Five Classics That Aren’t Nearly As Fun To Drive As People Think They Are

I was reading a great article written by a fellow collector car journalist (who I know and respect greatly) about a vintage twelve-cylinder Ferrari. By the end of the profile, it was clear that the writer felt the car simply wasn’t as fun to drive as its reputation had people believe.

It got me thinking…I feel the same way about plenty of other collector vehicles. So many classics are “good” or “pretty”, but just simply not really inspiring or engaging. Here are five cars that are perfect examples of collector cars that should be great to drive (based on reputation, looks, conventional wisdom), but in reality are only slightly more fun than having your throat swabbed for strep:

1966-1990 Rolls-Royces
Big, opulent… and more expensive than a year’s worth of Tara Reid’s bar tabs, Rolls-Royces have always been an acceptable choice of royalty, executives and rock stars. Hell, Keith Moon put his into a swimming pool, so if Moon-The-Loon owned one, they must be fun!?!?

Actually, they’re not.

All Rollers from a period spanning a quarter-century drive like a 1977 Buick with Jabba The Hut in the back seat and Mama Cass in the trunk. Steering is vague, sloppy and too slow. Overwhelmed by the weight, the suspension wallows and the brakes are inadequate. And after taking away the R-R logos and the radiator mascot, you’re left with a vehicle that has fewer usable luxury amenities than contemporary German luxo-cruisers.

1967-1969 Chevrolet Camaros
I can hear the hate email filling-up my inbox right now. The first-generation Camaros are sweet-looking cars (especially the redesigned 1969.) You can’t help but smile when you see a good Hugger Orange RS/SS Camaro with black-and-white hound’s-tooth interior. At one time I even owned a ’68 V8 Camaro.

Unfortunately, unless the owner does significant modifications, first-generation (as well as all second-gen F-body cars, for that matter) are really a let-down to drive. To be fair, the Camaro’s problems aren’t any different from those found on all other GM products (and most from Ford and Chrysler). Given the Camaro’s Trans Am series success and pony car performance image, one expects more.

Cars with power steering provide zero feedback with skittishly-quick ratios, while the manual-steering boxes are slow and heavy. Brakes, either by optional discs or standard drums, are controlled with a numb, spongy pedal. Muncie manual transmissions require long throws that are less precise than Stevie Wonder’s skeet-shooting skills.

The first-gen Camaro’s lack of fun factor becomes most apparent in twisties, certainly if one has driven some of the contemporary European sports and grand touring cars. Third-generation Corvettes are almost as bad, but at least the smaller bodies provide a heightened sense of speed and capability. The F-body’s size combined with its disconnected controls, bouncy suspension and front weight bias, mean it is best in the hands of stoplight bandits and other go-straight-fast types.

Jaguar XJS
A painfully gorgeous coupe – even when sitting next to the E-Type model it replaced, sadly the XJS is also painful to drive. With a luscious V12 and meaty tires, the XJS should have been a great GT car.

It isn’t. There is less sensation via the steering wheel than profits in British Leyland bank accounts. Ergonomics were penned by a sadist, as it is one of the few cars ever made where a six-footer can simultaneously hit their head on the roof, knees on the wheel and dashboard, elbows on the door, and seatback on rear obstructions.

Actually, the best part of an XJS is that it is so unreliable…so shoddily designed, that most journeys are cut short by some type of major electrical problem.

Mercedes 450/500/560 SL
Despite being an icon of the yuppies, the 1973-1989 Mercedes SL range just wasn’t (and still isn’t) that fun to pilot. Yes, I’m fully aware that Mercedes wanted this generation to be fabulous touring cars (not sports cars), but uncomfortable seats (not fully remedied until after the new millennium), a cramped cabin, ponderous steering and brakes, and Bosch fuel injection that either runs rich at idle or lean at high RPMs mean that the SL is a serious let-down for drivers.

Triumph TR8
Take a V8 and throw it in a British roadster? Sounds like a no-lose recipe, especially when the ingredients are a comfortable, nimble TR7 convertible and the bulletproof all-aluminum Rover (originally Buick) 215-ci unit. Too bad the car turned out as less than the sum of its parts.

