FF = Forza Ferrari!

On December 10, 2023December 10, 2023 By ChristofferIn News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of Owning1 Comment

One of the funny things with writing a blog on a weekly basis is that you’re sometimes not sure if you’ve covered a car or not. So when I went by a Ferrari dealer close to my home last week and saw a beautiful FF, I was quite certain I had already written about it, given I have fond memories of it from previously, and it is, after all, one of the most capable cars ever built – but was pleasantly surprised to discover that wasn’t the case!

All the more reason then for doing so this week, for a bunch of good rasons: firstly, it’s my all-time favourite among Ferrari GT’s. Secondly, it has a 12-cylinder, naturally aspirated engine of a kind we’ll never see again. And thirdly, whilst still pretty much a bargain, FF’s seemed to have reached a bottom and may slowly be on their way upwards in price, making it quite a rare opportunity from Maranello, given it’s one of the most complete cars Ferrari ever built!

*Pininfarina’s design language is the same as notably for the 458*

Big GT cars with four seats and a big 12-cylinder engine up front (although typically behind the front axle) have a long tradition at Ferrari, although the four seats have usually more been of the 2+2 kind, such as in the 612 Scaglietti that the FF succeeded when it was launched in 2011. Although there’s no way to compete with that name, the FF itself is definitely a more interesting proposition, and not only in terms of backseats.

People tend to have opinions of the negative kind of the wonderful, Pininfarina-designed FF looks, especially from the 3/4 rear angle. Well, anyone not appreciating the sublime shooting brake shape urgently needs a (new) pair of glasses, in my completely objective opinion. But be that as it may, the advantages the shape brings both in rear and booth space are quite astonishing.

The two back seats are of adult size and set slightly higher than the front seats, meaning they feel less cramped. In addition, the luggage space behind them is impressive, and should only two of you travel, the FF is as spacious as a hatchback. But that’s where the similarities end…

*You can fit a lot in here and if you’re four, it’s not too bad either*

Before we get to the main course, i.e. one of the most wonderful engine ever built, let’s look at another FF perk, namely its first four-wheel drive system. You see, not only is the FF Ferrari’s first-ever 4WD car, but it is so thanks to one of the most advanced systems in the market – for good and bad.

When the decision was taken that the FF should drive on all four wheels, Ferrari wasn’t happy with the compromises a traditional 4WD system would give, notably in additional weight moving the weight distribution upwards. Instead, they went ahead and developed their own system in the shape of a simplified, second two-speed gearbox (plus reverse) that sits behind the engine, allowing the latter to be positioned as low in the car as in any other Ferrari.

The system is called 4RM and can in a simplified way be described as the two gears having two clutches that constantly slip, thus meaning the system doesn’t need a differential. It’s only active in gears 1-4, and never with more than around 20% of the car’s 650 Nm of torque. The FF remains fundamentally rear-wheel drive, but thanks to the so called PTU (Power Transfer Unit) which transfers power to the front wheels independently when required, the front wheels can complement the rear ones.

*This is not the road to Verbier, but the FF will definitely take you there!*

There’s no doubt it’s a highly advanced system from a technological point of view, and one of its advantages is the weight saving, given it’s around 50% lighter than other 4WD systems. Unfortunately it’s not all rosy though, as we’ll see later.

So what about that engine? Well, it really is everything you could ever ask for. As a naturally aspirated, 12-cylinder, 6.3 litre piece, it was the biggest engine in the world when the FF was launched, and putting out around 660 hp, it ensures that even at close around 1900 kg, the FF is seriously fast at 3.7 seconds to 100 km/h and a top speed of around 330 km/h. I don’t need to tell you how well the engine sounds, and it’s paired to a seven-speed, DSG box from Gertrag that does an excellent job.

So with all this said, who is the typical FF-buyer? Some Youtuber suggested it’s someone who would otherwise consider an Audi RS6, which I personally think is utter b’shit. I would rather think of three types: the supercar driver with need for more room, the parent with small children and an understanding other half, or the parent with grown-up children, thus only looking at transporting himself and his partner. If it weren’t for the dog cage, I would fit perfectly into that third category…

If you feel like this describes you, there are a few things you should consider before parking a 6.3 litres V12 in your garage. The first is that the FF is a big car. At almost five metres long and two metres wide, it’s only marginally smaller than a Range Rover, meaning it’s not a car for narrow streets or congested cities, but rather for long stretches of motorway travelling. That also means you will manage a few more km before re-fueling, which is something you’ll be doing a lot of, in spite of a 90-litre tank. It all depends on your driving, but 1.7-2 litres per 100 km is what you’re likely to see.

*Intsead of worrying about fuel costs, enjoy the wonderful interior!*

And then there’s the PTU issue. As ingenious as the construction may be, it quickly became a major issue for Ferrari, since the PTU would leak in a large number of cases. At first Ferrari would replace it under warranty, then at cost, meaning more than EUR 25.000, but after that, specialist companies have come up who can renovate the box without replacing it, cutting the cost to EUR 8-10.000. So before buying an FF, make sure the PTU has been replaced or renovated, and otherwise negotiate the price heavily!

Next to that however, the FF rather has less issues than other supercars. It’s quite simply a great and very capable proposition, with the added advantage that it looks to have bottomed out, price-wise. Even if it was built during five years between 2011-2016, only some 2300 cars were produced in total, which is certainly one factor in keeping prices steady. The fact that most PTU’s have been fixed is another, as is of course one of the last true engines out there!

*The glass roof adds a lot of airiness especially to the back seats*

Most FF’s sold as new for EUR 350.000-400.000, depending on equipment, and most can today be had for EUR 100.000 (early cars with around 90.000-100.000 km on the clock) to 150.000, meaning less than half of their value as new. You will typically see higher mileages than for other Feraris, as FF’s tend to be used, which is a good thing! The condition, the PTU and the equipment are more important than the year of production, but if you have the choice, go for a newer car such as to avoid some small issues early cars may have. On that equipment list, the glass roof is a great option if you will regularly carry people in the back, but it’s one that will push up the price.

I could go on, but I think you got it by now. The FF is a car which as a package we will never see again. It’s far sportier than a Bentley Continental GT, and it it’s not only prettier, but also far roomier than the Aston Martin Rapide, which isn’t four-wheel drive. What’s more, it’s successor, the GTC4, is basically a face-lifted version of the same car, for which you’ll still pay around EUR 50-70.000 more, which there really isn’t any reason to do. Thus, if you have the passion and the money (including a budget for things that shouldn’t, but could go wrong), at least this blogger can’t think of a better option. FF is officially short for Ferrari Four, referring to both wheels and seats. I’ll take it to mean Forza Ferrari!

The day has dawned for Porsche bargains!

On October 22, 2023October 22, 2023 By ChristofferIn News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of Owning1 Comment

When I bought my Range Rover, that I recently sold, two years ago, I did so at 1/3 of its price as new back in 2015. Unfortunately though, at the time of selling it, it had lost another 20%. It felt like a pretty good deal at the time of buying, and I attributed the additional value loss to mainly Land Rover’s less than stellar reputation, and also the fact that it had a five litre V8 under the hood, which for reasons I don’t need to name, isn’t really the flavor of the day these days.

As I started looking for possible replacements however, it became clear that something had happened to secondary values in general, not just to old Range Rovers. My 2019 BMW 540i with less than 50.000 km on the clock that I finally replaced the Range with cost me CHF 49.000, from a new price of around CHF 135.000 (yep, it’s well equipped). So again, not far from 1/3 of the original value, in spite of this being a newer and more modern car, with a smaller engine, and from a brand with a better reputation.

*The 540i is in most aspects all most of us will ever need.*..

The sad truth is once more that in spite of fundamentals and common as well as economic sense, anything that is not fully electric is currently falling faster in price than Germany’s power production. The Covid pandemic was a bit of a hick-up in this regard, as it resulted in delivery issues that took a while to work through and that helped keeping prices of used cars artificially higher, but now that we’ve moved on, the trend is clear to see.

Whatever happens to the car market in general though, there’s a group of brands that are never really affected. Ferraris, Lamborghinis an other supercar exotics seem to be wholly uncorrelated to general trends, and bar some exceptions, that doesn’t seem to have changed, more on which below. And of course, anything with 911 in the name coming from Zuffenhausen can only go one way, right?

*…were it not for the attraction of that classic 911 design!*

Actually, no. In a way, this is of course not new. You’ve been able to pick up the 996 at bargain prices (and you still can, even though they’ve clearly bottomed out), but that was typically the only 911 that didn’t hold its value really well. What has become clear lately though, is that the 996 was the starting point for that being the case for subsequent models, rather than the exception to the rule.

The 997 succeeded the 996 in two series, of which the second one is preferrable to the first for quality reasons. A good 997 can today be had for EUR 40-50.000, but perhaps somewhat surprisingly, I don’t think that’s the car you should go for. Not when the far better 991 can be had for not much more.

The 991 was built between 2012 and 2019 on an all new platform, only the third one in the 911 history (the 996 being the second). It also had an all new body that was 7 cm longer than its predecessors but above all, it had a new transaxle construction with the rear wheels having been moved backward to improve the weight distribution. The result is better handling and, a fundamentally better car.

*More buttons than screens, and complete driver-focus*

The base 991 Carrera. came with 350 hp out of the flat six, increased to 400 hp in the stronger Carrera S. Both could be had both as manual and with the double-clutch, seven-speed PDK box. The first series was built until 2016, with the second running thereafter until 2019 having the all new, downsized 3-litre engine used until this day, rather than the original, classic 3.6 litre.

Today, you can find a nice, first series 991 with less than 100.000 km on the clock for around EUR 60.000. Actually, you can even dig out a Carrera S at that price if you search well. This for a modern 911 that mostly cost well above EUR 100.000 as new! Sure, it’s not 1/3 of the new price as my examples above, but it’s around half price and above all, it’s not what we’re used to when it comes to 911’s. Again, a GTS, GT cars or special models will be more expensive. But even a modern, base 911 is a pretty nice proposition, and I would argue a very nice one at this price point!

If most people agree with the above, what comes below will certainly be more contentious. When Porsche introduced the 718 Cayman and Boxster in 2016, as part of the general downsizing trend, they did so with a 2 or 2.5 litre turbocharged four-cylinder, something that was about as appreciated among enthusiasts as the introduction of the water-cooled 996 had been in the 90’s.

*The Cayman is arguably the best-looking, modern Porsche*

The four-cylinder wasn’t well received by the motoring press either, pretty unanimously seeing it as lacking character and producing an awful sound. Be that as it may – the engine certainly sounds different and doesn’t have the character of the flat six. But it’s powerful enough, cheaper to run, and for some people, two extra cylinders isn’t what really matters.

If this sounds like you, you’ll be happy to know that the very good-looking Cayman (that I’d personally prefer over the Boxster) can now be had for about EUR 40.000. And just so we’re clear, the 718 Cayman has been built since 2016, so this is a very recent car.

For me, it would have to be a first series 991 though, since a 911 is after all a 911, and I can’t really stomach the four-cylinder option. I would take my time (which will probably continue to work in buyers’ favour!) and find a nice Carrera S, perhaps pushing the envelope somewhat for the right car. And I’d go for the manual if I had the choice, but the PDK is so good so that it wouldn’t be critical.

*That’s exactly where a (preferably six-cylinder) engine should sit!*

Porsche price stability is thus not what it was, and at least in some, limited cases, this seems to be the case for Italian supercars as well. In a completely different price segment to the above, Ferrari has a bit of an issue around the SF90 Stradale, which unlike other top-of-the-line cars from Maranello isn’t really going anywhere. Literally, since especially in Germany, Ferrari dealers have SF90’s standing around for far too long, and at the time of writing, there’s currently no less than 152 cars for sale on the German market.

The 1000 hp hybrid, built since 2020, cost EUR 450.000 in base price as new, but in reality EUR 50-100.000 more once it hit the streets. Should you want to pick one up today, you’ll have no trouble finding a well-equipped one for less than the base price, probably as low as EUR 400.000 after a bit of negotiation, with insignificant km on the clock.

*You’re more likely to see one at the dealer than on the street…*

That’s not the way Maranello imagines its top-of-the-line cars to go, but my guess is that it has a lot to do with aficionados preferring Ferraris to come with a (preferrably naturally-aspirated) combustion engine rather than a hybrid, even it if has 1000 hp. If that’s true, given where the world is at, there could well be further disappointments ahead for manufacturers, but more good news for secondary buyers!

Japan’s only real pony car!

On October 15, 2023October 15, 2023 By ChristofferIn Classic cars, News, The Thrill of OwningLeave a comment

If there’s one thing that is even less featured on this blog than American cars, it’s those from the land of the rising sun. In the case of the US, this is explained by this not being my area of expertise. In the second, its frankly because of a lack of interest. Having said that, Toyota sells about 10 million cars per year and although it’s the biggest Japanese brand by a margin, it’s certainly not the only one. Surely there must be something to write about in those numbers ?

Honestly, these days I’m not so sure. There is the Nissan GT-R we’ve talked about, and then of course the Honda NSX, which however isn’t even close to reaching the cult status the original NSX has these days. The Lexus LC is a cool-looking thing, but as so many Japanese cars, it feels like it lacks personality. And then there’s of course a bunch of hot hatches, mostly from Honda, but if you’re into those, chances are you’re not reading this blog in the first place.

*The original Celica, here in cool, 70’s GT trim*

Last week however I saw a Japanese car I haven’t seen in a long time and which certainly. has personality. It reminded me of the time when Japanese cars were much less present on Western streets then they are today, meaning the early 70’s (which in turn reminded me of how old I am…). In an effort to change that, and especially to enter the US market, Toyota launched the car I’d just seen, the original Celica, in 1970.

Celica is Latin and means “celestial”, which I guess is the direction Toyota wanted sales to go. And over the coming years, they would be proven correct as the Celica became a very popular sports coupé. However, none of the later series had the charm of the first one, which was of course also Japan’s first try at, if not a muscle car, then at least a cool looking pony car!

*The interior, certainly with some US inspiration*

Back in Tokyo in the late 60’s, Toyota’s engineers realized that the only cars they had that could come in question for exports to the US and Europe had too small cabins for a normal Western male, and too small engines for their liking. If they ever wanted to make it big on the other side of the ocan, especially the US, that would have to change, and the Celica was Toyota’s first try at doing that.

