For sale, forever.

I was meandering through Dubizzle trawling the motors section as I often do when I stumbled across something for sale which will haunt me forever.

I don't even know where to begin with this, I actually need a thesaurus just to find some new vocabulary as I don't possess the words necessary to articulate just how horrendous this is.

Let's start with what it is. It's a car, apparently, manufactured by a New York based mental institution called Zimmer and this fine piece is known as the 'Golden Spirit' which I presume is just lazily named because of the golden bonnet ornament, it's probably a copy of the Rolls Royce 'Spirit of Ecstasy', I can't be bothered to zoom in and check for fear of being sick and I'm not interested enough to research it.

The story of it's inception according to someone on Wikipedia is -

"The idea for this automobile was initially drawn on a napkin at a private dinner between Paul Zimmer, Chairman and President of Zimmer Corporation and Bob Zimmer, Paul Zimmer's son, employee and shareholder of the company."

Basically they're in a meth lab together, totally off their faces when Paul thought it would be cool if someone redesigned a car for Hitler. He transcribed his hallucinogenic trip onto a napkin, most likely in blood and excrement. His son took one look at it, and once he had regained consciousness he responded with "Whoa man, that like, totally, like blows my mind man."

This one I found on Dubizzle was actually produced in 1987, begs the question who would of bought such a thing. I have three possible answers, one of which is that time travel is very real and someone simply went from 1972 to 1987. Or perhaps Zimmer had found someone cryogenically frozen and unfroze them just so they could sell it. Thirdly it could of possibly been a genuine buyer there was a lot of very drunk rich people around in the late 1980s.

Yep, it looks pretty dreadful inside there too. Loving the Recaro seats trimmed in afterbirth purple leather. The dials and wood dashboard look like they came from a 1970s Bentley, how uncouth.

Just what is going on back here. Did someone honestly design this, take a step back and this was acceptable? It looks busier than Dubai Mall parking on a Thursday night. Clearly one spare wheel isn't enough, everyone knows that these days tyre quality is so poor that even on a car that isn't designed to be used every day needs to carry 3 spare wheels.

I just can't imagine how these ever sold, they did apparently have a showroom in Jeddah. I can't imagine you'd get too many "Wallah habibi"s driving that around, I'm willing to bet the Police would take you in for questioning and try and charge you with crimes against humanity. Apparently the showroom still exists in KSA, if anyone finds it please send me a photo.

Is the standard response.

It is for sale by 'Top Gear - Used Car Trading' in Dubai if anyone would like to buy it. It's only done 64,000 I guess miles rather than KM since the advert states it is an American spec vehicle. If you have some sort of disorder and would like the most vulgar car ever designed then please get in touch with them and I'd love to hear from you too, the asking price is 

THREE HUNDRED THOUSAND DIRHAMS!!!!

I honestly can not fathom where they got that price from (how much must they be new?) and why did they stop at 300,000 AED why didn't they just make it eleventy-nine-hundred-billion it wouldn't of made any difference to the progress of the sale.

I would like to hear from anybody that can generate an valid argument for buying this car for 300,000 AED, sure if it was 3,000 dirhams it would be amusing to buy it drive it around until it got impounded and then just leave it to die.

Oh and if anyone does see this car in Al Awir take a video of the sound of the horn, I'm 99% sure it will have a comedy sounding horn.

I looked at it again...

.

Because French.

I was going to write a big article ranting of why French cars don't sell well here but then I found an image which basically summed it up for me which I shall reveal to you later.

My history with French cars is pretty minimal, I don't think I've ever actually owned one, maybe I have but purely just to sell on again immediately. I've had a number of friends who elected, against my best advice, to purchase a vehicle built (I use the term loosely) in the peoples republic of France, a nation famed for cheese, wine, and surrendering.

I remember one friend years ago bought a new Citroen C4 with a crappy low spec 1600cc engine that had about the same amount of power as a recently deceased bird and was as refined as emptying a bucket of excrement from a balcony into the street below. Needless to say it never did many KM because the car was constantly in the workshop and the owner was always afriad to drive it too far away from home for fear of it dying, I think he sold it finally after 3 years and 15,000km for a tremendous loss and 36 months of absolute crap motoring. Did he save money? Sure he did, a Golf would have cost several thousand pounds sterling more but he would of enjoyed his ownership and after 3 years when he wanted to move it on he would of been able to get more than small change for his car.

