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A conversation about cars, trucks, tugs and other machines of transport that flows like an ADHD fever dream, hosted by Hoonigan co-founder and 321 Action Action director Brian Scotto. Enjoy, it’s gonna be a bizarre ride.
S3 E20 Audio
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[00:00:00] And we're back with another episode of Firing Order, brought to you by Vyper Industrial. And as always, I'm your host, Brian Scotto. The topic today, the worst, that's right, the worst car mod trends of the last decade. And to debate this ever so important topic, we have the Zacs. We got Zac Mertens, AKA Mr.
Zachary, and Zack Klapman, probably best known from The Smoking Tire. We're gonna hurt some feelings today. Hopefully they're not yours. Enjoy. Legal disclaimer: It might actually be illegal to wear Heat Wave's polarized ultra black lenses while driving, but if you spend a lot of time in violently bright conditions, like snow or in the desert, then these lenses are gonna be perfect for you.
Traditionally, sunglasses have an 11% VLT rating, but these are cranked all the way down to 6%. That's limo tint for your eyes. They also provide a great level of ocular privacy for when you're looking at something you shouldn't be. I'll be wearing them tonight [00:01:00] while I'm sat next to my wife, scrolling Marketplace.
Avoid being blinded at heatwavevisual.com. What's that old saying? Don't ever meet your heroes. Unfortunately, this applies to cars, too, as my buddy Ken Block discovered when he bought his Ford RS200. To say it politely, the suspension sucked. So we went to KW to fix it on their seven-post suspension rig.
Some say it was misappropriated in the middle of the night from an F1 team, and it once knocked out the power grid of a small village. But what we do know for certain is that this machine allows KW to create any test conditions needed to best develop their suspension across the entire product line. Go check out kwsuspension.com and get yourself a kit developed on this insane seven-post technological torture device.
I, I mean, suspension rig.[00:02:00]
All right, boys, you ready to do this today? Yeah. Absolutely. It is the attack of the Zacs. How often do you guys, in a situation where you, the other person across from you has the same name, just off by a letter? Uh, last weekend. Yeah. Not often, but, yeah. Well, every time at Burnout Wars. Yeah. My business partner is Zach.
Yeah, yeah. Okay. Got that. It's a popular name in our generation. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. That, same for me. I was, Brian was the number two name of 1979, so grew up with a lot of them, which is why I go by Scotto, 'cause there's a lot of me. Anyway, no one cares about that. What people care about is today's topic, which is, for the first time ever, we're not going after the best in class, we're going after the worst in class.
This is the- Top five worst or just the worst five mod trends of the last decade Hell yeah, punching down- ... brought to you by Um, that's actually a good [00:03:00] point. Like, if it's too much of a punch down, uh, we're gonna have to call each other on it. So this can't just be I don't have enough money to do cool things to my cars, 'cause, like, I, I don't wanna...
Like, that's like- Oh, no ... whatever. This has to be these are bad decisions- Yes ... made with money. Yes. I, I can confirm that m- m- my list here is somebody spent good money doing this. Have you seen, by the way, when we talk about lists, you have one piece of paper over there that I gave you about 15 minutes ago- Mm-hmm
to write your ideas on. This man came with just a stack of paper. Yeah, he- Is this how, is this is what is expected from you at The Smoking Tire? No, no, no. We're much more, uh, fly by the seat of the pants there. This is like... I actually thought we were doing, like, a versus. Just because in my head it was a versus, and I was like, "Should I show up in a suit- Oh
and, like, bring a briefcase as if we're actually debating?" Just to be, just for a goof, but that was too far. Um, I just wanted to, like, collect my thoughts and write them out- Yeah ... and, uh, be able to present myself eloquently. He has cited sources. Yeah. Yeah. He's showed up, like, a full Wiki thing. He's just gotta go through it all.
He's like, "Hold on, but at, at [00:04:00] addendum." Yeah. Dodge versus Education 2 says- Uh, no, no. It's just, uh, so I could be a little more coherent than I normally am. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, by the way, I'm happy to have you finally come down to w- as far as you've come away from where you guys are up in... Where, where are you, Zac?
Playa Vista. Playa Vista. Yeah. Santa Monica adjacent. Well, you should- Let's be honest ... it's between... I'm, I'm the halfway point between you and Santa Monica. Yeah, I guess so. Yeah. Is that really him? It's west side. Yeah. It's west side. I know where it's at. I mean, you and I both lived on the west side. Yeah. We now slumming it down here in Long Beach, so thanks for coming down.
Thank you very much. No, thanks for having me. Welcome to the show. It's great. Yeah. So- Good to see you, too. Been a while Your credit score has lowered by at least 100 points now. Yeah, yeah. Definitely. Definitely. I, at fir- it's funny 'cause a lot of people were like, "Oh, you should have Zac and Matt on." And I'm like, that's- Their show That is the show Like, why why, why do that here?
Yeah Although it would be funny to have you guys on something like Firing Order, because it would put you in a different place, but- It'd be funny to have you conduct it- Yeah ... 'cause then you can kind of, uh- Yeah ... modulate that a little bit. But I don't know what we'd argue about, 'cause we tend to agree a lot [00:05:00] on most car things.
So I actually have a show that I want Farer to come on, and this'll be his invite, 'cause maybe he'll listen to this. Probably not. But, um, I wanna do a Firing Order with him and Vinny- Mm-hmm ... that is, uh, the don't meet your heroes cars. Top five cars that are not as heroic as you thought they should be. You should...
That, that's a great concept, yeah. Because I think bo- all three of us have sort of these feelings on certain cars we've driven that you're like, "These suck." Mm-hmm. Anyway, that's not the topic for today. So we set the ground rules, which isn't much, because honestly, this is a completely subjective day.
There's no horsepower numbers. There's no- Love this ... there's, there's no lap times. There is no anything that matters other than what the three of us think about this. Mm-hmm. No, that's right. We are just venting pure hatred today. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Today's a hate episode. It's gonna be fun. Well, it's like we're dads on the porch complaining- Fully
but we're also s- trying to pass the knowledge to the youth, so there's a little bit of constructive education I think. Yeah, yeah. Just don't, don't do this. When did, when did you realize that you are now part of the elder community in the car culture? When people would rip past me in loud cars, and Zac's gonna laugh at me right now, [00:06:00] and I'd be like, "Ugh."
Part of it, part of it is my increasing tinnitus as I get older, but then... And I also realized, I was like, "Oh, I, I don't wanna be that person. I used to be that person. What happened?" Zac pulled up, and, uh, my son came through the door, and I was like... He's like, "Zac's here." Which one? What? Yeah. That's rude. Yeah, I know.
My son opens the door, and he goes, "Zac's here." And then he looks at me, and he goes... Like he couldn't tell. Yeah. Because literally we could hear his car from, like, four blocks away. Mm-hmm. So. It's awesome. It's fantastic. By the way, you posted the other day that you were 40 now. Yeah. And the comments were all like, "Bro, I thought you were in your 20s."
Aw. Yeah. I don't, I- And I was like, "It's not how you look. No. It's how you act." Yeah. It's the irresponsibility for sure. Yeah, yeah. It's, it's 'cause I'm a child. Yeah, it is. Uh, I've just... I was actually talking to my dad about that. He's like, "You know, I've lived a very Peter Pan life." My little... It's funny, it's like I'm going to my little sister's wedding, and she's, like, 13 years younger than me.
My little brother's already married, on, working on sec- second child about to come. Yeah. Yeah, and then I'm, you know. That would just slow you [00:07:00] down too much. You know. Like, "Zac, I'm gonna build a blown V8 car that's completely useless." With, with the car seat in the back. Just park, park next to your other V8 blown car.
That's completely useless. Yes, yes. Okay. So- For everyone who doesn't know, this is how the show works. First, Zac will present his list, and then other Zac will present his list, and then I will present my list. Uh, and then we will take one from each of those lists, and we will move it on. And then we're, we're gonna do things a little bit different this time because we used to pick five.
We're gonna try going with just three, and actually grabbing more from the blind sides. 'Cause I think we realized that some of the Patreon list was better than our own list, so we want to be able to try to include them in a little bit more. I, I support that. Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, good idea. So, you wanna give me a little, uh, Patreon ad while you're here, 'cause you do them so well?
Ladies and gentlemen, look, if you are not subscribed yet, you need to go over to Patreon, okay? Patreon.com/brianscotto. I'm guessing that's what it is. It'll probably pop up in a link here. But that's where you get the [00:08:00] juicy stuff, and you can actually engage, interact. Hell, you can have a 57-hour-long conversation with Brian if you want.
He's got plenty of time. Anyway, go do that, because he can't have a normal job. We all know this. Support the man, okay? So he can keep doing this. All right, you ready to get into this? Yeah, support your rescue of broken European cars. Yeah, I got American cars in the package, too. You know, I, and I actually have a couple Japanese cars.
I do not discriminate. Yeah. I'd even, I d- I even have a few Italian cars. Right, as long as they don't work, you love them. One's behind me. Yeah. Yeah. I lost the key for that one, so it's technically broken. No, really? The key, the blade of the key fell out of the key. Yeah. Anyway. All right. Did you register it?
If anyone works at a Ferrari dealership and wants to help me with that, please, please DM me. But- They love doing that for free. Yeah, I know. For just 99 cents a month- ... you can save a Ferrari or a Maserati. In the arms of the angel. Donate right now, patreon.com/brianscotto. Brian drives [00:09:00] his cars. All right, guys.
None of them work, but one day- I don't think this is the show. Yeah. So anyway, uh- Okay ... top, top three terrible mods. Uh, selling anything to Brian Scotto. No. Yeah. All right. Uh, putting an Audi engine into anything. All right. Okay. Top mods, what do you got? My top three mod, terrible mods for the last decade are caliper covers.
That's a good one. The gunshot tune. Burble tune? Burble tune, I think gun- I think gunshot tune I think is even more offensive. Oh, is it, are we gonna cross a different... Okay. Fine, keep going. Yeah, I'm, I'm going all the way to gunshot, but burble was the gateway drug, for sure. And then the third one is fake toe straps.
Fake toe straps? So toe straps that are- With like the little heart on it, you know? Like the Right, right. Like slightly SMM Yeah, no, I know what you're talking about. I just wouldn't really, like, think about that. Is- do you feel like that's something you s- is that, like, a big ACH thing? Do you see a lot of people- I feel like I see them in town.
I saw one yesterday. Maybe it's just a recency thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But when they're... And then when they search pictures, there's, like, TRD branded ones and OMP- Mm-hmm ... branded ones, but they're [00:10:00] bolted to the grill. Hmm. And we can get into the details more of, like, why that's so stupid, but it should be pretty obvious.
But it's, like, it's a weird style thing, but it's completely useless, and also a little dangerous. Yeah, I actually had a, I had a tow hook on my Ferrari that wasn't, like, a fake one, but clearly the brand moved from, like, a casted tow hook to later on, like, a proper forged one, because mine snapped while I was trying to tow my Ferrari with it- Whoa
across four lanes of traffic. Luckily, I had a cop behind me. This is a great insert for that, uh, video of Nakai gluing a tow- Yeah, exact- yeah, yeah, exactly. Oddly, the 911 has a real tow hook on it that's connected to the body, but yeah, so. So that's m- that's my list of three. If you want the other two, I can do that.
Y- you have a lot of notes here. Yeah. So do you... I, I, I, this is not normal- Explain your answer. This is not normally how the show goes, but I don't want, I don't want you to have done all that work and not be able to present it. I don't mind doing the... Do, do you want me to explain my reasoning for the gunshot tune?
Uh, yeah, I want to, I want to hear you make the case for it. Okay, so my problem with the gunshot tune- Oh, gunshot tune ... is multifold. Uh, one, it damages your engine if you get too aggressive with the timing and the [00:11:00] fuel thing. Two, it straight up sounds like gunfire, and n- this happens near my house a lot, and I hear it, and I have to kind of really listen in and say, "Is that actual gunfire happening- Yeah
or just a dumb gunshot tune?" Are you, do you go on Nextdoor and post- No, I- ... with everyone else- Th- they spam too much ... who says, "Was that gunshots? That's gunshots. Are, are those gunshots?" Or is that only a Long Beach thing? I, I have unsubscribed from that w- uh, website 15 times. I keep trying to get away. Yeah.
I just think it, it's, it's based in trying to copy what race cars do. Right. And the reason race cars have a little, like, burble overrun is because they're blasting the cylinders with fuel to cool them off while the driver lets off the gas. But they're only doing it a little bit, but people have realized that if you just retard the timing even more and add more and more fuel, the lou- the sound gets louder and louder, and eventually you could damage your engine.
You could blow your cats out, which- Uh, I looked up for a BMW 335i, very popular with the gunshot burble community. Oh, it is. It is definitely- Oh, yeah ... when you say burble tune- What do you think? ... I think of BMWs. Exactly. Cats for that car start at 200 a piece. They go up to [00:12:00] 1,100 a piece. So you could cost yourself a ton of money.
200 a piece, is that like buying them from a guy who cut them out of your car? That's Magnaflow. No, that's Magnaflow prices. Okay. Okay. So Magnaflow, uh, magnaflow.com/brianscottpodcast. Shout out to Richard Waites. For sure. He- That guy's awesome. Yeah. So I just think it is, it is people trying to copy race cars, but then if all of you and your friends show up to the same In-N-Out, all with the same burble tune, no one thinks you're race car drivers, and if your friends arrive there first, they've already pulled all the ladies that love the sound of a burble tune- Right
'cause we know that that's who's really attracted to this sound. Of course. It is just- It is the male mating... It is the male mating call. It's a great way to meet other dudes that love BMWs. Oh, 100%, especially at gas stations. So I, I think they're so stupid. It sounds like ass, and also too, if you're retarding the timing, right, you're trying to cause the ignition to happen in the exhaust essentially, right?