The Celica was based on the Toyota Carina, perhaps not the best reference in the world if you want to build a sports car, and also a car with which the first Celica shared a few too many parts. But when it launched in the US in 1971, it was considerably cheaper than the Ford Mustang, which certainly helped. That said, it also offered far less under the hood, with a paltry, 1.9 litre four-cylinder, delivering a rather poor 90 hp, coupled to a four-speed manual box. Neither a six-, nor an eight-cylinder was anywhere in sight.

*It was certainly no Mustang under the hood…*

The original Celica’s looks are both unique as in the angle of the headlights, to the pony car body, also called “coke bottle styling” bridging the 60’s and 70’s. You can spot quite a few US cars in its lines, which is probably no coincidence. It’s also a car along the ladies’ shoe principle, i.e. compact on the outside but roomy on the inside, and this at a time when the Mustang was gaining both in weight and size, but not in power.

Then of course it was also Japanese, meaning it didn’t break, and actually it was the first Japanese car to be fully assembled on an automatic assembly line. It had an independent suspension and disc brakes all around, and of course it was rear-wheel drive, so that even with only 90 hp, if you knew what you were doing, it was happy to swing its tail. That’s all the Westerners needed to know to start buying Celicas in increasing numbers.

*No one drove the Celica faster than Owe Andersson!*

Swinging its tail in fast corners is also what the Celica started doing on the world’s rally stage, and would continue to do long after the first series. The Swede Owe Andersson was the first to drive a Celica, and he did it so well that he later founded Toyota’s European rally team, something that certainly helped sales especially on the European side of the Atlantic. Of course, later version of the Celica would become both more powerful and all-wheel drive, and make it big on the worlds’ rally scenes.

Going back to the original car however, the first series had a few different trims to choose from, and the engine evolved ever so slightly over the years until the first facelift in 1975, gaining in volume and thereby power, but only to a bit over 100 hp. The Celica was thus never a very powerful car, but as the 70’s moved into the oil crises, that was also not the priority for many buyers. In that sense, it came at the right time, partly explaining its success. The total production number of the first series is uncertain, but over 150.000 cars were sold both in 1972 and 1973, not bad for Toyota’s first try at a sports car in the West!

Yet as so often, there’s a big question mark around where all these cars have gone today. Sure, build quality was certainly better than rust protection even on a Toyota in the 70’s, and a fair number have simply rusted away. Given its low price, quite a few will also have ended up with young buyers better at fitting a rear spoiler than a new engine, or for that matter, at driving. That doesn’t mean they didn’t try though…

That said, around something like EUR 20.000, you can still find one of the original Celicas if you look carefully. And please do look carefully, meaning going for one with as few skirts and as little plastic as possible, as you never know what hides underneath. Ideally the car should also be complete in terms of parts, because finding spare parts for a Celica from the early 70’s could be “very difficult”, as the Japanese would put it. But if you find the right car, what you’ve then bought yourself is arguably both the coolest Japanese car from the 70’s, as well as its only pony car!

Street finds – the Fiat X1/9!

On September 3, 2023September 3, 2023 By ChristofferIn Classic cars, News, The Thrill of OwningLeave a comment

It’s not only the times that are a’changin, as Bob Dylan noted long ago, but last week in central Europe, very much the weather as well. We thus went from several weeks of wonderful summer days and late dinners on the terrace, to 12-13 degrees C and rain. Luckily things are set to improve, however to something more reminiscent of autumn by the looks of it, so I guess I was very lucky to spot a surprisingly exotic street find just before the weather change – the nowadays very rare Fiat X1/9. It’s no doubt a car that is best enjoyed in the summer, but it’s also a great testament to Bob Dylan’s changing times, as we’ll see!

*Angular body, engine right behind the seats and thus perfect weight distribution!*

The Fiat X1/9 is also very much the flashy family member in an otherwise quite boring group of 60’s and 70’s Fiat cars. It’s the successor to the Fiat 850, a four-cylinder, 60’s creation that looked like a bun (although to be fair, the Spider looked better than the coupé…). But it also belongs to the Fiat 128 family where the rights to the four-door sedan were later sold by Fiat to Soviet Lada, and which most therefore associate with old east-west spy movies.

Contrast both of those with the very futuristic X1/9, and it’s not only the model name that stands out. The angular design with the pop-up headlights was a design that would be if not copied, then definitely repeated in many other 70’s cars, such as the Lotus Esprit and of course the Lamborghini Countach. The X1/9 didn’t look anything like the rest of the family, but somewhat surprisingly Bertone had still designed all siblings, proving design houses can have good and less good days.

*Pop-up headlights were of course a must in the 70’s!*

As spectacular as the looks was the fact that the engine was right behind the seats, making the X1/9 Fiat’s first mid-engined car. Unfortunately though, that engine came from the boring part of the family, meaning at the launch in 1972 a 1.3 liter, 4-cylinder with a very modest 75 hp, coupled to a 4-speed manual box. In 1980 that grew to 1.5 liters, another 10 hp and five gears. Of course, at around 900 kg it’s fair to say that they X1/9 was a light-weight, but I think we can safely conclude that it looked about five times faster than it really was. That was of course especially true in the US, where emission regulations made the engines even weaker than in Europe.

It wasn’t only emission standards that became strict on in the 70’s, the same was very much the case for safety, again especially in the US. Fiat had actually built the X1/9 with North America in mind and had thus tried to adapt to the coming rules during the development process. Thanks to the mid-mounted engine and the targa body rather than a full convertible, the X1/9 was one of very few cars had no problem complying with what became the new US safety standards.

This gave Fiat’s faltering US a welcome boost, especially since the small coupé was far cheaper than other, somewhat comparable sports cars. Everything was going swell until the mid-70’s when those safety standards were developed further, forcing Fiat to fit what must be the ugliest bumpers in automobile history to the X1/9. Luckily these were later re-adapted to what can be seen on my street find, which is most probably a US import. Around 165.000 X1/9’s were produced in total between 1972 and 1988, and no less than 3/4 of those were sold in the US.

*The garden hedge – ugliest bumper ever seen!*

As observant readers may have noticed on the first picture, the logo isn’t that of Fiat, but rather of designer Bertone. The reason is to be found back in 1982, when Fiat wanted to discontinue the X1/9 and pull out of the US market, and Bertone therefore bought the rights and continued to produce the car in its name all through 1988. Not much changed on the car in the last years but Bertone would improve both equipment and materials, making the Bertone-branded cars such as the one I saw, the most attractive ones.

So what about the changin’ times? Quite obviously, it’s the concept of a sports car weighing in at less than a ton, making even a small, 1.5 litre engine with less than 100 hp if not plenty, then at least enjoyable enough. This is obviously very far from where we are today and if it sounds like your thing, you may think that with 165.000 cars produced, finding one will be easy. That’s however not the case as very few have survived – estimates talk about less than 1.000 cars in the US. Few are thus up for sale, but those that are tend to come in around EUR 15-20.000 in Europe.

*Cars from 1980 had five speeds and (slightly) more power*

The only question left to solve is then that around the name, because for a company who have typically been naming cars with real names or with numbers relating to the engine size, how did X1/9 come about? It turns out that prototype cars at Fiat were called X1, with the second number indicating the prototype in the order it was developed counting from a certain start date. The small Autobianchi A112 was for example called X1/2 as prototype, and the X1/9 was thus prototype number nine. It was however the only model to retain the prototype name in actual production and why that was, no one seems to know. But who cares? With the wind in your hair and the humming of a four-cylinder right behind you, you’ll have better things to think about!

Bentley Continental GT – now or never!

On August 13, 2023August 13, 2023 By ChristofferIn News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of Owning2 Comments

When I bought my 2015 Range Rover a couple of years ago (for which I’m sad to say, I’m not even close to finding a satisfactory replacement, but thanks to those of you who have helped me trying!), there were a lot of people telling me how it was no doubt the beginning of the end, provided long assessments of everything that would break and how the car would drive me in financial ruin. Of course most of these had never actually owned a Range but of course they knew anyway, especially since the car had around 100.000 km on the clock.

As mentioned previously, there were a number of factors that made me confident with the purchase, most importantly the selling garage’s excellent reputation, the fact that they were willing to extend a two-year full warranty, and that I knew that the car had mostly been used for longer distances. Cars are made for driving, not being parked in a garage, so in many instances a car with more km’s can be preferable to one with less. To that came the fact that the car was extremely well maintained and that the Land Rover V8 is not only a very solid engine that is just about run in at 100.000 km’s, but also quite an economical one. I’m currently averaging at around 12l / 100 km, roughly 8l less than what the self-proclaimed experts told me would be the case. This is of course mostly long distance, but that’s what I bought the car for.

*Best car I ever had – and it hasn’t ruined me in any way!*

Of course I could still have had issues and no, Land Rover certainly doesn’t have the best reputation for reliability. Maybe I’ve just been lucky, just like I was 10 years ago when I owned an Alfa 166 a few years without a single issue. The fact of the matter is however that now, two years after I bought the Range, I’ve forgotten where I put the warranty papers as not a single thing has gone wrong. The lesson there is certainly not that I’m never wrong, but rather that here as well as in other areas, you shouldn’t believe everything you hear, but rather do your own research and form your own opinion.

Against that background, let’s look at a similar case to my Range but one that no doubt will cause severe cardiac issues for every naysayer. Because if the Range would drive one to financial ruin, this machine would probably do so with the rest of your family and neighbors as well. It’s a car that was actually suggested as replacement to me as alternative to the Range, but that unfortunately doesn’t really fit the bill. Because in terms of bang for the buck, there can’t be much that beats an early version of the by now classic Bentley Continental GT.

*The first series launched in 2003 – slightly heavy, but an elegant design*

11 years ago, in the early days of this blog when it was still in Swedish, my co-blogger Sven drove a Continental GT after its first face-lift (more on that below), and provided a rather sober assessment of the car not being for him (he’s a fan of Maranello machines) and also not really being worth the money as new. That I won’t argue with, but now 11 years have passed since the face-lift and 20 since the new Continental GT was premiered, so that second point has certainly changed. This makes it worth revisiting the case, also since I had the opportunity to drive an early Continental GT last week.

For memory, Volkswagen bought Bentley in 1998 and five years later, launched the Continental GT as the first Bentley ever to be produced not by hand by elderly men in coats up in Crewe, but rather by modern production techniques to a budget. Those last words are important as they certainly contributed to putting quite a few Audi parts in the car as part of the process, which made the true enthusiasts reject the Continental right away as some kind of pimped Audi not worthy of the brand.

*The permanent 4WD ensures as much fun on snow as on road!*

I think a more sober assessment makes it pretty clear that without the VW take-over and the launch of the Continental GT, the Bentley brand would be long gone. Instead there are today 4000 car builders working in Crewe, compared to around 1500 at the time of the take-over. It’s also worth noting that with every new series of the Continental, it has become less and less Audi – at least in the visible parts. Here we’ll focus on the two first series, i.e. not including the current one launched in 2018, as these cars are still quite pricey.

To me, the Contintental has always been a good-looking and timeless creation. Seen from the side it’s a testament to many classic Bentleys, and the front is just about aggressive enough. Its least good angle is certainly the rear which lacks a bit of finesse, something that didn’t really change until the current series. The first version was produced until 2011 and was only available with the W12 engine that VW had previously featured in the Phaeton (another car that can be had for not much these days but that contrary to the Bentley, there is no reason to get…). It put out 560 hp with much, but not all the refinement of a more traditional V12.

*Yes, there are some Audi switches, but this is still a beautiful interior!*

All cars had four-wheel drive and were also available as convertible, and the Speed that appeared in 2007 along with the Supersports from 2009 deserve a special mention. The former saw power increased to 608 hp and rode lower on larger wheels, the latter had performance pushed even further to 630 hp, which along with a 110 kg weight reduction made it the fastest Bentley ever at the time, with a top speed of 330 km/h.

The Series II, launched in 2012, introduced the double-turbo, four-liter V8 as alternative to the W12. At 500 hp it was less powerful but the car was also lighter and still capable of a top speed of over 300 km/h. Cosmetic changes on the outside were limited but the inside showed an improved cabin less reminiscent of Ingolstadt. Above all though, the ride, handling and steering were clearly improved over the first version. As with the first series, various special editions including Speed and Supersports were launched through the years.

*The Supersports is a bit more bad boy, notably sitting lower on bigger wheels*

I drove a W12 from 2008 this week and driving-wise, I can only concur with what my friend Sven observed 11 years ago, which basically boils down to the fact that you can’t hide 2.3 tons. That means the Continental in all versions, possibly with the exception of the Supersports, is far more a GT than a true sports car. That’s however something it does very well. Comfort is opulent, the ride is sublime, isolation from the outer world almost total.

Of course anything in terms of infotainment feels very old, but you don’t really think about it and if you do, there are after-market options for most things. Leather and wood however both age pretty well, and that’s what dominates the interior. This is a car that will transport two in utter comfort on longer journeys, be it in summer or winter, and that will allow you to stretch your legs on more or less frequent fuel stops, depending on which engine you opt for…

*The rear is the least flattering angle of the first two series*

An early, well-maintained first series Continental GT with decent mileage will today be yours from EUR 25-30.000 in Europe, a second series is around twice that, whether with the V8 or the W12. For the first series, that means around 10-20% of the car’s price as new. Of course a Continental in any version, but especially as W12, will never be a cheap car to run, and buying one should always come with a budget for running costs and unforseen repairs. If you buy a first series and set EUR 10-20.000 aside for unforseen repairs however, you will sleep well at night knowing you’ll be able to cover most things that can come up.

The main reason that a Continental GT is an easier purchase than with the Ferraris and Porsches we love, is that most of these have previously been owned by elderly people with money who don’t know what a track day is, read the manual from the first to the last page, never rev the car beyond 2000 rpm and follow the service intervals meticulously. And it that wasn’t enough, I would also think that the fact that Audi bought Bentley five years before the Continental was launched bodes pretty well. This certainly made the modern Continental more reliable than its predecessor, that cost EUR 120.000 more as new, 12 years earlier!

