Affordable Classics
-
Peak Fahrvergnügen
One constant at Volkswagen has been the desire to move upmarket. The manufacturer whose name literally means “The People’s Car” has always set its sights on grander horizons. The Corrado is just one in a string of cars with driving performance that was overshadowed by its lack of showroom performance. Run like the wind Volkswagen…
-
A Rising Sun Also Sets
Mazda’s FD3S third-generation RX-7 is hot in so many ways. First, it’s in demand. You can count on one hand the number of these cars that have sold for less than $30k on Bring a Trailer since 2020 — with the best reaching $80k. So, as affordable classics go, the FD comes with a pretty…
-
The Sweet Spot
BMW is well known for building performance cars, but it was the E30-generation 3 Series of the 1980s that really put the German automaker on the map for affordable performance. When the succeeding E36-generation 3 Series was unveiled, BMW fans expected something spectacular. What they got was not the lightweight, edgy sports sedan of the…
-
Hot Hatch Fever
It takes some guts to walk away from everything that made your car company great, but that’s what Volkswagen did in the early 1970s. The 1974 Rabbit (or Golf, depending on your continent) was the replacement for the antiquated air-cooled Beetle. The all-new A1 platform was a complete departure for Wolfsburg, abandoning everything about the…
-
Depreciation, Italian Style
When Maserati returned to America in 2002, the company ended an 11-year absence from our market. A lot happened in those years, most notably an ownership transfer from Fiat to Ferrari. That change has been crucial to Maserati ever since. For one thing, it gave Maserati a ready-made dealership and service network. The Trident brand…
-
Mister Two Comes of Collectible Age
There’s something about a mid-engine car that’s just downright cool. Forget about the polar moment of inertia and the rest of the engineering-ese. When this motorsports-derived configuration appeared in the DeTomaso Vallelunga, Ferrari Dino and Lamborghini Miura in the late 1960s, it became forever associated with exotic cars. Even America’s sports car finally abandoned seven…
-
Two Much of a Good Thing
The early 1990s is not a period fondly remembered by either auto-styling aficionados or performance enthusiasts. This was the era of the inglorious 250-horsepower Corvette, when a new Ferrari infamously got outrun by a stock GMC pickup, and Giorgetto Giugiaro was slumming with the likes of Subaru. From this time of automotive derelicts, however, came…
-
Stung by a Scorpion
With regard to cars, I’m a sucker for two things: Italian sports cars and a perceived good deal. I scraped my knuckles on Fiat X1/9s, 124s and 850s. I’ve owned not one, but two Alfa Romeo Milanos. As a friend likes to joke, I provide food and shelter to the most needy, unloved, misunderstood and…
-
Old-School Muscle, New-School Luxury
When the salesman wearing the JCPenney fedora with a fishing lure snagged in the brim tells you his Acme Premium Plan is “the Cadillac of insurance policies,” there’s a reason why. In post-war America, Cadillac was unequivocally the car to have. It was an aspirational vehicle to own and to be seen in, and it…
-
Rotary Power for the People
The oil crisis of the 1970s frowned heavily on Mazda’s gas-guzzling rotary engines. Under constant development since licensure from NSU in 1961, the enormously expensive rotary-engine program had placed Mazda on the brink of financial ruin. The future looked bleak when Mazda’s largest creditor, Sumitomo Bank, inserted its own corporate leadership in 1977. Then, a…