The only French car I'd buy, and I wouldn't buy one here and in any case I don't think you could find one here is the Renault Avantime. A truly pointless car that I can only imagine started out as a joke in a very lazy meeting

Renault Boss - Come on guys, think up something wacky and interesting! Like a big 7 seat people carrier but instead put it with 4 seats, 2 doors, and more glass than the Lourve.

*leaves the room*

Renault design team- Okay, MPV, 4 seats, 2 doors, lots of glass. That work for everybody? Let's take the rest of the day off...

LOL - What have you done?

I think it looks kind of cool, in a quirky kind of way. A bit like the Japanese bullet train, it's pretty ugly but somehow it is quite nice to look at. I'd buy one of these just for the sake of having it, in Europe you can buy these for such small money these days and providing you can keep it from breaking in any irreparable way then I honestly do think it will be a classic in future. Renault are a very old company and won't be going anywhere soon as even though they do make pretty abysmal cars they sell well in other parts of the world. If you get time have a flick through some videos of it on YouTube, the interior is really nice and it does have some very clever little touches and ideas.

I'd take a V6 automatic in the blue above or the bright green, although I can say with an enormous amount of certainty that I was would break mine almost immediately and render it utterly useless as a mode of transport.

If you are wondering what I was talking about at the start of the article, about the image I saw. It's this. The recall sheet for a popular French car in Europe, I don't even know if they import them here, I hope not for the sake of customers.

Wheels may fall off? Joking right?

Engine may fail? That's reassuring.

Rear screen may detach? I bet that's fun for the car behind on the highway.

Fuel may leak and create fire risk? LOL.

Directional control may be compromised? The steering doesn't work.

Can you imagine the fear of trying to drive that any distance, constantly worried about fire or a failing engine. It's amazing how this car even made it to production with these issues. Can you imagine Toyota or BMW releasing a car like this. It just wouldn't happen.

Conclusion?

In future the first 12 months production of any new French car should be sold as 'Beta Version' and once it's actually ironed out all the problems they can sell it as a fully functioning car.....

Inline but off center for Audi.

Autocar reports that Audi is working on a new four-cylinder engine that features a bank of inline pistons sitting offset and parallel to the crankshaft rather than directly above it.

A patent drawing of the proposed design has been discovered that depicts its unusual design, with pistons attached to connecting rods via rocker arms that are fitted with counterbalancing weights.

According to the patent filing, “damping free inertia forces” are created, which should reduce the vibration of the inline four cylinder to the level of a six or eight cylinder engine. Autocar speculates that lobes could be added to the crankshaft that would allow the motor operate using variable compression ratios, something that would be an excellent step in development of ever more efficient internal combustion engines.

Audi and its parent company, the Volkswagen Group, are no strangers to novel engine layouts, having featured inline 5 cylinder, narrow angle V6, W12 cylinder, and even W16 engines in their cars over the years.

I'm sure it will be quite some time before this new engine design ever makes it into the market, but Audi is set to launch a new motor next year that uses electrically-driven turbochargers to reduce lag and increase performance.

Dangers of US imports?

One thing that seems to come up repeatedly for me here when selling a car is this statement "I've seen an American specs one for xx,000 cheaper". Or often what happens is I will spend time with someone discussing a car only to find out a day later he/she/they decided to buy a seemingly identical one for less money.

American specification cars do differ from the specification that is originally destined for this region.
To some people a car is just a car and providing it is the same year and colour it might as well be identical, but underneath they can be very different and hide an unpleasant past.

US cars do often differ with the GCC equivalents, cars of German origin especially.

US Import - different bumpers, no xenon, no panoramic roof.

The US cars have different dashboards, different bumpers, different lights, often different exhaust/emissions systems so have sometimes have a lower power output than we have here. Depending on where in the States they've come from the AC system won't be up to the job, thus after an hour of driving in Summer the cabin will be at a temperature previously unknown to science. Then the engine overheats because the thermostat and cooling system are not configured for this climate because 6 months ago your car was sitting at -33c in Minnesota.

Another problem is accident damaged cars. The car is deemed roadworthy and irreparable in the States yet it can be exported and repaired very poorly in an unskilled workshop here, so if or rather given the standard of driving here you do have a crash you won't have the protection that the original manufacture intended, your vehicle might not even have airbags fitted. You can check for any registered accident damage by doing a report at www.carfax.com but it will only show you damage that was recorded, but what it does show is usually very detailed.

