Car Freedom – #SolutionsWatch

by | Jan 14, 2025 | Solutions Watch, Videos | 58 comments

Anyone who has been car shopping recently knows that modern cars are surveillance and privacy nightmares that take control out of the hands of their supposed owners and places them in the hands of car manufacturers and government regulators. So what do we do about this problem? Joining us today to discuss these issues is Eric Peters, an Anarcho-Libertarian writer and gearhead who discusses the intersection of cars and freedom at his website, EPAutos.com.

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SHOW NOTES:

EPAutos.com

Eric Peters author profile at The Mises Institute

Your Exploding Car is Spying on You (NWNW #576)

Flashback: Alberta Introduces Seat Belt Laws (Feb 2nd, 1989)

1976 Trans Am walk around/drive

Reader Question: A Way Out of This Mess?

Harley-Davidson Responds To Our Boycott Over Woke Policies and DUMPS DEI!

Automakers Sold Driver Data for Pennies, Senators Say

Tesla issues software update to help owners flee Hurricane Irma by increasing battery range

58 Comments

  1. I noticed that the Antifa protesters (in 2020 BLM “protests”) were guided by a “controller” who drove
    an old but expensive BMW. This was recorded by a video of a pedestrian who caught them
    in the act of switched license plates.
    I immediately thought of how those cars were not transmitting their GPS coordinates.
    And I suspect that the CIA or similar intelligence is involved in directing the Antifa cult.

    The reduced Tesla range may relate to protection/durability of the battery.

    • Teslas will be super cheap in a few years when their batteries die and become toxic waste.

      On a side note lithium batteries are dangerous… as an experiment wearing gloves people can pull one apart and drop the lithium in water. On second thoughts don’t do that…..its not safe

      I wonder if the talk of lithium in the water supply to control suicidal ideation is pre talk for getting rid of the battery waste like they did with fluoride and the aluminum makers iirc

      • Different type of lithium.

        In batteries it’s usually lithium cobalt oxide (LiCoO₂) or lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO₄).
        In meds it’s usually lithium salts, such as lithium carbonate (Li₂CO₃), lithium citrate, or lithium orotate.

        They’ve been talking about medicating the water supply with it for decades, long before EV’s were a thing, well, modern EV’s anyway. Not counting the original EV’s from around 100 years ago that seemed quite good but were squashed by the usual suspects.

    • @Zyxzevn

      My expression of being an authentic political/social activist and life explorer was to make sense as my days went by and taking care of my gift of life. I’m a pure blood and my “Line in the Sand” essay/video/free pdf download explained all the facts necessary to understand the C19 scam, its dangers and creators.
      LINE IN THE SAND (essay)
      https://old.bitchute.com/video/EFwefBX5SLvW/

      After a roll over accident in 1984 I bought a 1973 Dodge B100 van for $700 as is. I took it to a Dodge dealer and had a new differential put in for $700 as well. It has no computers, or nonsense electronics, none of those “modern necessities” to shackle one to the eye in the sky.
      I’ve probably put in less than $20K to maintain a great ride for 40 years.

      I quit drinking alcohol at 25 an smoking at 42. I was a long distance runner for years till I tore my meniscus.

      I paid attention to life, not consequences and avoided most of the controller’s traps of consumerism and control. I was willing to follow that “little voice” on how to take care of myself through discipline and willingness to compromise. A far cry from the craziness of society now.

      I continue to try and share what I have learned in my music and essays and by example.
      Letting the media and others set one’s thought/actions life agenda is very limiting thing to one’s expansion of consciousness. Who really gives a carp about how much a ball player makes or anything about celebs, etc.?? Life is sooo grand and more then a majority of people could ever imagine while locked in belief systems created to keep one in line.

      And now…
      WHAT NEEDS TO BE SAID (song)
      https://old.bitchute.com/video/lMHyu4q52X3Y/

    • Hey zyxzevn!

      I’m done with SaidIt.net. It can never improve due to magnora7’s ego and his top-down mismanagement. I’m convinced he’s been compromised at the least, and could have been a limited hangout all along – or he’s just a lame daft dictator. At a certain point one can’t ignore the sunk cost fallacy and need for a divorce, even if I lose everything I sunk into the place.

