Garrapatas Peligrosas! BS Inspections, Texas Style

Murilee Martin
by Murilee Martin

The 24 Hours of LeMons has been racing at MSR Houston since 2008, and so we’re used to Shiner Bock, 100% humidity, and Taurus SHOs.

Dangerous ticks! The racers seem a bit puzzled by the name of the race, but the event patch is sure to become a sought-after collector’s item in the future.

The Cajun Coonasses’ Rolling Stones-themed “Beast of Burden” Saturn SC features an authentic Keith Richards-style cigarette in its grille now.

The Index of Effluency-winning Fairmont wagon of Property Devaluation Racing now has Brown Car Appreciation Society sponsorship. This car generally eats 1.6 Ford 302 engines per race, but we’re hoping it will manage to contend for an overall win this weekend.

The IOE-winning Sensory Assault RX-7 will feature a LeMons first: an engine-coolant-operated moonshine still in the car. The bottle in the foreground contains the fermented mash. Should work great!

We had high hopes for the Moose Knuckles Racing Porsche 924 after their nightmare JB Weld cylinder-head-repair frenzy at the last MSR race; they got exactly zero laps (half-laps behind the tow truck don’t count) at that event.

Sadly, things don’t look promising for the Porsche, what with the massive engine fire it suffered during practice this morning. Ai-ya!

The green flag waves at 10:30 Saturday morning, and I’ll try to do an update or two if I have the time. Failing that, I’ll have the usual end-of-day race update tomorrow night.

















Murilee Martin
Murilee Martin

Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.

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  • NSF Racing NSF Racing on Jun 04, 2011

    Allen Iverson, of the 76'ers, proven right on the "practice" arguement by the unlucky MKR team and their Porsche-b-que.

  • PrincipalDan PrincipalDan on Jun 04, 2011

    Fairmont Wagon. If only a rebuilt 302 and C6 transmission weren't beyond the price range of this class of racing... lol.

  • Mebgardner I test drove a 2023 2.5 Rav4 last year. I passed on it because it was a very noisy interior, and handled poorly on uneven pavement (filled potholes), which Tucson has many. Very little acoustic padding mean you talk loudly above 55 mph. The forums were also talking about how the roof leaks from not properly sealed roof rack holes, and door windows leaking into the lower door interior. I did not stick around to find out if all that was true. No talk about engine troubles though, this is new info to me.
  • Dave Holzman '08 Civic (stick) that I bought used 1/31/12 with 35k on the clock. Now at 159k.It runs as nicely as it did when I bought it. I love the feel of the car. The most expensive replacement was the AC compressor, I think, but something to do with the AC that went at 80k and cost $1300 to replace. It's had more stuff replaced than I expected, but not enough to make me want to ditch a car that I truly enjoy driving.
  • ToolGuy Let's review: I am a poor unsuccessful loser. Any car company which introduced an EV which I could afford would earn my contempt. Of course I would buy it, but I wouldn't respect them. 😉
  • ToolGuy Correct answer is the one that isn't a Honda.
  • 1995 SC Man it isn't even the weekend yet
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