*The original Continental was big, heavy, handbuilt and expensive!*

Cars like the Continental and engines like the W12, or even the double-turbo V8, belong to the past as we all know, and will never be built again. It’s very difficult to know which way the car world will evolve in the coming years but at this price point, if you’re into big, opulent GT cars, then a Continental of the first or second series is a wonderful proposition. It may come at a bargain price but will always look like a million bucks, but if you do your research carefully, chances are it doesn’t require you to be a millionaire. All in all, that’s not a bad proposition, and this is clearly a case of now or never!

The UK’s most successful sports car!

On July 9, 2023July 9, 2023 By ChristofferIn Classic cars, News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of Owning1 Comment

As we’re still in the first half of summer in the Northern hemisphere, the theme of a nice roadster continues to feel very timely. A few months ago I wrote about the legendary Triumph Spitfire, perhaps the easiest and cheapest entry into the British roadster tradition, and more recently we also looked at the forgotten Porsche 914, a German take on the roadster concept. This week we’re back in the UK for a slightly more robust alternative to the Spitfire that remains very reasonable budget-wise – the MGB. And you may be surprised to hear that the car we’re all somehow familiar with ranks as the UK’s most successful sports car ever!

It’s also very timely to look at the MGB right now, not just because we’re in the summer, but also since not only is it 100 years since the Morris Garages (MG) brand was founded, it’s also 60 years since the MGB was premiered. Originally however, MG wasn’t a proper car brand but rather a side kick to the regular garage business belonging to a certain William Morris in Abingdon, UK. In the side business, Morris and his colleagues would take boring Morris Oxford cars, work on them and hereby especially the chassis frame and transform them into if not sports, then at least sportier cars that they would then take to the race track on weekends.

*The guys around the car are probably the ones that built it the week before!*

In the late 20’s the MG brand separated from Morris Garages and start to make a name for itself in on the racing circuit. It hereby also created a bit of a mystical reputation, often being talked about as a car company with a soul that was almost palpable when you entered the factory. Be that as it may, it was certainly a car company with guts, as the MG guys choose to race the MGB’s predecessor, the MGA, in prototype form at Le Mans in 1955, managing to finish the race with two cars. They continued to do well in 1956, the first official year of production of the MGA, notably in the Mille Miglia.

Fast forward to the early 60’s and MG had become part of BMC, later to become the British Leyland group, as was notably Triumph. The time was rife for a replacement to the MGA had come but before that, as a side project, MG built a machine called the EX-181 that looked like a soap and was powered by a 300 hp, supercharged engine. Driven by Phil Hill, the car would set a speed record of 254 Mph (408 km/h) on the Salt Flats in Utah, thereby also doing wonders for MG’s racing reputation. When MG introduced the new MGB roadster in 1963 as the MGA’s replacement, they actually claimed the design was derived directly from the EX-181, which is perhaps something that doesn’t exactly jump to the eye…

*Phil Hill was a brave man, driving the EX-181 at more than 400 km/h in Utah…*

MG’s original plan was to use the MGA chassis for the MGB as well, but in the development process it was discovered that it didn’t leave enough designer freedom to create the wider but still low car they wanted the MGB to be. MG therefore re-thought the whole project and in the end, built the MGB as a monocoque rather than the traditional body-on-frame construction. One of the advantages of the new construction was enough strength to handle considerably bigger engines but as it turned out, MG would only make use of that in the MGB GT V8, more on that later.

The design of the new car was a purely internal affair, with no fancy Italian design houses involved. Basically the head of design brought his idea to the model maker, who in turn built a small model for approval by the CEO, after which he would do a full-scale model. The development would then start, leading to the finished car a few months later. Not many committees or Zoom meetings there! Even if the MGB didn’t really look much like the EX-181 record setter, most would agree that it’s a nice design, very roadster-specific and relatively timeless. It was also hugely successful notably in the US, to which MG started shipping around 40.000 cars per year in the mid-60’s, as compared to around 5.000 for the UK market.

*A timeless look, more modern than for example a Triumph TR4*

A selling point for the MGB was clearly the superior room both for people and their luggage that the relatively wide car body offered. Another was no doubt its relative simplicity. The power unit in the form of an 1800 cc, four-cylinder, transersal BMC engine was perhaps not very exciting as it was essentially a larger version of the engine used in the MGA. The 95 hp it developed were however sufficient, but when emission regulations became stricter in the crucial US market, the power number started dropping to just below 70 hp for MGB’s from the mid-70’s. The engine was coupled to a four-speed gearbox with overdrive available as an option, and disc brakes in the front were combined with drum brakes in the back.

To increase the appeal of the car, MG were set on offering the MGB also with a roof, but the MG guys didn’t manage to find a solution that looked attractive, so in the end the had to turn to, you guessed it, one of those fancy Italian design houses. Pininfarina created the MGB GT that was shown to the world three years after the roadster, in 1965. It was also the GT that in 1973 finally saw MG making use of that larger engine bay, by fitting the Rover V8 engine used notably in the Range Rover Classic in it.

*The roadster is a great looking car, perfectly usable as a practical daily driver*

The V8 may have been bigger but given it was an aluminium construction, it actually weighed less than the 1800 cc four-cylinder, meaning not many modifications were required. There were however various other problems, leading to very few V8’s being produced. On one hand MG could never get enough engines from Rover to build as many cars there was demand for, and on the other that demand quickly vanished with rising oil prices in the 70’s. In the end, the V8 would be taken out of production only two years later, in 1975, after no more than some 2.600 GT V8’s had been built.

Given the increasingly tough regulations not only on emissions but also on safety standards in the US, the 70’s weren’t kind to the MGB. I’ve mentioned the dropping engine power of the 1800 cc unit above, and added to that were some pretty horrific, moulded rubber bumbers that MG had to fit to the cars from 1975 onwards, replacing the stylish chrome model that had been used until then.

*The late 70’s wasn’t a great design period for the MGB – either…*

There were other, corporate problems as well, linked to a generally cash-strapped British car industry and other British Leyland brands such as Triumph that were given higher priority to develop the futuristic TR7, rather than trying to modernize the ageing MGB. And so the last MGB rolled out of the factory in Abingdon in 1980, and the factory itself closing its doors later the same year.

Between 1963 and 1980, no less than 387.000 MGB’s were produced, a record for any UK sports car. To that should also be added 125.000 GT’s, a pretty remarkable number given the far shorter production run, but only 2600 MGB GT V8’s. This is of course reflected in today’s prices with the V8’s being most sought-after. They start at roughly twice the USD/EUR 20.000 the four-cylinder roadster or coupé trade at in good condition. At that level it’s difficult to go wrong, as the MGB is also a simple and thereby economical car. Get a nice roadster version with chrome bumpers, and as a US MG commercial at the time would say: “at no extra cost, MG gives you the sun!”.

Shelby’s spitting AC Cobra!

On June 11, 2023June 11, 2023 By ChristofferIn News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of OwningLeave a comment

Did you know that the cobra is not one snake, but rather a family of snakes? In other words, that there are far more variations of this frightful animal than one? I didn’t, at least until I started to write this. There are at least six species that are usually included when you talk about cobras, notably the king cobra, which according to the definition of a “true” cobra would otherwise not count as one. That definition is limited to the Naja species, itself containing around 20 different types that you’ll find across large parts of Asia and some parts of Africa.

*Taking another path is highly advisable*

What these all have in common is being 1.5 to 3m long, able to raise around a quarter of their body and flatten their neck to appear larger than they are, and spit. The mechanism of that, which is apparently more a squirt than a spit, goes beyond this post, but the venom they deliver in this and other ways attacks the nervous system and can be deadly. As you’ve probably gathered by now, snakes is not one of my favorite animals. I like cars though, and I certainly don’t mind the one carrying the cobra name, as AC Cobra or Shelby Cobra. Without the risk of being spat at, let’s have a closer look at it this week!

To do so, we need to go back to our old friends at Bristol that I wrote about in a post earlier this year. That’s where it starts as you may remember that in the 50’s, the aeroplanec ompany that was to become Bristol was set on building a light, two-seated sports car, which they also did. It was referred to as the AC Ace and was powered by a two-litre, straight six derived from BMW and delivering around 130 hp, tuned to a bit more for racing purposes. Of course the car was light and given it also had quite an advanced independent suspension, it did really well in different European races at the time, although it didn’t win any major ones.

The Ace wasn’t just good, it was good-looking as well!

On the other side of the pond, Carroll Shelby’s career as a racing driver was coming to an end and his next one as constructor was about to start. Shelby was a living legend already then as one of the most successful racing drivers of the time, winning most of what there was to win at the time over in America. Now in the early 60’s he was starting off as a constructor and was looking for what he called “a winning bet”. It was over at Bristol in the UK that he found it. The Brits certainly didn’t mind because by this time, they had lost the rights to use the engine the Ace had been powered by and this at least created some demand for a car, the future of which was otherwise uncertain.

*Carroll Shelby, one of the all-time greats!*

Shelby had seen the success of the Ace in Europe and now came up with the very American idea of trying to squeeze a V8 into it. The car already then looked like a slimmed down version of what the AC Cobra would later become, but just to get the context right, let’s remember that at 3.6 metres and 850 kg weight, this wasn’t really a car for which a V8 had ever been intended. AC did however send over an empty car to America where Shelby was just starting his relationship with Ford that would over the years develop into a very close one. Ford thus delivered the engines that Shelby squeezed into the car that he now started calling the Cobra.

The first V8 was a 260 c.i. (4.3l), which was quickly followed by a 289 c.i. (4.7l) second one. Shelby still didn’t feel the Cobra was fast enough though, and of course this was the time when in the US, there was really no substitute for cubic inches. In 1964 therefore, with what must have been a mighty shoe horn, Shelby finally stuffed the 427 c.i. (7l) legendary Ford V8 big-block into the Ace engine bay that had been, conceived for a 2-litre six-cylinder. In order to do so, he basically had to rebuild the whole car. The body was stretched, transmission and suspension were altered and moved but by 1964, the job was done. The “true” 427 AC Cobra was born, with only the windshield and trunk lid being identical to earlier cars.

It’s not fully clear how much power the 427 Cobra had, but Shelby believed it was around 550 hp with about 700 Nm of torque. For a rear-wheel drive car weighing in at just over 1100 kg, this meant a 0-100 km/h time of below five seconds, unseen at the time. Like the animal from which it took its name, the 427 Cobra could certainly both bite and kill you if you weren’t attentive, but much as animals such as the cobra fascinate us, the car certainly had the same effect on Shelby’s clients. Even if demand was healthy enough as it was, Shelby would use a few tricks to spur it further, such as taping a $100 bill to the dashboard and tell his passenger they could have it if they could grab it. Given he pushed the pedal to the metal at the same time, rumor has it that this marketing trick never even cost him $100…

*Muscular yes – but not as pure as the original Ace*

Unfortunately the AC Cobra would only be built until 1968 when AC stopped producing the base body that was still required to build the car. In total only 998 cars were built between 1962-1968, about a third of these were 427 Cobras, and only 250 of these were street cars. Best estimates have it that around 100 of those are left today. You’re free to guess what those trade for…

The success of the Cobra was however such that already in the 70’s, different firms started to produce replica’s of the Cobra, something that goes on to this day. With time and improving technology, many of these are better cars than the original Cobra, which of course is completely irrelevant. There is no substitute for the original (or, to be honest, for cubic inches…), and if you push it hard enough, I’m quite sure the AC Cobra can also raise at least a quarter of its body as it takes off towards the horizon!

Buying right, and at the right price!

On June 4, 2023June 4, 2023 By ChristofferIn Classic cars, News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of Owning1 Comment

What do you remember about March 2022? Russia had invaded Ukraine only a week earlier, there was a coup d’état in Burkina Faso (yes, I had to look that one up…), and then the Fed started the current rate raising cycle, thereby ending a decade of zero interest rates or if you will, free money. As we know now a year later, the subsequent increases to the current level were the quickest in history, and it’s not clear if we’re done yet. They’ve happened against a background of rising inflation after as said, a decade of zero rates and money printing, by the same central banks who are now trying to contain the inflationary pressures that resulted from it.

When you don’t get any return on your savings, you try to do so by putting your money elsewhere. And so over the last decade, pretty much every type of investment has had a good run that at least partly came to an end a bit more than a year ago. One of the best areas to put your money in this period has been various types of collectible cars – oldtimers, race cars, and then with time, pretty much every car beyond a certain age, never mind really how collectible it really is. That’s what we’ll talk about today, as everything that is priced as a collectible certainly isn’t one, which is something the new market environment will no doubt show us. I have however recently seen some excesses in the market that are frankly just ridiculous and that show that a new balance hasn’t been found yet. Being sensible in your planned car purchase is therefore more important than ever!

*Pebble beach and other car shows have been spectacular in the last years!*

Back in 2020 I wrote a post you can find here, where I went into some aspects to consider when buying your dream car. I also emphasized precisely that, i.e. that you should really buy the car because of your love and desire for it – not because you think it will increase in value. Although many cars have continued to do so, that’s worth remembering. Firstly, whether a car will rise in value or not is never a given (except perhaps for a small number of hyper-exclusive and very limited series). Secondly maintenance, storing, insurance and running any car, but especially collectibles, eats up much of the potential value increase, so at the end of the day there often isn’t much left. then again, that’s perfectly alright as long as your priority has been to enjoy the time spent behind the wheel!

You may well think this is too negative, and that value appreciation on, say a manual Porsche 911 of certain series is all but guaranteed since they haven’t yet reached the stratosphere (well, most have, but not all), and they’re becoming fewer and further between. That’s true, but then again so is a Porsche 944 which still hasn’t gone anywhere and probably never will – although its sibling (and less good looking) successor, the 968 has. I’m certainly not claiming there aren’t cars that will rise in value going forward, I’m just saying that you shouldn’t bet on it, and it’s not what should guide your purchase.

*Today worth twice as much as its better-looking predecessor…*

That said, there are a few clues to help you select a car that is both a joy to drive and can be expected to hold its value relatively well. A manual gearbox is certainly one such thing, if you look for example at a 911, a Ferrari F355, and a bunch of other cars that are 10-20 years old. Production numbers is another, as special series or limited production runs tend to hold values better. The right engine will help, as will provenance, given a famous previous owner tends to do wonders for the price. I find this last one a bit strange since it’s not like it says “this used to belong to (select your favorite famous person)” on the car, but I guess there are things that can’t fully be explained by logic…

A case in point is a classic dealer in the Zurich area who has a Porsche 928 GTS standing in the showroom. With 90.000 km on the clock the mileage is ok but not exceptional, as is the general condition of the car – very good, but not mint. The GTS was the last iteration of the 928 produced in the early 90’s. At 350 hp it had the highest power output of all 928 series and is for many the most attractive in the range, provided however that it’s a manual, which this wasn’t. The dealer had tried to compensate this with a big sign saying “Prominent Swiss previous owner”.

