Amazing night race at this years AVD Oldtimer Grand Prix

This years AVD Oldtimer Grand Prix at the Nurburgring showed again amazing cars and races. One of the best for me was the race for two seater sportscars on Saturday night, started at 20:30 and ending 1 hour later, so going into the night. Not only was the field of cars impressive and exciting (you can spot two Maserati Birdcage, a Lotus 19, Lister, Ferraris, HWM, Lotus, Mercedes Gullwing, and many other precious sportscars), but the sound and light were just impressive too. The drivers gave their best and made the race a thrill. That's historic motor sport as we love it. But let the pictures speak!

Yes, your Corvette Z06 can save a lot of fuel!

Fuel consumption of fast and large cars looks often very bad, looking at the ECE measured average consumption. The magazine Auto Motor und Sport in Germany has introduced their own fuel efficiency lap, which every test car has to do. The differences are interesting, also the extremes. While it's obviously possible to drive a Ferrari 612 Scaglietti oder a Covertte Z06 at emission levels 40% lower than anticipated by the ECE measurement cycle, other cars like the Toyota iQ actually use 30% more fuel than measured in the ECE cycle. Obviously fast and heavy cars are penalized, but funny enough also the Dacia seems to look to bad.

Maserati 3200 GT - great and distinct rear light design

We loved these boomerang rear lights at the Maserati 3200 GT, didn't we? And it fitted the car so well that some people buying the 4200 GT actually changed the rear bodywork design to fit these unique lights. But it was not just the rear lights. The whole car was a beauty and quite a good design given the size and the ability to actually seat four people. And there was a lot more space for the rear seat passengers than in a Porsche 911 or a Lotus Evora for example, so no alibi seats. I tried it myself, it works! Of course the 4200 GT even had a bit more space but the 3200 GT was okay already. It drove well also, was pretty fast and had a decent handling. Most of these things the 4200 GT could do a bit better even, but as said, they removed the boomerang lights to fit the preferences of the American market. Sad! I almost bought one of the early cars and the guy offering me a test drive was a former formula one driver. He showed me what the car can do and it was impressive! From a financial point of view it was probably a good decision not to buy the car, because depreciation was hefty and maintenance cost for these cars is significant. And what all of these early cars sort of lack is the great sound engineering applied to the new GranTurismo Coupés of Maserati. Despite the same ingredients (engine) the new cars sound so much better. Other than this though the old car seems to be the more desirable one to me, as it was more nimble, more light and was available with a proper manual gear box. Will the 3200 GT ever become a true collectors' car? This is unclear and all depends on whether we will be able to maintain the complex electronics of these cars in 10 or 20 years from now (see also other previous blog entries on this topic).

May Spring finally come! Classic cars covered by snow

Remember my recent blog on the Porsche 911 SC, a classic car being driven as every day car? Well, here's another chapter. Recently we had some weather surprises and - again - a bit of snow, as you can see on the picture. Snow per se isn't particularly bad for an old car, but it usually comes with salt on the streets. Luckily this time the temperatures were just high enough to prevent authorities to send the salt crew. And the 911 wasn't used that day neither. Good!
But hopefully the weather will now finally get better, so that owners have more opportunities to use their classics like yesterday when I spotted a 50ies Maserati Barchetta race car on the street, a Porsche 356, a Jensen Healey and many other rare cars!

Select your car of the year 1967

In the year 1967 the German magazine "Hobby" asked its reader to select their "car of the year". What is interesting is the choice offered, sort of a preselection. They had three categories based on engine size. In the "small" section you will find a lot of cars that people barely remember today. Cars like Autobianchi Primula Coupé, Simca Sportscoupé 1200 S, Sunbeam Imp Californian, NSU Sport-Prinz Coupé, Renault Caravelle, Bond Equipe GT or Matra Jet 5 are rare finds on today's roads and even at oldtimer meetings. I would reckon that people today don't recognize half of the cars on the first picture any more. Only the Alpine 1100 Coupé, VW 1500 Karmann-Ghia, Fiat 124 Sport Coupé and Lancia Fulvia probably are cars many people would remember.
With the bigger cars it's a bit easier. Less known cars here are probably Reliant Scimitar, Glas 3000 V8, Bristol 409, Alfa-Romeo 2600 SZ or Fiat 2300 S Coupé. The kings of the road of 1967 like the Jaguar E-Type, Iso Grifo, Maserati Mistral, Maserati Ghibli, Lamborghini Miura or Mercedes-Benz 280 SL probably are still in the memory of any car interested person having lived in the 60ies or even later.
So, what would my pick today? In the first group Alpine Coupé, Lotus 46 Europe, Honda S800, Alfa Romeo GT 1300 Junior and Matra Jet 5 would be candidates for the win and if I had to choose one it would be the Matra Jet 5 as it was a very innovative car with a mid mounted engine and fiberglass body and it's extremely rare today. Plus it was successful in racing too. In the large car category my winner would be the Lamborghini Miura, a car that I really adore.
Interesting at the side is the fact that Hobby didn't include the regular Aston Martin DB5 but rather a designer version.

