I've thought the same thing about the falling number of car enthusiasts in the modern world, and the general lower interest in cars that are fun to drive.

NP all day long. Just swap out those US bumpers for some slimmer Euro ones and you're laughing.

Here was me thinking it was an MG Montego.

Exactly. I spend a fair amount of time wondering 'what if'. Triumph was definitely the British BMW (which is probably part of the reason BMW have kept hold of the nameplate and haven't done anything with it, stop someone trying to bring them back).

Drat. Ah well, they're fun enough as they are. 250bhp on a 2.0l race motor of this vintage is pretty damn impressive, so I doubt power will be an issue. Could definitely still keep carbs.

Sweet. That'd be excellent too. I wonder how many of those trucks are still around to pinch a drivetrain from (and whether it'd stand up to the torque of a Sprint engine).

Beautiful, but non-functional. Shouldn't be hard to cut a hole through though.

Big fan of the Beta actually. Sticking a Delta AWD system into one is on my long-term projects list, or even just one of the many hot versions of the Fiat twincam engine.

Good point, but it was still seen as a bit of a retrograde step, even if it was a successful one.

Thankyou, and thankyou again.

RWD is advantageous with the sort of power outputs you're seeing from sports cars nowadays, but there are distinct advantages to FWD at the lower power outputs common in the past. For instance, my FWD Alfa 156 has 187bhp compared to my mate's 189bhp BMW 325i, yet my car is faster in any test of acceleration above…

I'd go with that, but a bit broader. I'd say a sports car is anything that was designed from the ground up to be sporty. A sporty car is something that was designed as something else to begin with (such as an economy car or a GT) and then later converted to be sporty, like the Clio RS or the Jag XKR-S.

I will admit, RWD is more conducive to making a proper sports car. Also, it seems that part of a car being a sports car as opposed to a sporty car is having its own dedicated platform. Being built from the ground up as a sports car.

I'd say so. People seem to have forgotten that FWD was a pretty impressive technological advancement at the time. More predictable handling and better, especially in bad conditions than a lot of early RWD setups. For instance, when the Triumph 1300 was converted back to RWD for the Toledo and Dolomite it was widely…

You've picked two economy cars that have been given sporty apprehensions.

What an excellent analogy, although leprosy would also be applicable for the rust.

Rust on any classic car that isn't Swedish.

Just take the headlights and mirrors from this one and add it to the production version and it'd be good.

Swap 'museum' with 'really big shed' and it sounds much less pretentious.

I must say I much prefer the E21 to the E30. Much more shark-nosed.