Do You Watch Any "Car" Shows ?

The Top Gear thread started me thinking about all the car shows on teevee.

There are tons........Fast and Loud, Bitchin' Rides, All Girls Garage, Kounting Cars blah blah, a bunch of truck ones, and the auctions.

I will on occasion watch Fast and Loud and learn things, and I enjoy the Barrett Jackson auctions, but for the most part the whole "time line panic build shows" don't do much for me. The truck fix up shows I sometimes watch, I have an old truck I am restoring .....but they are only half about fixing, the rest is just an ad for what they installed. My truck is a two wheel drive so the four by four stuff doesn't apply anyway.

The one show that I have learnd a ton from is another British show, Wheeler Dealers.

Premise is one guy hunts down desirable older cars he thinks he can turn a profit on, and he takes them back to his buddy who is a great mechanic, and he fixes them up to sell. He is really an all around car repairman. He does body and paint, and interior work also. He also calls in guys who know really specialized stuff, no matter the repair it is shown through at a normal pace, lots of explaining, and pretty decent camera work.

They go through problem solving and repair and restoration step by step with tons of tips on how to do everything from brakes to sunroofs and power windows. Even simple tips for cleaning interiors are pointed out.

Both the guys are pretty personable, and the only real drama is whether they turn a decent profit, and to me they never make enough for all the work they put in. They have sold some cars for what I consider a pretty minor profit and they really don't get too upset.

Anyway.......just wondered if there were any car show nerds out there.

 

Not a car guy really, but I agree about Wheeler Dealers. They had to get a TV show to make their car habit pay.

 

"car habit". I love it......

 

I watch them for the entertainment...
RoadKill on YouTube is much better..but even IT has sold out

 

Wheeler Dealers is a click and stick show, love it.

 

+100 for Wheeler Dealers, love Mike & Edd, been following them on Twitter for awhile, they really are immersed into the automotive business quite a bit

 

i watched many of the shows, im in the auto industry and have been playing with cars for as long as I can remember

love wheelers and dealers for what you said, they take the time and show you whats is being done, counting cars has been just a bunch of replays lately, love fast and loud but the work when you see it in person is not good for the prices they claim they can and do sell for

huge street outlaws fan, both okc and new orleans, met many of the guys from both shows

my friend painted a few cars for the show fat and furious, i like that show and the misfits garage but just watching on tv you can see some of the flaws in the body and paint, drives me crazy

love bitchin rides but they need some new episodes, that is one show where seeing the car in person, the work is over the top flawless

pretty much though my tv is mostly on velocity

 

I love the big mechanic on the show wheeler dealers.. him fitting in the little cars is great.. but the guy who buys everything bugs me with his accent and his always beating people down on price.

 

I forgot to add another one, Chasing Classic Cars with Wayne Carini on the Velocity network.

I'm a Volvo fan, so I enjoyed an episode of Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee that featured David Letterman. He had an Volvo 960 wagon modified with a supercharged V-8 from a Mustang, he got the idea from Paul Newman who had one just like it. This one is a true wolf in sheep's clothing.

You do know the show is from Britain, they talk like that over there. As for beating people down, its a negotiation and the show is called Wheeler Dealers. When he is selling his refurbished car, every buyer negotiates as well.

 

Yeah I know they are from Britain and talk differently. I was just saying why it bugs me. i like watching the mechanic work and fix things. Watching the negotiation is too predictable.
guy a, ask for the moon
guy b, low-ball,
2 or 3 back and forths in the middle and its a deal on a usual fair price.

Could have just started at a fair price from the beginning and saved some time!

my favorite car shows are the detrot muscle, engine power, xtreme off road, and truck tech. Though that have become filled with ads within the show it is still fun to see their projects!

 

I did forget about Leno's Garage........I enjoy that one also.........but I like Leno so there is that.

