Monday, March 10, 2008

LS1 BMW takes a trip to D.C.



Well sorry it's been a long time since I wrote. There hasn't been much exciting to tell. I've just been driving the car. Nearly every day. It has been super reliable. Guess I can tell you about the BMW's first big trip away from home.



I Sold my Rx-7 and was going to meet up with the buyer about 2 hrs away from home to exchange the car on a saturday morning. The Friday afternoon my wife totals the family car (nissan maxima). Uh.... now what do we drive. Well what do you know my hot rod's a family car too. 4 doors room for four people. That'll work. Oh wait my wife just wrecked her car. Is it such a good idea to have her driving my high HP custom car. No real choice guess I'll have to risk it.

We decide that after we hand off the rx-7 to it's new owner we'll head on over to the nations capital to visit family. The car has had some heating issues in stop and go traffic. Since we're heading to the big city I decide not to risk disaster and I wire the second electric fan to be on no stop.




The BMW makes the drive to winchester VA at the hands of my wife and Rx-7 hand off is completed. Bye Bye Rx-7 my first swap projet. You will be missed.
I'm back in the BMW driverseat and we point the car toward's D.C. A few hours later we're in the captial in crowded streets, big buildings and endless stop lights. Not what the car was built for. We make our way to the National zoo to see the Panda's and meet up with some family. All goes well.

During our stay I take my Nephew Grant, who appreciates good cars, for a ride in the BMW. Hard to find a place to show off the blazing acceleration but we hold up traffic on an on ramp long enough to flare tempers but create enough space infront of the car for a full throttle, wheel spinning run from 20 mph to freeway speeds before having to hit the brakes to keep from plowing into the slow cars in front of us as we merge on to the freeway. We visit a few sites and then sunday head on home.

All goes smooth until a Virgina police officer decides to pull us over. What the..? Wife asks why we are being stopped. I reply "I don't know" Wasn't speeding at the time (a few hours before... well that's another story). Officer comes up and starts asking about my muffler. What? He's kidding right? I was so shocked I didn't know what to say. Wasn't sure I should be mentioning that the one he's looking at is only ONE of the mufflers. There's another buried farther up stream. He seems to be clueless that the car now has a V8 though it idles the whole time we talk. I figure it's not in my best interest to mention it and just take the ticket. I figure it could only get worse. I figure he stopped me more for the look of the muffler than sound. It's not excessively loud. I've passed numerous local police and state troopers near my home with no questions asked. When I went to pick up my wife from her crashed car I drove by a sheriffs officer with his window open then got out and talked to him. But nothing can be done and I wasn't going to drive 2 hours to fight a ticket even if something could be done. I sprayed the muffer AND exhaust tip with flat black high temp paint. Been through many speed traps and followed by police since and no problems. I think the other guy had something against BMW's.

Car performed well and got 23.7 MPG for the one tank of gas that was consumed during the trip. Though the car was a bit smaller than the Maxima we all made the trip in relative comfort.

1 comment:

Tyler. said...

awesome gas mileage. congrats