177. How Tuning Evolved, Modern EFI and the history of HTR Performance

This episode is brought to you by 6XD Gearbox. More on them later. Did you enjoy working on those C4s back then?

No. Well, I did.

No was a very quick answer.

No was a fact, there's no one hurt in that life.

It's probably premature to say that. I say no because of where we are today. You can have a guy that's 28 years old working on a brand new C8 right now being like, these things are bad to the bone, but 20 years from now, it's going to be a pile of s***.

Hello, ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the Minnoxide podcast. I'm your host, Harris AK. Minnoxide, saying this for the fourth time today, but since I post these weekly, the fourth time this month. I'm here with my Ford loving co-host, Dan. Yep. Mr. Gunnar Garage. I'm slightly delusional at this point because we are at PRI yet again, and I think I'm seeing double because we have Howard back on the show once again. And it's been a few months. So real quick, let's just do a quick introduction as to who you are, and we'll just kind of go from there.

Okay, so Howard Tanner. Current operation is HTR Performance Engineering. Many people know me from 32 years of Redline Motorsports, which I started in New York, moved to Florida, and I'm at another frontier of my occupation, I guess. Sure.

Yeah, and you're also a part-time producer for me, right? Or agent. Yeah.

Listen, you got a really good program going here. Young guy, you've met a lot of people, and PRI is definitely a place where everybody shows up to, undoubtedly. And, you know, I think the people that we've brought to your attention are people that got a good story. You're going to have a lot of good stuff to chop up and play. So I think I enjoyed it helping you guys out with that.

Yeah. So obviously, we had you on the show before, but I kind of want to get a little more of an understanding from your past. We didn't get a ton of time to talk about that last time. So where did this all begin for you?

Where did it start?

Yeah.

So, man, I got to go back deep on this one, but I guess we got a few minutes. I mean, like everybody else, you're a car kid, you know. For me, going back even further, I always had a desire to play with electronics and electrical stuff. I had a grandfather and an uncle that were engineers, and just spent a lot of time at Radio Shack, a place that's long gone now. Building things, making devices and what not. And then growing up in New York, they give you a driver's license at 16. And as soon as they gave me the driver's license, you get into a hot rod. And from there, I mean, it was probably... I got to start driving in 85, 86 or something. I think that... No, earlier than that. It was a long time ago. So, you know, yeah, I mean, fuel injection wasn't out yet by a bit. Actually, now that I think about it, it had to have been 80. Because my mother came home with an 82 iROC at one point while I was in high school. And that was the... We're getting a tune up? Hello? Can you hear me now? That was the beginning of my fuel injection awareness, you know, and growing up around car, you know, electronics and then growing up with street cars, carbureted cars, you know, running normal gasoline and just old school stuff. And then she came home with this car. It was a little bit of like, I think I know where all this stuff goes. So, I mean, that was, that was the early part of me getting into engine management and electronic cars. And probably a year or so after that, I started modifying them, figuring out, you know, boys can't leave nothing alone. You got to modify everything. And there wasn't a lot of information. There was no internet. You know, there wasn't the guy up the road. There wasn't a performance shop that was doing it. And it was quite a path to kind of figure out how all this stuff worked. And that's kind of what started the whole Redline Motorsports thing, was that I had cars that I was running at the track that were going pretty quick for the time. And people were kind of questioning, like, why is this guy sitting in a car with a laptop? Right now, it's no big deal, right? Every car's got a laptop in it. But to be able to start out that early and be on such the forefront, the cutting edge of that stuff, looking back now, it was like crazy. So from there, it's just businesses and kind of got me here today.

OK.

So you dabbled in with your mom's iROC, or if I remember correctly, the tune port injection on those things was kind of a nightmare, wasn't it?

Well, I mean, back when it came out, it was state of the art, right? You know, and even even backing up before that, actually, she had an 80, that was an 82 iROC. My uncle had bought an 84 Corvette C4, which back then was like, oh, my God, now it's the biggest pile of s*** in the man, right? But but so does everything that evolves now. But I didn't modify either one of those cars. But I did buy an iROC a couple of years later. And we started doing like 420 cubic inch motors from Lingenfelter and sending the chip out to get burned. And you know that that was the beginning of it, you know, I mean, you didn't have tuning software and everything else to get it done.

Yeah, so what was your first car, though? Like, so you were messing around with your mom's car, but what did you have?

For me, I started out, I was 15, I didn't even have a driver's license, and I bought a 67 Firebird for 750 bucks, with a small block engine in it. And of course, I couldn't drive it, well, at least legally. So I would get home before my mother got home, and I would drive it, and try to put it back in the driveway in the same spot, so nobody noticed it. But that was the real beginning of like, you're a car guy, you know? And even back then, I remember going to the bookstore and buying books on how engines worked and how everything came together with it, and broke a lot of stuff, messed up a lot of stuff, but that's how you learn it. I mean, like I said, there was nobody, now you go to YouTube or anywhere and you can get information all day long on how everything works. You just didn't have it. So I started out with that. I had a 70 Nova, had a Chevelle, and probably 86, I think, I bought a Malibu because they were a full-frame car. Yeah. Had a big block in the car. And that car got bade for quite a bit of time because of, I had a little problem with cancer when I was growing up. So the car sat for almost a year. And then when I started recovering from all the operations, everything else I was going through, I kind of got bored with the carburetor and the fuel injection stuff was really hitting hard. And I bought a 89, I think it was an 89 C4. And that was the beginning of starting to take stuff apart heavy, you know? So it's been a few cars. So carburetors went bye bye, fuel injection came and never left. Yeah.

Just funny because in that, when I first started buying Fox bodies, there was so many that I got that were, they took the fuel injection off and put carburetor back on it. Because it was just some people just couldn't wrap their head around.

Well, I mean, when you think about it, I mean, even many guys don't even know how the carburetor works properly. But the guys that did, there was a simplicity to it. You know, there's a couple of screws to turn, a couple of things to take apart and you can muddle through it. Now, all of a sudden, you've got wires and sensors and a computer at a time when computers were just really starting to be something anyway. You know, I mean, I'm going back that in 80, 82 was the beginning of really GM hitting fuel injection hard with the tune port. 81, the carburetor was still controlled by a computer. It was called C3 command.

Okay.

Computer command control. So even though it was carbureted, it had some electronic integration tied into it. It was that transitionary period and it did, it scared people. It still does. I still find people that come in and talk to me about stuff and they're like, I don't need all that stuff in there, until they drive a car that has fuel injection on it and air conditioning and XM radio and heated and cooled seats. They realize this is probably not that bad. But yeah, it scares people.

