Benny Kirk
1,675 ARTICLES
Would You Buy This Off-Road Modded Porsche Cayenne Over a New Bronco Badlands?
2 Jan 2022, 21:31 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Let's play a fun little game with unreliable and polarizing U.S. Market 4x4s. Why? Because when we saw that a custom lifted Porsche Cayenne Turbo was for sale on Carsandbids.com, we couldn't help but notice it sold for around the same pri...
Elefant Tank Destroyer: Ferdinand Porsche's Epic Fail That Got Its Butt Kicked at Kursk
2 Jan 2022, 20:20 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Folks tend to focus on the successes of Ferdinand Porsche that manifested after his death in 1951. We're talking the 911, the Boxster, and even the electric Taycan, and rightfully so. But don't get it twisted. A not-insignificant port...
Elizabeth Taylor Flew Shotgun With Howard Hughes in This WW2 Twin-Engined Bomber
1 Jan 2022, 20:56 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Some famous airplanes have become notorious because of the missions they've flown. Others, though, are notable because of the people who've called themselves passengers on board. Howard Hughes and Elizabeth Taylor ring a bell? Say hell...
Meet the Seversky P-35"Babybolt," The P-47s Long Forgotten Ancestor
31 Dec 2021, 21:34 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Some fighter planes seem to get all the love. It doesn't matter if it's the P-51, F-22, Spitfire, or a MiG-21. A select handful of all-time greats are household names, and the rest are all but forgotten. This is especially the case wit...
Before Multi Billionaire Status,Steven Udvar-Hazy Made Airplane Models Out of Match Sticks
31 Dec 2021, 21:28 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Suppose you ever wondered what you'd need to do to have a military aerospace museum named in your honor. In that case, we recommend checking out the life story of a Hungarian-American multi-billionaire by the name of Steven F. Udvar-Hazy. Y...
Bell P-39 Airacobra: Mid Engined, But No C8 Corvette With Wings
31 Dec 2021, 21:08 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Do you want to know why people don't build mid-engined airplanes anymore? It's because it took until after the Second World War for folks to realize mid-engined vehicles don't make practical sense unless they have four wheels and...
Up Close and Personal With Enola Gay, the Most Polarizing Airplane of All Time
30 Dec 2021, 21:17 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Suppose you don't think something as mundane as an airplane can elicit a genuine emotional response. In that case, we recommend you make the trip to the Steven Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Virginia, ASAP. Because on display at this offi...
NASA VIEW Headset Defined VR Decades Before Oculus, Probably Can't Play Half-Life: Alyx
30 Dec 2021, 07:00 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / We bet you think your Oculus Quest or HTC Vive is pretty neat. Or that you think it's the epitome of a brand new technology rooted deeply in the 21st century. Well, sorry to say, my friend, you're dead wrong. NASA's been designing an...
This Bizzare Parasite Fighter Hung from a Colossal Navy Airship
30 Dec 2021, 06:19 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / We've all had dumb ideas from time to time. It's a perfectly normal part of human nature. But deciding the best way to deploy military aircraft is from a giant balloon in the sky is a whole other level of bonehead, at least from a modern ...
Spotlight USA: Head to Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center for Planes You Won't See Anywhere Else
29 Dec 2021, 20:11 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / So far on Spotlight USA, we've been to military aircraft museums that are positively tiny, utterly enormous, and now, something in-between. The Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Virginia, is somewhere in the Goldilox zone of the spectr...
Here's Why it Took 30 Years and $10 Billion to Get James Webb Space Telescope Into Space
26 Dec 2021, 04:19 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / It's a Christmas miracle! After 25 years of development hell, the James Webb Space Telescope launched into orbit on Christmas morning. Much to the chagrin of people on Reddit and Twitter who bet money on it failing. But JWST is so much more...
Meet the Dodge Attitude, The Adorable Baby Charger Americans Can't Buy
25 Dec 2021, 10:30 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / The fine folks in Mexico must have more sense than their larger American counterparts. Living proof is in what the people there drive. Suzuki, for example, told the US domestic market to "sod off" over a decade ago. Not so in Mexico. ...
World War I Fighter Planes Were Horrifying Deathtraps, Here's Why
24 Dec 2021, 20:28 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / It's a travesty that the First World War so often gets brushed aside in favor of discussing its ostensibly more present-day impactful second boogaloo. That's especially the case when it comes to the fighter aircraft these pioneer aviators...
Here's What Remains of Lady Be Good, A B-24 Liberator Lost in the Desert for Decades
24 Dec 2021, 20:08 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Don't ever say there's no such thing as an excellent lost and found story anymore. Unlike something like the holy grail or the arc of the covenant, long-lost military planes pop up more frequently than you might think. Don't beli...
Years Before the Sidewinder, This German Missile Was the First of its Kind
24 Dec 2021, 20:05 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / We tend to take air-to-air missiles for granted in military fighter jet games like Ace Combat and War Thunder. It doesn't help that you're given an infinite amount of them in their air arcade modes. Things were much more complicated o...
Ten Years Ago, This Rear Engined Scion iQ Drift Missle Stole the Show at SEMA
23 Dec 2021, 21:51 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / It's hard to believe the famous SEMA custom car expo is now over 50 years in the running. It's been going year-to-year solid for generations, save for a 2020 public health crisis snafu. Ten years ago, this tiny little Scion iQ made people...
Mint Condition CF-104 Starfighter is Ready for Mach Two Shenanigans
23 Dec 2021, 20:00 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / We've slowly been compiling a list of the coolest military aircraft currently for sale on civilian resale websites. Last time, we found a parking lot full of SEPECAT Jaguar attack jets. This time around, we have a screaming metal death trap fl...
2022 Avalon Bids Farewell With Class, Adds SE Hybrid Nightshade Edition
23 Dec 2021, 17:20 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / The Avalon has always been the black sheep of the Toyota lineup. Too big to appeal like a Camry, not fancy enough to be a Lexus, and too mainstream to be a BMW 5 Series competitor. Perhaps that's why they've decided to discontinue the mon...
Meet the Mid-Engined Zimmer Quicksilver, The Nuttiest Thing on a Fiero Chassis
22 Dec 2021, 21:12 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Most custom cars based on the Pontiac Fiero of antiquity usually turn out pretty half-baked. If not completely ridiculous, in most cases. But we have to give credit when someone builds something genuinely interesting using the lowly Fiero as a foun...
Fleet of SEPECAT Jaguar Attack Jets For Sale, Ready to Form Worlds Cheapest Air Force
22 Dec 2021, 20:40 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Unless you're an avid War Thunder player, you probably aren't all that familiar with the SEPECAT Jaguar military attack jet. It was one of the most prolific aircraft in European, Indian and South American Air Forces in the late 20th centu...