I spotted an (insert obscure car name here) classic car today!

fintail

The first run 2014 cars are almost depreciating into my splurge price range now, but I think thirst and maintenance would make them an unlikely choice. They definitely have a presence, I sometimes think of them as an 8/10ths Bentley Continental for much less money.

Not sure if I have mentioned my current car. E55 was sold years ago (sellers remorse still pops up here and there), I am now in a lease of a final run W212 E250 Bluetec. Lease is up in about 6 months - part of me wants to buy it out and keep the car, part of me wants to move on (the reason I leased a few cars, to not be attached, and to sample different cars). Not a bad position to be in, but at the same time, not easy.

boomchek said:

These are gorgeous. One of my favourite looking cars on the market right now.

boomchek

fintail said:

The first run 2014 cars are almost depreciating into my splurge price range now, but I think thirst and maintenance would make them an unlikely choice. They definitely have a presence, I sometimes think of them as an 8/10ths Bentley Continental for much less money.

Not sure if I have mentioned my current car. E55 was sold years ago (sellers remorse still pops up here and there), I am now in a lease of a final run W212 E250 Bluetec. Lease is up in about 6 months - part of me wants to buy it out and keep the car, part of me wants to move on (the reason I leased a few cars, to not be attached, and to sample different cars). Not a bad position to be in, but at the same time, not easy.

boomchek said:

These are gorgeous. One of my favourite looking cars on the market right now.

I do remember you had the E55 last time I was active on here and I think you just acquired your current W212. I drove a pre facelift W212 Bluetec for a month or so that we had sitting on the lot at my previous work and I liked the size and the space in it.

If you like it then buy it out, or just lease something else and newer. My problem with the current E classes is that they look very similar to the current C class, sometimes I have a hard time telling them apart. Not that the C class is a bad looking car, but I think the E class should look a little bit different.

However my favourite car to take off the lot as a permanent demo was the F10 5 series, especially 535i. We always happened to have one or two for sale, so I just gravitated towards them. Just everything about it was right including the size (especially with 2 kids), performance, and handling.

Have you considered a new 5 series to lease?

fintail

The buyout idea is on my mind, but the residual is hilariously inflated, and I have received conflicting or uncertain information (including from sales managers) about how much they will negotiate from the residual. It's still up in the air. This Bluetec is an E250, which I prefer - I think the 4 cyl feels livelier even though it has marginally less power, it has somewhat better efficiency, and I like some of the facelift updates (no folding mirrors in the US market until 2015, LED lighting, etc). Maybe I'd buy another used one if I can't buy it out, but I am really picky about specs, and it won't be easy.

I'd consider a 5er diesel, but the price would need to be right, and the last time I checked, they weren't leasing as well as MBs. I am a bit of a bargain hunter. I don't mind the W213, I can tell it apart easy enough, but I am pretty set on having the full widescreen gauges if I got one, and that can be hard to find.

I also have thought about buying an earlier W222 S-class or even a G, but running costs put me off. This E250 has had no real problems, and I like the idea of the comfort and size of an E with the efficiency.

boomchek said:

I do remember you had the E55 last time I was active on here and I think you just acquired your current W212. I drove a pre facelift W212 Bluetec for a month or so that we had sitting on the lot at my previous work and I liked the size and the space in it.

If you like it then buy it out, or just lease something else and newer. My problem with the current E classes is that they look very similar to the current C class, sometimes I have a hard time telling them apart. Not that the C class is a bad looking car, but I think the E class should look a little bit different.

However my favourite car to take off the lot as a permanent demo was the F10 5 series, especially 535i. We always happened to have one or two for sale, so I just gravitated towards them. Just everything about it was right including the size (especially with 2 kids), performance, and handling.

Have you considered a new 5 series to lease?

uplanderguy

Fans of early-sixties Buicks might enjoy "Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte", played without commercial interruption on Turner Classic Movies today at 3:45 EST. A couple '64 Electra 225 six-window pillared sedans are in the film, as is a '64 Special four-door sedan. It's my favorite movie and has creeped me out for fifty years, LOL. Here's a clip showing the one Electra 225, also showing that Olivia deHavilland in this movie isn't replaying 'Melanie' from "Gone With The Wind" by any stretch, LOL:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pgvnxeEFkw

PF_Flyer

From the Jelly Bean Era. Saw one of these over the weekend. Hadn't seen one in a long time. To my eye, these always looked like they slapped a "cap" on the back of a sedan. Probably that angled pillar creating the perception.

texases

Exhibit A on "How not to make a wagon out of a sedan"...

ab348

Jelly Bean era or bean-counter era? I agree with your assessment. If they could have coughed up the money to change the rear door window frame and then designed a better cargo area side window it would have looked better. But they didn't. The styling of that era Taurus, especially the pre-refresh version, was pretty challenging.

ab348

Hey, I guess this must be a classic car now? After all, it's advertised on Hemmings:

https://www.hemmings.com/classifieds/dealer/toyota/corolla/2173307.html

It's the end of the world as we know it.

