A dive buddy owned one. You could stuff it full with gear and the hydropneumatic system would level the car. When I followed him in my Renault 18 GTL break, no way I could match his speed going over speed bumps in residential areas.

Nice lines. Did they hack the Mazda design center?

I assume the Lada has power assisted brakes. When the engine isn’t running, after a few presses on the brake pedal you run out of vacuum assist and the pedal turns hard. People who don’t know they have to stomp on the brake pedal will panic.

I don’t understand what is special here. What was the swap? I see a transverse inline 4 cylinder, what am I missing?

Great photographs. You worked hard to get so many good pictures. Sorry for raining on the parade but I hope you get the opportunity to invest in a lens that produces smoother background blur (bokeh). Yes, nerdy, but when you’ve seen both smooth and restless bokeh you’ll never fail to notice.

Todays gangster special for the king of the ‘hood: This Bentley Continental. If the motor ain’t blown, if the tranny ain’t slippin’, don’t bring that b*tch back trippin’!

There are 21 for sale in Germany at mobile.de. Minimum 8000 euro, maximum 118 000 (fully restored to new), median asking price 39 000 euro.

Yes it does. I met a German with his Subaru-VW van at a campsite on the Dutch coast. I heard him coming in and thought “Hmm, there’s something to the engine sound, deeper, smoother..” Don’t forget to install better brakes like he did.

Yep, impressive builder’s cleavage.

And ‘sufficient means’ is quite attainable when you can be satisfied with a beige 1997 V6 Camry and a sunburst yellow 1995 90 hp MX-5 like I am.

But it still makes sense to me. If you don’t rev the engine to the limiter and dump the clutch the Mazda is a bit faster. The Honda has more power but if you stay away from speeds where drag is limiting they are more or less equal to each other.The Mazda offers more mid range torque, the Honda offers the excitement of…

Put it in the context of a European country redeveloping after the civil war and the second world war and it gets more interesting. To me (Dutch) the Marbellas and Ibizas are interesting because my friends had them when I was studying and going on diving trips.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mort_%26_Phil I used to have a Dutch translation of this comic, never realized it was Spanish.

Three in a container. Very useful for putting a gun in the back and fighting a desert war.

We bought some pharmaceutical equipment from China. USD 25000 tabletting press had an ill fitting guide rail for the rotating punches but after some grinding it ran for 3 years until the gearbox gave up. It earned it’s money back but the operators are now much happier with a used (20 yr old maybe) Manesty-Casburt…

Do you own and drive a convertible with the top down at temperatures between 5 C and 15 C (40F-60F)? I open my MX-5 roof because the visibility is rubbish with the top up and I enjoy looking around and up during my 15 minute commute to work. Heating is set at max and I need the windows up to keep the heat in the car.…

I experienced this years ago in Egypt in a camp on a Red Sea beach. I can’t remember if the culprit rice was part of lunch or dinner. Around midnight I was vomiting violently next to my tent and the next day I was diving again.

I owned a Suzuki Carry when I lived on Bonaire, never had so much fun with a car since then. It was a rusted out ex-rental with holes in the floor caused by sea water leaking from dive gear. The holes in the passenger foot well came in handy when making a U-turn between curbs. It was the first rear wheel drive car I…

In the Netherlands we have this at T-intersections. The red and white sign is reflective.

My dad arrived late at a wedding in the seventies driving his 2CV in a headwind.