Collectors and enthusiasts call the relatively rare TR8 a “poor-man’s Cobra”, but as a former owner of both a TR7 and a TR8, I can assure everyone that the TR8 meets expectations like a QB taken in the first round by the Seattle Seahawks.

The TR7’s Lotus-like handling make it a really fun car to drive hard. After quality improved and a full convertible came into production, all it needed was more power and better brakes to take America by storm.

The TR8 seemed to accomplish this in theory (although initial TR8 prototypes were actually coupes). The aluminum 215 V8 not only weighed slightly less than the 7’s iron two-liter four cylinder, but also had a reputation for being able to produce tons of power when properly tuned. However, when the TR8 hit the shores, the extra cylinders delivered only an additional 47 hp (to 133 SAE Net hp). As delivered, the TR8 actually managed to weigh more than the TR7, courtesy of the parts associated with the new standard power steering and vacuum-assisted braking systems.

On the road the TR8’s power steering feels a universe away from the responsive feel of the unassisted unit in the TR7. Even worse, TR8 power brakes are mushy as leftover Caesar salad, yet do nothing to reduce stopping distances. Finally, the changes in clutch and transmission parts and configuration to accommodate the additional torque make it harder to find gears.

Triumph might have wanted to give us the best of Britain and America in one package, but the instead the TR8 seems nothing more than a TR7 put through a 1960’s Big-Three sensation filter.

La Dolce Vita Automobili Will Compete With Concorso Italiano on August 14, 2009

La Dolce Vita Automobili will be held at Black Horse at the same time Concorso Italiano, which has announced that it will also return to the greener pastures of a fairway. Four Wheel Drift covered Concorso’s event in 2008, which was relocated to the concrete hell of the Marina Airport.

While normally the Italian machine enthusiasts would love another event, it seems La Dolce Vita Automobili has created a big problem. In a week where it is was already impossible to attend all of the events due to conflicting schedules, La Dolce Vita ensures neither Italian car concours will be as good as Concorso two years ago.

Owners of Ferrari, Lamborghini, Fiat, Alfa, Maserati, and other Italian cars are already trying to decide which event to attend. There’s no doubt that clubs and popular online chat communities like Ferrarichat.com will be forced to “pick sides”.

The bottom line is that adding La Dolce to the schedule not only hurts Concorso, but also the Italian car enthusiast community. Don’t misinterpret our statement: if La Dolce can be the better Italian Concours for the Pebble Beach week, then they deserve to be the lone event, but there is no possible way for two Italian car shows to exist in the same metropolitan statistical area on the same day without the enthusiasts and collectors being hurt.

So we suggest that the La Dolce team sit down with the new owners of Concorso and decide who will “buy out” the other…or at least figure out who will eventually run out of cash in a number of years…

…because that will save us — the real car enthusiasts from getting only half the story when we are able to attend only one event each year until La Dolce or Concorso finally reschedules or dies.

Concorso Italiano’s New Owner Hits A PR Home Run

Concorso Italiano 2008 was a disaster. We were there…and like others, we reported that while we loved the cars and people, the Marina Airport venue was a disaster of New Coke levels.

The new owner of the Concorso Italiano just sent this email to press and past exhibitors. One thing is for certain: any owner who can hit a PR home run so quickly is very capable of ensuring there are many bright days ahead for the world’s best show for Italian vehicles!!!

Dear Fellow Enthusiast,

Please allow me to introduce myself. My name is Tom McDowell. I recently acquired the Concorso Italiano from Jack and Leslie Wadsworth. For many years, the Concorso has been a trend setting show with many traditional aspects that all have anticipated and enjoyed each year. From humble beginnings in the early 90s evolved a special camaraderie that most of you have shared. The founders, Frank and Janet Mandarano, brought in legendary Italian personalities who were honored to be part of the experience of being with you, their fans, in a one-on-one basis on a lush green lawn surrounded by the cars they had designed, raced, or engineered.

I understand well, that great moment when Piero Ferrari, Sergio Pininfarina and Luigi Chinetti Jr. drove up on stage with Piero driving the 3-seat Ferrari Dino Concept and the three of them began discussing their fathers and their lives in their father’s business. The huge audience gathered in and around the overflowing bleachers. Their questions were answered – all in good humor – and the cacophony from the paparazzi cameras signaled this was something very special, and it was!

