Form or Function?

There are no two enthusiasts that think exactly alike. Oftentimes we separate our interests into cliques and clubs in order to stick with what appeals to us as a collector of suck, bang, blow machines. There is no real way to prove who is 'right' in these groups - automobile modifying, collecting, restoring, or racing offers too many examples of art and science to count. One thing that has always struck me though, in everything badass, fast, slow, or just cool that I see that calls to me in a certain way, is that dichotomy between function and form. Followers of form have given rise to some of the best eye-candy the streets have ever known, but also to some of the worst. Function-driven creators fare no better, creating some of the most technologically amazing examples of speed, honed down to it's purest form, as well as vehicles that come off as mere machines, designed with so strong a purpose as to cast out enthusiasts looking for more of a 'feeling' than a 'force'.

As is often the case, the inventors and sculptors that can marry these two ideas in the most distinctive ways are the ones that capture the perfect symbols of automotive culture. Classic designs that will always ooze speed have been brought into existence by great minds like Ferdninand Porsche with his 356 Speedster coupes and roadsters that will forever impress, and Caroll Shelby with his contributions to motorsport in epic forms like the GT40 race cars of the 1960s, and more recently by men like Horatio Pagani who designed his entire company around the ideas of form and function, and hand-built quality.

Some of the more recent exciting prospects where form and function are colliding can be seen in recent concepts like Michael Mauer's Porsche 918 design - a beautiful car on it's own, but created to exude both sports car looks and functions along with a focus on the future and hybrid technologies focused on enhancing performance even further. Details like the wind-vane look wheels that premiered on the concept version of the car provide an example of what art and technology can inspire.

Let's hope that the different grups of car enthusiasts out there can continue to agree that there is a fine grey area where some of the fastest and most beautiful cars will always exist, and let's tip our hats to the obsessive, nitpicky men and women that are led to create them.

Rusty and Trusty

There are now, and forever will be, lunatics out there that devote more time (valve adjustments every ten run hours?), money (in beer costs alone), and blood (2 pints) than can be reasonably explained away into gadgets that you would never expect the neighbors to understand. As automotive enthusiasts, gear heads, grease monkeys, or even just occasional wrench-turners can attest, the decisions we make in the name of speed, acceleration, and noise often seem like a fools' folly, but we will make them over and over in the name of vehicles that we love.

One such addiction in life (for me in particular) involves the racket of any old small-block Chevy, running rough and loud through the dirt roads of the Michigan countryside. There is no explicable reason to feel your ears prick up when you hear one of the million C/K trucks made right here in this state idle on by, but prick they do. The particular truck that best illustrates this phenomenon for myself is a 1991 GMC Grandpa-special example that is rolling through 250,000 miles with rust, dented chrome, faded two-tone paint and all of the obligatory mildew smells that the old velour can provide.

It is my girlfriend's truck, purchased off a relative who bought it new and handed it down through the years. The window sticker is still there, yellowing away in the glove-box, along with a bunch of junk she'll never need (or throw out). The center console is huge, covered in a stained wood ovaloid that never fails to remind me of a toilet seat lid. The shifter must often be reminded, rather firmly, that it is supposed to find a gear when you slap it around, and the side windows rattle their tracks like a toddler with car keys, but somehow it still feels more special to hop up into that cab and fire the cranky small block to life than it does to sit in a toaster and push-button start a four-cylinder intent on doing its best Singer sewing machine impression.

I mean sure, you may have to crank it over a few extra times until your hand hurts, and the key is a bit bent. And maybe the fact that left-foot braking becomes a back-of-your-brain habit in order to keep the contrivance alive at every stop-light, stop-sign, or drive-thru window isn't exactly a prime next-generation advanced safety feature. But something just feels so right when you're headed Up North with nothing to do for a few days but relax, and all the windows are down, draining out a bit of the 20-year old cigarette smell, two paper speakers straining to drum up a resemblance of country music as you hammer down and feel the truck make a whole lot of noise and very little ambulation. There's a place for old junk like this in a lot of lives, people all over kicking old projects in frustration, but always returning, every day, week, month, year, in order to keep them going down the road, making smiles and memories, without TSC, DCTs, MPGs, or MSG being required to have a good old time.

For the record, upon my introduction to it, I quickly came up with a nickname for that old Sierra. "Stalls, No Balls" is still running now, leaking gas, coolant, oil, mud, and God knows what else all over the place. All of it seems to congregate at the rear main seal and shimmy back onto the driveshaft, which proceeds to do its best Ol' Harley chain oiler impression by flinging crap everywhere it goes. When you park at the store you just look for the lot lane with the oil slick trail leading right to the truck - no need for a car alarm to locate anything here. If I could pray for something magical, I just might pray that this steadfast contraption never sees pasture, but keeps loping along, receiving transplants and patches along the way, keeping this fool's folly alive.