Holy cow does this look good. Time to build the best back story behind a car ever…
3 Likes
Looks pretty good, i guess i’ll be entering a Communitasia, question now, what trim?
Good thing i have a Vole MkIII rally homologation special left around here somewhere…
1 Like
edit: the info has now come out, i appear to be relatively close, post has been edited
#Team Arstotzka
Mike: Driver, also has taken CTE auto mechanics, so will be the driver, current age is 22, and current occupation is a delivery driver
Josh: 21, In college for a Software engineer, current job is a Manager position at a local McDonalds
The car:
As can be seen, it is right at the $500 mark, which was perfect. It is, however, unfortunately very high mileage, and the Rebuilt title has us thinking how bad of an accident it got into in the past. However one reassuring fact is the Communitasia’s are pretty known for being reliable and mechanically simple, so here is to hoping that we have a chance at this. all that we have done to modify it was throw on an old but good set of Mud tires that were laying around, so we are ready to go
4 Likes
Count me in! Now I’ve just got to figure out, of the many I’ve done, which shitbox Luke Light and the rest of the Raceworks Division will use.
(And yes, while Luke is an android, he does still require basic supplies and so, as far as the team is concerned, he’s equal to the rest. Just instead of packing extra food and water, he’s packing spare hydraulic fluid, extra clothing, and the big box of spare parts.)
So, now it’s time for me to go hunting for my car. I’m thinking there might be an old Storm somewhere out in Nevada that Luke could go find.
Edit: Well, I’ve made my decision. 1977 Sinistra Savage convertible. Absolutely crazy car, and with good reason.
5 Likes
Team Greasy Lightning
The team -
Rick - A software engineer in his late 20’s, he’s enjoyed the outdoors but never really had a crazy streak growing up. He heard about this challenge and, easily having the cash to come up with something, decided to enlist his partners in crime.
Jen - Personal trainer, fitness instructor, and wife of Rick. She’s the kind who eats mountains for breakfast (figuratively… there’s a little too much dirt and rocks to actually do it)
“Fuzz” - Jen’s “little” 25 year old brother Ted, a rookie on the local police force. Energetic to the point of stupidity sometimes, with his past it was pure irony that he ended up in his current profession.
The car -
This was what the beauty looked like back in her heyday. A 1983 Suzume Kaminari GS-R, with the 5-speed manual transmission. Jen and Fuzz have an uncle whose friend recently passed away. This man was a bit of a collector and a little bit of a gearhead, and his property needed to be cleared of several cars before the estate could be sold. Fuzz got wind of this and took Rick to look at the choices.
They got this baby for $300. Didn’t start or run. They managed to get it to turn over by hooking up a spare battery. It was hiding in some overgrown grass, back end half buried in blackberry brambles. The passenger door barely opened and closed thanks to a sizeable dent, the front right fender was creased nearly its entire length, the rocker panels and wheel arches had some pretty significant cancer, and the interior was chewed up and musty.
Fortunately for Rick and the crew, once they got it home and thoroughly cleaned/dried out, they found it wasn’t actually horrible. Besides the cancer. After draining all the fluids, replacing the battery, filters, plugs, wires, dizzy cap, and BLEACHING THE FREAKING INTERIOR, the old rally-inspired coupe fired up and ran. New tires and new brakes finished out the repairs, and Team Greasy Lightning was ready to go!
8 Likes
Team Twin-Snail
The Crew:
Luke Light: Storm Automotive’s president, head of the Raceworks Division, and lover of fast and crazy cars. He’s never let being an android keep him down or hold him back, and when he heard about a crazy $500-or-less off-road race, he had to join. As $500 was pocket change for him, he made sure to find something suitably crazy.
Amy Storm: Her great-grandfather, John Storm, founded the company. She’s part of the Engine Design Team and also a member of the Raceworks Division, and is addicted to fast cars and big engines. While she knows almost nothing about off-road racing, and can’t understand why someone who happens to be a DOHC expert has been dragged along to repair a SOHC-based car, she’s willing to try, as her great-grandfather once did with rally racing.
