direction of pure performance, pure fighter. But by that time, the war was over and the future was turbojet powered as far as the Navy was concerned, so the hose nosed ensign eliminator was pressed into A2G duty. In an A2A fight, the Bearcat would have mauled it... bad. But it was just bad timing. (unfortunately :( ) Anyway though... taking timing into consideration, your idea of the Skyraider, as well as the afforementioned Ardvark show that you CAN convert a bomber into a fighter, and have it be great. It's just in which bomber you start with, and how you do the conversion. Even older and with less converting (none at all actually) is the Bristol F2B. A 2 seater observation/"bomber" that actually out fought the fighters of it's day. lol

What's all this talk of fighters and turning? You all need to be assigned some homework! Go fly FW-190s (Antons in particular) and Me-262s, and Do-335s until turning and air-combat no longer go together in your minds. (or you could even fly a Jug in the PTO or against 109s down low, too) When I first got into LOMAC online, one of the guys there expressed concern when he heard that I came from IL2 and I asked why, and he said something to the effect of "because you prop guys know how to dogfight". This played out as I was able to get many guns kills on Flankers with the Eagle. While the LOMAC FM could easily be criticized, they did try to at least make the relative aspects match up appropriately. It was not that I could make an F-15 turn with an Su-27 - it just wouldn't. It was about energy fighting against a jet guy who only knew how to slam the throttle and put the stick back. I've read that when Crusader and Phantom crews could mock dogfight early on, the Crusaders always won, but when a Crusader pilot transferred the Phantom, he wondered at how that was possible. Pretty much the same concept in application. Slart, I disagree with the idea that you can turn a fighter into a bomber but not vice versa. You can strap ornance to a fighter, sure. But doing so leaves you with a heavily burdened fast mover - that isn't really made to go that slow, and has no armor. I'd much rather be in a dedicated mud mover (ie, A-10 over A2G F-16). Doing it right involves a thorough redesign and new build, ala A-7 (it was different enough that existing F-8 airframes couldn't be field swapped into A-7s, they had to modify the design itself and build new frames). And as such, you could certainly go the other way, within reason. Go back to the blue-prints and get to work slicing and dicing anything that isn't needed for the new role and adding what is. In that way, the 105 or 111 could be transformed. (arguably the 111 WAS transformed in this way, the result was called the Tomcat) Again, disagree. Yes, the AI does have 720* vision, and can often break when it shouldn't, but, that said, I've gotten many gun kills in the Thud, and the A-4. In the A-4 I just conserve momentum, and in the Thud I use brute force, but the results and technique are much the same.

