A little grey wagon popped up on my radar the other day, presenting the perfect opportunity to write about DKW, Audi, and Auto Union for the first time. Those familiar rings on the hood are paired with the DKW shield and an Auto Union badge, but eventually all would separate. A few short years after this wagon was produced, the Audi rings stood alone for the first time in many decades.
This is Part One of a two-part entry into the Auto Union world of DKW and Audi.
Bright red paint, an interior to hide even the largest cocaine spillage, a targa roof, and sweet deep dish aero alloys all help define the Lamborghini Jalpa as a product of its era.
It’s the one everyone forgets as their minds gravitate to the older Countach or the newer Diablo.
A little while back, we featured a red modified Jaguar XJS that spent some time at a joint Jaguar-TWR shop named JaguarSport and emerged as the XJR-S.
Today we have a look at another possible direction one can go when modifying an XJS. Presenting the Lister-Jaguar Le Mans.
The TTAC Slack chat got to talking about Datsuns this week and, among mentions of the 280ZX Black Gold and 260Z, Datsun vault of knowledge Chris Tonn posted a picture of a late-Seventies 280Z.
It looked utterly terrible with its gigantic bumpers, and I soon became nauseous. But once that went away, I was left with a relevant and overarching question: Which car models were most negatively affected by the giant American bumpers of the 1970s?
The Rare Rides Pristine Vintage Toyota Precedent (RRPVTP) was set a few weeks ago, when we featured a Tercel 4WD Wagon. Then, Matthew Guy happened to present the redesigned 1990 Toyota 4Runner in his Ace of Base segment. This seemed a very timely coincidence, as a few days before we’d received a Rare Rides tip from commenter StephenT: a 4Runner of the first generation, lovingly maintained and for sale in Alabama.
You don’t see them like this very often.
Yesterday, the B&B collectively lit up the Buy/Drive/Burn article regarding $45,000 coupes in praise of the V8-powered 2018 Mustang GT. While munching on all the delicious clicks, I thought about the QOTD published back in December 2017. In that post, I asked you, our dear readers, to rank all seven generations of the Chevrolet Corvette. See where this is going?
Today we want to know where you rank all six generations of the Ford Mustang. Line up your ponies!
Jaguar has announced the D-Type is re-entering production this week, part of a “once-in-a-lifetime project” designed to get 25 examples of the iconic racer back on the streets. While it’s always exciting to see a venerable model resurface after a six-decade absence, this is nothing new for Jaguar. The company did a limited continuation of the E-Type coupe in 2015, the XKSS in 2016, and a singular electric-powered E-Type prototype in 2017.
That means the “new” D-Type is just another entry in Jaguar Classic’s ultra-premium heritage collection. However, this does not mean the continuation cars aren’t any less cool than a penguin perched atop a glacier adjusting his brand-name sunglasses. (Read More…)
We’ve had a couple of Renaults featured on Rare Rides previously. Starting out gently with the Kenosha, Wisconsin-built Alliance GTA, we kicked it up a notch with Renault’s second generation 5 GT Turbo.
But that hatchback was sort of a pretender using the 5 Turbo name. Let’s look at the original one, which was altogether more serious. (Read More…)
Our last Rare Ride was a convertible Cadillac by the name of Allanté. It mixed American power and engineering with a body designed in Italy. Today we take a look at something with the same sort of principles, but with the additional quirkiness of a British backstory.
And it’s much, much rarer than the Cadillac.
Yes, we await your wrath in the comments section. Rather than take time out of our day to satisfy head office’s wish for some holiday gift ideas — a concept you’re no doubt thrilled with — we decided to let someone else do the work. Thankfully, there’s no scented oil in sight (though motor oil and other fluids does make a good gift; I’ve received a 4.4-liter jug under the Christmas tree more than once).
Instead, what we have here is a rare thing. Some pretty good shopping ideas for a classic car lover that doesn’t leave us squirming. Happy head office, happy staff, and hopefully not-too-perturbed reader. You just know there’ll be another one come Boxing Day. We’re already taking bets! – Steph
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To paraphrase former editor of GOOD, Cord Jefferson, we Millennials are cold-blooded killers. Whether it’s due to lack of income or interest, few industries have been unaffected by our non-traditional spending habits. The auto industry has been especially vulnerable; I have attended academic conferences and read countless thinkpieces theorizing ways to motivate Millennials to fall in love with automobiles like their parents did. Finding buyers for all of these future cars will be tricky, but there’s a greater problem: If nobody in my generation cares for cars, who will do the work to design them?
Even more bleak are the prospects for students who are actually passionate about automobiles. One current transportation design student told me it is easier to get picked for NFL draft than it is to get a job designing cars for a major automaker. In the past, two schools dominated auto design education in America: Detroit’s College for Creative Studies and Pasadena’s ArtCenter College of Design. Today, graduates from these prestigious (and expensive) schools have to compete against a global talent pool, all vying for a limited number of internships.
With such overwhelming odds stacked against them, who would even encourage a prospective student to apply? (Read More…)
While there are dealerships that will happily service your vintage automobile, there are reasons a lot of classic cars are wrenched at home or taken to speciality shops. It’s not typically in a service center’s best interest to hunt down rare discontinued parts and train employees on the reassembly of carburetors. But it still happens, especially among premium brands.
Porsche is rather obsessive about its heritage and has extended that to maintenance and repairs at a large number of stores. It isn’t alone, either. Mark Rogers, a 20 Group consultant with the National Automobile Dealers Association, estimates as many as 1,800 U.S. franchised dealerships are willing to service vintage cars. Some are even selling them — putting desirable classics on the showroom floor in the hopes they might garner positive attention. (Read More…)
Detroit in August. Hot streets, hot cars, and no shortage of gawkers lining the sides of Woodward Avenue during the annual Dream Cruise.
All that iron. All that muscle. Wall to wall desirability. Well, not quite. The Dream Cruise remains an inclusive event, meaning every proud owner of something he or she feels is unique and exciting and rare has a chance to let it all hang out.
What follows is our picks of the rear guard. The oddballs. The head-scratchers. The secretly-desirable-but-we-don’t-want-to-admit-it vehicles. Oh, and there’s an extra-special Oldsmobile surprise at the end. (Read More…)
The other weekend, I traveled down to the rolling green acres of Kentucky for the annual Keeneland Concours event. There was a wide selection of vehicles at the show, and I love taking pictures.
Read on if you’re ready for some vintage American luxury.
If you’re a god-tier automotive enthusiast looking for more vintage project cars than you could ever finish before your death (and don’t mind living in rural Canada), then we have good news for you. There’s a five-acre property for sale in picturesque southern British Columbia that’s perfectly suitable for ignoring while you wrench away on more than 340 classic cars that are included in the deal.
For $1.45 million, you can be the proud owner of a restoration shop, a sizable hangar, and enough steel to build five more on a property already zoned for auto salvage.
The land sits alongside B.C.’s White Post Auto Museum and is only a few minutes’ drive from Shuswap Lake — which is rumored to shelter a 25-foot prehistoric monster known as the Shuswaggi. Cryptozoologists believe the beast to be a surviving basilosaurus, meaning there could be an entire family of ancient whales for you to hunt when you aren’t organizing row after row of mid-century automobiles. If you aren’t into cryptid spotting, mentioning old Shuswaggi could also be a good way to haggle down the price. (Read More…)
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