By Sam Barer

Sound Classics

With detective work regarding the history of the Sound Classics project 1975/1976 Ferrari Dino 308 GT4 finished, it was time to open that mid-mounted engine hatch and dive in with reckless abandon. All I learned during the buying process was that the car ran like a flatulent hippopotamus with a bad hip.

Actually, to avoid making an extremely costly mistake, it is very important to have a good method to the madness even before one buys a classic. From the time I first started the car at the seller’s house, I had a pretty good idea of the possible culprits, as well as sources and a ballpark cost estimate for the parts necessary to put it all right.

Continue reading after the jump!

Continue reading "Pinpointing Problems, Parts, Prices, and Purveyors for Project Ferrari Dino 308 GT4" »

By Rob Einaudi

Editor-in-Chief

This is probably the craziest concept headed to the Geneva Motor Show. It’s controlled by an iPhone. Seriously. More pics and info at Jalopnik

By Jim Brennan

UDMan

A couple of days ago, Jalopnik ran one of their “question of the day” features. It asked, “who is your favorite spokesperson?” Thus, the inspiration for a new series of posts on influential automotive spokepersons. So first up is one of the most memorable automotive ad men ever created. Meet Mr. Joe Isuzu himself, David Leisure.

Continue reading after the jump!

Continue reading "Favorite Automobile Spokesperson: Meet Joe Isuzu, David Leisure" »

By Rob Einaudi

Editor-in-Chief

Chad over at Freiburger’s Junkyard put together an awesome gallery from Winternationals. My favorite is this green Mopar, but they have  a little of everything, from Stock to Super Stock to Pro Stock. Check it out.

By Speedhunters

Car Culture At Large

One of the rarest cars in the Corolla lineage is the KE15 Toyota Corolla 1200, or Corolla Sprinter. These cars came out even before the TE27; we’re talking late 1960s here. Parts for the KE15/KE17 are extremely hard to find, no matter what country you search in – United States, Japan, Australia, Philippines, New Zealand, you name it. I have personal experience with trying to find parts for this car unsuccessfully – I owned a white KE15 about ten years ago, but ended up selling it after a year or so of not being able to find simple things like a windshield, door glass, rubber weatherstrips, a front grill, or bumpers for it. I couldn’t believe that someone as resourceful as me when it comes to old Toyota parts would have such a hard time finding simple parts for this car! Continue reading at Speedhunters

By Antonio Alvendia

By Ben Schaffer

The Real JDM

It’s times like this that I realize just how little what I do matters. I will never reach this level. See the first Zonda R video below. Thanks JayHundred for the link! Turn your sound up. The Zonda R is incredible!

By Brian Lohnes

BangShift.com

Check out Lee Smith’s ‘66 Plymouth Belvedere Whackee Wagon Super Stocker, a legit historic racer that was the companion car to the Crazee ‘Cuda with the same multicolor paint scheme. As if my lust for wagons wasn’t enough, this one has a Hemi in it. The fact that it’s the wagon version of Steve Atwell’s daily driver Hemi Belvedere, brings back memories of Hot Rod Drag Weeks past, and the ’70-’71 paint scheme is mint, the Keystones rock, and it’s got a rollbar. What else could you want in a wagon? Check it out here.

By Rob Einaudi

Editor-in-Chief

I like BMW race cars and I like Andy Warhol, but do they really belong together? This 1979 BMW M1 Group 4 racer painted by Warhol is one of four BMW “art cars” traveling around the country right now. Warhol spent all of 23 minutes painting the car, and it went on to be raced just once, at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1979. With the Warhol paint job I doubt that this M1 will never be driven on the track again. Kind of a shame. More on the traveling BMW collection at Autoblog.

By Rich Truesdell

Automotive Traveler

I don’t know about you, but the rise in the price of gasoline over the past 45 days has me perplexed. Let’s see, unemployment is rising, thus people are driving less. There’s so much crude oil that much of it is being stored in tanker anchored off-shore. And the dollar has rallied over the last two months, and guess what? The price of oil is indexed against the dollar, so one would expect that the price at the pump should be going down. But since the New Year, it’s actually risen about 50 cents a gallon.

This makes no sense to me and probably makes little sense to you, too. So what’s going on here? Continue reading at Automotive Traveler.

By Rob Einaudi

Editor-in-Chief

A Jalopnik reader spotted this mean Mopar on the streets of San Francisco and snapped some pics with his iPhone. The flat back with mesh ’73 Satellite appeared on the cover of Information Society’s album “Hack” back in 1990. More at Jalopnik