Sounds like your Uncle was a cool guy. To them both. Regarding the F-Body..... all evidence I have seen shows that the truth is much different than the statements. I am not one for conspiracy theories at all, but certain things are just obvious. There are only 2 options, managment to utterly inept it wrapped right around from fail into eventual win, or.... it was planned. In short, what I'm getting at is, GM wanted to kill the F-Body. And apparently it was solely to get out of their contract with St Therese. As long as those cars were in production, GM was obligated to stay at that factory. The only way to get out was to kill the car. From 1999 to 2002 they did NOTHING to it. 4 production years of identical cars. The only change from 98 was some very minor engine stuff to sort out the teeth troubles of dropping the LS1 into that chassis. They also cut back on options, and continued to raise the price. So the 2002 cost more than the 1999, for no reason at all. There were precious few changes during the LT1 era (from 1993 to 1997). And while the 4th Gen chassis is MUCH stiffer, and came equipped with more power and more options, it was still just a minimally revised 3rd Gen (change out the front suspention from MacPheresons to SLA, and stiffen the chassis, that's it). There is at least 2 Cat's Eye (what I've always heard the 91-92 styling revision of the Pontiac's referred to as) T/As running around with C4 IRS's stuffed in them as test mules. It didn't interfere with anything in any way and wasn't that hard to do. The goal was to put it into production, but the mothership nixed it. The GTA ('87-'92) was originally intended to have the GNX Turbo 6 in it from the outset. The mothersihp again nixed this idea as well. The intent of the GTA was to chase down the more affluent import buyers. The people who wanted tech move than V8s, and chose the RX7s or 300z's over F-Bodies or Corvettes. In my opinion, had that occured, IRS would have soon followed, inevitably and necessarily. However, all they managed to do was a limited production run for the Anniversary edition in 1989. There was talk of either killing the cars after the 3rd Gen wind down, or making them go V6 FWD (ala Ford Probe). Ever since the slow down of the early 3rd Gen, GM has basically had it out for those cars (sort of how there have been many attempts to kill the Corvette over the years as well). So what's that got to do with anything? Well.... I've read many things about clashes between Detroit and the CAW. GM also wanted to build SUVs instead of camaros and Firebirds. And they wanted to scale back dramatically long before Putz (err.... "Lutz") ever came on board. The only way to do this was to cause sales to drop sufficiently to allow them to pull out of their contract with St Therese. When the people who made Knight Rider 2000 went to GM asking to use the Banshee concept, GM refused. Outright stating that it might lead to popularity and demand for production. (potential sales, I mean what buisness would ever want such a thing? This wasn't speculation either, Smokey and the Bandit proved the concept beyond any doubt) Though I have seen a few commericals for the 4th Gens (and have them favorited on YouTube), I have NEVER seen them on the air. And I watch a lot of TV. lol In fact, other than Knight Rider, I never saw any 3rd Gen commericals either. They did 1 dealer video, and I think 2 other commericals total (1 in 82 and 1 in 85 or 86). There were a few magazine ads, but precious few, and only on Pontiac magazines. Even for the despicable camaro, the same is true. I've seen 1 ad on YouTube, but never any on TV. It takes effort to be that dense about a product. Especially one popular enough to prevent you from shutting it's production down legally. It would be cheaper (assuming they had no desire to pull out of St Therese) to support the products and reap the profit from the sales. But they didn't do that. Now... once they achieved this, we all listed to Bob Putz tell us how the F-Body belonged in the 70s and nobody wanted it anymore, and that the GTO was what the people wanted. The GTO sales in 2004 - 2 years after the shut down of the F-Body. Coming online with 2 years of hype, and a clean slate from an historical/marketing/public mind-set standpoint... only managed to come close to V8 Firebird sales. Not beat, not match.... just come close. And not all Firebirds, and certainly not all F-Bodies. Chevy during this time period had no answer/counterpart to the GTO, and the camaro was historically the higher volume brand. So that's a lot of sales flushed. In addition to the marketing money spent (I actually DID see several GTO ads, not a huge amount, but the fact that any got aired at all is a huge difference). As early as 2006 inside information was being leaked that the camaro was coming back. The GTO was a flop and didn't make it any futher. The Solstice was a hit, but the much ballyhooed GTO was not recieved. The simple fact of the matter is, despite what that schizo bastard (lutz) wanted to tell us, people wanted the Firebird. Not a glorified RWD V8 cavalier (aesthetically) with a GTO badge slapped on it. (I DO like that GTO btw, and would love to have one, I'm just making a point) Even the G8 was better recieved. But beyond the failure to supposedly understand market desires from the Pontiac end, if the camaro was such a poor seller that it had to be killed, why was it being planned to be brought back, even before the Challenger hit the show circuit? No, it sold. And it sold enough to be profitable. It was KILLED, with intent from iniside. (along with Pontiac, but nevermind that now, that's a diatribe for a later date lol) Sorry, not ranting AT you, just TO you. It's a sore spot with me and just thinking about it can trigger it. hehe

They've been saying that since the Me-262 (too fast to (gun) fight). As long as you and your opponent are on a similar speed and maneuverability scale, gun fights aren't that hard. I've been doing some missions lately testing out aircraft, and my test is the F-16. I have a mission with 2 groups of 2 F-16s, and they are armed with AIM-9Ls (all aspect). And my goal is to not out-range them, instead to get in close, and then take them out. When using the Flanker A and Fulcrum A, the missiles they came with (Atoll Ds being the best) were utterly worthless and just dead weight. So it ended up being a gun fight, and the Flanker is more than capable of taking them out with guns (it's a lot more effort in the Fulcrum, unfortunately [as I aesthetically prefer that one, plus the SF version has a better done cockpit than the SF Flanker]). Regarding landing speeds... what's high? The F-14A (ok, that's late 70s introduction, but in practice it was 1980+) I've gotten to touch gently at 110KIAS. As supermanevuerability remains important, each successive design seems to be dropping wing loading and increasing thrust loading, as well as using various flaps, slats, and FBW tricks to basically make these fighters fly like aerobatic planes, with slow landing and rotation speeds, great handling, and ridiculous top speed, climb and acceleration. (one page I was reading said that the ST-21, the planned upgrade for the existing F-14D, could have taken off with a full combat load with a 7kt TAIL wind, and brought 16,000lbs of ordnance and fuel back aboard. )