What are your thoughts on the throttle body stuff, like right now with like a PhyTech or Holley Sniper, or we got aces right around a corner here. Do you think that's a viable solution for people that want to update something older?

Yeah. There's a number of products out there now. Obviously, fuel injection has some big advantages. There's more consistency out of it. Drivability is a lot better. Of course, you have to get through the hump of dialing it in, but there's a lot of pluses to it. I think everybody's got some system out to do a retro, to take a 4150 spread bore carburetor and swap over. I mean, I don't see much of that stuff because at the level of stuff I work on, it's usually existing EFI systems. I still think that if you had a choice over a sequential individual injector system over the throttle body ones, I would take the sequential system over those anyway. But again, it's about simplicity. And when a guy pops the hood on a 69 Camaro, and it still has a chrome air cleaner on it, but a throttle body on it, it kind of fits better for them. So it kind of works.

So you mentioned kind of stuff that you work on then. So what are you kind of working on nowadays? Because obviously you've moved across the country now in the last, what was it? When did you move down to Atlanta? A year or two ago?

Almost two years.

A couple of years ago now?

Year and two quarters, yeah.

So what's the ambition now? Because obviously over the last 20 years, you've kind of been working on, is it late model stuff over that period usually? Or what does that look like?

Well, I mean, for me, whatever we were working on that year, I was always excited about next year. And the one great thing about having been around the engine management for as long as I have is that I haven't stopped. So every year, even though it might get more complicated or more diversified, it's another layer of an onion I've already been peeling off for a lot of years. So people that are just getting into it, it's definitely a much bigger hill to climb, especially within the latter time here. So right now, obviously, Gen 5 GM stuff is big and dominant. The Global B stuff, you know, C8, Blackwing, some of the trucks is a little trickier platform. That's an arena that I spend time in. But I also do a bunch of aftermarket stuff as well. So right now, I'm kind of preparing myself for, you know, there's another new small block coming out. They have other controllers that are coming. I mean, you can't snooze for one minute. You get lost real quick. Yeah, yep.

Well, it kind of goes back to that whole, like we've been talking about this all day with all our guests, is like there's always another layer to the onion. Has there ever been a point in your career where you're just like, this is too difficult? Or you're just like, we have to do it anyway?

No, because your personality is driven off of challenges. And otherwise you'd give up. I would have been done years ago. And again, I think when you've been in the hamster wheel as long as I've had and have seen and experienced and have got to know people in the industry that have helped guide you on that end of it, there's always a method to the madness, right? You know, whether we can get into it and have the controls to do it. But it all makes sense. I mean, you take these newer Global B cars with like neural network fueling and all kinds of other intricate processes they do. None of it's odd to me. You know, getting in there and having the tools to do it and the access to everything you need to is always the biggest part of it. But it's just an engine. It doesn't run any differently today than it did 110 years ago when the auto four stroke motor came out, you know?

Well, it's kind of like how my approach has always been in our conversations is like, Banish mentioned this actually when we did his last podcast, I think it was episode 123. It's like, at what point does it get so restricted where it just goes Mad Max all over again, where people are just like, you know what, we're just gonna be making fuel in the backyard or something like that.

Yeah, I mean, listen, the internal combustion engine is not going anywhere. It was really never going to go away, even with all the EV stuff. And now with some of the changes, it's all the manufacturers left stuff in their pedigree. The small block for GM coming back out, they all knew. At the end of the day, there's only so many ways to skin the cat out of it. It's got to work kind of one way. And it's just really great to watch the technology over the years go from an engine that would make one horsepower per cubic inch to a car that now leaves the factory at 1.7, 1.8.

Right.

And meets emissions. I think at the last podcast, we had talked about the new Zero One.

Yeah, yep.

Which is just the ultimate of like, it's insane.

Right.

To make that kind of power on gasoline, emission legal.

Do you have one on order?

I actually got a phone call two weeks ago from the guys in New Hampshire at McCaulkin, where I got my C8 Z06 from.

Okay.

Offered me a good deal and getting in on one as a purchaser prior. And I told them to sit tight a couple of weeks.

Okay.

So I don't know.

Has it been a couple of weeks?

We're getting close to it. I mean, PRI was coming up. All right.

Because today is what, Thursday?

All right.

You're holding me down to it now?

Yeah. We want an answer by the end of this podcast.

It's a bad son of a b****.

Yeah.

Yeah. And from a technical standpoint, it's just-

It's already a built car? Like, that just didn't get delivered?

No, no. It's to put an order in on something. Yeah. Because they can negotiate better on an order than something they have coming in and whatever. So it's just expensive.

Yeah. You're not kidding on that one either. Yeah.

It's a lot the stomach. I mean, it's a matter of desire over want at that point, you know? Yeah.

I mean, that's almost as much as our first house.

Yeah, it's a lot of money. Yeah. But I mean, but technically, as we've talked about innovation and what intrigues you with this stuff, I mean, that's such a marvel of engineering, but we're locked out. So again, as you talked about with Greg and stuff, is that at what point do you stop? I mean, when the tools stop is when you got to stop. Although what's been interesting is that we've been kind of going back to our roots a little bit with things. I can tell you working on C4 Corvettes long time ago when we didn't have all the control that we needed to get into the computer. We had a separate injector that would blow fuel in when it made boost. We had a thing to play with timing outside of it. A lot of those things have been adopted now going into Global B. They're starting to get better. I know you met with Dave Steck about his controllers. We're getting there. The thing is that you never give up, because sooner or later the industry is going to catch up to it. They're not going to stop us.

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No. Well, I did.

No was a very quick answer.

That was the fastest snow I've ever heard in my life.

It's probably premature to say that. I say no because of where we are today. Sure. Right. But at the time, remember, it was brand new. You can have a guy that's 28 years old working on a brand new C8 right now, being like, these things are bad to the bone, but 20 years from now, it's going to be a pile of s***.

Right.

Which it kind of is right now.

Because when you get to the C10s or 11s or whatever we're going to call them, it's like, man, they really, that C8 didn't have it figured out yet until the C10 though.

I really like the way they look. But I'm an 80s, 90s guy, the C4s.

Oh, C4. Yeah, I do like the C4 look. Yeah, I thought you were about to say C8s. I'm like, yeah.