You've also got flood damaged cars to contend with, often insurance companies won't pay out on these if it is deemed that it was the owners own stupidity that caused the damage so what you find is that nothing is registered on any report because it never went through the process of insurers, rather the car is just sold as spares and then shipped here and as above 'fixed' and put back on the road. Flood damaged cars are a nightmare, they develop electrical gremlins that are seemingly incurable and you will spend weeks and tens of thousands replacing wiring looms, control modules and convenience units just to fix on mystery problem only for another to develop immediately after.

It doesn't always make financial sense to buy an imported car, sure it looks cheaper now but sometimes you'll find that it requires parts for servicing that are only for USA markets so will have to be brought here especially for you and I know of some main agencies/dealerships that won't touch a vehicle that isn't an original GCC vehicle.

You've got depreciation to take into consideration, sure you can save maybe 15,000 or even more on a 2012 Mercedes C-Class but when you want to sell it in 3 years or so it will be worth less than a GCC one anyway so you're never really financially that far ahead anyway.

You might save 5,000 or even 10,000 over the 3 years of ownership having a US imported car but one of the biggest annoyances for me is the options they come with, we've grown quite accustom in UAE to vehicles generally coming with very high level of factory options. It's extremely disappointing to get into an imported one and realise that it doesn't have the dual AC system, the sunblinds, parking sensors, bluetooth, navigation and if it's come from a cold climate state they will usually have small alloy wheels to accommodate the winter tyres which just look depressing compared to the big S-Line, AMG, M package wheels. It's a lot of hassle and in reality doesn't offer any substantial financial benefits worthy of the potential headache. It only makes sense if it's a car you really, really want and simply isn't officially imported here like a Tacoma.

I'm not saying that they've all previously been upside down, submerged and on fire, of course there are some perfectly fine ones. Just do a carfax report and check the car thoroughly.

Bentley SUV

Since I first saw images of the Bentley EXP 9 F concept at the 2012 Geneva motorshow it's been something that has been of intrigue to me. By now we aren't strangers to the concept of luxury SUV or even 'sporty' ones and the Bentley promised to delivery the most luxurious package possible along with ample performance.

But now it seems the concept is absolutely turning into a reality, as pre-production models have been spied testing in different parts of the world. It interests me because of the potential impact on the car market, especially here in the UAE.

Even discounting the NewBentley.com link on the side of the car it's pretty obvious from the front end and headlamps that this is unmistakably Bentley. It doesn't look that big though which is a bit odd, I was expecting a full on monstrously ostentatious behemoth that would make a Range-Rover look like a dustbin.

Obviously they can still change the styling and the back end isn't properly revealed yet either so it isn't possible to make a decision on how it looks but I suspect the proof of the pudding will be getting up close and personal with the Bentley in the flesh so to speak. I'm not able to find any proper photos of the interior but I'm sure it's going to be quite special, Bentley do have a way of doing things that just feel right.

Something which I'm sure will be most great importance will be the engine, I presumed that it would be fitted with the 4.0 V8 BiTurbo as found in the Continental GT. Possibly available with a large turbo diesel unit, probably the V8 TDi as found in the A8, which is pretty much magical, as far as diesel engines at least.

Thanks to the plate number being displayed on this photo I was able to run the number through a system in the UK, where the vehicle is registered, and pull some information. Turns out this test vehicle is actually fitted with a 6.0 engine, presumably the W12 twin turbo. An engine which in it's latest form produces 626bhp and a mighty 820Nm of Earth spinning torque. Which would certainly give this SUV a serious bit of go, I doubt it will make it into production in that level of tune but 550/580bhp seems about right any more and it just seems uncouth and totally unbecoming of a gentlemen driver.

I'm hoping to find out some more details about this new Bentley as time goes on. It is rumored for launch in 2016 which I don't doubt. As for the price, expect it to be a lot. I can't for any reason see why it would be any cheaper than the Mulsanne which comes to about 1.5Million AED. That's not to say that it won't be popular here.

Where else in the world is a 6000cc twin turbo SUV designed and built by one of the most expensive luxury car manufacturers going to sell in any substantial numbers?

In case you are still left wondering where the target market might be for Bentleys new venture into the luxury SUV market. The rumored name for this model?

The Bentley Falcon

Monteverdi

I will admit that up until about 3 years ago I had never heard of this brand so don't feel ashamed if you didn't either. 

