Sure, beauty is only skin deep, but what car guy doesn’t get his head turned by a pretty set of wheels? Perhaps the most popular cars ever wrapped in a bowtie were produced in three consecutive model years. Which is the best vintage? (Read More…)

The bygone era of Detroit included many very stylish rides. This fact is one of the big reasons that old iron has such incredible curb appeal in 2012. They don’t make ‘em like they used to – and that includes dangerous style choices.

Don’t kill the messenger on these points, but there were several engineering choices that would have Ralph Nader spinning in his grave-if he was dead. (Read More…)

Buying a new car or truck is one thing – buying a mint condition affordable 1951 Studebaker is an entirely different concept.

The basic idea is the same – money exchanges hands for a vehicle. Beyond that, the game is like comparing mud wrestling to chess so don’t use the same techniques. (Read More…)

We advance into adulthood by degree, and every one of the degrees is a first time that cannot be duplicated or get a do-over, no matter how much we would like to change our personal history. So we romanticize the clumsy moments and brash decisions of youth as we get older and view our teenaged pasts in a nice golden hue. It may shave several layers of reality off the actual events but it makes our younger years more glamorous and heroic in a Paul Simon ‘Kodachrome’ kind of way.

One thing that never changes in my memories is my first car. We should remember our first cars with the same degree of reverence as other really big first time events from our youth. The kind not found on the pages of a collector car website. (Read More…)

These days the big kids on the block are giant pickup trucks and luxury model sport utility vehicles. A bygone era in Detroit featured giant cars with giant engines and painfully small mpg ratings.

The movement toward big and beautiful really caught fire in the late 50s when the Big Three fought a size-really-matters battle with their high end luxury models.

Purists would argue that high end pre-war cars were pioneers in the giant automobile craze, and they would be right. But the big car era became pretty main-stream until the 1973 oil embargo swung the size-matters pendulum the other way. (Read More…)

I am amply qualified to make the call on this topic. I have been a TV addict since I was a preschooler in the late 50s, and I still consider television to be the finest educator in my life, so I believe that I can make a well-informed opinion about the medium.

The fact that my television roots extend into the pre-Kennedy era in the White House means that I can include the 50s TV shows in my range of expertise. However, my choice for 3^rd place has its roots in late 60s TV and takes place on the mean streets of LA, ‘Adam 12’.

The first and only requirement of my contest is the generous use of police cars in the opening credits and ‘Adam 12’ fits the guidelines. The dispatch message is a call to action for the boys to roll, and the 1968 Plymouth Belvedere is the starring set of wheels in the introduction to season one of ‘Adam 12’. (Read More…)

The easy answer to this question is everyone one of them- from the tranny guy, to the engine rebuild guy, to the auto body technician and all the other restoration people along the path to a completed project. But which one of these trades will figure most prominently into the final equation for you? (Read More…)

Most dogs love to go for a ride. Perhaps it taps into their genetic hunting imperative. Maybe it’s a pack thing. One thing’s for sure: a dog would never question why it has to ride in the back of an open pickup truck. Nor, unfortunately, do hundreds of thousands of pickup-driving dog owners. The Utah Humane Society estimates 100,000 dogs die every year from jumping out of moving trucks. At least as many dogs are seriously injured. And the number of chronic ear and aggravated eye injuries is even greater. So stand back fellas: I’m going to pour some hate on owners who think man’s best friend should ride in the back of the truck.

On October 31 2006, Orange County teen Nikki Catsouras had an argument with her father. When Mr. Catsouras left for work, the his daughter “borrowed” his Porsche 911. Approaching a tollbooth, Catsouras rear-ended a Honda at 70 mph. The California Highway Patrol took photographs of the gruesome results. The photos hit the net and went viral. Catsouras sued the police for invasion of privacy. Lost in the shuffle: why was Miss Catsouras–a young, inexperienced driver— legally entitled to drive the Porsche?