Cars you didn't know existed until very recently.

[Sir Snipes]

The other trims look like mk2 Polo to me

[Timewaster]

Is there a single forum member that doesn't now want one?

If I brought one home I think I would be single soon after.

[Pillock]

Aye, if those trims are factory they simply made a mould of Mk2 Polo and Mk2 Astra trims and banged them out. Absolutely identical even to the point of the Polo ones having a little indent one end for the badge.

 

I'm pretty sure I've seen the back lights on the hatchback somewhere else before, a little 1980s Honda perhaps?

 

It uses half a VW aircooled engine - two cylinders in boxer formation, and is exactly half the capacity of a 1584cc VW unit so I wonder if they just use the same barrels and pistons.

[vulgalour]

The other trims look like mk2 Polo to me

 

They do, now you mention it!  Rear hatch seems familiar, like it's from a Suzuki Alto or something like that, and the door handle/notches are very Renault 5.

[Timewaster]

I'm pretty sure I've seen the back lights on the hatchback somewhere else before, a little 1980s Honda perhaps?

 

Honda Quintet, but not quite.

[Pillock]

Honda Quintet, but not quite.

 

I think you're right on both counts - they're the ones I was thinking of, and no they're not quite right.

[mercrocker]

I know I ignore modern life completely but did I actually see an SUV Maserati the other day? 

 

I am not going to google it because I don't actually need to re-see it.

[Lacquer Peel]

Yes they exist.

[17-Coffees]

Alfa made a knockoff Mustang... in Brazil.

Pass go and collect 200, game over, let a Korean-American nuclear war happen, I don't care anymore...I can die happy know such a thing exists!

[outlaw118]

Dug this little beauty* up on eBay http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1998-PANOZ-AIV-ROADSTER/132306774269?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649

It's a Panoz AIV Roadster. I've heard of Panoz, but only watching sportscar racing and stuff, never aware they built "normal" stuff. It's  got a wikipedia page, which as we all know is always* accurate....
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panoz_Roadster

[Supernaut]

Dug this little beauty* up on eBay http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1998-PANOZ-AIV-ROADSTER/132306774269?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649

It's a Panoz AIV Roadster. I've heard of Panoz, but only watching sportscar racing and stuff, never aware they built "normal" stuff. It's  got a wikipedia page, which as we all know is always* accurate....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panoz_Roadster

I knew about those yeeeaaars ago. Because there was one in the original Midtown Madness game.

 

[vulgalour]

Thanks to our very own Barrett I discovered Hupmobile and, by extension, this 1935 number which I really like rather a lot.

 

Some more info here: http://www.curbsideclassic.com/curbside-classics-american/curbside-classic-1935-hupmobile-j-521-six-aerodynamic-raymond-loewy-helps-usher-in-the-aerodynamic-era/

[AlabamaShrimp]

This is the bit where I don't understand aerodynamics. It's all curvy and stuff which makes sense but then those flat fronted 70s/80s stuff always got quoted with low drag ratings but they were bricks??

[barrett]

Because proper aerodynamics isn't actually all curvy and stuff. It's about finding the most satisfactory way of directing airflow around an object without upsetting its balance with undue lift, etc. A satisfactory aerodynamic shape would have almost spherical sides and a totally flat tail, but both of those things would create other problems. It's about finding a good balance. Those cars of the 30s with swoopy fronts were not even trying to be aerodynamic, it was just a fashion thing. And compare the frontal area of,say, A BX with that Hup - although it's more obviously brick-like, it's a fraction of the size.

 

As an aside, a recent expensive book about one of Loewy's designs captions pictures of those '34s as 'Humpmobile' throughout, which is a much better name

[vulgalour]

lol @ Humpmobile.

[Bfg]

This is the bit where I don't understand aerodynamics. It's all curvy and stuff which makes sense but then those flat fronted 70s/80s stuff always got quoted with low drag ratings but they were bricks??

 

Very, very briefly..  aerodynamic drag comes down to ;  a.)  the distance and the amount of air being pushed out of the way (so angles and frontal area come very much into play),  b.)  how readily the air returns back to its static position (rather than being sucked along behind the vehicle),  and then  c.) what is referred to as 'parasitic drag' which is all about the smoothness of flow.  (ie.  a. and b. in much finer detail ..around every nick and cranny of the vehicle).

 

Although seemingly nicely flowing and rounded., with the above (truly fantastic looking) Hupmobile - one needs only to imagine how the air flow would swirl (splitting the laminar air flow into numerous vortices) around its front bumper, around its beautiful but bulbous wings, into its wheel-arches and dished wheels, and even around the deeply recessed windows - to see how even a boxy car with 'flush-fitting everything' minimises these air disturbances.  

 

Parasitic drag is very often under-rated - because we rely so much on pre-conceptions that size counts. So many details (..like the recessed windows) are so small in the overall picture ..as to surely be insignificant.?   However, just put your hand square out of a car's window when being driven along at 70mph.  Although the surface area of your hand is quite tiny compared to the overall frontal area of the vehicle - you'll have difficulty holding it out square against the force of the air flow.  Multiply that resistance by 50 similarly 'small details' not faired in and you'll see how together they adds up to something quite considerable.!  Then clench your hand and feel how disproportionate the difference is. In racing it's not unusual to see the split lines between panels taped-over to fair them in, because they too make a difference.

 

What happens under and around the bottom of a vehicle is equally important. The above classic motor car probably has a really substantial channel or box section chassis, with numerous iron brackets, a deeply sumped engine, an exposed drive train, and then also front & rear transverse axles to catch and swirl the air around, together with steps in the body's floor to accommodate their travel. Every one of those details induce and so adversely contributes to the vehicle's aerodynamic drag

 

I hope that helps start to explain ..without confusing the topic with too much detail or jargon.

 

Bfg

141,650 views

[Dick Longbridge]

Just seen one of these pull up a couple of doors down, as I'm out hoovering my car. Back doors do a gull wing thing, and two littlies climb out. Just had to type in the plate into Cazana to work out what the hell it was. Tesla Model X apparently. Bargain* at £75k upwards. Maybe he didn't realise he could achieve the gull wing ambition with a Sera for less than a grand. Crazy fool!

 

[Sir Snipes]

They've had one in their Bluewater shop for a while now.

[Timewaster]

One of those Tesla X things appears outside or of the other units on our estate. They're huge!

From the pictures I expected it to be Focus sized.

[AlabamaShrimp]

Seen on today in Leeds outside the Tesla dealers, which is a shop??

 

Anyway very nice. Mrs Shrimp liked it a lot, didn't know it was that expensive though.

[SiC]

Renault Ondine Dauphine

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/112565991072

 

Sweet looking thing. I've never heard or seen one before!

[Ghosty]

What's going on with the plates? Are they Dutch ones printed on UK black and white stamped plates?

[MorrisItalSLX]

Holden Tigra

 

 

Drove past one today, I don't even remember them for sale new

[mercrocker]

There were Alfa Romeo Ondines as well.....

 

 

 

[vulgalour]

Go home, Alfa, you're drunk.

[Asimo]

[Ghosty]

It's like the vehicular result of De Stijl.

[Eddie Honda]

Also available with fifth wheel:

 

[Sir Snipes]

Also available with fifth wheel:

 

That looks fantastic. If I was an eccentric rich MD of google or whatever that's what I'd drive to work. Park up at my office block and take out my briefcase (sandwiches) from the load bed.

[Eddie Honda]

If I was an eccentric rich MD of google or whatever that's what I'd drive to work.

You'd better live dead close to work then (preferably the same site) as the gearing is so low, it'd do about a max of 40mph and the seats have bugger-all padding.