We, the new Concorso owners, believe that holding the 2008 event at the Marina airport was an unfortunate decision. It will not happen again. We seek to quickly return the Concorso experience back to the one you have known in the past.

I have now been the owner of CI for two weeks and have had time to speak with several past guests, and read the letters and press reports. Clearly, many of you take a more personal interest in this gathering of fellow enthusiasts and perhaps have a “protective” and/or somewhat “territorial” feeling about it. You may even feel cheated or let down.

Like many of you, I am not pleased with this unwelcome turn of events and vow here and now to correct Concorso Italiano. It will be steered back to its core beginning-to a place we all enjoyed for the right reasons.

SO AFTER ALL THE TALKING IS DONE WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO?

We plan to return Concorso to a beautiful golf course on the peninsula in 2009. A classic car should always be displayed on a green lawn. The venue will be agreed upon shortly. Our goals for the provision of a wonderful dining experience at a reasonable cost and the experience you all should expect, are at the forefront of our minds.

That said, we would like to hear directly from you about your own expectations and special things you might like to see at this very special event. We want to know what you, the true enthusiasts, are thinking. Please email us at ci@concorso.com or call (425) 742-0632. We are most serious about making Concorso Italiano the first-rate experience for you, your families, and your friends that it has been in the past. We will be listening. And we plan to make the 2009 gathering one to remember.

Very truly yours,
Tom McDowell
Mercer Island WA.

The Incomplete Guide to Buying a Car for Your Teen – Part Deux

Everyone (except the parents) knew the teen driver would wreck this car

One of the most popular articles I’ve ever written and published here on the Four Wheel Drift is “The Incomplete Guide to Buying a Car for Your Teen”. Today I’ll try to expand on the original guide by showing what happens when parents don’t follow some common sense guidelines.

No matter how many times I say it, parents just don’t seem to get the concept that the best vehicle for a teen should not reflect what a parent currently wants in their own car OR what they would have liked when they were in high school. Furthermore, no matter how much a parent loves their child or how they’d like to believe the teen is responsible, a good, loving parent should look at their children the same way a insurance companies do: with a heartless and emotionless analysis of the risk of incurring financial and human loss.

From a pure numbers perspective, giving a teen a high-horsepower sports car or high-speed GT is a akin to giving them three guns with a single bullet and asking them to juggle the guns (safeties off, of course) — once a day for ten minutes. Eventually, something bad is going to happen.

And as much as you’d like to believe otherwise, if your teen wants a fast car, it is specifically because they want to experience going fast. Since you’re not taking them to the track for autocross, they’re finding the limits of adhesion on populated public roads.

Some Real Outcomes of Bad Parental Car Buying Decisions
One of the benefits of spending time around a mechanic’s shop with a tow company located in the next building is that I get to see many bad outcomes of foolish decisions parents make. Here are a few favorites from just the last month. (Yes, these are just from the last month!!!)

305hp+16yo=THIS

The Mustang Cobra Calamity:
So, your 16-year-old son comes to you and says he wants you to buy him a used Mustang Cobra…what do you say? You should say “Over my dead body”, because you’re increasing the risk of his dead body if you say yes.

Unfortunately, a local family felt differently. It was this 3400-pound 1990’s Mustang Cobra with 305 horsepower that a 16-year-old crashed into a tree. I should make it crystal clear that an irresponsible kid will find a way to crash anything…and any modern car is capable of deadly speeds, but a high-horsepower sports (or sporty) car statistically increases the probability of high-risk driving behavior.

Given the damage, it is apparent the driver induced an oversteer condition, which sent the car’s passenger side rear rotating towards a tree at high speed. While the speed limit was reportedly 35 mph, this car evidently hit at equal or greater speed. Racers know that when a car skids, it scrubs-off speed quickly, so to hit a tree at the speed limit, the car would have to be exceeding the speed limit prior to the skid.

Luckily the driver had no rear seat passengers, otherwise the deformation to the area behind the b-pillar could have easily resulted in the right-side-rear seat occupant being struck in the head and killed.

