Tubbing a Vette:

December 31, 2000 8:02 PM

Tubbing a Vette: This guy's nuts! He spends $39,000 to purchase a used Corvette through the web and then proceeds to start doing mods to it. This mod permitted him to use 12" wheels. Then he did a whole lot of other things to it. Ye Gods!
posted by Steven Den Beste (12 comments total)

I'm nuts, too. What the heck am I doing at home browsing the web on New Year's Eve when I should be at a party trying to meet a beautiful woman (for honorable purposes)? Damn. (I'd even settle for meeting a beautiful female person. Also note that someone can be beautiful without being pretty.)
posted by Steven Den Beste at 8:05 PM on December 31, 2000

I dunno man, put a vette on one and of the scale and a woman on the other . . .
posted by christian at 9:48 PM on December 31, 2000

And you suddenly weight a whole lot more.
posted by dhartung at 1:15 AM on January 1, 2001

What means "tub"?

I wasn't going to look at this until I saw the bit about the 12" wheels. I had to see that--I was expecting wheels the size of vinyl LPs. Cool! Imagine my disappointment when I found it was just. . . a red car with fat tires.

I'm not much of a car guy, apparently. I feel like I should be ashamed, coming from Detroit. What's special about this car?
posted by rodii at 1:52 PM on January 1, 2001

Wide tires give the car better traction. A 'vette has a big engine and ordinarily if you floor it from a standing start all you'll do is lay scratch (i.e. spin the tires and leave a big long black mark on the ground). By having wider tires, there's more rubber on the road and you can accelerate faster without breaking the tires away from the pavement and laying scratch.

"tubbing" a car means to make the wheel-wells bigger. The 12" tire refers to the width, not the diameter.

As to why he's doing that and other mods to this car, I have no idea. But people have been doing that for at least 50 years; customizing cars goes back to the 50's if not even earlier, and as a hobby it's alive and well and more common than you might think.

J. C. Whitney has made a prosperous business out of catering to this hobby.
posted by Steven Den Beste at 4:18 PM on January 1, 2001

rodii, there are different car-customization classes. One class (typically found in SoCal) is devoted to appearance. (The California customization culture has driven the develoipment of more than one brand of vehicle, the PT Cruiser being one recent example.) Other subclasses are devoted to performance. Just pick up a car mag and see how many obscure statistics are cited in the sidebars. I swear to god I know what torque means in terms of physics, but I haven't the faintest what it means in terms of my vehicle.
posted by dhartung at 6:16 PM on January 1, 2001

In the UK we have our own car culture. This magazine is one of the reasons that I'm not part of it.
posted by davidgentle at 7:59 PM on January 1, 2001

I know about wide tires and slicks and fuel-injected lug nuts and like that. I'm from Detroit *that* much. I was kidding about the 12" diameter thing. (Though I still think it'd be cool. . . or how about putting it on skateboard trucks?) I just wasn't sure what made this car remarkable. Unlike, say, this one or this one or this one or this one or this one or this one. . .

(Sorry about the overkill. It's hard to stop. :)
posted by rodii at 9:26 PM on January 1, 2001

I posted the original link partly because the guy spent $39,000 for the car based on two photographs he saw on the web and fronted the money before ever seeing the car in person; and that once he had the thing in his hands he proceeded to start modifying it. That just struck me as noteworthy.

Besides, it's a Corvette. That's not just "a red car". :->
posted by Steven Den Beste at 9:57 PM on January 1, 2001

David, the car buff magazines in the US don't do that kind of thing. To get that stuff you go to the motorcycle mags. Then you'll see biker babes. Only they'll all have Harley tattoos and be wearing chains and stuff like that.
posted by Steven Den Beste at 10:00 PM on January 1, 2001

OK, I'll stop playing the ingenue. When it comes down to it, the 'vette *is* just "a red car" (well, not the non-red ones, of course). I mean, there's the 'vette mystique and there's the 'vette. Is the 'vette really, truly, such an outstanding car? Has it been more than ordinary in the last 30 years? Wouldn't you really rather have a T-Bird or a 280Z or a Maserati or a '67 GTO? Or is it just that a lot of people really wish they were Steve McQueen (so to speak)? (I'm not being argumentative here, I really honestly would like to know. I drive a Nissan Altima so you can guess I'm not exactly a muscle-car guy. :)
posted by rodii at 2:19 PM on January 2, 2001

I would really like a (politically incorrect) 67 Tempest Wagon which is basically a GTO wagon minus a bit of the power. Still, I believe a stock vette would beat most other cars any day of the week, supposedly they handle nice too. Maybe not the Maserati... But imagine how fast that thing is going to be when this guy is done.
Spelchecker wanted to change Maserti to Manservent, I think that is funny.
posted by thirteen at 2:34 PM on January 2, 2001