When you think of things that come out of Switzerland you tend to think of cheese, banking, army knives, chocolate and watches. You wouldn't think of the Swiss making a car, in fact for those you that haven't visited the fine country of Switzerland it is my duty to inform you that they are often positively anti car. The population seems to despise the automobile, I'm not sure of the reason. It just always felt like I was driving around in a hostile environment, not as bad as Erbil but still not calm, fortunately the awesome scenery makes up for it. But there once was a time when the Swiss did in fact produce a car.

Monteverdi, named after the founder Peter Monteverdi, existed from 1967 to 1984 and sadly didn't have

much luck which is a massive shame as the cars they produced are hugely interesting machines.

The first vehicle to wear the Monteverdi badge was the brilliantly named 'High Speed' which is a hilarious way of naming a car, can you imagine if other automotive manufacturers adopted this method? We'd end up with things like the Kia 'low risk of theft' and the Toyota 'really cold AC'.

Regardless of the slightly odd name is was quite desirable, because it was drenched in coolness. Imagine it's the late 1960s, you're a businessman and you need some new flashy wheels.

Got wood?

I think the businessman in question might have been in the pornography industry and this is without a doubt a pornographers car, not quite as much as a Mercedes SEC but almost. I mean look at that interior, you wouldn't be used to seeing that much wood unless you were in the business.

It was powered by Chrysler engine, a 7.2 V8 Chrysler engine no less. The same engine that Jensen used in their Interceptor. This gave the 'high speed' somewhere in the region of 380-400bhp which even today wouldn't exactly be lacking in power, and as you'd expect it's massively torquey developing 480Nm which makes this a proper grand tourer, a genuine Autobahn stormer.

Fantastically cool.

The 'high speed' went through a couple of different iterations until they eventually arrived at a saloon variant. Using exactly the same power train setup as the coupe but with the added bonus of having four doors and some extra luggage space. It retains the same front end styling as its two door counterpart which was in production at the same time, the rear however that doesn't look quite right, at least in my eyes.

High Speed 375/4

Obviously it's still endlessly cool and seriously unique, back in 1970 when it was launched there wasn't many cars like this available. Today you can go out and buy a four door Hyundai with over 400bhp but back then this was not the case and the High Speed would of been something really rather special.

Production at the Monteverdi factory in Northern Switzerland continues for another few years albeit at a very slow pace. The cars were hand built and pricey but demand for the marque remained.

They had a plan to take on the likes of Maserati, Lamborghini and even Ferrari with their new vision, the prototype named 'Hai 450 SS'  an odd name but 450 relates to the horsepower available from the again Chrysler sourced V8 motor, and Hai is German for shark. The 7.0 engine positioned behind the seats in true mid engined supercar style, this could of been a serious threat to the people at Ferrari. Sadly it didn't happen and only one was built, a second was built but it was slightly different and named the GTS.

Hai 450 SS

In 1973 the world experienced what it went on the call the 'oil crisis', demand for luxury sports cars with huge engines diminished and suddenly Monteverdi found themselves with a product that just didn't have a place in the market and demand plummeted.

In an effort to reinvent the company and find new customers Monteverdi switched the focus from sports cruisers and supercars to luxury SUVs. Something that only Land Rover was manufacturing at the time with the Range Rover. Powered by either a 5.2, 5.6 or a 7.2 engine, performance was still exceptional and well exceeded that of the 3.5 engine available in the Range Rover at the time.

The Monteverdi Safari was again a unique offering, a luxury SUV that was capable of 200kph if fitted with the 7.2 Chrysler engine. The Safari was based upon the Scout MK2 an SUV built by the American now defunct company International Harvester. The Safari was the companies most successful model and it's easy to see why. A unique combination of power, switchable four wheel drive, luxury and sportiness. The seating actually came from a BMW as Peter Monteverdi wanted to keep the interior as sporty as possible.

Apparently a good number of the production went to the Middle East, I wonder this there is a Safari sitting in a warehouse somewhere in Abu Dhabi or Dubai? 

In 1982 production of the Scout MK2 came to an end thus ending the life of the Safari. 

Monteverdi didn't have another vehicle in development to replace the Safari or otherwise, so turned to modifying Mercedes-Benz S Class models.

Like this, the Monteverdi Tiara. Based on the Mercedes W126

Sadly it was not a success and it was produced in very low numbers, the true figures aren't known. 

