Tag: Cars

Rage Against

Bad News, Drive Time

…not the dying of the light, but against those who want the internal combustion engine gone from our lives.

In one of his more serious moments, Jeremy Clarkson reviewed the Aston Martin Vantage V12, and his conclusion was unexpectedly poignant (watch it first before reading on).

“…what I’m driving here is an ending.”

Now this:

Lamborghini has bid farewell to its incredible naturally-aspirated V12 engine, fitting the final two powerplants into a pair of one-off cars that pay testament to one of the great supercar motors.

The Invencible [no, that’s not a typo] coupe and Auténtica roadster are unique special editions modelled on the outgoing Aventador and will be the last 12-cylinder Lambos without any form of hybridisation, with the Italian marque set to embark on electrifying its model line-up in the coming years.

I’m not a Lambo fan, haven’t been one since the disappearance of the wonderful 400 GT:

But I love what Lamborghini cars have come to represent (even though I don’t much care for it, personally):  completely batty, speed-is-everything, balls-to-the wall acceleration, hopeless impracticality, outrageous body shape, even more outrageous prices, and all that.

And all that, as Clarkson observes, is going to be taken away from us by the bloodless killjoys among us because in these oh-so modern times, we’re not allowed to have fun [thousands of silly and who-cares reasons omitted because I don’t want to have an RCOB].

Even the Puritans of the Mayflower  would have said, “Stop that foolishness.”

But we can’t stop them.

I’m feeling even gloomier than Clarkson.

Changing Perspectives

Drive Time

Chris Harris asks the important question:

What happens when cars like the 296 appear is they cause geeks like me to stop and rethink what we had assumed were accepted ‘classes’ of cars. This happened to me when I was driving the 296 and following Paddy in the Pagani Huayra BC. Because he was driving something that looked like a livid insect, I assumed it would simply disappear in a straight line. It didn’t.

What we now have is an ‘entry level’ Ferrari that is as fast as one of the craziest hypercars ever sold. It’s a remarkable reset in the history of fast cars, yet it seems to have passed most people by. Perhaps that’s because these machines are so competent that people expect such things to happen. But I can’t quite get my head around the level of performance a 296 offers.

I have no idea where this is all going.  I’ve written before how cars’ performance has increased to the point where very few people can actually drive them without wrecking them — 600hp engines? FFS — and here’s Ferrari making a “street” car that could have won the Monza F1 Grand Prix race as little as ten years ago — or even more recently.

I should also point out that Longtime Buddy and Former Bandmate Knob is on the waiting list for a 296.  I hate him.

Pathetic

Drive Time, Eco-Crap

I thought this nonsense was more the provenance of the Japanese and Koreans:

Even when they switch to battery power, Ferrari supercars would continue to make a booming sound if a patent filed by the Italian firm is used in its electric vehicles of the future.
The Maranello-based car maker’s plans have been exposed by design drawings filed with the US Patent and Trademark Office, which were first spotted by CarBuzz.
They suggest the iconic brand wants to take the authentic sounds created by the powerful electric motors driving its plug-in models, then enhance them and pump the noise out via external speakers.

JHC, can anything be more pathetic?

Not Wanted Here

Drive Time

Stephen Moore has the truth of it:

The American auto companies, which are so often bailed out by U.S. taxpayers, have made a pronouncement that they intend, in the next few years, to stop making and assembling gas-engine cars. You know, the kind of cars that Henry Ford started rolling off the assembly line 100 years ago at the Ford Motor Company in Detroit.

Henceforth, virtually all American-made cars will be electric vehicles. Perhaps the corporate brass in Michigan’s auto executive offices thinks this makes them good global citizens. They are all in on the fight against global warming. They may be making a political bet that the federal government and more states are going to go the way of California and eventually mandate that every car produced must be battery-operated. But there is also a good deal of virtue-signaling going on here by the folks at Ford and General Motors.

It’s a free country, and if they want to start rolling millions of EVs off the assembly lines, so be it.

But it’s one thing to make cars that appeal to members of the Sierra Club and quite another to produce automobiles that the typical buyer wants. And guess what? So far, most people have turned a decisive thumbs-down on EVs. (Incidentally, I’m personally agnostic on electric vehicles. I’ve driven Teslas, and they are wonderful smooth-driving vehicles. But they have problems, too, such as getting stranded with no juice in the middle of nowhere.)

So far, only about 6% of new cars sold are electric vehicles. And polls show that only about half of Americans prefer an EV over a traditional car. Much larger majorities oppose the government telling us what kind of car we can buy. 

No kidding.  And his conclusion is right on:

You would think that U.S. automakers would understand a basic red, white and blue reality, which is that Americans have a special and long-standing love affair with their cars. They aren’t going to trade in their Mustangs, Camaros, Cadillacs and trucks for an EV. For many of us, this would be akin to taking away our firstborn.
…
Sorry, this is 2023, not 1923, when Henry Ford said you could have a Model T in any color you wanted, as long as it was black.

Yeah, fuck Detroit and their “good global citizens” bullshit.  They need to start being good American citizens first, because without American car buyers, they’d be smaller than Dacia.  The last time GM, for example, played footsie with the Euros, the result was the Opel Blitz, which comprised almost all Hitler’s trucks as he pillaged Europe and Russia.

This latest foolishness is on a par — except that it could doom their whole company.

Hey… they’re a private company, sort of, so they can make any decisions they want. But:

Incidentally, as this “woke” green energy fad fades into the sunset, as it almost assuredly will, and the American auto companies see their sales crash, they’d better not come begging for yet another taxpayer bailout.

Yup.  Not one red fucking cent.

Looks like I’ll have to drive my Tiguan — or a second-hand Toyota equivalent — for the rest of my life.  That’s not the worst fate that could befall me.

Different Standard

Drive Time

You know how you will sometimes run across a woman who you know will be bad for you, will empty your wallet, will cause you to do bad things (and not just to her), will cause you to get into trouble, but at the end of the day, you just can’t help yourself?

Here’s the automotive equivalent, the 1952 Alfa Romeo 1900 M (“Matta”):

Didn’t know Alfa made a jeep-type utility back in the early 1950s?  Nor did I.  But let’s get back to the standards set in first paragraph of this post, because this little thing even warns you by its nickname that it’s going to be trouble:

Is it reliable? — doesn’t Matta
Does it have 4-wheel drive? — doesn’t Matta
What’s its gas consumption? — doesn’t Matta
Is it an uncomfortable ride? — doesn’t Matta
Is it expensive? — doesn’t Matta

Do I want one?  Hell yes.

Because it’s an Alfa.

And to make things even worse, here’s an earlier one, the 1930 Alfa Romeo 6C 1750 Gran Sport:

I want this one even more than the Matta… wait, no I don’t / yes I do aaaaaarrrrrrghhh I want both, because they color-match.

I have as much resistance to Alfas as I have to the type of girl in the opening paragraph.