If you believe he was only doing 35 mph, then I have a bridge to sell you!

The Case of “What Do You Get A Son Who Has Already Wrecked Three Cars?”:

This is one of the most sickening cases of car-related parental failure/insanity I have witnessed in a long time. Last week I was rebuilding Weber carburetors for the Ferrari 308 GT4 at my friend’s shop when a couple who regularly have their cars worked on in the shop came in and asked the owner to take a look at their son’s car in the impound yard next door. Their eighteen-year-old son had “been in an accident” the previous night.

The car in the yard looked nothing like the rare Euro-spec Mercedes E190 1.5-16 (a competitor to the BMW’s first-generation M3) the parents had bought the son after he had wrecked no less than three previous cars. Each time, the parents believed the impacts were the result of some unfortunate, unforeseen incident that wasn’t the fault of the boy. Of course, the parents didn’t want to believe that their little darling was responsible for these single-vehicle impacts, all which had signs of hitting something (like a curb) at high speeds.

So they found this rare car — one that Mercedes built to homologate the model for production touring car racing. While the 200 ballpark horsepower produced by the Cosworth-designed 16-valve engine seems tame by modern standards, the taught suspension and close-ratio gearbox make it tempting to drive the vehicle hard and fast.

Certainly, this fourth obvious combination of speed, irresponsible behavior and destruction would finally change the parent’s opinion, right? Nope… the mom explained that her son had been driving home the previous night and hit a “slippery patch” on a corner going the 35 mph speed limit. The slip, the mom explained, forced the car into a tree, which in turn launched the the Mercedes onto its top, and ended with the car sliding upside-down some additional hundreds of feet.

One look at the car and it was apparent that the driver had to have been going at the very least 60 mph to have impacted the tree at no less than 50 mph to cause the extent of the damage. The question: was it my place to explain that the son’s story didn’t hold water?

Softly and cautiously, I expressed my amazement to the mother that the son had escaped with just a small cut on his arm and a minor concussion, “because that car had to hit the tree at well over 50 mph for this amount of lateral distortion of the rear to occur.”

Quickly, the mother defended the son’s story.

The father, with whom I’d stood as he examined and arranged to buy his son’s “dream car” just eight months prior, looked up at explained that he had already been on eBay to find a replacement. He also asked if the shop owner’s VW Corrado project was possibly for sale.

I walked away in disgust.

Back in the shop with the customers still in the yard, one of the employees walked behind the counter and removed a note with a stack of $10 bills stapled to the wall. The note contained employee estimates of time it would take for the teen to total this car – all wagers had been made the day the car was purchased.

The moral to the story: Don’t lie to yourself about your children. Almost every single teen is a bad driver due to inexperience. Of that group, a large percentage suffers from a gross lack of respect for physics.

Data proves that collisions involving teen drivers are usually caused by speed and driver error. If the impact is a result of speed, following too closely, or inattentive driving, that’s not an accident…it’s negligence.

An accident means someone hit them and there wasn’t a single thing they could do…or at very least a totally unforseen event like a wheel/tire/suspension/mechanical failure. You know it’s an accident when the insurance companies consider it one, like with deer and dog strikes being treated as comprehensive claims. By the way, if your teen claims an animal hit them, they better produce a carcass, or at least a good fur or blood trail.

A parent who buys a fast car for their teen has no right to refer to a single vehicle collision as an accident. When a parent gives a untrained child a loaded weapon and tells them to play with it, the parent’s sanity should be questioned.

Don’t be an insane parent! The Injury, Accident and Theft Loss and Driver Death Rates reports compiled by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety prove which vehicles are more dangerous due bad engineering, cheap materials, poor performance…and most importantly the nuts behind the wheel. (If you think your child is different than the “typical” owner of a specific vehicle, you’re not only fooling yourself, you’re violating the laws of demographic and statistical analysis.)

Want your teen to be safe on the road? Follow these simple rules:
1) Buy a front-wheel-drive midsize-to-large sedan that actual data (from the IIHS reports) proves is safe: These cars are statistically the safest on the road, providing a good blend of size, stopping ability and platform rigidity to allow room to live when the vehicle rolls or is hit. Rear-wheel-drive cars, especially those with high-torque engines and close-ratio transmissions are easy to put into a spin.