This country is great in many things, but it’s not like we’re lining up famous people. The only two can think of who would motivate paying more for a car according to this logic would be Roger Federer, who’s however tied to Mercedes-Benz through sponsor contracts and, well, Tina Turner, who spent the last 20 years of her life in a magnificent villa on the shores of the Zurich lake. She obviously just passed away, may she rest in peace, but before that was mostly seen in a green Bentley. The “famous previous owner” is thus most probably no one known outside of the local Zurich circle. And it doesn’t warrant you paying – hold on to your chair – around USD 110.000 for this particular 928, especially when a far more desirable manual GTS can be had in similar condition for USD 20-30.000 less. Which is still double what they cost 2-3 years ago.

Another even stranger category is that of cars that someone bought a number of years ago and never drove, so that they’re now sold with very low mileage, most often in a condition close to new – at least on the outside. Obviously, if you’ve stored a car away for 30-40 years, it’s really important to know how it’s been stored, and also if it’s been maintained throughout. Because a car that is left standing for a number of years without no one attending to it, is not a car you want. Then the question is of course also whether there’s anything attractive with the car apart from the fact that no one’s driven it, or if it’s just an old car?

An example of this is a VW Golf GL Diesel from 1983, advertised by one of the most well-known classic car dealers in the region. Someone bought this 50 hp monster 40 years ago, sealed it, and put it away, so that it only has 2.000 km on the clock. I guess the 50 hp were not that exciting even back then… It’s most probably been stored correctly and maintained throughout, but who on earth would pay the asking price of around USD 28.000 for a car that wasn’t even desirable when it was new? I can think of a large number of far better, more modern and certainly more fun small cars for that money, and I’d be really surprised if this example doesn’t sit with the dealer for a long time. As if this wasn’t enough, the 70’s shade of brown really isn’t a particular desirable color,

It’s not all bad though, because the gems are still out there, you just need to be patient and look out for them. Coming back to 911’s, and more specifically one of my favorites, the 997 Turbo, I’ve spotted a manual 2009 car in silver with a red leather interior and all the carbon packs you could have at the time, and around 85.000 km on the clock. It’s in mint condition and has had one previous owner, the F1 driver Jarno Trulli (who raced between 1997-2011 and had the good taste of scoring his only win in Monaco in 2004).

*I need to find a good reason to put my money here…*

Whether he’s famous or not is not the point, it’s more that I would assume that an F1 driver for one drives the car correctly (albeit fast…) and also knows, and has the money, to maintain it properly. Then again if that isn’t the case, I wouldn’t hesitate going for a car where it is, no matter who the previous owner is. At an ask price of around USD 85.000, the car is only slightly more expensive than comparable cars, but that is probably warranted by its history.

Desirable? To me, absolutely, I’ve had my eye on the 997 Turbo for a while and actually find the red interior pretty cool, although it’s not for everyone. Will it increase in value? Maybe, then again it certainly won’t be free to run. Does it make my “car buying pulse” increase? Definitely – at the thought of driving it that is, not speculating about its potential future value increase. If you ask me, that’s exactly as it should be. Now I just need to find a half-rational argument for it…

The forgotten (and underrated?) Porsche 914!

On May 21, 2023May 21, 2023 By ChristofferIn News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of Owning3 Comments

It may look like an improbable combination but as many will know, there have always been strong historical ties between Volkswagen (VW) and Porsche. This goes all the back to the birth of VW since the company was founded by Ferdinand Porsche, and Ferdinand Piech, who later became the company’s very prominent president and who is arguably the man behind much of VW’s modern success, was Piëch’s grandson.

Most of us will also feel that we know the recipe for success of a classic Porsche. Six rather than four cylinders and the engine in the back rather than the front. It also goes without saying that the car should be engineered by Porsche rather than any other suspect brand, such as… Audi. And yet, a car that at least partly followed that brief not only wasn’t much of a success, but is today largely forgotten. I’m of course talking about the Porsche 914 – how long has it been since you last saw one?

*The 914, most often in typical 70’s colors, was quite a neat car*

The recipe for a successful Porsche is actually something the company had deviated from already in the 60’s when it offered the 912 as a cheaper version of the 911. The untrained observer wouldn’t spot much of a difference between the two, but the crucial point was of course the engine in the back, where the 912 had a four-pot derived from the 356, making it a much cheaper entry model. However, by the late 60’s it was getting old and needed a replacement.

Over in Wolfsburg, home of Volkswagen, the situation was a bit the same, albeit with a different car. The VW Karmann Ghia had been built since the mid-50’s, had never been very sporty, and was starting to get old. it would continue to be built until the mid-70’s, thus overlapping with the 914 during the whole lifetime of the latter, but VW saw the new car as a way to get a sportier, entry-level car in its line-up, and also one that would (at least partially) carry the Porsche badge.

*Many interiors are in leather or vinyl, but the cloth definitely brings more 70’s feeling!*

The two companies thus entered into a joint venture aiming at combining Porsche’s engineering prowess with VW’s mass production capabilities. The project was led by none other than Ferdinand Piëch who at the time was the head of development at Porsche, and the VW-Porsche 914 was introduced in 1969 under a new distribution company founded jointly by the two brands. When it was presented to the world at the Frankfurt auto show the same year, it was shown both on Porsche’s and VW’s stand, and the decision was taken to brand it VW-Porsche in Europe, but only Porsche in the US. With regards to Europe, that probably ranks near the top of the list of great marketing mistakes…

The initial 914, referred to as 914/4, was powered by a 1.7 litre, four-cylinder engine developing a whopping 80 hp and sitting behind the seats ahead of the rear-axle, making it a mid-engined car. During the production time the volume of the four-cylinder increased to two litres, and the power up to 100 hp. Certainly not much by modern standards, but the favorable weight distribution and the low weight just over 900 kg meant that the 914 achieved higher cornering speeds than its big brother, the 911!

*The favorable weight distribution meant that the 914 did well in GT racing*

In 1970 the line-up would be complemented by the 914-6, featuring the 110 hp six-cylinder engine from the 911 and also taking over notably breaks and wheels from the latter. The simpler 914/4 had these and other parts coming from the VW 411, a not very exciting family car. Irrespective of engine, all 914’s came with a five-speed manual gearbox, the 914-6 could in addition be had with a so called Sportomatic four-speed automatic, with hydraulic gear changes and the clutch replaced by a torque-converter.

On paper the 914 had a lot going for it. Its looks were certainly not offensive and rather modern for the time. The weight distribution was better than that of the 911, as was the space, with both a front and a back booth behind the engine. The car was of course also a Targa with a detachable roof, opening the passenger space to the elements. The 914-4 was relatively cheap and as if that wasn’t enough, in 1970 it was also voted “Import car of the year” in the US – arguably quite a small category back then…

*Once removed, the roof could be stored in the rear luggage compartment*

And yet, the 914 never managed to enchant neither the masses in general, nor the Porsche crowd in particular. Porsche enthusiasts at the time would of course not accept anything but the original 911, an early version of the skepticism that would later befall the 914’s replacement, the 924. The marketing strategy VW and Porsche had gone for in Europe, notably deciding to call the car VW-Porsche rather than only Porsche like in the US, didn’t help either.

That said the 914 didn’t really see real success in the US either, with quality and rust issues on early cars not helping. To that came competition, notably in the form of the Chevy Corvette, as well as the relatively hefty price tag of the 914-6, far from the entry model price tag of the simpler 914-4. Porsche would do what they could when it was already too late, notably publishing press releases specifically pointing out that the car wasn’t supposed to be called the “Volksporsche” (People’s Porsche), which of course had the opposite effet and became the 914’s nickname that lives on until today.

*Given how cheap it is, maybe you can afford the plane too?*

Still, Porsche built a total of 119.000 914’s between 1969-1975, so to call the model a coplete failure would be exaggerated. Unfortunately, what wasn’t exaggerated were the corrosion issues, which combined with the fact that the 914 never really gained in value and thus often came in the hands of owners not really taking care of them, means that not many of the over 100′ cars are left today. Then again as said, for the ones that remain, prices haven’t evolved anywhere near those of 911’s of the same period!

In Europe the fun starts around EUR 25-30.000 for good cars, with four-cylinder cars easier to find and cheaper both to buy and maintain than the six-cylinder version. In an “everything else equal” world you’d of course choose the latter, but given everything isn’t equal most of the time, I would claim you get almost as much of the 914 feeling with the four-cylinder, and finding a car in good condition is therefore more important than the engine. You’ve probably never had a poster of the 914 on your bedroom wall, but if you’re looking for a relatively cheap entry oldtimer carrying the Porsche badge, the 914 is certainly not a bad place to start!

GTO – three-letter magic!

On April 30, 2023April 30, 2023 By ChristofferIn Classic cars, News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of OwningLeave a comment

I spent a few weeks in Singapore some years ago and notably had the opportunity to catch up with a local reader of this very blog, as crazy about cars as I am. He was kind enough to take me to one of the leading, local supercar dealers on what felt like the outskirts of the city, and what he had on offer was very impressive indeed.

The issue is however that if you think speed limits are tough in Europe, that’s nothing compared to Singapore. In addition, the number of cars in the small country is regulated, so before buying a car, you need to buy a license giving you the right to buy one. The number of licenses is of course limited and the price for one varies a bit but was around $100.000 in 2022, and that’s before you’ve spent a dime on the car itself.

*It’s not far from Marina Bay to Malaysia…*

That said, if you have the money to buy a supercar, spending another 100 grand on a license may not a big deal. The remaining question is however where then to drive the car like it’s supposed to be driven. As it turned out, the supercar crowd in Singapore had a plan for that as well. As a member of the local Ferrari club told me, for their club outings they drive across the border to Malaysia and rent the Sepang F1 circuit for one day. That’s what I call a track day!

Of course, track days is something we have in Europe and the US as well, although in a slightly less dramatic setting. These days however, the car you take to a track day is typically a racing-oriented street car, such as for example a 911 GT2-GT3. Looking back, it used to be the other way around….

*One of, if not the, most legendary car in the world – the 250 GTO*

To come back to the heading of this post, the three letters GTO have a direct connection to what we today associate with track days. They stand for Grand Turismo Omologato (homologated), meaning the cars a manufacturer had to build for road use for a race version of the same car to be approved. When hearing GTO many of you will directly think of the most expensive and perhaps the most legendary car in the world, the Ferrari 250 GTO, of which 36 cars were homologated for road use.

It’s often referred to as the last true road racing car since after it, safety regulations would put a stop to such extreme machines being used on public roads. In other words, this wasn’t a street car you could race on weekends, but rather a race car you could drive on public roads. Or as Shelby Myers, a car specialist at RM Sotheby’s put it: “this was the last car that you could park in your garage, drive to the track, win the race, and then drive home.”

*Racing on Sunday, commuting on Monday…*

All 36 Ferrari 250 GTO’s were built between 1962 and 1964, and none of them were identical. They were a development of the 250 GT-series with the center piece being the 3 litre, 300 hp strong V12 with six Weber carburetors and a five-speed gearbox (increased to 4 litres and 390 hp on the three cars built in 1964). The development of the car was led by the legendary Giotto Bizzarrini (read more on him here and here), although he left Ferrari before the GTO was launched.

The cars were built by Scaglietti and Enzo himself apparently selected who was allowed to buy them. With a top speed around 270 km/h, the GTO won the GT World Championships in 1962-1964 and various other races such as Le Mans, Targa Florio (see here) and the 1000 km race at Spa Francorchamps. In total, it accumulated more than 300 race wins under its belt.

*At $70m, the price record for this GTO still stands*

The GTO is often considered the last great front-engine GT car built by Ferrari. That’s not the only thing it’s been called though. Other descriptions include the most beautiful Ferrari ever built, a true living legend, and rightfully, the most expensive car in the world, It’s perhaps no surprise that buying one takes a big wallet, but just how big is illustrated by the fact that in 2014, a GTO was sold for $38m and in 2018, the current record was set at $70m. The car in question was the 1964 Tour de France winner which thereby became the most expensive vehicle ever sold. Its price as new in today’s money would have been around USD 150′, so in other words, a pretty solid investment return!

The 250 may thus have been the last true GT car, but it was not the last GTO. Fast forward to 1984, when Ferrari introduced the 288 GTO at the Geneva Auto Salon. The car cost around $300.000 at the time, for which you could have got no less than for example three MB 500 SL’s, and it sold out before the Salon was over. If you find a 288 GTO today you can add a zero to that number, which still makes it a bargain compared to the 250 GTO. It may be far less legendary but not less important – rather the contrary.

*The 288 GTO set Ferrari’s hyper car strategy for the future!*

The 288 GTO (later called only GTO) was launched in period where Ferrari’s line-up with the 308, 328, Mondial and 412 was not the best it had ever been, and the company wasn’t doing very well financially. The new 512 was indeed an extravagant sports car in Enzo Ferrari’s taste, but he wanted something more. Or was it maybe the changes in the Group B rally regulation that motivated the GTO?

We’ll never know for sure, but what we do know is that the racing version of the GTO never happened. Instead, Ferrari reluctantly agreed to increase the street car production from 200 to 274 cars (yo have to think that some of their most faithful owners were pretty influential people already then…). And hereby, without knowing it, Ferrari had also found the formula for hyper car success that’s taken them all the way to today.

For the untrained eye, a GTO could be mistaken for a regular 308. If you look closer though, you see that it’s a bit longer (110 mm to be exact) different headlights. It’s a beautiful car in a more dynamic way than the original 250 GTO was, and looking at it today, it has an 80’s cool factor about it. The longitudinal, double-turbo 2.9 litre V8 put out 400 hp and given the car only weighed 1300 kg, that was enough for a 300 km/h top speed. The GTO hereby became the fastest Ferrari ever, and one of the fastest cars of its time.