      I’m now on x0x7’s hand-built forum from scratch, http://GoatMatrix.net (formerly http://Matrix.Gvid.tv) – small but steady and slowly growing, depending on the weather. I still have my http://Projex.Wiki and we started my http://LeverMind.net to become a bottom-up community self-regulating forum after I finally finish the first draft of its constitution and setting it up.

      I came here to find out more about the DIY and open-source kit cars. Disappointed.

      I am not (yet) confident enough to be a “free man” without drivers license and plates. But there is a significant movement that’s all about that. Unfortunately no matter how much of the legalese and lawfare you learn, it can’t stop a cop with a bad attitude or his back up from the monopoly on violence of our corrupt matrix of rigged systems. Plus every region is different. Also, you should always be ready at any moment when driving to waste at least 4 hours when they stop and harass you for not conforming. This might be worthy of a show for TCR.

      Not exactly the same, TCR might also consider covering deputations and their pros and cons – as well as the reclaiming your PERSON kind of stuff (all caps on birth certificate, bills, mail, etc). A group of folks in Windsor, Ontario are trying to liberate their PERSONs. I don’t know much about it, but I’d start with Cal Washington who does. http://duckduckgo.com/?q=Cal+Washington+autonomy

  2. On attitude towards gov intervention and how they have changed it’s amazing how few people today probably agree with the guy in the clip below complaining that he can’t have a few beers while driving home after work.

    People have changed a lot in a very short time

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2xcQIoh3FQQ&pp=ygUYTmV3cyBkcmluayBkcml2aW5nYmxhd3Mg

    I guess it’s like having an SKS propped up on the wall in the open… on the one hand you want to be free to do it but on the other hand it’s not always a good idea.

    • I got pulled over in 1979. I had no idea why. Cop said it was illegal to drive with kids in the back of the pickup. I asked him, “Since when?!” He said, “New law.”

  3. On car privacy Watchman privacy posted two talks with a chap about how your car spys on you.

    The real BIG thing IMO is to never let your phone connect to your car in any way- though most people are pretty stupid and never turn off their Wi-Fi or Bluetooth on their phones. I wouldn’t even leave cellular data turned on unless I wanted to do something specific, anymore then I’d leave a pc connected to the internet

    The guest links in the pods go to a service that claims to provide a report on your specific car and what it collects

    https://watchmanprivacy.com/2023/07/04/78-an-unencrypted-hard-drive-on-wheels-car-privacy-with-andrea-amico/

    https://watchmanprivacy.com/2024/07/16/112-vehicle-privacy-part-2-andrea-amico/

    Personally I recommend a cheep motor scooter because you can insure it for almost nothing and it’s so primitive any data collected will be on wax tablets, lol. But don’t ride in the rain….

    • I agree that a cheap motorcycle might work for some folks, but they have limitations with hauling friends or stuff.
      I had a few motorcycles when I was young.
      With vaxxed car drivers now-a-days, I would hate to wrestle with safety.

      In the mid 1970’s, I bought a running intact 1949 Chevrolet Car for around $600.
      I so wished that I had kept it.
      It ran great, and was SIMPLE.
      When you opened the front hood, it was mostly empty space with what looked like a lawnmower engine.

      Even those old World War 2 jeeps were simple.

      My late 1960’s VW hippie bus (camper style with pop top) was simple.
      Air cooled – no radiator.
      I loved it.
      Paper towels blew into air intake the pipe around 1972 when I bought it and so I burned up the engine.
      I hated getting rid of that thing.
      Simple. I like simple.

      • I was thinking of getting a side car since no one dares ride with me…. But they cost more then my bike did 🙁

        I built a motorized bike but it scares me tbh and my father in law did an electric bike kit (he also built his own battery pack) and I guess regret giving away my bike trailer now because I bet it could have hauled a lot more then my underseat storage.

        That sounds like it was a good van- changing the oil on a van recently I saw someone strip then break the top oil filter cover…. Fixing it they broke a bolt on the engine and then snapped the replacement bolt with a correctly set torque wrench.

      • 1960’s era VW Camper Van with pop-top – IMAGE
        https://fr.pinterest.com/pin/9007267978312253/

        This is what my van looked like.
        I still remember the 8-track tape playing “Born to be Wild” by Steppenwolf on those hot sweaty afternoons in the Texas summer.
        No A/C, just windows open.