Scott Regale: Storm Automotive’s head of Interior Design. He’s here because he’s told Luke that he has off-road experience. The thing he didn’t mention is that his off-road experience consists entirely of rolling over a Storm Husky pickup truck, and getting a Storm Swift GT stuck 20 feet up in a tree. His mechanical expertise stops at changing tires, but he’s a master electrician.
Linda Regale: Scott’s sister and Storm Automotive’s accountant. You’d be forgiven for believing she’s only here because her brother’s here, but she’s a great navigator. Give someone else a GPS unit and give her a map and compass, she’ll find a way to get there first. However, while her navigational skills are exceptional, her driving needs work. Preferring power over finesse may prove to be the team’s undoing in the RWD beast that Luke found.
The Car:
Big, bold, and beautiful. The 1977 Sinistra Savage, with the optional drop-top and 4-speed automatic. Luke had seen it a few times up for sale near their Nevada-based alternate factory, and believes he got a great deal on it.
Having thrown down $497.68, the surprise was when the car actually started. Sure, it ran rough, and Luke seemed shocked at the mileage, but the car was his. 662 cubic inches of twin-turbocharged, mechanical-fuel-injected mayhem, aged perfectly to the tune of 578,362 miles.
Of course, the first thing he noticed when driving it back to Chicago for the Raceworks Division to help fix it was that it wasn’t exactly… fast. Despite the big engine and turbochargers, the fuel system was all out of whack and the factory air-to-air intercooler had hugged a bush at some point, and was a fairly nasty boost leak.
Luckily, the car made it, despite the appalling fuel efficiency and lack of power. The Raceworks Division fell upon the car and started the repairs, starting first by draining and changing fluids, swapping filters, swapped the twin catalytic converters for some that hadn’t been under the car for quite so long, and starting to beat all the dented panels back into shape. The interior was reupholstered to get rid of the slimy mess in the back seats, the top was replaced, and the transmission was given fresh fluids in hopes that it’d last a bit longer.
Luke and Amy worked together to overhaul the engine, retuning the mechanical fuel injection system and dropping in a spare intercooler from an old rally car. With the water-to-air intercooler in place, they turned up the boost just a little, keeping it running on Regular Unleaded.
With nearly-400 horsepower on tap, but going to just the rear wheels, it was inevitable that once they had the engine sorted out, the transmission fixed, and new tires ready to mount on the rims, the method of removing the old ones was going to produce a hellish amount of smoke. Linda and Scott proceeded to burn the rear tires off of the car, at least until the fire department was called.
With the new tires on the car, team Twin-Snail was ready to go. The last thing on the checklist was to name the car. As Luke had driven it the most, and had some knowledge of how (not) fast it was, as well as a reference to what was under the hood, it ended up being called the “Snail-Boat.”
Known Issues:
Transmission fluid leak near valve body.
Smokes a little. (Luke’s note: No, it smokes quite a bit. And it burns a little oil.)
Top gets stuck in the down position and cannot be retracted electrically.
Alternator works, battery charges, but is using a home-made voltage regulator that gets really hot.
Power steering pump has a blown bearing. Makes really terrible noises at just about anything above idle.
Lights are all-or-nothing. To have low-beams, you must also have high-beams on.
Fan clutch shrieks when engaging.
9 Likes
#Team Parklands
The Crew
James Martindale: 29y/o, degree in Economics. Works for a large company, doing their accounting. Loves all things automobile, and challenging.
Nicole LeDeir: 27 y/o, Degree in Computer Science. Works in IT tech help (She hates her job). Seems to enjoy seeing things go right, and organization.
Mark Jin-Soo: 27 y/o, Degree in Mechanical Engineering. Works for large Firm, doing what he loves. Currently in a relatioship with Nicole, so has been dragged along. At least he can read a map.
The Car
Very poor condition Eyre-North Parklands, picked it up for a smidge under 500, with almost 700k miles, this has been through hell and back. I got it from a guy from down the street, said it was his dad’s and neither of them could be bothered with it.