As for Ferrari’s future strategy, the attention the GTO got helped lay the foundation for what would become a very successful formula for hyper cars from Maranello: no more than 500 built, technologically at the top, and buyers carefully selected. The F40 followed the same logic as did the F50, the Enzo, and later the LaFerrari.

As a side benefit the increase in value would follow almost automatically. Apparently the group of owners who were selected and thus own all the cars listed above is larger than you think, and they’re no doubt thankful to the 288 GTO for being not only a great car, but also for making what followed possible!

The most bling-bling of them all!

On April 23, 2023April 23, 2023 By ChristofferIn Classic cars, News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of Owning1 Comment

For most of us including yours truly, the Thrill of Driving (ToD) apart from being the name of this blog, refers to exactly that, i.e. the wonderful feeling you get from driving, say a manual 911 Turbo up a twisty mountain road, for example here in Switzerland. Then again, what really constitutes the thrill varies, also as we get older. Some people will think of it as maximum straightline speed, as in a Tesla Plaid. For others it’s hearing the screaming sound of a 12-cylinder from Sant’Agata. And then again for some, it’s more about the Thrill of Being Seen than the driving itself. And whereas a Lamborghini works pretty well also for this purpose, there used to be a brand out there that was only about turning a maximum number of heads. This week we’ll look at the almost forgotten creations from Excalibur, the craziest thing to ever come out of Milwaukee!

Brooks Stevens was an American industrial designer, specialized in cars and bikes, who worked at Studebaker where he had been commissioned by CEO Sherwood Egbert (yep, really) to design a spectacular car to put on the company’s exhibition stand at the NY motor show in 1964. He came up with the idea of creating a car with modern running gear, but in the style of the pre-war Mercedes-Benz SSK. The chassis came from a Studebaker Lark Daytona, over which a fiberglass body draped. The car was called the Studebaker SS and it was a great success with dozens of orders placed during, and after the motor show.

*The Excalibur, inspired by the Mercedes-Benz SSK*

Unfortunately Brooks’ creation wasn’t enough to save Studebaker that went broke the same year. Stevens was however determined to bring his car to market and did so by setting up his own company together with his sons. They called it SS Automobiles and the car they launched, very reminiscent of the Studebaker SS, was given the name Excalibur. Equipped with a 300 hp, small block Chevy V8 from the Corvette, production of the Excalibur started in 1965. The car’s low weight of about a ton gave it spectacular acceleration for the time, needing less than six seconds to 100 km/h with a 200 km/h top speed. The car was a success and in 1968, the roadster was complemented by an even more spectacular four-seater, the Phaeton.

*All cars from Excalibur were hand-made and thus individual*

With two oil crises in less than 10 years, the 70’s was certainly not the decade for V8’s on paper, but it didn’t hinder Excalibur from introducing an even bigger V8 and continue to do well without much of design updates. The general design was of course why clients bought the car in the first place, and given all cars were hand-built, a lot of smaller wishes could still be accomodated, as seen from the multitude of Excalibur models. Still, the company was also slightly schizoophrenic, choosing for example to sacrifice basic things such as roll-down windows (rather than just sidescreens) all the way into the 80’s. The Roadster was by then in its fourth series, but the engine had been heavily capped to a smaller V8 with only 155 hp – not even an Excalibur could completely avoid the oil crisis. The problem was that over the years the weight had almost doubled to close to two tons, meaning this by now was very far from being a performance car. It was also far from being a good deal with the price having increased about as much as the weight, to around USD 170′ in today’s money…

*A Phaeton 1978 was definitely not a sports car, especially at 155 hp..*

As spectacular as the Excalibur was, buyers no longer found this a very interesting proposition, Stevens had to file for the company’s first bankruptcy in 1986, and this woud be the start of a long line of owners over the coming years who all tried to revive the business, and who all failed. Henry Warner took over Excalibur in 1987, created the Excalibur Marketing Corporation with a plan to sell the Excalibur Series V. The engine was back to the original V8, but prices were roughly the same as before and success wasn’t much bigger. Warner sold far too few cars and had to throw in the towel only three years later, in 1990. A certain Michael Timmer then bought the rights to Excalibur, but he went bust before he’d made any cars at all. The last in the tragic row was Udo Geitlinger who acquired the rights to build Excaliburs in 1991 and relaunched the brand three years later with the Roadster Series VI. They would sell a few dozen cars but towards the end of the 90’s, the Excalibur lights went out for good.

*Original Mini-like angle to the steering wheel, not much side support on the seats!*

There is still an Excalibur Motor Corporation today, but that is one focused on restoring and maintaining as many of the existing cars as possible, both the Sportster and the Phaeton, with no plans for any new cars. In total, around 3500 Excaliburs were built through the years, all in the company’s home town of Milwaukee. How many have survived to this day isn’t clear, and it also seems to be matter of debate whether you like Excaliburs to have survived at all – no one is indifferent. But in a very uniform car world, isn’t it a breeze of fresh air when someone sets out on an arguably crazy project such as this one, and still manages to build a few thousand cars? Personally though, I don’t have any special feelings for the Excalibur. I’ve never driven one but knowing it’s a 60’s US car with a big V8, lots of power, a steering wheel tilted like a bus and initially radial tires, something tells me it’s more at home in a straight line than on a twisty mountain road. And it’s certainly not a car for the shy!

Wolfsburg’s hole-in-ones!

On April 9, 2023April 9, 2023 By ChristofferIn News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of OwningLeave a comment

About a year ago I wrote a post about one of the real legends among modern cars in general and hot hatches in particular, namely the Mk1 VW Golf GTI. As pointed out back then, the GTI became synonymous with a whole market segment for decades to come, and helped establish the Golf beyond being just another small car. The first Golf series was obviously also the first iteration of a car that’s still around today, although every generation has taken it a bit further away from the purity of that original version. Over the years there have however also been a number of special series of the Golf, or cars produced in larger numbers that have been extra special. This week we’ll look at a small selection of some of these!

Mk II Golf Country (1990-1991)

If most special edition Golfs have been focused on adding performance, the VW Country, arguably the quirkiest one of them all, certainly wasn’t. Rather, it was VW inventing a market segment that didn’t yet exist, namely that of the compact all-road estate or compact SUV. The Country was launched in 1990 at a time when VW was at the height of automotive experimentation and the Golf was rapidly becoming their most successful model. Trying to make it appealing to a wider audience, the Country was given all-wheel Syncro drive and an off-road suspension that both looks the part and gave it all of 21 cm ground clearance, coupled to the 1.8-litre, 97 hp engine. It also had bullbars front and rear, lots of additional headlights and one of the larger, all-terrain wheels fitted to the tailgate.

*The Country would take you where no Golf had ever gone!*

All this makes it look rather strange and really far too high for its length, but the Country saw quite some success notably in the alpine parts of Europe, and all in all, 7735 examples were produced until 1991 by no one less than Steyer-Daimler-Puch in Austria, builders of the far more famous Mercedes-Benz G-wagon. 50 Country cars were equipped with the GTI engine, giving them an extra 15 hp, and good luck in finding one of those today, Finding a normal Country isn’t that hard unless you’re in the US, as it was never sold there officially. This was however the car said to have inspired Audi to build the much larger Allroad a few years later, and also the whole market segment of small SUV’s such as the Toyota Rav4.

Mk II Rallye Golf (1988-1989)

Another limited series of the Golf that didn’t make it across the pond was the MK II Rallye, although the reason for it is much more tragic. James Fuller, president of VW America and and a big fan of the Rallye Golf was on the Pan Am flight which terrorists brought down over Lockerbie in Scotland in 1988 and with him, the idea of bringing the Rallye to the US died. In Europe, 5.000 homologation cars were built as required by the regulation at the time, and these were fitted with the same 1.8 litre four-pot as the regular Mk II Golf, however with a so called G-lader, a scroll-type supercharger that helped the engine to 160 hp and 225 Nm of torque. The same Syncro four-wheel drive system as on the Country helped bring power to the ground, and the Rallye looked cool in a very 80’s way with squared headlights and flared arches, inspired by the Quattros, M3’s and Delta Integrales of the period.

Built in 1988-1989 and sold at around twice the price of a regular Golf, the Rallye was expensive. Even more so was the derived Golf Limited, built only 71 times, and essentially a four-door version with the same engine but with classical Golf looks and all options such as leather seats, electrical windows etc.. Finding a Rallye today is still possible although nice ones are getting pricey. Finding a Limited is rather difficult… The G60 engine was however also fitted to the regular Golf Mk II, and those are easier (and cheaper) to come by.

Mk V Golf R32 (2005-2009)

Most Golf enthusiasts agree that the Mk III and IV Golf series were really not much to write home about, with the once so pure Golf only getting fatter and less sporty. The Mk IV had however introduced on one hand the R32, six-cylinder engine and on the other the double-clutch gearbox, making the Golf the first car in the world fitted with a DSG gear change. Both were carried over to the better-looking and better-driving Mk V, from 2005 in Europe and 2007 in the US. The GTI was still there but the R32 was clearly the one to have, with 250 hp and four-wheel drive making it good for a top speed of 250 km/h and a respectable 6.2 seconds to 100 km/h. The chassis was great as was the drive, and the happily revving 3.2 liter V6 is obviously an engine that has been fitted to many other VW and Audi models.

*The Mk V R32 was the return to form Golf enthusiasts had been waiting for*

The MK V R32 could be had both with Recaro bucket seats and with the mentioned DSG box, which in its manual paddle mode is a far better proposition than the standard manual. Looking for one today, those are the options you want to have and that make the car feel even more special! And in terms of power, with a few exceptions the Golf has also not really evolved further, so 250 hp for only 1500 kg is still pretty much up there!

Mk VII Golf GTI Clubsport S (2016-2017)

The last in this very unofficial listing of special ones is the only front-wheel drive car, which was in no way intentional, but more importantly, the Clubsport series is also the sportiest version of the GTI that can be had these days (alongside the even more powerful R, but that’s again a more refined, four-wheel drive car). So what to say then of the Clubsport S, which compares to the regular Clubsport like the GT3 does to the 911? With a stripped down interior with weight saved notably by removing the back seats as well as the spare wheel, the S weighed in at less than 1300 kgs. It had a far more aggressive suspension setting than the regular Clubsport, a slip differential and was riding on Michelin Sports Cup 2 tires. The four-pot was tuned to deliver 310 hp, helping the S to a top speed of 310 km/h, and also to a record time on the Nürburgring in 2017.

*The Clubsport S, a track weapon as understated as they come.*

400 Clubsport S were made, and although the regular Clubsport is of course not comparable, it remains the purest and (except for special series) most sports-focused version after many years of the Golf getting more comfortable and ordinary. 265 hp in Mk VII version (the one the S was built on) as well as larger brakes, a lower ride height and different ratios in the seven-speed DSG gearbox compared to the regular GTI all give the Clubsport a different driving experience to the standard GTI. It’s a highly rewarding one and the Clubsport is not only far easier to find than the S, but also much easier to live with on non-track days!

So there we go – four different Golfs over 35 years that have all contributed to holding the Golf flag high, and also testify to the VW engineers’ willingness to engage in less ordinary things – however only up to a certain limit. Because perhaps with the exception of the very visible Golf Country, what they all have in common is that it’s never about power alone, but always in combination with a certain comfort, practicality, quality – and understatement. If they keep at it, the Golf will be with us for many years to come, hopefully bringing even more special ones!

The Audi (B8) RS4 – naturally-aspirated legend!

On March 26, 2023October 26, 2025 By ChristofferIn News, Test drives, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of Owning2 Comments

When Ferrari introduced the new Purosangue that I wrote about back in December, many of us were pleasantly surprised to hear that it would be powered by something as exotic these days as a naturally aspirated V12, in this case putting out no less than 725 hp. Supercharged engines are obviously what you mostly see in our time, so Ferrari sticking to the tradition, especially with a 12-cylinder, is great! What’s also pretty great and far cheaper than a new Purosangue are some of the classic naturally aspirated engines from not too long ago, especially those with 8 or 10 cylinders. Audi is then a name that quickly springs to mind and this week, we’ll look at what’s become as much of a bargain as rare in terms of power trains – the B8 Audi RS4!

*As practical as a Purosangue, and much cheaper!*

The tradition of Audi power wagons starts with the RS2, built by Porsche after they were done with the MB E500 they were commissioned to build for Mercedes and that you can read about here (but that was never available as station wagon). The RS2 was based on the Audi 80 and although it looked a bit more muscular, the fascination came from it retaining the basic family station wagon looks whilst driving like, and having the power of a sports car. Up until then, that had never really been the case. What it didn’t have however was a V8, but rather a 2.2 litre turbo five-cylinder engine putting out 315 hp. The RS2 was only built during three years from 1994 to 1996 and has already become a true legend, priced as such.

When the RS2 was replaced by the RS4 in 1999, the engine had grown by one cylinder, 0.5 litre and 65 hp (to 380 hp), but it wasn’t until the second generation of the RS4 in 2005 that the V8 party got going. The original six-cylinder was then replaced by a 4.2 litre, naturally aspirated V8 putting out 420 hp, and the car was available as sedan, station wagon and convertible. More importantly, the B7 generation as it’s called was only available with a manual six-speed gearbox… At a 40-60 front-back drive train split, it also had a more rear-biased quattro system and also not to forget, it was the first RS4 with the lovely, double oval exhaust pipes! Thinking of where we are today, it’s difficult to imagine a more appealing cocktail than this, however ideally in sedan or station wagon form as the convertible suffered a bit rigidity-wise.

*A normal (B8) A4 until above the bumper, all RS4 below!*

The V8 lived on to the B8 generation built between 2012-2015, but other body forms than the station wagon didn’t, so the wagon was the only shape the new RS4 was available in. Power had now increased to 450 hp at an almost incredible 8250 rpm, but the manual box was gone, replaced by Audi’s equally excellent (but less fun) 7-speed DSG box. A new differential allowed for as much of 70% going to the front wheels and up to 85% to the back wheels, boosting the entertainment factor. It’s also worth remembering that both the B7 and B8 were light cars by today’s standard, with the former at around 1750 kg and the latter at 1850 kg. The B8 was to be the last V8-powered RS4 and was replaced by the current version which has gone back to a turbo-powered six-cylinder engine.

