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Lotus Exige S

 

Pulled up next to this Lotus Exige S the other day on San Vicente in Brentwood. I've loved the lines of these cars since they were first released. All the seemingly ceaseless iterations and special packages keep this car fresh to me, but mainly I just want to drive the thing someday, but always lurking in the back of my mind is the reality that you've got to be able to get in the car before you drive it.  

The Lotus Exige S (this one in matte black, one of 25 made) was at a Lavaggio open house a few months ago and I attempted to climb into the car to see what it felt like. Great hilarity ensued, as you either need to be a contortionist to do it smoothly the first time, or simply have done it a lot. If you're over about 5'10" it's probably a lost cause, but also good inspiration to keep up with your yoga training. If you can find an equally limber passenger, you should probably be good friends with them, as you're sitting pretty close together in the cramped cockpit. 

That being said, the current Lotus Lineup contains some extraordinary cars, and given the models that have already been announced to replace them, I'm hoping that at some point a Lotus will be within my range of ownership. It'll likely be an Elise and not an Exige, but the handling on either will be ideal for the hills above Malibu. 

Hot Rods on PCH

Always fun to see a convoy of hot rods on PCH, particularly in the middle of the week when it's not so crowded. 

Not so much fun to see one parked by the side of the road, waiting for help! 

 

Spyker C8 SWB, VW R32 MK IV

It's tough to melt into the crowd in a Spyker C8. They just don't lend themselves to anonymity. Even at Supercar Sunday they tend to stand out, so on a sidestreet in Hollywood it's a difficult car to miss. 

Not much in the way of pithy (or otherwise) commentary today...I just liked the colors in these photos.

Hot 1972 Datsun 240Z - Motor4Toys

Fun seeing this 1972 Datsun 240Z at Motor4toys on Sunday. I'd passed him on PCH last week as I was heading into town and thought that it looked in pretty nice shape: 

I wasn't exactly sure what to make of the mods though - the driver looked like he wasn't the sort of boy racer who'd bolt wings on just to make it look fast. Seeing the car up close led to a few surprises though - the interior was done up really nicely (including roll cage) and it had an automatic transmission. Most interesting was the engine, a Chevy 383 Stroker: 

The car was clean and pretty (I love the colors) and looks like it would be fun to drive. In fact, as I headed home after Motor4Toys, I saw this Z leading a group of other cars headed down PCH from the direction of Neptune's Net in Solromar (sadly, there was no time to get the camera out).

Aston Martin V-12 Zagato

Just because I want one doesn't mean that I can rationalize stashing an Aston-Martin V12 Zagato in the garage....but a guy can wish, right? 

The nice folks at O'Gara Coach Company/Beverly Hills Aston-Martin invited me down to pour Martian Ranch wines at the premiere of the Aston-Martin V12 Zagato last week. This is a car designed for racing, although there will be 150 examples constructed for the 2013 model year. Whether they'll be street-legal in the USA is still up in the air, but I kinda think it'd be nice to have one of these around for track days, y'know? We're not talking mass production here by any means, since they're essentially handmade cars with a price that is going to be around $550,000, depending on where the dollar is at that time in comparison to the Euro. I would suspect that a sizeable deposit would be required, so I'll remain on the sidelines, waiting for one to hit the secondary market. (ahem)

Based on the V-12 Vantage, two prototypes were constructed and have been on the show circuit, making appearances at Frankfurt and Pebble Beach. This car was built for the Nürburgring 24 hour Endurance Race (they took 5th & 6th in their class). The 6-liter, 48-valve, V-12 engine is mated to a 6-speed automated (that sounds cooler than "automatic") transmission and when fired up (which they did at one point in the evening), the sound of the car is awe-inspiring. It's fitted with Brembo ceramic brakes and custom-designed wheels. This prototype wore the black rims but I prefer the look of the chrome wheels shown on the Aston-Martin V-12 Zagato website. 

The interior of the car is pretty businesslike right now - this is a race car and it's difficult to integrate a roll cage and make it look real sexy, unless you like that sort of thing. The website promises "V12 VANTAGE INTERIOR WITH ZAGATO STITCHED LOGOS AND PLAQUES" so maybe they'll paste that stuff onto some carbon fiber, black leather, alcantara, or some other exotic covering. It's not the sort of car you'd buy if you want a sedate sort of ride so the designers have a lot of leeway in what they do without having to worry too much about sound deadening. I reckon that the sound of the engine and exhuast would be pleasing enough. 

BTW, before things got going at the event, someone pulled up in a Lamborghini Aventador. Nice looking car, and appropriately menacing. More on that next week, since I'm pouring wine from Uvaggio after its premiere at O'Gara on Friday. 

(is that a 1965 Volvo 1800 S in the background?)