        Riding around with friends or going on double dates or camping out by the lake with friends, this was a lot of fun.

        The front seat was full stretch like a couch.
        One of the back seats would fold into a bed.
        It had a sink and cooler like frig box, and a ‘closet’ place to hang clothes.
        All kinds of little storage areas.

    • Thanks for posting this. I’m one of those tech dummies so I’ll definitely check this out. My car is pretty old though, 2016 but it does have a bluetooth feature and I have listened to audiobooks in my car.

      • Don’t beat yourself up over it too much, they keep moving settings and such around so unless you’re paranoid or a tech head it’s impossible to keep up with their sneakyness.
        I will offer a bit of advice though- get an old android phone and slap a music player app on it and then leave it in airplane mode. I have a super old one that pretends it’s an iPod (which I am too poor to afford) and I just slap stuff into it via a USB cable from my computer.

        Even a trash old phone will play music mahjong and chess games and I trust airplane mode enough since I’m not currently on the run or anything.

        I hate Bluetooth and won’t have anything with it near me since I am pretty sure it gives people cancer… but I also won’t have Wi-Fi in the house for the same reason (not to mention I don’t want any device calling home without my permission) back when I had a router everyone got mad at me for turn it off when not in use. I freaked when I found the things admin password was literally “password” lolol

        iPhone are the worst for doing usb transfer on Linux and are sneakier then android even if more secure. I annoy someone close to me by grabbing their phone and showing them that they actually DO have blue tooth and Wi-Fi on because if you just click them on the slide down (rather then settings) they turn on again after a set period. Yes, i am that annoying in real life, lololo, Got to say I do like how their iMessage can text anyone anywhere in the world for free.

  4. This interview with Eric Peters was a real treasure!!
    I just loved it!

    —- LINK to…
    Fawlty Towers and Rexleonum new car anecdotes
    …and…
    Monday January 13, 2025 – ZeroHedge
    Texas Sues Allstate For Secretly Tracking Drivers Through Apps, Using Data To Raise Rates
    https://corbettreport.com/nwnw576/#comment-172178

  5. This is a very good report and serves as an incentive for further action like do not comply and find an end around the spy tentacles. I have two 2013 GM sedans and several years ago I removed the fuse from each car that controls the On Star devices using the fuse block diagram as a guide in the owner’s manual. Perhaps car makers are already limiting what is shown in the fuse block diagram in newer cars. If I take my mobile phone, I disconnect the WiFi and Bluetooth, and completely shut down the phone. Some people also suggest using a Faraday bag. I would like to find the fuse and/or connections for any data recording devices to disable them completely. That is the next step.

    • Can those options be used using an OBD2?

  6. I’m familiar with Eric Peters as he is a regular guest on The David Knight Show which I often listen to. He epitomises a 20th century appreciation of cars as a gateway to freedom and independence. Sadly those days are fading. For now at least.

    Here in Wales I hung onto my 2000 Toyota for as long as possible spending increasing money each year to get it through the ever more stringent MOT (yearly inspection) test dreading an “upgrade” to a more modern and electronic version. Alas, 2023 was the year it died and I’m now an owner of a 2006 diesel Ford which has frustrating electric windows but otherwise appears to be devoid of too much electronics and no nanny features that I am aware of.

    When this car dies who knows? May be it’ll be time to go back to horse and buggy. And even that won’t appease the watermelon gang because horse farts are causing climate emergency, aren’t they?

    If we lived in a free market without overbearing regulation I’d envision a ‘car for life’ – simply made, reliable, with easy to replace parts as they wear out. No electronics. Maybe a radio. I think they have something like this in India. Or used to have if anyone can enlighten me.

    But of course the design problem is not restricted to automobiles. It’s affecting almost everything. As more and more things get designed by computer programmes, the complexity goes up while the usefulness and durability goes down.

    What saddens me is the fact that most people in their 30’s and younger have never experienced good design and haven’t a clue what they’re missing. I’m in my 60’s so I grew up in a perfectly functioning analogue world.

  7. Thank you for this important solutions watch! Great way to start 2025. I drive an 18 wheeler and I can definitely report that we truckers are definitely scrutinized in all we do. We are under the loving watchful eye of big brother in the form of a lytx camera that is so sensitive we can’t even sneeze without committing a violation.
    Even though my brother and I have been driving for a combined 45 years, we have young, eager coaches who are fresh out of college telling us how to become better and safer drivers. We have seen almost everything out here on the road in our 45 years but now that we have cameras we are treated like inexperienced drivers.The addition of these cameras has made our jobs much harder.