I hadn’t driven a B8 for a long time until a couple of days ago when I had the pleasure of doing so here in Zurich. The car in question had a pretty amazing history It was sold by the same garage that now had it for sale, to the only owner it ever had. He apparently has a number of cars so that he never used the RS4 in the winter, which given its talents is rather strange. Actually he didn’t use it much at all, as he only put 31.000 km on it since new, but still had it serviced every year in the very same garage. Built in 2014, the car looked absolutely new. Of course, after three weeks of sunshine it had to rain this very day, and I almost got the impression it was the first time the car saw water coming from the sky and not the (manual) car wash…

*Beautiful Dayton grey color and black pack. Not a big fan of the wheels.*

Starting from the outside, the B8 is a pretty, purposeful and muscular car with the larger body really setting it apart. It’s best from the front and side, with the back being a bit too much normal A4, except of course for the double exhaust and the diffusor in between. As you get in, the first impression is that of quite a tight car. It gives an incredibly solid impression with some nice carbon inlays in the RS4, but a bit less plastic wouldn’t hurt, even if the grey stuff is of excellent quality. As we pulled out of the city in comfort mode, the car very much behaved like any family wagon, albeit one with very precise steering and suspension on the firm side even in this mode. Putting it into Dynamic (together with Individual and Auto the other options, and the most sporty one) changes everything. There’s an immediate change of tone in the exhaust, the suspension firms up and the steering becomes sports car-like direct. As we reached the outskirts of the city the engine was warm, and I was finally able to start pushing it a bit. What an absolute pleasure it was!

The engine is absolutely incredible. Power delivery is immediate and the revs keep rising as long as you hold your foot down, as the tone changes from a deep grumble to more of a singing bariton. The power delivery is naturally aspirated-smooth and the amount of power feels perfect for the car. It’s also noticeable how much tighter the smaller RS4 feels compared to its bigger brother or an E63. The road was really wet and I was on 20-inch Michelin Pilot Sports with an increasingly nervous garage guy next to me so we were nowhere near the edge, but at no point did I feel nervous – the car was glued to the road, the steering made it extremely precise to handle, and the engine kept singing. Motor journalists like to call the RS series and especially the B8 boring and maybe it is on a track. But a station wagon is made for transporting people and stuff whilst still procuring driving pleasure to the person behind the wheel, not for track use, and this is a car that excels at precisely that. Downsides? Some road-noise is one, not helped by the 20-inch wheels. And the size of the manual shift paddles is another – did they run out of metal in Ingolstadt?

*Solid, purposeful, but slightly joyless*

A well-preserved RS4 of the B8 generation with up to 70-80′ km on the clock will be yours for around EUR 40-50′, which at about 1/3 of its price as new, slightly more than a few years ago, but still an absolute bargain. It’s also a car that can be expected to hold its value very well given it’s one of the last naturally-aspirated V8’s out there. If you really insist on changing gears manually then the B7 is worth considering, but for everyday use I would go with the B8 as it still feels like a modern car. There’s a few options you should think about doing so. Firstly color-wise, the Nogaro blue is the rarest and the most sought-after, but it’s very blue indeed. As a more discrete alternative, the Daytona grey is my favorite. Then, “my” car had both the sports exhaust and the dynamic chassis and you should definitely go for both. You should also make sure it has the B&O sound system, as Audi’s more basic system is awful (most cars have it, but mine didn’t). Finally the panoramic roof is nice and helps lighting things up a bit. Audi’s quality may be top-notch, but you can’t call the interior design overly joyful…

Even though they come from the same naturally-aspirated tradition, it goes without saying that no one considering a Purosangue will be in the market for a used B8 RS4. But if driving pleasure is a priority, a power station wagon will always be a better choice than any SUV. Among these, a V8-powered RS4 is an increasingly rare car and currently one of the best deals to be had. Find one with the right equipment, service and owner history and you will not be disappointed!

Bristol cars – as British as it gets!

On March 19, 2023March 19, 2023 By ChristofferIn Classic cars, News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of Owning2 Comments

What do Sir Richard Branson, Liam Gallagher/Oasis and Tina Turner have in common? I guess Tina or Liam may well have listened to the other’s music while travelling on one of Richard Branson’s Virgin planes but as you’ve guessed, that’s not the connection I’m after. That would rather be that they have been, or still are, owners of a Bristol automobile, perhaps the most British of all UK car manufacturers. With a long-term building philosophy of “no more than 2-3 cars a week”, never more than a single show room in London’s Kensington High Street and an at times very particular view of what good car design is, it’s really no surprise that the brand hasn’t survived until today – but it is a surprise it lived on as long as it did! Before Bristol is completely forgotten, it’s well worth having a deeper look at one of the UK’s quirkiest car companies and some of the wonderful cars they built during the 70 years it was in existence!

As many other car manufacturers, Bristol had its roots in airplane manufacturing but even before that, as a builder of tramways in the UK. The tramway company started operations as early as 1875 and business was especially good during WW1 when the Luftwaffe kept damaging the tramway’s power lines, thereby creating a need for lots of maintenance work. With the tram business up and running and the Wright brothers having flown over the English Channel, it became clear to Bristol’s founder George White that the future was in the air. The airplane business started in 1910 and enjoyed an equally good business in the run-up to WW1. As for so many other military suppliers though, when the war ended, orders no longer came in. Bristol had no choice but to diversify again, creating the Bristol Car Company in 1918. However, it wasn’t until the 1950’s that it really came alive.

What really got the car business going was a collaboration with Frazer Nash, at the time UK importers of BMW. Somehow Frazer Nash came in possession of all the drawings and specifications of the BMW 326-328 after the war and it was based on these that Bristol built and presented its first car in 1946, essentially a remodeled BMW introduced under the name Frazer-Nash-Bristol. The engine was the same straight six the Beamers had under the hood, but this and later Bristol cars weren’t just copies of the respective BMW’s – they were improved in several ways and already in the 50’s earned a very good reputation. Even though the official collaboration with Frazer Nash ended the year after, Bristol’s 400 series would go on and include all cars until the 80’s. Starting with the Bristol 400 in 1947 and along with the following Bristol two and four-seater cars until the 406 (and there were models for all numbers in between), the cars were all powered by the same two-litre, BMW straight six engine.

*The Bristol 50’s factory didn’t change as much as others in subsequent years…*

From the start, Bristols were thus positioned as luxury cars and comparable to the Jags and Bentleys out there. Of course all cars were hand-built back in the 50’s and 60’s, but Bristol did so in line with the British car building tradition and was quickly seen as an alternative to for example Jaguar. The cars were built to high engineering standards, said to be “built to last”, apparently to the difference to some other cars of the time. This together with the exclusivity that comes from building such small series of cars was what Bristol felt justified the high price. The “no more than 2-3 cars per week” was probably all the company could do anyway back in the 50’s, but the motto lived on through Bristol’s full history, making any Bristol a very rare automobile these days. Some of those will be far more desirable than others. If the early 400 series Bristols from the 50’s drew heavily on BMW, the 60’s and early 70’s models were certainly the high point of Bristol’s own design. You’d be excused for thinking that the design department was on long term leave during the following decades when you see later cars.

*The interior of a Bristol 406 – very nice and very British!*

Starting with the Bristol 407 the company switched to a Chrysler V8 engine which from the 411 (most cars) and onwards (all cars) was the large 6.2 litre one. The 411 is actually worth a special mention as perhaps the nicest of all Bristol cars. A total of 287 were built between 1969 and 1976, with the big engine making the car capable of a top speed of 230 km/h which you would have to be very brave indeed to exploit. This made Bristol the cool and far less common alternative to the Jaguar XJ-C or the Jensen Interceptor that I wrote about back in October. Engineering-wise it was certainly comparable and in the looks department, it was certainly up there with the XJ-C and some Italian beauties, which is saying a lot!

*The 411, perhaps Bristol’s nicest car in my humble opinion*

The late 70’s and early 80’s were certainly not known for good design and nowhere was it worse than at Bristol. Starting with the 412, the company’s efforts to modernize the lines failed so spectacularly that fans pretty much gave up on the company, starting its long demise. Cars like the 90’s Blenheim roadster were seen as dated already when they appeared, and it was in a last effort to save the company that Bristol developed the Fighter, built between 2004 and when the company went into administration in 2011 in around a dozen examples (no one knows for sure). It was a pretty extraordinary car, looking like nothing else and powered by Chrysler’s V10 Viper engine, here producing around 500 hp and coupled to a four-speed autobox. Bristol had plans to build around 20 Fighters a year and also to launch a turbo version with twice that power (yes, really!), but that wasn’t to be. Given the low level of interest the Fighter generated, probably due both to the particular design but perhaps even more to the GBP 230′ price tag, no other Bristol car would ever see the light of day.

*The Fighter would be Bristol’s last car – not sure about the license plate*

Bristol Cars went into administration in 2011 and was then bought by the Swiss Kamkorp group who never managed to bring out any new models so that until the lights were finally turned off in 2020, the company mostly renovated and supplied parts to older Bristol models. In 2016, the Bristol veteran Richard Hackett was one of the founders of a company called SLJ Hackett, today one of the main distributors of older Bristol cars. SLJ offers most Bristol models for sale and with prices starting around GBP 50′, they are more affordable than you may think. So if you want to do what Sir Richard, Tina Turner and Liam Gallagher did, then SLJ Hackett is the company for you. It goes without saying that the driving pleasure will be from the right side only – after all, who would come up with the strange idea of driving on the other side? Unfortunately there’s no place for companies like Bristol in today’s car world and that’s a shame, because it could certainly use a bit more of them!

The forgotten lord

On March 5, 2023March 4, 2023 By ChristofferIn Classic cars, News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of Owning2 Comments

The Range Rover is the most legendary luxury SUV out there, and it’s now been around for more than 50 years. The brand new model of which deliveries started early this year is however only the fifth generation in the line-up. The original Range Rover was built for all of 24 years, the third generation L322 for 11 years and the L405, the predecessor to the fifth generation of which I have one in the garage, for 10 years without major modifications. You will have noticed that the second generation, the P38, is missing from the above. This is a car that was never really loved, had the worst reputation of them all and had it been possible to stop, would probably never have been launched in the first place. Doesn’t really sound great, does it? This means that the P38 is very much at the bottom of the Range Rover pack in terms of secondary market values (or put differently, it’s dirt cheap), which is something that always intrigues me. This week, we’ll therefore look at the forgotten lord, the P38, to try to figure out if it’s best left to die, or actually something worth considering!

It was certainly not a very confident Rover company that presented the P38 in 1994. Rover had been taken over by BMW the same year in a merger that will not go down in history as the most thought-through, and when the Bavarians came up to the Rover factory in Solihull and saw the new Range project, they were apparently far from impressed. This was the car that was supposed to succeed the Classic that was was already then a legend, and BMW didn’t feel it was even ready to be released. They were however far too late to do anything about it and in the same year, the P38, somewhat half-heartedly, was presented to the world. Production of the original Range actually continued a couple of years in parallel to the new car, and the development of what was to become its successor in 2001, the L322, had already started. Talk about being an unloved child and with a build-time of only seven years, the P38 is (until today) the shortest-lived car in the Range line-up.

*Early P38’s are recognized by yellow turn signals front and back*

What is clear just by looking at it is that the design is nothing Rover needed to be ashamed about. What was to become the P38 was developed internally at Rover and the final project was preferred over four other, notably one from Bertone. Rover definitely made the right choice, as the P38 is a good-looking car and unmistakenly a Range Rover. The low waistline and big windows give it a friendly look and have the additional advantage of making it easy to place the car on the road, which to be fair is also helped by the fact that at 4.7 metres length and 1.9 metres width, it’s far smaller than later Ranges. The P38 was available with three engines, two versions of the Rover V8 at 4 and 4.6 litres, and a six-cylinder BMW diesel at 2.5 litres. Of these, the only one you should ever consider is the 4.6 l, as even that only puts out 224 hp and 380 Nm of torque and doesn’t make the Range a fast car. The 2.5 litre diesel delivers a paltry 136 hp, less torque than the V8 and needs a spectacular 17 seconds to make it to 100 km/h. It’s not even very economical doing so. All engines are coupled to a 4-speed automatic in a body-on-frame construction.

As in all later Ranges, the interior of the P38 is a very nice place to be, with a very distinct smell from the leather and other materials used. This was very much intentional as Rover had understood that with the introduction of the P38, these cars would start moving away from the pastures onto the roads, meaning buyers would expect a more luxurious interior. There is thus almost as much leather and wood in one of these as in a modern Range and although comfort is not the same at the same level, the air suspension helps you travel in high comfort. I’ve had the pleasure of doing so several times through the years, and the P38 provides exactly the same commading driving position in a plush chair as later – and more expensive – Ranges do. With an engine that doesn’t encourage anything but soft cruising that’s all you’ll ever do, and the P38 will be an excellent companion. All cars were well equipped by standards at the time, with the HSE being better than the SE, the Autobiography better than the HSE and with special series like the Holland & Holland bringing additional goodies.

*A low waist line and large windows give a very airy feel!*

So what about the quality and BMW’s feeling that the new car wasn’t ready to be released – has history proved them right? It certainly didn’t take long before the P38 started developing a reputation for bad reliability. This may not have been the case had buyers come from Rover’s traditional crowd, but BMW and other owners who were convinced to spend a lot of money on a new Range were far less understanding than traditional Rover buyers of regularly having to clean oil off their driveway. Having said that, all Ranges have a reputation for bad reliability, including mine which I’ve now had for 18 months and almost 20′ km without a single issue, so you could well imagine there’s a cultural angle here as well and that maybe, the car is better than its reputation. As so often, quality will stand in relation to previous ownership and service history, but it’s clear that the poor reputation has contributed to P38’s loosing value like a stone. There was a time you could have them for literally nothing, and people did, ruining them on the way, meaning the P38 has become rare these days and that prices have therefore started to climb somewhat. It will most probably never develop into a true classic like the RR Classic, but my guess is that values have hit the bottom.

