Cars Coming Soon: Audi A4 Allroad and a $100,000 Ford Focus

Posted on Nov 14, 2020 in Racing | 3 comments

A Focus by any other name is still a Focus. Right? We see them every day in shopping-mall parking lots across America. We rent them during trips to Dallas. We see them advertised by dealers for low, low monthly payments. We have friends who drive a Focus. We’ve considered buying a Focus. But a Focus for almost $100,000? That’s just crazy talk. Or is it the...

Starting Small: 1971 Honda Z600 Coupe and N600 Sedan brochure

Posted on Nov 8, 2020 in Featured | 2 comments

Everybody has to start somewhere. And although the Honda Motor Company‘s first four-wheeled products were the brilliantly designed S(port)500/S600/S800 roadsters of the mid-1960s, American buyers weren’t able to purchase those through official channels. The first Honda cars that we could—and did—buy in those pre-Civic days were the Z600 Coupe and S600 Sedan,...

How Many Human-driven Years Remain?

Posted on Nov 1, 2020 in Editorials | 1 comment

Autonomous vehicles and shared mobility are invoked in our contemporary discourse as an inevitable fate. There is an unsettling undercurrent rippling around a not altogether desirable future for the automobile as we know it. I am not anti-progress, anti-technology, or otherwise prone to romanticizing yesteryear. I welcome the convenience and safety of new...

Most Beautiful Cars: Jaguar E-Type

Posted on Oct 24, 2020 in Antique | 2 comments

The most beautiful car ever made – Enzo Ferrari There you have it, from the man whose company has created more incredibly beautiful car designs than anyone on the planet. The Jaguar E-Type (XKE in the US) is probably THE most beautiful design ever for a production car. It is a car so striking that it was included as a permanent part of the collection at New...

GM’s Solution to Recall: Just Buy a New Car

Posted on Oct 21, 2020 in Safety | 1 comment

Sorry for the trouble. Buy one of these as compensation! Let’s say you bought a car only to find out later it has a defect that could potentially kill you. Would your first response be heading to your nearest dealer and buying a new version of the same brand to replace your defective car? Of course not. That’s a silly question, right? Most people would simply...

Too Much Junk in the Trunk (and Everywhere Else)

Posted on Oct 16, 2020 in Editorials | 1 comment

Ben writes: Hey Bark, I have a brother with a mechanically-healthy 2001 Toyota Camry LE four-cylinder automatic. I’m estimating it has about 180,000 miles now. He uses that car everyday — extensively on the job, and for visits to family members out of state. Mileage is piling up fast. He does have the car regularly maintained — mechanically — through a local...

Bronco, Ford’s first SUV, turns 50

Posted on Oct 9, 2020 in Featured | 2 comments

Photos courtesy Ford Motor Company, except where noted. Other manufacturers had pioneered the format before the Bronco. Others had even applied the “sport utility” name to their products before the Bronco. But Ford’s Bronco, when it hit the scene in late 1965, was the first to combine the two and open wide the four-wheeling market—and then later take that...

Nissan Z Series & Nismo Tribute

Posted on Oct 7, 2020 in Technology | Comments Off on Nissan Z Series & Nismo Tribute

Nissan has come to great lengths with their GTR, but what about the Z lineup? Let’s step back in time with the original 240Z. I would like to give my regards and condolences to his family, Nissan Japan, and Nissan USA with the recent passing of Yutaka Katayama. Yutaka Katayama is also known as Mr.K, who was the original designer of the Nissan S30 (Fairlady Z in...

Contest: Win a Free Lemur BlueDriver for Your Best Car Story!

Posted on Sep 25, 2020 in Technology | 2 comments

“Looks like your’re low on blinker fluid fluid from a broken tank. Don’t worry, I’m fixing it now. It will only be $900, all said and done. Wanna see our customer lounge?” Frustrating being at the repair shop, feeling like you got the run around . . . Tell us your WORST, most HILARIOUS and downright RIDICULOUS experience with a repair shop or service facility....

Dan Wheldon’s Unnecessary and Awful Death

Posted on Sep 14, 2020 in Racing | Comments Off on Dan Wheldon’s Unnecessary and Awful Death

Here we go again. Dan Wheldon, a highly talented, respected and loved race driver dies in a horrifying crash that should have been prevented. IndyCar racing has now claimed six drivers since 1996. Six were injured in this 15-car crash alone. Driver Alex Zanardi lost both his legs in a crash in 2001. Sunday’s IndyCar 300 race in Las Vegas was just another...

Burning Oil in a Brand New Car

Posted on Sep 8, 2020 in Safety | 2 comments

Burning oil in a 1973 Cadillac seems legit. Drive an old boat like that around for long and you’ll stop at every gas station and put in a quart of oil. Worn engines simply burn and leak oil, often causing heavy smoke and the putrid odor of crusty black tar. Drivers of those old cars don’t get too angry at the oil consumption because they know it just comes with...

High-Low, High-Low, It’s Off To Work You Go

Posted on Sep 5, 2020 in Editorials | 1 comment

Earlier this week, I had the pleasure of editing Daniel Ho’s theories on crossovers as reflections of the zeitgeist. In his thoughtfully-written piece, Daniel argues that crossovers are chimeras, reflecting a social trend towards generalized products that combine social signaling attributes from multiple socio-economic categories. The crossover, therefore, is...

Most Beautiful Cars: Ferrari 250

Posted on Sep 4, 2020 in Antique | Comments Off on Most Beautiful Cars: Ferrari 250

“Aerodynamics are for people who can’t build engines” “I don’t sell cars; I sell engines. The cars I throw in for free since something has to hold the engines in.” – Enzo Ferrari When I decided to create this list, I started with some simple rules. First was to disqualify all pre-war cars, as most were custom built boutique examples created by specialty...