Mr_Shiftright

We all knew years ago that the term "classic" was becoming increasingly meaningless, so we just needed this ad to put the last nail in the coffin.

fintail

Those are actually the normalized ones. The real jellybeans are the 96-99 models:



As time marches on, the first series ovoid Taurus are becoming less common, but still quite a few around. Ford had some guts to be this bold, which is laudable - I prefer weirdness to the faux aggression of so many modern designs.

PF_Flyer said:

From the Jelly Bean Era. Saw one of these over the weekend. Hadn't seen one in a long time. To my eye, these always looked like they slapped a "cap" on the back of a sedan. Probably that angled pillar creating the perception.

stickguy

I saw corolla, and was at least hoping it was a 70s vintage SR5 or some such. Not the cheap used car my mom got when she was 75. And that price is ludicrous.

uplanderguy

The first Accord wagons were in the vein of looking like a roof was attached to the trunk of the sedan.

andre1969

I think most wagons try to share as much architecture with their 4-door sedan counterparts as possible. But, that tends to work better when the sedan version is a bit more upright and formal to begin with. Or, at least, the trailing edge of the rear door is more upright. That Taurus wagon is a mess, I agree. But, I have a feeling it wouldn't have been cost-effective to design it correctly.

fintail

Yeah, most wagons in relatively modern times have used apparent sedan rear doors with a grafted-on rear. The ovoid Taurus used Sable doors. The original Taurus had sedan doors too, but maybe wore it less obviously:



I recall Camry wagons had unique rear doors, but Accord wagons had obvious sedan doors. MB and BMW wagons have unique rear doors, too.

ab348

I knew a guy who owned one of these from new. His was the only one I ever saw running around town. I suspect dealers here didn't bring many in, or perhaps could not get them allocated to them in that era of high Honda popularity and short supply.

kyfdx

I saw the same model sedan on Saturday. Typical rust on a car from that era. Sadly, low level trim LX

texases

VW and Audi also do a great job with their wagons.

stickguy

I saw a gen 1 A3 today. That is a sharp looking car.

andre1969

There was something about the '92-96 Camry wagon that made me think of a heavily revised '87-91. I wonder if the '92 wasn't as "all new" as Toyota would have led us to believe? The sedan certainly seemed all-new, but the wagon struck me as a bit of a hatchet-job

omarman

ab348 said:

Hey, I guess this must be a classic car now? After all, it's advertised on Hemmings:

https://www.hemmings.com/classifieds/dealer/toyota/corolla/2173307.html

It's the end of the world as we know it.

1976 Chevrolet Chevette advertised on Hemmings.
"Primary damage: Bio hazard, Secondary damage: All over..."
Price: $2,288 Auction

fintail

Accord wagons of both generations, along with the Camry wagons, were fairly popular here, and are still seen now and then. The 92-96 Camry wagon seems a lot larger than the 87-91, but the curved lines could exaggerate it. The dual rear wipers remain the most notable feature of the 92+ models.

I hope the "biohazard" on the Chevette with two extra digits in the price is just mold.

texases

andre1969 said:

There was something about the '92-96 Camry wagon that made me think of a heavily revised '87-91. I wonder if the '92 wasn't as "all new" as Toyota would have led us to believe? The sedan certainly seemed all-new, but the wagon struck me as a bit of a hatchet-job

Not sure I follow you. The '92-'96 wagon looks like a modified version of the corresponding sedan, I don't see any of the '87-'91 in it. And the prior model was a bit smaller all around, wasn't it?

andre1969

I think it's the shape of the rear door on the '92-96 wagon. It looks to me like they took it off an an '87-91 and made it fit onto the '92. At the time, the '92 certainly seemed a lot bigger...in my mind that was when the Camry made the jump from compact to midsize. But looking back, the wheelbase only went up a bit, from 102.4" to 103.1".

