Integra Type S Review; Spray-on PPF?; Are Tire Changes a Bad Sign?

Summary

The Smoking Tire Podcast: Integra Type S Review; Spray-on PPF?; Are Tire Changes a Bad Sign?

Hosts: Matt Farah & Zack Klapman
Date: February 19, 2026
Episode Overview:
In this episode, Matt and Zack deliver a hands-on review of the new Acura Integra Type S, debate automotive industry trends, discuss the practicalities and trade-offs with modern tow vehicles, examine the implications of AI in publishing and YouTube, and field thoughtful listener questions—from “un-shitboxing” a Subaru to the reality of frequent tire changes on a used Lexus LC500. Along the way, signature wit, tangents, and real-world enthusiast perspectives abound.

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Main Theme

A blend of accessible car culture discussion and practical advice, centered on a deep-dive review of the Acura Integra Type S as a modern enthusiast’s do-it-all car. The episode also explores the realities of car ownership, emerging automotive tech like spray-on paint protection, AI’s effects on car media, and broader car-community questions.

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Acura Integra Type S: Review & Insights

[06:26–14:03]

• Driving Experience:

  • Described as "a simple and well-executed car"—engages all aspects an enthusiast wants: good inputs, lightweight, responsive, comfortable seats, excellent shifter, usable infotainment. “Not too much like, screens in your face,” Matt notes, with praise for its traditional yet digital cluster ([07:50]).
  • Feels surprisingly light: “It feels like it doesn’t weigh anything.” ([07:53] – Matt)
  • Large, practical trunk/hatchback; hosts wish for an optional rear wiper due to rain buildup ([07:57]).
  • “I really like the price—$53,000 as it sits. …Considering how many different boxes this thing checks and how few affordable sports cars are left on the market…” ([08:26] – Matt)

• Comparison to Civic Type R:

  • About $6k more than a Civic Type R.
  • Stereo (ELS) is outstanding and seats are “just right” for comfort—especially lumbar support, which edges out the Civic.
  • Civic’s bolsters are better for spirited driving; if Acura had them with lumbar support it’d be “one of the best seats ever.” ([09:23] – Zack)
  • Slightly softer, more refined for daily, but less aggressive.
  • Better looking, in Matt’s view.
  • “Japan’s M3, kind of.” ([13:51] – Zack)

• Fuel Economy & Practicality:

  • Fuel economy “not great” at sustained highway speeds—smaller tank means less range than expected for the car’s size ([10:34]).
  • Noted differences may come from tire spec (Cup 2s vs. PS4S) and Civic’s draggy wing ([11:30-12:00]).
  • Easily manageable for city and highway—“Even though it’s a stick, the clutch is so light and the shifter’s so easy.”

• Performance & Track Use:

  • Advanced drivers may quickly reach its limits: “You’re gonna get to the limit of the car in your first couple of sessions… it probably won’t challenge you.” ([12:24] – Matt)
  • Still, “such a good, do everything, pick-an-activity” car—nothing it’s truly bad at.
  • Hosts advise against heavy modification: “It’s such diminishing returns.” ([13:33] – Matt)

• Comparisons & Legacy:

  • “Nicest driving front-wheel-drive car I’ve ever driven.”
  • Recalls previous favorites: R53 Mini JCW, Fiesta ST, Mark 7 GTI, and legendary Acura CL Type S.
  • Reminisces about failed attempts to buy earlier great Honda models due to unavailability ([14:48]).

Notable Quotes

• “This car, what was I driving right before it? …the Acura is just a simple and well executed car that engages basically everything that people who like cars ask for.” ([06:50] – Matt)
• “If I never rode this new one, the 310 [Vespa], there would be absolutely nothing wrong with keeping mine forever. …It’s just that now I’ve had a taste.” ([06:04] – Matt, on loaners and upgrades)

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Industry News, Towing Rigs, Lexus GX550

[24:30–31:17]

• Towing Search:

  • Lexus GX550 enters the hosts’ personal tow rig competition.
  • “Can tow 9,000 pounds and has adjustable, self-leveling air suspension. …It’s a lot of money [~$75-80k], but a lot cheaper than a Cayenne.” ([27:43] – Matt)
  • Breakdown of trims and towing capacities; considered for practicality, not passion.
  • “Hannah likes boxy shit.” ([28:59] – Matt, about spouse’s taste)
  • Suggests premium trim for best value.

• Ride Quality:

  • Overtrail model drove “really trucky” on highway ([29:20]), but hopes premium, road-focused versions might ride better.

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AI Disrupting Online Content & YouTube Frustrations

[31:17–43:16]

• AI as Content Thief:

  • How generative AI and large language models (LLMs) scrape content from small creators, reducing their already thin ad revenue — recipe sites are highlighted as a poignant example.
  • “All they wanted was a click…LLMs just scrape it right off.” ([32:57] – Matt)
  • “With recipes it absolutely fucking does [steal traffic].” ([35:25] – Matt)

• Shift in Media Promotion:

  • Vent about how cross-promotion between YouTube, Instagram, and other platforms has been neutered; platforms downrank external links, hurting organic, creator-driven discovery ([37:52]).

• Changing YouTube Landscape:

  • Discussion about YouTube becoming less meritocratic, now favoring “cringy” content, clickbait, or Jack-and-Logan Paul types over high-effort journalism or videos.
  • “We know what gets good traffic, and it’s cringy as fuck.” ([36:22] – Matt)
  • “The audience will find you… because there’s someone else out there that has a similar brain.” ([37:07] – Zack, quoting Patton Oswald, but noting it’s not so simple now)
  • They believe the algorithm rewards spectacle over substance, and that older creators’ revenue/visibility is purposely being squeezed.

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Listener Q&A Highlights

(Patreon Questions included throughout from [43:16] onward)

Spray-On Paint Protection Film

[78:32–80:27]

• Plasti-Dip has released a spray-on PPF—applies like a wrap, peels off for easy track day use.
• “People put painter’s tape on their car; it doesn’t do shit.” ([80:09] – Matt)
• Useful as a temporary track solution, but hosts express caution about long-term use and residue.

Buying Used: Frequent Tire Changes on Lexus LC500

[51:40–54:14]

• Listener’s parents are wary of a CPO LC500: two alignments and five sets of tires in 45k miles.
• “Maybe that person drives spiritedly… You could blow off a set of Michelins in 9,000 miles.” ([53:23] – Matt)
• Forums confirm: “That seems about right. The front end’s heavy, it’s got soft tires from stock.” ([54:07] – Zack)
• Conclusion: Not unusual for that car.

Un-"Shitboxing" an ’06 Subaru WRX Wagon

[65:22–67:48]

• What mods to make an old Subaru less of a beater?
• Hosts recommend sound deadening, updated carpet/headliner, modern suspension, a decent stereo—focus is on comfort and livability rather than speed.

Tire & Rim Choices for a Lifted BRZ

[83:55–85:05]

• Advice: Drop to 16” wheels for more sidewall, have separate tarmac and gravel tire sets.
• "If you can afford two sets of wheels and tires, that's the answer." ([85:14] – Matt)

Rental Car Philosophy

[54:41–55:49]

• Matt: Always take a minivan. “I’ve never been in a situation with a rental car where I had a minivan and wished I didn’t.”
• Zack: Chevy Tahoe is his utility pick.

Secret Pre-License Driving

[76:12–77:23]

• Hosts recount parents letting them drive in parking lots or quiet neighborhoods before licenses—early hands-on learning is invaluable.

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Notable Moments & Quotes

• On car buying and responsibility:
  “The way we acted about our cars was very different from people who were given cars… We treated not just the car but the responsibility of driving way differently.” ([81:56] – Matt)

• On overdone carbon fiber:
  “Having carbon fiber accents is trashier than having camo accents.” ([63:09] – Listener question)
  “There is a way to use naked carbon fiber in a way that looks cool, but they don’t always do that. Sometimes it can look plasticky, sometimes they overdo it.” ([63:16] – Matt)

• Podcast’s endearing tone:
  “Thank you, everybody. Appreciate y’all—patrons, even you guys, who talked mad shit. Appreciate you too.” ([92:32] – Matt)

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Other Key Segments / Timestamps

• Restaurant Tangent / LA Life: [02:06–05:32] (local eats, Vespa rides, LA winter woes)
• Vespa 310 Ride & Value Retention: [05:12–06:11]
• Modified Car Memories: [77:38–78:32] (nutty engine swaps remembered fondly)
• Ford Colors: [57:45–61:14] (theory: each year, Ford offers one “real” color that’s a stunner, rest are bland)
• Hypercar Gearbox Choices: [61:17–63:16] (explaining why top hypercars still use single-clutch automated if not dual-clutch)
• Performance SUV Use at Rallies: [90:07–92:29] (they’re accepted by most, but sometimes with grumbling)

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Overall Vibe & Takeaways

• Informed, informal, and fun: Matt and Zack balance concrete expertise with the humility of real-world car owners—unscripted, honest, and approachable.
• Episode’s Heart: Integra Type S—a worthy modern icon for enthusiasts seeking usable practicality without sacrificing spirit.
• Larger Themes: The challenge of balancing passion and practicality, living with the realities of platform shifts in automotive media, and always: the joy (and madness) of car culture.

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For listeners who want to catch up quickly, this summary covers all core themes, standout moments, and practical advice from the episode. Skip the ads, enjoy the vibe, and refer to the timestamps for deeper dives into each topic!

Transcript

[Matt Farah]

What up, everybody? Welcome to the Smoking Tire Podcast. Today's episode is brought to you by off the Record. We love them over here because I know that off the Record is looking out for me 24, 7 when I'm on the road, no matter where I am in the continental United States. Because their coverage extends to basically 97% of the continental United States and some Alaska and Hawaii. Off the Record is a service that connects you with a qualified attorney to fight any ticket you might got no matter where you are. So you get a ticket near home, maybe you have somebody. But what if you're in a different state? You don't want to go back there and deal with the court system on your own. That's why off the Record is here. All you have to do is go to offtherecord.com TST. That's offtherecord.com Tst then you're going to upload a photo of the ticket, some information about what happened, your version of events, so to speak. And off the Record, we'll fight that ticket on your behalf all the way to the Supreme Court if need be. And most of the time they get her done over there. And their goal is to get those points off your record. You don't want points on your record because it could affect your insurance, could affect potentially your employment, a variety of other things. So offtherecord.com TST for 10% off all legal services. They are out there looking out for you. All right, folks, on this episode, Zach and I review the Acura Integra type S. Spoiler alert. We like it very much. I find a new option that enters the field in our competition to find the best towing option for our potentially free trailer. And we talk a little more about our thoughts on AI in the YouTube space to clarify some things from last week's show. Plus, can you or should you un shitbox. A 20 year old Subaru. It's the Smoking Tire podcast. Let's go. Hi. This is a show. Hello.