  8. Good timing for this episode on Car Freedom seeing as the annual Detroit Auto Show is going on this week.
    I recall the late 60’s and 70’s when I would go to the Detroit Auto Show every year. Cars were associated with freedom in those days. I would have to say that the war on freedom has been going on for a long time and each year they take a little bit more away.

    Back in the 70’s I had a job as a Mechanic doing prototype work in a non-union shop for Ford Motor Co. We got the overflow from the Ford Engine Garage and thus did a lot of the same work for half the pay and half the benefits. Anyway, the people there used to talk about Japanese Cars like they were junk because they kept changing things every few years and you couldn’t get parts for something that was only a few years old. Of coarse this had do with Federal Government Mandates requiring an average of 27 MPG.

    At these Auto Shows I would see how the Japanese Auto Companies were putting newly designed engines on the market, often with 4 valves per cylinder and creative valve timing, then they would come out with something newer in a year or two which made the older engines obsolete and hard to find parts for. None the less, I knew they would get it right eventually and they did.

    Mean while, back in Detroit they were still using engines designed 10 to 20 years earlier and often a new Model simply had a new front and back design with all of the same guts. I recall the 1978 Ford Granada being nearly identical to the 1977 Granada. Leaving the shop one Saturday I stopped and talked with the head of Environmental Emissions for Ford who was working with the shop welder. He was there working late on a Saturday because Ford had to have that car tested by the EPA the following Monday. Anyway, the quick fix was to have this welder install six (6) Catalytic Converters on this car with a V-8 engine. Retail price for these Cats would have been about $300 each at that time, (more than 10% of the cost of the car). A Catalytic Converter simply burns wasted fuel that is not burned in the combustion camber to reduce HC emissions going out the tail pipe. I never saw that many on a Japanese car.

    I got Laid-off from that job because I would be heard saying things like “you can’t keep making junk and expect people to keep buying it”, but hell 1976 was GM’s most profitable year and they were sell mostly junk. I think it was the early 80’s before the shit hit the fan for Detroit Auto makers. So much for silencing decent, eh!

    I think that the Toyota Truck for About $13,000 with no Air Bags mentioned in this episode is a great solution but it can not be sold in the USA. That needs to change. These AIPAC paid pawns that pretend to represent segments of the American people (Congress) have to be made to repeal all such unconstitutional legislation.

    • TruthSeeker,
      I really enjoyed reading your write-up.
      It was interesting.
      I laughed out loud on the Cat part.
      “Solutions”

  9. You’re there, driving along, and all of a sudden something happens that you have to swerve around. Suddenly, an alarm in your car goes off, diverting your attention away from the new thing on the road you should be paying attention to. Next thing you know, you’re dead.

    Calling cars 2-ton death machines has never been truer. I had to keep turning off all the unsafety features in my car because they kept distracting me. Trust me, the more of this stuff you see on cars, the more people WILL get into accidents. Is it any wonder that car manufacturers would only be interested in people surviving accidents rather than avoiding them so that once a person has wrecked their car they would have to buy another in some scheme to have a never-ending customer chain?

    Disposable vehicles will be the new pollution while the climate-change narrative is continually beaten into your head.

    • Indeed, I can recall when Cars (actually nearly all appliances as well) were made to last forever with replaceable parts that were actually available. All that ended about the time JFK was taken out and the money went bad. For example 1964 was the last year American Dimes and Quarters had Silver in them. Stating in 1965 they were made of Nickel plated copper, thus becoming tokens instead of real money.

      One Auto industry analogy is that Chrysler Corporation hand a rear pump in its 1964, 727 Automatic Transmissions. This made cars with it able to be push started. (they used to sell this Transmission to Roles Royce so it must have been good). For the 1965 model year they eliminated the rear pump to save money and cars with Automatic Transmissions could no longer be push started. I had a 1965 Dodge, 383 CI with the 727 Automatic Trans and it took a lot punishment, even without the rear pump. Yep, I went through a lot of tires too. There are not too many cars these days that can take more than one 40 MPH reverse slam, that is if it will let you do it at all.