According to the way the EPA classifies car sizes though, the '92 was a huge jump in interior room (note that they show a '92 wagon for the '91 entry, for some reason)...

Mr_Shiftright

Greatest Car Movies Ever Made

Warning: This is a Rabbit-Hole

Michaell

Mr_Shiftright said:

Greatest Car Movies Ever Made

Warning: This is a Rabbit-Hole

Thanks. Thanks a lot. I'll never get those 20 minutes back, now.

ab348

Mr_Shiftright said:

Greatest Car Movies Ever Made

Warning: This is a Rabbit-Hole

Maybe a third of those movies are actually what I would call car movies. The rest are just movies that happen to have cars in them. I hope the order displayed isn't in what they consider lowest to highest (though I suspect it is) because i could not disagree more.

omarman

The summary of #50 Two Lane Blacktop referred to "a rival racer." I remember that guy.

Mr_Shiftright

Michaell said:

Mr_Shiftright said:

Greatest Car Movies Ever Made

Warning: This is a Rabbit-Hole

Thanks. Thanks a lot. I'll never get those 20 minutes back, now.

Could have been worse. I watched the last 20 minutes of the 49ers/Atlanta game.

Mr_Shiftright

ab348 said:

Mr_Shiftright said:

Greatest Car Movies Ever Made

Warning: This is a Rabbit-Hole

Maybe a third of those movies are actually what I would car car movies. The rest are just movies that happen to have cars in them. I hope the order displayed isn't in what they consider lowest to highest (though I suspect it is) because i could not disagree more.

Yeah some are questionable to be sure but they do bring back memories--and occasionally, make me wonder why I didn't demand my money back at the box office.

berri

What's that cop car - 63 Plymouth?

explorerx4

I had to cheat from another movie I knew he was in, driver in the Yellow GTO is Warren Oates.
GTO had a leaky carb.

roadburner

My favorite car movies:
American Graffiti
Furious 7
Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior
Mad Max: Fury Road
Smokey and the Bandit
Two Lane Blacktop
Vanishing Point(1971)

My favorite racing movies:
Grand Prix
Le Mans
Rush

Personal notes:
I saw Mad Max 2 at a sneak preview at midnight on a Sunday; the bar exam was the following Tuesday. It was worth it.
I was already a car nut, but seeing Grand Prix in Cinerama when I was 9 years old sealed the obsession.

Michaell

Mr_Shiftright said:

Michaell said:

Mr_Shiftright said:

Greatest Car Movies Ever Made

Warning: This is a Rabbit-Hole

Thanks. Thanks a lot. I'll never get those 20 minutes back, now.

Could have been worse. I watched the last 20 minutes of the 49ers/Atlanta game.

Wow. That was bad.

SF played Arizona yesterday, not Atlanta.

Both start with A, both nicknames are birds.

I can understand the confusion.

omarman

It gets complicated with college sports. The last time Stanford had a mascot for their team was the Stanford Indian which was dropped and replaced with the Stanford Cardinals nickname and then later modified to just Stanford Cardinal which refers to the color red - not the bird.

But the Stanford marching band does have an official mascot.

Michaell

omarman said:

It gets complicated with college sports. The last time Stanford had a mascot for their team was the Stanford Indian which was dropped and replaced with the Stanford Cardinals nickname and then later modified to just Stanford Cardinal which refers to the color red - not the bird.

But the Stanford marching band does have an official mascot.

That's so they can tackle the Cal player trying to score with the band on the field.

(hint: look up Stanford Cal 1990)

boomchek

fintail said:

Yeah, most wagons in relatively modern times have used apparent sedan rear doors with a grafted-on rear. The ovoid Taurus used Sable doors. The original Taurus had sedan doors too, but maybe wore it less obviously:



I recall Camry wagons had unique rear doors, but Accord wagons had obvious sedan doors. MB and BMW wagons have unique rear doors, too.

I always liked the looks of the first gen Taurus wagons. They looked great for that time period when most cars were still boxy, and I still think it looks great today.

I had a 92 Accord EXR wagon and loved it. Picked it up at the local public car auction for about $1000 or so, and managed to get service records from the dealer that sold it at the auction, which happened to be a dealer I worked at before the purchase for a few years. The owner of this Accord never missed a service, so I had service records totalling about $15k from the previous 20 or so years.

My Accord wagon, this thing was mint. I had it in 2012 I think.

boomchek

And speaking of wagons that just had a "cap" grafted on their sedan versions, if you look closely, even the good ole Volvo 240s had a slight kink on the top of their rear doors, likely because they used the sedan doors, and the sedan version had a slightly sloping roof in the rear.