Took it home, and by god. Surface rust everywhere. Also it died on the 600m drive back to his house. So much luck! Air suspension was shot, brakes barely worked, Radio looks like it was stolen, and someone slashed the seats. Heard these things went for at least 70k+ when new… Must’ve fallen a long way since '92. Took apart the engine, and rebuilt it. Looks fine now, luckily just Surface rust everywhere. The L675vti seems to run well. Passed inspection, so it’s road legal, I guess. Ended up sinking maybe over 5k to get it properly working.
Hope it pays off…
10 Likes
Team Cignale
The Crew:
Giacomo “Gippino” Paduli: 27yo, bicicle mechanic. When he was young he loved MountainBike but he preferred the lasagna. Over the year his weight has been growing, now it’s around 135kg and 185cm. They don’t make bikes for him but he added 2 wheels and now his favourite hobby is Offroading. He owns one Suzuki Vitara and one Jimmy, this one heavly modified for extreme offroading.
Position: Left
Role: Driver and navigator
Marco “Boombox” Buglia: 28yo, uneducated and unemployed. Formerly a DJ, he worked for 8 years in the “Show Biz” now is unemployed. He partecipated at “Sarabanda” (musical quiz) at age 17, winning 30.000€, this was the last luck of his life. He opened a music store but then cames iTunes. Now he lives with his mother. He is 175cm tall and weight less than 60kg.
Position: Center
Role: Entertainment Manager, center console
Luca “Spadella” Chiarugi: 26yo dishwasher, or, as he prefers, “Chef assistent”. He studied at Hotel School, he love cooking (and eating), He’s Giacomo’s best friend; He is here only to counterweight his friend, and to prepear some good meals. He hates mud and nature and he is obsessed with hygiene. The only one with a girlfriend (at least at the start line). 178cm 106kg. He is “famous” for his puns.
Position: Right
Role: Counterweight and cooker
The Car:
'87 Raziel Cargo Saltafossi
Old military veichle, or something like that, they don’t know where it came from, the only hint is the wording “M.M 88” on the side, and the green colour. Giacomo found this one at the junkyard.
The odometer indicates 000243km, something don’t look right, maybe it done a full turn.
Looking at an old broshure of the Raziel Cargo Saltafossi you can learn:
- Equipped with a powerful I6 Engine
- All wheel drive with manual locking differential
- Rugged to support abuses
and some other minor things
The Raziel Cargo was one of the bestselleres van of the 80s and this version is the offroad version, used mainly by police forces and army. Originally sold for 17000$ (at 30% markup), Giacomo buy it for around 650€.
But let’s talk about this specific model. When Giacomo found it at the Junkyard inside is complitly empty (in the back) and it is divided in 3 compartiment. Front one is the cab, 3 seats decently spaced by a sliding door to acces the second compartiment. The second compartiment is completly empty, maybe in the past was used as secondary crew seating, on the side doors there are two black plastic openable hatches and on the back wall another sliding door. This door leads to the third and final compartiment. This one is completly dark exept for two small grilles on the back. On the floor there are some dirt and junk.
Outside you can notice an heavy winch on the front bumper, it not work all the time, or better, sometimes work. On the roof there are 8 additional light (4 for the front and 4 for the back) and a roof rack.
The changes they have made are only in the interior. In the back they placed some tools, an electric generator and some spare parts, here the guys store their camping equipment; the middle compartiment is equipped as a kitchen, with some stoves, sink and food storage, TV with a DVD player, there is also a water tank under the floor and a water heater. In the front they have changed the stereo system with a better sounding one (a bit custom) and they have placed a mixer to turn on and off the outside speakers.
Performance are not that good, this thing is very heavy, but comfortable.
They don’t have made other modifications exept for small repairs, like an oil change, lightbulbs change, new battery and a vigorous wash. It don’t need any other care, the engine runs itself and the wheels seems to turn 360°.
If you haven’t got it, they are from Italy, more precisely Maremma (souther Tuscany) and “Cignale” is a slang for “boar”.
