...Every month?

[proscriptus]

How about, The Deranged Squirrel of Motoring, Most months?

Here's a nice letter I got a while back to tide you over:

Dear Morons,

In Issue #11, page 71, you wrote that “the demi-hemispherical design of the oil pump lobe ensured constant pressure to the main bearings.” Well, where to begin? For starters, you failed to mention that Al Vargas’ work on the Blemer 86J/L oil pump in 1931-’34 Groveson engines was nothing more than a copy of Lemmy “Sourdad” Flembug’s design for the Series G Lynchberg. Maybe you’ve forgotten, but Vargas always claimed that his right leg was slightly shorter than his left due to Flembug’s “Plogiston Rays,” so as “restitution,” when Vargas left Flembug’s Ames headquarters in 1922, he took the famous cocktail napkin with Flembug’s sketch. Vargas’s later claims in patent court that his quasi-demi-hemispherical design were an original idea were ludicrous, but of course Vice-President Dawes was married to Cynthia Vargas, so Flembug lost on appeal.

But what is even more disappointing is your description of the action of the pump itself. The original Flembug-Cutterson OilSqueezer was a constant/main design, but the Blemer 86J/L was an intermittent-type system, due to the crown brake arrangement of the Groveson six. Anyone who has actually disassembled the heads on a Groveson should have been able to tell you that instantly. How hard could it have been to find a real “expert?” I expect this sort of error from a magazine like “We Got Old Cars” or “They Ain’t New No More,” but as the “Koran” of the “old car hobby,” “Hemmings” ought to “do” better.

I have been a subscriber for the last three issues, and I am deeply disappointed in you, and everything you stand for.

Signed,

Willy Loman

[Sniff Petrol]

Ah, yes, sorry about that. I'm working on it now. Soz.

Sniff