Mm-hmm. Also, you're washing down your cylinders, right? You're just smoking cylinder wall. You're also washing down your oil with fuel, which you're gonna smoke some bearings. Actually, you know what? Just stay on that little burble. They s- keep doing it and just [00:13:00] blow your engine out. It'll work itself out.
Yeah. It's kind of like a social Darwinism thing. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Automotive Darwinism. We fixed the glitch, right. Yeah. Yeah. It sounds like ass. It sounds terrible. Like, it sounds terrible. But this comes from, like, one of the first manufacturers to do this was Mercedes. Yeah. Right? Was it? I think- Yeah ... you might know better
F- F-Type R in 2015 was the one that- You, you definitely know better ... that broke out, and I feel like that's where it really began, 'cause that, that car was so- What year was that? Uh, 2015 was the SVR. Oh, but, but I even, like, Mercedes had some sort of kind of burble pop all the way back to- Mm. Okay ... the C63.
Yeah. Like that had that- Like the, the air injection deal? Yeah, I don't remember how exactly they did it, but, like, I thought that was cool. I agree. So, so there has to... I, I think there's an issue here where it's not about the actual, and maybe that's why you say gunshot versus just the regular burble, but, like, there is, like, a level where it becomes uncool.
Correct. It's a spectrum. I, yes, it is. Because, like, my 911 has amazing decel pop. I love the decel pop [00:14:00] on my 911. Yeah, but also your 911 is, you know, forcing a lot of air and fuel and- I- a- and it's got a pretty built engine, and it does... It doesn't do it because it's tuned to do it. It does it because that's just how the engine runs.
Yeah. So I mean, it is tuned to do it, but not on purpose as a pop. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's not a basically stock engine that's just like, "Oh, dude, I want the burble. Mm-hmm. Let me get that burble tune, dog." So is, is, so is that the, um, is it like a comorbid? Like, the comorbid of this has to be that- It's on a stock engine I don't think it has to be on a stock engine- Or a stock-ish engine
'cause I think a lot of OEMs are doing it, like the, we all saw the video of the Elantra N. That guy got pulled over- Yeah, yeah, yeah ... for running track mode- Yeah ... 'cause it was doing all these big pops. But I think that's an example of it's gone too far. So I think when the, the car is stock, if it does a little voom, ba-da-ba-ba-ba, that's fun.
Mm-hmm. And we wanna have fun with cars, and we wanna feel like we're driving something rad. But when it starts to, like, popcorn down the road because people are turning all these knobs- Mm-hmm ... and, like, adjusting everything in, in the settings, [00:15:00] I just think it becomes, the sound gets offensive, it gets worse, and you know it's worse for the car.
It was cool in the '80s with a Quattro S4 on anti-lag. Sure. I mean, anti-lag's different. Anti-lag's a whole, anti-lag's a whole other thing. Yeah. It, it's, exactly. But, but that's what people are trying to create- Exactly ... is sort of that anti-lag sound. But the anti-lag sound is a whole other thing. Exactly.
Which is literally destroying your engine, but in the terms of racing, it's- Yeah ... keeping the power up. Exactly. Keeping all that energy, that heat into the turbo so you can keep that bitch spooled. Yeah. No, that's a pretty good one. And then the, uh, the, the caliper cover thing- Oh, my God ... the caliper co- Okay, so I think here's the difference, and this is, like, the, this is, like, the libertarian approach, is that, uh, gun pop burble tunes bother me.
Mm. Like, it literally bothers me Your caliper covers bother my eyes. It doesn't bother me in the same way. Like, I cannot look at your caliper covers. I cannot deal with your caliper covers. But, like, I d- have no choice but to deal with your verbal [00:16:00] ticks. That's a very good point. Yeah. You know? They find that- And, and when I say libertarian, I mean, like, you know, the whole idea of a true libertarian, not what libertarians are today, is, like, just don't do anything that...
Like, I won't do anything that bothers you. You don't do anything that affects my life. I don't do anything that affects your life. Like, that's the basic co- idea of it. Um- It, it's like if, if you don't- It's the same idea ... if you don't watch your neighbors have sex, who cares who they're having sex with? Se- right.
So I don't have to look at the caliper covers. Exactly. But- Exactly ... the gunshot tune, them coming in the living room- But they're having sex so loud in my- In my living room ... in my dining room. Knocking over my things. It's like, "Guys, can we just-" Yeah. By the way, I'm talking about Zac. But anyway. He's using the sex defense.
That was . Oh my God. Oh, I gotta hear this story after. Oh, bleep that. I gotta hear this after. Bleep it, but keep it in. Oh my God. I can't wait to hear that after the show. Shout out Christmas party 2017. Ugh. Wow, I never thought that would go to the public, but it just has. Anyway, uh, so caliper [00:17:00] covers. Give us your argument on that.
Mike, the crux of it is that people are putting on these covers, they're silicone or aluminum, and they're doing it to basically do an impression of a track or performance vehicle, but the brakes underneath aren't changed in any way. So you're saying, like, let's say somebody's got, like, a single or dual piston caliper- Yes
and they've got, like, a six piston cal- oh, man. So- Can we, can we pull up a- Have you not, have you not seen these before? I've, I've, I feel like I've, I've seen it before, but, like, I was just trying to make sure that's what he was talking about. And a lot of times- Not like a- ... it's just, like, 3M double-sided tape holding it to the caliper.
Yeah. So not, we're not talking about- Easy removal ... like, a color change here. We're talking about, like a- No, no, no ... you got a fake ass- Yeah, you're just- Milward or like- You're just faking the funk on- Yeah ... the fact that you got Brembos or something. So the, the, the, the big story that came out is 2023, I think, is Tesla got caught.
Tesla said that all the performance Model 3s were gonna have Brembos, and then they changed the supplier for the rear caliper- Mm-hmm ... to a company called Mando, and the caliper was small, so they put on a red caliper cover that was way larger than what was needed for the actual caliper, [00:18:00] and when people pulled it off, they went, "Wait, that's the same brake caliper that comes on the Long Range."
So they're being told- Hmm ... "Hey, this is a performance braking system," and it's the same one just dressed up. Weird. Tesla lying to customers? How strange, right? I've never heard of that before. That's devious. So a year after that, this company, uh, Caliper Skins made one that's silicone. By the way, this episode is brought to you by Caliper Skins.
So bas- it became a trend, though. Like, Tesla people started putting on these silicone caliper covers just to, like, separate the look of their car from the other millions of people that look just like them. Hmm. But it's not just... I thought it was just them. There's a company called Rough Country that makes them for trucks.
Zac, trucks. That's how I relate to you. Yeah. Um, for Jeeps and Broncos and all kinds of things, and it's the same shit. It's, like, an aluminum thing that just looks like you have a performance brake, and makes you look a little different, makes you look a little faster, a little tougher. But what I don't get is that you, you're taking track, like, track chic, and then trying to just present a fake version of it, and that really bothers me.
But in some ways, hasn't, isn't that, like, what defines 90% of tuning? That is true. [00:19:00] Is, like, trying to look... And again, I think this is- Sure ... where everything lives on a spectrum, because it's like you're just trying to make your car look like it's more performance-oriented. That is valid. Spoilers- Valid ... body kits, all these things that have, like, no real aero to them.
That's true. I almost included the whole Charger vertical aero wing, but I, I left it off. I was sitting behind a Charger the other day looking at that going, "Who, like, invented that?" Because it's probably a autocross- I think it's a competitors I think it's a nod to, like- Well, it's the- ... old NASCAR kind of
well, it's the Gurney flap. Yeah. It's the, it's the Dan Gurney flap. Mm-hmm. But, like, it, it, how it becomes, like, how it's become, like, the trend across every ship box, like, Mopar car. It's kind of incredible. That's true. I don't know where that started. It's, like, a pretty simple mod, too. Like, you could probably- These are-
make it at Home Depot. These are also the same people that leave the bumper covers on for the corners. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's, like, almost a trend. It is. Oh, that was a trend, man. I wi- I wish I had made multicolored, uh, whatever those are called, like, shipping covers and just sold them. I probably would've made a million bucks.
Yeah. Uh, there was a, I'm in a, [00:20:00] the group, a group chat based off of the last Firing Order, which was the track day cars, and, uh, Chris Stewart sent a photo of a car with just, like, a red lip. It was, like, a Fiat with a red lip, and he said... I mean, not a Fiat, a Fit with a red lip, and he said, um, "So unfortunately, we have red lippers, too."
And it's like all of us knew exactly what it meant. Like, there's always, like, that guy who has a stock car that then is like, "I'm gonna paint my lip red 'cause it's gonna make it look cool." Like, like Aston's race team. Yeah. Yeah. That's what I'm saying. Or, like, get, like, red seat belts. Oh, I like red seat belts I mean, I do too I like red seat belts.
I'll defend that one It's like r- he said all day was like, "Yeah, race car," 'cause like it's got red seat belts Yeah. Well, that's like a Porsche thing that then Volkswagen did, which just seemed really cool, and I'm actually, like, looking into getting red belts on one of my cars I, I think they look cool, but I think then the function of the seat belt is still the same as if it was gray, yellow, whatever Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah But with this- It's just an aesthetic thing
you are lying about how big your brakes are because you've put on this like, you know, placard or whatever Yeah, but I mean, as men, we m- we lie about all of that kind of stuff Very, [00:21:00] very true It's all about that Yeah It's, it's an eight piston Yeah, it's a d- definitely an eight piston It's definitely, yeah, so More like a five and a half, but...
How big is the piston? I mean, why do we even bother talking about it? I measure in the metric system I measure from the bottom of the rotor I measure from the b- the hub All right. Okay. So, um, and then the tow strap one and... And then the- Is that j- is that just like a personal irk, the tow strap? Tow strap one?
Yeah. Would you, you have notes on that too? It's probably 'cause it's, uh... No, I mean, that's just, that one's the shortest That's just a check. That's the shortest It's just like, this is dumb. You can't pull the car with it Right But it looks like you can pull the car with it, so it's just, it is totally non-functional.
It costs money So, so everything from your list is you don't like cars that try to be race cars to an extent? No, that's only two of them so far What's the last one? The last one is either, I think, I think pickup truck bed smoke stacks that are huge Wait, I thought, wait, you had three Nope. You had burble tune You said burble tunes What did I say?
You said sh- you said... Caliper covers Caliper covers Oh, fake tow straps. Yeah That's right No, we already got you at three, man Dip it into four and five. Dang it You're trying to dip in. You can try to, you can try to, you can try to slip [00:22:00] that in later on the blind spots All right So... I support the smoke stack one though, for sure You could add it to yours if you want I mean, if you want We, we can get to it in the, we can get to blind spots All right.
We'll get to blind spots All right. So we need to now pick which one of yours moves forward. Which w- which is the most offensive on his list? Burble, burble tune I mean, he was pretty specific in saying gunshot tune Gun- yes. Like, gunshot- How much burble is okay to you? Very little Mm-hmm I think, I think once it sounds like popcorn being made, and especially when these guys- Mm
are rolling at fucking six miles per hour and it's wa- Like all, all through the fucking- Shut the fuck up ... parking lot, just Yeah, we get it. You're here. No one cares. It's an M4, big deal Like, it gets- My 911 kind of sounds like that. I think- No ... would I upset you if I pulled up to an event? No, your 911 sounds like it's supposed to.
Well, it is supposed to. That's, that's different. It doesn't just backfire. You're just not sitting there just pa, pa, pa, pa, pa, pa, pa, pa, pa. No, no, no, no. Yeah, yeah. Like, it's not backfiring. Oh, no, no, I know it, I know what it does. Yeah. But yeah. I mean, I do think it's, it's dangerous, like, [00:23:00] the, if the sound originates because someone tuned their car for power and reliability, and then it just has overrun noise to- Mm-hmm
you know, cool the... Whatever, that's all right. But if we go into your credit card history and we find that you went to gunshottune.com- ... for $200 and you did... 'Cause it- I had to kick a guy out of the Burnout for that. Really? Like, I was like, "Yo, stop." When you're, like, in the hot pits. It was at Burnout SEMA.
Yeah. And I was like, "Do not sit and just rev your shit." And then he did it- This- ... and there was a child walking by, and I was also walking, and it blew out my, like, a- Yeah, yeah. I still can't hear well in this ear because of it. And I yell, I was like, "Motherfu- you will never come back here." S- so this for me, this doesn't fall under mods, although it is the use of a mod, but this is certainly an activity that I am just too fucking old for, which is, like, the rev off.
Yes. Like, that I just do not understand. Like, if I go to an event and that's happening at an event, it's like I just don't want to be here anymore. Do they still do that? Oh, fuck, I- Oh, yeah. I just- Oh, yeah ... yeah, I just had to deal with it. Really big in, like, supercar market, too. [00:24:00] Yeah. Yeah. Also really big in the, uh- He looked so shocked, 'cause he's like, "That's my side of the fence."
But I, I don't go to the meets, though. I don't go to, I don't go to helicopters and write-offs out in Huntington. Yeah, yeah. Helicopters and write-offs. So, like, like- Yeah, it's- ... people cold start their Lambo and rev rev. Yeah, yeah. It's like the DDE guys. Like, that's, like, that side. Oh, I love Damon and James, but.
They have a great time. Yeah. And, uh, there's a part of me that's jealous that they, that's their business now. They have a great time. And I love those guys. Great time, yeah. And it's funny, 'cause I often get accused for not liking those guys, 'cause I'll shit on them, but if I shit on you, I probably like you.
You know what? They drive my cars. 'Cause it means I have a friendship with you that you feel like, you know, I can shit on you. It's true. Yeah. Or he pays you to do that. That's too, that's true too. Right. I mean, that was the, really the only perk at Hoonigan- Oh, I bet ... was just being able to shit on all of you all the time.