7 Likes
**
Team Mountain Pass
**
The team
The first member of team Mountain Pass and team leader is Pierre Mountbatten, a 53 year old Australian car journalist who founded the iconic hot hatch bible, Mountain Pass, in 1984 to capitalise on the emergent European hot hatch scene. Pierre is not French and neither is anyone in his family; his mother thought it sounded “posh” and Pierre has hated it ever since…
Pierre’s companion for this competition isn’t the curvy blonde he was wishing for but his protege Andrew Morgan; another Aussie journo who introduced Touge to the Mountain Pass repetoire. Andrew is a regular columnist for Mountain Pass and is very active in the grassroots motorsports scene…
The Car
Since the whole shebang would feature in a future issue, the car selected for the race had to be both obscure and front wheel drive and so, after weeks of searching for something suitable, Team Mountain Pass had found their car…
Presenting the 1993 Bogliq Kitten Ralleye!!!
Pierre had some contacts in the classic rally scene but it was Andrew who eventually found it, buried in the back of an old farmers shed. They were both ecstatic to find out they’d got their hands on an obscurely rare, Eastern European imported, variant of the regular Kitten which was fitted with parts that were sporty for the USSR but a bit weird for the USA… DOHC 2v, alloy headed 2L four cylinder; twin Boglex sidedraught carbs; Locker diff etc.
The price? $499 and three hours listening to the old farmer drone on about the day the Commies tried to destroy his barn!
After installing a new battery and replacing the oils and fluids the little Kitten spluttered into life. Emboldened by this good fortune, Pierre stripped down the Boglex carbs and cleaned them out, then rebuilt them without changing any settings. Now the l’il Kitten purrs and roars and Team Mountain Pass are looking forward to trying their hand at automotive roulette!!! 
9 Likes
Team POD (Prince of Darkness)
The Crew
Trevor Simmons: He’s currently the editor of Driver’s Edge magazine. Living in Berkshire, England. This 57 years old guy is famous for founding Driver’s Edge Magazine in 1992. And now famous for having an automotive channel call “Simmons’ Garage” where he show off his usually unusual cars. He decided to do the race for fun. Mostly.
Ivor Derr: A 46 years old from Oregon. He used to work for Axle Hopper Magazine before it’s closure in 2014. Nowadays he has a Youtube channel call IvorDoAuto, which host many different automotive content. He also occasionally write for web iteration of Driver’s Edge magazine. He was invited to do the trip by Simmons.
Jimmy Monnet: A 47 years old automotive journalist from Wiltshire, England. He’s a writer for Driver’s Edge magazine. Simmons chose him personally for his exuberant writing and driving. He once flipped over a Mitsushita during a review and thus been call The Wiltshire Flipper ever since.
Rory Kensington: This 67 years old dude used to work in the R&D department of Conan Cars PLC in Surrey, England. Right until he quit about 4 years ago. He now owns a repair shop specialised in Conan. A personal friend of Trevor Simmons.
The Car
Oh yeah, this is a beaut right here. A 1967 Platts Special Siskin 1750 Automatic Mk.4. This car is very rare in the United States. But the crew insist on finding an example in ANY sort of condition.
Platts was founded in the late 1800’s. Based in Coventry, England. The company survived until 1986 when it was bought by a French company who subsequently phased out the marque. This particular model is call Special Siskin. The name plate ran from 1934-1969. The Mk.4 was built from 1964-1969. This example is the Special Siskin 1750 Automatic. They were powered by Vanquist made B6 Series from 1750cc to 2200cc. Couple with either 4 speed floor mounted shifter manual or 3 speed automatic. As the name suggested, this is a Bork-Warwick 3 speed Auto.
The Special Siskin was marketed during the time USA didn’t have stiff import rules and safety regulation, from 1960-1968. The car didn’t sell very well for obvious reason.