Volvo 1800E, MGB GT

While driving back from Dry Creek Valley last week I was tooling down the 280 trying to avoid the traffic on the 101 when this Volvo 1800E whizzed by in the right hand lane while I was standing still in the fast lane. I guess it pays to be local and know how traffic flows on your daily commute. This looks to be from around 1969-1972 and is probably an E....very nicely restored, and seemingly a daily driver that looks a lot sharper than my 1965 1800S that I use as a daily driver. I'm a little wary of taking my car on long trips (say, to SF or Phoenix) but that's almost as much about its lack of air conditioning as it is the car's reliability. I have few qualms about driving it around town on a daily basis though - Triple A is good about long-distance tows. In fact, here's a shot of my car from the other night getting hooked up to the tow truck:

The situation was pretty pathetic (in the literal sense of the word) and it came very late in the evening, but the lesson has been learned, that lesson being namely that it's not a good idea to buy cheap key blanks to make copies of the ignition key! #@$%&!

 

Back to Highway 101 passing by the San Martin airport, I saw this nicely restored MGB-GT cruising along the freeway at maybe 20 mph slower than the rest of us were cruising.
More power to 'em (literally)! This was one of the cars I initially lusted after in my teenaged years, but I've read way too many horror stories about them to want to bother with actually owning one. Maybe a MGA or TD or TF 1500 would be more in keeping with whatever aesthetic I profess to maintain. Whichever MGB you wind up buying, you'd do well to check out The MG Experience website. Lots of experienced people involved there, an extremely useful resource if you're restoring or maintaining one of these cars yourself.

Ferrari 365GTC/4 Redux

In my previous post, I wrote a bit about a Ferrari 365 GTC/4 that I saw in town earlier in the week. What are the odds that I'd see another one (red as well) driving up my street a few days later?
It's likely that this may be the same car as the earlier one (didn't get license plate info foreither car so there's no way to know for sure) but it's interesting to see two of these 2+2s so soon. I also like to think that it may also speak to the quality of the neighborhood that a car such as this comes to visit....

Ferrari 365 GTC/4 in Century City

While passing through Century City yesterday I saw this Ferrari 365 GTC/4 at a stoplight. While this may be the most unloved of all of the 365 series body styles, I've always been partial to it. This probably stems from an experience in back in the late 1970s where I followed one down the Pasadena Fwy into downtown. I was driving a supertakerish Pontiac Grand Ville and it was inspiring to watch the Ferrari smoothly whoosh through the curves, never needing to brake on what is the oldest freeway in the world, not to mention the curviest. Meanwhile, my efforts to keep the USS Behemoth in my own lane while trying to keep up with the Ferrari were a losing battle to say the least...

A lovely car in all respects except perhaps for repair costs. I've read that this model is even more nightmarishly expensive to maintain than the other 365s, but perhaps that is the price one pays for the extra seats in the back.  Or maybe it's because of the way the transmission is mounted (on the engine, not the axle as is the case in with the GTB/4 Daytona. Only 500 were built in 1971 and 1972, and they remain relatively affordable, as such things go. A very imformative website devoted to the 365 GTC/4 can be found here. The forum makes for some interesting reading.

So maybe it needs a little work.....

I often see cars in various stages of reconstruction as they're moved from place to place. This old Thunderbird looks to have a lot of potential in the restoration process.

This oval window VW seemed to be in a bit of distress. It was being driven up PCH toward Heathercliff at a very slow rate of speed (and off to the side of the road too).

I'll finish with this car, which probably doesn't need any work done to it at all, given that it appears to be a rat rod all gussied up to look like a barnfind or a relic from the middle of a wheatfield somewhere:
Regardless of whether or not I see the entire Rat Rod thing as smacking of being an attempt at attaining instant street cred without actually having spent much time on the street, in the end it's all about getting people involved with cars as something to enjoy, rather than something to endure.

Ultra-cool Rat Pack/Pimpmobile coupe, but what IS it?

I saw this car parked in front of a house in West Los Angeles lately and it caught my eye:

Driving (much less owning) one of these bespoke semi-pimp cars from the 70s or 80s is falls under the Fantasyland category, but there's an unassailable coolness factor to this category of automobile and it would be fun to cruise around town in this for an afternoon. I mean, deep down, wouldn't we all want to be a member of the Rat Pack, or be hanging out with Superfly?
There's enough chrome on this car to shine up everything in nearby Beverly Hills that isn't already plated in gold. In fact, this car might have presaged the trend to chrome the entire car.  and it would seem that front-end aerodynamics weren't high on the designer's priority list. One would think that if you were driving a car like this, you'd have so much cash on hand that fuel economy wouldn't be a big deal. The Stutz Blackhawk (if it's good enough for Elvis Presley, it's good enough for me),  Dual Ghia (my fave in the category), and even the Excalibur (still available!) and Clinet cars were perfect for this market (although the Mercedes-inspired latter two cars never particularly inspired me). Gas probably didn't cost much at that point anyway, so mpg obviously wasn't one of the selling points. 
This car looks as if it's been fairly well maintained, although perhaps age (and gravity) are catching up with it. My question is, what is it? It's got the some of the lines of a fourth generation (67-70) Cadillac Eldorado but has that vague "Italian designers crafts something he thinks the Americans would go for" vibe to it. Or maybe it's a one-off from George Barris, Dean Jeffries, or one of the other car customizers who were working in LA back in that era. Does anyone have any thoughts as to what this is, who designed it, and what's underneath the acres of metal bodywork?