Mass Cruisers February 2019 Newsletter

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Mass Cruisers Auto Club Cruisin’ at the speed of fun

March 2019 23rd Annual N.E.M.E.S. Show

Castle Island Brewery BEER CAN DERBY

Where are all the Hybrids & EV's

Gathering of the Clubs

INSIDE: CRUZIN AUTO SHOWS & EVENTS

Celebrating 28 Years of Cruisin’ Volume 28 Issue 3

We’re on the Web www.masscruisers.com And

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Contact us by snail mail: P.O. Box 217, Wrentham, MA 02093 Or by email: HO350@comcast.net

We’re on the Web! www.masscruisers.com

Our clubhouse is located at 124 Main Street, Norfolk, behind Dunkin Donuts and across the street from the Police Station. Visitors, guests and those interested in joining the Mass Cruisers Auto Club are welcome to attend one of our monthly meetings held on the third Tuesday of each month.

DIRECTORY

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N.E.M.E.S SHOW

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CASTLE ISLAND BREWERY BEER CAN DERBY

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WHERE ARE ALL THE HYBRIDS & EV'S?

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4th Annual Gathering of the Clubs

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SUPPORT OUR ADVERTISERS

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CRUZIN

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AUTO SHOWS & EVENTS

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Club Officers President: Mark Crichton Vice President: Larry Nyborn

Secretary: Lesley Corda-Majeski Asst. Secretary: John Guravage Treasurer: Kevin Rushlow Asst. Treasurer: Rich Armando At Large Board Member: Steve Huntington

Special Assignments Webmaster: Steve Vining

Managing Editor: John Buchanan Newsletter Editor: John Guravage Digital Graphics Editor: Diane Thorton Facebook: Patrick Touhey New Members: Zeke Sawayer Sgts. at Arms: Rick Lawlor John Sturniolo Charity Coord.: Frank Bryant Food Pantry: Bob Wood

By-Laws: Wayne Lestan MAAC Rep: John Buchanan Cruise Nights: Steve Huntington Sponsors: John Buchanan Fred Tierney Club Events: Rich Armando

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23rd Annual N.E.M.E.S. Show

By John Buchanan

Always on the lookout for a gearhead February diversion during the winter, there was the 23rd Annual New England Model Engineering Society (N.E.M.E.S.) show held at the Charles River Museum of Industry and Innovation in Waltham that was held on Saturday Feb. 16.

The museum is located in the historic former Francis Cabot Lowell Mill along the Charles River built in 1813 where the first power looms were designed, built and put into service producing textiles for the Boston Manufacturing Company. This year the February 16 show enjoyed unusually good weather.

The N.E.M.E.S. show is a great event to bring kids who can not only see how New England Industry operated in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, there are some hands on exhibits with volunteers that can explain what the museum’s exhibits are. Exhibits consist of everything from Waltham watch making to Orient bicycles and automobiles. Combined with the annual N.E.M.E.S. show where hobbyists display their working models and intricate mechanisms that showcase their metal and wood working skills, this is a great way to help kids awaken their mechanical curiosity and perhaps one day take up the hobby themselves. What makes the N.E.M.E.S. show great is that the models are built from scratch using fabrication trade skills that are fast becoming lost arts in this country rather than model building kits with assembly instructions. It is always gratifying when I see a teen displaying models built with their dad who is passing on, not only the skills needed to build, but also the passion for a great hobby.

One interesting museum exhibit this year was “With These Hands” which presents 24 portraits made between 1973 and 1977 of textile workers, capturing a special time in a unique environment. These workers are primarily the children of immigrants. Their parents came from Ireland, Quebec, Poland, and Greece; all drawn to jobs in the mills that ran full bore for over a century. The cycle continued with new immigrants from the Azores. It takes hard work to keep these machines running and these are the workers who did it. The exhibit will continue to run through March 2019. https://www.charlesrivermuseum.org/with-these-hands

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Castle Island Brewery BEER CAN DERBY

