Beware fellow autonauts, for this be a forsaken land full of sorrow and heartache. Even the bold tremble and quake at the horrors that lie beyond these gates. If you choose to enter, be forewarned. You may not return.

You have been recruited by the Star League to defend the frontier against Xur and the Kodan Armada.

Source: Cardomain Blog

Every now and again the Internet offers up some interesting bits of automotive information. Take this “50 Worst Cars of All Time” list, found at Time Magazine online. Created by Dan Neil, a Pulitzer Prize winning automotive critic and syndicated columnist for the Los Angeles Times, this list was compiled to show us the biggest automotive flops that history has to offer. Mr. Neils’ commentary on each vehicle is not only fun to read, but quite insightful as well.

To see the entire listing of the The 50 Worst Cars of All Time continue to: Time Magazine Online

There is something to be said about owning a beater. They’re not pretty, generally don’t run well and are most likely the farthest thing from a performance vehicle that one can imagine. The general public views them with looks of disgust and considers them road hazards. What they don’t realize however is that to those of us in the automotive know, our beaters are our full-on prize possessions.

The beater is a ride that laughs in the face of all that is beautiful in the automotive spectrum. They love parking on city streets and live for door dings and crappy weather. The beater is a beast that does what all high-end garage queens strive to be, that being… useful. Go to any Home Depot or the local train station and see for yourselves how many Mercedes and BMW’s you see in the lot – the simple fact is, not to many. They don’t live here… this is the beaters playground.

God knows over the years I’ve had my share of beaters. Everything ranging from a 1981 Mercury Capri (remember those), to a clapped out rusted Dodge Dakota pick-up truck, to my all time favorite… a 1997 Mercury Villager mini-van… man do I miss that thing. They were all great vehicles that did exactly what they were supposed to do. They gave me the freedom to park, go and do anything I wanted without the worry of something happening to them. So, with that being said, let’s here about the POS you’ve got in the driveway… I flippin’ love these things so post them up and be proud of your pile.

Related: RideLust’s 15 Beaters That Won’t Disappoint

The Red Green Show officially went off the air in 2006, but the indelible legacy it left on DIY gearheads lives on and to this day, duct tape is second only to Bondo as the destitute crowd’s favorite repair tool. Among those most heavily influenced by Red Green’s jury rigging is a member of RideLust’s own staff (who shall remain nameless) that attempted a half-assed repair job of their own on an aging Volvo. Hilarity later ensued at the inspection station (followed immediately by a rejection sticker) and in honor of the laughs they elicited we’ve assembled an assortment of our favorite moments in Possum Lodge engineering.

If you’re like most consumers in the market for a used car, your needs are probably best served by eBay, AutoTrader, or your local Craigslist. If you are like 99% of automotive enthusiasts, however, your pursuit for that perfect diamond in the rough exists in perpetuity. You can easily squander 5+ hours at work tirelessly refreshing your browser in the vain hope that the pristine Volvo 850R you’ve spent the better part of your adult life pursuing will magically appear for thousands less than its Blue Book value. If such is the case, then the chances are good that you’ve also experienced significant frustration at the hands of Craigslist’s rather limiting search parameters. Although you probably could if you neglected your job, family, and personal hygiene for days on end, it’s realistically impossible to search every Craigslist in every state in every city in the continental U.S. (though you’ve certainly tried). Fortunately, I’ve found a way: searchtempest.com. Not only will SearchTempest.com allow you to expand your search radius to include any location within your current zip code, it also throws in all the relevant eBay listings as a bonus.

In the event that the skeptic in you is wondering: no, neither SearchTempest nor any marketing company related to it coerced me into or compensated me for the production of this post. I’m just an obsessive car collector that spends more time than I should virtually car shopping, trying to convince myself that an ‘86 L7 that’s probably riddled with electrical problems is a great investment.

(Hat tip to Caio Campos for exacerbating the illness)

In Wilmington, North Carolina, Alliance Credit Union will be rewarding the egregious aesthetic taste of Mr. Saintard at the awards ceremony for the first Ugly Car Contest. Aimed at helping one lucky driver ditch his jalopy in the charitable spirit inspired by the Cash for Clunkers program, Alliance opted to bestow one lucky (or unlucky, depending on your perspective) winner to receive a $5,000 cash prize to be put towards the purchase of a new car or a gallon of Bondo and a few cans of spray paint.

While it doesn’t seem to be in miserable enough shape to warrant a five grand prize – especially not when compared to the other truly hideous contestants – Mr. Saintard’s scratched up Saturn apparently offended the senses of enough voters to earn him the crowd favorite and Alliance’s Grand Prize. Hit the jump to check out photos of few of the more, ah, deserving vehicles.

