A new side gig for me (if anyone's interested)
 

A good friend of mine (Neil VanOppre) used to write for the big car mags back in the `80's and `90's and was the editor for "Muscle Mustangs and Fast Fords" for a while as well. He and another friend of his (Tony DeFeo) were also the driving force behind the short-lived "Cars Illustrated" magazine. While CI was only published for a few years back in the 1980's, it developed an almost cult-like following in that brief time.

Fast forward to today: An anonymous source obtained the rights to the old CI name, and I'm happy to report that the CI title has been resurrected in digital format.

http://www.carsillustrated.com/

Once again Tony & Neil are at the helm and are working feverishly to get things up & running again. The site is relatively new and there isn't a whole lot of content posted yet, but I am honored to announce that I will be contributing material for the site and my first article was posted tonight.

http://www.carsillustrated.com/to-dy...-the-question/

Most of you are already familiar with my 496 build, but Neil thought there was a lot of useful information to be shared from the build and asked if I would be interested in putting together a multi-part article for the site. Naturally I obliged.

Please take a few moments to peruse the site and read up on some of the other projects currently underway.

The next installment will be posted up as soon as I have time to get it wrapped up. If there's any interest here I'll post the updates in this thread.

Re: A new side gig for me (if anyone's interested)
 

Congrats !!! Sounds cool..will check it out.. Good Luck !!

Re: A new side gig for me (if anyone's interested)
 

Loved that old Mag, I was a follower big time. Powershifting 101= Priceless!

Good luck with the new format, headed over to check it out!


BIG

Re: A new side gig for me (if anyone's interested)
 

Congrats! Looks like a cool site.

A couple decades ago I was a tech editor at DPG which published Mopar Muscle, Musclecar Review, SuperFord, Mustang Monthly, Corvette Fever, etc. It was a fun time back in the day when they had paper magazines and cameras with actual film in them.

Good luck with the project. [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/biggthumpup.gif[/img]

Re: A new side gig for me (if anyone's interested)
 

Good to hear Eric. They are lucky to have you. Congrats!! [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/biggthumpup.gif[/img]

Re: A new side gig for me (if anyone's interested)
 

excellent! They were my favorite automotive writers and will be following the new website for sure! Great idea too!

Re: A new side gig for me (if anyone's interested)
 

[img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/headbang.gif[/img] [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/biggthumpup.gif[/img]

Re: A new side gig for me (if anyone's interested)
 

Thanks guys.

Rest assured the content will remain true to its heritage. Neil &amp; Tony are just as zany today as they were in the `80's. [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/grin.gif[/img] (I'm in good company lol)

Re: A new side gig for me (if anyone's interested)
 

Congrats, I must have missed this post!

Re: A new side gig for me (if anyone's interested)
 

I still have a pile of those old mags in my attic somewhere, used to buy them as a kid as soon as they came out. They used to have EXCELLENT articles on East Coast street racing as I recall, very no nonsense musclecar mag. Wasn't Joe Oldham involved with that mag for a while.? Glad to see its back and look forward to reading to it. Good Luck with it Eric.!

Re: A new side gig for me (if anyone's interested)
 

Well....

Sadly, this isn't panning out as was originally expected--nor intended.

The new owner of the CI name apparently isn't interested in reviving CI as it originally was--a kick-ass magazine aimed at working stiffs. Shame, since that's precisely what made it great in the first place. Now it's going the way of becoming little more than a 1 man blog with the primary goal of hawking the latest &amp; greatest new flashy gizmos and gee-gaws with the random car show or event coverage sprinkled in for good measure.

I'm not going to go into further detail here, but if one should be so inclined, it's all pretty much out in the open over on FB (I literally cringed while typing that sentence.)

Here's the part that really sucks for me--I had been considering doing the Vintage newsletter for a while, but to be perfectly honest I wasn't able to generate enough material on a consistent basis to keep it moving forward. When the CI gig was presented to me, I was hoping that would provide enough extra material to be able to do the newsletter on a consistent basis. Not that the CI gig is dead in the water, I'm back to square one again.

However...there may still be a light at the end of the tunnel. I'm not at liberty to go into details at the moment, bit if/when things come together, I'll post up back here again.

I'm trying! [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/dunno.gif[/img] [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/crazy.gif[/img] [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/laugh.gif[/img]

Re: A new side gig for me (if anyone's interested)
 

Eric -- I'm sure if there is a way, you'll find it ... hang in there! TAZ

Re: A new side gig for me (if anyone's interested)
 

For those who haven't already seen it on FB;

There's a new internet magazine in the works.

Since CI is now (sadly) meandering off in it's own direction, Tony &amp; Neil decided to take matters into their own hands by starting their own magazine, &quot;Street &amp; Strip Garage&quot;. Naturally, yours truly has been drafted into service as well, and I consider it an honor to be a part of this merry band of maniacs.

So far there's a Facebook page, and a website is in the works.

Tony has posted up a killer ultra-low buck slant 6 Dodge Dart project which is coming to fruition as we speak, along with a few other projects which will soon be revealed. I've posted some material on my `83 Malibu wagon build, and Neil has brought his &quot;Project Pro Tree Mustang&quot; out of hibernation and is on the verge of getting it back to the digs after a far too-lengthy hiatus.

If you dig low buck stuff being built by &quot;average Joe&quot; (or Neil, or Tony, or Eric)-type working stiffs, then SSG should be right up your alley. Don't expect too much in the way of modern stuff, this is old-school hot rodding the way it used to be.

We're still scrambling to get everything up &amp; running, so please be patient.

It'll be worth the wait. [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/biggthumpup.gif[/img]