Click above for more shots of the Force Performance TriCharger
Fans of the classic B-Body Dodge Charger from the late '60s and early '70s have long been disappointed that Chrysler released the modern Charger as a four-door sedan. Despite being a sales success, there is still a faction of die-hard MOPAR fans who believe it was a mistake to put the Charger name badge on anything other than a two-door. We'll be polite and leave the '80's four-cylinder front-wheel-drive Charger out of the discussion – oops. A company by the name of Force Performance is currently working hard to rectify the situation by chopping up an LX-based Dodge Charger into a coupe. As you can see from the pictures in our gallery, the scalloped doors from the 68-70 Charger have made the conversion along with a twin-nostril split grille reminiscent of the classic '69. We can also see a well-domed hood, which is necessary for clearance over the insane HEMI V8 engine that's both twin turbocharged and supercharged. Three blowers, hence the TriCharger name. Awesome. Thanks for the tip, Orange Bread!
Mustang wagons have long been part of ponycar folklore. Some customs exist, but a factory-built first-generation Mustang shooting brake still appears to be mythology. Our friends at Hemmings have turned up some very nicely done cars that individuals have put together, a particularly fetching blue one has a very well thought out roofline and rear hatch. This whole bit of nonsense may have its genesis in a one-off wagon that Intermeccanica built for Barney Clarke and Robert Cumberford back in the '60s. It seems that you can do a lot with an early 'Stang and a Sawz-all if you're determined, and wagons are just the start of it.
Click above for high-res gallery of the Alpine A310
We see rear-engine, 6-cylinder sports cars from Europe every day. They always have a Porsche badge on them and usually "911" in their name. Whether in Carrera, S, Targa, 4, 4S, GT3, Turbo, GT3 RS or GT2 trim, they are great cars but so common that they barely stand out anymore. The occasional 356 is always a pleasant surprise, but especially in Southern California, those too are almost every-day sights. So when we saw this particular rear-engined European sports car, we were quite thrilled. It's a 1980 Alpine A310! And not just any A310, this one had a full on Fleishmann Group IV body kit plus a massive rear spoiler that must make this puppy stick like glue as it approaches its 130+ mph top speed. While several thousand A310s were built between 1971 and 1984, none were officially imported into the States. Seeing one "in the wild" is such a treat, even if it happens to be at a dealership that specializes in rear-engine European sports cars.
Alpine was affiliated with Renault a bit like AMG is with Mercedes. They started out as tuners and racers but were eventually bought and incorporated into the Renault operations. They had a pretty good racing record with the older Alpine A110, particularly in rallying, where they won the Monte Carlo Rally and World Rally Championship in 1973. The A310 was their follow-up. It started life powered by a tuned Gordini four-cylinder engine with up to 125 hp, but eventually featured the PRV 2.7L V6 later used in the De Lorean. Even with just 150 hp, these little fiberglass flyers could keep up with a contemporary Porsche. Think of it as a Lotus Exige built by the French, with a back seat, and the engine hanging in back of the rear axle. Okay, maybe the Exige analogy is a bit of a stretch, but with its tubular steel backbone chassis and fiberglass body, it was light, quick and a good handler, which makes it a fun sports car and a delight to see in person.
There are fantastic combinations, like bacon and, well, just about anything, and then there are things that should never be combined. Jeep CJ-7s are super iconic, and they represent the pinnacle of AMC's stewardship of the brand. Though the Dukes of Hazzard itself was no Citizen Kane, every kid of that era has indelible images of an orange Charger flying through the air etched in their memories. Again, General Lee: cool. Put them together; ignoring the fact that a proper "Dukes"-themed CJ would mirror the Golden Eagle edition that appeared in the show; and you have created that which should never be. The "01" treatment has been applied to some very odd vehicles the world over, though, so we suppose that a General Lee-themed CJ isn't so bad in the long run. At least both elements appeared in the original show...
Click above for huge high-res gallery from the concours
To celebrate its 26th year as Orange County's most prestigious classic car show, this year's Newport Beach Concours d'Elegance moved from its recent home in Irvine to the St. Regis Monarch Beach Resort in Dana Point. Still not Newport Beach, but much closer to the ocean at least. Benefiting the Mary & Dick Allen Diabetes Center at Hoag Hospital and the Assessment and Treatment Services Center, the event featured Cadillac as its honored marque to commemorate GM's 100th birthday this year. Besides the gorgeous 1931 Cadillac Sport Phaeton V16 Fleetwood poster car, there were at least a dozen other notable Caddys, as well as about 150 other beautiful classic and collector cars, of which you can see most of them in our high-res gallery below.
Although a notch below the premier events like Pebble Beach, some of the most beautiful and significant vehicles around show up for this concours. Representatives from The Petersen, The Nethercutt Collection, the William Lyon Estate, the Mercedes Classic Center, the Simon Collection, the Caballeriza Collection, and the Marconi Museum were on display, alongside some superb machinery from local collectors like David Sydorick and Peter Mullin. Altogether there were about 150 cars in 14 classes. Ferraris, Porsches, Jaguars, Aston Martins, Packards, Lincolns, Cadillacs, Delahayes, Mercedes, Rolls-Royces, Duesenbergs, Woodies, race cars and even a horseless carriage or two were visible through the fog around the links.