      By the 1970’s Detroit Car manufacturers were paying bonuses to employees who could come up with ideas to make cars cheaper. One of these hair-brain ideas Ford actually paid a bonus for was removing the Drain Plug on the Automatic Transmission. For years you had to carefully remove the oil pan bolts and pry open a corner of the pan just to get the oil all over the f**king place. I see now that my Jeep has a drain plug. It kind of resembles Federal Prohibition on Alcohol in 1919. It was so bad that they had to repeal it, yet both lasted for more than a decade.

      In regard to designed obsolescence, Detroit has a nick name “Salt City” because they put more salt on the roads than anywhere. Indeed, I see rusted out vehicles that are only 5 years old or so all time. This effects most of the Japanese vehicles as well, so looks like they found a way to beat the competition, eh!

  10. My previous car was a 2005 Prius. Somebody crashed into it in September of 2023. I had it for a long time and probably would still have it if it hadn’t got totaled. But, it was expensive to insure and license. The main reason, I think, is because it fit the category of “alternative fuel vehicle.” It still used gas, though.

    My current car is a 2009 Honda CR-V. It cost less to insure and about half the cost of the Prius to license.

    I’ve only had three new cars since I started driving so many years ago. I don’t want a self-driving car. I don’t even like to use cruise control.

    • What kind of insurance/license schemes do you folks have over there? Here, for example, there are two yearly charges, the amount of which depends mostly on vehicle HP. The starting amount is about 120€ for the “technical examination” (this also includes the road tax that is not spent on maintaining roads and carbon tax that is not spent to combat carbon) and another 150€ to insure. This is the most basic amount, for every extra 30 HP insurance cost goes up by about 50€. Anything extra you want to tack on, is going to make this sum inflame really quickly.

  11. My ’08 Camry is in top shape and will last my lifetime, probably. I have wanted an EV for a half century, and have 3 Aptera’s on order since 2020. They plan to issue the first in 2025 and go into full production in 2026. I will gift one, sell one, and keep one. It will self charge by it’s PV panels and since I don’t make long trips anymore it will never need to be plugged in. It is a niche car, two seater, 3 wheel, most efficient car ever made.
    Latest batteries will out last the car. Older batteries are two valuable to trash. They will be repurposed or recycled. Within a decade no more mining will be needed. All battery metals will be obtained cheaper by recycling. I predict car ownership will fade away when the robotaxi outcompetes private cars, cutting cost by 95%. I follow this tech. It’s improving so fast the financial “experts” can’t keep up. Same with energy plants.

    • That aptera thing is interesting, I hope it comes to fruition in 2025, thought when I read “by the end of 2025” it makes certain things I know about modern “business people” immediately come to mind. People in this day and age are just incredibly terrible at doing business.

      Another thing that sprang to mind is that those solar cells look very gimmicky, to me at least. The square surface is quite limited, while most panel pull 120-140W per square meter or about a tenth of that mount per square foot. The amount of power is going to be able to put into batteries is going to be quite limited, IMO.

      https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c3/APTERA2019_ASPHALT-DOORS-CLOSED_crop.jpg

      Are we talking about 20 square feet here? At three different angles? If that thing can pull 300W during sunny summer noon that’s going to be a miracle. Maybe they’ll opt to implement some pedals 😀

  12. How do you express your unhappiness with things in Japan James? We find this very difficult in France! We have been told that if we complain we will be deported re the vaccines for instance. We have an old diesel (which has not used any new manufacturing facilities for years of course!) and are told we can’t go into the centre of Montpellier as the car was made before 20011. The future is not looking good; just about everything is an attack on our resourses and ability to be free of control.

  13. Since mass resistance doesn’t seem achievable, why not figure out where the end-point transmitter is in the vehicle and physically disconnect it, like we do for “Smart” home appliances that ship with built-in IoT Wi-Fi? Would that disable the vehicle?

    How-To for physically disabling the Wi-Fi on a LG washer/dryer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mKT3H1MFRM

    • That was a good video. Thank you.

      I imagine the plan is eventually to have. The IOT stuff form its own MESH network so that even if you don’t have home Wi-Fi they will connect to each other like many smartphones do (hence apple tags working). There is a world wide map of almost all the Wi-Fi networks in existence so just knowing the names of the nearby networks will allow general location data to be generated.