2) Buy safety options– they save lives and are far cheaper than medical bills: The more airbags, the better. Get stability control and anti-lock brakes too!

3) Tires, tires, tires, tires: The safest cars are still dangerous on old tires. Invest in new tires of good quality. Options, prices, reviews, and survey results are available quickly online at Tirerack.com.

4) It isn’t about you: Buy a safe car for your teen, not a car that you thought would have been cool when you were his or her age. Just like many of you, I love old cars…I have a bunch of them, but classic cars don’t make safe daily drivers. With no airbags, crumple zones, ABS and with a habit of breaking down, they’re bad choices. (Just ask any ER or orthopedic surgeon how many horrible injuries they see from people who get hit while sitting in or standing next to their broken-down car on the highway!)

5) Understand what message the car your teen drives sends. Others will have opinions about your purchase, especially the kids at school. No matter how much money you have, buying your teen a brand new high-priced car is NOT OKAY. Do you really want classmates to hate and mock your son or daughter for being spoiled or snooty simply because they drive an expensive car? Nobody ever is disliked for driving a Buick or minivan, but sports cars and luxury rides ruin friendships and create bad reputations, no matter how undeserved. (I went to high school with kids from some of the Northwest’s richest families, and these multi-generational big-money kids all drove their mom’s hand-me-down station wagons to teach them the value of money and the relative importance of cars to things such as education and achievement.)

6) Whatever you end up buying, train your teen to drive it well and lead by example.

7) Protect your investment! Get as much uninsured/underinsured motorist coverage your policy will allow. It’s cheap and protects your teen, as well as their car.

8 ) Don’t be fooled: Would you rather have an angry teen riding the bus or a dead teen you can visit any time you’d like at the cemetery. If your child doesn’t exhibit the responsibility to drive, don’t buy them a car, period. And never, ever, ever, believe their version of a story that ends in their car wrapped around a tree.

It Was A Hell Of A Speech, Mr. President, But…

I left D.C. and my job as a Congressional staff member fifteen years ago. I don’t write about politics, but I do appreciate great political writing. President Obama’s was one hell of a speech. You’d have to be the most bitter hater of Americans or American Democrats to think otherwise.

But…

The staff here at Sam Barer’s Four Wheel Drift would like to correct our President (and his writers). The President made reference to America as “the country that invented the automobile”.

Sorry, Mr. President, it wasn’t the United States of America!!! You must have been watching too much Schoolhouse Rock “Mother Necessity” (which claims Henry Ford invented the car.)

While Frenchman Nicholas Cugnot’s steam car in 1769 is believed to be the first self-propelled vehicle, usually Germany’s Karl Benz and Gottleib Daimler are considered the “inventors of the automobile” back in 1885. France’s De Dion-Bouton also beat Americans to the punch.

GM Revisits 1972 Again

While everyone else is talking about General Motors’ move to spin-off Saab to allow the unit to declare bankruptcy alone, over here we felt its later press release was more important. According to the company, resources from its High Performance Vehicle Operations have been diverted to other units.

This basically means that all those fun cars like the Corvette ZR1, Caddy V series, Chevy SS series, and other vehicles are S-O-L. It feels like 1972 again – when high insurance costs and a fuel crisis spelled the end of corporate support for all things high-horsepower (high compression small block engines, Hemis, multi-carb setups, race-spec cars on production order sheets). At the time, GM stopped funding sports cars and convertibles to focus more on the rapidly evolving compact segment.

So what do those of us at The Four Wheel Drift have to say about this?

About frigging time GM did something smart!

Look, we like hi-po cars probably more than you do. (Did you pick up your five-year-old from preschool in a Corvette today? Sam did!) But at the end of the day, low-production sports cars can’t save a company. What saves companies are high-volume, good profit cars like mid-size and compact sedans that sell due to being without a doubt better than the competition.