[Zach]

This is a show.

[Matt Farah]

Hello. Hello.

[Zach]

The American Brother broadcast system.

[Matt Farah]

Hello. From the land of fatty meat dreams.

[Zach]

Pretty sure that's what happened.

[Matt Farah]

Zach said he was having fatty meat dreams.

[Zach]

I've just had a lot of weird nightmares last night. I don't have that very often.

[Matt Farah]

Really?

[Zach]

Yeah. And I felt really, really full after dinner even though we didn't get, like things that seemed heavy.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Zach]

So I don't know if there's a lot of hidden, like delicious oil in what we had. The food was amazing.

[Matt Farah]

I hope we don't find out that I can't eat there anymore.

[Zach]

You just gotta ask what kind of oil everything's cooked in.

[Matt Farah]

Took Zach. I took Zach to my favorite restaurant and I will plug it called two Homies, spelled H O M M E. S like the French, like hommes.

[Zach]

Yeah, but their website said homaze.

[Matt Farah]

It's home. Yeah, it's home. It's pronounced Homais.

[Zach]

Yeah, but it's.

[Matt Farah]

It's a fun. Actually, it's. It would be a great username on the Patreon.

[Zach]

Yeah, it would.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. French West African cuisine. The place fucking absolutely rocks. So great.

[Zach]

Phenomenal.

[Matt Farah]

Better make a res, though. Otherwise you ain't getting in. Cause they popular and only I know the password, which doesn't get me in.

[Zach]

Doesn't exist.

[Matt Farah]

It doesn't exist.

[Zach]

You're trying.

[Matt Farah]

I'm trying to make a password happen for locals. I hate that shit. When, you know, when a place is a little local place and it gets popular, I don't hate it because of that. You want these folks to succeed. Sure. But you just. God damn it. Now I can't get a rez to my favorite spot.

[Zach]

You were a fan when they were in the garage.

[Matt Farah]

We were there. Just let me get like, you know, fucking.

[Zach]

If you keep going for, you know, years, I think they usually, you know, that's how you end up with, like, the seat at the bar.

[Matt Farah]

Well, no, for sure, but, like, this place has no phone booking system whatsoever. That's why there can't be a password. You can't call and you have to use one of the apps and shit. And there's no. As far as I know, somebody somewhere.

[Zach]

It's also a really small restaurant at Resi. Seven tables.

[Matt Farah]

It is very small. But if you work at Rezi and you are aware of a backdoor way to have a local's password for, like, better Res's at those restaurants. Like, let's go.

[Zach]

Yeah. They also don't want to skip you past other people because the optics will be bad. It's a very small restaurant and, you know.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, no, no. Yeah.

[Zach]

But.

[Matt Farah]

But come on. Just across. Not just this restaurant, across the board. Respect the elders. Respect your longtime customers.

[Zach]

You know, you need a punch card to show how long you've been going.

[Matt Farah]

That's what I'm saying. That's. Yeah, that's the local. That's the local's password. Yeah. But anyway, fortunately, Zach woke up from the V dreams. Yeah. And I rode a Vespa through the rain this morning because I had an early. I had a Doctor's appointment in Beverly Hills. I checked to check in at 6:30, which it was 48 degrees, which is like not objectively that cold, but when you're getting on a motorcycle, getting out of bed and getting on a motorcycle in la, that's cold, that's cold.

[Zach]

Our bodies think that's cold.

[Matt Farah]

It's cold. Yeah. So I literally, I wore long underwear and it was all right. And I was like, I hope they don't make me like run on a treadmill for this test. Cause I'll be very sweaty in this long underwear, but a little wet. But I have to give back the Vespa 310 today. I've had it the whole. I've had the Vespa 310 for two months.

[Zach]

You can buy one.

[Matt Farah]

Yes, definitely. 100%. Am I buying one? Fortunately, I think I'll be able to pay for more than 60% of it by selling the one I have.

[Zach]

Oh, nice.

[Matt Farah]

You know what I mean?

[Zach]

Money in, money out.

[Matt Farah]

The one I have has retained its value like super well. I could probably sell it on Instagram in a day. And I probably will, to be honest with you. Because if I never rode this new one, the 310, there would be absolutely nothing wrong with keeping mine forever.

[Zach]

Sure.

[Matt Farah]

It's just that now I've had a taste.

[Zach]

Right. That's the problem. That's how they get.

[Matt Farah]

You had a little taste. So I'll do. I'll do a review of the Vespa 310 in the next.

[Zach]

Is that basically how dealership loaners work? Like your car's broken and they go, well, while you're here, take this new one around?

[Matt Farah]

In theory, yeah. Which is great. Until the new one is the same one you've got, but with 8s.

[Zach]

Or if you bring in your Alpha quad and they give you a Stelvio. Not the same.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Let's start the show with the week we had with the Acura Integra Type S. Not our first Type S, this is the second go round with the Type S. And this car, what was I driving right before it?

[Zach]

Ineos.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, right. I think the ineos.

[Zach]

I think it was.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. And also the ineos. And then before that the Corvette E Ray and the GT3RS, which are both very techy solutions. I mean, the GT3RS is an NA engine, but like with all the settings and all this aero and shit. And the Acura is just a simple and well executed car that like engages like basically everything that people who like cars ask for in A car is present in this car. Like, good inputs, lightweight, responsive, good shifter, comfortable seats, like an easy to use multimedia system. Not like too much like screens in your face. I mean, there are two screens, but the gauge cluster screen remains pretty much just a black digital screen.

[Zach]

I mean, Acura says it weighs 3,000 pounds.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, it feels like it doesn't weigh anything.

[Zach]

And it's a big, comfortable car.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, it has a big trunk with the hatchback in this one. I would love if they had an optional rear wiper. In the rain. In the rain. A lot of rain collects on the rear windshield. But it's just parked overnight. It's nearly flat, and if you don't get up to highway speeds, the air doesn't blow it off. So I'd like a wiper, but Hannah's like, matt, almost no sedans come with rear wipers. I was like, that's true. Absolutely correct.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

And also I really like the price. $53,000 as it sits, which again, not nothing. But considering how many different boxes this thing's checked and how few affordable sports cars are left on the market. I drove this thing for five minutes. I was like, oh, yeah, I remember why. This was at Performance Car of the Year last year. This is great.

[Zach]

It's such a good, do everything car. It's a little. What is it, $6,000 more than a Civic Type R, MSRP wise. But I remember was the stereo is like Elios or something.

[Matt Farah]

Els.

[Zach]

Els, like one of the best stereos I've ever had. Any price point in the last three years. Fantastic.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, the stereo is really good. And you get the lumbar support. Makes a really big difference from the Civic Type R to this. This rides a little better for every day.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

I think this looks better than the Civic Type R. It's just me, not for everybody.

[Zach]

I think they're both. I actually really like the front of the new Civic. I think they're both really good looking, But I think the lumbar in this is good. But the bolsters in the Civic Type R are amazing. Like, if you're gonna drive quick, this is a little bit, you know, soft in how it holds you. Yeah, it's a little bit open. If I could combine the two or honestly just put like an air bladder or, you know, thing in the Civic Type R seat, that would be one of the best seats ever.

[Matt Farah]

But you probably could do that.

[Zach]

I mean, I. Aftermarket. Yeah. I wish it came with it. It should, because it's a great seat.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Zach]

But this is Such a Mustangs do everything vehicle, the Civic seats.

[Matt Farah]

And the Mustang seats are two seats that are, like, really missing that adjustable lumbar. And if they could find an affordable way to do it, those seats could be, like, perfect. But they're like sevens because of that. I'm sure these are supposed to be affordable cars, so they gotta cut literal pennies wherever they can. But that shit bums me out. But for go, you know, go anywhere, do anything, pick an activity, there's nothing that the Integra is bad at.

[Zach]

I think it was the mpg, though. That's the only thing that In a car that is, like, refined and seems so well suited for, like, road trip stuff that I remember when I drove the Civic Type R to San Luis Obispo and back, I was like, whoa, I'm getting, like, 22 miles per gallon.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. It's not very efficient on the highway. And it also has a pretty small tank. So your cruising range is not as much as you would think, considering how big the car is.

[Zach]

I mean, advertised 28 highway, which is good. So if you can achieve that, is

[Matt Farah]

that for this or for the Civic?

[Zach]

That's for this.

[Matt Farah]

I also wouldn't be shocked if I were to learn, and I don't know the numbers on this, if the Civic, because of that wing, gets worse highway fuel economy than this car does.

[Zach]

Yeah, that's a great point.

[Matt Farah]

This may be more aerodynamic for highway, and the Civic may be more suitable for handling it and have a little bit of a higher limit. And that wing might make some drag.

[Zach]

That's a good call, because the car and driver achieved 31 miles per gallon at 75 miles per hour. So in the Integra. In the Integra. So they actually beat, you know, advertise. So there you go. That means

[Matt Farah]

if you were driving a press car in Southern California, which I imagine you were, it may have had fucking cup 2s on it.

[Zach]

Oh, yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Which this has. And this has PS4s, which there's probably a mile or two per gallon in that. In that tire. That's a sticky tire.

[Zach]

That's a good point.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. So the combination of sticky tire wing, you know, probably means this is a better highway car than the. Which I buy that if I had, like, a long. Like, even though it's a stick, like, it's. The clutch is so light and the shifter's so easy that I wasn't, like, tired of driving it in traffic or anything.

[Zach]

Yeah. And then you can go run it at the track. I mean, this is such A good do everything. It's a rare thing these days.

[Matt Farah]

My only criticism out of the track, and I've got a lot of track time in this thing, is if you're an advanced driver, it's a great beginner intermediate car. And if you're an advanced driver, you can have fun in it, but you're gonna get to the limit of the car in your first couple sessions if you're an advanced driver, you know, and it won't, it probably won't challenge you. Like you can find other challenges in driving. But like the car, you know, even if you go full off, it's still such a manageable thing that if you're an advanced driver, you go, okay, I get this after like a couple sessions. And you won't be like, I'm gonna take this to the track every weekend, you know, but.

[Zach]

And then you could throw mods at it. But then would you change the character of the car?

[Matt Farah]

It's like down the rabbit hole and you know you've still got a front wheel drive car. Like there's making it go. There's a reason that like no front wheel drive cars have more than like 325, 350 horsepower. It just stops being useful.

[Zach]

Then you guys are adding flings.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. But like it's just such diminishing return. You start throwing all this money at stuff, you know, I'd leave this alone. Wouldn't you?

[Zach]

Yeah, unless they, if the warranty expired and I still had it and there was like downpipe tune that would get me another 60 reliable horsepower. I would do that.