 

after posting i went back to work and said, man i forgot about leno...lot of education and comedy on his show


unique whips is decent if you need something to watch but they dont do anything special, car wrap or paint, rims, tint, redo interior

westcoast customs got a lot of publicity but also hurt their image with pimp my ride, but in reality they do a lot of high end custom work and seeing some of it in person, its pretty damn good

overhaulin went from fun when it started to ok, so much talking and less showing the work

the guy on the right, peter klutt, dont mind watching his show if its all there is, but he had a show years ago restoring cars and he was so anal it was crazy, he had to have the car 100% how it came off the Detroit line

 

anyone remember pimp my ride with xzibit? lol

 

i did mention them, west coast customs got a lot of publicity but also bad image from that show, they really do some great custom work, i have seen first hand.

 

I frequently watch the 4 car shows on Spike. It was once called PowerBlock. I think now they are calling it PowerNation.

Xtreme Off-Road
Detroit Muscle
Engine Power
Truck Tech

Gearz with Stacy David is good, but I haven't seen it on lately.

 

Unique Whips actually has a few good tips on removing interiors, headliners, door panels, which made it easier for me to repair a door speaker and a window motor.....I also popped out part of my headliner to route a satellite antenna lead. I think I might have been more nervous if I hadn't seen how they just tear in to a car's finish bits.

NOSlimm......thanks for the input on the finsihed products, I will pay more attention, I just assumed they were all near perfect paint jobs.

 

Wheeler dealers and Chasing Classic cars are my favorites.

 

gas monkey, fast and loud is the worst in terms of talking up how much the vehicle is now worth which is usually some crazy high number, but after seeing a few in person, it was terrible...I love the show, but they can spend a lil more time getting things right.

these two pics show what im talking about, cant find the other ones I had...GMG built this truck and auctioned it off which their friend dennis bought and said it was $200k truck all day long and had over $100k into it. not only did it break down trying to leave sema at the convention center to the linq High Roller, it broke down on the auction block

check out the fender to door, hood, a-pillar alignment...I do auto collision so this drives me nuts



there was one spot you could see a big spot of body filler on the bedside that wasnt sanded completely, different angles of light it really jumped out

this picture you can see where they taped the tailgate up of the truck and tried to high the two-tone under the moulding, should have been done with the gate on the truck, also notice the gate almost touching the bedside, other side had a gap i could stick my finger in, lastly, notice they used whatever screws they had to put the moldings on, yes they did come screwed from the factory but a "show truck" details, details

 

im bored in a picture posting mood, another one from GMG, i love gt40's...some will like the black with airbags, some one...the car on the show was sold as a guy who works on nothing but gt40s didnt want to repair it...red flag right there...so they buy it and find the aluminum frame is bent, so I believe they stuck a porta-power between the rails and pushed it till it touched, claimed it was square and welded it up, you can do that on certain things but as I said I do collision work and later in the episode they had trouble fitting the hood after they painted it, another no no...make sure it fits, then paint it, then reinstall. so after seeing that, then seeing it in person and the hood gap was off, I knew the front end was still swung over but people gawked over it anyway...id drive the wheels off that car but Id fix it right first



these were the cars my friend painted for fat and furious or whatever the show is called, they came down and worked in a shop in new orleans, he said the cars were nice, but not show quality bodywork before they painted them



my friend the one in the center low

 

Whoa.....had no idea they weren't always top notch at GMG. Those panel gaps are way off for the numbers they had originally envisioned getting.

I saw the GT40 show, assumed it was dead on. Didn't Dennis and Richard also do a Ferrari repair.....as I recall some of the parts prices were closer to an entire used car, for me anyway.

If I had to do it all over again career-wise I might have looked in to the auto repair industry, I enjoy it as a hobby, suppose it can all change though if it's your job. My body guy and my mechanic both drive pretty unremarkable autos so maybe it's the last thing you want to play with in your off time.

Suppose it's the same for me, I used to refinish furniture and my furniture looks like Goodwill cast offs