We couldn’t help noticing that last week GM quietly moved its product czar, Bob Lutz, to the corner as a part of what we call “executive cleansing”. While we love Lutz’s damn-the-torpedos approach to the world and his love for sports cars, he’s certainly been wrong more times than he’s been right on high-profile products. Lutz has been part of the problem — too much emphasis on ego products using horsepower numbers (like the GTO and Caddy V) to improve brand image, rather than using a bottom-up overhaul to finally put complaints about quality, cheap materials, lack of refinement, and inferior technology, which affects perception of the whole corporation. You can’t make all of Pontiac look good if all ya have as an example is a G8, which is at best a higher-horsepower “alternative” to BMW or Infiniti. Consequently, GM has also put Pontiac’s name in the news: the nameplate is going to be reorganized so that it is no longer a “stand-alone brand” — instead being a model lineup sold at Buick-GMC dealers.

Along with Lutz, the corporation canned its head of dealer relations, which is a good move. GM seemingly never (with the exception of with its Saturn division, which unfortunately is scheduled tol be dissolved in 2012) understood that much of the corporation’s problems have stemmed from a network of poorly-trained, and therefore completely inept, dealer service entities. GM has yet to connect the dots between perception of quality and the fact that — especially with higher cost vehicles like Caddies and Corvettes, the dealer’s inability to solve a maintenance issue reflects on the brand image.

It is going to be a long road going ahead. Putting Saab’s small market share and high warranty costs out to pasture shows good judgment. Stealing from HPVO to build better core-market products is even smarter.

Hold onto those Corvette ZR1s and Z06s, because unlike Confederate Dollars, they’ll be worth something someday…kind of like 1971 Hemi ‘Cudas and other kings of the previous American performance wars.

The Best Vehicles in Which to Lose One’s Virginity

Ford Escort: Doing it in the back of this car screams: 'I'm paying someone to take my virginity' (Photo:FoMoCo)

Cars and sex …it’s a combination as old as America and apple pie. And if I had somehow forgotten this due to not hearing yet in 2009 Meatloaf’s “Paradise By the Dashboard Light”, I was quickly reminded during a liquor-induced discussion at a recent get-together of preschool moms for their “Ladies’ Night”.

Yes, thanks to being the one who a) shuttles my kids to and from school and b) is always exploring new ways of making jokes that crack-up parents during show and tell, I was invited by the moms of my daughter’s preschool classmates as they let their hair down and frequently raised their drink glasses up.

Late in the night one of the moms disclosed that not only did she lose her virginity in a vehicle, but also the model name was so apropos for the event that it immediately became the anchor at number one as I started forming this — the “Four Wheel Drift List of the Best Vehicles in Which to Lose One’s Virginity.”

BUT before the Top Ten, we all have to remember that not all people (well, make that not all girls) are willing to go all the way, so first I must disclose that the best car for a bunch of heavy-petting has to be the Ford Maverick Grabber.

AND

Not to forget those without a willing partner – the “ménage-a-moi” types. If you’re going to get caught in your car servicing yourself, a Ford Aspire is appropriate.

Now, without further delay –

The Best Vehicles in Which to Lose One’s Virginity

10) Mercury Cyclone Spoiler: Because it’s only her first time once.

9) Hillman Minx: Go in with a prude, come out with a Minx.

8 ) Nissan Pathfinder: Perfect for two naked newbies fumbling about while following treasure trails.

7) Ford Escort: Unfortunately, some people have to pay to play.

6) Mercury Cougar: Mrs. Robinson, are you trying to seduce me?

5) Gilbern Invader: Invader? You don’t have to ask a guy twice!

4) (Tied) Ford Probe, AMC Javelin, Dodge Lancer, Pontiac Torpedo, Bonnet Missile: Protect your Probe, Javelin, Lancer, Torpedo, or Missile with a clean cover before parking it in her garage.

3) Swallow Sabre: Two words any guy would want to hear in the same sentence from a lady — Swallow and Sabre.

2) Chrysler Conquest Tsi: If it’s that important initial Conquest, Tsi probably is an acronym for “Ten-Second Intercourse”.

1) And finally, where a real-life preschool mom actually lost her virginity:

in the truck bed of a Chevy LUV.