Grey sportscars - where is the color?

I have been writing about the fact that more and more cars come with boring colors and are mostly ordered in grey, silver or black. Well, what started with limousines and company cars has continued with compact cars and also with sportscars! Even the Italian cars are painted more and more in silver or grey. Have a look at this picture showing four Maserati Granturismo GT Coupés. Three are silver or grey, and only one is in red. And you would really wonder who the brave man was to order this car in red ...
By the way, not too many Maseratis were painted in red except the race cars. Maseratis often were ordered in blue or silver, even in the sixties. But there were many yellow Ghibli and Merak on the other side too.

Classic Cars in the Winter time

Many/most of us probably couldn't sleep well if they knew their cherished classic car being parked on the street during the cold winter nights with salt on the streets and snow everywhere. Well, there must be people thinking differently as these pictures show. They have all been taken in Berlin this week. All of these cars are classics and some of them even are technology master pieces. My favorite car here is the Citroen Maserati SM. It's kind of the combination of the Citroen ID/DS with the six cylinder Maserati engine. The shape is breath taking and it certainly was a pleasure to drive when new and fresh. But also the ID/DS pictured here is a collector's item and the Mercedes-Benz SLC as well. Hopefully somebody will rescue these cars eventually and bring them home in a warm garage!

Why is Porsche car design so unbalanced?

Looking at Porsche sportscars from the fifties to today it's interesting to see what worked from a design point of view and what didn't. Let's take it car by car.
The Porsche 356 was a very modern car with an aerodynamic shape and lots of innovative engineering. A master piece. Also from a design point of view. We may dislike the narrow wheels today and where they are placed at the body, but it's certainly the work of a genius.
The Porsche 911 tried to continue the basic concepts of the 356, but to modernize everything. And succeeded. Again, a design that worked over many years (until today) and looked great.
Then in the late sixties the first design failure. The Porsche 914 clearly was a modern car, but many people disliked its shape and the fact that the front and back almost look the same.
With the Porsche 924 Porsche tried again to do a low cost model and diverged from the old style engine in the back approach. The car was fairly successful and the design seemed to work. The design was improved with the Carrera GT and the 944, but finally was almost destroyed with the late facelifts (Porsche 968) that tried to bring the car closer to 911 and 928.
The Porsche 928 was a trial to finally replace the 911. Not successful. The design was very brave, very different from anything else done before by Porsche and even other manufacturers. The old Porsche fans didn't like the car and it didn't help that it was heavy and thirsty and more a GT than a sportscar. Still, the car is a design icon today.
The Porsche 959 was another attempt to create a modern variant of the 911 theme. An impressive car. And it brought some design elements coming much later with the other cars. But basically, the car was a 911 derivate.
With the Porsche 964 they tried to make the 911 ready for the 80ies but failed. It looked too fat and not slick enough. This was corrected very successfully with the Porsche 993 that brought back the old lines and inserted many modern design attributes. It's a classic already today, and being the last aircooled model probably fetching high prices for the foreseeable future.
The Porsche 996 was a bigger step, bring water cooled engines and enlarging the car along all dimensions. Many people disliked the design of the front lights and all in all it certainly wasn't the best car Porsche ever produced. It sold well however and inspired the other models of the marque, for the good and the bad.
The Porsche Boxter, showed as a prototype 1993 in Detroit, was the next attempt after the 914 and the 924 to add a line of cars below the 911. With its mid-engine layout it clearly was different than the 996, but the final design brought it closer to the 911 derivates and maybe helped to sell it. But design wise it was a big step back from the initial prototype. The Cayman shared all of the design elements.
The Porsche Carrera GT with its formula 1 style ten cylinder engine represented everything that was good about Porsche, also design wise. That's how the Boxter should have looked like. That's what could have replaced the 911 if Porsche had wanted. Not with a 10 cylinder but with modernized six cylinders.
And then came the Porsche Cayenne. Horrible. An absolute design failure. Even its twin sister Volkswagen Touareg looked so much better. The combination of typical Porsche design elements such as lights and bumpers with an SUV is difficult to digest. But from a sales point of view it worked. Interestingly enough.
With the Porsche 997 another continuation of the now more than 30 years old theme was introduced and it looked so much sharper and slicker than its predecessor. Good work for a facelift. Actually it was more than this and besides still being rear engine driven everything has changed over the last 30 years. But the customers continue to buy.
Finally with the need to increase production numbers even more the Porsche Panamera was presented. A four seat for door limousine in the shape of a stretched 911. Again, the design doesn't work really and the back is really a big mistake. But it sells, as many people like the advantage of four doors. How much better however the addition of a four door limousine can be done to an existing sportscar range is shown by Maserati with the current Quattroporte and Aston-Martin with the Rapide.