Click above for high-res gallery of the 2008 Coronado Speed Festival
Every autumn the naval base on Coronado island in San Diego plays host to dozens of vintage car racers for a festival of speed as part of Fleet Week, the largest military appreciation event in the country. The runways are a natural asphalt playground, and the Southern California weather never fails to provide plenty of sunshine. Nine separate classes of cars run throughout the weekend, from Pre-1941 Sports and Racing cars all the way to 1966-1972 Historic Trans-Am cars. Our particular favorite were the 1955-1960 Sports Racing cars that included a stunning 1957 Ferrari 250 TR, a pair of Jaguar D-Types, Maserati T-61 Birdcage, and a beautiful Aston Martin DBR-2. Spectators could also take tours of the pit area, browse the Meguiar's car club corral, take Naval ship tours, and explore a display of modern military vehicles and planes. We didn't stray much from the track, however, so that we could bring you plenty of photos of all the different groups of cars. You can check out the pictures, all available in high resolution, in the gallery below.
It's a fact that the English language is currently being sliced to ribbons. Spelling and grammar have gone out the window, and elocution is such a lost art that we're amazed when a speaker can manage a paragraph. It's interesting to see where these shortcomings manifest themselves. One would assume that an advertising agency, being in the business of communicating, would double- and triple-check a message before sending it out for the world to see. Imagine our surprise, then, when across our digital desks slid a memo from Carmichael Lynch trumpeting the Minneapolis, MN agency's relationship with Subaru of America.
It didn't start well. The subject header of the email read: "Subaru 360 Goes Airbourn (sic) To Find Home on 10th Floor." Interesting capitalization, and a very creative spelling of airborne. Bush league for an agency that handles Harley Davidson, Jack Link's, Cargill, and Toys 'R' Us, to name a few. Intrigued by the mention of a 360, Subaru's diminutive first stab at automobiles, we read on. Carmichael Lynch, upon landing the Subaru of America account in 2007, located a 360 and had it spiffed up for display in the company's 10th floor lobby. While small, the only way to get the little Subie ten stories up was a crane, which hoisted the car through a window last Saturday. Delightful little story, and we were inclined to give the wacky subject line a pass until we read the last sentence, which started: "Today's Subaru Forrester..." Whoa. If we were SoA, we'd be incensed. Spelling bee time: Forester. F-o-r-e-s-t-e-r, Forester. Forest is a chronically misspelled word, but it's still intolerable when it's the very firm being paid to represent the actual product.
Well, now we feel better. Check out the pictures of the 360's crane ride in the gallery, and hit the jump to see the original text of the email from Carmichael Lynch.
Thanks to the box-office success story that was Back To The Future, the De Lorean may be the most recognizable instance of the gull-wing door, but the most historically significant and the first model to truly popularize this unique portal was the Mercedes-Benz 300SL. Since then, the German automaker has continued experimenting with the gull-wing design, with the C111 and C112 concepts from the '60s and '70s. Apparently, the time has finally come for a return of the iconic design feature on a production supercar. We've already seen spy shots of what appears to be an odd mash-up of Dodge Viper parts with McLaren supercar bits tacked together, but the latest mule now appears to have the upwards-opening doors that could give the new model its name. Besides the doors, we can definitely see the long hood and short deck styling that echos the design of the current SLR. Rumor has it that the new supercar will wear the AMG badge and be powered by at least 550 horses from an undetermined powerplant hooked to a seven speed automatic transmission. More as we get it.
The 16th Annual Palos Verdes Concours d'Elegance was held this Sunday at Trump National Golf Club in Palos Verdes, California. Like a half-scale Pebble Beach, the PV Concours offers visitors a golf course setting above the Pacific that produces a beautiful backdrop for viewing some of the greatest classic cars around. This year's event celebrated 100 years of General Motors, as well as Cadillac, and alternative fuel vehicles among its dozens of classes. Highlights included a 100-yr-old electric car, a Ferrari short wheelbase, a Miura Jota, a '69 Trans Am, 427 COPO Camaro, '48 Delahaye, '54 Fiat 8V, and some great Corvairs and Cadillacs.
Besides the cars, concours are always fun for celeb spotting, especially around L.A. KNBC's Dave Kunz, Parnelli Jones, Barry Meguiar, Bobbie 'dine Rodda, Paul Moyer, Bruce Meyer and even Deepak Chopra were among those who made it out for the show, which benefits the Palos Verdes Art Center and Palos Verdes Peninsula Rotary Foundation. We assembled a huge gallery of some of the entrants, all labeled so you can identify some of your favorites.
Click above for more shots of the HXC Cuda conversion
When Chrysler gave its Plymouth brand the axe, many storied name-plates were orphaned -- none of them more legendary than the Hemi 'Cuda. As the Mopar brand began teasing the world with its pony car revival, otherwise known as the Dodge Challenger, a great many fans of the classic Barracuda were left wishing that their childhood dreams of driving off the showroom floor in a brand new Hemi-powered Plymouth muscle car could finally be fulfilled. And so they might. HXC Performance is currently hard at work designing a retrofit kit that would transform the Dodge Challenger into a proper Plymouth 'Cuda. Many aficionado's believe that the 1971 'Cuda was the best looking year, and it's on this model that HXC chose to base its conversion. Included is a new grille, fender "gills" (which were only used in '71), Shaker hood, tail lights and a new rear valance.
To up the performance ante of the standard HEMI-powered R/T model, a Brembo brake package and suspension upgrade will also be included, as will a few engine option packages that can bump the power up to 475 horsepower. Mustang and Camaro owners may now have one more reason to keep an eye on their rear-view mirrors, mimicking countless scenes from the muscle car glory years of the early '70s.
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