The whole clam shell opening up, being able to work on it. I mean, they were, again, looking back at it now, especially I've had built some pretty quick ones at the time. It was like, the Corvette's the ultimate GM car. I'm working on one that's one to two years old. They're basically new and you're doing stuff, going faster than you were a b*****. Now, you don't even know that one drove by you on the road anymore, but that's like with everything. At some point, you get to the life. We're like, that is humans, right?

Yeah. Were you racing the C4s at the time then?

What's that?

Were you racing the C4s?

Yeah. I mean, I had a C4 that was running 10 Teens, which back then was fast.

Yeah.

I mean, you're talking about a car that ran like 15s or something, 14s or something when they were new and had cam packages. I had a guy I was working with in California with some of the chip burning. It was barbaric, but we had some stuff that was running. So it really was a big part of me getting attention in New York and what I was doing, because that's what led into like, hey, can you make mine do that? Can you make my Camaro do that? And that's kind of what fueled Redline Motorsports from the beginning, you know.

Can you explain? Okay. I've never actually asked this in all of our 170 some episodes. So can you explain how tuning worked back then, like chip burning and all that stuff? Like, what exactly, like, what does the process consist of?

Well, back then, I mean, the chip was a, you know, a double EEPROM, Electronical Erasable Programming Renal Memory, and the chip was either removable or not removable. And you'd have to send the computer someway that had the software to get in there and actually modify the binary code. You didn't have a user interface like HP tuners where there's a timing table.

So you had to understand what the binary code was, ones and zeros, right?

Right. So most of these guys were, you know, computer guys, software guys. They really, they were more of that than they were calibrators for engine management.

Okay.

And I had Ron Zimmer, who I think the kids now run Z Industries or ZDP. They make all the pulleys to go on all the blowers today. So Ron, back in the day, was one of the pioneering guys.

That's Grip Tech. They make the Grip Tech stuff.

Jim Fermato, who's been, you know, passed away many years ago. His son, I know, has a shop doing tuning stuff. Those two guys were like the bad a****. And we would, you know, run a car and get information and then pop the chip out, put it in a bag, FedEx it out to either Florida or Jim was, or Ron was in California, wait for FedEx to come back, get it back, you know, four days later. I mean, it was, it was a struggle, you know, but that's kind of what it was. And were you ever perfect? Probably not. It's not like today where we can, our data logging capability and our ability to respond to address a calibration as quick as we can, it wasn't like that.

Yeah.

You know, so it was.

You could fine tune something. You're not going to send a chip back just to get another little bit out of something.

Right. And you were close, but you know, how far were you off?

Right.

In hindsight, looking back right now, we were probably way off, you know? But that's what it was back then, you know? It was a game.

So what was the next evolution of that? Obviously you got more and more into EFI. When did data logging become a thing?

I started, well, interestingly, I went to Mid-Ohio College for a training class on Excel CalMap, which back then, that software was on a three and a half inch floppy. I drove all the way out there, I think it was like in my early 20s, and I took a class out there. Back then, that was pretty b***** stuff. I came back and I rewired my entire C4 with a standalone controller using the Excel stuff.

Oh really, okay.

At that point, you had software and you could do things. That was the beginning for me of manipulating data and figuring stuff out. And then I think 1997, the LS came out, and you had LS1 Edit, which had capabilities. It was as good as it was gonna be, but it was a bit barbaric. When the guys from EFI Live came out with their software, that's when things, to me, started changing. I did a lot with those guys in those early years, with the, you know, 97, 98, almost up into, really almost until the DI motor came out. And of course, you got HP tuners, and I used to use both of them. So, I mean, that's data logging was never hard to do. It was just a matter of the software companies putting enough in there to get what you need. And they realized that the editing part was heavily weighted on the data logging part.

Okay.

You know, so.

Did they ever have a, so like in the Ford world, I believe this is how it worked, but we had like Megasquirt, right? So you could, it was like a chip that had an interface. So like you could put it into a stock ECU and still do some like tuning on the fly type stuff, but you weren't burning a chip. You could do it through there. So did they have anything like that in the?

So GM, so nobody really, well, somebody did offer that HP, EFI Live came out with the Roadrunner computer, which was basically that. It was a modified chip in the controller that you could almost real time flash. And back then that was like b*****. You know what I mean? To be able to do that. So it was one of those things that.

For anybody listening, I just got dicked by Kyle.

You've been had?

Yeah. Thanks.

He's been in my mouth too.

What did he do?

So Kyle off this is here. Take a look.

Yeah. Oh, we really did get dicked.

Yeah.

That's awesome.

I will cherish this forever. Yeah.

But that right now, you got to dig him back.

Oh, yeah, he will. But anyways, Tangent, you brought Ford into this.

Yeah, I always find a way to work it in.

So EFI Live partnered with Moats. And I think there were some, maybe in Kentucky, so I don't really matter. And we would put that controller in like a C5 or an F-body, and you can flash it and program it in real time. And then once you got done with that calibration, you put the other computer back in there and just flash it. So it cut down a lot of that reading, writing, changing, reading, writing. I still have it. It's in my Howard Tanner, Smithsonian outdated calibration tools. But yeah, that was about as close as we got to that.

OK.

You know.

So OK. And the reason I'm going down this road, right, is because like, I don't think we really had a tuner on this show, but really with his beginning to end experiences you've had, I guess, as wide as it goes.

Power hungry from doing the diesel stuff way back in the day was a similar deal.

Yeah, true. Actually, yeah. I'd say probably on a similar level of experience.

I think he was tuning for like Bully Dog and some of those guys too in the early days.

Is that also Ford stuff?

Yeah.

How do I translate that to Chevy? But anyways, so the reason I'm asking this, though, is because things have come so far. So nowadays, what are you, mostly HP tuners and FuelTech or?

Yeah. I mean, Holley, the FuelTech, HP tuners, obviously. I still do EFI Live, you know, stuff, which is, you know, just a different tool in your toolbox. Sure. But it's, you know, I think, again, I look back in the fact that how long I've been doing it and the fact that came from a carburetor, that to watch it evolve has just been amazing. Like, I mean, it's just, you know, it's overwhelming when you think about it. It gives me a different appreciation for where we are today with it. But it all makes sense to me, you know what I mean? I think if I got out of it for a couple of years, you'd miss a lot right now.

Oh, if you want to just talk about from carburetor to ZR1X, holy s***, right? Yeah, that's insane.

But it's cool.

Yeah.

And it's just, I mean, a lot of it is different materials. We're learning. Engine management has done a lot of it. There was a time when, back in the 70s, when the emissions were hitting hard and power was going away, and Corvette made 160 horsepower, you know. And to be here today, again, with the 01, meeting Euro 5 emission standards and making that number on gasoline.