The car was found in a shed in Oregon. Bought for 300$. The tag suggested that the last time this was on the road was in 1989. The engine’s missing, and the rust is pretty bad. These weren’t the pinnacle of rust proofing. But with enough welding the car was deemed good enough. The engine’s been substitute with a B6 2200cc Twin Carb unit from a 1975 Vanquist 622 TC originally made 95hp. But that’s not good enough for the day. So Rory strapped on some turbocharger unit. They didn’t even know what it came off. But it’s blowing through original SU Carburettors at 6psi nicely. So it’s now Dyno’ed at 123hp. With the infamous British made electronics. Will this car survive? Probably not.
Other than that the car is BONE STOCK. This, my friend, is the ultimate autoshite. A quasi-luxury British made model from the 1960’s, using 1950’s technology. The car is made of rust and shorted circuit. And it’s run by a group of cantankerous middle age men and an OAP.
The Prince of Darkness is ready to unleash his wrath.
(And oh yeah, this car featured crank start).
10 Likes
#Team All-Brit
The Crew
Ieuan Jones: the 26 year old Welshman at the helm. noted soft drink aficionado and lover of quirky cars.
Dominic Choudhry: the 24 year old British-Indian mechanic. highly skilled pool player and can jump onto a 5 foot ledge backwards, apparently.
Isla McCormack: the 23 year old Scottish navigator and electronics whiz. concert grade pianist and master of bad puns.
Titus: the 3 year old Samoyed. contributes nothing to the team, but he’s a good boy.
The Car
The team sourced out a pretty tidy 1992 JHW Forte GTi-S for £250. it hadn’t run for 10 years or so and needed a service and MOT badly, but nothing super serious. and, all things considered, that was a bargain for a tidy little hot hatch with over 150bhp
10 Likes
I love it! Love the variety and creativity. Keep it going, guys.
(will process more entries tonight after work)
4 Likes
#1993 Erin Berlose(Mk 2) Lex 2.7
Click for larger images
The Car
A 1993 Erin Berlose Mk 2, in standard mid-range affair. The car that defined Erin’s 90s renaissance; sadly not its V8 powered, AWD stablemate, but still the smooth bodied executive saloon that has become a favorite among those buying second-hand Erin’s.
This particular one, UK registration L480 NDA, rolled off of the production line in Wythenshawe, Manchester, on September 18th 1993, and has since done close to 150,000 miles. Almost all of the original documentation is still with the car, including a tattered pamphlet entitled “Your New Erin…” that would have been given to the first owner upon collection of the car. The Sundried Red paint is looking a little faded, and premium upholstery hasn’t been maintained at all, but the black plastic detailing has survived and almost all of the car is still working.
Most of the time, that is. The 2.7l i6 is a bit down on power, probably due to a dodgy oil change a few owners back that has left the camshafts covered in gunk. The starter motor is seeing its age, and the exhaust probably ought to be replaced. It occasionally makes a very distinctive ‘pu-pap-pap-pap-pu-pap’ sound, but only sometimes…
Interior electronics aren’t all up to scratch. Could be down to a few blown fuses, but that doesn’t explain why the driver side electric chair only reclines so far before just sort of stopping. Nor way if it gets above 25 degrees outside, the air conditioning simply cannot keep up. There are also quite a number of rattles. In fact, a lot; one of the previous owners seems to have used this thing as a family run-about and the kids were evidently keen on playing with everything.
Still, as a car to do a rally in, it offers great comfort with good driving dynamics, decent acceleration and (hopefully) sturdy reliability. The team bought the thing for £499 - this being a world where £=$ - and so far, on the few road tests they’ve done, it’s driven without a fuss. Speaking of the team…
#Team ‘Southend Or Bust’
Three third year university students from Cardiff University who fancied spending their holidays not getting shitfaced on VKs and bottles of Echo Falls.
[ul]James Hurley - 21 year old actually named after the Twin Peaks character by his mother, and not even for a joke. Your stereotypical CarThrottle fan. Wishes they were doing the rally in a BMW, has a thing for Emma Stone and can make even the most mundane food taste amazing.
Seb Anitolo - 20 year old Spanish student studying in the UK. Has been known to attract both women and men with his thick black hair, which he keeps perfectly maintained via a kit-bags worth of products. Studying Geography, not for any particular reason, but it has earned him the position as team navigator.
