It had to happen. The MINI got me in trouble. The first weekend I had it out this year, I got a speeding ticket. 86 in a 60, on the East Shoreway in Bratenahl. Coming around a bend, he got me with laser. The Valentine One lit up when he got me, but by then it was too late. Thankfully, the officer didn’t notice that I don’t have a front license plate. Though, that doesn’t make much sense, since he would’ve been aiming the laser gun at the front of my car, right about where my front plate isn’t. I won’t complain, though.

So, tonight I had to go to traffic court. Since I was more than 25 over the limit, the appearance was mandatory. I’ve had two tickets in the past, and didn’t go to court for either of them, so this was a new experience. I sat in the back of the courtroom and got to observe the goings-on for a while before it was my turn. Basically, everyone goes up, one at a time, to talk to the prosecutor. If you plead not-guilty, a court date is set up, and they go. For guilty and no-contest pleas, you sign a paper and wait your turn to talk to the magistrate, who sets the fine. A lot of people had done a lot of stupid things, but I noticed that a number of people who were only charged with speeding seemed to be able to plead their charges down, so I figured it’d be worth a shot. The people with 26 prior convictions, and the ones who were driving on suspended licenses or without insurance didn’t seem to be so lucky, though.
So, it’s my turn to go talk to the prosecutor. I sit down, and he says, “Speeding, 86 in a 60. Do you want to plead no-contest to this?” I reply, “well…can I plead to something with no points?” since it normally would’ve been two points on my license. He said, “For 86? I don’t know about that. Why were you going 86 in a 60?”

Show me more… »

Categories: MINI
1 Comment »

Looks like the Sheetz in Mentor is almost finished! Grand Opening this Thursday, January 25. I don’t know if they’re doing anything special, but if it’s like the last Sheetz opening I saw, they’ll have coupons for free stuff as well as cheap gas.

Categories: Uncategorized
1 Comment »

Last Saturday, a couple friends and I drove to Detroit to see the North American International Auto Show. I’d never gone before, but it was great, and was a lot bigger than the Cleveland Auto Show (which I’ve been to several times.) It was also a nice opportunity to try out my new camera (that I bought a day before the show). I finally got the pictures downloaded from it, straightened and cropped (thanks, Picasa) and uploaded to the Gallery.

There are a couple sub-albums of photos of vehicles that I thought were interesting, including the new 2007 MINI Cooper models and the upcoming Chevy HHR Panel. There are a few things that I wish I’d have taken more pictures of, but a lot of the really cool vehicles (like the new Camaro) had a lot of people crowded around them.

Categories: Uncategorized
2 Comments »

The next weekend (September 30th) we went back to do a more in-depth inspection of the panel truck and talk to the guy who was selling it. I crawled underneath it to check out the frame, and it was really solid. According to the owner, it spent its life down in the Carolinas, and likely never moved under its own power in Ohio, so it’s probably never seen salt.

There weren’t too many faults with the body, either. There was plenty of surface rust, but no major rust-through, except in the passenger-side footwell. The right outer cowl panel was missing and would need to be replaced, the left rear fender was in pretty sad shape.

The only major problem with the body was the back door frame. The top part of it had been cut out, and one of the rear roof supports had also been removed. It appears that someone wanted to fit something into the truck that was too tall for the opening, so they cut into the roof to make it fit.

The guy who owned the truck was pretty cool, and basically has his own private junkyard, mostly full of old Chevy and GMC trucks. We negotiated the price for the panel truck, and he offered to throw in a complete door frame section with part of the roof cut out of a similar-vintage Suburban for $50 more. I agreed to the purchase, left a down-payment with him, and let him know that I would be returning to pick up the truck the next weekend. In the meantime, he would get the door frame cut out of the ‘Burb and put it in the back of my panel truck.

Before we left, I took a few pictures of the truck. You can see them in the gallery.

Categories: Panel Truck
No Comments »

In September, 2006, I decided to undertake a project of epic proportions. Trust me… stand next to it, and you’ll agree that it’s epic! Here’s how it began….

I got a call from my Dad one day, “I found your panel truck.” When he and Mom were driving home from visiting me, he saw this old panel truck for sale. He gave me directions to the yard where it was sitting, and I planned to go past it when I drove down to their house to visit a couple weeks later.

It was a project that we’d discussed off-hand for years…. at one point, he pointed out that with the shape of the front end on the late ’40s-early 50’s Chevy trucks, you could cram in one hell of a motor (big V8, blower, and anything else you wanted) without having to cut up the hood, so nobody else would know what you had underneath. There’d be plenty of room to tub out the back fenders and run some really wide tires, too. It would get discussed a little bit now and then, “Hey, you could do this….” or “That’d work great in a panel….” when watching the SpikeTV PowerBlock. But we never did anything about it. It even took me a few minutes to realized that he was serious about it when he called me.

The next two weeks, I did a lot of research about these old trucks - how to identify the various model years, what things different people did to their projects and so on. I couldn’t stop to look at it during my drive down, but I did go past and make sure it was still there. At home, Dad and I made sure not to discuss it when Mom was around - we were sure she’d balk at the idea of me parking a rusty old truck beside the garage for the next few years.

Dad and I made an excuse to go and check it out the next day, Saturday, September 23rd. It was priced pretty reasonably, and overall it was in pretty decent shape. The owner wasn’t home, though, so we’d have to come back again later.

Categories: Panel Truck
No Comments »

On my way home tonight, the Blazer rolled over 200,000 miles. Who ever said that American cars don’t last?

Here’s to another 200k! (we’ll see….)

Categories: Blazer
No Comments »

Welcome to the new claancy.net. I’m still making changes and getting everything set up, but you can expect to start seeing updates very soon!

Categories: Uncategorized
No Comments »