      IoT is a pretty bad idea- as Bryan Lunduke pointed out in a talk he gave aside from the privacy stuff the odds on getting security updates is low and having an older device connected will be as secure as running windows Vista. lol…. Considering that most people’s routers have the default password available on the internet I believe he is correct.
      https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3HxPzutkNYw&pp=ygUTTGluZHVrZSBraWxsIHVzIGFsbA%3D%3D

      I posted him doing an in-depth talk on how IOT will destroy us all.

    • They likely have laws that prevent “Licensed Repairmen” from disconnecting these things but those of us that don’t have a Licensed to loose are free to do as we please. I would think it easy enough to find and disconnect the transmitter on a car. The Receiver might be a bit harder to find, however on many cars like my 2012 Jeep it is as easy as unplugging the SAT radio antenna.

      • No need for laws to regulate this type of stuff. If you want to have an official dealership/service office you’ll follow the manufacturer’s “guidelines”.

  14. The wonderful Guv’ mint. In America, only in America? Only in Guv’mint do you mandate a Mommy knows best ( Lots a $s to someone special ) application cure, then later be proven to be worse than the diseased afliction.

    My first thought hearing this report was why not mandate an off switch with any on switch mandate.? But of course Guv’mint can’t go but half way, with anything.
    For example:
    https://images.app.goo.gl/1ryZk9Taihwk4dK38

    Somebody’s got to die.

  15. If you’ve ever seen the film American Graffiti, (or lived it) you can understand that the automobile was the emblem of independence and freedom. We grew up on that ideology. My current car is a 1991 Geo Tracker, built just when they began to install computers, but for emissions systems only. It is a rebadged Suzuki Sidekick, built in Canada (where they apparently, at least at that time, produced very good cars). It has been my daily driver for 35 years, and only beeps if I leave my headlights on. It is totally manual, from transmission to windows. Everything is within reach in the engine, and the engine is still in great shape with 229,000 miles on it. I hope I never have to replace it.

  16. Probably have to get a wheelbarrow and a team of huskies.

  17. I have 2 BMW’s, one 35 year old (E34) and the second one (daily driver) is 29 year old (E38). I’m collecting as many spare parts as possible and keep cars in top condition, so I can driver them for next 20 years to come.

    The problem is, that they will not only cut off accessibility to spare parts, but also to gasoline or LPG. Since I have a farm, I’m thinking about my own gas from biomass and cow/horse poop. But that’s pretty expensive thing to build. James maybe in next #SolutionsWatch you could dive into home made cheap gas sources, how to build them, where to look for help. Because in EU there is an option to get this done with subsidies, but it comes with multiple burdens. For instance I would have to mortgage the farmland and I know exactly how would it end if I did so (land grab by the bureaucrats).

    Thanks for your work, been following it since at least 2010 🙂
    Best regards,
    Peter of Eastern Poland

    • ALCOHOL – I am a big proponent of alcohol as a simple, super-clean, viable, and sustainable fuel for engines, cooking and heating. Making alcohol can be extremely inexpensive and it can be decentralized. There are probably countless folks who fly under the radar (because of authoritarian policies and permits) who make it for their own farming or vehicle use.

      There are some cool things which you can do with the waste products from making alcohol, i.e. the ‘mash’ and the CO2 which the process gives off as waste. Such as, feed the mash to fishes in your fish farm pond. Use the fish poop to fertilize your greenhouse and the CO2 to bring about a flourishing greenhouse (CO2 in a greenhouse also kills the bugs). …this is being implemented. –Sidenote: Greenhouses will often buy a machine which creates CO2.
      Archer-Daniels-Midland (ADM), an American multinational food processing and commodities trading corporation and they incorporate that mash-fish-CO2 utilization.

      “Alcohol Can Be A Gas” by David Blume – A 600 page book with graphics and DVD (which I have).

      https://corbettreport.com/april-open-thread-2022/#comment-132612

      • Living Webs Farms – Jan 2019
        Alcohol Fuel Production Part 1
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JF_zrCk_QcI
        Author of the book, Alcohol Fuel,” Richard Freudenberger teaches us the hands-on details of small scale alcohol fuel production (ethanol).
        Richard describes the processes involved and the distinctions between different types of alcohol, decisions about effective types of feedstocks to use and how you can integrate this technology into your farm/garden/homestead.
        Learn the pros and cons of the technology and glean pertinent knowledge to help you begin utilizing alcohol fuel.