Oh, oh. Never mind. I was going a different direction with that. Uh- It was, it was gonna be this, like, joke. Oh, it was, like, a German joke. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, okay, got it. Yeah, yeah. All right, we're here, we're here. Call it the sunroof, hm? Yeah, so I, I, I'm gonna have to agree. Ugh. So, uh, yeah, I'm gonna have to [00:25:00] agree.
It's, it's, it's definitely verbal tune. I think everyone knew that was making it to the list. It is one of the more unfortunate things that has happened. But there... I, I, well, I want to, like, get into the mindset of those kids, 'cause they must think, they think it's the coolest thing ever. They do. I found, I found a Reddit post.
It's so, it was so adorable. It was written by a guy who's, like, 28, and he goes I th- I've aged out of my Burble Tune and I'm not sure why. And he was literally asking, and he's like, "I had a 335, I had the Burble Tune, I loved it, and I see them now and I just think they're so stupid. What happened?" And everyone's like, "Congratulations, you've turned 27."
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like the automotive version of jinx. But you still drive- Yeah ... a super loud fucking car. That's, yeah, that's different. Like, you just pulled up and I heard you from two blocks away. Yeah, but that's different. It's different. But you will eventually grow out of that. Like, I love that- I hope they do.
I love, I love that I can't really hear my S8 when I'm inside of it. I love that, like, my Vanagon's pretty quiet. And then, like, I go drive one of my loud cars, and I, like, I will, like, constantly try to turn the volume down, realizing that I [00:26:00] can't actually turn that down. Like, I'll, like, be just trying to think.
I, I, I- I'll be like, "Which way do I have to go right now?" And I'll, like, reach for the volume knob and then go, "Oh, no, that's just the car being obnoxious." To be fair, I have... So, on the Vette, and then I just welded, I just built a new system for my K5 that actually has switchable, like, valve stuff. It's still pretty loud to most people, but it's not like open headers anymore.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right? But I can, you know, when I'm driving it, a lot of times, like, I'll, I'll switch it off, like, to, you know, be incognito. But then, like, I'll be driving, I'll be like, "This doesn't feel the same." I'll just have to, like, open it up and be like, "Hell yeah, dude," you know? But you can turn it, you can switch it back.
But can- And I do think that that is aging a bit, you know? It's like a- And I'm, I'm not trying to defend the Burble Tune crowd. I'm trying to be, play devil's advocate- Yeah ... and be in their corner for a second. Do you think that they get that same feeling? Like, that excitement that you get- Ooh ... out of, like, are we taking away something from somebody?
That, like, that, like when I... I love decel popping my fucking 911. [00:27:00] Like, it's a cool thing. But I do enjoy how it sounds going up through the gears more than I enjoy the pop down, right? Yeah, yeah. Like, the pop's cool and it's kind of like a novelty, but, like, if I had to make a choice, like, ripping that thing from, you know, five and a half to, you know, eight grand is where it sounds best.
Yeah. Right? Totally. But it, but maybe they're getting something great out of it that we don't understand. Well, these are mods, so yeah, they're get- they're getting some sort of enjoyment out of all of these things. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It just, it's a terrible mod. Fair. Fair. That's why we're having this conversation.
Do you agree that that's the worst of your list? Yes. All right. Yeah. So we're moving that one forward. All right, cool. All right, Zac. All right. I knew, I, the thing about this one, well, I think it's gonna be hard for us to rank which is the worst one. Yeah. I think that's gonna be where, like- That, that's- ... what is the most offensive is where the real, the real battle comes.
But let's see what you got here. So my first one was clout tunes, right? Which is, include Burble, but then the big thing that irritates me is ghost cams. Somebody that, like- I'll be honest, I didn't know this was a thing. But the minute you say it, [00:28:00] I now understand. So, like- There was a, uh, an, a, he drove like a, like a bad motherfucker.
But, like, there was an F-150 in a show, uh, that I had in Nashville, and I was like, "Man, that thing's chopping." I was like, "Oh, it's a, it's a Coyote." And I, uh, then I come to find out it's a completely stock Coyote. It's just got, like, a timing sweep tuned into it so it chops, like, so pop, pop, pop. And you'll hear that on a lot of people, even that, like, install cams, and it's like they, that's how they keep them, like, idling good and, like, able to take off.
Yeah, yeah. It's like, do, like, the timing sweep and, like, do the correction stuff. But, like, to not have any engine- Is there any performance value to it? No, I don't believe so at all. Not at all. So you're just faking- You're faking the, like, the, you're faking the funk. I didn't know this existed. Yeah, it does.
This is amazing. How much do you know about cam culture? Not that, I know how they work- 'Cause, like, you gotta understand, like- ... but I don't know what cam sweep is ... a lot of his identity is on how, like, just, like, absolutely out of control, like, loppy and lopey a cam can be. Oh yeah, man, [00:29:00] I follow him. Yeah. So, like, if your air conditioning can't run at idle because - That's new shit, right?
Yeah ... because the cam, the cam profile- Yeah ... doesn't allow your idle to be, you know, to do that, like, he's into it. Shouldn't have enough vacuum to have brakes- Yeah ... that are boosted, uh- Yeah ... air conditioning. I, I, I was telling him once- Spectrum indeed ... I was telling him once about a Volkswagen I had, and he, as normally once I say Volkswagen, like, his eyes just started glazing over and, like, rolling into the back of his head.
And then I told him that the cam profile was so wild that if I turned the air conditioner on, it would immediately stall a car, and he, like, came back into the conversation. He was like, "I kinda wanna hear about that." It just- "Maybe I can install it to, like, you know, like, a margarita blender." Well, we, in car, car people, we love compromise, right?
We love something that we have to get rid of in, in, uh, the effort of performance or interest. Mm-hmm. We're like, "Ooh, yeah, I can't even run this part of it because it's too powerful." But, like, why, you have to think about why is the sound of, like, just the most choppy cam so cool. It just sounds badass.
Because we [00:30:00] relate it, once again, to cool race cars. And to power, yeah. Yeah. And to big power. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And the era we grew up in, I mean, I don't know about, I know, like, Le Mans existed now, but when I was a kid, I h- I was around muscle cars, hot rods, and, like, occasional stock car things- Yeah ... or, like, drag racers.
I never saw a Porsche whatever 935, like, start. So whatever that sounded like didn't implant itself in my brain, so I don't really care. Yeah, yeah. I don't think, I don't think none of them sound that good, to be honest. But stuff like that, that's like gi-gi-gi, gi-gi-gi, gi-gi-gi. I mean, Brian's- It's in the mint though
Brian's chops, it's- My 911? Yeah. Yeah, it chops. It's, it's like, uh, I, I remember, like, I walked over, I was like, "What the fuck is that?" And I was like, "Oh, shit." Yeah. 'Cause we were, like, col- it was cold as hell. Well, on a cold start, too, it does, like, a full, like- Like da-da-da-da ... th- 300- Yeah ... you know, 300 rev drop, like re-re-re, re-re.
I should clarify, old 911 race cars with big engines do sound like that. Yeah. And sometimes I go, "They put a V8 in that thing?" But, like, new ones, the scream, it's just the sound. But, like, the old choppy stuff sounds cool. A buddy of mine was telling me the other day that this guy we know just built a car where he, it's a Volkswagen, but he ran, [00:31:00] like, a- Like, either, like, a super thin or, like, a special type of metal in the flywheel- Mm-hmm
and a special starter just to give it that race car start- That shing. Like that, like, weird sound. Like you're drawing a fucking- Yep ... Excalibur or like a- Yeah ... like a, like a samurai sword. Yeah, like there's that weird sound that, like, real race cars have when they start up that just, like, the sound of, like, really high compression, a micro starter 'cause it needs the torque to turn it, and like a flywheel that's, like, as thin as Saran wrap.
Yeah. And it's like that combination that, like, just makes a certain noise that road cars don't make, and it's like he went to all this trouble to create that just 'cause it's a cool sound, and I respect that. Right. Like I... But, like, at the same time, it's not far from what you're talking about bec- but he had to design and engineer this.
He, that... Wait, what, how does ghost camming work? He was a race car. What is this? So basically it's like they can tune it, and they can tune the timing sweep to just be like, "Pa pa pa pa pa pa." Just basically it idles like shit, right? But, like, it's, it's just sweeping or, like, jumping back and forth, right?
Like, to give you, like, some fake ass chop. [00:32:00] I don't respect that. 'Cause the one thing is, like, some of those cam- Wait, hold on. Hold on. Hold on. Is this... Is what our big issue with all of this is, 'cause almost everything we've said, it's fucking stolen valor? Yes. Yes. It is. Yes, I had that written. Yeah. A bunch of them are stolen valor.
Yes. It's stolen valor. It's because, like, you get to drive a car that you could push a button on and make it actually just operate normal, but then you get the cool points of how it sounds that way. Mm-hmm. 'Cause if a car like mine that actually does all that, it has a lot of other things that makes it a really uncomfortable and annoying car to own, operate, drive, and do all that, but you don't have to have that.
Yeah. Here's the other thing, like, uh, overhead cam V8s with, like, big ass cam profiles sound really nasty, and they actually, like, it's a really unique sound and it sounds, like, wild, right? So if you have, like, a quad valve V8 with, like, some big ass cam profiles- Right ... it's like, it sounds pretty savage. Or, like, the sock Ford, uh, old NASCAR motors, like, sound gross.
Yeah. Like, just nasty at idle, right? But again, [00:33:00] stolen valor. Yeah. So ghost cams is one of them. By the way, we just did the one thing we said we weren't gonna do. I, I know. We went, we went demon. But all right, run the rest of your list. Okay. We won't interrupt. Second, squat trucks, right? Mm-hmm. Yeah. And then, uh, I have some other ones here, but, like- Just give the best.
Give the best of the group. We can bring the rest up in the blind spots. Yeah. Any EV swap of a classic or performance vehicle. Oh. Let's start with that one. Okay. Because- Oh. Hmm ... any classic or performance vehicle? Yep. Because you, you're taking away the heart, the thing that, the thrill, the theater- of that, what that thing is, and then you're, you're just, you're stripping it of all of its glory.
You've driven some EV swap. Yeah. You wanna go? I drove a Baja, EV, uh, Volkswagen Baja Bug that was swapped with EV. That was terrifying and very fast. Is that the guys down in- Yeah ... what's their name again? EV West. Yeah, EV West. Yeah. I drove their drift car, their E36 also, and then- What's the name of their swap kit?
It's like Revolt. It's like, has a, it's like Revolt or something. It's a good name. I don't know. Anyway, yeah, EV West. [00:34:00] But one of the ones I always thought was a good idea was, like, Vanagons or, or VW Buses because those are slow, unreliable. They can't get up a hill like- I would, I would love my Vanagon to be electric.
You know. It, the engine does nothing for me. Now, but I think to your point, yeah, the engine has, it's the part of the reason I bought the car ... it's like the character of the engine. The car sucks. Right. But if the car is good because the engine or that's part of the character, then swapping it, like a 911, Ferrari, whatever, to put a, an EV in that and just completely mute it, like- Mm-hmm
and castrate the thing and take away its, its song, whatever move that is, that's terrible. Yeah. Like, the thrill, the vibration, the sound, the theater- Mm-hmm ... from those cars, even if it's slower, it just feels like it's the experience of driving, uh, something that is exploding within itself- Mm-hmm ... is awesome.
Okay. Now, with EV stuff, battle this point here, yeah, you can, like, do some sick zero to 60 times, zero to 100 times, whatever, right? That wears off so quick. Yeah. It's like nitrous oxide, not in your car, but, like, taking hits of [00:35:00] nitrous oxide out of, like, a balloon or like a d- You know? Like you, when- You got 20 seconds- Sick
of like- Whippets, boys. He's talking about whippets. Yeah. It's like you get this high for a bit, and then- Yeah ... it just goes away. But, uh, yeah, it's just like, it just wears off, and it just, it, you just, it loses its fun after... Like, when we had the Lucid guys, I was like, yeah, we had, like, six people in the car, big boys, and it was fast as shit.
Nauseating fast. But after, like, two runs, I was like, "Nah, whatever," you know? "This is boring." Yeah. Mm-hmm. You know? Okay. So I would meet you on thinking that, uh, that this is bad, but I don't think for all cars. There's a, there's a few. No, no, I said performance. Okay, performance. Or f- like classic performance cars.
'Cause you said, you said classic and performance, but you mean classic performance. Yeah, yeah. 'Cause, like, for example, like, I don't know, like, a suicide door Lincoln, like, I wouldn't mind an EV suicide door Lincoln. Like, that car isn't about the noise. Yeah. It's about cruising. The Vanagon- Mm-hmm ... I wouldn't mind.
Yeah. Um, uh, the Baja [00:36:00] Bug's an interesting one for me 'cause I kind of find Baja Bugs to be, like, performance cars, and I do, having been in ones that sound cool, you were just in the Scumbug that- Yeah, which rips now. Yeah. Oh, geez. Which- It's so fast ... what's in there now? A, a dirt- It's like a, it's EcoTech.
EcoTech, yeah. But it's a, it's like a big EcoTech with a turbo, so it's a 2.- It's like a 2.4? ... 2.4. Yeah. It is- terrifying. Yeah But like also it, it's like as you- But just, there's something about the way the noise echoes through a Beetle because it like just, through the back wall of it, I, I don't know, it just sounds
I mean, it's kind of 911-ish, but it- Yeah ... it has like a really cool noise to it. But I think they're like, cruisers I don't mind. Yeah. Vans I don't mind. No. It's kind of like a whatever. Like, if you're trying to get from point A to point B in the most comfortable fashion, you know, yeah, it's like it's quiet.
Yeah. It's, it's ... You know. But again, absolute pain in the ass to recharge. Yeah. And then also, if it's for a performance vehicle, it's just lame. It, like, n- there's a reason why nobody goes to watch like, uh, was it, what was the F1, uh, knockoff that they did all electric vehicles? Oh, uh, no one cares. At the ExCe right?