By John Buchanan

What are some Mass Cruisers doing to keep busy over the winter? With the unique skills of Steve Huntington flushing out the intel on such a momentous event, several members took part in the Castle Island Brewing Company’s first-ever BEER CAN DERBY challenge on February 9. What's a beer can derby, you ask? Well, it's just like the classic 'pinewood derby' of your childhood scouting days, except racing with an (empty) Castle Island beer can instead of a block of wood. Simple enough, but the lil' ones aren’t allowed to compete. You must be over 21 years of age to participate in this event and pony up $5 for a kit consisting of a clean beer can, wheels and axles. All beer can racers had to weigh under 12 ounces and fit inside width and height requirements, too. The first half hour of the check in process saw future competitors trading tune-up tips from past scouting days racing experiences! The rest is up to you. There is another difference between the block-of-wood racing and this one: this is one race event you can compete in while dinking one of the house featured craft brews; HEARTHSIDE, AMARILLO, CANDLEPIN, LARGER or KEEPER to name a few.

In total, four Mass Cruisers were racing their Beer Can Derby entries and were in the company of 50+ others…all handcrafted racers (just like the brewery’s handcrafted brews). Beer Can Derby racers were seen in all sizes and shapes; from a ship with oars, Lego man manned, and a 3D printed hot rod coupe. Steve Huntington had a wedge-shaped demon with orange google eyes fashioned from a CANDLEPIN can.

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Congratulations, Mike and Lorna!

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Castle Island Brewery BEER CAN DERBY

By John Buchanan

Continued from page 4 Diane and Dave Thornton attached three CHUCK cans standing tall…until it didn’t.

Lorna Rabbitt had her CANDLEPIN beer can manned by a flying monkey with cape flowing in the wind. Mike Rabbit’s HI DEF can was perhaps the most formidable looking of our crew with chromed headers tilted out on left and right sides.

The double elimination tournament started off promptly. Little by little, competitors were bumped out. Very often, Mike and Lorna’s tool kit (especially the duct tape) proved useful for many rival pit crews’ tweaks in hopes of not suffering that next loss.

Race by race, the field became smaller and more competitive. It didn’t seem like anyone who had been eliminated ever left the building. The crowds stayed to cheer and marvel at the winners. The “pit crews” became larger, rallying around their favorite racers still on the track. The good-spirited chant at the finals from everyone in the race area was “Monkey, Monkey, Monkey” for Lorna’s races! Eventually, the Mass Cruiser husband and wife competitors were the final ones! Yes, the Castle Island emcee was wild with amazement as the two divulged they were indeed married! Mike & Lorna Rabbitt took home first and second place trophies!

Now, as Mass Cruisers, we all know both Mike and Lorna Rabbitt are pros when it comes to valve cover racing, having organized the build and running of our Mass Cruisers valve cover events at the Bass Pro Shops cruises. Where this was Castle Island’s first beer can derby, the event organizers were not aware that a couple of pull -tab ringers had entered the contest!

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Where are all the Hybrids & EV's?

By John Buchanan

Where are we in the Electric Vehicle EV revolution after there was a rush in Europe to ban the gasoline and diesel powered vehicles back in 2017? What sent tremors around the world were; 2017 India announced it would end sales of all gas and diesel car sales by 2025, Norway also agreed to end sales of gas and diesel cars by 2025, France announced it would end sales by 2040, Britain also by 2014 with Scotland phasing them out in 2032. Then Volvo announced that all its models were to be either hybrid or electric in 2019 while Daimler would have 10 new EV’s to market by 2022 and Volkswagen would attempt to have 30 or more BEV’s to market by 2025 and after the diesel scandal upped the ante vowing to create electric versions of all 300 of its models. BMW and Jaguar/Land Rover followed suit. Well that was in 2017 and here it is 2019 and this is what Volvo says posted on their website: “Today, you can buy plug-in hybrid Volvo cars that offer the choice to run on gasoline or battery electric power. In the future, we’ll add even more powertrain options – including mild hybrids and battery electric vehicles.”