It is thought there are three left today. The project was abandoned and sadly that was the end of Monteverdi. There have been several attempts to bring the marque back but nothing has come to fruition.

I feel the Safari is especially ahead of it's time, I can remember Porsche kicking up all sorts of a fuss when they launched the Cayenne and everyone thought it was the first sporty SUV ever built, when in fact that badge of honor predates the Cayenne by a long way.

The Monteverdi factory is now a museum, and I will be visiting next time I'm in Switzerland.

Automotom Motoring

Automotive friend or foe?

I figure Dubai being that it is supposed to be a sort of 'halo' city of the World will be one of the first places to gain driver-less cars, at least in any large numbers. Since we always like to have the biggest, the longest, the tallest, the most explosive, the fastest, etc, etc.

I read a bunch of comments on Twitter about driver-less cars and that they're a bad thing, especially for Dubai. One persons mentioned that 'driving standards are bad now, without people in control imagine the chaos'. Okay, so it wasn't worded exactly like that but after a couple of tweets back and forth this was the gist of it.

But surely that's the whole point of these driver-less cars, to remove the driver. The Police are constantly telling us that speed is the main cause of accidents, well actually drivers are the main cause of accidents. If we had better drivers on the roads of UAE there would be less accidents, and not by any small margin, the difference in the number of accidents on the roads would be huge. The road network, for the most part, is pretty damn good and even the sign posts are good too. There really isn't any need for as many accidents as we have here.

So we remove the driver from the cockpit and leave everything up to technology. The closest thing to a driver-less car today is the new Mercedes S-Class, specifically with all the active assistance packages fitted. It has an array of sensors and radars that even the CIA would be jealous of, long range that, thermal sensing this, it's got everything. What this translates into is that the car has access to a lot more information than our feeble senses will ever get to enjoy and because of this, with the right programming, it can make better decisions than us. You activate the systems and the Mercedes will monitor the traffic around you and even behind you to keep your speed where it should be and also keep the distance between you and the car in front at a safe margin. It will "see" the lanes in the highway and keep itself perfectly on track and even take corners for you. If the traffic in front starts to slow down the Mercedes will also slow down, even stopping if required. At the moment the system only works if you have a hand on the steering wheel, as there is no way they could sell it if it was a total hands off system, very few governments would accept this. You can trick it into thinking you've got your hand on the wheel, just tape a small weight to one side of the wheel and the car will think it's your hand. But this just is the beginning on the technology. Here's a video of what it can really do but sadly isn't available to the public just yet, but without any doubt this is the future of motoring.

Apart from being safer there are other benefits to your everyday life. Can't find a parking spot in a busy part of town? No problem, just stop right outside where you want to be, exit the car and tell it to go away and find itself a space to wait. You can send a message from an application on your phone when you want it to pick you up again and it will be able to tell you that it will be with you in a few minutes. Or maybe one day you don't feel like dropping the kids off at school, let the friendly GoogleCar take them.

Driver-less taxis also appeal to me greatly, whilst I appreciate that the RTA Dubai Taxi drivers do the best they can. I am 100% certain that I'd be happier riding to my destination in an autonomous vehicle. It will actually know the way and will take me to the correct destination, not just the one that he happens to know that sounds vaguely like what I asked for. It would also be infinitely safer too, can you imagine the joy you'd feel taking a taxi journey and not being in tremendous peril every minute of the journey.

But what about car people?

I myself am a self confessed 'car guy', I like cars, and I like driving. I don't especially like driving to and from work on the same monotonous journey in traffic everyday through a concrete jungle but I like driving nonetheless. I believe in the future once these driver-less or autonomous cars are generally accepted as an everyday part of life you will still find the automotive fraternity going strong.

Car people will cruise to and from work five days a week in their bland electric self driving boxes and on the weekend they will have their special toy to play with. I can never see proper cars dying out because of the feeling it gives us, the thrill it gives us, the joy it gives us. I for one would be perfectly happy to ride safely to work in a blandbox if it meant having an old 911 to hoon about in and tinker with at the weekend. Insurance would probably be cheaper too as there's less accidents and less risk on the road, and you'd have more money for petrol too since your blandbox runs on hydrogen or electricity.

Naysayers 

A few decades ago every elevator used to have an operator to get you to your floor safely, I don't think there is anywhere in the world that still does. The car will be similar, right now the technology we've developed outweighs our own capability, so best leave it to the machines to do the operators job.