It [00:37:00] was called No One Cares Racing. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Nobody wants to go to that because you, you, it's not entertaining. Formula E. Formula E, yeah. No. Formula E. You're right. Yeah. Or like E1, like the powerboat racing, like- Yeah, yeah, yeah ... great. They ... Or like what was the desert one too that- That was the one I was thinking of, 'cause they had Ken race a couple of them.
Yeah. Extreme E or something like that. Yeah, yeah. Yep. Like, uh, I remember talking with RJ Anderson. He's like, "I don't know." He's like, "I don't know if they're just like laundering money or something," because like, he's like, "We're at these exquisite places in the middle of nowhere, and then we're like partying on yachts and stuff, but there's like, nobody watches this.
There's no, uh, like you can't view it from anywhere 'cause you're in the middle of nowhere." This is- And, and they gotta transport them to all these different continents ... this is a whole other pod. Yeah. Which is why I'm gonna start another podcast called The Whole Other Pod. But this is because every time the automakers decide there's a new technology, they take all of their motorsport funding and they put it in that bucket.
Yeah. And everyone sees an opportunity to go build a cottage industry around- Mm-hmm ... this new tech that everyone wants to go do. EV was the biggest one. Everyone jumped in, everyone [00:38:00] got burned. Yeah. Because all of that stuff sort of ... Everyone's turning around now. Audi, who was like, "We're never gonna make ICE engines again in racing," are like, "Hey, Formula 1, hey, this and that."
Like, you know, they're, they're going back to it. 'Cause I, I just, I'm, I'm not an anti-EV person. I think there's places where it makes sense. But like, it doesn't make sense in racing to me. No. Because part of what makes racing cool is the sound. Hell yeah. We're sitting here the whole time, one of our biggest complaints is people doing Burble noise, and the reason they're doing it is because it emulates race cars.
No one's like adding like a zzz sound to their car. Yeah. Uh, think about like how much time is spent or, or, or was spent on sound design for Gymkhana. Or how much- Yeah, yeah ... extra time was spent on Electrikhana- Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah ... for sound design, right? 'Cause it's trash. 'Cause you can't get the feeling and the excitement when you can't hear something banging gears and stuff.
Yeah. All right, I'm a big supporter of that one. Yeah. Let's talk squat trucks. Yeah, squat trucks are just fucking . Like, there's no ... A, you can't ... It's dangerous. It's [00:39:00] straight up dangerous for- You can't see ... other ... Yeah, you can't see. It looks dumb. Half your truck is lifted, the other tr- half is lowered, right?
It, it's like You know when you see the movie Idiocracy, right? And it's like, ah- Ah, it's playing live right now on, on the news. Yeah, e- misfortune has been foretold. Exactly. I just saw Kid Rock at the Pentagon giving a briefing on straight Airmobes. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. So, like, you know, you're like, "Wow, we're, we're, we're, we're on an accelerated timeline to get to that."
But, like, squat trucks, yeah, like, it's just dumb. It doesn't look cool. And then I had Kyle trucks like roped into that kind of. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, I, like big wheel- By the way, Kyle trucks- Thank you ... 'cause it was something that we named- Yeah ... while we were walking SEMA one year. A Kyle truck is like a SEMA truck, right?
Like ridiculously lifted- Any level lift ... right, stretched tires, right? Yeah, two inch drive shaft, all that stuff ... with all that. Because that was when, like, the Monster Energy Kyle joke was big, where it was like Kyle punches walls and Sheetrock. Yeah. And we were looking, we're like, "They, what are these things?
They don't even have a name yet," 'cause [00:40:00] they weren't, like, squat trucks. Some people- They could be all Hawaiian ... Hawaiian style, and I didn't wanna knock Hawaii- Mm ... with that. Like Hawaii has actually, actually- He would not drive that there ... but also real Hawaiian trucks are kinda cool. Yeah. Like, if you go to Hawaii, like the lifted, like Toyotas are kinda cool over there, and they fit in Hawaii.
The v- what, what we've done on the continental side of that- Yeah ... is an abortion of that. 26s and 28s with, like, super thin stretched bright sides. The whole outside of SEMA. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Fender, fen- Yeah ... yeah, the fender lights, all that stuff. Yeah ... you know, where we would always be kind of like baked into them, you know what I mean?
Yeah. With, like, our space, it was always, like, surrounded by those trucks. Yeah, they were c- so we named them Kyle trucks. And, like, that culture's massive. I mean, we operate some of those shows, right? Big money. Huge money. Like, the Atlantic City show that we do is, like, 40-plus thousand people. Yeah. And it's like all of Bader Field is packed with them.
Now, look, hey, if that's what you like to do, cool, but I just don't like the look, you know, with, like, the stretched tires. Yeah, yeah. I, I like ba- you go with the sidewall, baby. Like, that's- I, I get it, but we invited five of those trucks out for Gymkhana 2022 when we [00:41:00] filmed down in Fort Lauderdale, Miami, and I actually thought they were kinda cool.
Like wa- like I always thought they were uncool seeing them parked at SEMA, but watching them just, like, mob deep together and the cars, like, crab walking down the street- But what- ... I was like, I get it. Like, to me, it's like lowrider culture- Yeah. Mm-hmm ... for trucks, where it's like ... And I get that that's also what mini trucking is, but, like, I do appreciate when they're done really well.
Like, it's not my hobby- Yeah ... but, like, I understood that about donks too. But, like, they are real enthusiasts. Like, they build things that work- Yeah ... when they're not at SEMA. And, like, when they're actually out driving, it's like, I get it. It's like lowriders on three wheels. Like, this is like, it's like clown car-ish- Yeah
but there's something cool about it. So let's, let's pull that out of there. Squad trucks, though, terrible. It's just dumb. And then also, the same type of people that like to just park it on, like, a, just a basically stock ... Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, just, like, sitting doing- Yeah ... rev offs. Yeah, like, part of that
I don't know if it's, like, the, the culture I hate or just, like, I, I ... The trucks are dumb. Well, they b- they, it's one of the things that's actually been getting [00:42:00] banned across the country- Yeah ... because they are, because people ca- can't see over their hoods so they keep, like, running into people. Mm-hmm. Or like literally just driving over cars because they all have typically big wheels backs are squatted so much that they can't see forward and that used to be like the pre-runner aesthetic I was gonna ask about that.
So like so it was done like that here because they were built for desert running where it basically was set up so that like it was it's like a cheaper way to like from my understanding someone will probably correct me but like it was a cheaper way to set your vehicle up to run whoops with like big front suspension and like a lot of plush rear and that's just kind of how they ended up they kind of sat squatted that way.
So on the street it would just sit low in the back because it has a lot of drop. But it wasn't like super dramatic you know and also too. It wasn't intentional like they didn't do it on purpose they did it because like that was how the suspension setups ended up becoming on their trucks usually because they would put these big front suspension on and not do like full like bed and you know [00:43:00] redoing the bed and like raise suspension in the rear so they would they would get this like weird setup now they're in a situation where it's like these guys are trying to be at the craziest angle possible so yeah So that's my list.
All right. So we got ghost cams, squad trucks. What was the other one? Oh yeah, any EV swap in there. What's your least favorite on the list? What really grinds your gears? I think the ghost cam thing is the most offensive because the squad truck, it's a dumb expression of car culture, but it's still like that happens.
It's like VIP, you know, when people are driving around on one inch of the inside of their tire when they've got a 315 tire, whatever it is, like that's stupid, but it's an aesthetic choice. But like the ghost cam is instead of taking the cam out and putting a cam in and like being stolen valor, that's what it is.
It's misrepresenting what your vehicle actually is. Me, it's the EV swaps. At first I was not on the page, but when we talk about just from a performance side, like if I like show up somewhere [00:44:00] and there's like a beautiful like 911 and I'm walking around it long nose, like it's all just like really well sorted.
I get around to the back and there's a fucking motor and not an engine in it. I immediately like it's like it's like watching porn that when you get to a certain point, you're like, oh, I didn't realize this was the kind of porn I was watching. Like I feel disgusted and need to shower. So it's like that chick has a dick.
It's like it's like there is something about like this isn't what I thought I was going to be. And I don't know. I I I've driven some of them. But I don't find, like none of them are better than what it was before I think I will change my answer 'cause when I went, when I thought EV I went to the classics 'cause we were thinking positively.
Yeah. But when it swapped into sports cars of any kind, it's, it's a, it's ruining the vehicle. What are you doing? Why are you doing it? So I think that I agree with you. That's worse. Because we had a bunch of people bring EV... I mean, EV swaps were like on a trend for a while, Tesla swaps, all of that, and these guys would [00:45:00] bring cars to Hoonigan all the time, and they would absolutely decimate tires, wheel speeds of 100-plus mile an hour burnout.
Mm-hmm. Like, it did all the things you would think you want it to do, 'cause EV West brought that E36 by. Yep. Really cool machine, but I wouldn't wanna own it over the other one. And, like, as time has gone on, like, I find them, like I just don't know why to do it. And I think it ruins, like, like a lot of cars are like, you're like, I just like it, it takes, to your point, I think it takes like the soul out of the car.
Mm-hmm. Yeah, I agree. It's like the robot of it. So also, and by the way, I'm, I'm not saying I like anything that's on your list. I, the one I give, like, and I know that this is high on the list, 'cause I've already sneaked at the, I've already taken a sneak peek at the, uh, at sort of the, uh, the blind spot list from the Patreon, but, like, squatted trucks are super high on the list.
But as a guy who also drove, like, really slammed cars, like I understand- Mm-hmm ... driving something completely not pragmatic because it looks cool to you. So, like, I, I have a small [00:46:00] soft spot for that. But I just find that, like, the EV swap thing is weird to me too 'cause it's almost, like I don't know who that enthusiast is who's like, "I wanna take this really cool car and, like, make it-" I wonder if it's generally not car people I think it's gotten less popular.
But I think it's definitely gotten less popular because, like, you're not seeing it. As much. No. Like it's- It was a boom for a while ... it's huge because it was like new tech- It was a trend ... and it was like, ah, this is like, this is where the market's going. We're gonna... And then as soon as they were like, "Nah, y- we're not doing that," everybody's like, "Thank God.
All right, finally." Yeah, yeah. All right. Is, all right, so wait, you didn't have to swap your vote. Like you- No, but I agree with you. I do. Oh, okay. Truly. Where, what, of, of your three, which w- which one irks you the most? Being the cam guy, the ghost cam is, uh, pretty offensive to me, but, uh- We might have to just bo- we might have to just bundle it into- The pops and the cam, a- all underneath like f- sort of like faux ECU programs Stolen Valor tunes
Stolen Valor tunes There you go. Sto- Stolen Valor tunes Stolen [00:47:00] Valor, yeah That could, we could just group that, because I think, like, we've said burble, we've said pops and bangs Yeah, and then that's, I actually, that's how I had it, like- Yeah ... grouped. So, like- Yeah, it, it, it fits in, it fits under there. So- So we got EV swaps and then Stolen Valor tunes.
That's, that's so far on the list. Yeah. Okay. We're all in agrees. Okay. All right, we're gonna take a quick break. We'll come back. I'll drop my list, we'll go through the blind spots, and then we'll try to order them all. Here it is, another story time interruption, brought to you by my good friends at FCP Euro.
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All right, we're back. And look, I, I wanna start by giving a little caveat to my list, is that I knew that, like, all of the corners were gonna be covered by you guys and also the Patreon list. So I tried to, like, think a little outside of the [00:50:00] box of the traditional things that, like, you would lean to, and maybe some things that are, like, a little controversial that maybe we don't think are bad, but I, I think are.
Okay. Fire away. So I'll try to get through the whole list without him cutting me off, so. Um, I'm just, wait till, wait till, wait till this plays out. Pot calling the kettle black. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Hey, you know, my pod, my rules. Okay, first up on the list, and this may be something that comes with age, but straight pipes on street cars.
All right, I can already see. I can already... Yeah, straight pipes on street cars is the first one. I agree. The second one for me is rep wheels, but I will carry that over to any kind of, like, replica thing, because nowadays e- it has become so easy to fake everything. And to me, I think part of the culture, especially of building cool cars, is, like, finding [00:51:00] the right stuff and, like, tracking that down.
Not always... It doesn't always come in the spending. It, it's just, like, g- either f- getting that good deal, where when everything is available for the lowest possible price in usually questionable material and quality and manufacturing, that one. And then the last one is 1,000-plus horsepower street builds.
Hmm. Let's get into it. You know how I know you're gay?
I, I, I own cars that technically make 1,000-plus horsepower, but I think that... Do you wanna go on that one first? Sure, we can go to that. I think that the trend that every car now needs to make a hun- make 1,000 horsepower to be cool has sort of, we've, we've, like, we've, we've lost the plot of, like, what makes cars fun.
Yeah. And I think we, I mean, you even said, like, what did you say to us before the camera started rolling about your Tahoe? Or can you not admit it [00:52:00] 'cause then people will know that you're a little soft inside? Well, that it's terri- That's absolutely terrifying. Yeah. It's undrivable almost. You couldn't drive it here.
Well, no, because I don't have a big enough fuel cell, and it's also not registered. You, you, you live, like, blocks from me. You, you built a vehicle that is so unpractical that you can't drive it to my house, and we live in the same town. I mean, technically I probably could, it's just not, I don't, it's not registered.
You, but you might not make it home. I mean, yeah, it's also- How many gas stations are between? Well, it's gotta be at least E85, and then, yeah. So look, my, my, my point here is- But yeah, it's, you make a good point ... I'm gonna go off by saying I love thou- thousand horsepower crazy machines, but I think we have moved into this modding trend- Mm-hmm
that, like, 500 horsepower is not cool anymore. Like, 800 horsepower is barely cool, and now every car has to have 1,000 horsepower, and we have the technology to now do that. I don't think that with that comes, like, one, I, I don't think most people can drive a 1,000 horsepower car, like, with any level- Agreed
of, [00:53:00] of real control. I think that these horsepower wars have gotten a little out of control, and we've created this, like, this, uh, carrot that everyone's trying to build something that when you actually do own it is not actually fun. And- It's actually not cool to dri- it's like, it's a pain in the ass to drive.