[Matt Farah]

Sure.

[Zach]

Just to like, just to have it. Just to you know, rejuvenate my interest in the acceleration. Just to have it. But otherwise I wouldn't touch anything at all. Yeah, this is, I don't know, Japan's M3 kind of.

[Matt Farah]

It's a, it's. I think it's the nicest driving front wheel drive car I've ever driven. I mean if all things considered, like maybe I'd have to go drive it again. But like maybe my R53 3 John Cooper works Mini, that was my previous and the Fiesta st, but the Fiesta ST is so small.

[Zach]

Well, the Mini also. Yeah, I think the Mini is more exciting, but I think this is nicer, if that's the word we're going for, is definitely this more well rounded. I mean I think It'd be this versus like, I don't know, Mark 7 GTI. Like that would be maybe what I'd compare it to for a minute.

[Matt Farah]

The Best handling, front wheel drive car ever was the Acura CL Type S. Remember that car?

[Zach]

Oh yeah.

[Matt Farah]

I wanted one of those bad 05. They were the shit. Yeah, the six speed and that blue. Those were. Those were the fucking jam. The second gen cl. You couldn't get them, I thought. I tried to get one and I literally could not get one. And that's how I ended up buying the Audi S4. Because I could get an S4 and I couldn't get a fucking Acura. The couple times I've tried to buy Honda products, I couldn't get them. In high school I had the money for a Prelude. That was my first choice.

[Zach]

Oh yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Couldn't get it. Six month wait to get a Prelude. But the Subaru Legacy GT was on the lot and so I got that.

[Zach]

Man, that's a bummer. This is such good looking cars.

[Matt Farah]

Could have been a Honda guy this whole time.

[Zach]

Is this.

[Matt Farah]

It was too. I was a year early on the Civic sis. The Civic SI didn't come out till a year later so I couldn't have got one of them. Folks gotta take a break because support is coming in from HelloFresh. I am gonna get back on that HelloFresh this spring because nothing hits like home cooking. And Hellofresh makes it easy to do more of it this year with recipes that feel good and that taste delicious night after night. I love to cook, but what I don't love is deciding what to cook. It takes up too much of my brain space and then I find something that I like. But it's like it needs a marinade overnight or it needs some other thing that takes six. And so what's great about HelloFresh is I know that their recipes don't take very long to make. They just don't. We're busy, we get home from work, we don't want to do it. We do want to do some cooking. So HelloFresh has over 100 recipes each week including stuff from around the world. Meals that help you beat the winter blues. They wrote that. And they have now bigger portions to satisfy everyone with high protein glp. One friendly and mediterranean options. There's tons of wholesome ingredients, sustainably sourced seafood, antibiotic and hormone free chicken. And it's really great because there's less waste because you don't have to buy some big jar of spices you're only going to use once or buy an entire head of lettuce just to use half of it or whatever. It's so easy. The recipe cards. There's these big Clear cards with photos and easy to read. Anyone can do it and you keep that card and then you can multiply that recipe if you like it later and make it for a big group for a party. You know what I'm saying? So if you like to cook, you want to cook and you want to cook tasty food, but you don't have time to always search for new stuff and you don't want to waste any food that you're not going to make. Hellofresh is it. That's where it's at. So go to hellofresh.com smokingtire10fm to get 10 free meals plus a free Zwilling knife $144 value on your third box offer valid while surprise lasts. Free meals applied as discount on first box. New subscribers only varies by plan. Do it again hellofresh.com Swimmin Smoking Tire 10 FM Smoking Tire 10 FM. You got that? Now back to the show. Dude, these were. And I drove one. These were the shit. They drove great.

[Zach]

I think they brought one. I think Acura when they launched the new tlx, they did a big drive at Angeles Crest when they do the generations thing, the heritage thing. So they had the Integra Type R, which was amazing. And then they had one of these and it was like, why is this so comfortable? But also handles pretty well.

[Matt Farah]

Scroll down. These were great. You have more photos. Does it say the skid pad number on there on the car and driver test results? Does it have it quarter 14, seven in the quarter. It doesn't have handling? No, in the full test they had handling, but this thing was a dual overhead cam V6. 260 horsepower, 232 pound feet of torque and it weighed high 3,4004 hundreds. The thing scooted six speed manual. You get 28, 29 miles a gallon on the highway with this thing. And the interior layout, the seats and the dash and shit of these were dope. They looked great.

[Zach]

260 horsepower in 2003 was a lot. It's a bunch you're getting close to like sti evo horsepower. And those at the time were like, oh my God, this is the fastest sedan in the world.

[Matt Farah]

Well, this was a V6. This would have been smooth. Yeah, this is, I mean this is the. The Acura 3.2 was an awesome, awesome engine. They put it, they put that shit at everything. Frank's red hot of V6 engines. Yeah, I love those. But, but dude, I am, I am absolutely shocked. I don't see more Integra Type S's on the street. People need to be buying these things. These are fabulous cars. My only gripe with it, and I have not gotten, I have not asked Andrew about it is if. And I don't remember the last. The last one we drove was a 24, right? 2024 car.

[Zach]

Okay.

[Matt Farah]

Probably this is a 2026. The only difference I can tell is that the ADAS comes back on every restart in this car. And that is new bueno because it definitely did not do that in the previous generations of cars. Definitely is a hard word. But like I never experienced any kind of ADAS interventions in those cars. Once I turned it off one time,

[Zach]

I'm trying to find news on whether it was updated or changed.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, this particular car, which I got the car with less than 500 miles on the odometer, is a 2026 model year car. Every restart, the ADAS comes back on. And it's not. That's not like. So like if you're shopping for one of these, if you could find yourself a leftover 25, I might strongly consider that versus the 26.

[Zach]

I wonder because what else did they change? Do you know?

[Matt Farah]

Nothing as far as I know. Is this color new? I don't know if I'd seen this silver before, so that might be a new color. But like that's.

[Zach]

That's new colors, minor factor tweaks and some tech updates.

[Matt Farah]

Tech updates. That's what, that's what that means, tech update. Buried in tech updates is adas. That comes on every fucking time you restart this car.

[Zach]

Infotainment upgrade. It seems like according to Road and Track that like they didn't. Nothing about the car fundamentally changed. Like they didn't get new dampers or a whole new.

[Matt Farah]

It drives exactly the same as the last one and whatever.

[Zach]

Small tweaks.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, but this is one of them. So that's a. That's a bummer. You hate to see it.

[Zach]

The ADAS is coming for us, dude.

[Matt Farah]

You hate to see it. 2026, all of these, like fucking all these guys. You know what would be great for the world?

[Zach]

What if dictator Farah.

[Matt Farah]

What if when I run for president, what if you could convince all these fucking coal rolling diesel tuners to instead pivot their businesses to adas to remove adas. Adas defeat toons.

[Zach]

I think that would bring so much more liability to them.

[Matt Farah]

No, dude, you would own. Think about it. You'd own the libs so hard their safety nanny bullshit. You'd own them by defeating it. Right?

[Zach]

But I think if I was one of those Companies, what I'm doing is I'm going from making a product that the EPA might get mad at three years later, which they did, and sue me for, versus if I turn off a bunch of people's ADAs and then they crash and then all of them sue me for causing their accidents, I feel like I'm opening myself up for losses.

[Matt Farah]

But they asked you to turn off their ADAs.

[Zach]

Sure, lawyers do that.

[Matt Farah]

They signed a thing. I want you to turn off my ADAs because it stinks.

[Zach]

That's valid. I appreciate your ability to try to weaponize this group that was doing one illegal thing to a new illegal thing.

[Matt Farah]

Well, they're obviously perfectly happy to fuck shit up. And obviously the main goal of those businesses is to own the Libs. It's not to make horsepower. Right. Gale Banks told us that.

[Zach]

Right, sure.

[Matt Farah]

So if we're not making horsepower, we're just owning the Libs. So, like, here's a new way you can own the Libs.

[Zach]

I wish I knew more. I know because some people, when we asked for advice on towing rigs, a lot of folks were saying to turn off things like cylinder deactivation or some of these diesel functions because they hurt the life of the engine. Excuse me. But then other, you know, other companies are out there just like trying to make power, blow smoke and be assholes.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, I've heard the cylinder deactivation can hurt the life of the engine argument before. Okay, but that's like, that's like long distance. That's like folks who are towing, you know, 600, those are like pros.

[Zach]

I don't know, maybe I don't know how early it was hurting. You know, like the LS engines were doing it and they had a big problem. The GM had a big recall. But I don't know if it was affecting them beyond 100,000 miles or if it was above 40,000 miles or what. I mean, anything like that's going to take time and take an effect. It's not going to be like your truck has 5,000 miles on it. You turn that system off and all of a sudden it's.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. The latest contender in the tow rig argument. And actually I think is a possible leader if we're making just like generally wise decisions. Folks taking one more break because support is coming in hot. Not actually more like ice cold. In shaken with AG1 because motivation comes and goes, but habits show up even when you don't feel like it. And AG1 is the easiest habit. You can start now to support consistency even when your Motivation isn't perfect, right? Because most supplements over complicate things. Lots of pills. Weird timing. A doctor just told me I just had to take one of my pills at night instead of in the morning. I said, listen, document if you want me to take it at all. It's happening in the morning. I'm not good at taking pills at night. AG1, I like it in the morning also. I take everything in morning. Everything important, right? Night is for fun. Morning is for important things. AG1 simplifies your nutrition with multivitamins, pre and probiotics, superfoods and antioxidants all in one scoop. It's a daily reset that brings foundational nutrition no matter what your schedule throws at you. Whether it's a weekend trip, a late night, or just these start stop routines that come with winter. It's the opposite of complexity. 20 seconds, one scoop. A cup of water. Done. First thing on those cozy winter mornings before your coffee, before checking your phone. It'll anchor everything else. And you don't need to like change your entire diet. Make a huge change, whatever. Just the AG one will get you going in the right direction each day. AG1 has over 50,000 verified 5 star reviews and comes with a 90 day money back guarantee. For a limited time only. Go to drink ag1.com tire to get a free AG1 flavor sampler. An AGZ sampler to try all the flavors, plus free vitamin D3 and K2 and AG1 welcome kit with your first AG1 subscription order. Limited time offer only available while supplies last. Drink ag1.com Tire Drink ag1.com Tire you're going to get all those flavors and I'm going to tell you you're going to end up in two places, Berry and tropical. That's really what it's all about. I've tried all the flavors. Those are by far my favorite. They got the original. They got the citrus berry and tropical. They crush. I really like a tropical in the morning. Berry's a little more, you know, desserty and so yeah. Drink ag1.com tire drinkag1.com tire to get that free AG1 sampler. Agz Sampler to try all the flavors, plus free vitamin D3 and K2 and the AG1 Welcome Kit with your first AG1 subscription order. That's a lot going on, but supplies won't last long. Drink ag1.com Tire Drink ag1.com Tire and now back to the show, the Lexus GX550, which is a thing I'm not in love with. I Have no emotional attachment to it. Can tow 9,000 pounds and has adjustable self leveling air suspension. Did you know that?