That thing is positively drool-worthy. A full size jet powered aerobat. (more fun than an Extra 300 )

Neat idea, and it's cool that it can be done. There is one problem though. I don't often spend too long on the main menu (or any of the menus for that matter). So using a full song like those will end up resulting in you hearing just brief snippets of the beginning over and over and over and over and over again. It's better to have something instrumental, and even more-so to have it be a loop of some sort, that way it doesn't matter which part of it you hear. But maybe that's just me. (I tend to get songs stuck in my head really easily, and when it's a brief snippet of a song, it drives me nuts, real fast lol)

They must've been overly inspired by Fatbeard/Captain Cartman. Full episode - http://www.southparkstudios.com/episodes/220764

On a related note (not trying to drag your thread O/T WM ) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdNqUW5wwTE

Thanks! I just washed it yesterday and planned to go out for a drive on the backroads today with the camera. I wanted to get some shots among nature, preferably the blooming of Spring. But everywhere I went there was either no place to pull over and park, or nothing worthy as a backdrop. grrrr. There's a red covered bridge around here, thought that would be perfect, but it was freakin' Grand Central Station today. Ah well... Interesting story too. Wish I could have taken a tour of that place. Most people seriously underestimate these cars because of the brand, they are far more sophisticated, strong, and all around amazing than (most) people realize. This is my 3rd. My first was an '84 T-Top WS6 equipped Trans Am, off-white with gold accents and wheels (didn't like the color scheme at all). That got wrecked unfortunately, but I was already starting to feel my interest in it wane as a friend had planted the GTA seed. So after that happened, I went and got a black '88 hardtop GTA with the gold lace wheels and a tan cloth interior. Didn't care for the interior color, but LOVED that car to death. Unfortunately, it too got wrecked. Several years of pennance in boring ass FWD 6-bangers passed before I was finally able to take delivery of this beast. And this time, it's exactly what I wanted - color, options, everything. (except that I wanted a hardtop, but since 1998 they didn't make any hardtop T/As, the bastards - however, for the 4th gens, there's really nothing more than just a skin of sheet metal, meaning hardtop or t-top, it's just cosmetic. I love t-tops, but as I want it to last forever and love the twisties, I'm concerned with structural integrity. My '84 had all the structural rigidity of a warm pile of taffy. But the 4th Gens are different. Even I didn't know it at first and I'm a Trans Am guy. lol That's what I mean about them being surprising. 4th Gens are tanks, not just in weight, but strength. I've seen pics of 1 rolled at >100mph and it looked fine. The pics were posted by the person who was driving it when it rolled. And... I could ramble on for ages, but I'll spare you all. lol ) As soon as I get some spare cash to blow, I'm going to pick up a 3rd vehicle for a daily driver, so that I can park my current daily driver and make it a fun toy as well - 2003 Dodge Dakota R/T extended cab R/Ts are an inch lower than the "Sports", per the factory. They are RWD only, have 4.11s in the back, and a fairly stiff suspension. Rolling on 255/55R17s on all 4 corners. A nice thick steering wheel with quick ratio steering, 4-wheel disc brakes, but front-only ABS and no Traction Control of any kind (other than your right foot). It's packing a 360ci (5.9L) Magnum under the hood, but that isn't as impressive as it sounds, it's very lazy (because of hyper restrictive exhaust, low C/R, and a mechanical fan, and it's built for low revs, but it's got plenty of torque, and with those rear gears, it gets up and goes - surprises a lot of cars). Black/Grey interior (from the bottom of the door windows, down, is black, above that is grey. Sounds weird but it looks nice), leather seats (driver's is full power adjustable), 6-disc CD changer (stock), and a "trip computer" in the headliner. 4-speed auto. It came with a roll up tonneau cover and a tough plastic bed liner, so even though it's a street truck it can still haul stuff. I carry loads of wood in it all the time. It was actually my Grandfathers truck. 70-something years old (when he bought it (new)) Korea vet, always been a truck guy, traded in his 4x4 quad cab Dakota for this after I bought my Trans Am. It's a sweet ride and most people can not beleive that my Grandfather bought it. When he was still alive he would frequently get people asking "what's an old guy like you doing in a truck like this?" lol So aside from just being a nice truck, it's special to me. The way it is in that pic is exactly the way he left it. I have since taken the cowboy hat off the rearview, because I can't stand anything hanging from my rearview, it's too obstuctive. I don't plan to overly modify it. But once I can park it and put some money into it, I'll be getting the 20" R/T rims (just like whats on there, but 20" rather than 17" - to fill in the gap), higher performance tires, new shocks with increased re-bound damping (it needs that desperately), possibly a set of sway bars, a new exhaust, electric cooling fans, computer tune, and possibly even a home designed intake manifold (have some sick ideas in that dept.). A friend of mine wants me to twin turbo it, junk yard style (ie, on the cheap). He's a forced induction junky though, I doubt I'll go that route, personally. Beyond that.... who knows. Maybe I'll do more, but probably not. Only time will tell. But I do need to get a true beater so that I can better keep the R/T in good shape. I've blown off cars driven by dudes who think they are mr cool in their riced out civic or mustang gt and the like. Both at the light, and on the backroads (it'll grip like a mutha through the twisties, R/T doesn't stand for Road and Track for nothing. )