The Saturn wagon was an obvious hack job of the sedan. Not surprised there. I barely see ANY Saturns on the road anymore.



And to keep this on topic I don't recall when's the last time, or if I ever saw a TSX wagon:



The Lexus IS Sportcross is a rarity too:

tjc78

The Saturn may be the worst offender IMO.  

omarman

I think to understand the love between Cal - Stanford and the tree just look up fubar.

pensfan83

As far as mascots go this one takes the cake IMO...for now.

andre1969

I hardly ever see Saturns of that vintage any more, either, although I have a friend who lives in an area with a nest of them. And, until just recently, his brother had an L-series. Alas, the L-series died and left them stranded in Baltimore. It had to be towed, but then got broken into at the towing lot, and the break-in damage was so bad it was a total. Next time I'm out that way, I'll try to get a pic of the house...it almost looks like something out of a sitcom, where Saturn would have been the automotive sponsor!

kyfdx

My son's friend has a Sportcross. It lives just up the street.
Spotted a TSX wagon, last week. A handsome design.

Michaell

kyfdx said:

My son's friend has a Sportcross. It lives just up the street.
Spotted a TSX wagon, last week. A handsome design.

Found out that one of the instructors that reports to me has a TSX wagon. 74,000 miles on it. He talked about a replacement next year, but his son decided to get married in Hawaii, so the car purchase is being deferred.

fintail

Yeah, the first Taurus wagon was maybe even more futuristic than the sedan, one of those cars that still looked current at 10 years old. The rear door glass was also very modern. Landmark design for the US market.

Speaking of those Accords, a friend of mine who loves the 90-93 cars kind of wants this - price might be slightly dear even if everything checks out, I think. He had a 92 for years, and one thing I remind him is that these are not fast cars.

Another wagon with obvious sedan doors, but one I have always thought was sharp, is the original Saturn:



Saturns are getting thin on the ground here, but seen now and then. At the local auto auction I check out now and then, I have seen them well north of 200K miles, so they can keep going with maintenance.

boomchek said:

I always liked the looks of the first gen Taurus wagons. They looked great for that time period when most cars were still boxy, and I still think it looks great today.

I had a 92 Accord EXR wagon and loved it. Picked it up at the local public car auction for about $1000 or so, and managed to get service records from the dealer that sold it at the auction, which happened to be a dealer I worked at before the purchase for a few years. The owner of this Accord never missed a service, so I had service records totalling about $15k from the previous 20 or so years.

My Accord wagon, this thing was mint. I had it in 2012 I think.

fintail

I've loathed the Flyers and their fans for most of my life, but I think that mascot is brilliant, cracks me up.

pensfan83 said:

As far as mascots go this one takes the cake IMO...for now.

Mr_Shiftright

Michaell said:

Mr_Shiftright said:

Michaell said:

Mr_Shiftright said:

Greatest Car Movies Ever Made

Warning: This is a Rabbit-Hole

Thanks. Thanks a lot. I'll never get those 20 minutes back, now.

Could have been worse. I watched the last 20 minutes of the 49ers/Atlanta game.

Wow. That was bad.

SF played Arizona yesterday, not Atlanta.

Both start with A, both nicknames are birds.

I can understand the confusion.

Oh yeah, I've made that mistake before. I was just trying to blot the game out of my mind entirely. I woke up screaming this Monday morning, but I took a little tea and dry toast, and I'm ready for next week's game.

boomchek

fintail said:

Yeah, the first Taurus wagon was maybe even more futuristic than the sedan, one of those cars that still looked current at 10 years old. The rear door glass was also very modern. Landmark design for the US market.

Speaking of those Accords, a friend of mine who loves the 90-93 cars kind of wants this - price might be slightly dear even if everything checks out, I think. He had a 92 for years, and one thing I remind him is that these are not fast cars.

Wow, that Accord is identical to the one I had, even the red interior was the same.

jpp75

I've always thought the TSX wagon was a very classic design, I wouldn't mind having one if it was in my budget. Especially if they had made them with a manual.

omarman

berri said:

What's that cop car - 63 Plymouth?

Yes Warren Oates at the wheel of a 1963 Plymouth Belvedere 4 door sedan. In the Heat of the Night

berri

For some reason I always found the 63 Plymouth a curious combination of designs and angles. Its dash was interesting in a different way as well.