[Zach]

No, but I do know. We definitely want self leveling suspension.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, all three of our choices do have it, but like it sort of splits the difference. It's like 75 grand, 80 grand. It's a lot of money, but it's a lot cheaper than a cayenne.

[Zach]

Wow.

[Matt Farah]

And it's like, is that what unlike. Those are the wheels. Those look like fucking Lorenzer. Those are those wheels.

[Zach]

That's where we're at these days.

[Matt Farah]

That is the pimp. My ride is fucking set of wheels on there. That's crazy. On a Lexus gx. Dude.

[Zach]

That looks like if you had a time machine and you want to make a lot of money the hard way, you could just bring modern wheels back to 2000 and just sell them.

[Matt Farah]

That's crazy. That one. So two of the trims, there's like the, the base trim and then there's the luxury trim, the premium, which is base and then luxury and then the over trail. The luxury can tow £7,800. The other two trims can tow 9,000. Yeah, 9,000. So the over trail is more expensive than the premium. But like that's Hannah likes boxy shit.

[Zach]

True overtrail starts eight grand more.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, you get a whole bunch of off roady shit I will not use.

[Zach]

Right. So maybe you go premium.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, maybe we save the money and go premium. But that's actually a pretty, pretty good option.

[Zach]

I mean, it looks cool.

[Matt Farah]

I don't hate it.

[Zach]

What engines? This thing is.

[Matt Farah]

This is the twin turbo six.

[Zach]

Oh, okay.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, but it's got enough power and it has the self leveling suspension. It has some knobs for things. It is, it is fundamentally a very nice vehicle. Although when I drove it, you know, on the highway, we had the over trail and I didn't love how it rode. It rode real trucky.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

You know, it's a body on frame and it rode like it.

[Zach]

Yeah. That's why I can tow so much.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Maybe if we try the premium on more like roadie tires instead of off roady tires and not so off roady suspension setup, maybe that'll make it difference.

[Zach]

But the seats look nice.

[Matt Farah]

The seats are comfy. Yeah. No, so it's not, it's not something I'm passionate about, but it does check all the boxes.

[Zach]

No one's passionate about Alexis. Really?

[Matt Farah]

No, but like I would rather own the Cayenne hybrid. Yeah, but it's Just a lot more expensive. Or I have to get a. Get a used one with 25 or 30,000 miles on it. Whereas look, this dude, this photo is towing a fucking boat. Not much squat in the back there. Okay. So, you know, it's a pretty. That's a pretty tough, tough choice.

[Zach]

That's a strong towing capability.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah, no, it's. It was more. I was very surprised when I saw that number, which. So that's all right. Okay. So that's. That's our leaderboard.

[Zach]

You and your dad can have his. And his Lexuses. Lexi.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, with his T. With his T,

[Zach]

he's got the X1.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Yeah. I wonder what that can tow. Probably not. Probably not much at all. That's just. I don't think that's set up for the tx5.500h. £5,000. Okay.

[Zach]

Okay.

[Matt Farah]

Not bad. I mean, for like you could tow a little boat.

[Zach]

Little Side by side.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, like a little. A little something which is probably all you. That car is more like, you know, it's. It's. It's more of a. Of a luxury car than a utility car. It's more just like a tall luxury car. It's got captain's chairs and shit.

[Zach]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Matt Farah]

So. Oh, yeah, I wanted. I got a few different interesting emails, few different different opinions about the AI and YouTube discussions with Johnny. A couple people called me an idiot for saying that. I like to say I said YouTube was in the toilet and they wanted to correct me that YouTube is actually making record amounts money.

[Zach]

Well, yeah, the YouTube, the business.

[Matt Farah]

Which is not what I was trying to say.

[Zach]

Absolutely massive.

[Matt Farah]

Which is not what I was trying to say about YouTube even. Absolutely not what I was saying at all about YouTube. And someone else, you know, had a good point that I, that I didn't get around to mentioning. And they were like, they were like about AI, you know, about my AI skepticism. And they said one way that AI, another way that AI is a theft is think about recipe websites. Think about someone who starts a website that's based on advertising like all other websites. And they put time and energy into doing recipes and they make the food, they take the photos, they write the thing. They have to write all those essays.

[Zach]

You write 600 page essay at the time.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, that's bullshit. To get people to find it. And all that work they put in just for whatever. Pick your LLM to scrape the data, put it in a search result. And now the person who did it, they don't even get. All they wanted was a click.

[Zach]

Yeah, that's a good point.

[Matt Farah]

That's all they wanted was a fucking click. And maybe if you like how it was presented, a follow or a bookmark or whatever, or you take a peek at an ad, don't even click at it, just have it appear on your screen. Screen briefly. The standards of what people want from a viewer on a website are so low. Take a look. Use the knowledge I have here that the LLMs just scrape it right off of that and effectively just bypass these overwhelmingly pretty small businesses or maybe medium sized businesses or even a large business, a big media company like fucking Hearst or something you know, put into creating that content. It's, it's gone. It's just they don't get just the basic thing that they want which is to just the click.

[Zach]

Right? Yeah. Now if you search like you know, best brisket recipe, it goes here you go like here's the top rated one online.

[Matt Farah]

Sure.

[Zach]

But. But doesn't give the click to the person who made the recipe. Yeah, yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Or you know, if you or from in our business. What were the, what were, what were the lap times from Performance Car of the year 2025?

[Zach]

Oh sure.

[Matt Farah]

You know what I mean? Like if you search for that you'd get the story. You'd click on the story, I hope.

[Zach]

But nowadays with like now you get

[Matt Farah]

a summary, a Google AI summary and now you won't click anymore. And so the company that spent, who knows, 100 grand, whatever, whatever, whatever it cost.

[Zach]

So you would have to click. So we just searched it and yeah, the summary is very small so you'd have to click Road and track link.

[Matt Farah]

Just try Performance Car of the year instead of the acronym.

[Zach]

Oh nice.

[Matt Farah]

The AI. So my example doesn't work. I'm sorry that my example doesn't work. The AI summary sucks and you do have to.

[Zach]

Or road and track has a good fortress.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Or if you use ChatGPT or if you use a different, different LLM maybe you'll get a different answer. I don't exactly know. I'm sorry that my real time test didn't quite work. But with recipes it absolutely fucking does. And then there's probably a lot of other examples and there's examples of AI that helps medicine.

[Zach]

Sure. You saw the, oh I sent you the video. But other people had as well, which was like oh, the Star wars thing,

[Matt Farah]

you use it to cure cancer. Right.

[Zach]

It just stares and then it just cuts back to Ali Portman with like huge AI boobs. And it is the perfect summary of what AI is doing. It's like, hey, we need all these resources. Oh, to help us? No, to steal everything, patrol everybody. And that's about it.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, we'll give them a little taste. We'll make porn really realistic. And you won't have to dig through the actual search results on Google to find stuff. We'll just summarize it at the top. Will it be right? Not really fucking sure. Will you double check? Absolutely not.

[Zach]

Probably not. Yeah, it is powerful for some things, but, I mean, if you want a recipe, just search online because then you can see the pictures and you can see what people are saying about it. Cause that's what you don't get with ChatGPT food. It's just gonna say, trust me, this is the best one.

[Matt Farah]

A couple of people told me that I was an idiot for saying YouTube was in the toilet and then used examples of people who were doing very well on YouTube. Examples like Jake and Logan Paul, who are perhaps the worst humans. A couple people said, I don't know anything about YouTube. We're making the wrong videos. If you don't get to complain about your revenue and your traffic being down, if you're not willing to do the things that get good traffic. And I say, that's the point. We know what gets good traffic, and it's cringy as fuck. We were told by fucking Kevin what gets good traffic. And that's not. Not good for the fucking world.

[Zach]

Yeah. I think what was great about YouTube, and still is to some degree, is you can make whatever kind of content you want. Patton Oswald said this. Like, make the art you want to make. The audience will find you because there's someone else out there that has a similar brain.

[Matt Farah]

But what's tough about that is the black box in between your audience finding you.

[Zach]

Yeah. Because the algorithm. And look, there is content that will attract eyeballs because. Because it knows how to game like our lizard brain and show you lots of colors, lots of cuts, all these things. And it might not be as informative as video A over here, but your brain is gonna be drawn to it, and YouTube's gonna feed that to you.

[Matt Farah]

And you're no longer allowed to leverage your other media spaces to promote this thing.

[Zach]

Oh, the link.

[Matt Farah]

So if you make a YouTube video and you try to go to your Instagram audience and say, I've made a YouTube video, you should check it out. That post gets fucking pushed down. Because none of the platforms want you to leave the platform. So you have to either, like, imply somehow that you've made a YouTube video, and these people should Check it out. Or you have to make a completely separate piece of content for Instagram, which you won't necessarily get paid for, and then those people won't go watch the thing that you're trying to make money from anyway. Like, it's just, like, not a good system. For years when you tell people, build up your social media audiences and you can use that to promote the thing that actually makes you money. Except now they've just cut all that off and they go, no, no, no, no, no, no. Now you have to create individual pieces of content for all of this different shit, because we're not gonna let you cross promote anymore. So, like, that's why I think it's shitty. Cause, you know, it's not shitty if you call yourself, like, a creator and you're just like an ambiguous content creator and you're willing to make videos about whatever, or you're just vlogging or you're doing skits or you're doing pranks or you're doing whatever. You're just like a. For lack of a better word, like a fucking Jake Paul or Logan Paul. Like, other than Jake Paul is like a boxer now, right? But, like, I don't know what the other guys fucking. What they do, like, what's in their videos. Like. And, okay, I'm like an old guy, but, like, it's not like you can go like, well, what are his videos about? Like, kind of like everything and nothing, right? He's like a vlogger, glorified, right? Like, that's.

[Zach]

I guess I haven't paid attention since he went to this forest. Well, point which I should Mark is YouTube's gonna flag me for saying the word.

[Matt Farah]

For saying the word. Yeah. Okay, well, but I mean, point being, like, if you're an automotive journalist or a certain type of journalist and not just sort of an ambiguous creator personality, then it makes it much harder for you to spread your work in that way, because you have to somehow. You can't now use the traditional methods of telling people that you have a new thing. You have to, like, grab them from within YouTube's own ecosystem using the same exact method that, like, people that'll just fucking do whatever to get a view are using. I think.

