[Shotimes] "Soul"

[Ron Nottingham]

A car with "soul" will have "soul" from the first time you drive it.  As
soon as you start the engine, put it in gear, and take off.  "Soul" does not
come from time.  I've had cars that never had "soul" from the moment they
were purchased, and never developed "soul", even though they were a blast to
drive.  You do not build "soul" into a car, it is born with it.  It comes
from the caring engineer's hand and the pridefilled assemblers' hands.  It
includes the engineer in charge of designing the dash screws and goes
through the engineer in charge of testing prototypes.  It all starts with a
caring attitude in the mind of the person whose idea it was originally.

Stop and ponder all the cars that have "soul", and I am willing to bet that
the person that penned the original idea has an extremely deep feeling for
cars.

The first time I ever drove a SHO, I knew right then, these cars had "soul",
even though my feelings for a Taurus were very low.  The Nissan Maxima is a
great looking car (to me anyway), and really stirs my soul, it excites me
when I see one, and I would really love to have one, BUT the Maxima has no
"soul".  Even though the Maxima is as good as a SHO, has a better driving
"feel", and is a much better chassis, better designed in every way (my
feelings about the car), I choose a SHO to own.  A SHO was my second choice,
not my first, that distinction belongs to the Maxima.  To this day, my wife
always asks me why I just don't go ahead and buy a Maxima, as I am always
looking at them (or was, until I moved to the "Dark Side" with BMW's :-),
but I can't force myself to make payments on something that I only truly
enjoy from the outside (even though the new Maxima has far better
performance than my SHO on paper).  For now, the only cars that really get
me going, and I am prepared to buy are BMW's, T-birds (80's & 50's), SHO's,
Capri's (80's), and XR4Ti's :-)

Ron N. - Dalton, GA
90 SHO

----- Original Message -----
From: "Dave Kegel" <d.kegel@attbi.com>


> If this were true, then you'll never be able to jump in a new car and feel
> that it has "soul".  Which, is what most of you seem to be saying.
>
> I think you guys are confusing familiarity with soul.  That new pair of
> shoes will never have the same "sole" as those old comfy slippers.  HA!
>
> Dave
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "van Oss" <vanOss@centurytel.net>
> To: "George Fourchy" <krazgeo@jps.net>; <shotimes@autox.team.net>
> Sent: December 05, 2002 11:17 PM
> Subject: Re: [Shotimes] "Soul"
>
>
> > George is right.  The crucial element is the driver's feeling that
he/she
> knows the car, knows what it will do, feels comfortable
> > and confident that the car will do what the driver asks.  That rapport
can
> take time to build.  As Billy Joel said, it's always been
> > a matter of trust.  A good car tells you that you can trust it, by
> behaving under stress with predictable, acceptable manners.  A
> > bad car is any car in which you don't know when you can trust it, or you
> know you can't. I can drive my 92 SHO at 120 mph at
> > Brainerd and feel confident that it will behave in Turn 1.  When you
know
> a car will do what you built it to do, that is a rush.
> >
> > Joseph van Oss
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