You’ve all heard of the Alberta Advantage, but are you familiar with the Alberta Answer?
In 16 years of writing these stories for The Sun, many times I gave local businesses a good plug by mentioning a reliable service they provided.
After the story ran, I would suggest to the owner that now would be a good time to run an ad in The Sun.
With slight variations, the answer was usually “Oh, Good Heavens, No. Why, if all my customers showed up at the same time, I wouldn’t know whether to have a bowel movement or rewind my wrist-mounted timepiece” (I’m paraphrasing).
For a good number (not all) of them/us the latest recession in Alberta has really only meant “less overtime” or “Yay, this year we can finally take a vacation.”
Therefore, I was pleasantly surprised when Bob and Peter at Lakeview Automotive signed a contract to sponsor my stories in the Friday Driving Section of The Calgary Sun (TGIF = Thank Goodness It`s Fred-day).
Lakeview is a busy shop, but even with the day-to day repairs and fleet work, they still carry on Fred Crane`s tradition of doing Classic cars and trucks, but mostly Mustangs. And they are unafraid of a few new customers, even if they were caused by my stories.
After many, many years Fred sold the main part of the business to Bob and Peter. He`s still there as a consultant, and along with Trevor, does the restorations and pumps up the power (and brakes, wiring, etc) on the older stuff.
But now he doesn`t have to look after time sheets, ordering parts, hiring and firing and so on. He has his own hoist in the shop and just whistles while he works.
Both Fred and this writer still belong to the local Mustang Club, but we seldom make it to the meetings…too busy with life.
It has been nice to write what I please without a lot of direction from my sponsor.
They`re too busy to specify, and I don`t need any co-writers. But they did have an invitation for me to see their latest venture. Even better, Peter took me for a spin.
Most people who own a Classic Mustang have a new one, also. When Ford brought out the Retro Mustang, it caught on immediately. Then, they started upping the horsepower.
But in 2015, everything changed. With the introduction of the independent rear end, the whole car was transformed.
The new 5-litre V8 came with all the forged guts to be able to handle serious power. The best way to make said power is to pressurize the incoming air & fuel mixture.
Kenne Bell has long been associated with hot-rodding Buicks, and they engineer their products to perfection before releasing them.
Lakeview has just finished the installation of one of Kenne Bell`s 2.8 litre Twin-Screw superchargers on their white 2015 Mustang. It looks like it came from the factory like this.
First thing I noticed was the chrome pulley rotating behind the left nostril of the Ram Air Cervini hood. This blower has its own cooling system, separate from the car`s cooling system.
With the optional pulley, the engine makes 700 horses (it came with 435). The sound is pure music to the ears.
There are lots of two and three-year-old Mustangs whose warranty is about over now. If you want new life breathed into your ride, this is the way to go. The boys are confident enough in this package that they told me to announce a discount of 25% on labour on all Mustangs for 2017.
If the streets are good and dry, drop by Lakeview and go for a ride. You`ll be convinced in a block or two.
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Fred Nelson is an accredited Calgary auto appraiser who is sometimes mistaken for Boxcar Willy. He has no credentials whatsoever as an Automotive Journalist, and no desire to seek same. Phone him at 403-242-3856 or FredNelsonRacing.com