***** This thread is now closed, please CLICK HERE to go to Volume 12 *****
This thread follows on from VOLUME 10 *****
Another thread for commenting on rare, unusual, old or just plain daft cars etc.
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Today onmy travels near Brighouse I passed a house with four Allegros outside on the road and then just up the road at Birkenshaw a driveway with two Citroen Pallases circa mid eighties a GS Club an NSU Pince and something under wraps.It wonderfulto know there are still some good old excentrics still round all I see in Germany are rusting Skodas and dead Trabants.
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You're right Andy, that's the great thing about the UK (and Switzerland) - there's something interesting in almost every street.
France is a bit like Germany, all you see is boring (mainly French) Euro-porridge, rusting away at the bottom of gardens. French car buyers were certainly patriotic but nobody could accuse them of having imagination.
Oddly enough, you almost never see a Citroen GS or a Renault 14, 16 or 18 for that matter - dead or alive. Maybe it's really true that mid 70s-80s sheet metal was rubbish.
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I saw a Renault 16 in Redhill at the weekend. Hadn't seen one for years. There's a bloke near me who spends many an hour tinkering with a couple of Vauxhall Vivas - not sure I see the attraction personally. Maybe I'm missing something.
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One of my earliest memories is being in grandad's Vauxhall Viva. I cleary remember the whole thing juddering, he was one of those people who used to change gear far too early.
I pass a coke bottle Cortina or Taunus every morning and a few metres further on an Vauxhall Chevette (Opel version). I even saw a Capri a couple of weeks ago, quite a sight in Poland.
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Siting in the traffic just the other day and the last mortal remains of a Ford Taunus wallowed by - in fact it sported a Transit badge on the back. Just one of those occaisions that can never be shared at the time due to my being a passenger in an even rustier Lada!
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Followed an absolutely pristine dark blue Mk 1 Viva deluxe yesterday, it looked as though it had just left the showroom.
Weren't the tyres narrow way back then...!
P.
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A house not far from me has four Mk 2 Escorts in the front, and someone else has around half a dozen 2CV's in various stages of restoration. A Wolsey Hornet in top notch is a regular sight too, there can't be many of those that haven't long ago turned to rust.
--
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There's a house on the A34 between Congleton and Macclesfield which usually has several Hillman Imps parked outside, every one of which has an exhaust which could wake the dead.
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Seen today at the Trafford Centre, a Pug 307cc in a rather shocking shade of pink. Lots of the interior in a similar colour too. The reg. no. was also doctored to make the word pink!
Come trade in time...
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Really spooky:
"Seen today at the Trafford Centre, a Pug 307cc in a rather shocking shade of pink"
Read this this morning. At 3:30pm I saw the same car at the Tesco Extra off the M60 in Stockport. Would not call it shocking shade of pink ... not that bright ;-) A dull shade of pink to me. It will not only have been resprayed but the interior was covered in pink leather! ££££
On the way out I thought I'd take a quick photo if it was still there... it was. But roof now down and the driver with a passenger and child with even more pink blankets etc were in the car. Driver was filing nails before driving off. I nearly plucked up the courage to ask her why she did that to the car! But might have seemed odd a bloke asking a young blonde woman about the car without someone/her thinking of an alterior motive from me.
Car had "Jo" stitched into the front headrests so assume that was her name???
Seeing the car I cannot see how that was not quite expensive to get in that colour with the pink leather interior (including the "Jo" stitching).... so resale value probably of no concern.
Reg plate was definately illegally spaced.
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Last night, driving home down the M1 in the dark. Parked up on one of the raised 'Police vehicles only' spots off the hard shoulder, was an dark-coloured Audi A6 Avant with blacked out windows and no police markings. It was not the latest model (3-4 years old), and although I passed it quickly I saw it had foreign number plates but couldn't make them out. The rear plate was white with smaller characters than a UK plate...
What was it doing there, an EU traffic police exchange program, or some none-the-wiser tourists stopped for their sandwiches in a nice safe parking spot!
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Spotted today in the place of honour on the forecourt of the former Rover (now Honda) dealer in Limoges, France - a Streetwise! Start the queue here lads, I am prepared to negotiate for you, if I can keep a straight face...
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Parked in a street in Wycombe today, a red G-reg Nissan Bluebird with an F1 style rear spoiler on the bootlid!!!
--
Its not what you drive, its how you drive it! :-)
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i had a hearse fly past me doing about 90 on the a6 just north of loughborough good job it was empty he must of been late for a pickup i suppose
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i over took "thrust2" on the m6 many years (it was on a low loader at the time )
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Overtook a red soft top Ferrari on the M1 Thursday evening about 11.30
Not a clue what model but the reg plate was NAS 1
Small guy driving it, sat at 65mph in the middle lane
But glued to his mobile............