Source: PRNewsire

When Cash For Clunkers officially expired for consumers at 8:00PM on August 25, 2009, roughly $2.8 of the total $3 billion allotted for the programs use had been spent – on paper, at least. In reality, dealers had yet to see a dime of their promised rebates, and many had actually ended their participation early when triple digit rebate tallies threatened to put them in the red. For every dealer that praised CARS for the business it drove in, there were two more who were on the brink of losing their shirts if they didn’t see some cash flowing back soon.

Today, three weeks after the carnage, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood says $2.5 billion has been approved for release, which accounts for about 85% of the 690,000 rebate applications submitted. By the end of September, LaHood promises every dealer will be reimbursed, followed shortly by hell freezing over.

Source: Detroit News
Image Cred: AP Photo

Crumple zones. Disc brakes. Anti-lock brakes. Airbags. Electronic stability control.

Walk into a new car dealership, and every car will have crumple zones, two airbags, and discs on at least the front wheels. Further, save the barest of Hyundais, most of the cars are going to have ABS, and by 2012 all passenger vehicles sold in the United States will require electronic stability control. These are systems most of us take for granted, but while they’re par for the course today, driving has not always been so easy. As you dive deeper into the history of the automobile, you’ll notice that among the first to offer what we now consider basic safety features was the Mercedes S-Class.

This iteration, known by its chassis code W116, was the first Mercedes to officially bear the “S-Class” name. The name S-Class had been used unofficially before then, though; the name itself is a shortening of the German “Sonderklasse“, meaning “special class” or, loosely, “in a class of its own”. And it was–the top-line Benz had always been engineered without regard to cost, affording it build quality and reliability that was unsurpassed in the industry. This trend continued (along with the consequent delays and going over budget) until the launch of the W220 in 1999, which was notable for earning Consumer Reports‘ lowest possible reliability rating of “Poor”. Well done.

For this reason, the W116 was and still is extraordinarily popular with leaders, administrations, and warlords in Africa and the Middle East. No self-respecting president would choose anything else, because the S-Klasse is the only car that could break through a crowd of millions, retrieve you and a dozen of your closest advisors, run down thirty of your most fervent opponents, get you to the palace in time for dinner, and bring you to the politburo meeting the next day.

The 450 SEL was Mercedes-Benz’s flagship at the time. “SEL” designates the car’s class and fuel injection (Einspritzung) and a long wheelbase, respectively. More importantly, the “450″ denotes the engine’s approximate displacement in centilitres–in this case, the car is motivated by a 4.5L V8 pushing 190 horsepower, highly respectable for its time. Even more respectable was the 222-horse rating the engine bore when unrestricted by American emissions standards, the horses that carried both Deutsche Bank executives across the Autobahn and Robert Mugabe across seas of dissidents, all in the utmost comfort.

Even more respectable was the 450 SEL 6.9–its motive power was provided by a 6.9 litre V8 which was rated conservatively at 286 horsepower and 405 ft-lb of torque. Allow me to reiterate: four hundred and five foot pounds of torque. That is enough to make not only the 4200-pound car but also entire political regimes leave town without a trace.

Even though those numbers were down to 250 hp and 360 ft-lb for the American market, the 6.9 was still the first production car to offer a fully electronic four-wheel multi-channel anti-lock braking system. It was the first S-Class to offer the hydropneumatic suspension developed by Citroën, begetting handling comparisons to cars as tossable as the Mini.

That’s pretty impressive, considering this car looks about as long as an aircraft carrier.

Seriously. You could fit the entire Serbian consulate in that back seat. Not to mention every political dissident you could fit into the trunk without even bothering to dismember them. And, hell, it can cross the Kalihari Desert.

Yes, you could just buy a Camry and be done with it, but the Mercedes-Benz 450 SEL is more comfortable, more powerful, faster, better-looking, more reliable, and gets better fuel economy.

Wait, that last part, that’s not right. The 450 SEL nets an estimated 12.4 miles per gallon. But when a good example can be had for well under five grand, you’ll have to suffer for quite some time to make that difference up.

As of the Clusterfuck Cash for Clunkers’ official termination at 8:00PM EST Tuesday evening, the Department of Transportation is reporting that a total of $2.88 of the $3 billion fictitious taxpayer dollars allotted has been spent. A staggering 690,114 new vehicles have been purchased using the program, and at least half as many dealers are 6-figures in the hole as they await their rebate check.

To assuage any fears regarding a timely turnaround, the DoT has also reported that they have an estimated 2,000 highly enthusiastic federal employees working around the clock to assure all rebate applications are processed as quickly as possible. Thus, dealers can expect to be repaid sometime around the next lunar eclipse.

Source: AutoNews
Image Cred: Reuters Pictures