If you see this car on Craigslist for $10k, it's stolen. Photo: BMW
If you live in or visit the Newark, NJ area long enough, sooner or later your car will be stolen. At the very least, it will be broken into, as I learned the hard way when I parked a new BMW 325Ci at Newark Airport. I was gone for ten minutes, which was long enough for some asshole with a slide hammer to punch my door lock and break into my car looking for the valet key. They didn’t find it, of course, but they managed to do $800 worth of damage to the driver’s door in about 15 seconds. I won’t give you detail on the internet, but let’s just say that BMW’s are REAL easy to break into and their factory alarms are as useless as rear wings on FWD street cars.
When the first redesigned MINI Cooper was released in the U.S. back in 2001 it was a huge hit. It was small, quick and handled like a slot car and with that funky interior, it was a car that was difficult not to like. Over the last nine years there have been a couple of changes, but by and large the MINI as a whole looks pretty much the same as it did when it was first released. Two years ago though, MINI introduced the Clubman. It was a bit bigger with a split tailgate design and was designed for those who loved the original but wanted a bit more room.
I remember thinking last Sunday that the upcoming week was going to be a rough one. I had the New York International Auto Show to cover, I was taking delivery of a car and I still had loads of work to accomplish on my 1968 Dodge Charger to get it ready for the One Lap of America. Covering the NYIAS is a blast. There is a lot of walking and picture taking involved, but you also get to reconnect with a lot of industry people that you may or may not have gotten to see throughout the year.
I’ve been hearing some really good things about Buick’s new Lacrosse and at the NYIAS I finally had the chance to check one out. For the last 30 years I think it was a prerequisite that you needed to be on deaths door before you put down a deposit on a new Buick. Grandparents were generally the only buyers of these things and the only reason they kept coming back was because they’d been driving Buick’s since the 1950′s. This is an image that Buick is desperately trying to shake by offering new models designed for younger buyers.
For years criminals, speeders and bad dudes everywhere were chased down by Chevrolet Caprice police cars. These babies are nothing short of iconic and have reputation for being some tough SOB’s. Now, after a 15 year absence Chevy is re-introducing the Caprice in full police garb to police departments all around the country. Understand now that the Caprice is not a rebadged Pontiac G8 although it does utilize the same platform.
Cars, like people sometimes get a raw deal as far as looks go. Sure you can dress them up and give them some new shoes, but at the end of the day they still look like they got hit in the face with a bag of hammers. This was unfortunately true for a select few vehicles at this years show.
I mean really, how many sets of lights does one car need? We’ve got lights on the hood, lights in the grill, and then underneath on the chin spoiler even more lights – these were itty bitty though. The Nissan Juke hasn’t even been released in the U.S. yet, but I fear that if it does make it to our shores, it’s going to be the butt of more than a few jokes.
Every year I go to the New York International Auto Show and every year Scion shows up with a great booth pimping out their latest and greatest. As I approached their display one car immediately jumped out at me. It was a hot-rodded version of the 2011 Scion TC that was heavily modified by Five Axis for the NYIAS.
Ever since the economy took a dump you’ve been contemplating a new direction as far as your career goes. You’ve looked into high finance but didn’t feel that warm cushy connection. Then you checked into cooking school, after all those celebrity chefs seem to be bringing in some pretty big coin. Then after knocking back a 12 pack of Bud and watching a rerun of Boogie Nights, it finally hit you didn’t it… PIMPIN’!!
Aston Martin’s are just sexy cars and aside from a little stint of ugly in the 1980s, they’ve set the standard of what an executive coupe should be. They’re automotive tuxedos that exude confidence and have an aura about them that states: “I’ve made it…”. I love these cars and if I had the means I’d pick one up in a heartbeat. They also, to me anyway, represent themselves as somewhat of an executive hot rod, which is probably why James Bond drives one.