Insane.

What's wrong with the EPA? What's wrong with emissions? Nothing. They work. Matter of fact, they made the motor make that power because they're using every ounce of the fuel efficiently. Right? Because emissions were really designed for all the stuff you weren't using.

True.

Right? All the raw hydrocarbons and stuff that comes out of a tailpipe from poor burning, cylinder heads that don't work, being able to deal with all the particulates that come out of a fuel injector. All that stuff have all been addressed and focused on, which is why you're able to make this power that you're making on a car like a 01.

So real quick, do you think that's the result? Because again, if you go to an efficient engine program, if the combustion is perfect in there, do you think most of the anger for people comes from all these extra stuffs like def fluids and all that stuff? Do you think if it was just an efficient burning engine from the get go, people would be a lot more relaxed about all this?

Yeah, I mean, listen, you can't, you can get an engine, I mean, Greg will tell you this, you can get an engine pretty efficient to where like you have no cats on it and its output is actually really good, but that doesn't solve all what they want to try to clean up. So you're always going to have something on there. My point is, is that those things are not affecting performance.

Sure, yep.

Right. You take a brand new C8 Corvette at 495 horsepower and there's not a lot to be gained in the calibration that justifies doing it. It's that good. And a lot of vehicles are like that now. They're just not worth touching unless you make some kind of mechanical change that changes airflow, which is where the power comes from. You just leave it alone. But again, that's all about refinement and being able to use all the fuel. So efficiency is part of emissions. Sure, it works.

So my question is, and I don't remember if I asked you this last time, do you think we would have gotten here had it not been for the screening? Like, do you think we would have just been lazy about it anyway and still just kind of been going on? Would the OEM just be like, this is how it works, it's fine? If we hadn't had this government kind of cracking down on us, would we still have gotten to the point we're at now?

Well, I mean, the government's been cracking down since the 70s, right?

Right.

Because there's a legitimacy to the issue, right? I mean, you know, I'm not gonna get on one side or the other with being b*******, whatever, but like, you know, nobody wants to breathe in the stuff. And at the end of the day, you're wasting fuel, right? Your fuel economy is better if you don't waste it. You make better power if you don't waste it. So the government didn't really care about us performance guys making more power, but it just happened to be that during the process of emissions and controlling the engine's combustion that we're making better power.

Right.

So it was kind of like a plus when you think about it.

So maybe we would have gotten there, but it wouldn't have been the OEMs that did it. It might have been us that did it. Us enthusiasts were looking for something to get more efficient and more power.

I mean, the whole point of making powers is efficiency.

Right.

So but that's thinking of it from this side. The government's thinking it from the other side.

Right.

At the end of the day, we're both looking at it the same way.

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I make it be a race car. I mean, why, you know, there is some point when fuel needs to be wasted for cooling on certain scenarios and situations, but for the most part, for an average performance motor, like, why would you want to waste any fuel? And even though people are like, well, I don't care about fuel economy and my hot rod. Why not?

If you can have both, why not?

Exactly.

Why not?

So why stop? And they both go hand in hand, that if you can make an engine burn efficiently, you're going to get the best power out of it and you're going to have the best efficiency, which leads into the emission part of it. So kind of works for everybody's advantage.

Did your journey as a shopper, as a tuner or whatever way you want to phrase it, did it ever take you around the country? Did you do any cool stuff around the nation?

I've been places, Texas, I mean Florida before. I decided to live down there. I've been to Dubai several times. That's been amazing. Working with those guys, I still have several customers over there as support. Actually, now I've got more remote support and scattered around the country and the world actually. I've got people in Chile I deal with. I've got Dubai. I've got one guy in Italy that I deal with. So I guess it brought me around the country in that sense. I really didn't have a need to. I mean, I always had a shop as a fixture. But yeah, I mean, you don't need to go there anymore, especially from the calibration side of it.

Yeah, true.

It got that way with, so I'm in IT in the field and I used to have to program switches with a console cable over a telephone, talking to somebody while I was running scripts. Now, I just get TeamViewer or something on and get hooked to the Internet and I just let them do it, and I don't have to worry about s***.

Yeah. The remote, I mean, it's not any different really. If you're looking at your laptop and you're dealing whatever, you're still looking at the same data. It is an interesting phenomenon because you deal with not being there, and it gets hard to diagnose things with people. But if you know what to look for, you could see it, you can catch it. So it's a double-sided sword. It definitely makes your intuition a little bit sharper. And it's actually kind of an enjoyment when I'm helping guys out and they're on the dyno with a car and you're making changes and they make another squirt and they send you the numbers and the log and you keep seeing the incremental increases in power and the calibration starting to fall on the line. And you realize you're doing it without being in front of the car. It's kind of neat, but you got to work with the right people, though. That's why any remote support I do, I don't really do it for like random people. I try to work with shops that understand me. I understand them. I know their work ethic. I know how they're installing stuff. And in that way, the success is much better.

Right.

Because a lot of people are hacks.

Yeah. You're not getting some guy named Jimmy who just threw it together in his garage. Yeah.

You know, you're some guy named Jimmy, right?

Absolutely. 100 percent.

I'm just like I'm going over my head. I'm like, yeah, no, Dan's Jimmy.

Yeah. I do put together nice parts, though. I don't usually cheap out on parts.

That's fair.

Yeah.

Um, it wasn't always drag racing related for you as well, or did you dabble in the road course world?

No, the you know, growing up in New York and the street scene, I mean, there was it was drag racing. You know what I mean? I got I'll never forget. I was probably 16 and a half, 17 years old. And we all knew that all these guys used to hang out at this sub shop called Mike's Sub Shop, Mike Neibes.

Jersey Mike's?