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Probably hoping that the Prince wouln't find out that he was out driving his car....
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Ford GT parked in our village last week, looked very very wide!
-- He's a cheeky wind-up scamster and he's on the radio....
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2 NSU Ro80s, both M plated (1973/4) both with towbars parked up next to each other near the library in Knighton in Powys. Must account for a fair proportion of the ones left in the UK hope they have a considerate owner... Both seemed rust free with tidy enough interiors, cars before their time.
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DK how unusual it is really - there's a yellow one often to be seen at a body shop other side of Harrow Rd - but a sort of burnt-orange Lamborghini the other day at the top end of Portobello Rd, nearest end to Notting Hill Gate.
Don't remember the model name - Diablo is it?Back tyres more than a foot wide. Didn't look really suitable for urban traffic. Being inside it would make everything including four-year-old toddlers look very tall.
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heading west on the M62 around J31
2x GM Vivaro type vans, 1x Movano sized van and one 7.5 tonner, all white, with blue/white/orange reflective side stripes. The vivaro or Renault master sized vans also had a blue/white check stripe on the bonnet - none of them had any written signing, but all four were using blue lights and sirens - what gives ?
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PU - is that a definite ?
Last time I saw the bomb squad, (*) the van was signwritten with 'Royal Logistics Corps' & 'Ordnance Disposal' etc
(*) - somebody found a WWII handgrenade of a playing field and thought the best thing to do was strap it to the back of his pushbike and take it home........
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Go on, get out of the car...
www.mikes-walks.co.uk
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It was a guess. I was thinking about this whenI was on the bike yesterday, were they new vehicles being delivered for localisation in respect of markings ?
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If they were being delivered, somebody wants their wrists slapped for using the blues'n'twos !
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Go on, get out of the car...
www.mikes-walks.co.uk
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A while ago I was overtaken by two big American 4x4's on the M4 with UK plates, I would say that they were 10 years old. They had no livery but had US style flashing blue lights and were travelling at 100mph. Now these looked well dodgy, not US Army or Military, not even like the CIA. The 4x4s looked like something a bouncer would drive.
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Last night was behind an electric G Wiz struggling up Meadow Head, Sheffield in the dark. Slowed to 25mph once but otherwise it was doing 30mph or so. Thought my eyes had gone funny when I saw this half width car!
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I wasna fu but just had plenty.
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this half width car!--
Wide enough to get in the way though.
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A Range Rover Sport
Why odd?
It had taxi plates in Aberdeen! Taxi for Higher (Fares)
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Spotted among the common Bentley Continental GTs etc in Casino Square, Monte Carlo the other night; a Spyker. Not the veteran, the supercar (so they tell me).
Parked round the corner (next to my friend`s Pug 106!), a UK plated 1965 RR Silver Cloud III but with the Continental Flying Spur body: Now that`s more like it...
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Oh, and I forgot - seen in a little town in Provence, an immaculate Austin Metropolitan in turquoise and white with whitewalls. My uncle had one in the 1950s and even when I was 3ft tall I used to bang my head on the roof in the back seat.
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Spotted yesterday at the Horseshoe pub, Willaston, Nantwich (opposite Crewe Vagrants football / hockey / cricket club) amongst a gathering of modern MGFs / TFs no less than 3 MGRV8s glinting in the sunshine, a lovely sight
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Toyota Avalon.
Been driving a rented one around California, Arizona and Nevada the past 2 weeks.
Very comfortable even on virtually a non-stop 10 hour trip.
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I wasna fu but just had plenty.
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Bit back this, whilst waiting for the other half in a supermarket car park. A MK`1 mondeo came in driving in with just a rim on the front wheel, it made a big gauge in the car park tarmac. A scroate got out went to the ATM and got back in. The scraping and sparks was unbaralble and everyone was gobsmacked, they just sat there including me. Anyway two miles up the road, saw him again with the police there. The front wheel must have came off and he crahsed into a bus head on. Must have been stolen, no one hurt as far as I know!
Now that is unusual
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A Maxi in Bramhall. Haven't seen one of them in a while.
JH
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Amongst all the Euroclones on a busy Dual Carriageway a beautiful ('cos I very nearly bought one) Beige (yes beige) Ford Granada Mk1 Coupe Ghia, complete with matching wheeltrims, looked in smashing condition. Also all alone in a corner of a garage forecourt, looking rather forlon but still classy another beige car this time a Jaguar XJ12L (for long wheel base) on a K (72) plate, looked very original, I later lusted after a Series II XJ12 when I was in School, 153 mph top speed and 0-100 and back to zero in twenty seconds, a true monster car.
