Spotted is Globe Drive writer Peter Cheney's weekly feature that takes you behind the scenes of his life as a vehicle and engineering journalist. We also highlight the best of your original photos and short video clips (10 seconds or less), which you should send with a short explanation. E-mail pcheney@globeandmail.com, find him on Twitter @cheneydrive (#spotted), or join him on Facebook (no login required). All photos by Peter Cheney unless otherwise noted.
Invasion-Ready
Reader Stephen Browne spotted this Ferret armoured car in Mississauga. Yes, it has a license plate, and is apparently driven on the street. The Ferret was produced in England between 1952 and 1971. Equipment included a 130 horsepower Rolls Royce engine, grenade launchers, and a .30 calibre, turret-mounted assault gun – an item that countless Toronto commuters have longed for at some point. (The owner assured Stephen that that the gun on his Ferret is disabled.) The Ferret has poor outward visibility, but crash protection is well above average.
Bling it On
If you saved all the aluminum foil from your kids’ school lunches, you’d probably have enough to cover a car within a year or so. Vinh Yang spotted this chrome-wrapped Audi R8. As he noted: “You can’t buy taste.”
“We Can Walk From Here…”
Outlet-mall shoppers like to pull right up to the store. I spotted this row of closely parked vehicles in Woodburn, Oregon.
Mr. Big and Low
I spotted this lowered, customized Cadillac in Etobicoke, Ont. Isaac Hayes music played in my head, unbidden.
Automotive Semiotics 101
As you may know, semiotics is the study of signs and symbols. Here we have a lowered, chrome-wheeled Cadillac with a Fat Pimps Car Club decal and a Homer Simpson bobble head. There’s probably a PhD thesis in this for someone.
“Lexus For Sale: one owner, mint. A few scratches on the belly.”
“Stancing” is one of the more exotic and impractical subsets of the automotive modification field. The goal: get your car as low as possible while fitting the largest possible rims. The only downside – your car can only be driven on a billiard table. I spotted this belly-scraping Lexus in Toronto.
The English Patient
I always love stopping in to see my friend Gus. He’s an ace mechanic who has spent his life working on British classics. This early-1960s Jaguar E-Type was in his shop on my last visit. You can see why Enzo Ferrari himself called the E-Type “the most beautiful car ever made.”
Where the Analogue World Still Lives
Repairing modern cars is largely computer-based. You plug an umbilical into the OBD port, run some tests, and tweak the settings. The cars in Gus’s shop are all analogue machines, built in an age when engineers used slide rules. Repairing them demands deep knowledge and more than a little patience. I wrote about Gus’s specialized trade a while back. (NB – I used a pseudonym in the story because Gus has all the customers he can handle, and didn’t want anyone tracking him down.)
Nader’s Nemesis
A reader spotted this 1960s Corvair in Halifax. As you may know, the Corvair is the car that consumer safety activist Ralph Nader condemned in his book Unsafe at Any Speed. With a rear-mounted engine and swing axles, the Corvair could be a handful if you went into a corner too fast. The duct tape on this one doesn’t do much to increase your confidence.
Death Trap? You Decide
The Corvair was an interesting car. Although Nader’s book doomed it in the marketplace, the Corvair had a loyal following. When I was a boy, I thought the Corvair was awesome. But after my mother bought one, I came to a different conclusion. You can read about it here: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-drive/culture/commuting/drivers-logbook-corvair-truly-was-unsafe-at-any-speed/article564393/
Calling Don Draper
I spotted this 1960s Cadillac on Queen St. in Toronto. This is Mad Men era style at its best.
That Seventies Thing
Back in the 1970s, Nissan was called Datsun, and they made a really cool sports car called the 240Z. Reader Alan Wechsler spotted this one on the Gardiner Expressway in Toronto. Datsun connoisseurs will note the Brock Racing Enterprises (BRE) colour scheme. Brock Racing was run by my friend Pete Brock, who has one of the coolest resumes in the car world: he designed the Daytona coupe for Cobra legend Carroll Shelby and penned the shape of the original Corvette. He also ran the BRE team and a hang gliding manufacturing company. A true renaissance man.
Porsche, or Volkswagen?
There’s always something interesting in the shop at Gentry Lane (the Toronto Lotus dealership where I work on my car.) This Porsche 914 race replica was in the bay next to my Lotus while I changed the oil. The 914 was a mid-engine sports car designed to bring a new audience to the German brand back in the 1970s – it cost a lot less than the flagship 911, and it handled extremely well. It was available in two versions. The standard model used a VW-based four-cylinder engine. The 914 /6 used an air-cooled Porsche motor taken from the 911T. Detractors called the 914 a glorified Volkswagen.
A Four Dressed Up Like a Six
You don’t see Porsche 914s very often, but Gentry Lane had two of them in the shop at once. The one looks like a six-cylinder 914 /6 – check out the flared fenders, Fuchs wheels and race-style spoiler. But it’s a four. Oh well.