In that case, have a look at this - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnGJGnUO_90 (especialyl starting at abour 1 minute, 15 seconds).

I took the question to be in regards to TW sims, and on that note, I voted Vietnam. SF2:V is what truly got me into the series and brought me here. I have some earlier planes, and some what-ifs, but by and large my install is all about Vietnam. I would LOVE to mess with WW1 and 2 stuff in this series, except I can't. Without torque, gyroscopic precession, and prop wash modelling (even if it was just a fudge to make it feel right), I just can not use a single engine prop plane in this series. That leave only counter rotating twins, and there just aren't that many of those that are all that interesting. Modern stuff just can not be trusted. I seriously doubt that the full specs of any currently used fighter (US fighter at least) will be de-classified and available to the public. What-ifs are ok because they are what-ifs anyway, but a what-if that is supposed to be real just doesn't work (hard to explain, but it makes sense to me lol) Also, modern stuff doesn't really work well in TW sims either. The systems modeling is just not there (which is quite unfortuante because the FM (at least where jets are concerned) is excellent). However, it's just about perfect for pre and early radar and early to JUST maturing missiles (ie, '46 to mid to late 70s). All that said, if you take the whole of my simming experience, it's overwhelmingly WWII. :)

http://www.aolnews.com/world/article/us-mother-torry-ann-hansen-ships-adopted-son-back-to-russia/19433604?icid=main|netscape|dl1|link3|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.aolnews.com%2Fworld%2Farticle%2Fus-mother-torry-ann-hansen-ships-adopted-son-back-to-russia%2F19433604 Good lord. I know it's bad, but the twisted part of me can't help but find it funny too. lol

The article was pretty open about the adoptive parent's status. She's single with 1 biological child of her own, and she adopted this kid (for reasons unknown and not delved into by the article). Sounds to me like someone was being quoted, and when speaking, sometimes things are less than explicitly specific. I take it to mean that he/they want to freeze all adopts of Russian kids to anyone in the US, single parent or married couple.

