The Strange Story of the Chrysler TC by Maserati
Lee Iacocca wanted Italian prestige for Chrysler, Maserati needed cash, and the result was a costly two-seat roadster that arrived three years too late.
Car Posts
Road and performance car stories
Design stories, engineering notes, model spotlights, and the cars that became more than transport.
How Bob Lutz Changed BMW, Ford, Chrysler and GM
From BMW Motorsport and the Ford Sierra to the Dodge Viper and Chevrolet Volt, Bob Lutz kept pushing car companies to trust great products over committee thinking.
Volvo Chose the Design, Then Buried the Designer
The Volvo P1800 may wear Italian tailoring, but its shape came from a young Swedish designer whose role Volvo tried to keep hidden.
Beneath the Brutalist Skin of the Alfa Romeo SZ
The Alfa Romeo SZ looked brutal on the surface, but its steel shell and composite bodywork made it more advanced than the styling suggested.
How the Third-Gen Camaro Became a Clean-Sheet 1980s Benchmark
GM briefly considered taking the Camaro and Firebird front-wheel drive, but the third-gen F-body ultimately kept its rear-drive character and became an 80s styling benchmark.
The Man Behind Porsche's Greatest Engines
Hans Mezger shaped Porsche's flat-six, the 917, turbocharged race engines, and the McLaren-TAG Formula 1 era.
How the Datsun 510 Became Japan's BMW 2002
Nissan saw what BMW was doing with the compact sports sedan and built the Datsun 510 into a simpler, cheaper, rear-drive answer with global appeal.
The Curious Case of the Q-System Gearbox
The Alfa Romeo 156 V6 could be ordered with one of the strangest automatic gear selectors of its era: a four-speed auto with a manual-style H-pattern mode.
The Ford Focus MK1 Control Blade Revolution
The first Ford Focus changed the compact car class by proving that clever chassis engineering could be felt by ordinary drivers every day.
The Second Life of the Lotus Elan
After the Lotus Elan M100 seemed finished, its tooling found a surprising second life with Kia in Korea.
The Genius of Toyota's Super Strut Suspension
Toyota tried to engineer around the compromises of MacPherson struts with a complex front suspension that chased double-wishbone behavior in a strut package.
The Evolution of Heads Up Displays (HUD)
From military aircraft gunsights to augmented-reality windshields, heads-up displays moved from aviation hardware into everyday cars.
Inside the 2UR-GSE: Toyota’s V8 Masterpiece
Toyota and Yamaha turned the 2UR-GSE into a high-revving naturally aspirated V8 with dual injection, tuned acoustics, and serious motorsport credibility.
351 Windsor vs. Cleveland vs. Modified: A Ford V8 Breakdown
Ford built three very different 351 V8s, each with its own purpose, personality, and place in the brand's performance history.