Chris Bangle Takes His Butt and Leaves BMW

Four Wheel Drift’s Sam Barer with Chris Bangle at the Pininfarina Rolls-Royce Hyperion launch at Pebble Beach in August, 2008

Our friends over at Keith Martin’s Sports Car Market just broke the news that Chris Bangle is leaving his post as Chief of Design at BMW. American-born Bangle has led design at the German company since 1992 and has overseen the look and feel of all its current products.

Bangle is best known for the controversial multi-angle rear treatment on the 2002 BMW 745i, which journalists nicknamed “The Bangle Butt.” Love it or hate it, the edgy style was adopted by almost every other major automaker. We found that specific 745i to look muscular and bold from most angles…and from the driver’s seat, quite honestly, it was the most comfortable and best performing large sedan we’d ever driven.

When Four Wheel Drift staff met up with Bangle at the unveiling of the Pininfarina Rolls-Royce Hyperion during the Pebble Beach Concours weekend this past summer, we found him to be smart, warm, funny, stylish, and exactly as quirky as you’d want your design head to be. When we remarked about how we have always found it unconscionable that so many other journalists found themselves unable to accept the Bangle Butt and credit it with influencing current offerings from automakers world-wide, Bangle simply smiled and said “If I was smart I would have trademarked that phrase: ‘Bangle Butt’.”

Tireless and hyper-competitive, the still quite young Bangle designs everything from cars to neckties, so don’t expect to see him fully retire. We do wonder, though, if this means that BMW NA Museum boss Paul Ianaurio will need to find another co-driver for vintage rallies. Ianaurio and Bangle have been notorious for winning vintage rally events in classic BMWs (laughing and joking the whole way despite competitive desires in both men to win.) We’re going to email Ianaurio and offer our services.

The team at Apexstrategy.com and The Four Wheel Drift know that the world hasn’t heard the last of Chris Bangle or seen the last of his groundbreaking and controversial designs.

“Extreme Bentley” will be revealed in Geneva

If the 200+-mph Continental GT is simply not crazy enough for your day-to-day needs, Bentley leaked today that they will soon unveil the “Extreme Bentley”. The car will debut on March 3rd at the Geneva Auto Show.

So what exactly does the Extreme Bentley deliver? Nobody really knows for sure, but what we do know is that it will have the company’s most powerful engine ever. Additionally, the vehicle will be flex-fuel capable, meaning gas and ethanol. Quite honestly, we wouldn’t be surprised if the Extreme Bentley comes with a flux capacitor with a Mr. Fusion conversion to generate the 1.8 gigawatts necessary to beat the current lineup of cars wearing the Flying B that have 700-plus lb-ft of torque produced under the bonnet.

Bentley did release a teaser shot of the front of the car. Unfortunately, it doesn’t show much other than the front fascia, which looks like the lovechild of a Continental and a Lamborghini. It’s not particularly pretty, but it might “work” with the rest of the car.

The New King…Make That New -Queen- Of Collector Car Trivia

As usual, the Classically-Tough Trivia Quiz puzzled many of the best automotive minds. Like in previous years, after sifting through the submissions, we found the average score was well under ten points.

That’s where “usual” stopped and Classically-Tough “firsts” began. For the first time in the CTTQ’s history, the contest was won a) by a non-American and b) by a person lacking a Y-chromosome.

Congratulations to the new Queen of Classic Car Trivia Isabelle T. from Nova Scotia. Not only did she win with a score of 20 out of the possible 34 points – she CRUSHED everyone else by a huge percentage.

If you didn’t get a chance to take the Classically-Tough Trivia Quiz, you can try your hand at it here before reading the answers.

Here are the answers:

1) The Honda CVCC (Compound Vortex Controlled Combustion) was the first car certified by the US Government as compliant with model-year 1975 regulations contained in the Clean Air Act. More surprisingly, unlike every other car to eventually meet the regulations, it did so without the use of a catalytic converter.

2) The back cover of Road & Track throughout the 1950s was dominated by advertisements for Jaguar.

3) Ferrari model name designations corresponding to specific races included: LM (Le Mans), TdF (Tour d’ France, such as the 250GT TdF pictured above as it crossed the auction block at RM in Monterey, CA this past August), MM (Mille Miglia), TF (Targa Florio), Monza, and Mexico. Interestingly, the 365 GTB/4 was never officially named “Daytona”.

