Pick a Rocket to fit your Pocket !!!

Automatic Washer - The world's coolest Washing Machines, Dryers and Dishwashers

Help Support :

And Finally (well not really)...

My First Car...

1970 Monte Carlo... Exactly like this one...

Fuel was 39 cents a gallon for Sunoco 260... The ultimate fuel, highest Octane available at the pump. 103 Octane.

$7.80 to fill the tank !!!

 
Toploader 55 and the Useless Brakes

hi sorry I should qualify that statement, compared to modern brakes they are, but they were as good as you got on road going Japanese bikes in those days, as I said the frame was good but the front forks and rear swinging arm were designed for physically smaller and lighter bikes, these had to cope with enormous power of the engine (105BHP) plus the near 600lb weight............on later versions Honda introduced a type of single rear shock arrangement to help control the rear end but by then it was too late...........other companies had trounced them in the performance stakes, but too me this bike represents everything that was great about Japanese 70s bike design, overpowered and under framed basically :-)

The 1st
Yes Honda were the first to introduce an across the frame inline 4 cyclinder bike, closely followed by Kawasaki with there ball breaking Z900 DOHC 4, ahh such brilliant machines.

Goldwings
Again a first by Honda the horizontally opposed flat 4 1000cc magic carpet.........sooooooooo smooth and utterly beguiling you had no idea of what speed you were doing this machine just picks you up and moves you forward without and fuss or bother,amazing no wonder they scored a huge hit the design

Right here endeth me lesson on bikes I have loved + few others

This should be the CHROME channel, you lads across the water had the best of everything then ...............green envy :-)
 
Honda USA

See you got all the best stuff, UK GL1000s had wire spoke wheels, it wasn't until Honda introduced the GL1100 that it got a face lift plus a few other upgades and Comstar wheels. I never look at old fots of me.............I am an old man now..........Waaaaaaaaaaaaa

anyway thanks for that picture
Gary
 
Back to chrome and lights. The nicest car I ever owned was my 75 Electra 225. I'd love to have it back. Like the Goldwing above I bought this car spur of the moment as soon as I saw it. It was as gorgeous as it was big. Unfortunately it was a pig on gas and costly to drive as the gas prices were increasing. No regrets because I always dreamed of owning a big new boat before they got downsized and this was it. Folks always said if you want something bad enough you'll find a way to get it.. and to get this and the bike I worked two full time jobs and part-time at a disco on weekends (although that was more fun than work) LOL

petek++1-26-2014-15-54-15.jpg
 
Tatra . . .

Since someone mentioned Tatra, here’s a Type 87. I can’t recall the year of this one but probably late ‘30s. Quite advanced and rapid for its day, albeit with sometimes lethal handling. The owner also runs an unrestored Type 603 from the ‘60s. Funny to think that plenty of great cars had tailfins, but this baby has tailfin!

hydralique++1-27-2014-21-46-13.jpg
 
That Starfire dash does look slightly padded...

Interestingly, the Corvair was one of the few American cars of the era to influence European car design, NSU (see, it all tracks back) being an example with the Prinz.

That Skoda really is glorious!

Would love to hear Toronado stories.
 
'67 was a good year for Chevy. Like Ford, the '67s were slightly updated versions of the '65-'66 models and they all looked good. Certainly the Ro80 was a more beautiful, more interesting and better handling car than the Impala, but I'd put money on that Impala going well over 100,000 miles from new with little more than regular oil changes while an early Ro80 would have been lucky to have made 100,000 miles on no more than two engines.

 

Quite a few European cars in the '50s and '60s were influenced by American design; another that took cues from the Corvair was the Hillman Imp and its derivatives, this is a Sunbeam Stiletto. Like the Corvair it was a clever rear-engine design allowed to run its course but rear engine sedans turned out to be a technical dead end and so neither had a successor. Ironically Chrysler owned the Rootes Group from '67 so for much of the model's life it was a Chrysler product.

hydralique++1-28-2014-11-08-25.jpg
 
Some neighbors on the next street had an NSU Prinz. This would have been around 1963 or so. Even compared to a Corvair, it was a very small car. The lady of the house used it to pick up her kids from school. I got to ride in it a time or two. It was pretty noisy. They bought it in Germany and had it imported to the U.S. when they got home.

I used to laugh whenever I saw it because compared to what I was used to seeing, it was so strange. But this Prinz was the only one I ever saw. I never seen another one since.
 
Olds A/C

Some years ago an acquaintance of mine named Lucien told the funniest story of Olds and their early adoption of in-dash A/C. He grew up in a well off neighborhood where back in the ‘50s people bought new cars regularly and of course everyone wanted to take a look. One neighbor bought a new Olds 98 in the mid ‘50s and Lucien’s family walked across the street to check it out. The owner was especially proud of the factory A/C. Lucien’s dad was firmly a Cadillac man and their cars all had the roof mounted A/C registers with the clear ducts to a trunk mounted evaporator. As they walked back across the street Lucien recalled his father saying “The Olds is a nice enough car but that cheap air conditioning system will never sell, who’d want all that cold air in their face?”

[this post was last edited: 1/28/2014-13:02]
 

Latest posts

Back
Top