Yeah. Like, I- It's, it's a monster ... I test drove somebody's ZR1- Mm-hmm ... that made, like, 1,100 wheel, and I was like, "Dude, this is, like, unusable." Yeah. Like, in any sense. Like, any part of the power band in any gear, even on, like, real sticky tires, just, like, it's worthless. But it's sick, but it's also- ... you couldn't just drive it around.
Like- But like five years ago, the amount of people who had thousand horsepower cars was pretty small. Yeah. Now it's like, it seems like it's become a new normal. Yeah. Like, the recipe is so proven, it's not as expensive to build that kind of power as it once was. I'm not saying it's still cheap, but I also wa- like, I wanted to pick something that didn't live in the, like, "I'm cheap, so I bought, you know, caliper covers."
Yeah. Like, this is the other side of it. [00:54:00] This is the, like- Yeah ... you have money- $60,000 build or whatever ... you have money and you're going and building something that is kind of a useless car. Yeah. I mean, it, it's very, in bragging- It makes sense on track if you're a drag racer or- Yeah ... you know, like, but- And most, most times, like, so most people that are in the thousand horsepower range are usually on, like, turbos, right?
Mm-hmm. And, like, I guarantee nobody's just driving around. Like, that, that shit is turned most of the time all the way down- Yeah ... just so you can, like, use it. 'Cause it's a bragging number. Yeah. Like, it's just cool to be like, "Oh, my thing makes 1,000 horsepower." Yeah. Like, my Nova makes I don't know, maybe 650?
Yeah. It is plenty fast. Oh, yeah. It's plenty powerful. I said that to you last time, and you questioned my sexuality. And you were like, "We're gonna throw nitrous on it. We're gonna do this, we're gonna do that." No, but I- And I'm like, I'm like, "Cool, we can do that for the fun of it, but, like, I'm never gonna turn the tanks on."
Yeah. Like, not for regular- And that's the whole point ... not as a street car. I think, I think if you have all this power but you can never use it, then I think you're missing out on a huge part of driving that car, is getting... Being able to floor a car for more than half a second is, like, a really [00:55:00] enjoyable thing, you know?
Mm-hmm. And actually, if you have a slower car, which you have several, there's a green one outside. Mm-hmm. Like, getting on the freeway, I'm sure you have to floor it, and it's exci- I don't know, for me, like, when I was a kid, flooring the car and just watching the numbers climb was so exciting that I- And then grabbing another gear
and I knew I was doing something I shouldn't be doing. Instead of short gear, instead of short shifting- Yeah ... because you're afraid of, like, just- And if you have 1,000 horsepower, you, you turn to get on the highway, you put it in fourth, you barely touch the gas- Mm-hmm ... and you're at 80, and then you don't get to really enjoy your car- Yeah
until you get off again. Well, the sweet spot I think for street cars is, like, 550, 600 wheel. I agree. Like, that's like, it's perfect on the street. How, how do we get people back to that? Because I think this is the new goal, is everyone wants 1,000 horsepower. Well, it's 'cause of the internet, right? Mm-hmm.
Everybody's just bragging. Now, like, I built a vehicle that can't make less than a thou- I have it turned all the way down, but it's like roots blower. Yeah, yeah. It's just not going to make l- and it's like I can't use it. Right. I mean, I can. It's sweet, but- But it's not really a street car. Yeah, no. No. Like, you would like to street it, but it's, you built it for something else.
Yeah, yeah. But, like, if you, if you can- I wouldn't, I wouldn't call what you do motorsport, but, but it's sport. It's a form of it. It's a sport. There's motors [00:56:00] involved. And it involves motors. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Motorflexing. Yeah, yeah. Motorflexing is the perfect term. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, but no, I mean, it's like- It's like, is bull riding a sport?
I don't know. It's kind of like the similar thing. Like, you go into a pen and you try not to die. Yeah. Yeah. Basically. But no, it's, like, the 550, 600 is great on the street, you know? Yeah. I mean, for usability, you could drive, and then you can lean into it, you know? Mm-hmm. You'd still probably get that thing up real, get in some trouble.
Yes. For sure. I'm surprised I'm getting out of any level of agreement from you. I was for sure this was gonna be the one that you're like, "That's insane. Every car needs 1,000 horsepower." No, no. You actually are practical in moments. Well, just turned 47. Yeah. It's the 40 thing. Yeah. Yeah. I'm old now. Yeah.
But you've also, uh, you know, I always thought that, like, the bigger number was cooler, and hypercars, you know- She always does. Exactly. And hypercars, you know, the Veyron had 1,000. Oh, my God, this unattainable number. But then more hypercars had that, and then all of a sudden Supras were making it, everybo- GTRs were making it.
So it just got boring, and I think maybe for you guys, like, the more I was exposed to the car culture and around it for my job, the less interesting that stuff became. And I remember we filmed this guy, [00:57:00] he had a 1,200 horsepower... No, he had a 900 horsepower GTR. And we said, "How long has this kit been on there?"
He said, "I had the 700 for two months. Now I have the nine. I'm kind of bored. I think I'll go for the 12." Mm-hmm. And I went, "Oh, so you're just chasing this dragon. You'll never catch it." Yeah. So I think it's exposure, and maybe people will just slowly get bored, and then they'll return back to 6, 700- Yeah
respectable horsepower. I drove 1,700 horsepower. You drove the same car. Like, it's phenomenal, but- In the right environment, right? In the right en- it was, yeah, it was like- Yeah, runway ... closed, closed runway, yeah. Yeah, then it's amazing. That's what it's for. But to just, like, drive around and, you know, burble pop your B58- Yeah
and then pull into, you know, the movie theater and be like, "I have 1,000 horsepower." Like, would you, how much did you use on the way here? 200? Although, I, I will say I did, uh, ride in my buddy Justin's twin turbo R8, and it was like, oh, you could just go and get groceries in this. No, it's true. And then we clicked off an eight-second quarter mile on a completely unprepped surface on street tires, and it would, like, the AC was on, and it was like, wow, this is pretty nuts.
It, it does work for some cars. That is amazing. Yeah. I, I, I'm not g- like, I'm not here trying to say [00:58:00] that no cars should have 1,000 horsepower. I'm saying the trend- Yes, like- ... that that seems to be the new standard, I think is, is bad for the whole culture. I've said it before. Yeah. I agree with that. Now, I, I have a
It's funny, yesterday I saw a video of a guy making... He's like, "Yo, these are the new Alibaba Kong blower lids for, like, LT4s," you know, like- Yeah, yeah ... LT5s and stuff. So, like, well, on the, on the fake replica stuff, like, just knockoff stuff- Yep ... it's getting out of hand, man. No, it, it's, I mean, look, in the early days, like, I may have felt different about this, 'cause I felt like, hey, car culture and cool car culture shouldn't only be for the rich.
Yeah. Right? So it's, like, nice that there's, like, something, another offering. But now it's, like, a full rep, where it's like, do you want BBS RSs or do you want, like, f- like, BB5s that look just like a BBS? It's like, well, that's, again, it's in a stolen valor thing. It's like, that wheel's cool for whatever particular reason to a certain person, and, like, finding one, [00:59:00] finding a set, rebuilding a set is all part of it.
Like, buying a set for $400 to look like that, I mean, like- Mm-hmm ... we were talking about watches before the show. It's like fake watches versus, like, why wear a fake Rolex versus a Rolex? Like, I'd rather you just buy a wheel that's not, that's, like, its own wheel that's less expensive than trying to have a TE37 or trying to have that.
And I think that goes across the whole market, because now it's, like, everything, like, I think someone called it, like, Alibaba tuning, right? Yes. And it's like we're just, everything now is just fake parts. And I don't know, it just, it, one, like, there's just an inherent, like, reps are not cool. Whether it's a Gucci bag or it's wheels, like, there's just a certain element of, like- You remove craftsmanship and- Yeah.
Yeah, and, and there's a piece of that. The second part of it is it's bad for the industry, right? Sure. Because the people who put all the work into engineering these things and building a name around them, like, that gets out there. You also might be buying a wheel that's not up to the standards- Yeah, yeah
of a wheel company, and then it can shatter- Yeah ... at 100 miles per hour. Like, all- But [01:00:00] the- I was gonna say, all those fittings, like those Dynafit fittings- Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah ... like, he constantly is battling, like, people just trying to, like, knock off the thing. Yep. But, like, the problem is, and again, like, the craftsmanship and the engineering that goes into some of that stuff, it's like, sure, it's got, like, kind of the same look and sort of the same function, but it doesn't have, like, a 10,000 PSI rating, you know?
Right, yeah, yeah. It's like- Right ... and- So there's the safety side on, on- Yeah ... that stuff. And also, you're just, you're buying fake shit. And I think the last part of it is- This one's kind of like a harder one to explain, because I think the internet has changed this for all of us and everything, is like, I think part of what makes hobbies fun is, like, the progression that, like, you go and you get, you know, you, you build this.
Like, you get that. Like, on my first car, like, you know, I had s- I had springs, and then when I was able to afford it, I bought coilovers, and I started with Konig wheels, and then I got better wheels. And like, you know, you just, like, kind of keep upgrading and being able to build that because, you know, there was th- it, one, it wasn't easy to get all of it.
Two, it was, some of it was out of my means. Um, I [01:01:00] think having, like, everything to be just available and you can drop it down and, like, hit send and it all just shows up and then you put it all on, it removes part of, like, what makes the hobby fun. 100%. Like, building cars, like, in one... And we did it for YouTube, so we probably created part of that trend, but it's not, like, the way a car should be built.
Like, a car should be built over time, and you continue to enjoy each mod versus, like, "Hey, here's my car. It makes it... I built it. It makes 1,000 horsepower, and the first time I'm ever driving it is right now with 1,000 horsepower." Yeah. I mean, think of anything you've, you've bought where you, you researched it a lot.
Like, all that time researching, you're getting anticipation and, like- Yeah ... the joy of shopping and researching for this thing. Like, you're getting- Yeah ... all the brain chemicals. Like, and you can stretch that out for six months while you save for springs- Yeah ... or while you save for coilovers. But if you just go and get a bunch of- Yeah
replica stuff, it's not as good, but it kinda looks like it, I don't f- uh, people will think they want it all right away, and I don't think they do. I think you're missing out. That being said, I just bought some rep stuff for one of my cars, so I don't know. But there was a set- What? Because there was a set of mirrors that I really wanted that [01:02:00] are, like, no longer possible to find, and somebody r- remade a couple of them, but they- That I do think is different
but, but they remade them in carbon fiber. Okay. So it, like, improved what they originally were. They fixed some of the initial things. But, like, those we... That's like, those mirrors are no longer available. They're very hard to find, and they were kind of flawed to begin with, so. I think that's a, that's, there's reproduction of something that is just gone- Yeah
and then there is straight up copying something that exists that you wanna sell for less money. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, and fake it, and that's not cool. Yeah, I definitely paid more money for this. More expensive reps. Uh, and then straight pipes. What are you guys' thoughts on that? On the street They're super du- I mean, you mean straight all the way from header back?
No cats. Nope. Yeah. No cats is dumb, and that's not just me. That's Steve Dinan on our show. He was like, "You gain five horsepower maybe. That's really stupid." Four, yeah. So y- people who are taking the cats off, you're making the people who are behind you in traffic pass out. Okay, so here's where the- You're not gaining any power.
It's loud, cool So here's where that comes from. I won't say which car, 'cause I'm not trying to snitch myself, but I have a couple cars that are straight piped. Do they work? Do the [01:03:00] cars turn on? Yeah. 'Cause it doesn't matter if they don't turn on. Yeah, they run Right ... and one of them's a daily, right? And I went- Such fucking hypocrisy.
I know, but I'm changing my... Th- th- look, look, I can be part of the- I am part of the problem. Most of this podcast is me saying sorry. "Murder should be illegal," said the murderer. Hey, you know, self-awareness is- Yeah ... a true virtue. Oh, yes. Um, so- Okay ... here's where I... And I, I'm gonna change it, because last year I did this, like, uh, event.
It was like a drive/car show kind of thing. We called it Treff Punks. It was old Volkswagen, Audi guys. Um, we did this drive. My car didn't have cats at the time, and nobody wanted to be behind me. And eventually, at the end, myself and Jason Whipple, who's my partner in Treff Punks, said, "Okay, next year we're making a rule that no one can have straight pipes," because, like, it makes it unenjoyable for the person behind you.
Mm-hmm. And if, like, when you're only hanging out with your own friends and you don't wanna be behind your friend, you start [01:04:00] to realize, like, this isn't really worth it for the four horsepower. So I don't know. Like- So I, I don't really like- And also, straight pipes on VQs should, like, be illegal. It's funny, that was like- And, and- Punishable by, punish- punishable by death
and S54s Punishable by death. I was at a racetrack last weekend. They sound the s- Oh, yeah ... a straight piped E46 sounds the same as a VQ. Stop doing that. It is trash. It is trash. Trash. I have a neighbor that, like, constantly has, like, a clap drift car, you know, like a Missile. Yeah. And like, man, every Friday it's fire, like, "Rah," just like, "God damn."
Well, also, like, that era BMW, what was it, like, anti-rasp? What was the, the, the, like, the... What was the thing that they used to sell for those, the exhaust? It was, like, an anti-rasp pipe or something. I think so, yeah, that exists, yeah. Because they just sound so shitty. Sound terrible. Yeah. I'm not gonna ever put exhaust on my car, 'cause it sounds worse.