Martin Deenham - The only one with proper mechanical experience, and very, very particular. Spent 4 weeks just researching which engine to go for, let alone the car itself. Secret but undying love for The 1975. Very non-secret hatred of sleeping in a tent.
[/ul]
“TSOB” as they’ve nicknamed themselves have done a bit of work on the car; it’s had a good clean with a jetwash, Martin sorted out some off-roading tires and wheels to fit them (via his mate Terry from the local garage) and the boot has been converted into a storage space for all the beer they’ll need on the journey.
Plus some practical things like some extra fuel cans and a tool box.
Aux cable and iPhone dock setup on the dash, extra pillows packed for Martin and car running fine (at the moment); Team ‘Southend Or Bust’ are go.
12 Likes
I’ll have to whip something up for this one.
1 Like
#Team Viking
###The crew
Ivar Jastrzyn - 38 year old Polish-Danish engineer living in Poznań and designing engines for some Polish car company. Son of a famous designer Paweł Jastrzyn. Loves tinkering and can repair almost anything, be it mechanical or electrical, if only it is a part of a car. Doesn’t like “small talk”, very patient with cars, very impatient with people. Not a bad driver, but not the best either. He is on his month holiday in the US. Participation in this rally was mostly his idea.
James Tornquist - 33 year old American manager working at Zavir USA in Bridgeport, CT. Trips around USA are one of his passions - the other being playing a guitar. Surprisingly nice for a manager but often talks too much. Like, way too much. But he can drive pretty good and cook even better, and also can be a navigator, but only in emergency situations. Oh, and his grandparents came to the US from Norway, so he sort of counts as a Viking. He and Ivar know each other since 2009 when they met in Kraków during James’ trip around Central Europe. He inspired Ivar to participate in this rally.
Aina Vinter - 29 year old Swedish car interior designer working for Edler, but currently at Zavir USA on a cooperative ZETA project, where she met James. She got to know Ivar by their friends at Nordesign Studio, where she worked for a moment a few years ago. She loves camping, hiking tours and stupid cars. That’s why she decided to participate in this, having not much better to do during her short holiday, why she will be the team’s navigator and why she insisted on buying…
###The junk… car
1995 Zavir Squalo IV in a basic Veloce trim with a then-innovative 3.6 TCV engine (as seen here)…
…ruined by its 5 owners, 2 years of standing in the bushes and 586 134 miles on the roads. The two biggest surprises about this car were that it runs and it’s story is known. It was bought in New York as a company car, and it served as such for 4 years. Back then the car was in elegant metallic Dark Olive Green. Then a sales representative bought it with almost 200 000 miles on the odometer and still in perfect shape; he owned it for just 2 years, but driven another over 100 000 miles in it. During the next 7 years it served well as a family car. After that it was a taxi for 5 years and then… came the catastrophe. It was bought by some young idiot, tempted by a 3.6 turbocharged V6, RWD, premium interior and relatively low price. He obviously had no idea that the turbos were there only for economy, RWD was quite useless for fun with the car’s suspension tuning and power/weight ratio, most of the gadgets in the interior didn’t work after all these years and the attractive price didn’t came out of nowhere. After realising these things he decided to repaint the car in a bright retina-burning green, put some “cool” alloy rims on it, give it a bad look, rear wing and a bonnet scoop. Oh, and a bigger turbo with a bigger intercooler… Which eventually ruined the tired engine - even the legendary S42E isn’t indestructible. As he - quite obviously - didn’t have the money to repair it and couldn’t sell it, he abandoned it on his grandfather’s farm. After two years our team came there and bought this thing for just 500$. Condition just after they’ve bought the car:
- blown head gasket on the left bank
- oil leaks everywhere on the engine
- 3 of 6 cylinders running (only the right bank), but without turbocharging (unknown reason at first)
- active suspension not being active at all - stuck at the softest setting
- veeery loose steering
- very worn out brakes
- bent rims
- lots of dents on the body
- rear left power window not working, front left working sometimes, central lock not working, left taillight not working, A/C only heating, many gadgets not working properly or at all
- missing fog lamps and front badge
- incredibly faded paint
- dirty, shabby leather interior
Things done:
- engine rebuilt
- stock turbos fitted, but with the old aftermarket intercooler - it’s more effective
- steering fixed
- new brakes
- new wheels, with steel rims and hard tyres
- suspension electronics replaced with an aftermarket chip (way cheaper)
- rear wing removed
- front window mechanism cleaned (which fixed it), replaced wiring in the left side of the car (which solved the problems with the central lock and the taillight), cleaned and refilled A/C (now barely, but also cooling)
- thoroughly washed interior
Will this old and tired “premium beater” soldier on with our team of Vikings? Or will it give up and die in the middle of nowhere? Only time will tell 
11 Likes
Half a million miles, eh? Is this a Lexus or something?