Good point. :) That's why I am interested in advances in "hard" FM for various planes. I prefer to either tough it out, or edit as needed if a plane is too undermodeled in hard. :) (and it's always nice to hear when a simulated brick is actually just undermodeled and it would really be better/easier than that IRL. hehe :) - at least.... IF you can edit it. Oleg's drag-chute pulling F6F really sticks in my craw)

Thanks for that, I had no idea (about the formation dates of Israel, or the terrain dates). :) What happens if you exceed the terrain's date? I only have SF2:V, but have downloaded and installed several modern aircraft. I have had dogfights over North Vietnam against opponents, generate by the application with a stated date as recent as 2007. In those situations it seems to like to put Su-27s as the opponent. Looking at the ini file for that terrain just now I see that it went from '64 to only '75.

With all the great stuff here, I'm not too surprised really.

Any more news on this? I'm interested in any advances in "hard" FM add-ons. I can't stand the thought of "normal" FMs, feel like I ought to be playing an x-box game or Zaxxon or something.

I found this thread doing a search for Cobra Maneuver. heh (trying to find out why neither the TMF MiG-29s nor MarcFighters Su-27 seem able to do it - if it's something I'm doing wrong or not). ANYway.... Figured I'd contribute. :) I see the title is past tense, for me it's present tense. 2002 Pontiac Trans Am WS6. 5.7L LS1 (came stock with LS6 intake and may possibly be an LS6 block, some 25% of them were, but I can't read the block # to know for sure) WS6 hood de-baffled (by me) and painted with aircraft matte black paint inside (by a friend who's a painter - done because the fibre glass inside the hood is bright white and on a black car it just didn't look right) 6 speed T-56 275/40ZR17 on all 4 corners (again, stock size, the Goodyears have been replaced by BFGoodrich CompT/As though) Bosch 5.3 ABS/TCS system with Electronic Brake Force Distribution (stock) (this ensures maximum rear brake force allowing for improved performance under all conditions) Koni Single Adjustable shocks placed on all 4 corners (self installed) [this install also dropped the car about 5/8" up front and 1/2" in back, not only imparting a rake, but lowering the CG, which helps reduce body roll in corners and reduces nose dive and tail lift under braking, which with the EBFD improves the braking performance of the car) Double-adjustable rod-ended Panhard bar (self installed) SLP Sub-Frame Connectors bolted and welded in place (done when only 4,000 babied miles were on it) SLP Shock Tower Bar (self installed) Black with black leather interior Polk 10" sub and Kenwood 600w amp to drive it, mounted inside a "Stealth box" specially designed to hide away in the t-top holding area of the hatch Dyno'd at 300rwhp and 330rwtq (stock), running a 12.9 1/4 on the dyno. I would never abuse it on a real track in such a way, but it has been recorded more than a few times that these cars CAN reach those numbers on a real track, bone stock - Average is in the 13.2s however, with 0-60 coming in at 4.9 under ideal circumstances, and about 5.1 to 5.2 on average. Future plans include new wheels and tires (going with an 18/19 combo), dynamatting, interior re-build (to cinch it down), home made CarPC install, new exhaust (or maybe just electric cutouts), lid ((ram)airbox lid), PCM tune, either a watts linkage or a C4 IRS, if a watts linkage - then a Torsen T2R diff (hopefully in a lighter, stronger housing to reduce unsprung weight), upgraded T-56 (replacing some synchro keys and the weak (IIRC 3-4) shift fork), a set of matched stiffer sway bars, and some dress-ups - light an overlay on the front plate cover Phoenix, my Last of the Breed badges, etc. Down the road I might even look into trying to replace the ABS/TCS system with the one from the Corvette. Which is the same Bosch unit, just with all of it's features functional (whereas mine has some deleted). This picture is before the Koni install, so it's at stock ride height. I lifted the G6 ad-phrase because I felt it more appropriate for my car, and titled this pic "Beauty has a dark side". Taken in April a few years (06 I think?) ago just after washing and waxing it then taking it for a ride. Bought new in June of 2002, it had 9 miles on it when I took delivery (had to wait for it to arrive at the dealer, was bought before it ever even got there), it now has around 16,300 miles on it. (and much of those are from brief periods where I had to drive it every day due to my daily driver being out of commision for various reasons)

I never much cared for beer. Just something about the taste, I've tried several and never really liked any of them. But then I saw this, and it pretty much put me off beer - http://www.spike.com/full-episode/season-2-ep-6/28707

What is that?