You may have laughed in the eighties, but you're coveting this Lada now, aren't you?The VAZ-2103, known over here as the Lada 1500, was basically a Russian Fiat 124. It offered such Western decadences as four headlamps, a powerful(ish) 75bhp 1.5-litre engine and sporty-looking instruments, as well as certain modifications to make it more appropriate for Siberian weather; an emergency starting-handle, an auxiliary fuel pump, thicker-gauge steel.This particular example blows away the cobwebs of stereotype and cliché, sporting vibrant, verdant paint and arrow-straight bodywork. Modifications are limited to a gentle tickle with the lowering sickle and a gorgeous set of white steel wheels with whitewall tyres. This, ladies and gentlemen, is a beautiful Lada. Yes, it's OK to say that now.
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This FD Mazda RX-7 is a remarkable car. How so? Is it the 13B motor, rebuilt to run a single Garrett GT35R dual ball-bearing turbo? Is it the fact that it's a daily driver, running on E85 ethanol and producing 505bhp? Perhaps it's the zero-offset Rotas, the Tein coilovers, the fuel-lines running through the rear diffuser, the tangerine paint?
This Willys Jeep-based hot rod is a riot of detail. You can't fail to love the piston wing mirrors, the schoolroom plastic chairs are nicely offbeat, and the grandma's-parlour carpeting is fantastically odd. In fact 'fantastically odd' sums the thing up rather well overall. SuckSqueezeBangBlow's favourite detail, though? The gauge markings painted on the fuel tank. That, combined with the satanic porcupinery of the open headers, creates a glorious object of slapstick lunacy. In the most serious way possible.
Saviour of British Leyland. Alec Issigonis' magnum opus. International rally winner. Coveted design classic. The Austin Maxi was none of these things, although its significance to the British motor industry in the 1970s is often underestimated. It was spacious, well-appointed, competitively priced, reliable (apart from the early gearbox issues - best not to think about that) and, above all, frugal - a key selling point during a fuel crisis. And, if nothing else, it showed the world what a useful thing a hatchback was.
The idea of a desirable Volga estate is one that you'll never be able to sell in to a lot of people. But they're missing out, as you can see here; this wagon, borne of an era of austerity, looks gloriously battle-scarred with its frilly edges and gentle patina, yet at the same time defiant in the face of modernity. Its suspension has had a fair wedge of height hacked from it, while the arches accommodate polished Cragars - this Volga cocks a snook at its own functional ethos, blending a little American warmth into its icy surroundings. And there's something rather wonderful about that.
