There is strange, and the Amphicar was strange indeed. It was an amphibious vehicle built in the Germany – a country that is not exactly celebrated the world over for its pronounced eccentricity or its history of building quirky or frankly bizarre cars. VW and BMW could be said to epitomize the German car industry, [...]

Popular legend says the distinctive Pacer was the American Motor Corporation’s answer to the fuel crisis, an attempt to offer the internal space of a traditional US car but with much more compact dimensions and reasonable economy. In fact, a clay model of Pacer was built in 1971 by AMC’s chief stylish Richard Teague, and [...]

For Alvis of Coventry, post car production became something of a sideline to its more profitable armoured vehicle interests. That isn’t to say that the TD, TE and TF were not fine cars, far from it. Developed form the ‘Greylady’ TC21, these were mature motor cars for discerning enthusiastic luxurious, well built and well mannered, [...]

Despite a distinguished history of beautiful sporting cars, Alfa Romeo was close to expiring. The company was taken over by Fiat in 1986 and incorporated into a new group with Lancia. Subsequent models, including the 145 and 155 were based on the Fiat Tipo family platform, a very functional and humdrum front wheel drive chassis. [...]

The now legendary South London motor trader Sydney Allard based his famous rugged sports cars on Ford V8 power. His pre war special cut its teeth in mud lugging trials and kicked off the successful Allard racing heritage. It wasn’t until later however, after the Second World War, that Sydney Allard decided to launch himself [...]

Despite the encouragement provided by the arrival of the 164, Alfa’s progress as a maker of fine cars spluttered badly, but somewhat predictably with the introduction of the lackluster mid size 155 and the Golf rivaling 145/6. Once again it was left to an Alfa sports to give the famous marque a lift. The much [...]

The Alfa Romeo SZ was a short run coupe intended to give Alfa’s image badly tarnished in 1970’s and 1980’s, a serious boost. However, it became known as II Monstro in its home country, where enthusiasts had been weaned on a diet of finely sculpted Italian sports cars. Serious motoring writers called it the world’s [...]

The Alfa Six is an interesting lesson in how not to do things in the luxury saloon class. Designed to look discreet and dignified rather than flagrantly expensive, Alfa felt that wealthy buyers would want to avoid unwanted attention in bandit ridden Italy, the Six looked stodgy and dated when it came to the European [...]

The ‘Type Four’ project has to go down as one of the most successful manufacturing co-operations ever experienced in the automobile industry. It is certainly the most successful of modern times and has provided a model that other companies have strived to follow. It began as a tie-up between Saab and Lancia, but Fiat and [...]

The 1972 Alfasud was by general consent the greatest car of the decade. Its name, though, was an indication of the insane government intervention that tragically thwarted if form becoming one of the greatest cars of all time. The Alfasud, an Italian phrase meaning “Alfa South’ was a complete break form the company’s past engineering [...]