[Zach]

I think it's a bunch of things because humans get bored. Like, the most successful TV shows ever. You know, after season four, you'll see so many people going, I like the first seasons better. It's like, well, because it was new and exciting. Stranger Things, a great example. I mean, well, they also get a long Lead time.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, it's like a band's first album. You get for your first album, they have their whole life to write, and then they got to write the next one in a year.

[Zach]

They might have spent 10 years writing the first season, but I think, you know, we get. The human's ability to get used to things is, like, unparalleled. So that's part of it. But also, there's just way more competition because, okay, sure, people might say that our videos are not keeping up with the Joneses, but I would say there's a lot of new automotive creators that do amazing work. Throttle House and their views also got cut by, like, 40%. And so that, I think, is a good example of. It's not just us. Everybody is competing with content creators. Yeah. All these folks, audiences, like, I don't get bored or move on or just get distracted by a new shiny thing that YouTube wants to promote.

[Matt Farah]

In my experience. They know, because they have all the data, how hard they can squeeze an older content creator who's been committed for a long time. And they know how they need to get a new content creator hooked up with good numbers and good revenue in the beginning, so that they go, yes, this is my career. They know if you've been invested for 10 or 15 years putting out videos, you're probably not just gonna cut bait. You're probably gonna keep making videos even if they give you less than you used to. Than they used to. You're in. You've been in.

[Zach]

Yeah. I don't know if our CPM is different than a new creator's. Like, if we.

[Matt Farah]

It's not necessarily cpm. It could be visibility. There's like, four things that need to be multiplied together to end up with some dollars at the end. They can pull the strings on three of them.

[Zach]

Yeah, that's true.

[Matt Farah]

You know, so. And they're not gonna tell us which ones they are. And I'm not necessarily, like, boohooing. There's no, like, constitutional right to make YouTube videos. There's no universal basic income of YouTube videos. Like, all I'm saying is, like, why I think it's shitty now, but you're making them on YouTube. Yeah. Because where else would you do this? It was great in the beginning. So many things on the Internet, it did open the door. Yes. But, like, so many things, like, fucking stranger things, it changes. It turns shitty. Cause people fucking get greedy or move the thing or are trying to achieve different goals that are. The goal for us is allowing the people who want to find us to find us in a fucking straightforward way. And the black box is like making that much harder.

[Zach]

That's true.

[Matt Farah]

Okay, can you make that bigger please? Let's go to the Patreon. Patreon.com the Smoking Tire podcast is where you join in on the fun for a low, low monthly fee. You can watch the live stream, get the show early, get extra show, ask us questions for the show and get access to exclusive merch drops and collabs such as the upcoming notice canyon in frozen berry metallic which is going to be amazing. If you have purchased all five of the previous notice canyons, I will guarantee you an allocation. Send me an email just like I

[Zach]

did last time and then snap your fingers and all the people disappear. It's like thanos

[Matt Farah]

and yeah. Oh, dude. By the way, you know what happened? My carbon fiber wedding ring cracked. Whoa. Yeah, I was like, oh, that's a sharp thing. And I went, oh, that's why they

[Zach]

don't use it for planes.

[Matt Farah]

I can just pull that off. So I had to order up a new one and I ordered a backup. It went up by $20 the last five years.

[Zach]

That's pretty good.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Wow.

[Matt Farah]

It was $159 and $179.

[Zach]

Now I'm shocked at the size of the inflation. That's great.

[Matt Farah]

How little it was. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I got a new glow in the dark carbon fiber wedding ring on the way, but I feel kind of naked without it. You know what I mean? Front wheel drive. NSX says, what would it take to get carb to be more open minded towards car culture? I feel like policing a minority of the population when bunker oil exists is a waste. I mean, I mean I'm kind of with you to say, I don't like when we say why are we looking at this and not looking at this? Because the problem with bunker oil is it's like international waters, it's that kind of thing. Most ships aren't allowed to burn bunker oil in Los Angeles, for instance. They have to either have a dual power mode and burn hydrogen or natural gas or some other kind of non bunker oil thing when they're within a certain distance of the city. But like, yeah, I don't know what international law can do or plans to do to curb fucking bunker oil. I totally agree with you that like, I mean it seemed like maybe with the quote Leno's law there was like on the way to a little bit of sanity. But like, like carbs perspective is probably like, well, why should we give you an exemption so you can just like have fun in a car.

[Zach]

Well, and they're probably going, you know why? In their eyes, they don't want to sacrifice the health of the majority for the enjoyment of the minority.

[Matt Farah]

Right? Yeah.

[Zach]

I mean that's probably fundamentally it.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Show favoritism towards, towards the kind of people that have the disposable enough income to buy extra non carb compliant cars. I don't think carb really gives a fuck about making it easier to drive 20 to 30 year old cars that were like those transitional emissions type cars, like 80s like my Countach, which has never and will never pass smog. I think I do believe there should be either based on mileage or whatever, exemptions for vehicles of cultural and historic interest. I'm okay getting historic tags or whatever and applying and having an extra hurdle so you could have that car registered in California and it won't pass smog, but you're only driving it a certain amount and whatever.

[Zach]

And I think what just happened this week is an example of, you know, the slippery slope. It was like, oh, the EPA is no longer going to regulate some of the emissions from cars. But it was like, and also factories and all these other things. So people, you know, if you're a politician and you get carb to agree to like just give permission to like a certain group of cars, well then your next opponent can go, oh, I thought you were about cleaning up the air. You said that you were. Except for this one little thing. I mean it's just, just the domino effect is terrible.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah, it's, it's the kind of thing where when you're a gearhead, you go, why don't they do this? And then when you're like the politician, you go, well, come on. Of course it's like it, you know, flip side of California, you know, you gotta, you gotta make it work, you know. But lots of people do. I mean like, lots of people do. Like you can, you can, you can. Letter of the law, you can get creative a little bit. You know, I prefer you didn't go Montana, but you know, there's room for a little bit of creativity and you

[Zach]

can own a lot of really fast stuff that is within the emissions regulations. Like, it's not like we are devoid of horsepower here.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Now the modification thing is very difficult. But again, like you can get a lot of horsepower, probably more than most people need off the dealer a lot.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, there's. So, yeah, there's. If you're talking about modern cars, there's not a lot of reason to add horsepower to most modern cars. Yeah. AAA is on the way. Are there any rear wheel drive sedans with a Miata ethos or are they all heavy pigs respectively? A Miata ethos? I mean that's tough because like if you want a sedan like you just like nobody wants like the minimalist, non insulated, you know, like sedan, like people want a certain amount of baseline refinement when you're buying a four door car.

[Zach]

Right. Because the goal, the Miata's goal is to be enjoyable, to drive spiritedly.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Zach]

So they can aim everything at that. But a sedan, the goal is to carry four to five people in comfort probably across a pretty significant distance.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. And when you're talking about like a rear drive sedan, most companies that are, that are bothering to make rear wheel drive sedans in the last 15 or 20 years are doing it for sort of like high performance reasons, but they're also luxury cars. And so you just. People that want a high performance sedan don't typically want to hear the gravel through the footwells or to hear wind noise or the kind of things that are like part of a Miata charm.

[Zach]

I think this is what we had a lot, we had a lot of options in the 90s. I mean, you know, Kamisa's got that famous post of like 33 sports cars that were available, a lot of two plus twos and now, now I think you have to go hot hatch if you want a four door car. In the spirit of the Miata, front wheel drive hatches is your, that's your market. And I know it sounds like the

[Matt Farah]

Tegra is about as close as you're

[Zach]

going to find or you go GR Corolla or Focus RS or Fiesta ST back in the day or gti. It's light, it's aimed at the young person who wants to have fun driving. But just the, I think the packaging, the cost and all that stuff of a rear wheel drive car, they always go upmarket.

[Matt Farah]

The closest I could think of in a modern car would be that Giulia Ti, you know, four cylinder.

[Zach]

I heard those were fun.

[Matt Farah]

They're not bad. Yeah, they're all right. I mean that's about as close as I think you'll get in a modern car.

[Zach]

Yeah,

[Matt Farah]

yeah.

[Zach]

Speaking of aaa, so this weekend I went and sold a firearm to a gentleman. Legally. For anybody listening, guy's a tow truck driver and he comes outside with me afterwards and he sees my car and he, he's like, oh, nice BMW. He goes, I tow a lot of these And I started laughing and he told me a story I'll tell very quickly. He's like, yeah, just this guy the other night his brakes stopped working. He's like, he was driving, engine made a huge sound, brake stopped working and he had to slam it into the barrier to stop.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, wow.

[Zach]

And I was like, why didn't he pull the E brake? And the guy goes, he didn't have one. It was like a project car with no back seats, roll bar. Like this guy had built a race car. So if you build a race car that you drive on the street, keep

[Matt Farah]

your E brake, keep your fucking handbrake. Yeah, it sucks. Yeah. Yamahabibi have you been to Mount Panorama? I have not, no. That would be cool. Sterling likes to go fast. My parents want to buy a certified Pre owned Lexus LC500. Certified. But a red flag that stuck out is that according to the carfax, it's had two alignments and five sets of tires in 45,000 miles. Is that anything to be concerned about? I asked the dealer and they said it's normal. Two alignments and five sets of tires in five years and 45,000 miles. Look, I don't think that's that abnormal. I mean, I think maybe they're going through tires quick. But like, you know, if you've got. That's a set of tires every 9,000 miles. Yeah, I mean, look, maybe that person drives spiritedly. I mean if the first person, you know, if the first owner lived somewhere that's on a beautiful windy road, has a great commute and fucking lets it rip daily. Yeah. You could blow off a set of Michelins in 9,000 miles.

[Zach]

Absolutely. It depends on where this person lives. Like if they live in Florida where they just drive straight all the time, then I'd be worried that like your friends Rivian, where there was a hardware problem on the suspension, it couldn't get aligned correctly and it was just eating tires. Yeah, but if that's not the case and this person lives near, I don't. The Dragon or somewhere twisty.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Zach]

And if the owner's like in their 30s or something, then maybe that's why they're going through tires.

[Matt Farah]

Or like 45,000 miles in five years is a good amount of miles. Like there's a decent, there's a decent chance that this is this person's only car.

[Zach]

True.

[Matt Farah]

Summers and winters. Do we know what kind of tires they're going on? If this person went, bought the car, like let's say they bought the car mid winter with summers, they Would have had a tire change every six. They might have gone summers and winters. And if you're going back and forth between summers and winters, you may want to get an electric.

[Zach]

Oh, Reddit. Reddit said. So I found a post that says I drove 10,000 miles and the LC already needs new front tires. And people are saying, welcome to the LC club.

[Matt Farah]

Okay.