So what's the take away here?
Porsche designed and built some really ground breaking cars, but they also introduced designs that didn't work and were probably the work of the marketing department, not created by people with passion and love for aesthetics. The need to produce bigger and bigger numbers of cars created dependencies that make the result suffer.
Here are my all time best of Porsche:
356, 356 Abarth, RSK, 550 Spider, 904 GTS, Carrera 6, 911 Carrera RS. And with a bit more distance 924 Carrera GT and 993.

Neglected future classic car? The Maserati Quattroporte 1994-2000

If the used car price is a measure for whether cars can become sought after collector's item then the Maserati Quattroporte IV, built between 1994 and 2000/2001, is a lost case. Despite the rarity, only about 2'800 cars were built, these cars are quite cheap to buy. A good one will change hands for the price of maybe two large inspections. It's actually not easy to understand why. The designer was Marcello Gandini, who was responsible for such famous cars as the Lamborghini Miura or the Lancia Stratos. The car was with a length of only 4.55 m quite compact, especially if you compare it with its successor. Engines with 6 and 8 cylinders were used to deliver more than satisfactory performance. So what is wrong with this car really? Nothing really, if you like the shape. Maybe it suffered a bit under the bad reputation of the Biturbo area, but you can't blame this car for that. If there wasn't that much electronics used in it, I would consider buying one.

Looking for a car as a present and being on a budget?

Let's assume you still haven't got an idea for a christmas present for someone who is a real petrolhead and you are on a budget of let's say € 600k to 800k. What could you do? Well yes, you could take a look at one of these car sites such as www.mobile.de and see whether there's something in this segment.
And yes, there is! Actually a good hundred cars or so would fit your budget, great. And there's quite a choice too. A range of Ferrari Enzos, a number of Maserati MC12s, many Mercedes-Benz 300 SL Gullwings, some BMW 507, even Bugatty Veyrons still make it into that bracket. But there's also one exceptional car within this group, a Porsche Carrera 906. It may be a bit overpriced, but it's clearly distinctive! I certainly would know what of the lot I would prefer as a present. But sadly enough this is pure fiction and not a true story. Maybe next year, dear Santa?

The 2009 AVD Oldtimer Grand Prix at the Nurburgring - great cars and exciting races

For once I have swapped the drivers perspective with the spectators perspective!
Last weekend again the German AVD organized the Oldimer Grand Prix at the Nurburgring. It's said to be the worldwide biggest event of its kind, with 650 cars and 900+ drivers it's definitely impressive.
Well, the weather wasn't that great this year, with lots of fog causing the organizers to cancel a number of races on Saturday and delaying the program on Sunday by quite a bit.
But nevertheless superior fields and cars were offered to the spectator.
When have you last seen a Mercedes-Sauber C9 in action? The two Australians Rob Sherrard and Wayne Park brought the car to Europe to race it against some of the other remaining Group C cars of the period. But the rest of the group was clearly no match to the C9, it almost rounded the rest of the field, delivering very quick lap times. The Group C was guest at the OGP for the first time, and I am sure, all of the visitors wish them to come back next year!
But there were many other exciting races to be seen. The historic Formula 1 races were great to watch, listening and smelling the Maseratis, the Coopers and the early Lotus cars was just very entertaining.
Interesting sports cars and touring cars were there too, delivering hard but fair races and showing the limits of both the drivers and the cars.
And then of course were also the CanAm racers in the Orwell Supersports showcasing what it means when huge engines meet maximum downforce. It's unbelievable how these "big bangers" accelerate on the straights and how high the limit is in the curves. But it's even more impressive to see, how the two liter cars are almost able to follow the 8.8 liter monsters in real (racing) live.
The Oldtimer Grand Prix offered something to everybody. And the stories told by the speakers helped to survive long breaks due to the weather conditions or other issues. I learned quite a bit about the Opel history and why Opels were so popular in the 60ies and 70ies. It's sad to see that due to recent events a brand such as Opel always gets destroyed.
Finally the Motor Klassik subscribers were showing their less racy but still mostly attractive oldtimers. This was an opportunity to see cars such as the Citroën-Maserati SM, vintage Corvettes, a whole range of Porsches and even a Mk 1 Golf.
After two days of watching 15-20 races you actually have been able to screen quite a bit of motor sports history and I am sure most of the spectators will return next year for the 38th Oldtimer Grand Prix.