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About a billion old 405s, Renault 5s, Pug 205s and various other 1980s French diesels, belching out copious particulate clouds, in Lille this past week.
Which BTW is a very nice place, just not very healthy on a bicycle.
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very nice place just not very healthyon a bicycle.
Tee hee bm... lucky to escape with your life if you ask me.
Where pray is healthy on a bicycle?
Tsk, sorry, lots of places I'm sure.
But where exactly, I mean safe from cars and stuff?
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A cycle track - if only.....:-(
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Spotted a Rolls Royce Phantom on an 07 plate driving through Southall Broadway. I'd be pretty nervous to be taking a £300k car through their with all the nutty drivers they get.
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Spotted a Rolls Royce Phantom on an 07 plate driving through Southall Broadway. I'd be pretty nervous to be taking a £300k car through their with all the nutty drivers they get.
It was probably driven by a gangster anyway.
--
Its not what you drive, its how you drive it! :-)
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you do see a lot of young Asian drivers in Southall accompanied by several women and music blasting out the windows.
But I don't think they stretch to Rolls-Royces.
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theres a chap about 1/4 mile at the start of the villiage from me whos got a hawker hunter fighter plane in his garden , sileby nr loughborough if your passing thru take a look
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Milky,
Can you see this by any chane on the GoogleEarth/WIndows sat image thing, what road is it on ?
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Milky Can you see this by any chane on the GoogleEarth/WIndows sat image thing what road is it on ?
ratcliffe road going into sileby off of the a46 bout 8miles north of leicester
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Milky Can you see this by any chane on the GoogleEarth/WIndows sat image thing what road is it on ?
no ive just looked , the res aint good enough , its ratcliffe rd if you want to try and find it?
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Milky,
I'm in Barrow, often go through Sileby and I ain't seen the the plane - which road is it on?
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Phil
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Milky I'm in Barrow often go through Sileby and I ain't seen the the plane - which road is it on? -- Phil
ratcliffe rd on your left as you head out of the villiage toward the a 46 its the last house on your left just before national speed limit sign, funnily i didnt know it was there until about 9 months after moving to sileby
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"its the last house on your left just before national speed limit sign, funnily i didnt know it was there until about 9 months after moving to sileby"
Been past there at least 4 times today - let alone hundreds of times in the past - though I must admit I have been avoiding Sileby of late because of traffic in morning - usually go "over the top" from Barrow via Seagrave to get to work. Will go via Ratcliffe Road tomorrow and will have a good look tomorrow morning as I pass.
Is it the white house set back from the road at the bottom of the dip - got a big cupressus hedge at right-angles to the road?
--
Phil
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heres a snap of it i took last year anyway, by the way the merc isnt mine......
i34.photobucket.com/albums/d142/Pixxa37/pic.jpg
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Spotted it today!
Can't understand why I haven't noticed before!
--
Phil
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I was in Bernkastell on the Mosel over the weekend and saw a locally registered Chevrolet Impala - vast hoizontal rear fins. Great condition and engine noise - just a bit of blue smoke from the exhausts on the over run. Bright sunny day, great finish and was a real head turner!
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A new one for me....VW Variant. Bright orange in colour.
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Saw this in a field in Pembrokeshire the week before last. It didn't move all the time we were there, so I imagine it's still there now. Can anyone tell me what it is?
[IMG]i11.tinypic.com/44lth51.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]i13.tinypic.com/2n0iwqp.jpg[/IMG]
The Ransomes nameplate made me think of grassy applications such as baling but I couldn't work out any more than that.
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Probably a spud harvester - ISTR that that Pembrokeshire was quite a large producer of new spuds, having a mild marine climate.
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Staying in Pembrokeshire in Summer 2005 followed a little tank thing along main roads from the pub (me not him) looked like something the Blues and Royals might mount. Load of sooty black diesel smoke.
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That little tank thingy would have been visiting the German tank ranges near Angle. I had a ride in Mk1 Leopard tank there once, and the rocketry practice was very impressive at night.
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Forgot to add that while in Mosel I also saw 2 old Citroen DSs on the road, an early model Alfa Spyder (The one from The Graduate!) and a Karmann Ghia convertible - the good weather must have brought them out!