  18. This guy talking about seatbelts and airbags reminds me of the guy who protested motorcycle helmet laws and who got in a crash during an anti-helmet demonstration, got head trauma, and died.

    I appreciate the talk on surveillance and repairability, though.

  19. > who protested motorcycle helmet laws and who got in a crash during an anti-helmet demonstration, got head trauma, and died

    This fella likely enjoyed his rides far more without the helmet on. Either way, that was his choice, so what’s the issue? He would have died at some point, anyway, and yet he got to choose the way in which he lived his life.

  20. I’ve been wanting to get out of my “new-ish” car for over a year and into something that is less reliant on a computer system to function. Financially, it will be difficult. So I’ve been researching getting an older model Jeep Wrangler somewhere around the 2000 to 2006 range. Prices are quite reasonable right now in the US for something like this. The only problem with the Jeep Wrangler is the fuel economy isn’t all that great. Usually anywhere from 14 to 19mpg. Then I started looking at ways to improve that and went down the rabbit hole of “on demand hydrodgen systems” called HHO. Poor fuel mileage is about the only problem I have with older model vehicles in general and this seems to be a good work around for that.

    Buying older cars is definitely a solution. It just requires that you educate yourself on its maintenance and care.
    I’ve placed my search on hold for now, but I hope to be able to resume it again one day soon.

  21. IMAGE – Bar Graph with categories (government report)
    Where inflation is and isn’t – 12 month change in price
    https://verifiedinvesting.com/cdn/shop/articles/vi-statistics-where-is-inflation-is-and-isnt.jpg?v=1736984913&width=1000

    Notice that “Auto Insurance” outrageously is at the top with a 11.3% increase in cost.
    However, somewhat surprisingly, “Used Vehicles” and “Rental Cars” have seen decreases in costs.

    We should note that Real Estate insurance costs would be bundled with “Housing” and “Rent”, of which both categories are ranking in the top tier of increased costs over the past year.

  22. I’m just catching up on this episode now as well as the comments.

    I won’t get into all the gory details, but all the nightmares I went through with my new car
    that lasted more than six months started with an injury.

    I hadn’t been driving my new car more than a week when it injured me!
    I was absolutely furious. I was in a parking lot, put my car in reverse and crawled
    at no more than one to two miles per hour (a snail’s pace). All of a sudden my car beeped, my steering wheel vibrated and the brakes were slammed down on their own.
    Then the brakes were released and bounced up onto my foot.
    I suffered injuries to my ankle and knee.

    For you see the car noticed a vehicle passing by behind me and thought it was
    in my best interest to slam on the brakes and have them spring back onto my foot
    to avoid a potential accident!

    That was the first item on my list I took care of (disabled). 🙁

      • Yes you are correct. I was lucky that the injuries weren’t serious and lasted only a couple of weeks.

        I called the salesman who sold me the car immediately after the incident, leaving a message about what had happened.
        He told me to call him if there was anything I needed help with when I was leaving the dealership with my new car.

        He never returned my call.

        • I don’t know of any self respecting sales men who would return that call.

          A good aproach here would be to draft a notice with which you would request compensation for injury prior to filing a law suit. Not sure if that should go toward the manufacturer or the dealer. Likely both would be best.

          You would put in that you tried to give them the courtesy of oral communication, but since they failed to respond, you have to ramp it up. Such notices are best repeated a few times with a couple of weeks in between.

          A notice is an sxcelent introduction to suits (notices show you tried to settle) and it would certainly serve the purpose of rattling their cage. Even if you do not follow through with a suit.

          • Yes you are correct again.

            But you see I am no longer a spring chicken.
            There are only so many hours in a day and I have to set my priorities and be realistic about what I can and cannot do.

            Undertaking such a venture would take an enormous amount of time, commitment and energy.
            If I was to act with the suggestions you made the proper time was soon after the injuries occurred.
            It happened almost a year ago now.

  23. I have a 2005 honda hybrid manual transmission, 90,000 miles and even though I have had to maintain it with some replacement parts due to wear and tear, I really love driving this car and I still feel I am driving it, it is not driving me. But at some point I am going to have to replace this car, but really I would like to keep it indefintely if possible. I live in California, I need a car, this subject is one I have been interested in for some time.