No, this is it was it was like the old classic stainless steel building with the big arrow all lit up in neon. And Friday and Saturday nights, that's just where everybody hung out. And I a few of my buddies that were car guys with me growing up in, you know, in high school, like, let's go check this place out. And we went up there one night and the the property was kind of up high off the ramp, so you couldn't see it until you got off the highway. And I remember coming up that ramp up to the road and looking over to the right and seeing this place full of cars and all the neon and pulling in. And I was just like, done. What an addiction. I mean, again, you're talking cars that were running like, you know, 13, 10, 12, 90s. Yeah. You know, Chevelles with big blocks in it. And I just saw all these older guys, older than me, that were the street warriors, you know, betting for money and doing all the stuff. And then the deal would go down and there'd be like a tension going on in the parking lot. And then like 12 o'clock, everybody would leave and go to the mystery location. I mean, it was just this thrill with it. It was intoxicating. You know what I mean? So growing up around that, you just get addicted to that. And then, you know, you want to, you want to be a part of it. So drag racing on the street was the thing, you know? And then we realized there's a drag strip and you can do this stuff going faster and everything else. And the road course stuff, I actually went to an event at Watkins Glen with my C5 Corvette. A friend of mine took his Viper and we had the time of our life. I had never been on a road course in my entire life. But the so the road course side was Watkins Glen was only, you know, two and a half, three hours away from where I was. Hell of a track, hell of a track. You know, didn't realize that I finally went to it. But I went there with my friend with his Viper. And we just had the time of our life. I had never been on a road course in my life.

What year was this?

Gen one Viper or it was he had a gen. His was a.

Was in the 90s still?

It was a 02 02.

OK, so Gen two, I think.

Yeah. So he went out there. We had headers and bolt ons, and I went out there with a cam and header package on there. And we just had a blast. I mean, we were constantly getting yelled at by all the guys with the with the Porsches because they don't like the Vette guys and the guys with noises. And we vowed that we were coming back the next year for sure. So during that time from one event to the next, I put a 422 cubic inch stroker motor in my C5. We put a Rowe Supercharger on his car, and we just came back and raised all kinds of hell. But they had the whole track open. That's like a three and a half mile track if they open up the full from the boot and everything. And never went back after that. So I went two times on the road course over there. And then I got too focused with work and everything else. Had a lot of customers in Florida that were road race guys. I mean, you've got Daytona. We had Palm Beach at the time. You had Homestead, you had Sebring. They were always in striking range. So I embraced it and supported it for my customers, but I never went back. And now I live six miles from Road Atlanta.

Yeah, dude, you gotta take that up.

You think I'd take my CAZ out over there at one point, but I don't want to get chipped on it.

You don't want to get chipped on it. You Corvette guys drive me insane. Throw some PPF on it, drive the damn thing.

I got PPF on it, I don't want to get chipped on the PPF.

We put PPF on the PPF.

The PPF is expensive.

I'm just gonna put some blue masking tape, like, oh my god, you know what drives me nuts with you Corvette people is when you guys get the-

What do you mean you Corvette people?

You Corvette people, yeah, no, these are fighting words.

We've been talking to them all day.

Yeah, no, they get the, especially when it's got the, when it's the maroon color, because the maroon color with the silver wheels and then they get the black bra across the front and it drives me nuts. I'm like, guys, make that clear nowadays. Like throw it on there. Stop going to Target.

Yeah.

Anyways, I had to get that off my chest today because I know there's gonna be Corvette folks listening. Did you ever have a job or is it always car related? Like you forged your own path.

Yeah, I mean, when I was in high school, I worked at a gas station after school for three hours, left there, worked at a supermarket till midnight and then on the weekends, I worked at a U-Haul. But that's why I had a nice car in the parking lot of high school. Sure. Right, I mean, that's the basic foundations of doing anything is making money. So yeah, started with that. When I graduated college, I went to an automotive engineering school, well, a community VOTEC level. Graduated in the top 2% of my class, was getting ready to go to Detroit for engineering. But I was like, you know what, I want to spend more time working in the field. So where I had graduated from, all the dealerships were looking for guys that were on the top of their game. So I went to work for a Pontiac Buick dealership at the time. And that was a great, actually, no, I started a Chevy dealership first. Yeah, I started at North Star Chevrolet first out of college. And that was amazing because I was a young kid. I'm working on brand new Corvettes. You know, I was salary because I was a new guy, so it didn't matter how long it took me to do the work. And I got a really good learning experience there because I took all the classes I could take for free. You're working on new stuff. And they saw that I had a little passion for the performance side of it. So I found myself at like 19 years old working on all the Corvettes, which was kind of cool. And then I left there to go work at a Pontiac Buick dealership, which was really great at that dealership because the guy that ran the dealership was a complete hot rod motorhead, big with the Buick Grand Nationals. And all the guys there were all had hot rods and cars. And that was a real great experience. And that was about the time the cancer thing kind of kicked in, which I only found because I was in a car accident and ended up in the hospital.

You got hit by a semi, right?

I got smacked by a semi that ran a red light in middle winter time and no lights on. It was a mess. So anyway, that was a big derailment that kind of stopped the jobs. And it was probably a year or so after that, I got into the glass industry and I was working for a guy, helping him with his glass company, complete departure from the cars. And that lasted about a year and a half of me realizing the cardinal rule of business of having all the responsibility with no authority, which many years later made sense to me. I was still young then. And I went and started my own business. And that's what carried me for 22 years. I had the glass company and then the car stuff came back kind of like six years into owning the glass company. And that's how Redline started. So I was running two businesses at the same time. So a lot going on. But yeah, that was a... The glass company really taught me a lot about business. We're dealing in a completely different demographic of people, more disciplines needed. You're dealing with much more expensive things, commitments, your team, your people. And I always carried all that stuff in the Redline, which always made it very successful. But yeah, so job-wise, that's kind of... I got into ownership at 19.

Yeah, because then Redline just went on for what, 20, 25 years?

No, still almost 30, 32 years.

Yeah.

Wow. And then I had... That 32-year span was overlapped by the glass company for 22 years.

Sure, yep.

At the same time. Until I finally had enough of that. That's when I had moved to Florida in... I'm going to go to Florida. Oh, 2012.

Okay, sure.

Can't keep track. You know, but you learn a lot from other industries, but business is business.

Sure.

You know?

Who's the... I guess whether it's a person or experience, is there any valuable lesson that you picked up over the years? Like a pivotal moment? Like, you know what? Like, whether it's like a I f***** up sort of situation or I learned from this, like, is there any pivotal moments in your career or tasks or challenges?

I mean, I'm very self-motivated and I'm a plan A, B, C, D person.

Sure.

So when you have that kind of mentality, you just you forge through it. Sure. You don't, you know, you grow up in an environment where you can't get a lot of advice when you're younger, at least for me, people around me. And you're like, you just have to trip and fall and get up, put a bandaid on it and figure out why you tripped.

Yeah.

And keep moving. And so for me, it's been a lot of, you know, they talk about the school of hard knocks, which I think that's just a stupid statement, but the validity behind that is you just got to do your time. I mean, experience is the best teacher that you can ever have. So have there been people that have like inspired me about things? Yeah. I just talked about that today, about John Lingenfelter. Oh, sure.