Of course there was high anticipation with Tesla in the U.S. introducing their $35,000 Model 3 coming to market in 2018 and the Car & Driver five star reviewed Chevy Bolt debuting in 2017 and winning the Motor Trend 2017 Car of the Year, has there really been a rush to buy them? The $35,000 Tesla had a starting price of $49,000 last year then in a Reuters Jan.2,2019 news release: “Shares in Tesla Inc dropped as much as 9 percent on the Wednesday after the electric car maker cut U.S. prices for all its vehicles to offset lower green tax credits and fell short on deliveries of its mass-market Model 3 sedans in the fourth quarter.”

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Where are all the Hybrids & EV's?

By John Buchanan

Continued from page 6 With the oil boom in the U.S. due to efficiencies in fracking keeping the price of oil and gasoline prices at tolerable levels, and the lack of both driving range in EV’s for long distance driving Americans and their higher initial cost to purchase, we really haven’t felt the economic pinch to rush out and buy an EV or go through the expense of putting a charging outlet in the garage. Those government subsidies for EV’s which were intended to make them price competitive are also fading. Many believe the subsidies only benefited the wealthier market segment and not the masses of car buyers. Of course my garage is home to my two antique vehicles while my daily driver gas guzzling 4 x4 extended cab pickup truck and my son’s all-wheel drive SUV weather the storms year round sitting outside in the driveway. So there is no urgent need to hybridize at my house. We had one club member that leased a Chevy Volt when they first came on the market with a very highly incentivized low lease rate that was only costing him out of pocket $34 per month. Since then I don’t think there is one of our club members that

have an EV or Hybrid or has been considering purchasing one in the near term or, if they do, they aren’t broadcasting the news as one would normally do when they plan to get a new car, SUV or truck. We are definitely in a transition for personal transportation that has been further put in turmoil for younger tech savvy customers since the arrival of Uber and Lyft and, looming on the horizon, the self-driving vehicle technology pioneers like Google’s parent Alphabet startup Wymo. It’s been over one hundred years since the first electric vehicles hit the road and the industry has yet to drive the gasoline engine out of existence. The time will come, I’m sure, when we’ll have solar charging stations installed in our garages for the coming wave of autonomous self-driving vehicles, but for the moment, I’m still holding off installing an EV charging outlet in the garage and I will continue to enjoy driving my gas guzzling antique car and pickup truck across this vast country when the opportunity strikes.

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4th Annual Gathering of the Clubs

By John Buchanan

The Red Devils Rod & Custom Car Club were Hosts for the 4th Annual Gathering of the Clubs held at the Sturbridge Host Hotel for the Feb. 22-24 weekend event. Members from 27 car clubs from all over New England and beyond showed up for the Saturday afternoon introduction of clubs that meet to enjoy a winter weekend together and have some fun that begins on Friday afternoon and doesn’t end until sometime on Sunday. There are clubs, like our own Mass Cruisers, that just show up for the Saturday afternoon festivities to broadcast our 2019 Bass Pro Shops cruise dates and others like the Goonz Car Club from Ireland www.goonz.cc and the Torquers Montreal Car Club from Canada https:// www.facebook.com/torquersmtlcc/?rc=p that make this an annual reunion vacation trip to party and bench race with fellow New England car club members. Of course the primary intent is for the New England clubs to broadcast their 2019 car show event schedule plans to minimize event date conflicts and hopefully invite other clubs in attendance to attend their shows. After all the clubs get their 15 minutes of mike time and the buffet food is consumed the passing of the gavel to the 2020 event host takes place, in this case it will be the Bay State Rattlers, host for their Hot Rod Reunion #X on the 3rd Saturday August 17, 2019 at the Eagles Club in Leominster. The 2019 host club the Red Devil’s were also promoting their Fall Throw Down #4 at the Rte. 1A American Legion in Wrentham on Saturday September 21 with a Sunday 9/22 Rain Date.

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Support Our Advertisers

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CRUZIN

By John Buchanan

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Auto Shows & Events

By John Buchanan

Diana Griffin, Patriot Place Director of Marketing knows that spring is around the corner when Steve Huntington delivers the Mass Cruisers 2018 Cruise Season Thank You plaque.

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March 2019

Member meetings are held the 3rd Tuesday of each month.

P.O. Box 217 Wrentham, MA 02093