*A late 2001 car – cars after 1999 have an improved Bosch engine management system.*

So, should you park a P38 in your driveway? I can imagine some good scenarios for doing so, but they’re all based on finding a mechanically sound car, so the regular checks of service history and general condition are very much mandatory. High mileage needs not be an issue if the car has been regularly maintained. During the last three years, the Lucas engine management system was replaced by one from Bosch, generally considered better. Among expensive things to fix, pay attention to the suspension, if it’s harsh or inexistent, that means a problem with the air suspension system which will be expensive to repair. Also check the auto box in Manual and Sport. Otherwise one of the attractions of the P38 over its successor, the L322, is firstly that it looks better, secondly that it weighs almost half a ton less and thirdly, that there’s less (and less complicated) stuff to fix. The P38 remains a very comfortable way to travel and of course, being a Range Rover, an outstanding offroad car, and the few remaining nice examples out there can be had today for less than EUR/USD 10′ with much room for negotiation, which is a true bargain. In the electrified world we’re apparently moving towards, there’s of course a risk is you’ll never get more from it than scrap value when you try to sell it, but what the heck – why not enjoy the ride until then in a car that will always look more expensive than it is!

The old-school brute!

On February 12, 2023February 12, 2023 By ChristofferIn News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of Owning2 Comments

In my first post of 2021 with things to wish for in 2021, I mentioned a hope that Japan would again bring car enthusiasts something to cheer about. Unfortunately they didn’t, and I guess that in terms of combustion cars, it will never happen again. What they did do however the year after, in 2022, was to cancel the production of the Nissan GT-R for the European market. The GT-R is a true beast of a car, perhaps the best sports car ever to come out of the land of the rising sun, aunched 15 years ago to take on the the European supercar bunch but none more than the 911 Turbo as we’ll see later. It more than held its own doing so driving-wise, but without the brand but partly also the elegance of at least two of those three (sorry Lambo…). As production will stop globally this year, it’s time to pay tribute to the brute from Japan!

*A sleak but clean design that has stayed with the car through the years*

Back in 2007 I remember a young colleague as crazy about cars as me, telling me that the then brand new GT-R that had just set a record on the Nürburgring of 7 min 38 secs, quicker than the 911 Turbo at the time. He told me this was proof if it being the best sports car in the world, ahead of anything from Stuttgart or Maranello. I told him that wouldn’t matter much for sales numbers, since anyone buying a Ferrari cared far more about the brand than about lap times of the Nürburgring. It’s probably fair fair to say we were both right – the GT-R was and still is one hell of a sports car, but one that hasn’t come near the sales numbers of Porsche and Ferrari that Nissan was certainly hoping for. Unfortunately for Nissan, it didn’t convert many Ferrari drivers either.

When the once so celebrated Carlos Ghosn became CEO of Nissan in 1999, one of the first things he wanted the company to start planning for was a sports car that would represent the vision he had for the brand. His idea was to build on the heritage of the Nissan Skyline GT-R, the sportiest version of the luxury Skyline coupé, a car that never made it officially to the West and was only available as right-hand drive, but which since then has achieved a true hero’s status and been imported privately many times. The new car would retain the round rear lights from the GT-R and importantly, it should also beat the lap time of the 911 Turbo on the German Nürburgring (commonly also referred to as “the green hell”) that Ghosn had set as benchmark. Work on the GT-R thus started in the early 2000’s and in 2003, Ghosn announced the car would be launched at the Tokyo Motor Show in 2007. Unlike a certain Elon Musk, he kept his word!

*Ghosn delivered his baby timely in 2007*

The chief engineer of the GT-R was a certain Kazutoshi Mizuno, previously chief engineer of the Skyline GT-R and more known as “Mr. GT-R” well beyond Nissan. He was no doubt a key person in the project, notably convincing the not-easily-convinced Ghosn that the new GT-R had to be built on a completely new platform. The car Mizuno put together was one of the most advanced constructions that had been made at that time, with a body combining steel, aluminum and carbon fibre, an advanced chassis, four-wheel drive, crucial in bringing the power of the 3.8 litre, V6 turbo engine to the tarmac, and a dual-clutch, six-speed box mounted in the back in a transaxle construction. Initially the GT-R had around 470 hp which over the years and the different facelifts increased to up to 100 hp more in the standard version. The engine is however also a favorite among tuners, and it’s not difficult to find GT-R’s with well beyond 700 hp.

*The engine of a 2017 GT-R – it looks the piece!*

Already in the standard version however the GT-R is an extremely competent car as illustrated by a long list of racing successes in various GT categories. I’ve been lucky enough to experience a few of these over the years, both as a passenger and behind the wheel, and it’s really a car like no other. It has a very muscular, “heavy” appearance, looking bigger than its 1700 kg. Getting behind the wheel feels like stepping into a mix of a spaceship and a video game, with an interior that has what may be the largest amount of buttons on any car, before the large screen infotainment age. It fits the purpose but does so without any frills, fancy materials or much design, which is a bit of a shame. Having said that, and you tend to forget any concerns you may have had the same moment as you turn the key and wake up the lion family under the hood…

The twin-turbocharged 3.8-liter V6 engine produces a growling sound and works in perfect harmony with the six-speed dual clutch box and the razor sharp steering to provide a really pure driving experience. The first version of the GT-R was produced until 2009 is the only one needing more than 3 seconds to 100 km/h (3.2 to be exact), all subsequent cars had more power and made the sprint in less than 3 seconds. Not only that, the torque of at least 600 Nm happily kicks you in the butt whenever you want it to. This is a seriously quick car but not only that, it’s one that outclasses most other cars if you bring it to the track. That may also be the place you want to use your GT-R, given it’s far less practical than the outside may have you think. The back seats are not made for humans and the boot is so small that it barely has enough room for a weekend bag.

There’s been a multitude of updates and versions through the years but I’ll limit it to the two most important here. There was a larger facelift in 2016 that on one hand brought more power and an improved gearbox, but also visual changes on the outside an an upgraded interior with better materials. Before that however, the Nismo edition of the GT-R had been introduced in 2013, being built as the most advanced version of the GT-R ever since. Power in the Nismo was increased to 600 hp and it set what was at the time the fastest time ever around the Nürburgring, shaving around 30 seconds off the already very competent time of the standard GT-R!. Both suspension and brakes were improved as well and on the inside, Recaro seats did their best to hold the driver and passenger in place.

If you’re the no frills kind of person that that puts the driving experience ahead of the logo and being seen, then there’s probably no better sports car in the world than the GT-R. And that’s even before we’ve talked price, because at the price point where GT-R’s trade, this IS quite simply the best sports car in the world – full stop. An early car with sub-100′ km is yours for EUR 50-60′, a post-facelift one will cost you EUR 20′-30′ more, which to me is well invested money. It’s only the Nismo cars that add significantly to the budget, trading for EUR 150′ and upwards. This is of course very much less than any comparable car, be it Italian or German, including Nissan’s benchmark, the 911 Turbo. Not only that, the GT-R has all the Japanese quality you could wish for so given a serious history, a high mileage doesn’t have to be problemtic. You should be careful with tuned cars and as said, go for a post-facelift car if you have the budget but from there, you can’t really go wrong. The GT-R is the best car to ever come out of Japan, and chances are it will remain so!

The Audi R8 – Vorsprung durch Racing!

On January 8, 2023January 8, 2023 By ChristofferIn News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of OwningLeave a comment

As we start 2023 I thought we should do so with the Audi R8 – a true legend in the sports-supercar segment, one that was mentioned in my post just before Christmas on the best sports car for 130‘, but which in my view deserves its own post. There’s a number of reasons for this: firstly, the production of the oldest supercar in the market has come to an end and the replacement, given it’s electric, will be a completely different car. Secondly, with relatively minor design updates during its long production run, early R8’s still look as modern as they did the first day. Finally, given that long production run, it’s not difficult to find an R8 for far less than the arbitrary 130’ I had set as limit in my other post, which is very good news!

*The final version of the R8 before retirement*

Audi’s transformation from the very boring brand it had been in the 70’s and 80’s to the far more exciting brand it would then become started on one hand in the rally series in Europe with the success of the Audi Quattro, on the other with the marketing people in Ingolstadt thinking up the slogan “Vorsprung durch Technik”, translating into something like “advantage through technology”, which would become Audi’s signum. The ambition was to establish the brand as a competitor mainly to BMW and Mercedes through technological advances, something that would shape mainly the engineering but also the design of Audi cars over years to come. The R8 when it came out in 2007 was at that point no doubt the clearest expression of that ambition!

Actually, claiming that the R8 only goes back to 2007 is not fully correct. The first R8 is more than 20 years old and was the result of the same management team in Ingolstadt wanting to build further on that racing success Audi had had in the 80’s by developing a car for the 24-hour Le Mans race, given that’s the only European sports car race that gets any attention in the US, a market Audi was very keen on. The original car called R8R was pretty much a failure in this regard as it never did well in the race, but its successor, now called only the R8, would go on to win Le Mans five times and in the first year 2000, claiming all three podium places.

*Other than the mid-mounted engine and the overall look, nothing else is really the same…*

With that success in the bag, Audi presented a first prototype for a road car already in 2003, which would then developed to the final car that would be introduced in 2007. The similarities between the prototype and the finished car are obvious to see, basically meaning that the R8 design is 20 years old, but looks like it could have been presented yesterday! Sales opened in the autumn of 2006 and the first year’s production was sold out in a few weeks, pretty impressive since the competition among naturally aspirated sports cars at that time was quite fierce. There was notably the brand new Aston Martin Vantage and of course the far less expensive Porsche 911, to name but a couple. The R8 was much more expensive than a 911 and if you asked the folks at Audi also far more of a supercar, however one that could be used everyday. Clearly buyers were convinced!

The R8 is a close sibling to the Lamborghini Gallardo with the two cars sharing everything from the aluminium chassis to (later) the V10 engine. At the launch in 2007, the R8 was available with a naturally aspirated, 4.2l V8 that revved all the way to 8′ rpm and produced 420 hp. The sound isn’t like anything out of Sant’Agata, being much more and perhaps a bit too discreet. Still, it’s refreshingly natural! At 1600 kg the car wasn’t a lightweight but the 4.5 seconds it needed to 100 km/h were very respectable 15 years ago. The gearbox was either a six-speed manual in an open gate shift which is the highlight of the rather dull interior which mahy consider the low point of the car, or a semi-automatic called R-tronic, the predecessor of the later S-tronic that would be introduced in 2012. The first series R8 was only available as four-wheel drive, however with a far more 30-70 rear-biased quattro system than was usually the case at Audi.

*A functional but maybe slightly boring interior, with the gate shifter being the highlight!*

In 2009 the wonderful 5.2l V10 then made it into the R8. Audi’s marketing team liked to introduce it as a Lamborghini engine but this was of course the same engine that had previously been featured in both the S6 and the S8, so its origins were really from Audi. It increased power by another 100hp, thereby bringing the 0-100 time to below 4 seconds. Both engine versions now also became available as convertible and in 2011, the R8 GT came out, limited at 333 coupes and 333 convertibles. The GT was 100kg lighter, 10% more powerful and had various other revised settings making it more of a real GT car. Various other tweaks brought the more powerful V10 Plus in the final year of the first series, before the all new second series was introduced in 2015.

The second iteration of the R8 may have been an all new car but even though it’s far more angular than the rounded lines of its predecessor, there’s no doubting the family heritage. The V8 was now gone, as was the manual gearbox. Depending on year the V10 would produce a little less or a little more than 550 hp and just like for the first series, there would be a 333-example GT series of what was to be the final R8. Unfortunately that last GT looks a bit like the last version of the Countach, in the sense that it has so many wings and skirts (all in carbon of course) that you barely see the brilliant lines of the original design. The second series would also be available as pure rear-wheel drive.

*The dry sump engine sits deep and is visible through the transparent hood*

Over the full production run since 2007 Audi sold close to 40.000 R8’s, far less than for example a 911 but almost three times more than its sibling, the Gallardo. By Audi measures, there’s no doubt the R8 was a success. Neither the engineers, nor the marketing people at Audi would like the 911 comparison, seeing the R8 as far more of a supercar. Indeed, if there was ever a supercar with everyday usability, this is the one – provided your everyday usage isn’t dependent on carrying lots of stuff around, as space is rather limited, even in the supercar segment. The 911 comparison is however relevant from a servicing perspective, and the Audi people most probably have nothing against that being mentioned. A well maintained car will be much closer to a 911 than anything from Ferrari or Lamborghini in service costs.

If an R8 is your thing, the first decision is whether you prefer the rounded lines of the largely analogue first series or the more angular and much more digital experience the second series gives. Other than the design, the other point to pay attention to is the steering, being hydraulic on the firs series and electronic on the second, and there being no really set opinion on which is best. A first series car will give you the option of the less legendary but more economical V8, but if you go for a pre-2012 car, then definitely go for a manual since the R-tronic is not a pleasant experience and those cars also hold their value far less well.

*A 2008 car, to me still the best-looking!*

Rather than picking up that 130′ car i wrote about a few weeks ago, I would probably go for the basic version, meaning a first series V8 with a manual gearbox. Those start at around 50/60′ USD/EUR for really nice cars, which is very attractive indeed! The V8 is not as exciting as the V10 and doesn’t sing as much, but it looks just as good through the transparent cover and the extra 30′ a manual V10 costs aren’t worth it if you ask me. I’d try to find a car that had the interior options which were quite useful in making it feel a bit more exclusive, such as the extended leather package and some carbon pieces. Equipped in that way, with a solid service history and in a “non-controversial” color, odds are that such a car will continue to hold its value very well indeed. Of course the GT cars of both the first and second series will do so as well, as will the rear-wheel drive cars of the second series, however at a much higher entry price.

The R8 is a great piece of modern supercar history. It’s probably the most approachable and usable supercar out there, and it’s a great expression of how “Vorsprung durch Technik”, that’s accompanied Audi throughout the years was a combination of technology and design. In its cheapest, first series, manual V8 version, it’s definitely the best iteration of a manual, naturally aspirated, everyday supercar!

Street finds – the Jeep Grand Wagoneer!

On December 11, 2022December 11, 2022 By ChristofferIn Classic cars, News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of OwningLeave a comment

Christmas is a time of year full of traditions. There’s the food, the tree, the extremely repetitive Christmas songs, and then of course those Christmas movies. I can think of no other season that you associate with watching the same movie every year, yet that’s what happens at Christmas, and we all have our personal favorites. In our family, Chevy Chase’s hilarious (if you have a rather simple sense of humor) National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation has a special place. I actually find the first 10 minutes the most fun, when Chevy alias Clark Griswold drives his family out into the wilderness to find the family Christmas tree, and on the way manages to get into a fight with a pick-up and to squeeze his giant station wagon with vinyl wood decorations on the sides between the axels of a big truck.

