Keith Martin

If your inbox is anything like mine, it is overflowing with “Hot Tips on Cars to Collect” or “Which SUVs to buy now before their prices take off.” Let’s make one thing clear. If your primary reason to be in the collector car hobby is to make money buying and selling cars, then you are…

My 16-year-old daughter started to drive this summer. This means borrowing the family car. So, I started finding myself car-less more often. I took this as a good reason to embark on another used-car buying odyssey. Odysseus was gone for 20 years, but I took just three days. I wound up purchasing the first interesting…

There once was a time when the automotive calendar went quiet after Monterey Car Week. Not so any longer. In the months of August, September and October, we now have several top-flight but very different events to look forward to and attend. I’ve recently returned from my second time at the Chattanooga Motorcar Festival. On…

The SCM 2006 Lotus Elise had not seen much action recently. It had been moved about in the storage garage to make more room for other cars and driven short distances, but it had been a few years since it had been truly exercised. The letter from the State of Oregon reminding us that the…

Part of the chatter that surrounds online auctions is the ability of non-certified viewers (“trolls”) to make authoritative comments. I was selling a Mercedes 220 Ponton online one time, and bidding was going along nicely. Suddenly a troll opined, “Do you know the heater boxes on those are lined with asbestos? If you drive with…

I hadn’t driven our 2004 Mercedes SL 55 AMG since last June. Saturday was a clear, sunny, 70-degree day in the Columbia Gorge. I decided to take the SL out. I pressed the key fob remote with anticipation and nothing happened. I looked at the fob and a little red light flashed, telling me the…

Long before BMW offered a four-door 3-Series and Mercedes, the C-class, Alfa Romeo was selling “The Family Sedan That Wins Races.” It was the Giulia Super. More than 475,000 Giulia sedans were produced from 1962-78. While they came in a bewildering array of configurations (see http://www.berlinaregister.com/gul.htm), the only model officially imported to the US was…

The text messages had been coming daily for a week or so. An immaculate 1971 Citroën DS21 Pallas with just over 12k miles on its odometer was on Bring a Trailer and Publisher Martin was bidding. After the car failed to meet reserve, he was able to strike a post-auction deal. Good for him – but…

The writing is on the wall. The internal combustion engine is dead. Granted, it will take a long time to completely die. It certainly won’t happen in our lifetimes. Reflect upon this: At the dawn of the automotive revolution, electric cars were competitive with gasoline-powered ones. The lack of long-range, quick-charging batteries led to their…

I learned to drive when I was eight years old. My grandfather put me behind the wheel of his beloved Ford 9N tractor on our farm in Novato, CA, showed me how to depress the clutch, stick the shifter into first, engage the hand throttle and I was off. Most kids today don’t have that…