Yeah. Yeah. So straight, straight pipes just really stupid. Just like no, no cats. Okay. Yeah. Well, so here, here's the argument for no cats, right? There's also- Like, the sound- I wanna be that guy- When you have, like- ... there is a little bit of an environmental problem with it, too. Th- Right, yeah ... which, like, for a [01:05:00] race car is fine, but for a street car- Yes
but, like, so, like, the rasp you get when you don't have cats is like- Sure ... it sounds nasty, right? Like, I don't like straight pipes with no muffler, like some sort of, like, resonator, right? Uh, but I will say- My Vette has cats on it. Yeah. It's so much more pleasant to drive, and it's loud as shit still. Oh, yeah.
Uh- We've, we've mentioned it, like, five times in this pod ... yeah, I was like, "How is this thing this loud?" 'Cause I thought with cats, like, I was kind of forced into the cat thing, but, like, I didn't mind it because- Yeah, yeah ... like, I was like, you know, when- Does everything in your body just want to be like, "Fuck the EPA.
Pull my cats off" "No headers"- Yeah ... "just open valve." Yeah. Now- Just my fucking 17th Amendment right. Light the engine bay up. No, but, you know, like, I will say, like, it's, it's fine, right? Now, on my K5, I don't think I could put ca- It would... Like, the more muffled that it is- Yeah, yeah ... it, like, runs way worse. Like, it's too much blocked.
Yeah. I mean, my Nova doesn't have cats. Doesn't seem like- Big, big blocks need- Old car, it's different. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of allowed. But, like, yeah, you know- Back when we still poured oil into [01:06:00] rivers, like, that real- Also that, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Or, like, yeah, sure. When ships had lead in them- Yeah, yeah ... and paint was made of whatever.
Yeah. Yeah. But, uh, no, I- Yeah ... I hear what you're saying. Like, especially, like, straight pipe, like, supercars, like- Testosterone was higher, IQs were lower. Sorry. When America was America. Sorry, go ahead. I'll stop cutting you off. All right. Let's move into you guys now decide which of the my list do you want to move forward with.
For your straight pipes, 1,000 horsepower cars. Straight pipes or rep- rep product. Mostly rep wheels, but, you know, just, like, high-end rep stuff. I'm gonna go rep. I agree. Really? Yeah. Okay, that's the move for you guys. Because it's, it's stealing p- it's stealing the work of engineers, other companies, and you're not just, you're not...
There are so many different designs you could have for a wheel, for example, that will look close to basket weaves without stealing the IP. Yeah. The only reason you're making, getting ones that look just like BBS basket weave, for example, is because you want people to think you have BBSs. Like, you're straight-up lying to people.
You are lying. But you're just doing it for $400. Yeah, you are lying, and you're, like, arguably trying to fit in only to then [01:07:00] be called out for having reps, which, like, blows back on you to begin with. Yeah. I think the horsepower thing is just technology and access and- It's automotive catfishing ... and it's triple down from, uh...
Yeah, it is, yeah. It's automotive catfishing. Yep, yep, once you, once they really get there, they realize you're not as hot as you said you were. Right, and they're like, "Oh, great. Now I gotta fuck this person." Yeah, yeah. That doesn't happen to Zac often, but you know, so, um, all right. I would've said, I'm just, I want to put my vote out there.
I would've gone for the 1,000 horsepower trend, and I, and I'll tell you why. Because I think it has created- an unattainable expectation of cool to n- new entries into the car community. I think that there we have risen the level of what is considered, like, the bar, that the bar now feels so high, and then actually when you get to the bar, you realize, like, you didn't wanna be at that bar to begin with.
But I think that it's removed, like, the coolness for, like, just a cool, well-sorted, like, 250, 300 horsepower car. I think that that problem you speak of is real, but I think it permeates more of the car culture than just horsepower. I know. I know. I think [01:08:00] people think they need a 911, or they think they need something expensive to have a good time.
They need a, they need a crazy motor swap- They need to finance something ... that doesn't make sense. And then, yeah. They need to have something... They need to, they need the RS at the end of their GT3, and they need a GT3 at the end of their 911. Mm-hmm. Because just a regular 911 isn't cool enough to Vinny.
Mm-hmm. Fucking snob. Anyway, make that a... Cut, clip that. Send it, send it to him. Um, yeah, no, I mean, there's that problem, too, which is maybe a whole other conversation. That's a whole other pod, so. But Vinny is a problem? All right, I'm gonna move into the blind spots. You guys voted me on that one, so right now, moving into the blind spots, we have sort of any kind of tune- Mm-hmm
that creates s- what we're now referring to as stolen valor tunes, which I love that. That works. Um, and then from your side, we have- Quadras? No, no. It was the other one. Oh, uh- EV, EV swaps. EV swaps. EV swaps into performance cars. And then from my side, we have reps. All right. Now let's, let's, let's bust out what the, uh, what the Patreon had.
[01:09:00] So, okay. Um, as always, uh, we question the Patreon a day or two before we do this to get them to give us what we refer to as the blind spot list. So these are things that, like, maybe we weren't thinking about. Um, okay, one of the ones that comes up immediately is Instagram handle stickers. Oh, damn. I was...
That was the one I wanted to- It's a good one. Yeah, that's a good- It's a good one. It's not even a mod. It's just something you shouldn't do, but I guess it feels like a mod. Like, you had to pay for it, and you had to put it on your car. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, it, it l- Like, who has ever looked at someone's car and been like, "I'm a go follow that"?
Nope. Never. I don't think anyone does. Nope. Years- I'll just, I'll ask the person. If I'm talking to them and I like whatever they're building and I wanna talk to them about it later, I'll be like, "Oh, what's your thing?" But- But don't you see the in- the back windshield banner? And you know what? They don't do that.
They just go, "It's this thing." They just use words. W- what do you think is, like... Do you think they think, like, some other dude's gonna roll by and be like, "Oh, man, that dude's cool. I'm a go follow him"? Do you- Or do they think some chick is like, "Oh, man- You hear his [01:10:00] fucking pops and bangs? That's what they think.
That's the dream. I want that dude to pop and bang me. I'm gonna hit him up on his Instagram. Pop, pop and bang and Instagram handle combo is pretty, like- It's serious, yeah ... it's a, it's a, it's a- It's a full Edgar move. Yeah. Yeah, you're in there. Yeah. They ... Honestly, I don't know, man, but, like, you're just, y- you're causing problems for yourself because you're exposing exactly who you are, and, you know, it's easier to track, and with all these cameras that'll, they'll- With all the flock that got brought in- All the flocks, right
because of you damn Takeover kids. Right. Yeah, so you're just- Yeah ... you know what? You're just giving up, you know, all your information to be, uh, have that car seized. Here's one that I actually disagree with, I don't mind them that much, is rock lights. So, like, u- like, basically the underglow- Yeah. Yeah ... but for trucks.
I don't know, I kind of- Oh, yeah ... I'm a bit of a racer. I still think, like, I still think rock lights are cool, but it's on the list a couple times. It, they wrote, Lucas Graham says, "Rock lights, squatted trucks, that whole class of people." Ooh. I mean, that's a little- That's a class- ... that's a little dismissive.
That's a class diss right there, yeah. Yeah. [01:11:00] Except I've seen, I've seen trucks that, with, like, the rock lights and stuff- And then underneath- ... and the truck costs 200 grand, so ... underneath it says, "Rock lights are the underglow for pavement princesses." So, yeah. Oh, that's 100% true. Yeah. Yeah. When you have rubber band tires on a lifted truck, yeah.
I will say, rock lights in the engine bay makes for really nice when you're trying to work on stuff at night and, like, find a problem. That's a good point. Yeah. Yeah, no, no, no. I, I actually think rock lights, like, the original intention for them is off-roading at night- Yeah ... and being able to see around the vehicle.
Yeah. Like, that was the original idea, as in it shows you rocks. It's become a little bit more like, "Check out my wheels and check out my-" Yeah. It's accent lighting. "Check out my chrome-" Sure ... like, my chrome axles," and things like that. But, like, I don't know. I, I'm, I'm gonna eventually put rock lights on my van because my van breaks every once in a while- They're the same-
and I have to work on it ... they're the same as, like, a house that has a light shining up at its, at its palm tree. So at night you're like, "By the way, we have a palm tree." By the way, you know what we need to add at ... 'Cause I, I had a few things on my list, and when you said that I thought about it, is OEM mods.
Like, things that, like, the manufacturers have started putting in cars that are really uncool. Up [01:12:00] badging? No. Up badging is like a ... That's, like, what people do to it. I ... More like, um, like engine noises coming through the speakers. Yeah. Oh, my God. Uh, another one I wanna call them out for is, like, I really hate that when I open the door on my wife's Land Rover it shows the image of a Land Rover on the floor- Yep
next to her. Like, ugh, it's just so cringey. Yeah, the puddle light. Anyway. And now the- That's a whole other mod ... the M2 CS has lights in the doors that tell you, that say CS. Yeah. So if you're sitting there, you remember what car you're in. I, yeah, that's, that's just, that's just a lot. Um, a lot of guys here on Burble Tunes, um, big wheels on old cars, nine out of 10 times they look like rubbish.
I don't know. I'm, I like dogs. Depends on the size wheel. Tinted front windshields I mean I happen to have a very tinted front windshield on my Raptor 'cause I got it from Arizona, and you know what? It's kind of nice. In Arizona it's kind of nice, yeah. In the desert it's great. If you live in the desert, but I get that.
Oh, I can see it. But at night, did it- I have to roll my windows down to, like, g- go through parking garages. Yeah. So I think these days you can get clear UV film that is very helpful for sun and skincare and stuff, but you can still [01:13:00] see. Oh, this is a really good one. Uh, and I may be, I may be, uh, I may be a little guilty of having done this in the past, is f- you fake overlanders with your top-heavy rooftop tents creating enough drag to decrease your miles per gallon by 10.
It was number six on my list. It was. Yep, absolutely. Yeah, okay. Yep. So that, that could be- Truck rice. Yeah. That truck rice. Yeah. That, that could move into, uh, into one of our, our blind spots as we move, as we move forward. I support that one. Uh, horns. So basically like- Oh, train horns ... train horns, anything in that kind of space.
Andy says Altezzas, and either Andy didn't read the last decade, he's from 1999- Mm-hmm ... or Altezzas are back and we're too young to know, or too old to know. I'm not really sure, so. Now we're talking about Altezza lights- The Altezza lights ... on an i300? Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, remember the Altezzas.
Like the clear, yeah, and then they went everywhere. Yeah. That light that, that every- they went everywhere, yeah. Um, I'll be honest, when those came out I thought they were super cool. So did I, 'cause it was different. Like, it, it felt like- Yeah ... so futuristic. Yeah. I definitely was sitting there trying to figure out how to do Altezzas on my Golf.
I never did, [01:14:00] but yeah, saw those things. Um, let's see. I- whistles that go woo woo. Oh, that's a, that's an old one. Woo hoo. That's cool. Well done, bro. Woo woo. Um- Oh, someone else said, uh, someone else said, actually said exactly what we said, "People going catless to gain four horsepower, but it only really smells like shit all the time."
Jillian says that. Yes, Jillian, we agree. That- that's- Um, the, the... What? Um, let's see. Uh, OEM, uh, let's see, badge overlays, um, putting uglier wheels on than stock. Like, I don't know if I would say that's a trend, but we've all seen people do that, where you're like, "Oh, that looked better when it was-" Mm-hmm ... "just stock.
Why did you change that?" Um, fake hood pins, fake scoops, fake vents. Oh. Fake scoops and vents was on my list. Um, straight piping non-performance cars. I don't know. Actually, I think if you got, like, a Dodge Aries, like, run that thing with a straight pipe. Run that. Full [01:15:00] bozo out the back. Like, just do it. Um, a lot of Burble Tunes, a lot of squatted trucks are on here.
This guy says, "Squatted trucks, especially the Carolina squat." I didn't know that there's a difference between Carolina- Oh, you didn't know the Caro- That's, yeah, the Carolina squat is the most- I thought that's, I thought that was where it was originated. I didn't realize it has its own deviance level of squat.
I sh- I should've, I should've specified, the Carolina squat. That's like a- Can you, can- That's, that's, that's like maximum squat ... can you inform, you, what's- That's like a, that's like a 35-plus degree rake angle. Whoa. That's almost the optimal angle for peeing across the room. Yes. 45. Maybe it's a continuation.
This is a good one. That's right. Rolling two step on a normally aspirated car. Ah. 'Cause there's no reason for it. That's a good one. Yeah. That's a good one. Um, chassis-mounted, uh, wings on stock road cars- Mm-hmm ... or hot hatches for no reason. Doing K or LS Coyote Hellcat or JZ swaps for no reason or [01:16:00] affordability.
Um, many cars have good engines, whether they're supposed to or not by aftermarket. Okay, I think this kind of falls into the Vinny argument, which is, like, the engine swap thing is, we're, we're doing it too much. Like, not every car needs an engine swap. Oh, just swapping to swap. Just to swap to swap. Like, to swap because of the cool points of the swap- Mm-hmm
versus, like, a good reason to swap the car. Mm-hmm. Right? Like, instead of like, "Hey, I can turbocharge this car and make a very reliable and good power. Instead, I'm gonna rip it out and put in a car, put in an engine from another manufacturer for cool points." Yeah. So clout swaps. It's like a YouTuber problem.
Clout, clout swaps- Yeah ... would be a good, a good, a good, a good way for that. Dodge owners. Wait, there's more. Dodge owners who leave bright yellow splitter protectors. Yeah, we all agree with that. Um- Making Rams say war ... off-road builds with highway tread tires. Oh, that's a, that's, that's a good one. Um, street-driven diesel trucks with hood stacks.
Kinda mentioned that b- before. Um, let's see what else we [01:17:00] got here. Uh, shotgun tunes. That was, you mentioned that. Giant wings. Um, chrome parts store knick-knacks. Oh, dude. You know- Oh, I was gonna, I was gonna say, that was gonna be one of my- Can I- ... like, uh, the, the f- I- ... the wheel lips, and like- I don't think anyone-
the wheel lips ... I'll be honest, I don't think anyone who does that listens to this show. No, they don't know how to- But when I see- Yeah ... those things, I actually have, like, a, like, a weird empathy reaction. 'Cause it's like you have been so... You've been led down the wrong path, my friend. Like, like, this is, like, like, let me be your shepherd.
