The Mazda 1800 (and the more common predecessor the Mazda 1500) were much more common in Australia. Not very commonly modified or restored though, and surprisingly I have never seen one fitted with a rotary engine swap. I wonder if the seller had ideas of a rotary swap, since there are several rotaries in the…

Exactly. In no way is this ‘just another old Ford’, or even ‘just another old Custom car’. I wasn’t born until 17 years after this car was built, and I was born on the other side of the world, but as soon as I read the headline to this story I immediately thought “Hirohata Merc’. I can’t think of a single Lead Sled…

Down here in Australia Ford did a similar thing to create the Ford Landau from the Falcon coupe. The Landau was essentially a Falcon coupe fitted with the full Ford LTD front end, interior and luxury trim, different taillights and a vinyl roof to hide the tacked-in steel panels that shortened the side window openings.

I have regularly posted this picture to trigger people who don’t know the context, letting them think this was on a car I actually drove! In reality it was a scrap Datsun 4 stud wheel ‘modified’ purely to keep an old Valiant parts car on 4 wheels so I could roll it around as needed (it had no drivetrain, and by the…

My most extreme drag racing spectator experience was when we went to a meeting at Calder Park in Melbourne, where at that time there was banking directly behind the start line with a row of parking along the top. When the jet cars and rocket cars came out, all the spectators sitting on the banking quickly moved to…

It’s not like the people who DIDN’T survive being carried around in the trunk of their parents’ car will be able to post a dissenting opinion.....

This is the best version!

Since most of them are looking at the driver’s door, they are probably baffled by the 3 way windows.

Yes please! I want to see this race:

I rode my motorbike to the testing centre to get my Learner’s Permit and cheekily parked it right out the front in full view of the people at the counter.

YES. Massively complicated and finicky has been done!

This is Professor Charlie Squeakbean, found lost and alone in our back yard at 2 weeks old - now going on 3 years old and pursuing a fulfilling career in cat poetry.

It probably was a bit of an improvement over the basic leaf sprung rear end that the Escort originally had, but, knowing the guy that built it (who went on to establish his own performance workshop), I think it had been more a case of doing it because he could. The Datsun IRS setups were great for handling, but made…

MKII Escorts also have the master cylinder well away from the firewall, almost at the front of the engine bay.

I can confirm they are not entirely comfortable as a 4 seater - a friend’s mum had one when I was at school, and even when I was 8 years old I found there wasn’t enough room in the back for anyone who isn’t an amputee.

I did that on my fleet of Datsun 510s way back when. The factory dampers in the front struts weren’t cartridge units, so you could pull the damper assembly out, wash out the old oil and refill with suitably thicker stuff until you got the settings you wanted. Plus I got very good at measuring coil springs and…

I used to have an 850 coupe, except mine was a Series II (added ‘Kammback’ slight raised lip shape on the rear, and recessed driving lights on the front with a smaller nose emblem/trim) and I made a sticker for the back window that read “When I grow up, I want to be a Ferrari!”

Some years ago I saw a road registered homebuilt car (VERY difficult to manage in Australia due to regulations) that looked of similar build quality to “Geoff” from Top Gear, but shaped like a cheese wedge.

Another exotic option would be a Drysdale V8 - last price I saw had them in the area of $100,000USD. Australian built, with the top end of the engine based on Yamaha YZF600 barrels and heads. 154hp at 12,200rpm (but revs to 17,000rpm and sounds insane) with a 210kg dry weight.

Difficult to break, yes, but not unbreakable. Although to kill one required an oil line to break (Australian cars had the oil filter mounted externally with hard lines to the engine since the steering box interfered with the original filter location) soon after having had the oil pressure switch leak on a road trip…