I drove maybe three of those vintage 300Zs. they were delightful. At one point Road & Track declared it the most beautiful sports car ever made. Thing of it is, though? That vintage put big nerfy plastic bits everywhere. I built a 4x4 TR-7 a good 30 years before "battle wagons" were cool. The only place I could find one in New Mexico was a junkyard that was also the official Aston Martin repair shop for the mountain west; the guy who ran it was a raging drunk who had a number of interesting critters lying about (2 dead Lotus 7s, a Lotus Sprint, a whole bunch of Abarth stuff). Occupying center field was an Aston Martin Lagonda that he had apparently been working on for two and a half years without getting it back to its owner. One of the things I hate about this timeline is the Aston Martin Lagonda I didn't buy in the early 2000s is now a $350k car, despite the fact that everyone acknowledges what an utter and total piece of shit it is.
I mean, does anyone ever think of The Virage when they think of cool, memorable cars?
Yeah man I remember when you could get into an e-jag for less than $20k. They're positively stratospheric now. I think if I were to pick one horrifically-impractical parade float of unreliability from that era it would be the Ferrari Dino 246. Have you ever really thought about how much fun it must have been to have been Roxette? Like being Abba but there's only two of you and you have power chords. Shit. The girl died in December. I guess I have to spend the rest of the day listening to Roxette and dreaming of Ferrari Dinos. PROTIP: if you set your sights on truly unattainable cars, you will never be tempted to murder.
that little Dino is.... cute? it makes me think of those Fiero Ferrari kit cars people assemble. It's awesome in all the right ways. the shot of the jag's mechanical throttle made my heart race. What a beautiful car.I guess I have to spend the rest of the day listening to Roxette and dreaming of Ferrari Dinos.
unattainable cars
I think without the Fiero the kit car industry would have died in '84. SO many different flavors of "almost" are based on that chassis. To me a Dino is a mid-engined sports car that isn't trying too hard. It was supposed to be like the Ferrari Lite of the era; if you truly wanted to go fast, you bought a 365 like a real man. They're stratospherically expensive for what they are, too. 2.4L of Italian unreliability for a mere $250k? Sign me up please! But they're the curviest little creatures. If I could buy one for a tenth what they go for I'd sure think about it.
I've talked with two different people before that both say they regret selling their Acura NSX's about a year or two before the prices sky rocketed. I can't say I have any regrets, but the two special cars I came closest to buying was a used 2003 Mach 1 Mustang that I decided was way too much car for me and the guy at the dealership was overly aggressive in trying to get me to buy it, so I wasn't comfortable and a first generation Toyota Celica on Craigslist that I could have afforded to buy, but it was in no way a practical daily driver and buying it would have emptied my savings account. To this day, I regret selling my El Camino, especially for so cheap, but you know, when rent is due in two days and your roommate at the time is unreliable, you gotta do what you gotta do. I loved that car. It was rusted and ugly and beaten up and barely ever worked, but it was awesome.One of the things I hate about this timeline is the Aston Martin Lagonda I didn't buy in the early 2000s is now a $350k car, despite the fact that everyone acknowledges what an utter and total piece of shit it is.
I was at a trade show in Vegas in 2000 or 2001. That's back when the Imperial Palace still had a "car museum" in their penthouse; it had been a Duesenberg museum and was in the process of converting to a used car lot before the whole thing went away. Up at the top, tucked into a corner, forgotten and ignored, was a Lancia Stratos. This Lancia Stratos. I think they wanted $30k for it, but they said they'd take $25k. Which was definitely more than I could afford, and substantially less than the $475k it went for in 2018, and substantially less than the $1.5m several models went for in 2003-2006. A $25k car bought in 2002 and sold for $475k in 2018 would be a 19x appreciation factor. That used to bug me a bit. Then I bought Ethereum at Frontier and decided that regret never gets you anything. My auto shop teacher had a 1931 Mach 1 with the Boss 429 Hemi in it. It sat there rusting away, year after year. He drove it every day but never did anything about the salt damage. Still breaks my heart.
Why did you have to remind me that this awesome website exists? It fills me with "wants" and "gimmes" and nothing even extreme. I mean, look, at less than $2,000 currently, I really, really want this Toyota Tercel. Dala, baby, this car will fix 2020 for us, I just know it.
The cars I lusted for and couldn't afford, contemporaneously, were modest. A friend's little sister was straight up gifted a Subaru XT Coupe at sixteen while I was running carbs through the dishwasher to try and get my donor RX-4 running. We used to haunt the car lots because it was something to do and there was just something about the perpetually-unattainable Mazda MX3. DOHC 1.8L V6, y'all. A kid showed up at college. His dad had bought him one for graduation. He was a nice enough guy but forever a spoiled brat in my eyes. Another kid in school had a family tradition where Grandma and Grandpa gave them $15k towards the car of their choice the minute they turned 16. I had very carefully calculated that to be more than enough money to buy a 1982 Lotus Esprit and put a Rover/Buick 215ci V8 in it with either a Porsche or ZF transaxle. Fucker bought a Prelude. I drove a '77 Buick that I had purchased for $125 because its oil seal was leaking. Ended up fixing the oil leak and driving the fucking thing because the car the mill was supposed to go into took a whole lot longer without the promised parental support. Another buddy got a cherry '67 Camaro that he wrapped around a lamppost within a month while racing his buddy with the '67 Mustang Fastback that he wrapped around the same lamppost a month later, rebuilt, and wrapped around a different lamppost six months later. Meanwhile the TR-7 I spent forever fixing was eclipsed by a different kid whose dad gave him a choice between an '81 TR8 convertible or a '74 Elan. TR8 was dead in eight months, so he also got the Elan. I probably drive a Porsche convertible to avenge my high school self. I doubt I'm the only one.
I briefly worked with Steve Wozniak in the early 1990's when the NSX first came out. He had one in each color, and two black ones... he said he accidentally bought a second black one because he thought he didn't have one, so he let one of his team drive it every day. Woz was driving me to his office in his favorite NSX, and he'd wired up the car stereo to a cellular radio scanner, and we were driving around listening in to people's cell phone calls... It was surreal. Woz was the most careful, meticulous driver I have ever ridden with. The NSX was completely wasted on him. I've talked with two different people before that both say they regret selling their Acura NSX's about a year or two before the prices sky rocketed.