I'll Admit It Faster With Finnegan Is Entertaining.

I like it better than Roadkill, and even the hackery doesn't really bother me.


But when he said the builder of the Death Metal Charger swapped the leaf springs under the axle to lower it in today's episode, it really made me cringe...

I watched it and enjoyed it, but...

I think there could be some more real tech in there. For example, instead of LS swapping the Blazer I would have rather learned how to waterproof a distributor. My Trooper has a distributor and is great at swimming, and it didn't take an LS swap. 

I don't really understand the switch to gravel rally tires for that hard-packed dirt course on the rally episode, nevermind the way they picked spring rates. 

Lowering the S10 ruined it and he never did seem to get a good lap. Oh, and that Nitrous setup clearly needed tuning.

Ok, I loved the supercharged T-bird episode. That was fun. 

At the end of the day I guess I'd hoped this would be a story about minute spring rate changes, tire pressure optimization, shock valving and engine tuning. It's also a premise that requires a ton of testing and optimization, but is produced on a schedule that prohibits that. 

The show is fun, but not really about making cars faster. 

Guess we'll just have to make our own version at some point. 

I wasn't sold on the first episode. The second episode got its hooks in me and was really good. Third episode was pretty cool too. Fourth episode was a step back, I don't know, didn't really got it for me. Haven't seen today's episode. But any extra time hanging out with Finnegan is great, and they've gotten some pretty cool guests too. Didn't know the Jeep guy, but Randy Pobst is always fun. Same with Cleetus. And I respect Chris Forsberg, even if I don't like him.

In reply to NickD :

you also never really notice how tall Cleetus actually is until he is in other videos. iirc he is 6'6" or something like that.

In reply to MrChaos :

There's a reason James and Cooper call him the "Tuning Giraffe"

Worst internet mechanic ever.  Entertaining, but cringeworthy technical skills.

Been trying to watch the channel since Haggerty was nice enough to give me a free year. I would not pay for it.

Roadkill and now Faster with Finegan are good enough to watch. The rest of the shows are too pasteurized for my taste.

I enjoy Roadkill Gold.  Steve takes some getting used to but he does seem to know what he is talking about and I enjoy wandering around Junk Yards too.

NOHOME said:

 

Roadkill and now Faster with Finegan are good enough to watch. The rest of the shows are too pasteurized for my taste.

Not a Roadkill Garage fan? I think that's one of my favorites. Largely because it gives the unique mannerisms of Steve Dulcich more screen time.

In reply to Tom Suddard :

Unfortunately, you are never going see any of that sort of thing in this show. Tech is beyond secondary here.  The LS swap was mostly a waste of money.  And it locked up by the end of the episode.The advantage would be getting rid of fuel slosh.  A simple shield on the distributor should solve any ignition issues they might have, but honestly, I'm better all the plug waires were shot, since the dizzy is in the back on a Rat Motor.  Swapping from electric fans to mechanical in somethaig that is going through huge water holes is a huge step backwards.  

But like I said, I found it entertaining (NOT educational), and Newberg (sp?) Cotton and Finn don't seem to annoy me.  Probably because they dont seem to be consciously trying to brand the show or punch their lines.  Just a trio of guys slapping stuff together to try to make it faster without any real research.

Streetwiseguy said:

Worst internet mechanic ever.  Entertaining, but cringeworthy technical skills.

No doubt.   But he is genuinely enthusiatic.  

Streetwiseguy said:

Worst internet mechanic ever.  Entertaining, but cringeworthy technical skills.

You should watch him take Blasphemi on Drag Week.

Don't confuse entertainment with skill.

In reply to NickD :

I like Roadkill Garage a lot.   It's just a couple guys screwing around for the most part.

Hot Rod Garage has become much better.   Lucky is the unsung hero of the entire RK fimily, IMO.

Faster with Finnegan was the first time I had ever heard of Cleetus McFarland, and I have to admit that I wasn’t terribly impressed by him from that video. But after reading some strong endorsements here on the forum, I checked out some of his stuff, which quickly turned into binge watching. He’s pretty entertaining. 

Javelin said:

Streetwiseguy said:

Worst internet mechanic ever.  Entertaining, but cringeworthy technical skills.

You should watch him take Blasphemi on Drag Week.

Don't confuse entertainment with skill.

Yeah, Finnegan is actually an amazing mechanic. He has held drag boat records, as a young guy had a Toyota truck on the cover of minitruck magazines and has built some serious machines.

Cooter said:

Hot Rod Garage has become much better.   Lucky is the unsung hero of the entire RK fimily, IMO.

My favorite guy of the whole bunch.  He seems to be able to get a lot done without a lot of drama.  I watch his own YouTube videos as well, they're too short (and show he's a better mechanic than a videographer) but he really cranks through the projects in his own shop.

So it sounds like they are just pumping out variants of the same show, much like they did with magazines.... that didn't end terribly well.

In reply to Stefan :

Have you watched the shows?

In reply to Cooter :

I sort of agree with Stefan. Some of those shows are copy paste, some of them are original. At least motor trend is trying! Roadkill, roadkill garage, junkyard gold, faster with Finney, these are all great. The stupid drift show sucked, the head to head show had promise, but ran out of ideas really quick. And the rest of the trash that motor trend bought from speed channel outright sucks. They bought a lot of fluffy drama automotive programming that nobody watches. And you can tell that they are trying to get everybody at home to watch it so they can justify the purchase by the way they set up the website to try to get you to watch their stupid E36 M3, instead of the originals that you want to see

I dont have a motortrend subscription. Is it on any other networks?

Streetwiseguy said:

Worst internet mechanic ever.  Entertaining, but cringeworthy technical skills.

You apparently haven't seen the YouTubes mechanics I have. 

I thought it was funny how Cotton and Randy Probst instantly annoyed each other. 

Edit. It also shows no matter what the roadkill or hot rod guys do, people will constantly moan and complain about the shows.  It's become the Star Wars of car shows. 

_ said:

In reply to Cooter :

The stupid drift show sucked...

The sad part was they had a season of a show called Modified that was actually pretty decent. Geoff Stoneback and Matt Powers were personable hosts, and they went all over to different disciplines of import racing (time attack, half mile drags, drifting) and drove both their own cars and borrowed cars, as well as every episode they did a mod to a new Civic So project car. It got cancelled though.

Ryan Tuerck used to have a great YouTube series, Tuerck'd, which covered his Pro FD competition as well as his grassroots escapades and doing car stuff with his friends. It was pretty great. Then he and Forsberg teamed up for a show of building and working on drift cars that was pretty decent. Then they both quickly became insufferable dinkuses and the show turned into 30 seconds of them working on cars and 11 minutes of b-roll footage and I tuned out.

I'm waiting on the 850" twin turbo drag boat to be finished.... 4k hp in a flat bottom boat. 

Scotty Con Queso said:

 

Edit. It also shows no matter what the roadkill or hot rod guys do, people will constantly moan and complain about the shows.  It's become the Star Wars of car shows. 

I loved the "All they do.is Dodges" complaint, as they did 2 episodes on an Oldsmobile-powered Mazda and 2 episodes on a junkyard rescue Mach 1 and an episode on an off-road AMC Hornet. I think, of the Big 3, they've still done more GM content by far.