(Ferrari 250GT TdF) 

4) Dutch-based Spyker built mostly Benz-powered sports and racing cars starting in 1898, but ended production in 1925. It revived auto production in 2000 with high-end Audi-powered sports cars.

5) The base Corvette ballooned to its heaviest in 1978 at 3,572 pounds, but 1975 offered its all-time worst base power-to-weight ratio.

6) While 1971 was the last year for Porsche’s carbureted air-cooled six-cylinder, there were actually two models with two displacements. The 911T had a 2.2 liter, but the rare 914/6 used a 2.0.

7) In typical Colin Chapman style, the Lotus Elan 1600 Series 1 utilizes the front fame crossmember to store vacuum for the purpose of raising the headlights? Unfortunately, the inherent moisture in a vacuum tank helped to rust the member. Those that didn’t rust often were damage by curbs and bumpers.

8 ) Say what you want about the Edsel’s styling, but it’s hard to find many cars that came with more standard horsepower in 1958. The only vehicles to offer more power were the Baby-Hemi-powered Chrysler 300D, Chrysler New Yorker and DeSoto Adventurer, as well as Edsel’s FoMoCo big brothers Lincoln Capri, Lincoln Premiere and Mercury Park Lane.

9) Although Toyota eventually built the 2000GT, it was Nissan which originally contracted Yamaha and stylist Albrecht Goertz in 1963 to create a two seat sports car. Backing out after the initial prototype, Yamaha approached Toyota.

10) The last time Lincoln offered a vehicle with less than 100 advertised horsepower was 1929.

11) Krit used a swastika as its emblem. Unlike the later NAZI symbol, the Krit’s swastika was not tilted on end.

12) Fiat’s Lingotto plant brought raw materials in at ground level and moved finished cars onto the roof above the fifth story to the test track.

13) In celebration of its victory of the first Mille Miglia, cars from the Italian automaker OM begin the tribute La Festa Mille Miglia each year.

14) In 1969 Pontiac marketed the Le Mans, Trans Am and Grand Prix despite not competing in any of the synonymous races.

15) Buick initially used the Riviera name to denote a hardtop body style (without a fixed B-pillar.)

16) The Ford Mustang was initially only available in Raven Black, Caspian Blue, Skylight Blue, Guardsman Blue, Poppy Red, Rangoon Red, Dynasty Green, Pagoda Green, Cascade Green, Chantilly Beige, Prairie Bronze, Sunlight Yellow, Vintage Burgundy, Wimbledon White, and Silversmoke Gray.

17) Thanks to turbocharging, the 2.2-liter 146-horsepower Chrysler LeBaron/Dodge 600 had the best horsepower to cubic-inch ratio at 1.0814 hp/cu in., beating Ford’s 5.0 Mustang (.662) and Smallblock Corvette (.657). Ford’s turbo SVO Mustang offered a better ratio, but was on available as a coupe.

(1986 Dodge 600ES Turbo Convertible)

18 ) Legendary automotive journalist Tom McCahill penned one of the greatest automotive reviews of all time about the 1951 Jowett Javelin. He wrote that the Javelin “cornered like a porpoise with heartburn”, was styled “like a bride’s first cake: taken out of the oven too soon”, and that “I didn’t know whether to spray it with an aerosol bomb or pat it on the flank.”

19) BMW and Cadillac both have produced engines with six different cylinder counts. BMW’s include the 2-cyl of the Isetta, as well as 4,6,8,10, and 12 cyls in more modern cars. Cadillac’s first car had just a single cylinder, but 4, 6, 8, 12, 16-cylinder Caddies have also been produced.

20) After getting fed-up with the poor reliability of his car James Ward Packard had a less-than-helpful meeting with the President of Winton. During the meeting Mr. Winton challenged Mr. Packard to do better.

21) The extra credit question asked to identify a picture of the famous Buick Y-Job, the vehicle usually recognized as the world’s first concept vehicle. After it completed its tour of many shows and exhibitions, designer Harley Earl put it to use as his daily driver for many years