[Zach]

The front end's heavy and it's got soft tires, you know, from stock, so that everyone's like. That seems about right.

[Matt Farah]

There you go.

[Zach]

So.

[Matt Farah]

So then I think that is. That's pretty standard. The car is just gonna go through tires. Good to know.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, good to know. No, it doesn't. It does make sense. Although I'm. I'm you with PS4S's if you're not pushing it. If you're just driving around on them, they last a long time longer. You should get 20 out of a set that you're not pushing. If you are. If you're pushing it.

[Zach]

Yeah. If you're having fun.

[Matt Farah]

Okay. Pain in the ADAS says, what would be your ideal rental car? If you could only rent. Rent one car model for all future trips, regardless of location.

[Zach]

Oh, my God.

[Matt Farah]

This is the easiest question I'll ever answer.

[Zach]

Oh, you're gonna say Porsche 911.

[Matt Farah]

Rental car, dude. Rental car. Yeah, you can rent those minivan. Chrysler Pacifica. I've never been in a situation with a rental car where I had a minivan and wish I didn't. It's a rental car. I'm not taking. I'm not taking some. I'm not like, not Matt Farah all of a sudden. If I want to take a fun trip, I don't not getting a rental car. Rental cars are utilities for me.

[Zach]

Okay, that's a good point. I think I. I would go with like a Jeep Grand Cherokee or. No, it's heavy tire.

[Matt Farah]

Are you kidding me? I remember that Grand Cherokee.

[Zach]

That's why I switched to Chevy top. Well, that one had the 4XE engine.

[Matt Farah]

That was heinous.

[Zach]

So I'll go Chevy Tahoe.

[Matt Farah]

That's all I was.

[Zach]

Ground clearance a little more. Do everything but minivan.

[Matt Farah]

A Tahoe is an excellent choice if it was good enough for Biggie.

[Zach]

If it's good enough for, I don't

[Matt Farah]

know, half of the federal government Diablo me. How funny is it that there are two C level automotive personalities both named Alex, both of whom own Morgan three wheelers, both bald, and whose last names rhyme and only differ by one letter?

[Zach]

That's funny as hell.

[Matt Farah]

It is very True.

[Zach]

Yeah, it is very nice people.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Alex Goy and Alex Roy shout out to them. Only one of them is a. Is a slang for Christians. Done by Jews though, right? That's true. Fast and curious. I'm going to the ice race. Any events to attend while there?

[Zach]

Attend the ice race.

[Matt Farah]

The ice race is the event. Fuck else you think is going on in Montana? This is it. Everyone's going for that.

[Zach]

That and you go skiing.

[Matt Farah]

No, dude, honestly, we have no idea what's going on.

[Zach]

Very true.

[Matt Farah]

The schedule that they have given us. And granted like I'm a driver. Like Zach has a regular media pass. Oh, you have a media pass? You have a media pass. But like I have a driver. Ali is a driver. Like we know nothing. So I have no idea what's going on. I'm going two days early to go skiing because why the fuck not while you're in there. And beyond that, we have rented a Suburban and a quote mid size all wheel drive suv.

[Zach]

Notice we didn't rent a minivan.

[Matt Farah]

We didn't? No, we didn't. Do you know how much they cost for this week? Dude, I looked to get a fucking Pacifica for this trip. It would have been like 2 GS. Oh my God, it was like 4x the cost of a 5 passenger SUV. Jeez. A suburban and a minivan were like. Suburban was like 3 GS. All suburbans have been rent. What's so funny about. I told you about the Suburbans at the Yellowstone Club, right?

[Zach]

That's just all there is. Because there's all there is Chevy dealership down the street, right?

[Matt Farah]

Correct. There are no other dealers out there. And so all these fucking billionaires. And also once you're in the Yellowstone Club, nobody shows off anymore. There's no nice watches or nice clothes or any of that shit. Cause you're there. Who are you showing off to? So everybody just rolls the same silver, black or white suburb. Just like that one. But same with the rentals. That's all there is. But they're so expensive. Queer shift in gears. Why does Ford suck at colors? I just saw molten magenta in person and it looks gorgeous. Reminds me of a more metallic ruby star. But photos online took a photo and it looks red. Photos online and look red. Pull it up. Can we get a photo of it? So Ford, Ford. I have a theory about Ford's colors. Oh, this color? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So this is very much like a frozen berry or a cassis red in that you need the right light. It's all about the Light?

[Zach]

Yeah, it's a lot. It's a little bit deeper than Cassis Red. It's really nice.

[Matt Farah]

I happen to think it's very cool. But I just meant in terms of. It doesn't look like Cassis Red, but in terms of how light affects. It's different angles look, different colors.

[Zach]

Definitely. Just look at this picture. This front three quarter people listening. The part that's in shade looks purple, and the part that's lit up looks like Mazda red with a dash of purple in it. Just a slightly more purpley Mazda red. So, yeah, it transforms a lot depending on how the light's hitting it.

[Matt Farah]

I really like this color. So my theory on Ford colors is every year they offer one color that costs way more than they sell it for. And I've usually, in the past, when I've bought Fords, have usually bought that color. It was the original orange on the Raptor, the nitrous blue on the Focus rs, the whatever the fuck the silver was on my Mach E was amazing. That. The liquid silver was awesome. This is definitely one of those colors. They had a green on the updated Mach E that was amazing. The dark, deep British green.

[Zach]

And they used it on Bronco. It's called, like, explosion green.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So every year they've got one color that's got a ton of depth and a ton of richness and a ton of fucking sheen. And you go, there's no way that they can get $600, you know, and they're losing money on this. And then all the other colors are flat and terrible.

[Zach]

Yeah, but this person. This person said they suck at colors. I don't think they do. And if your phone took a photo and it looked red, I mean, right here where it's in full sun, it just looks like a flat red. So I think your phone's ability to capture, you know, like, my car. When I look at my car when the sun is on it on the mountain, like, I see some of the depth and some of the sparkle in the green, and when I pull my phone up and take a picture, it looks black.

[Matt Farah]

It looks black pretty much, yeah.

[Zach]

So some of it's the phone's ability.

[Matt Farah]

I mean, I can put two cars, two pictures of my Porsche side by side, and it will look. Look like it's not even the same car. Cassis red. I mean, I very famously saw the photo on Craigslist of the car, and I went, ew, I'm repainting that. And then I walked up to it and went, this isn't Actually, the car I've just wired you money for, and they're like, yes, it is, but this one's pretty. I thought I was buying an ugly one. This is pretty. That's the color.

[Zach]

Shit,

[Matt Farah]

I blow horns. Why do so many of the new boutique hypercar companies insist on using single clutch automatic transmissions? There's a consensus that they're the worst type of auto to develop. They're the worst type of auto, yet almost all of them insist on using them. Easy. They're the only gearboxes that can really hold that kind of power reliably. And the people buying these cars, by and large don't want to drive stickers.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Either they don't know how or they don't want to.

[Zach]

Yeah, when we were with SSC, they were like, I mean, the thing's making what, 850 pound feet of torque, like some ungodly number. It's making 1200 horsepower.

[Matt Farah]

The SSC? Yeah, I think it was more than that.

[Zach]

So basically I think it was like

[Matt Farah]

1700 horsepower and like 1200 torque or something.

[Zach]

You said there was no dual clutch that they could buy that could hold over 800 pound feet of torque. Companies are working on it, of course,

[Matt Farah]

and maybe Bugatti's Gotti got one and that's it.

[Zach]

They've got theirs and it's theirs.

[Matt Farah]

But I think that's why Zinger has solved this problem. The solution, it doesn't have to be go dual clutch. Zinger solved the problem by putting a motor generator, flywheel paired with a single clutch gearbox. The same single clutch gearbox these other guys using, and it feels like a dual clutch. They just solved it that way. So very creative for them. Yeah. I would love to know the take rate on the manual Pagani Utopia versus the paddle shift one. I doubt they would tell me, but I could ask llcardier. We said last week that Ferrari has decided aesthetic carbon fiber is played out. Well, Jony, I've said that. I don't know if Ferrari said that. I thought this for the last five years. I think having carbon fiber accents is trashier than having camo accents. Is that. Well, I wouldn't go that far.

[Zach]

Yeah, they're both bad.

[Matt Farah]

Nothing is trashier than camo because you're

[Zach]

not hiding the vehicle.

[Matt Farah]

No, look, there is a way to use naked carbon fiber in a way that looks cool, but they don't always do that. Sometimes it can look plasticky, sometimes they overdo it. Sometimes if you've got like, for instance, if you have like a bright colored Porsche Spyder RS that has all the carbon like shit on it. It looks, it's kind of a mess where if you get that stuff just body color painted, it looks beautiful. Corvettes. The E Ray that I drove on the road trip recently with all the body color paint and stuff, that's fabulous. It looks great. So like selective application and I think

[Zach]

two things like overdoing the interior kind of turned me off a lot. When it's like the vents and everything have carbon on it, just too much. And then when the cost of carbon came down a lot. This stuff used to be prohibitively expensive. Hard to get now on ebay you can get a carbon anything for any car. So you go, oh well, the market's saturated and it's no longer special. So what can Ferrari do to differentiate themselves from John with a 2015 Civic that has full carbon on the inside is like they go away from it and then they do something else.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, I mean I think it's very smart of Ferrari to go look, we're going to it put. Put 10 kg of luxury back into the interior. We'll find it somewhere else. We'll take it out somewhere else. I think that's wise at this point because the ones we drive when it's like interior carbon kit saves an ounce and it's $12,000 and you're like, what?

[Zach]

You know what? I liked it in the 458 we borrowed from what's her face.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, from Guntherwerks.

[Zach]

Yeah. Like the gear selector like knob that stuck out of the center was a cool looking piece of carbon fiber. It was one piece molded, but then that I thought was rad. But if you cover the little vents and all those controls and like little buttons in carbon, it just looks tacky a little bit.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Yeah, selective. There's speed holes. Clap me says, I know un shitboxing is a crazy task, but I have an 06 WRX wagon. I'm planning to do some work too. I can't find anything better in that rally wagon formula. I know sound deadening, a radio with carplay and seats. But what else would you consider or recommend doing? It's not a daily anytime I see

[Zach]

an 06 wagon, I still want one. I just think they look rad. I'm fan a.

[Matt Farah]

So like what do you recommend doing? Is a weird question because I wouldn't recommend doing any of this. Okay. But like that's just me. I get where you're coming from in terms of how they look. Like yeah, they look nice. But like, I mean, Jesus, I think I'M actually confused.

[Zach]

This person says it's not a daily, but you want to add sound deadening. So that's going to add a lot of weight. Now maybe sound deadening technology has changed a lot. I know there was like lightweight foam you could spray in that was much better than the Dynamat. Dynamat's really heavy. So if it's not a daily, why do you want to deaden the sound? Or is it just like it's a fun weekend car?

