I've driven and owned all sorts of interesting cars (a few that have been mentioned). Big fancy sport cars are unequivocally driven by rich people and are completely unapproachable; My experience is with Porsches, Aston Martins, expensive but unassuming cars like Mercs, Lexuses, Range Rovers. Mustangs are blasé and…
It is more metal, but it's not particularly curvy metal. That means it's a bit less trauma to replace.
Hella sweet! I used to drive a '62 VW Panel BUS (VWs aren't vans) daily, and it was a riot. I love bulldog ugly cabover trucks, and a little rust is OK if it's honest rust (as in, not covered in filler and turd polish).
Drum brakes are better PROVIDED they're adjusted regularly and properly. The fade piece has more to do with advancements in materials science than intrinsic design. In fact, drums have more surface area for cooling compared to discs if we're honest... If you have finned drums like the early Porcshes it's even less of…
More ground clearance than a Jeep in all trims. Seats 9 in passenger trims. Rated as a 1-ton truck in panel, single, and double cab configurations. Reliable when properly maintained, infinitely rebuildable when not. You can literally live out of them in camper trims. More character than any other car ever. Most…
I think I've seen that truck. Is that in Boulder?
I DD a rock stock '74 FJ40 (I posted a lengthy case for the FJ40's title above). I live up in the mountains where the ability to end up on your roof on the side of a twisty canyon road during a raging ice storm and still get home in one piece without calling in reinforcements (no cell phones) is mandatory. When your…
If the best SUV is defined as the best Sport Utility Vehicle (versus the more modern definition of soccer mom's kid hauler), I submit the Toyota FJ40 Land Cruiser for the title.
The way-too-many-buttons-for-a-steering-wheel concept has been expressed already, but I'll still be accused of sacrilege for sure... I think a lot of the recent pack of super cars (Ferrari shown) have ridiculous looking steering wheels that would be better suited in a Chuck E Cheese arcade than a 6-7 figure…
I'm glad someone else picked up on this. The Skip Fire is a crude cylinder deactivation that's missing some of the refinement of the OEM's variable displacement systems. Maintaining a constant speed doesn't require a whole lot of power (36hp will push a Beetle along at 80mph given a long enough straight, flat stretch…
I find it interesting that the Italian car enthusiasts states that Ghia is an American designer, unlike Pininfarina and co. I wonder what that's about? Slip of the tongue? It's certainly not Ghia's best work IMHO, so maybe he's trying to distance Ghia from the rest of the Italian carozzeria?
Get a good VW bus that you can sleep in (I prefer the earlier ones, but I only have to sleep two and a dog). Head out in a direction. When you stop, people will invariably want to talk to you about their youth (the VW bus is, in my experience, the most approachable classic car in existence). Ask them what they would…
There's also a Studebaker of the same general Ghia design (and likely others, as they kind of recycled them frequently across clients) though I forget the model name, but it's too chromed and aircraft-y to be anything but period kitsch. Weird propeller-esque grille thing aside, the nose on it looks like one of the…
Au contraire!
All that follows refers to the '55-'59 model year KGs as that's what I have experience with, though the model didn't change too much from year to year: From the a-pillars back (exterior), the only way to tell the difference from the same angle is the missing panel gap and vent for the air cooled engine,…
Practicing luthier here. Oak makes a fine tone wood. Re: Brian May. Similar in tone to mahogany. It can even be pretty when quartersawn.
Type 3. Parts available new all day, great aftermarket support (mechanically at least), and I imagine it would be fun to see the looks you get after loading the rear trunk, then head around and load the front trunk.