Yep.

You know, I mean, always wanted to shop like John Lingenfelter, always admired his professionalism, his diligence to figure things out, be on the leading edge of stuff, you know? Steve Jobs was another one, you know? I mean, his epic path of what he's done, the good and bad of technology.

Think you'll ever get a turtleneck or no?

What's that?

Think you'll ever get a turtleneck?

No, I never wore a turtleneck. That's how.

So much for Steve Jobs inspiration.

Yeah. Well, I'm just talking about his vision for, for something and pushing it and seeing that there was a need for something that we didn't know that we needed and pushing through with that. I mean, now you can't live without your iPhone, right?

Yeah. Well, he's rolling over in his grave with this latest update on my f****** iPhone. Okay. Anyways.

Well, it's at his control now, but, you know, just as a person to do that stuff, you know, Jack Welch, the former operations officer for General Electric, another guy. So, I mean, there, there's some heavy duty guys that, you know, I look back on that were like made s*** happen. And I don't want to also lose sight of George Carlin, the comedian.

Classic. I love that guy. Yeah.

Yeah. His ability to just tear something apart, make humor out of it. That's kind of my personality is just everything is just this humor and everything.

Yeah.

So how do you know all these? Because again, everybody that we've had at PRI so far, in one way or another, has been a result of you introducing me to them. Is this just a matter of you just being in industry for a certain period? Was there any collaboration on working with any of these guys? How exactly did you get so well connected and respected in the industry?

Well, I mean, again, it's one of those things that it's like making friends, right? I mean, you could be go bowling and you didn't know Dave, and all of a sudden you see Dave at every bowling event.

Does he go bowling?

Maybe.

I should ask him that later.

I met him over here. Oh, yeah. So all of a sudden you realize that, hey, this guy's pretty cool. So the same way you make friends in the wild, I mean, this industry, it connects you. I mean, it usually starts from a business relationship. You know, I mean, Dave, for example, Dave Stack, I mean, he's been such a pioneer of products and devices and things that, hey, you want to use that stuff, you know, and you finally get on the phone and you realize that you have the same commonality of making things work, figuring things out, you know. We need him, he needs us. You do projects together, you're successful, you share information and you build a relationship.

Sure.

And when you have that and you start adding decades to that, they're your friends.

Sure.

You know, so, I mean, it's crazy to walk around PRI. This is my 17th year of PRI. It's a few years. And for me, it's not really about the product anymore. It's about seeing those friends. You know, it's like, you already know what news coming out. I don't see things that are at a booth that like, wow, that's brand new. You know, because those are your friends.

Yeah.

And they've shared things with you, you know, but seeing everybody and being able to have those face-off conversations. So, yeah, everybody that you've got a chance to interview has been somebody that I felt were people in my past and present and future that had value and have done some great stuff over the years. That's why I thought they'd be good guys to talk to.

Gotcha. Was there ever a point where you almost weren't a GM guy? If you weren't a GM guy, what would you do? Would you be a Subaru guy?

No. No, because, well, I'll tell you one thing that's back in my pedigree. My grandfather was actually very good friends with Zora Dantov.

Oh, really? I remember you telling us that last time.

So that's a pretty powerful guy connection-wise to not be tied to Corvette and Chevrolet.

You're probably going to need to ship your car soon, or know somebody that will. And as someone who used to work in freight logistics, I understand the difficulties of finding reliable transport, especially when trying to make it to rallies, race tracks, or the warehouse to hide your Corvette, because you're going through a messy divorce and when she says everything, she means everything. Anywho, Nick Shearer is the proud owner of SureThing Logistics. Having traveled much of the country with every type of vehicle you can imagine, he's got the experience and reliability that you want to ensure a safe journey for your pride and joy. If you want to find out what it takes to ship your vehicle, go to surethinglogistics.net, fill out the intake form, and be sure to let him know I sent you. Let's get back to the show.

And I got a chance to meet him a couple of times, and that always was the coolest thing ever, to realize that you've met him, talked to him, and there was this relationship. And that kind of always just gave me a little bit of like, I'm a Corvette guy now. I think before I started driving, I remember what turns you on to a particular car. I think I had this little thing for Dodge for a little bit, but this was pre, I'm talking 15 years old, and then somehow it just went right to GM and never stopped. Sure. I've dabbled with Ford stuff over the years, even Dodge stuff back in the Viper when the Viper was hot, but GM's always been the beltway.

So, what's HTR and what's the future now? What are we up to now?

So, I mean, HTR really started quite a few years ago as a project I was doing with a Chevy dealership up in upstate New York. We were building modified Camaros for the dealership, and I needed some kind of like badging or something, so HTR just kind of got used, and then after we finished that program, it just kind of went dormant, and when I decided that I didn't really want to run a shop anymore, just burned out and tired with Redline, I realized that the things I like about the industry are engine building and development, calibration work, and I like going to the track. The greatest thing about all three of those is I don't need any employees. So, that's kind of what inspired that to allow me to, because you get to a certain point in your life, if you don't hone in and enjoy the rest of your life doing what you like, you're just wasting your life away. I just felt after 32 years of the performance stuff and customers, I just didn't want to do it anymore. I wasn't excited. I think we laughed about this. It was like Forrest Gump running down the road when he was trekking across the planet and everybody was following him and all of a sudden, he just stopped and he was like, I'm done. That's kind of where I was at with it. It's given me my own individuality to focus on stuff I like. I got all my own equipment and my dino and that's kind of what that turned into. But I got involved with another shop up in Georgia over the last year and a half. Unfortunately, it didn't work out like I wanted. So for that, I'm full steam back with HTR and just recently just took an opportunity with the guys at FuelTech, which I'm very excited for.

This is about where I'm supposed to say, oh, what's going on with the two badges there?

My double badges here, I guess. Yeah. So.

I mean, it's two sides of the same coin, right?

I guess.

Yeah. What's your role with FuelTech? What are you going to do for them?

FuelTech, what's interesting with the FuelTech is that they really weren't looking. I really wasn't looking. We just started having some conversations. Anderson and I, I was up there on a Saturday. We're trying to get a C8 back up and run in that bad a** C8 that he's got. We just started talking about business and growth and life, and what struggles do you have here at FuelTech. It's all about growth and growth has struggles. We just left it at that. When I decided to go venture off and look at other opportunities, we started talking again about, what do you need? For me, I have a very strong background in management, sales, marketing. I shoot and edit all my own videos. Technically, I'm involved with engines and calibration stuff. And I'm still full on fire. And I think it might have resonated to him that we're trying to get to another level. You know, they're not easy to find people like that. You know, there was a time when companies were looking for people that were 24 years old to hire them. And now these 24 year olds are just lazy with COVID head. Right?