[Matt Farah]

Well, and also like, what other work would I like? I'm not sure what to recommend. Like if you're putting in sound deadening, I'm not an exhaust, I guess.

[Zach]

Right.

[Matt Farah]

Like we're not gonna, we're not trying to improve your performance at that point.

[Zach]

Point.

[Matt Farah]

You're trying to make it more luxurious. Right.

[Zach]

Or do you offset one with the other? If you add weight from sound deadening, do you also need to add 50 horsepower to kind of keep the car, make it feel quicker?

[Matt Farah]

I mean, I'd probably put a new headliner in. I'd get. You know what I mean? Like if you're pulling all this shit out, you could buy a new headliner and new carpet. 20 year old fucking car. Nasty. You know, Buy new carpet. The new. The carpet itself will be very cheap. The headliner itself will be very cheap. It's some labor to do it, but it's not like rocket science. So if you're gonna do it, do it.

[Zach]

I would do the custom fabric of some kind. If you're putting new seats in. Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

You might want something special.

[Zach]

Interesting.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. But I'm not really sure where else to go with that.

[Zach]

I would do modern suspension of some kind. If this has 20 year old suspension. Technology's changed a lot. You don't have to go crazy expensive rally stuff, but some sort of upgrade will probably feel a lot better.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, sure. Okay. Toyotai Foreskin says when we talked about the enokinetic Lotus, when comparing that to a stock regular Elise. I feel like a regular Elise is most of the way to that ver that for less than half the money. Is that a fair analysis or are you absolutely getting 60 to 80k more worth of additional driving experience? You're not just getting 60 to 80k of additional driving experience. That's not what he's selling here. You're probably getting 30 of driving experience, but what you're getting is a brand new car. So like the Elise that you go buy on bring a trailer or cars and bids today. Probably because it's not quite Old enough, won't have all new bushings, all new shocks, a built motor. With this you're not getting just a modded Elise, you're getting a brand new, effectively Elise. Like they, they don't touch the tub, but all the rubber is replaced. I didn't go through the whole list of parts. I went through the parts like the shocks and the brakes and whatever. But there's a page and a half on the build sheet of new OEM rubber and fittings and bits and fucking stuff. And so you're not getting a modded Elise, you're getting a resto modded Elise. And so if you want to talk about. About half of that money goes to the driving experience. The other half of that money goes to the part where the car has been restored and fully freshened from the ground up. So when you buy this thing, all you're supposedly are going to have to do for the next 10 years is change the oil and the tires and the brake pads and nothing else. Whereas if you were to start with a random ass 2005 Elise, you. You're not going to get a car that's like fresh and new and tight like this. So half and half. Fair question. Totally fair question. Tim A. It feels like the C5Z06 is a usual go to performance bargain recommendation. How would you describe the jump in performance and value to the C6 06 which are around 30k? For an early clean example, I'd say significant. A C6 is a much higher quality item than a C5, which is a real plasticky thing.

[Zach]

A C6 is pretty plastic inside too, but I didn't spend much time.

[Matt Farah]

Oh boy, they're not good. I have a lot of experience. They're not great. If it's just about a lap time, the performance increase is incremental. If it's about feeling like you're getting a higher quality item, the extra five or six thousand bucks that apparently, according to this, I don't know, the market that it'll take to get you into the bigger car is significant. The chassis is more refined, you get 100 more horsepower from the factory, you get better brakes. It's just a much higher level of performance from the factory. And if you do the same things you would do to the C5 to the C6, it goes even higher. You know, listen and sometimes watch. What are some quasi vintage GTs you'd cross shop against an R129 Mercedes SL500.

[Zach]

What's a good R129 cost shot right now?

[Matt Farah]

25 grand for, for like a great, that's great. 25 grand is a great one. Average 15 is just sort of a decent. Bmw8 series.

[Zach]

Yeah, but I mean. Yeah, less reliable.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Than the Mercedes.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Zach]

Honestly that Acura we were talking about, that's, I mean that's a GT car and it's 20 years old.

[Matt Farah]

Acura CL Type S. Very interesting. Yeah, the two door Acura Integra that came out with the stick, that was pretty cool. Lexus scs, you know like Lexus SCS are definitely, definitely there.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

I mean I might consider some Mercedes like, like, like the E500 sedan Mercedes or maybe a Porsche 928.

[Zach]

What about like the XKR? Like the 175 edition?

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, those are cool.

[Zach]

Yeah, good choice. Reliability wise. But that car was.

[Matt Farah]

Those are all right. Yeah, they're like the, the one from like, you know, whatever 201112 immediately before the F Type. Those are cool. If you're brave in xjs. Really brave, really brave. I mean, you know you can, you can get a lot of cool Mustang. I mean it's not going to feel like a Mercedes but, but you know, if you're looking at a com for a convertible that's got some space.

[Zach]

What about that Alpha? Was it Monaco? No, orange one we drove, we borrowed it from.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, Montreal. No, those are six figure cars. Oh damn. Those are six figure cars. Early, I mean maybe like early BMW, like a BMW E30. Like a 325 convertible basically. Would, would, would be a good comp.

[Zach]

Or you get a 90s five series. I mean that's, that's a good one.

[Matt Farah]

Audience of 135. I, I like that.

[Zach]

That's good.

[Matt Farah]

I'm considering buying a left hand drive. You mean a right hand drive. Aristo. Any tips or tricks for getting used to driving on the other side of the car? No, there are, I mean it works exactly like you think it works. There's really nothing to it. I mean make sure you can see

[Zach]

it will require more focus.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. For a little while.

[Zach]

For a little bit. So just what do we say when we drove the Lotus around England when you think you've got wait another week before you turn the stereo on because if a new variable pops up you'll probably freak out and you'll miss shift or something like that. So just learn it.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, the gear pattern is the same, your feet do the same thing. The steering wheel turns exactly the same. If you're shifting manually, you're just shifting with your other hand. But it's the Same pattern, but things

[Zach]

like we're used to pushing away with our right hand. So if you push away with your left hand, you're going down in gear, not up in gears, stuff like that.

[Matt Farah]

The gears are in the same place.

[Zach]

They are in the same place, but the body motion is backwards.

[Matt Farah]

You know, you may have to set your mirrors in kind of an odd way at first to get used to that. And then of course, you know, in a JDM car versus a US car, the blinkers and the wipers are flip flopped. So you're gonna have to get used to that. Whereas like a right hand drive European car, they're not Chrysler Specifica. If you were casting cars for a rap music video, what car would you choose for the biggest flex? Hmm. I might go Gatsby.

[Zach]

Yeah, I was gonna say like Browndell. Rolls.

[Matt Farah]

Brown door rules.

[Zach]

Yeah, yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Rolls. Yeah, that would be.

[Zach]

I mean if you know, you know, sort of thing.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, I mean Jay Z has gone vintage the LM002 recently. That's a good one. But I think, I think like literal gilded era, late 20s, Duesenbergs, Rolls Royces, that kind of stuff.

[Zach]

Or the Cadillac 16 like. Or the. No, the concept car. Concept cars.

[Matt Farah]

Concept cars, yeah. You could also go concept cars. Yeah. Quadrifolio face. How much secret pre license driving did you do? Any adventures? I never stole my parents cars without a license.

[Zach]

Me neither.

[Matt Farah]

I didn't. I wouldn't have really had anywhere to go, I mean, but my dad did let me drive a lot before I had my like not out on public roads. Like we live near SUNY Purchase. Big school, State University of New York, we live near there. And their campus was like. There was a huge ring road that was like literally a circle around the campus. And then there was a bunch of huge buildings and parking lots and whatever. And it was like in the off season or whatever, like summer. Like my dad would take me there with his car and we just like drive around the campus. Like I was fully confident in operating a car and driving manual like a year or two before I had even a permit.

[Zach]

Nice.

[Matt Farah]

It was nice. It was good. That's cool. Yeah.

[Zach]

My grandparents lived in one of those gated communities in Palm Springs which are like many, many. It's like the suburbs there all just have a gate and they have a water feature. So I was allowed to drive around there with my parents in the right seat in my grandfather's gigantic 79 Cadillac Deville, I think. So I could do that. And that's how I kind of got used to just blinkers maneuvering, all that stuff.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Redhead, step Jew. I was recently watching the no given RX7 video and I was wondering what your favorite nutty modified car was.

[Zach]

I mean I. That is.

[Matt Farah]

That one was up there at the top. That's up there. The Honda S600 with the motorcycle engine was insane. That Toyota Corolla, the 75 Corolla with the supercharged, that was really cool. Engine was cool.

[Zach]

I found the twin engined 33 Ford or something with musto and it's like, who builds this? Two engines, two superchargers. That was crazy.

[Matt Farah]

The. Oh, what was it? The feet. Excuse me? The Fiero. The guy put the dual overhead cam V6 in the back and a Corvette ZR1 steering rack in it and it was like it drove better than an NSX in some ways. That was really cool. Yeah, there's a lot of creative people

[Zach]

out there doing it, especially when the car works. That's when it's really impressive. When it's Frankenstein. But it's drives well.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, those are the only ones I like liked. I mean there's other stuff that was like interesting for brief moments or whatever, but. Yeah. This is the last page the project car left undone. Should we use spray on ppf? You know, someone just sent me that plasti dip. Is making a spray on PPF like material. The one I saw the video someone sent me like a re Instagram reel of it. It wasn't clear. It was more like a spray on wrap. Like it was like black on a blue car. Oh, and it peeled off like a plasti dip. Is this supposed to be clear? Introducing the first invisible shield. Well, look, I think this is interesting. I would like to try it on something to see. Oh, a nice soundtrack. So here's their video on their website. The guy tapes off the nose and cleans it up with alcohol and then just sprays a can of this stuff on, then kind of buffs it. It looks like it has a sort of a matte finish though.

[Zach]

It does. You can see.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, you can see it.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

And then you just pull it off. You know what I thought? You know what I kind of dig this for maybe is like the track dig instead of the painter's tape. Painter's tape is so dumb. People put painter's tape on their car, it doesn't do shit. You get a rock chip right through that.

[Zach]

It takes so long to put on so much tape.

[Matt Farah]

Thanks.

[Zach]

This is pretty cool for that. As long as it, you know, repeated use doesn't damage the stuff because painters tape is good because I don't think it hurts your clear coat.

[Matt Farah]

So this.

[Zach]

Does it interact with it? I'm not sure.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, I would maybe look at it for like a. For your track day or something like that. Or if you're doing like a road rally or something.