1 Like
This, my dear Deus, is what we call Zavir Quality 
Edit: And for the first 18 years of it’s life the car was really cared for and kept in good condition (except some electric gadgets), only in the last 4 it wasn’t well maintained.
1 Like
#Team Clockwork Orange
The main driver will be Damon Walker. A failed prospect racing driver, he spent most of his life chasing an objective, which folded when his money ran out. At 21 years old, he seems to be going through a late adolescence, deciding to rebel, go against the system and connect with nature - whatever that means. Having started studying economics, after 6 months working as an intern in a consulting group, he decided he had had enough.
He convinced his high school friend, Patrick Rourke, who everyone called Packie. Born in Scotland, he is in his last year of mechanical engineering, however, his mechanical capacities were severely limited. He did know a lot of concepts and understood how an internal combustion engine worked inside out, however, couldn’t hold a spanner for his life. Maybe his theoretical knowledge will be helpful, if not he’ll help push the car and put some banging tunes in the 8-track.
In order to actually finish the rally, the pair decided to ask an older friend of theirs. Pete Davies, 41 years old, had worked for nearly two decades as a mechanic at the dealership of a budget mainstream Italian car company with an unpronounceable name. He said he would love to give it a go, because those basic cars are pretty much the same underneath, aren’t they.
###The car
Introduced in 1974, the Mk1 Baltazar Quark helped the firm mantain its share of the market, by being more modern than its ancient EP1 city car and smaller and cheaper than the new Quasar. As such, it was offered with a range of engines, with the 850 cc engine directly related to the one used by the EP1 since 1947 and a brand new family of modern inline 4 engines, with 8-valves and SOHC, offered in 3 different sizes, 1250, 1650 and 1700. For the 1979 model year, the car got a facelift and the engines were subtly tweaked. Due to the introduction of catalytic converters as an option on some markets, the engines were changed to 1400 and 1700 cc capacities.
The car shown here is a facelifted 1979 Quark 1700GT. It produces a whopping 100 hp, enough to take this 844 kg car to 100 km/h in just 8.9 seconds and onto a top speed of 175 km/h. Inside the car has 5 seats, lined with a mix of cloth and velour and a basic 8-track radio. Sculpted 14 inch wheels and a host of subtle tweaks to the outside mark this as the sporty car of the range.
This particular car was bought for just $450. Aparrently, it was the family since 1987 and treasured for nearly 30 years by a caring owner, but after his death the family had decided to sell it on.
However, this does seem like bullshit salesman speak. Sure, there is very little rust, with mild bubbling of the paint around the arches - actually quite impressive for a 40 year old car with no kind of galvanization on its panels. But the tyres aren’t the original high performance (for the era) models, instead being fitted now with some long lasting, hard-wearing tyres originally used on the base level car, and the exhaust system seems have been modified, with one of the mufflers removed and no catalytic converter in sight, hard to tell if it was removed or if it didn’t come with one from the factory to begin with, as it was an optional extra at the time. At least the wheels are standard, and the engine runs smoothly and with no worrying noises from the electronic injection.
12 Likes
I would join but this mod restriction is kinda annoying.