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Motorboat Monday: A diminutive Fairey with a fair bit of urge
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After last week’s shallow-draft scorcher from North America, today’s offering for Motorboat Monday comes from three thousand miles West, and could barely be more different in character than the V8-motivated Kindsvater. It’s only fifteen feet long, and has a fraction of the power, but good things come in small packages. As with last week’s boat,…
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The Carchive: The 1987 Mercury Topaz
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It’s Friday night, and, oh… well, nobody’s going to be reading this, anyway. I could write absolutely anything on the inauguration day of a new US president; everybody will be out drinking vast quantities of alcohol either to celebrate or to try to forget. Not I, though. Your loyal servant is here when it matters,…
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Drown (out) your sorrows with Supercars.
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We don’t get political here at Hooniverse, but what we do do is offer somewhere to escape to when the world is heavy with grim omens. And what better form of escape is there for the octane-veined motive-power enthusiast than a field packed with glittering supercars? The 2016 Goodwood Festival of Speed was impeccably timed…
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Craigslist find: TWO 1982 Cub Commuter microcars!
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About four-fifths through the previous Century, a category of car that had lain dormant for a while suddenly went through a renaissance. The microcar. There were many reasons that people should be tempted by a tiny, lightweight, basic car – cost savings to the driver, reduced environmental impact and the smug feeling of grabbing that…
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Motorboat Monday: 455Ci in a Kindsvater Jet Boat
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455 Cubic Inches. Oldsmobile V8 power. In a boat which displaces so little it’s practically on the plane when it’s not moving. This glorious machine was glinting away on the Classic Motor Boat Association stand at the 2017 London International Boat Show. And I’ll bet that, given an opportunity, it would have been one of…
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A Datsun 160J: When the tinworm loses its appetite
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Though it’s nowhere near as hostile as that of Iceland, the British climate is one that incubates tinworms to an extent that they will feverishly tuck into any metalwork that takes their fancy. My forum moniker alludes to the fact that the pesky blighters evidently find the 1988 Rover 800 a particular delicacy, and will…
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Not The Carchive: To finish on a bright note.
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It’s been a good day. I was going to fill the 15:00 slot with a visit to The Carchive, and I had photographed – and you’re gonna love this – a 1987 brochure for the Mercury Topaz. But one thing lead to another and I’ve run out of time to write it up. So lets…
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P66: The Forgotten Jensen
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Back before the great Intensedebate Apocolypse of 2014, I managed to find myself behind the wheel of one of the most spectacular cars ever to come out of Birmingham. Not an especially long list, admittedly, but a star-studded one. Nevertheless, the Jensen Interceptor was a British car with Italian style and American brute power –…
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Diecast Delights: The Audi Avus Concept
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Concept cars. As an impressionable kid the unveiling of new concept cars was always the highlight of my motor show trips. On any manufacturers stand these lurid flights of fancy would stand out from the massed ranks of more spacious superminis and cleaner-burning diesels, which, naturally, bored the shit out of me. No, give me…
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On Unexpected Artistry
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Very occasionally I will find myself bored while in the car and parked, waiting for somebody. If I’m beyond the reach of internet data I will often rummage around the car in search of something to read; the “EXT, ECON, MIRROR, OFF and CD CHANGER CONTROLLER” printed on the dashboard in front of me being…