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Bit different this, quick trip up M1 on Sunday morning and between J 24A and 25 there were 5 traffic police Volvo estates parked in line on hard shoulder (where that Severn-Trent works/reservoir is on left going north), mile up the road another parked in one of those elevated little police lay-by things, turned off at J26 and another was on the opposite carriageway going towards the M1 - was this all of Notts traffic police sighted in 10 minutes?????
--
Phil
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ooh nasty! Having seen 5 together I'd have assumed that was ALL of them and put my foot down.
JH
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ooh nasty! Having seen 5 together I'd have assumed that was ALL of them and put my foot down. JH
That may have been all of the marked cars but they do have a few unmarked ones, would have to keep your sixth sense on alert for those.. ;o)
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Was walking my son to school this morning when a silver Mercedes S came rapidly up our road with flashing blue police lights at the base of the windscreen. One un-uniformed person inside, no other distinguishing marks. Wasn't obvious why it was in a hurry either. Seems like a rather expensive choice for an unmarked police car, if that's what it was.
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This was not in was West Sussex was it ?, i have noticed there seems to be a lot of silver Mercs in use as Police cars there.
Speed cameras must be lucrative in those parts.
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Possibly misunderstanding the term 'hot-hatch', a VW Bora spontaneously combusted today in Bury St Edmunds as I cycled past. Coo ..... what a pong!
The source of the fire was within the engine bay and the fire brigade arrived promptly to deal with it.
Do Boras have any sort of history for performing this trick?
I hope it didn't belong to a Backroomer!
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In a small town (population about 2,000) south of Clermont-Ferrand, a new Citroen C6 in use as a taxi. I don't think I've seen half a dozen in all France.
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This evening, in Ladbroke Grove, a car I didn't recognise - very unusual that.
It was a long, pointed-tailed sort of thing like an endurance racer, multi-coloured paint job and a strangled engine note, turbo V6 or something of the sort.
Might have been a Le Mans Jaguar a decade old.
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Spotted today, a Rover 75 in Wembley being driven by a wannabe rapstar, with 50 Cent blasting out the opened windows, and lowered suspenision.
Pimp my Rover 75. Unusual image.
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Downers Grove IL, USA this afternoon
a De Lorean pulling out of a side turning
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A Dutton Mariner outside woolworths in Surbiton.
I guess it is not too far from the Thames.
In case you are not familiar with them:-
www.timdutton.com/
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Someone brought one of these to our cricket ground once. It has a very low bottom and he ran aground (!) in the gateway on the way out. Took three of us to push/bounce him clear. Final irony is that we're about as far from the sea as you can get in England.
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A Mondeo. 93 L plate GLX saloon in really factory fresh condition. Parked next to it in supermarket carpark. Commented to the owner on the condition. An elderly gent, he explained that he'd had it from new and looked after it.
A common sight 10 years ago, this was easily the best one I've seen. Don't forget this was car of the year in 1993...
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A Mitsubishi Animal 4WD Pick up in glossy very clean black. Unusual ? Yes because it was a local farmer in his field herdng sheep, first one of these I've ever seen in its proper habitat.
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Norrthampton, lunchtime today. Yoof in usual gear, burberry hat etc driving a chavved up Vauxhall................
No not a Corsa but a Y reg Chevette!!!!
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No not a Corsa but a Y reg Chevette!!!!
Probably an ironic Chav.
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in S'bys car park yesterday, a D suffix (1966) Dormobile.
JH
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On the hard shoulder of the M40 yesterday, a broken down Rover SDi.
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Its not what you drive, its how you drive it! :-)
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A vicarious unusual sighting sent to me by the interweb. A brief video filmed by phone from a car on the A55 in Anglesey this morning, a flight of BAe Hawks in "Diamond 9" formation above the road absolutely stunningly beautiful, also brief clips of them landing 3 at a time onto the runway (invisible from the points of recording) at RAF Valley, also a solo Hawker Hunter over Holyhead Fire Station - distracting motorists. The same guy filmed some Lightening jets gambolling like lambs with the clouds above the A4080 some years ago using some older technology. I love planes but very distracting for drivers.
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i was at conigsby bout two week ago and witnessed a squadron of jaguars leave for pastures new, absolutley perfect formation as they left, then a eurofighter shot along the run way and turned verticle with both barrels on , absolutely marvelous then the lanc came out and did her stuff in her new livery ( been at cov airport for a make-over) it all brought a tear to ones eyes
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Happy memories of a TACEVAL in the late 1980's at Honnington, a sqdn of Tornados taking off at night with afterburners lit up - got a ringside view from the runway sanger (dug-out)
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i would have loved to have seen that
some people have all the best jobs :-(
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I wish I could post this somewhere, a second clip arrived (slightly further south on the A55) these planes are "stacked" flying towards the traffic. can't describe it exactly but like a set of steps, separated by what appears to be a few feet in altitude and distance. superb precision flying, how there wasn't a pile up on the dual carriageway below, I don't know, I love seeing my taxes spent like this, I truly do.