  24. There was some mention of pay-your-own way notions with regulation. Saying that we should not be subjected to laws that do not serve us – such as seat belt laws, was an example given but not gone into… I appreciate it when people might not want to pay for others. Alas, I don’t think the deeper questions get asked, about these issues.

    As an example, there’s public education, where the are concerns, why should someone pay another to go to school, as if it is theft. [ Where it has been tried there are countries who’ve come to the conclusion that it benefits them to provide education for those who want it. Here is an excerpt from a Michael Moore feature about Free College. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5g3Km5kSi7A ]

    It’s the same issue regarding public health care and such services. The notion that we should not be paying for others should be suspicious. Not because they should, but because there are other causes at play there. Imagine these folks saying they shouldn’t pay for the roads they don’t use. How ’bout EMS, firefighters, and police services as well? Is not the desire that these serve some selfish end a source of problems, like wasteful spending, rampant inefficiencies, and wasteful spending?
    Have we considered it fascistic tendency implying merger of the government with that of corporations for private profits.
    Like a ‘wrap-up smear’ such obstructs the discussion of meaningful change.
    https://www.c-span.org/clip/news-conference/user-clip-pelosi-explains-the-wrap-up-smear/4785397

    What would make more sense is to consider lighting on things such as bikes. There’s requirements in some places that cyclists need lights while it’s dark. The first assumption is this is imposing on them undue burden – should they not have lights as they find appropriate to suit their own needs? [ Isn’t everything merely to satisfy one’s personal desires? ] Alas the lights aren’t only so that they can see, they are to be seen. So for example so that motorists can see them in the darkness. Not just because we do not want cyclists to die, but accidents can often make a mess, and that might mean some slow down or inconvenience. [

    So it makes some sense that there be some organized social benefit, like having standards for the common measurements, language, and other common arrangements where it is of benefit to have agreement.

    Yes, indeed there are confirmation biases to be overcome, but it’s essential to suit our own selfish wants occasionally. It could be helpful to encourage use of standards like the CMM –
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capability_Maturity_Model
    Where it’s demonstrated even government projects could be optimized… why not apply it more broadly to government and institutions? It could also be employed on regulations such that they could be held to some metrics and perhaps evolve with time and performance.

  25. A small anecdote for whoever is interested….

    Two years ago my FIAT 500 was giving up on me and I needed to buy a car.

    As you might remember we were in the middle of a plandemic and the world was a bit topsy-turvy. So I decided to buy an original new Russian 2022 LADA Niva. Hell, what could go wrong? These cars haven’t changed much since their inception in 1978. These cars were meant to go through the Siberian winters from the kolkhozes to the storage depots. And back.
    I thought, you know, a car I can screw with. lol
    Anyway, I wanted the most simple model there was: no electronics where possible, manual transmission, the known robustness and the rust that will come shortly.

    But I was surprised. Even this simple model came with: power steering, electric windows, ABS, one airbag, and… a SOS button.
    SOS button? Who does it connect to? What does it record? What does it transmit??? Is Putin listening?

    Anyway, that was the first gadget I found and disconnected. It was a black box behind the glove compartment. It had a power cable, an antenna and a data connection. Supposedly the box records all the happenings of the past 20 minutes: driving, location, how many passengers, and conversations. It has a battery build in that keeps the box working for days without power and a builtin SIM chip. From what I know the car does not have any cameras on board, so it would record audio only.

    The system is called GLONASS and connects to a dispatch when the button is pressed or in case of a crash. That’s why the car has ONE airbag (plus the spare tire under the hood) to trigger the system. In Russia it is law to have this system build in all cars on Russian roads.

    I live in Germany. Here you seldomly see a LADA drive by. It’s a bit frowned upon as, you know, “Putin-lover” or Kremlin Stooge or the like. I’m neither. But I do enjoy driving it and it does give a slight “f*ck off” attitude, which gives me a little pleasure.

    The car is even a hybrid! No not electric. Gasoline and LPG.

    I can basically fix this car with a hammer. And a sickle….

    PS: Starting this year all new vehicles have to be equipped with these digital systems here in Germany. Everything will be tracked and who knows who has control over your car.

    Cheers.

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