[Zach]

I would just be nervous about long term use because we know with plasti dip you can peel it off when it's newish and then it sets in there and it basically turns to paint after a couple years.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Granny shifting. Not double clutching like you should. You've mentioned before that your dad matched you dollar for dollar for your first car. If you had kids, would you take the same approach as he did or would you give your child one of your older cars as a starter car before having them purchase one?

[Zach]

Yeah. Would you give them the Countach or the Pow?

[Matt Farah]

The older car. In fairness, my parents did let me drive their cars until I had my own car. So it's not like I didn't get to drive anything unless I bought my own car. But I was like, I imagine you were. I'd been thinking about what car I was gonna buy for years. I was like, I was ready to go. Someone without kids. Giving parenting tips here is a little odd, but I think the approach my parents gave me was the right one.

[Zach]

My wife, same thing. Her dad said he would match how much she saved. Yeah, she saved way more than he expected.

[Matt Farah]

But he got stuck.

[Zach]

He did. He really did.

[Matt Farah]

That's funny.

[Zach]

But you know, the goal with, I think with him was he wanted her to have a safe car and if she paid for it herself, she'd have to get an older car, maybe one in more disrepair. So matching it is a way for you to work together and gives your kid incentive to make more money and save money and you get a safer car.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. And I'll tell you something. The kids that I knew in high school, the ones that had to work to get their first car, whether they worked to pay for all of it or they got matched or whatever, the way that we acted about our cars was very, very different from the people who were given cars, whether they were hand me down cars or whether they were new cars. I mean, I went to a pretty ritzy school, so a lot of the kids got new Audi A4s or Jeep Grand Cherokees and stuff like that, and other people didn't. And we really treated not just the car but the responsibility of driving way differently when we had bought our actual cars. It was a big difference. In attitude that I would. If I had a kid, would want that. That attitude passed on to the. To the kid. I knew kids. You must have known at least a couple that, like, totaled multiple cars in high school. Did you know anyone who totaled multiple cars and just kept getting new cars?

[Zach]

No, no.

[Matt Farah]

We had a couple of them that would fucking wreck out a 318. And then they'd get a new Grand Cherokee and they'd wreck out a Grand Cherokee and they'd get it out of. I mean, it was wild. I mean, even, like, fairly well off me was like, that's nuts. Just crumple them up. Yeah, they're just wrecking these things out and getting new ones. Like, what is going on? And the new ones were always like, better. It wasn't like, oh, you couldn't handle this BMW. You get a Corolla. It was like, you can't handle BMWs. You get a Jeep. You can't handle a Jeep, so you get an Audi.

[Zach]

Like, well, they probably were like, oh, the Jeep's not a sporty car. Kids will make anything a sporty car.

[Matt Farah]

No, I'll tell you what, a Jeep may not go around corners, but you can jump the fuck out of a Jeep. Yeah, it's the problem.

[Zach]

You can.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, man. Oh, shit. This is why we're. Now we're tackophile. We're talking about lifting the BRZ again. We talked about this last week. Homie wants to turn his BRZ into a pseudo rally car for the street. What do I do about wheels and tires? Stick with the 17s or drop down an inch or two, stay wide or go narrow street tarmac tires or off roady tires. I feel like I want to have a dedicated set of gravel tires and a set for tarmac. No different than track and street wheels for my. Yeah, that makes sense. This will be my daily in the Dallas suburbs. By the way, this is awesome. It's currently on Koni yellows with OEM springs and oem. Okay, fine. I mean, first, if you're gonna downsize, you wanna make sure that they'll clear your brakes. So you can only downsize, like, so much. But I would say if you want to improve your ride quality, I would consider going 16s with a little more sidewall. And then, yeah, having a road tire and a gravel tire, that would be awesome. You don't need to go skinnies for the gravel. You would go skinnies for, like, ice.

[Zach]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

But I would say, yeah, if you can afford two sets of wheels and tires, then I think that's that's the answer.

[Zach]

Because if you drive the gravel tires on tarmac a lot, you're going to wear out the tread quicker. And it also like, it'll have a softer sidewall, which will be nice in the dirt and in the gravel, but you might not want that on the street for cornering and braking. It's going to make the whole thing feel like even softer. So go for two of them. But what a fun thing to do.

[Matt Farah]

Prayer of the refugee wagon. Superb thoughts on not running a front plate in states where it is required by law. I mean, dude, that's up to you. Your choice. That is like literally. Well, one, you know, conventional wisdom of course, says one crime at a time. And while this is not a crime, it's like a 0.25 of a crime. Like it. Here's a. How dirty are we riding outside of this? Because if you're doing everything else according to the letter of the law, a quarter of a crime at a time is an nbd. No big deal. And I'm pretty sure in California, no front plate tickets, like 50 bucks. So, like it's a crime for poor people. What can I say? It's not a crime. If you've got 50 bucks. That's shitty. But that's how these work. And so if you're comfortable with the potential punishment and or the fact that running no plate might attract attention from the police that otherwise your car would not, there's your thing in California. If you've seen my taycan, I have the license plate front, the sticker, which is rad, that's legal and you don't have to drill your plate. And that's like better than running a front plate and not, you know, it's not as good as no plate, but it's better.

[Zach]

It's a good half measure for sure.

[Matt Farah]

Good half measure. Fully legal.

[Zach]

Consider that.

[Matt Farah]

But morally, I have no qualms about this at all. You pay the cost to be the boss. Looks better. Not there. So Zach keeps it clean, keeps it tight. You run a front plate?

[Zach]

Yeah, because my bumper was already drilled for it, which is annoying in hindsight. When I got my car wrapped, I should have bought a new bumper because they're not that expensive. I could get the CSL one. Oh well. But I do the tow hitch mount and 405 motoring filled in the bumper, so that's not drilled anymore. So that looks clean. Clean. But I do run front plate because I got tickets for it, I don't know, years ago. I just don't want to worry about it.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. I mean in my, for my, for a daily driver type car, I would just say run the plate, you know, whatever for. For a sports car where it ruins the profile, the front end, roll the dice, whatever. Keep that other plate in the, in the car. Take your ticket like a man. Call off off the records. Not fighting your. No front plate.

[Zach]

Yeah. Just go yes on that. I don't, I don't know.

[Matt Farah]

I don't do it. I'll take the ticket. Ticket. Thank you very much. PCAR photos you've mentioned using Pelican cases. I'm thinking about getting the 1535 air. Do you prefer foam padded dividers or Trek packs? What are those?

[Zach]

That's what I have.

[Matt Farah]

What the Trek pack is the divider

[Zach]

system that uses those U shaped pieces

[Matt Farah]

of metal, the interlocking bits.

[Zach]

I prefer a Trek pack. Although what you have, I have the insert is actually great.

[Matt Farah]

I have. Zach has these, these Trek packs are cool. I have. Mine is a little softer. I have the full like drop in insert. I'm pretty sure my case is a 1560. It might be a 1510, but I think it's 1560. And I have this full drop in insert that has some options of like moving a few bits around with Velcro. But the Velcro, Velcro's really strong.

[Zach]

Yours is foam covered in cloth and the Velcro allows you to move around.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. And stuff stays in there like pretty tight. And then I have the, the divider, the, the organizer thing on the inner lid.

[Zach]

That's the most, one of the most important things because you gain a lot of volume. Yeah, I think the Trek pack I probably have, I probably maximize my volume more than you because these are very thin. They're also really sturdy. But you haven't had any problems with yours. So it depends on the weight of what you're carrying, how much it's going to get dropped around. I mean these are like infinitely adjustable. I find them to be really handy. But it's just, it's not as soft as.

[Matt Farah]

And if you're extremely hardcore, you can go to Pelican with all your stuff.

[Zach]

You can do it online now.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, you can?

[Zach]

Yeah. That's what I did for the A7 case. So you can get laser custom foam. You can go on their website. It's really easy to use, but you're gonna have to measure your shit and you can measure your lenses and all these things. You can tell them what camera you have and they know the shape of it and they Will laser cut, cut the foam so it fits all your things perfectly.

[Matt Farah]

That's the best move.

[Zach]

Big tip though, when you do that, if you enter the numbers yourself, make sure you get the depth right because the first time I ordered it, I didn't know that and everything was cut one inch down. I had to order it again and it was a. This is a smaller case, but it was $100 for totally custom foam. Pretty rad.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. I haven't used any of the airs. We use the traditional pelican cases and I'm not exactly sure what the difference is to the air.

[Zach]

I think they're both. They both carry on legal. I think the air is slightly lighter, but the volume's almost exactly the same

[Matt Farah]

if you get a roller though. The rollerblade wheel and bearing upgrade I just got that. Shit is so clutch. It rolls so smooth and quiet now. Last one, Koji. Koji. Does a performance SUV or crossover have a place on the long distance rallies like the road and track ones or not? So I have no problem with it. People have brought X3Ms. A guy brought a RSQ8. One guy brought a Bentayga once. Someone brought a Macan Turbo once. It doesn't really bother me. I brought Urus on an Adventure drives rally when that came out. It doesn't bother me. And it certainly wouldn't bother any of the people at road and track that put on these events. These are certainly dynamic cars and some people are bigger or need a more upright driving position for health reasons or whatever. And so driving while awesome. They have themes for their events. I don't think they. I don't think they would necessarily be down with. With SUVs.

[Zach]

You'd have to check because they also have rules about what years it is.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, no, if you wanted to come with a fast SUV on our event, that would be fine. People have done it. Someone brought a Cayenne Turbo GT ones. People have done it. And people will continue to do it. Yeah, it's cool. No worries with me. Other events I can't necessarily speak for. I know Rob Ferretti gave me shit when I brought the Urus on adventure drives. He really wanted it to be sports cars. And I was like, want me to come or not? And it turned out for the best, actually, because I ended up driving like almost 3,000 miles. And if I was in a sports car, it wouldn't have been fun. Yeah, Uruses are so great for long trips. As long as it's got fucking adaptive cruise, which is not a given in that car. At $300,000.

[Zach]

Sure.

[Matt Farah]

Great questions, folks. Folks. Thank you, everybody. Appreciate y'.

[Zach]

All.

[Matt Farah]

Y' all patrons, even you guys, who talked mad shit. Appreciate you, too. We've got. We're gonna have to do some more shows because we're going on the ice race next week.

[Zach]

Huh?

[Matt Farah]

So it's gonna be a busy week of shows, and we're going to the track on Thursday with the Maserati GT2 Stradale, which they dropped off this morning. And it immediately got rained on.

[Zach]

Yeah. Now it's clean.

[Matt Farah]

Now it's good again. And we'll talk about the Vespa next show. Although the review is. I'm buying one, so I'm not sure what else you need to fucking know. That's pretty much as good a review as you're gonna get. Thank you again. Love you all. See you later.