Corvette owners catalog. You, like, why are you adding, like, the Buick portholes- Yes. Yo, my n- Yo, my neighbors are some creators- To, to, to your Prelude ... my neighbors, the Backspeed Boys, uh- ... they, they, they always go on these, like, they, they buy, like, the shittiest car they can, then they do, like, a, like, a, you know, quick refresh- Yeah, yeah, yeah
a bunch of stuff. Right? And they came with this SN95 Cobra, right? And it had the Buick ports, the... I was like, "What part of South Los Angeles did you get your..." He was like, "Actually, that's [01:18:00] exactly where we got it from." And I was like- Yeah ... "Was the guy, like, 50 plus?" And they're like, "Yeah, actually." And that's where, like- Loves Buick.
Yep ... like, I, I, I thought of that in my own one, which was just, like, parts store mods. I was gonna say, that, that wrong aisle in AutoZone. Yeah, like... Yeah, like, like, the, where you're just like, "Oh." But at the same time, I remember being really young and just really wanting to, like, mod my car. Yeah. Although my car was already modded.
And, like, not having access, it's different today, but, like, not having access to places where you could get, like, really cool parts- Yeah ... and going to places like that, only to sit there and say, you know, like, "Oh, do I want that?" Like, "Oh, that'd be kinda cool." Like, you know, and I th- I, I'll admit, like, I definitely did, like, fake carbon wrap, like, dash parts and stuff as a kid.
You know, you grow out of it, but- It's like a teenage phase for cars. Like, the same way you get, like, piercings and, you know, dye your hair crazy colors and stuff. You're just like, "Ooh, I can, I can afford $20 for this emblem." I'm gonna put this GTR badge right here. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Or like, uh, I was gonna say, if we were doing this from a time period of, like, the [01:19:00] '90s, you remember, like, the, the radiator hose sleeve that made it look like an AN line?
Like a br- Yeah, yeah. Yes. Yes. W- I wanted that, too ... so, okay, one- What do we like from that list? Is there anything there we wanna move forward? Can I throw one in that I'm subshock doesn't matter? Yeah, yeah, no, let, let, let's go with this one first- It wasn't, okay ... and then we'll go, we'll, we'll go into the extra things we have.
Carolina squat for sure. 'Cause it was missed on the first pass. I mean, but yeah, it's a, obviously lots of people on that. A lot of people said it. Lot of up votes. I mean, if, if we were gonna do it, what was the other one? Did it have a lot of up votes? Yeah, it, that was definitely, it, just the amount of people who said that was really big.
So that one was definitely there. The Instagram handle one was also, was also pretty prominent. Instagram handle mod. I'm, I'm, I hate seeing Instagram handle. I, every time I see one on somebody's car then I'm like, "Hey, man. You're cool." Yeah. "D- don't do that, please." If you have one on your car and you're listening right now, just we can help you.
Little Windex and eraser. Mm-hmm. Pretend like it never happened. For 9.99 a [01:20:00] month, you can subscribe to Brian's Patreon. Where we can teach you how to de-Instagram handle your car. Um, okay. I think I like the s- the swap one I think is, but that's a smaller problem. I think that's a YouTube problem. Yeah. I think- That was on my, that was on my list
yeah. Like, if we were to explan- expand my list to five, I would've included, like, clout swaps, so, because I think that there's this world where, like, we're just doing, we're just doing it to do it. I vote Instagram handle. Like, it- You know? Tony Harmer always says to me, he always says, like, "Man, people really just be doing things."
Like, he'll send me- That was the most Tony Harmer shit ... he'll send me, he'll send me a link to just some crazy car build that'll be like, "Man, people really just be doing things." It's the best way to explain it, so. So if you had, if we had to go between Instagram handle or squat trucks, what's your vote? My vote is squat trucks.
It's a terrible thing. I mean, Instagram handle's bad, too, but. Squat truck. All right, squat truck got the- Dan- dangerous. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I think squat trucks is, is that. It [01:21:00] feels, it almost feels low-hanging fruit to me, but I guess it is pretty bad. It's easier to take things out of the bed of the truck, I guess, but harder to put them in.
That is true. Are you, like, pushing uphill- That is true ... the whole time? Yeah, it's also really made the vehicle completely useless. Yeah. So. And that, yeah, that's a problem. Yeah. Well, what, what else you got? The one I had was, uh, putting Raptor lights on trucks that are not wide enough to be Raptors. Ooh. You know the three orange lights that- Yeah
the T- Tacoma boys like to put on there? Yeah. I wanna tell you- Didn't he- ... Mike Burrows just did that to the truck I sold him. Really? I sold him an F1- Oh, wait. I sold him an F- To the F-100? Well, Ashley's F-100, he put the roof lights on. He put the five- Jake, can you, like, can you give the- I mean, the grill lights
can you give the audience the, uh, legitimate reason why that was a thing? Sh- yeah, uh, when the Raptor came out in 2010, there was a law, um, that any vehicle that's wider than 80 inches had to have three orange marker lights no closer together than six inches, no further apart, I think, than 12, and it had to be on there just to tell people, "Hey, this is a big vehicle," for things like- Right, like-
buses- ... or dualies ... or dualies- Right ... stuff like that. So the Raptor was, you know, 87 inches wide or something like that, so it needed it. And then it became [01:22:00] cool. 'Cause it's, it's the stolen valor thing. That's a really common thread I'm realizing- It seems to be, yeah ... because it, it's people showing up in smaller trucks.
Mm-hmm. It's the sock in your pants, and they're like, "No, no, no." I put them on too. You're like, "But you don't need them." It's like, "Oh, I know, but it, the, the Raptors have them, and I wanna be a Raptor. I wanna be a big kid, you know?" Yeah, yeah. Like, people are, "You're not a big kid yet." Yeah. So, just wait. Dude, by br- dude, by bringing on half of The Smoking Tire, have we become just an elitist podcast now?
'Cause it's like, if you're not here, everything is stolen. No, no. I'm just kidding. Yeah, it's not that. I'm just like ... Well, here's the thing. They don't, they don't project any light onto the ground. So, if you're off-roading at night, great, put all the lights on that you want. Yeah. But those three orange things, only, their only purpose is so people see you in the dark and go, "Big truck coming."
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then you, and then you show up. So- And then you show up. Yeah, then you show up with a Tacoma, which is a superior vehicle to a Raptor in many, many regards. Uh, as a first gen Raptor owner, I'm gonna have to- They're awesome. Wait, what's superior? I think the Tacoma does some things better than a Raptor does.
What? Uh, trail, the- Have you ever driven up a [01:23:00] hill in a stock Tacoma? Long time ago. Like, like, like I mean, like, I mean like a big- Have you ever, have you ever tried to drive over 80- I mean like a big road ... on the highway in a stock Tacoma? That is difficult. No, that's true. Raptor's a better highway vehicle, it's a better open desert vehicle.
But for like, I've been on some narrow trails for off-road camping- That part, I could see ... Raptor's problematic for that. Yeah. But that's, but it is a great truck. Don't get me wrong. Okay. So we have, just so we can, we can kind of go back through this. Stolen Valor. So we have Stolen Valor Tunes, right? I love that we've, we've branded that this time.
So we have Stolen Valor Tunes, and that's going to include, like, pops and bangs. It's also going to, um, include, like- Ghost cam ... ghost cams. Ghost cam. Which I d- didn't even know was a thing. That's, oh, the horrors of life. Um, obviously then we have, um ... Why do I keep forgetting yours? Uh, EV swaps. Oh, right, right.
Sorry. For performance vehicles. Of course, yes. EV swaps, for sure. Because EVs are forgettable. Mm. Mm. Nice. The experience is forgettable. Ah, yeah. That's true. Nice, nice job there. [01:24:00] Um, and then our rep parts, and then we also have our, um, squat trucks. Mm-hmm. Okay. So let's add one more thing from either something that was said here, could be Instagram handles, or is there something else on your list that you've got?
Uh, you stole my, uh- Oh, yeah. It's right- Yeah. It's right here. Oh, thanks. He recycled it. But yo, what's funny is, like, I had straight piping any VQ. And then, oh, I had ... Okay. Well- I love how specific you were there. Yes. Uh, bolt-on flare. So basically, like, Bushwacker JDM builds. Yeah, yep. Like, like, I ... There was, there's some things where it's kind of cool.
I think it works if you're running a bigger tire. Yeah. Like, I have built, like, I have the Bushwacker flares on my van, but I'm also running a 10-inch wheel, so like- Yeah, I'm talking about, like- I need them visually ... there's all these, like, kits where it's, like, just bolt-on flares, and I just think it looks like a Bushwacker on a
You know? Oh, you mean on cars. Yeah, on cars. Okay. So the name for that, and I would say it actually goes back more than 10 years, but we w- we [01:25:00] used to refer to that as the, um, Over Fender Nationals. Yes. Mm-hmm. Right? Which was, I wanna give the credit to Formula Drift for that one. Yeah. Which was, like- The over-fender nationals was SEMA.
Like, every ca- like, what can you not over-fender? Like, everything gets over-fenders. It's the Oprah of body kits. Yes. It's like, just put an over-fender on everything. Yeah. So, I have a few over-fender cars, but, you know. Well, it- It works on some things. You, I have an RWB. Yeah, and my, my coupe- It works on that
my, my Audi coupe's a over-fender, too. Also running a 12-inch wheel. It, but that's also, like, it's, like, race car shit. Yeah. I'm, I'm talking about, like- Which it wasn't, but it is now ... a, a fucking BRZ, like- Some BRZs work, but- With 220 horsepower. Yeah ... it's the, it's the, it's the non-necessary version of it.
Yeah. But I don't know. I think, honestly, above that, the, the Instagram handle one definitely trumps it. Yeah, I agree. Anything else that you got? I mean, straight pipe VQs. 'Cause did, did you have other stuff on your list? Uh- You were, you, you sound like you had some backup pieces ... yeah, you, you, you wrote the Iliad.
Yeah. Like- Yeah. You, you brought in War and Peace over here. What do you got? Da, da, da. Oh, no, you already covered it. It was [01:26:00] stick on- Can we, can we- ... stick on scoops and vents ... can I post your, can I post your research- Yeah ... to, uh, Patreon? Sure. 'Cause I think other people might wanna read it. No, it was stick on scoops and vents, which we covered on Patreon.
Oh, we covered that one. But I think straight pipe VQs are offensive. To your point, they enter your living room, and they have sex in front of you. Yeah. And we need to stop that. They're a terrible sound. And, and it's not like good sex. Right. It's just like argh. It's like not, it's not the sex you wanna watch.
'Cause, like, sometimes, like, there's, like, like, when a Ferrari comes down my street, I w- I w- I want that sex to, like, wander its way into my living room. Mm-hmm. I get to hear it. Yeah, that's because it's a- I- ... Eastern European 12 out of 10 coming into your room. Not, you know, a, a with a fucking... Anyway, uh. Wow, we're gonna have to bleep so much of what Zac says today.
But okay, yes. You've seen so much more of the world than I have. Okay. Well, you know. And all of this before- Live on the- And all this before 12, too, which is the amazing part. All right, so, so we're going into our final [01:27:00] five. Stolen valor tunes, EV swaps on performance cars, rep parts, uh, squat trucks, and Instagram handles.
Instagram handles. And we think that's better than anything else that you had previously said. Like, you had other stuff on your list. You had obviously had squats, so you got two things in. Anything from your list better than your caliper covers, better than- Yeah, 'cause the Instagram handles happens across all marks- Yeah
all models- Right. Yeah, yeah ... all income levels. Yeah, and look, if someone here is listening, and we can educate the youth- that that's just not something we should be doing to our kids Dude, there's adults that do this with like their, they, they have like new Mercedes actually- I was gonna say, if you have it on your Konigsegg, okay?
Okay? That's better than that That's actually the largest, that's like one of the biggest, uh, yeah. All right, guys, we're gonna take another quick break and, uh, we'll come back and we'll try to rank all this. It's the Snack Intermission, brought to you by Vyper Industrial. All right, this is my favorite part of the show.
This is Snack Cart, where we enjoy hopefully a new snack for everyone, and we rate it, brought to you by [01:28:00] Vyper Industrial. Nice. Basically, you can thank them for both what you're sitting on and the snacks you're about to eat. So- Best chairs in the game ... I found these the other day. The Reese's Big Cut Strawberry Peanut Butter and Jelly.
That's horrible. So it's a Reese's Cup, but with strawberry in it. No one's had this? No. All right, everybody gets their own. They're tinkering with an almost perfect snack. Yeah. So risky. All right, initial responses, as you're still chewing? That's not bad. Somebody engineered some flavor. Yeah. Pretty spot on Top scientists working on this.
Mm-hmm. I think it needs more jelly. Yeah. It's like 5% jelly taste. I would agree. It just tastes like Reese's, which is fine. I mean, Reese's are good, but I agree. It's a little light on the jelly. Zac, what's the dirtiest thing you've ever had in your mouth? Which Zac? Oh, I mean- I don't remember her name, but it was- Me, yeah
behind a dumpster in the . One thing about Zac is Zac will eat just like raw meat j- and then turn around and then just eat garbage. He doesn't let everyone see him eat garbage, but I've eaten garbage with him. I might be his garbage friend. I mean, sometimes an import in a [01:29:00] storm. All right, boys, rank them.
Yeah, what does this get on a scale of one to 10? I'm gonna give it like a three 'cause like I'm already like starting to like not feel good. I'll give it a five. It was a six, but now my stomach does hurt, so I give it a five. I really enjoy like the peanut butter and jelly, um, like the little like, what are those called?
