Ralph Hosier’s Rover 75
Evo magazine’s tame engineer is back on PetrolBlog with some words on his Rover 75. For more of Ralph, follow him on twitter at @RalphHosier or check out his brilliant TechnoBlog.
What do you think of when you see a Rover 75? Flat cap, maybe? Or perhaps you see slow progress on roads near old people’s homes? Rover spent millions developing that image, unintentionally of course, but is it deserved?
Like many car enthusiasts I had dismissed the slightly bulbous retro styled granny wagon as being too dull and unreliable, but after a fellow writer waxed lyrical about the 75′s virtues I started looking into it in a bit more detail and found that there was a lot more going for it than I had realised. Read more 
Black Magic VW: Gary’s Volkswagen Santana
When was the last time you saw a Volkswagen Santana? According to How Many Left? there are just seven left on Britain’s roads, making the 4-door saloon quite a rare sight. It was actually no more than a B2 Passat sedan, making the Santana some kind of retro Shatchback hero.
Amazingly, some 194,000 Santanas were produced between 1981 and 1985, before the Santana name was dropped in favour of the Passat saloon. Three years later, in 1988, the B2 Passat was replaced by the B3 and the Santana was banished, in the UK at least, to automotive history. In China the name may live on, but in the UK, you’re more likely to hear Santana on the Ken Bruce show than see one on parked on your local high street. Read more
L@@K, there’s a PetrolBlog Shed on eBay.
Time with the PetrolBlog Shed is coming to an end. After five months and 6,000 miles of togetherness, the Accord Type-Shed is on the way out and has this very evening been thrown to the mercy of eBay. How much it’ll fetch is anyone’s guess, but with a month left on the MOT and six weeks of tax, I hope it goes for a little more than the £8 starting price. But there’s no guarantee of this as the market for used cars is frankly rubbish at the moment. If your car happens to be a large, petrol-engined banger, than the market is even worse. Read more
Bangerwatch: Fiat Uno Turbo i.e
In the market for an ’80s hot hatch, but would prefer something different to the ubiquitous Golf GTi or 205 GTi? Well, if you’re feeling brave, you might be tempted by this little Italian rocket found in the classifieds. Signore e signori, I give you the Fiat Uno Turbo i.e. Admit it, you weren’t expecting one of these to be for sale today, were you? Read more
The hunt for Sao Penza
According to howmanyleft.co.uk, there is only one Sao Penza left (legally) roaming the streets of Britain. That’s right, just one Sao Penza. And you’d forgotten all about them, hadn’t you?
When I wrote this article last year, I had no idea that the Sao Penza was so close to extinction. But for all its faults and obvious flaws, the fact remains that as a nation we’re down to a single Sao Penza. Granted, there appear to be three laid up, but I think we can safely assume that these are probably sat surrounded by weeds, spiraling into the abyss, never to feel the warmth of Britain’s tarmac again. I’m also pretty certain that the last time I visited the Beaulieu Motor Museum, there wasn’t a Sao Penza mingling with the F1 cars or sat alongside a Ford Sierra Cosworth. Read more
Extreme Bangernomics: Million mile Honda Accord
It is often said that the Honda Accord is one of, if not the most reliable car in the world. Warranty Direct’s survey in 2006 certainly came to that conclusion, as did a Which? Survey in 2009. There are others too, just do a Google search for ‘Honda Accord reliability’ and scroll through the resulting 7.5 million web pages. I can only hope that my very own Accord can deliver the same levels of reliability over the coming weeks and months. Read more
PetrolBlog looks at: How Many Left?
These sort of websites should carry a government health warning. Not only did I lose half an hour of my working day when I discovered it via twitter, but I’ve just spent the last hour trawling back through my entire back catalogue of past motors. The website in question is www.howmanyleft.co.uk and be warned, you will lose hours on there. Read more
Honda Accord Type-Shed: an update
The electric aerial still works. The electric aerial. It still works. When I picked up the Honda Accord exactly two months ago, I somewhat irrationality established that the electric aerial would be used as some kind of barometer of reliability. As long as the electric aerial works, the Accord will remain reliable. OK, so in the great scheme of things, this is hardly up there with the ravens and the Tower of London, but it is my barometer, so I’m sticking with it. Read more
PetrolBlog looks at: The German Car Industry
On the face of it, a book by James Ruppert on the subject of German cars from the 1980s is always going to be of interest to PetrolBlog. The Bangernomics Bible has already inspired me to purchase the PetrolBlog Shed and I’ve got a long standing love affair with cars from the 1980s, particularly those from Germany, France and Italy. So you would hopefully excuse the mild excitement when I got my hands on a copy and clapped eyes on the cover, resplendent in the colours of the German flag and featuring an E30 BMW convertible. Read more
PetrolBlog buys a shed
PetrolBlog recently reviewed the Bangernomics Bible which, in short, is about buying and running a car for the cheapest possible outlay. I was so inspired by the book that I decided that I’d like to have a go at running a Banger for myself. So when the Audi and Citroen developed temporary faults, I was presented with the perfect excuse to look for a ‘PetrolBlog Shed’. More petrolhead logic perhaps, but like we need an excuse to buy another car. Besides, this is public service at work here.
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PetrolBlog looks at…Bangernomics
When it comes to used cars there’s one man who stands as a giant over us mere mortals. In fact I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he is one day rewarded with a knighthood for his services to pre-owned motor cars. The man in question is James Ruppert, or to use another name, Mr Bangernomics. James has been a mainstay of the used car section of Autocar magazine for years and is the kind of guy you’d want to take with you when you’re viewing a used car or visiting an auction. Quite simply, James Ruppert is the man. Read more