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I saw a G-Whizz today, funny given the saftey (sl)rating they go today
i thought these were just a joke, but some women was really taking her nipper to school in one in Harpenden today
folk are strange
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i thought these were just a joke but some women was really taking her nipper to school in one in Harpenden today
Round here too, nipper with those thick round pink spectacles... But you expect them round here.
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This evening, parked outside the Pakistani grocer down the road, a Lotus Elite. No, not a proper one, one of those big flat bobtailed four-seaters from the seventies. Making a lot of exhaust fumes - cold engine - but didn't sound disastrous. Didn't sound wonderful either (or look it).
Just off Holland Park Avenue on the way in from Sussex this afternoon, an electric car being charged by a cable across the kerb (I bet it's illegal, and would certainly worry me if it was my car). Called a City, better proportioned and better looking than a G Whiz, slightly wider. Don't suppose it's much better though...
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At least the Elite is still alive!
In front of me in the traffic a couple of days ago on the Ile de Noirmoutier off the west coast of France, a very tasty looking Ferrari 250 GT Lusso of about 1960. Sounded wonderful, looked gorgeous even though it was metallic silver!
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Called a City better proportioned and better looking than a G Whiz slightly wider. Don't suppose it's much better though...
Produced by a French company, known as the Mega City, costs over £9k but is certainly much better looking and somewhat more car-like than the G Whiz.
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On the big roundabout on the M25-A2 junction I once saw a flatbed covered in 'wide load' signage carrying one of the passenger capsules/pods from the London Eye. Not sure where he went but was taking up the best part of two lanes. It appeared undamaged so just going for maintanence or something I imagine. A moment of light relief from the hellish traffic that seems to always infest that particular junction!
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1950s Merc SL Roadster on M5 near Taunton on Friday night. Was travelling with another classic car but completely forgotten what that was (think may have been a Healey). Both being driven rather than on trailers, albeit rahter sedately in heavy rain.
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Mk 3 Capri on the M40 at about 6am on saturday. Always did love the capri and Mk1 Escort.
StarGazer
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Whilst sunning myself in the yank roadster at a set of traffic lights, this morning, I was distracted by the unmistakable camshaft 'tick' of a pinto engine - craning my neck I was stunned to spot the culprit, a mk2 capri replete with swiss cheese sills and a scabby fibreglass bonnet bulge.
The car undoubtably was imported in the early 1990's from Germany and had clearly not benefitted from the local climate and certain lack of maintenance in the mean time....brought back some memories, my father had one of the first 3000E's in the early 1970's and I recall him later pointing out to me the mile post he had hit whilst avoiding a telephone box in Newport Pagnall - he had just left the Aston Martin works and blamed it on an adrenalin rush!
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MTC, you might want to avert your eyes at this point......
Last night I saw a stretched Chrysler 300C going through Clapham (village in Sussex).
I think it was being used on one of these newfangled proms.
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Yesterday within a few hundred yards of each other on a busy bit of Dual.
A beautiful late model V12 E type (convertible) in a sort of mid-blue. A very used looking Volvo Amazon.
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A beautiful late model V12 E type (convertible)
Not as beautiful as a 3.8 coupe PU... there was something wrong with the looks of the V12 and it wasn't that good a car either.
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I preferred it,,,,, possibly as I am a child of the 70s
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Toyota Yaris.
Nothing unusual except that this was in Midland, Pennsylvania, an unpleasant and economically "challenged" part of the central US near Pittsburgh, where the vehicle of choice is an erratically driven shotgun rack equipped pickup truck. I've seen the Toyota Echo in the US before but I didn't know Toyota imported the Yaris. In the same area I saw what looked like a Daewoo, sorry Chevrolet, Matiz. Wouldn't fancy being in one of those in accident involving aforementioned pickup truck.
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>>I've seen the Toyota Echo in the US before but I didn't know Toyota imported the Yaris.
I think Toyota have decided to standardise on the name.
USA Today 12/29/2005
Yaris is a small, economy car that will replace the unloved Echo in Toyota's US lineup this spring,
The Australian November 30, 2005
In Australia the new Yaris replaces the Echo, which most of the rest of the world knew as the first-generation Yaris.
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Reliant Kitten, the four wheeled version of the Robin.
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