The movie came out in 1989 and as said, Chevy/Clark is driving a boring station wagon rather than the car that was launched precisely for this kind of family setting and situation (except the part under the truck), featuring the same kind of fake wood decoration. I’m of course talking about the legendary Jeep Grand Wagoneer, a record-breaking SUV in several aspects. The Wagoneer was notably built for 29 years, the third longest of any one generation car in American history. It was also launched in Europe seven years before Land Rover’s first Range Rover, which was of course three-door only for the first years, meaning it’s arguably the grand daddy of all modern luxury SUV’s. I saw the below example in Oslo, Norway earlier this week, perfectly parked in front of a nice hotel entrance, putting its elegant line in the right context. This week, we’ll therefore have a look at this true but increasingly rare SUV legend in its most luxurious version!

*It’s difficult to imagine a better city setting for a Grand Wagoneer!*

The Wagoneer was produced for so long that its mother company Jeep had time to change owners no less than three times. When production started in 1963 Jeep was part of the Kaiser Jeep Corporation, making the Wagoneer the direct replacement of the Willys Jeep Station Wagon that had been produced since 1946. Seven years later Jeep would be sold to the American Motor Corporation (AMC), and finally in 1987, to Chrysler, where it’s remained until today. As said the Wagoneer was built until 1990, however the Grand Wagoneer version that we’re focusing on here was only introduced in 1984, meaning most of the ones you see were built during the Chrysler years. That’s perhaps less important than the fact that quality-wise, the 1988 to end production years seem to be the best, with a number of improvements both to the interior and the exterior, In terms of engine though, Chrysler continued to use the 5.9 litre (360 cui) V8 developed by AMC, that at around 150 hp wasn’t very powerful in horsepower but all the more in torque, giving the car great towing capacity. It was also a heavy drinker, with average consumption apparently at 11 mpg or around 20 litres per 100 km…

*The engine may not be beautiful, but it has all the torque you need!*

What’s always enchanted me with the Grand Wagoneer is its looks and of course, it’s wonderful fake wood! Jeep guarantees that not a single tree was chopped to produce the vinyl panels on the exterior, and the same seems to go for the inside. There’s definitely an 80’s chic around the panels but they do add visually to the body, making it look less heavy. By modern standards the Grand Wagoneer was of course less heavy not only in looks, weighing in at around two tons, around half a ton less than a modern, large SUV (in the traditional American way, the Wagoneer was a six-seater). Being the top of the line version the Grand Wagoneer also had a lot of equipment for the time, with stuff like premium speakers, central locking and windows, and even keyless entry on the last model years from 1989. Of course it also had the split tailgate like the Range Rover does, perfect for enjoying a cup of coffee out in the wilderness, or on whichever adventure your Grand Wagoneer has taken you.

*A perfect American mix of leather, cloth and vinyl!*

Any type of Wagoneer has gotten rare these days and even fewer are in the condition you want them to be. The original Grand Wagoneer additionally suffers from the doubtful long-term quality of fake wood, so I was really lucky to see one in such a good condition as the one in Oslo. The rarity is also seen in prices, with a good version costing at least EUR 40-50.000. Then again, for car that has such presence and literally invites you to take your family or friends out on any adventure you can think of, that really is a bargain. Fuel costs will stay somewhat reasonable given you’ll cruise around at moderate speeds, listening to your cassettes on the premium speakers. There will be some additional costs to pencil in though, unless you already have a pair of used Timberlands, a squared flannel shirt and a leather jacket that has lived as least as long as the Grand Wagoneer in the closet!

The simple life!

On November 20, 2022November 20, 2022 By ChristofferIn Classic cars, News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of Owning1 Comment

It’s a pretty established phenomenon that as we grow older, we tend to look back on our younger days with a feeling that life was both better and simpler then. That it was better is nothing but a myth as any statistic, and I do mean any statistic, will tell you. In terms of simplicity however, it’s a different story. Earlier this week I was sitting at a corporate dinner when the discussion turned to the early gigantic mobile phones at the turn of the 80’s and 90’s. I said something about life being simpler before the mobile phone and to my surprise, all of the far younger than me basically gave up a cheer.

Simplicity is of course something we’ve lost in the car world too. It feels like most new cars today have more chips than bolts (and quite some difficulty sourcing all of them!), and even a lightweight fanatic like Lotus has with the new Emira crossed the line to something more settled and mature for an audience today expecting more comfort, even in a Lotus. Not too long ago, this was very different, which is of course part of the charm of classic cars. So if you’re wishing for a simpler life and perhaps also for a classic set of wheels to put in your garage without having to rob the bank, let’s look at a cheap and simple option that has enchanted car enthusiasts for 60 years. A car that is one of the biggest successes of UK car industry ever, and that has also inspired further more modern legends, such as the Mazda Miata. I’m of course talking about the wonderful Triumph Spitfire!

The story starts in the UK in the late 50’s, when the UK car industry was cash strapped as always but not yet in the very dire straits it would find itself a few years later. Triumph watched the success Austin Healy was having with the Sprite, a simple roadster with a small engine and an equally small price tag launched in 1958. Triumph had themselves built the TR2 and TR3 since the early 50’s, but realized there was market share to be taken by marketing a cheaper and simpler car, that was still better than the Sprite. The design was commissioned to Giovanni Michelotti, a legendary Italian designer with cars from Maserati to Ferrari under his belt, but also less exotic ones of which notably quite a few for Triumph, including the TR4 and (later) the Stag.

And yet, the car that was to become one of few real successes of the UK car industry almost never happened. In 1960, Triumph was sold to Leyland Motors and in the midst of the merger, the Spitfire which at that time was only a single prototype, was forgotten in the corner of the Triumph factory in Coventry. If not for a Leyland manager poking around and finding the car under the dust, it may never have been. As it happened, not only did it come to be but it did so very quickly, as the first car was presented only 18 months later, in 1962. The name obviously comes from the Spitfire fighter plane from WW2 and it’s unclear to this day how Triumph agreed with Vickers, makers of the Spitfire plane, agreed to use the name – if they ever did.

*A Mk III interior – unlike later cars, the instruments are still in the centre*

Presented in 1962, The Triumph Spitire 4, where “4” represented the 1.1 litre, four-cylinder engine with 63 hp, was a simple car indeed. It only weighed around 700 kg so even with 63 hp, it had reasonable speed for the time, but the reason it weighed so little was that things we would tend to think of as quite standard even for classic cars, such as carpets and heating, were optional. It also had a very light folding top that should perhaps better have weighed a couple of kilos more, as it was almost impossible to use. Of course, at 63 hp, the Spitfire wasn’t what we would call a sports car today. It needed around 16 seconds to reach 100 km/h, but given you’re basically sitting on the road given how low the car is, that actually feels like plenty. Especially when you notice that the rear end is very lively indeed when the road starts to turn, something that wouldn’t be solved on later Spitfires until the 70’s.

The little modified Mk II Spitfire came in 1965 with now 67 hp. Sales in the US were really picking up and Triumph encouraged owners to race their cars on weekends, advertising any success they would have in the Triumph name. The “race on Sunday, sell on Monday” philosophy led to the Mk III in 1967 now with a larger engine at 1.3 litre, and – horray! – an updated soft top that could actually be closed. By this time you also got carpets in your Spitfire. By 1968, 100.000 Spitfires had been sold of which over half to the US. Two years later Michelotti did a pretty complete re-design for the Mk IV version, including the same rear lights as on the Triumph Stag, and a heater as standard. The final Spitfire 1500 that came in 1974 was the most powerful version there would be at 71 hp, however only outside of the US as there, emission regulations actually made it slower than its predecessors.

*The Spitfire 1500 with rear lights form the Stag. Objectively the best Spitfire.*

In the mid-70’s, the UK car industry was in full crisis mode and there was no money to further update the Spitfire as would have been required to keep the car competitive in view of increasing competition, notably from Japan. The GBP/USD exchange rate also meant the car became expensive in the US, with sales numbers starting to dip. The Spitfire would be with no further updates done to the car until the end of production in 1980. By then, over 300.000 Spitfires had been built with the last version, the 1500, representing about a third of total sales and no doubt also being the best car.

Even for an ex-TR4 owner like myself, driving a Spitfire as I did a few years ago, is a different experience. It feels like you literally sit on the ground, everything is smaller and trust me, the least of your concerns is a lack of speed, especially as the small four-cylinder produces a wonderful sound! That said, the early cars are perhaps a bit too simple even for those looking for the simple life this post started with. So if a Spitfire sounds like your thing, I would go for a late, 1500 car or if you prefer the earlier design, then for a Mk III. A good car will be yours for around EUR 15-20.000, a small price to pay for a pure driving experience. So leave the mobile phone at home, put on the gloves and go for a drive in a truly simple UK car legend!

Wonderful British quirkiness!

On October 23, 2022October 24, 2022 By ChristofferIn Classic cars, News, The Dream Garage, The Thrill of Owning1 Comment

There was a time not too long ago when the UK was perhaps together with Italy, the world’s greatest sports car nation. A large number of brands built various roadsters, coupés and GT’s, many of which have today become classics. Some are obviously more well-known than others, and their fame is often reflected in the astronomical prices many of them trade at today – think for example Aston Martin. What most of them have in common though, except Aston Martin and one-two others, is that they’re no longer around. The late 70’s and 80’s were a period of demise for the British car industry and through that, a number of highly original and quirky brands were lost. That’s of course how a market economy should work but just like with Saab a few decades later, it also meant losing a bit of the originality the car industry was characterized by not too long ago. One of the quirkier brands from this period is no doubt West Bromwich-based Jensen Motors, builders of the Jensen Interceptor of which I was lucky enough to see one earlier this week. This week we’ll therefore look closer at a quirky English brand, its cars and, well, the British view of the world beyond the channel! Jensen started as an automobile body manufacturer back in the 50’s, notably for the British car maker Austin Healy. Next to that however, the founding brothers Jensen decided to produce their own sports cars in small series. The first in line was a car with neither a very selling name (C-V8), nor a nice design – some would go as far as call it outright ugly. Jensen’s designer Eric Neale certainly didn’t think so but given the client is always right, the C-V8 was pretty much a complete failure.

It was the search for a somewhat more successful car than the C-V8 that led to the Interceptor, Jensen’s by far most well-known car, presented in 1966. This time the design had been commissioned to the Italians at Carrozzeria Touring (another company that would go bust a few years later) and although certainly more convincing than the C-V8, it was definitely still quite original. The front looked like many sports car in the day, the rear which in the UK became known as the “fish bowl”, is rather reminiscent of the 70’s AMC Pacer (which was of course designed after the Interceptor). If the exterior isn’t to everyone’s taste the interior is much more so, with a selection and quality of materials that led to the Interceptor being compared to high-end brands such as Aston Martin, Bristol or even Rolls-Royce.

We’ll make a quick pit stop here for a small side story that I find a wonderful illustration of Jensen and British car industry of the time. Jensen in parallel to the Interceptor built another model referred to as the FF. That’s actually a historic car as it was the first non-SUV passenger car with four-wheel drive, and thus highly innovative for its time. Neither in the 60’s nor now however does it snow a lot in the UK so if you build a four-wheel drive car close to Birmingham, you have to assume it was also intended for exports. All good so far. It’s just that no one in the Jensen factory apparently thought about the fact that most of the world outside of the UK by now had the steering wheel on the left side. So the FF only came as right-hand drive. Let’s just say it wasn’t a tremendous recipe for export success… Back to the Interceptor, which during the 10-year production came in three series with only subtle design differences between them but where the MK III was by far the most produced. The MK III also came with three different bodies: the most common “glass bowl” saloon, the much rarer and arguably better-looking convertible, and the ultra-rare coupé with a plexiglass rear. All three series had Chrysler big block V8’s and 3-speed automatic transmissions, but whereas the first two shared the same 6.3 litre, 325 hp V8 as the predecessor C-V8, the MK III had an even bigger, 7.2 litre engine, however at 285 hp with less power. This all had to do with the new US emission rules that limited the power of large engines quite heavily. Not only was the 7.2 litre engine less powerful, it was of course also heavier, and just a tad thirstier: apparently we’re talking 25-30 litres per 100 km (8-10 MPG) …

The convertible version of the Interceptor was presented in 1974 and is another example of Jensen’s risk-willingness or complete ignorance of the world beyond the UK, depending on how you see it. At this time most other brands were halting the development of new convertibles altogether, as it was widely expected that US safety authorities would enact a complete ban on open cars without roll-over bar. So Jensen was basically the only brand brave or foolish enough to launch a new convertible in this period. They were ultimately right given a ban was never enacted but they were kind of wrong anyway, since the whole company went bust only two years later, in 1976. By then they had produced about 500 convertibles, out of a total of some 6400 Interceptors.

Although the big block Chrysler engines were quite bullet proof, the fact that they all had carburettors and lots of them, didn’t make them any easier to run or service. The carburettors had to be adjusted frequently for optimal performance, apparently up to as often as every 1000-2000 km. Cooling was another issue Interceptors were known to struggle with and then there was of course the same issue as with all other cars in the 70’s – rust. You can certainly convert the engines to injection and upgrade the cooling system, an idea that some won’t like at all given the car is then no longer original. It will however be far more drivable, and thus possibly a solution for those preferring to spend time on the road rather than in the garage. Cooling and carburettors aside, the Interceptor is known as quite a wonderful GT car, offering loads of 70’s luxury and charm typically for far less money than a comparable Aston or Rolls (who as we all know also tend to have an issue or two…). There aren’t many in the market which makes pricing uncertain, but good saloons tend to start somewhere around EUR 50′ with convertibles costing much more. If this wonderful example of British ingenuity combined with a dinosaur-engine of a type will certainly never see again, then please make sure that if you’re not mechanically talented, you know someone who is, and go for a car as perfect as possible, as finding replacement parts for an Interceptor risks being as hard as finding a UK prime minister who will stay longer than a few months!

The Thrill of Driving

Category: The Thrill of Owning