I will say COVID broke me for a little bit.

Yeah.

Until I realized I had to make money again.

I think you should have long hair.

Well, you dug yourself out of it. So good for you. But I'm just saying as an example. And I don't mean that for all 24 year olds out there.

No, no. Listen, I talk to more 24 year olds than you do probably. It is insane how the hybrid work from home era broke everybody. Like honestly, like it's like if there's no work to do, it's like nobody's going to seek out the work. Right? Like, you know, I was like when I used to work at Office Max, right, I went most boring job in the world, by the way. And there's a reason why they're not they got absorbed by Office Depot. But it's like I'll just look for stuff to do. And I just don't think people have that curiosity or productivity mind yet. So I just wanted to touch on that real quick.

And it comes from, again, growing up. And it's funny because Lewis, one of the one of the guys that runs the operation up there, he had De Leon. Yeah, so we were sitting and having a little discussion one day. And he goes, he goes, how old are you? And I told him, and he just gave him a smile. And it's funny because normally, hey, you're the old guy. Not that I'm that old, but I'm older, right?

I'm not worried about you yet.

Right. But that, but what comes with that is experience, right? And you can't buy that. I don't give a s***. You know, you're 24 years old. It's impossible to have the experience that somebody has that's older, that's done stuff. So, you know, that becomes your value.

So you're missing one important part. Sorry to interrupt, but you're missing one important part there. You never stepped out of the game either. You just mentioned at the beginning of this episode, you stepped out for a year or two right now. You're behind like that.

Right.

You never did that either. So you're keeping up to tabs on that as well.

Yeah. I mean, listen, having two businesses, both successful, having business practice experience, all these things, you know, so Anderson was almost like, Oh my God, what do I do with this guy? You know, and really at the end of the day, you know, your most important asset in a business is your people. And I've had this conversation probably 20 times today about that, you know, and when you come across people that you have a belief in, their personality works, you need help growing your brand and stuff, you kind of figure it out. And so we so we did for the short term, I'm going to be involved with FuelTechs Education. OK, they do a pretty good job of, you know, supporting their sales of their controllers to give customers the technical support they need to operate it, teach them more about calibration, teach them on the wiring. And I've got a soft spot for that. So and I connect well with customers. I got a good background on engine management. It doesn't matter if it's FuelTech or MoTech or whatever, it's the fundamentals are there. They wanted to move somebody who's an amazing teacher over there, our condo, over into development, which is a big place that the company needs more pushing on from new product. So me getting involved in this is good for me, it's good for them. I got a feeling it'll evolve into other aspects of the company and whatever pace it needs and whatever they need, I'll be involved with it. But just an amazing bunch of guys, the product is awesome. I'm blown away of their support that they give the customers is just second to none on product. And it's fun being around high powered cars up there. So it's going to work out pretty good.

You let me know when they're ready to sell that DeLorean. I'd like to have that one.

DeLorean is pretty cool. I went to lunch with Anderson a couple, two, three weeks ago and we took the DeLorean.

Yeah.

It's pretty loud. Yeah. I don't know how he drove.

It's loud.

I don't know. And he drove that thing all the way to Las Vegas and back for SEMA.

Oh, s***.

Yeah.

From Atlanta?

Yeah. Yeah.

I can't wait to meet this guy.

Yeah. Anderson's he's a he's a he's a warrior. I mean, he's he loves the stunts and doing that stuff. But that car, she told me the story about that car, which I'm sure he'll bring up with you. But you got that thing. I think he bought the DeLorean for like 15000 bucks with no motor in it. I mean, I don't know where you find DeLoreans these days, but right. He got one.

Even if you give him with a motor in it, it's like having one without a motor. These are not great.

So he bought the car and then he bought a Ferrari engine off of eBay or somewhere. So it's got a V12 engine in it of legitimate Ferrari motor.

Was it V12 or V8? Wasn't it like an F430 engine?

I feel like it's a V8.

Okay. I thought it was.

I'm pretty sure it's a V8. So they're running the FT700, which is the new FuelTech workhorse, and they're running all the direct injection on it. And they just beat the balls off that thing. But yeah, he drove that thing. He's got some pretty good videos of them just cruising across the country with that thing, and it made it all the way out there and back. I think they took it to the desert. He was beating the crap out of it. So what I like what they do is they push the envelope. I mean, there's not anything in that shop that's not now running an FT700 that they're using for development to figure it out. Coyote motors, diesel trucks, they had a small little dragster, junior dragsters are supporting, jet skis. I mean, it's just push the controller to the limit. It's pretty cool.

So how long have you been working with FuelTech product anyway? Because obviously you were working a little bit before you moved to Georgia. What day were you?

So the FuelTech thing is funny because in 2012, a customer of mine in Florida came to me and like, oh, you got to check out this FuelTech stuff. So I went and checked it out. I'm like, I don't get involved with that stuff. I mean, it was on like Pro Mods, right? And it had its niche kind of thing. You know, the relationship with Pro Line. And that just wasn't what I was focused on as Redline Motorsports with, you know, high performance, high powered street cars. And then over the course of probably 10 years, I kept seeing it popping up. They're winning more events. They got more stuff going on. They came out with the FT 600 controller. I still never had a spot for it, you know. When I decided to move up to Georgia to work with that other shop, I knew that they were doing stuff with FuelTech. And I'm like, well, now I'm close to FuelTech. I want to check this stuff out and get more, you know, more in depth to add to my repertoire of controllers. I think I was up there for maybe four or five months. I took one of their five day, four day training classes. They're, you know, they're wiring controller stuff. And I literally left there paying a $9000 bill for the new FT 700, the harnesses, and I bought all the stuff from my, I have a twin turbo C6 car that had a pretty well balanced Holley system installed on it before I left Florida. And I decided if I'm going to get good at this, I'd rather have it on my own car and I'll figure it out on my own. So I didn't really have a lot of experience with it prior. The other shop was that we were just getting deep into it. And obviously, I'm going to have a lot of experience with it now. So, you know, it's when you understand calibration, it's really more about navigating to the software and the nuances with it. It's not something that's overly difficult.

It's all the same once you break it all down to its engine management, right?

You know, that's why I like my get involved with teaching and the training stuff that we're going to do. I mean, you got to go back to the basics, right? I think everybody wants to grab the laptop and be the hero, and it doesn't really work like that. You know, there's very few guys that are heroes.

