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Archive for the ‘Cars’ Category

For those who are vintage sports car buffs one of THE places to be is Phillips Island, located in Australia. If you have not heard of the Phillips Island Classic Festival then hold on to your driver’s seat and make sure you have automobile insurance. This year the event was held in March where five hundred participants worked hard to place in forty- six races. The action was intense since breaks consisted of only fifteen minutes each.

The visual treat of watching these sexy four wheeled classic beauties strut their stuff made everyone’s day from 18-20 of March For the Porsche aficionado the array of historically important Porsche’s was not for the faint of heart. Klaus Bischof from Germany brought the ‘Moby Dick’ Porsche 935 which shared the spotlight with the Porsche 962 that in 1987 won Le Mans. In addition, Stuttgart Museum loaned out the 1969 Targa Florio winning Porsche 908-02 which made an appearance with Porsche Type 718 RS60 Spyder that won the 1960 Daytona 24-Hour race. The cast of stars provided many photo opportunities for their adoring admirers who came to the festival.

But the cast of stellar vehicles did not stop here. The winner of the first Le Mans Grand Prix 105 years’ ago, the 4-cylinder engine in Anne Thomson and Wallace McNair’s Darracq GP, was also present. For those of us who were not there, the photos themselves have us drooling at the mouth. There is something poignantly sexy about these unique high performance vehicles. They represent stages of a learning curve where the sport of car racing had not yet evolved into what it is today. The dashing and courageous race car drivers of yesteryear did not enjoy the built in safety features as drivers do today where they can virtually walk away, unscathed, from a burning vehicle.

As the days progressed the following beauties also made guest appearances:
• 250F Maserati #2501/2523
• #2525 Maserati
• #2527 Maserati
• Holden-powered Faux Pas
• Darracq
• Williams FW07
• 1948 Lago Talbot

These are only a few of the wonderful vehicles that participated in the Phillip Island Classic Festival. The beautiful sunny drenched day contributed to a wonderfully successful weekend down Memory Lane and re-instilled in everyone renewed respect for the raw talent from the drivers, to the designers, to the builders of these fabulous vintage vehicles.

Camaro, Charger, Mustang, these are just three of the popular cars in a category once commonly and widely referred to as muscles cars. Since their inception many decades ago, these vehicles have gone through cycles of popularity and obscurity.

Maybe no sports car was as popular in terms of numbers sold in the 80s as the Camaro and its Pontiac cousin the Trans Am. In many small towns throughout the U.S., during this period the practice of cruising was at a peak of popularity. Teenagers, short of other activities to entertain themselves, would spend hour upon hour on Friday and Saturday nights riding their cars up and down an established strip. The ritual was one of social interaction, but the car you rode along the established route was very important, and one of the most popular vehicles was the Camaro. The most seen colors were red and black.

Since the 80s the popularity of the Camaro waned and the line was temporarily discontinued. Now Chevrolet is attempting to reestablish the car as one of America’s elite muscle cars. The return of the 2010 model fills a void in the overall Chevrolet family of automobiles. With the car out of production for a number of years, many consumers and previous admirers of the Camaro are wondering will the car be able to reclaim the moniker of muscle car.

So you’re excited about the return of Camaro, but are not sure whether the car is right for. Let’s take a closer look at what Chevrolet is offering this time around. It should come as no surprise that not all the cars will be identical. Manufacturers realized long ago that consumers are varied and the best way to sell more cars is to offer more options. The options with the new Camaro come in the form of the following packages: LS, 1LT, 2LT, 1SS and 2SS. The best way to figure out which option suits you is to get a brochure and read the features of each model. Still it won’t hurt to take a brief look at some of the features.

A good thought to keep in mind: if you want the prestige of owning a Camaro, but not so much of a hurt in your bank account, opting for the less powerful option does have it’s perks. The discount car insurance
rates that exist are much more affordable when trying to insure a less powerful vehicle. Although, if that doesn’t matter to you, certainly go big or go home, right?

Let’s start with the LS, which has a standard V-6 engine. With aesthetics such as dual, stainless steel, polished exhaust tips and 18-inch Heritage steel wheels the car is pleasing to the eye. The LS also includes remote keyless entry, cruise controls on the steering wheel, digital compass, power and programmable door lock that comes with lockout protect and a theft deterrent system. In case you’re wondering, this package puts forth 304 horsepower.

At the other end of the scale is the 2SS. This package includes Boston Acoustics premium audio, USB port, wireless technology, leather front seats, and a 6.2L/378 V-8 that harnesses 426 horsepower. The vehicles are rear-wheel drive with independent suspension and come standard with a 6-manual transmission.

The new Camaro retains the look of a powerful muscle car and with the V-8 version it has the equipment to be called a muscle car. Just as important for its longevity, the car has enough packages and available options to make it appealing to many buyers. The Camaro is back. For how long is yet to be determined

If you are preparing to buy a second hand car in the near future then you will want to make sure that you explore every avenue possible to make sure that you get the best deal. One of the best places to find a second had car is on the internet because it is a huge market place, which means that prices tend to be lower. Of course, this is not always the case, but if you know what you are looking for, and if you know what sort of price you can expect to pay for a good example, then the internet is certainly the place to look.

Obviously you have to be sure that you go for the right sorts of sites to search on. This means avoiding the auction sites on the internet because these sites by their very nature tend to encourage you to make an offer which is beyond your means. The best thing to do is to go for a site which has a good reputation nationwide, which will encourage as many people as possible to sell through the site. This will mean that you have a great choice when you are looking for used cars for sale. Obviously you have to make sure that you can test drive the vehicle so that you will be able to tell both that the vehicle is in a suitable condition to buy, but also so that you can be sure that the car will be fun for you to drive!

When it comes to buying used cars, there are many schools of thought. Some people outright refuse to believe that there is any sense in buying second hand, whereas some people, and this includes some very wealthy people, refuse to ever buy a new car! The reason for this is that second hand cars tend to depreciate very quickly in the first few years of their existence. A lot of people feel a little bit robbed if they are paying for that depreciation, although some people think that you can’t beat the feeling of having a brand new car.

If you are in the camp which believes that there is sense in buying a second hand car, then there are some excellent bargains out there for you! One of the best things you can do these days is to try and buy a second hand car online. www.motors.co.uk is an excellent site which has an enormous amount of used cars available to buy.

The great thing about this site is that you can browse exactly the way you want to. If you are only interested in Volkswagen Golfs, then that is all you have to search for!c You can narrow down your search parameters much further too, so that you only return results for a Golf tdi convertible which is around four years old, for example! The site really is this flexible, and you can find some superb bargains if you are prepared to hunt about.

Anyone who is looking for a second hand car is usually looking for a few different things from their car. Firstly of all they will be looking for value. This can be difficult to discern without having owned the car for some time, but this can be judged by looking at things such as miles driven, and the amount of service history which is attached to the car. These things are normally good guages as to how well the car has been looked after.

On top of value they will be looking for reliability, and the first thing you need to be able to do is to test drive the car. AS lot of the cars for sale online will not be available with a test drive, and will be sold as seen. This is particularly the case with cars sold through the auction sites, so these are worth avoiding. A site such as motors will normally be selling cars through the owners themselves, and the usual protocol will be for you to contact them direct after discovering their car online. This is a far better way of trying to find Second hand cars and you will find that nine times out of ten the seller will welcome a test drive and they wouldn’t dream of selling the car without being absolutely sure that you are happy with it.

The third thing people will be looking for when buying a second hand car is frugality. By this I mean that the car be cheap to run and to repair when necessary. This takes a bit of research but the internet is littered with sites giving genuine reviews for second hand cars.