The, the- Crustables? Crustables. Mm-hmm. God, you eat child- Yeah, like those are good. I have a child. When you have a child, you eat child food. Did you eat those before the child arrived? Yes. Anyway, back to the show. No further questions. Yep. All right, we are back. We are back. Let's rank them, boys. Let's start with, um, us- usually we would have six and we'd have to kill one.
Mm-hmm. But let's just, let's just start with what is, what is almost acceptable? Like what is the thing that maybe doesn't deserve to be on the list? Right? So it, it's, it's gotta be the fifth place thing, so it's the thing that, like- Squat truck, I think I'd put fifth. Okay. It's, 'cause it's an ex- Ar- give me the argument
it's, it's, it's, it's not a good trend. It is a little bit [01:30:00] dangerous, although it might be... Yeah, it's the most dangerous one on here. Um- But like there's, muscle cars back in the day had huge forward rake. Yes, it was based on m- on like drag racing and stuff, but it became an aesthetic that permeated into the streets, right?
And it's just, I think it's a trend. It is an aesthetic choice. People think it's cool. It will fade. That's the other thing, is I think it'll go away more quickly than some of these other ones, and let people kinda drive the thing they wanna drive. Hopefully they don't hit other people. What's your take on that?
I'm gonna have to say maybe IG handles would be at the ... I mean, it's gross. But like, it's not in your ... Like- It's, it's- You're not gonna get rear-ended by an IG handle. Yeah, and you're not also, you know, stealing people's ideas and concepts. Uh, it's not just super irritating like the tunes with like pops and bangs and stuff like that- Right
you know? So. I would be between that and EV swaps. Yeah. Because here's the thing on the EV swap, is like it [01:31:00] annoys me, but I also am one of those people who like, I hate when people tell me what I shouldn't do to my car, and I like ... Do you know what I'm saying? Like, it's your fucking car. Meaning like ... No, no, no, but I, I- It's like this entire list Right?
I was gonna say, like you can't squat truck your car. No, I, I guess, I guess more what I mean is like I have a bunch of Porsche purists who are like, "Oh, I can't believe you, you know, chopped off your..." Shit, I'm like, "I don't fucking care." Hmm. Like, it doesn't matter. It's my car. I can do what I want with it.
True. I feel like the EV swap thing kind of like goes into it. It's not, it's not like hackery. Like, they usually, th- a lot of the swaps are done pretty well. Some of the 911 swaps are actually reversible, which like makes it less of a problem for me. Um, I just think it's not cool. But I guess that's what the whole- Yeah.
I guess the whole argument here is like, this isn't cool. It's not really about safety. And is, is the EV swap really just like it's a version of the engine swap that bothers us? Like, if you take a 911 and put an LS in it- I, I would argue- ... it changes the character ... I would argue that I think- It's castration
I would a- I would argue that it is actually peak clout swap, because like I think especially when all of it was happening, and I [01:32:00] got friends who swapped cars so I wouldn't hear it from this, but like, like Lee. But like, you know, those are things that like it was like, "Oh, this is cool, and people are gonna think it's cool," but like you made the car worse.
Like, you probably made the car worse, especially if it was already a performance car. So, uh, or maybe, maybe it's, maybe it is IG handles. All right. So IG- All right. I'll go I- yeah, 'cause it's not dangerous. IG handles, fifth. All right. Next? I mean, i- in the way we've been con- having the conversation, next is either squat or EV swaps, unless
Or, or rep parts or stolen Valor trucks. But it seems like those were all- I, I vote EV swaps for fourth, for the reasons aforementioned. Also, I'll throw EV swaps in fourth too. I'll, I'll agree to that. Because, like, rep parts is super irritating, and it's like, it's, it's damaging to the country. Mm-hmm.
Craftsmen. Um, I will argue that maybe squat trucks, uh, should be there Should be fourth? Uh, you know what? [01:33:00] As, as soon as I said that, I, I kind of pulled the words back into my mouth because I guess, again, just like IG handles, like EV swaps aren't really dangerous other than that they could catch fire and an entire fire k- fire patrol can't get it out, and it takes like three battalions to put it out.
True, but gas cars tend to catch- And you have to- ... on fire more often statistically. That's because there's more of them. Is it by ratio? I think it's by ratio, too. Like, the fire thing is, is going away. And, and well, then there's hybrid fires. That's a different story. Yeah, I don't know. It's the h- it's the fact that most, and this is a whole other conversation, but it's the fact that we are now installing, uh, containers full of water at fire stations 'cause we don't know how to put the fires out.
True. It's just a little terrifying. That, that's true. It's a little scary. Yeah. I've seen an electric fire. I'm gonna tell a story, though maybe I shouldn't. Actually, I think I'm still under NDA. Oh. I was once involved in an electric car that we had to leave in a parking lot, uh, over two nights, and, like leave it away from everything else, hidden, because we thought it was going to explode.
Not just a parking lot. Jeep 4XE? What? Like can't, I can't- Is it a Jeep 4XE? Okay ... I can't say what it was, but it was definitely terrifying. We all thought it was gonna blow up, so we found an [01:34:00] empty parking lot and left it there for two days, hoping that it wouldn't explode. All right, I guess I'm good for EV swaps in four.
Okay. That's, th- th- this, this has not been as much of a fight- No ... as I thought it was gonna be. Um, it's a- it's almost so easy to hate with you guys. It's like, it just really just comes naturally. We all agree on the hate. Yeah, yeah. We all agree. Yeah, we all agree on this, yeah. So all right, top three we're getting into now.
Third place, i- is that where squat trucks land or rep parts? Uh, um- I mean, I will say this, the Patreon, no one really mentioned rep p- or actually, yes, they did. Okay. Some people said Alibaba tuning, so I guess I'll put- I'll say squat trucks is third in my opinion, because it only affects the squat truck community and the people they hit, but that's still a fairl- fairly limited number, whereas- Right, 'cause if you don't live in North Carolina-
rep parts are stealing from- ... you're probably safe ... all the people that have made parts, and also, uh, it's the stolen valor thing, and then so is, uh, the, the tunes. Man, I almost didn't put rep on my, on my top three list. It's crazy how [01:35:00] fast it's, it's moving. It's w- it's way out I'm glad you did, though. I, I wouldn't have put it or thought w- I, you- Yeah
we, we made the joke in the chat earlier about it, which I thought was really funny. But I think it's a really good point, 'cause it's taken all this product, all this money away from people who made the real thing. Yeah. And sometimes the rep part is literally dangerous. 100%. And some- sometimes it's just, like a heavy, shitty version of the thing that you really wanted to buy.
And other times it makes the original thing uncool, because the rep becomes so prolific that people think that it's all rep, you know? It starts dragging it down. Yeah, and it starts dragging it down. Like, there are certain wheels that used to be really hard and rare to find, like OZ Futuras, and like now there's just like a ton of reps in the market.
Or, like the original, um, AMG, um, Monoblock Arrow II, really cool wheel. Now there's a rep company that makes them, and it's like all of a sudden everybody has them again, and, like the search for that was part of what made that wheel cool. Okay, so third place, squat trucks. Squat trucks. This is almost too easy.
All right. All right, so now it's between one and two. So [01:36:00] Stolen Valor tunes or rep parts. What's the, what, which one, which one is the worst of the current mod trends? Which one really just- I'm, I'm gonna go two ... irks you? Like, I'm gonna go the tunes, man. Is the worst. That's gonna be number one. Yeah. That's gonna be my number one.
That, I didn't wanna say it, but that's my list, too. Because they, they're everywhere, they enter the living room, they're offensive, uh, and they're misrepresenting a lot of stuff, too. I don't think anyone would get us, get an ar- give you much of an argument for it. It is probably the worst part of the culture right now.
It's also, I'm gonna add this one 'cause we haven't really talked about it, uh, it is close to as annoying as takeovers are to the police department. Oh, yeah. So in talking to my friends at the sheriff's department, they're like, "One of the issues is that we get so many phone calls for gunshots because of this."
And do you remember at Hoonigan, 'cause we were in sli- slightly of a dicey area when we were at Hoonigan Long Beach, um, we used to have a triangulating [01:37:00] system that would go off all the time whenever we would run any of our cars that had anti-lag. Oh, the gunshot triangulation thing. Yeah. So, so, so the triangulation system can tell where there's a gunshot, and then it l- it, like, it, it can narrow it down to, like, 30 feet.
So the police used to constantly come to our building while we were, like, tuning or testing cars or just filming, thinking- that there had been gunshots. And they'd show up- You- ... and we'd be like, "Uh, we're just filming." They're like, "All right, fine. We figured as much." But- Cue up the, uh, the three south of the border Honda boys.
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's perfect. And it's like that was, you know, so that is one of the things that causes, like, the annoyance level, where the annoyance is so high that now the police are mad, and the only way they know how to deal with that is to say, "All aftermarket exhausts are now banned." Yeah. And that's how we're- Mm
moving into a future of the world where you're just not gonna be allowed to tune your car at all- Yeah ... or make any changes. So, like, that I think is one of those ones where, like, the e- like the- Yeah ... the rep parts- That affects the future. The rep parts affec- affects the present. Yeah, and the rep [01:38:00] parts is, like, it's annoying.
You could argue that we're being a little classist 'cause we're saying, "Hey, you shouldn't buy things unless they're real." But I think that from an engineering point of view, from an IP point of view, which, like, I'm a big supporter of creative IP and people should get paid for the things they make, and you shouldn't be able to rip them off.
Um, from the safety point of all the, the broken stuff and, like, wheels just splitting or just bad, bad quality stuff and things like that, that's all really bad. But yeah, I don't know. I guess, yeah. I mean, not that it really matters. You guys have already voted, so it's, we've already ranked this, but I just wanted to talk through it, so burn a few more minutes on the clock.
Mm-hmm, sure. Just 'cause, 'cause it upsets Nick. And do you agree with that order for yourself as well? Um, yeah. I think this works. I mean, I would... I, I kinda knew going into this, like, when, when you first texted me, 'cause I asked you, "This, was this your idea?" I was like, "What was the w- you know, worst mods?" And when you, when you and I texted back and forth, the top of my head, I was like, "This is either gonna be squatted trucks or verbal tunes."
So- Can I tell you something that didn't get on the list, and maybe 'cause it's more than a decade old, and I kinda [01:39:00] forgot to mention it before, is, uh, truck nuts. Truck nuts. Oh. I started writing it and I went, "Too old." It's too old. It's, it's 15, 20 years. Like, it, it feels like it's, it feels like it's in the past.
Yeah. But, like, I'm still- You already admitted that, though ... offended by them when I see them. Sure. Yeah. I'm still like, "Oh, like, I don't need to see that." Somebody made a lot of money- Oh, yeah, yeah ... off those. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 'Cause that was ev- especially in the Midwest, holy shit, it was- Yeah ... everywhere. Yeah. I, I'll also say another one, and this is probably just me being older and I have a child now, but, like, big profanity on cars.
Oh, yeah. Like, there's the one guy who I think has, like, he had the windshield banner on the back of his car that said, like, "I eat ass," and, like, he kept getting pulled over. I s- was it a Charger? 'Cause that guy had- Maybe. I saw one of those- Maybe ... and he also had his steering wheel handled. And it's like I get it from a First Amendment point of view.
It's like, yeah, you should be able to say whatever. But it's like- I don't know. It's just like, it's like I- that level of attention, it's like y- you don't realize how much of a douchebag you're being. Mm-hmm. Like, you are giving me the douche chills. Right. You know what that means? M- Like, I feel- Yeah, you're, by association, you feel douchey
by association, like, I feel douchey, yeah. Yeah. There was quite a few- Like, I'm cringing at your douchery ... quite a few stolen-looking [01:40:00] G8s at, uh- ... LS Fest West this last weekend that had some, uh, wildly profane things, uh, blasted on the back- Yeah ... windshield of them. Yeah, I mean, it's, it's ... I get it. Like, when I was a kid, I remember people had, like, Calvin pissing on a Chevy logo- Oh, I, I was gonna say, right?
Yeah ... or a Ford logo. We've had it in the community forever. Mm-hmm. I don't think it's been our brighter side, so there's that. All right, any, any other notes, changes? Anyone else forget anything before we lock this in for... I mean, this is basically history. This is, like, the New York Times of- Yeah ... yesteryear.
This is ratified. This is, this is the written word now. Yeah. Yeah, this is it. All right, here we go. The list. Number five, Instagram handles as stickers on your car. Number four, EV swaps in performance cars, especially classic performance cars. Mm-hmm. Number three, squat trucks. Number two, rep parts. Stop robbing from the real people who made things.
[01:41:00] And number one, a term that was coined on this show- Copyright ... stolen valor tunes. And please explain that. Stolen valor tunes, that's verbal tunes, ghost cams, backfire, shotgun, machine gun tunes, whatever the hell you want. It cracks and pops and bangs, all that bullshit. Listen, just, just do, get some real parts in there, okay?
Yeah. Don't be a . Get a real tune. Get some real parts. And just- Just let the car make power ... uh, yeah, or just straight pipe your car like other people used to. Yeah. It'd be lower on the list of bad things to do. Exactly. It's at number seven, yeah. Yeah, be a number seven. Don't be a number one. No. So all right, boys, this has been fun.
Gentlemen. Super fun. Yeah. Yeah. Had good times. I think we made a decent list. I think we got some real progress here. It's, it's, it's fun to do a very- Yeah, it's good ... unserious list. It does, no one seems upset about this. No. L- normally, when we end this show, people are like, "Ugh, I don't know how I feel about this list," 'cause it, it's about something that's really important and dire and true to them.
This doesn't... It's whatever. This is very [01:42:00] important, but I think we all came together to hate. Yeah. And that's, uh- Yeah, that's a good way to bond ... that's f- Hell yeah, guys. That's w- That's the end of the show, guys. That's what white guys doing a podcast come together saying, people. Yeah, you guys just need beards.
Wow. Some tough times there.
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