Yeah, people still do it.

You know, it's an ego driven thing and, you know, you're God and it's, you know, really the basic foundation is often missed for probably 90% of the guys who walk around with a laptop and they get by and they'll make a car go quick one or two times, but they drive like a pile of s*** because of the basics. So, you know, our whole thing with the training at FuelTech is making sure the guys understand those basics and then how that adapts to all the controllers.

Well, as we kind of get towards the end of our time here, is there anything else that you kind of wanted to touch on as well? I know we talked about a number of topics over the last few weeks, but is there anything in particular that you wanted to kind of?

No, I mean, listen to, you know, the PRI's just, I'm glad you came out here and did your thing and you've gotten a chance to meet some of the guys that we've set up. I think they're guys that you'll have relationships with, which is really what PRI's about anyway. Sure. I'm gonna be pretty busy here pretty soon with the FuelTech stuff. I think you'll see a lot more of my involvement. I'm super excited to work with those guys. They're just, you know, I just realized that I have to be excited about a product of what I'm doing or I can't do it. Sure. You know, because it's really not about the job. I don't really need the job. You know, I want the adventure. Of course, you want to work. You want to provide for yourself, but not at the expense of driving yourself into the ground.

It was what episode, FuelTech?

154, I think.

When we were over there, they were super accommodating. And you're right, the environment there is different than other places I've been, because they're just, it was very cool.

Yeah, I mean, listen, any business you go to always has ups and downs and struggles and whatever. And I know there's things over there that are part of the growth that hopefully I can be part of helping for my own experiences. But, you know, I'm excited for the challenge over there. You know, they believe in me. They believe in what I'm capable of doing. And like I told them, I go, just try to let me be me, because it's me that gets it done. If you try to reconfigure me and rewire me, I'm not going to be as good as I could be. So, and I think that, you know, there are enough crazies over there, but they're disciplined, and I like that environment. And there's a lot of room for ground coverage, like with the new controllers and new products coming, that that's exciting. You know, and I do like teaching. I like the education part of it, you know. So, and we got some stuff up our sleeves to grow over this year. So it'll be good.

You think we're going to start to see it on a lot more street car stuff?

So that's a place that you're going to see it a lot more on. I think it's gotten so brand associated with 4,000 horsepower Pro Mods that a guy says, well, I just got a 69 Chevelle with an LS motor in it. That's not for me. And it is for him. So I think that's a big market. I think we're going to find ourselves getting more adapted to. And the big thing is the support. And I can't overemphasize how important that support is. Certain companies that have been out there for a while, you call up there and you get some hillbilly on the phone and he redirects you somewhere and you never get to the end of it. And for the consumer, that's frustrating. So our whole thing with the FT Vision line is that letting people know that the support is there. Our tech guys are awesome. They can answer just about everything. They can log on to help you. And we offer these classes to help you get good at it. You know, because it's, you know, that's the holy grail to it. And it's intimidating. So, yeah, it's gonna be fun trying to like revise that program with them.

Sure.

And allow, like I said, our condo to shift over to another area. So there's gonna be a bunch of moving parts in that company, and I'm all about it.

That's awesome.

Yeah.

Well, Dan, do you want to rip the usual three?

Yeah.

All right. So you've been through this once before, but at the end of every episode, we like to ask our-

We can't pull back from the last episode about the vehicles that I-

Hi, man, we're gonna see how good your memory is, or maybe you got the same taste, or we'll get something completely different. It's fine. So we like to ask our guests to pick three cars. I need a track car, a show car, and a daily driver. You have an unlimited budget.

And the last time you did this, it was a stumping question.

Yeah.

There's probably gonna be the same answers.

Okay.

So show car, I could care two s**** about.

Yep.

Because you buy the car for yourself, not for everybody else, at least in my opinion. The track car, I think we skimmed across that 0-1X is probably something, especially being a GM guy. Yeah.

The other one was what? Daily driver.

A daily driver. And I think I told you last time, I like my Duramax.

Sure. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. My Denali Ultimate. So.

All right. So you got to pick a show car. It can be double duty. It can be something fast that you don't care. People look at it, but it's sort of, what are you thinking?

It'd probably have to be like an older Vette, but built as a Restomod.

OK.

You know, twin turbo mirror image turbos. Cool chassis underneath it. Nice paint job. I got a soft top.

Which generation?

Early, like a 67.

OK.

OK.

Yeah.

I can give it that.

So it's a dying car because the younger guys come out, they forget about all the old stuff.

I got a buddy of mine that has two big block ones sitting in a shed, yeah, just sitting in there.

Sitting in a shed.

And so much so, at least this is how he explained to me, they still have, there was like plastic shims they put underneath the seats, like in between the seat and where bolts of the floor. And this car still has them, at least one of them does, those in it. So, you know, it's never been a part. Sometimes the interior comes out or the carpet or whatever.

Got some barn finds.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

That's pretty cool. So, yeah, those are still my the ones I would pick at. I guess I think we skimmed in this last time. It's hard today to get excited about cars sometimes. You know, I mean, obviously, that 01 is pretty b*****. You know, obviously, a thousand horsepower car. But like, there's so much crap being built today sometimes and all the problems that the manufacturers have. It's kind of hard to fall in love with stuff. So I don't get excited as much as I used to.

Yeah. Where can I really find you?

Well, I mean, most certainly FuelTech, for sure. You'll see more of me through some of their videos and training and the pushing. I know you're probably meeting with Anderson tomorrow.

Yeah, that's scheduled at least.

Yeah. So I'll help. I'm going to go have we're having dinner here at 730. So I'll probably I'll bring it up. Tell them that, you know, sure, hit it hard over here. But he's got some. He's an amazing guy. Great stories. You're going to really appreciate talking to him. I mean, I'm proud of what he's been able to do to start a company, build the product, get it into the United States and plant roots in it. It's just you guys will enjoy the story.

I'm excited.

You know, so FuelTech for sure. My HDR stuff, I'm still doing freelance calibration support. My site is hdrperformance.com. I could be reached at. Not too hard to find these days. So I'll be there.

It's awesome.

Still putting in the fire.

And then find us at Gunner Garage.

Yeah.

Yeah.

As for me, well, first of all, Howard, thank you for coming back on. Appreciate it. This is a good time. And I'm sure we'll see you again here in the near future with all the exciting stuff you got going on.

Yep. 100%.

Dan, thanks for existing. And we'll see you all next time.