There's just something right about a primer second-gen Camaro, isn't there? Add the obligatory GM rust around the rear window, hang a pair of handcuffs from the rear-view, stop by the 7-11 to grab a pack of Marlboro Reds and a sixer of Mickey's Big Mouths and you're set! Now, we don't know for sure whether the owner of this '77 fits the Ideal Camaro Demographic- hey, maybe this car is owned by a 68-year-old veterinarian who favors those three-dimensional sequined sweaters- but it's more fun for us to assume we're looking at an ICD car here.

In 1977, the standard engine in the Camaro... well, you don't want to know. Let's just say that the super high-performance optional 350 put out 170 horsepower and leave it at that. Not only that, the F-body's weight had crept up to 3,500 pounds by '77, about the same as the '65 Impala 4-door and a good 400 pounds more than the '70-1/2 Camaro. Still, I've driven quite a few of these cars and they're actually fairly enjoyable on the street (and lots of fun with Hoon Grade™ engine upgrades).


Ah, the standard rear-window rust. Even in California, GM cars tend to get this problem. Just paint over it!


The huge Malaise 5MPH crash bumper is blended in fairly well with the vast plastic snout on this car; compare this treatment with, say, the Spitfire of the same era and you can see that GM did a pretty good job of bumper camouflage here.

DOTS 1-200 • DOTS 201-250

What's the best way to show that your car is better than the competition? Slap a huge Malaise decal bearing your car's name on the side, set up the ramps, and jump the competition! It's even got more headroom than the Rabbit, which we all know is roomy enough for Wilt Chamberlain! Then it kicks Honda's ass by having a longitudinally-mounted engine, though we're not sure quite how that's an advantage in a front-wheel-drive car.

This DOTS Bonus Edition thing has really taken off, with photos coming in faster than I can post them (be patient- my jumble of files rigorously organized system will result in everyone's shots appearing sooner or later). We've seen North American cars and a few in Europe, and now it's South America's turn. Chilean reader Felipe sees this '74 Torino parked in his neighborhood (I forgot to ask which city), and he's gone out and interviewed the owner for us. ¡Gracias, Felipe! Make the jump for the car's story... but before that, let's look at a Malaise Torino that's not quite as nice as this one!

This Gran Torino Brougham from the year 1974, was imported new to Santiago de Chile.
Around the year 1990 it was sold to the owner which I bought it to, it was taken to a southern city called Los Angeles (Not California). There it was well maintained, it was used as a second car, only to drive around the weekends, not a daily driver. Around the year 2004 the owner had to leave Chile, this is when I bought it, the car travelled a distance of 500km with only changing the fuel filter, this means it was in good condition, at least the engine and transmission, when it arrived I noticed that it had some oxide; low part of the doors, fenders, trunk door and the trunk itself was ruined by oxide. Now the restoration begins, all the parts corrode by oxide were cut of and replaced by new metal, the chasis was in good condition so nothing was done there.
After the paint, which was done using the same colors, well originaly the roof had a white vinyl cover, which was taken out and replaced by a pearl white color, no more vinyl. When all the paint and metal was done it was taken to an electric to change completely the cables, and take out all the none original butons, maybe in the states this does not happen very much but here in Chile it is very common to find cars that have an enourmous amount of cables and buttons. Well the electric system was left original, exept for the third brake light and the sylvins were changed to halogen lamps, the orginal AM radio and A/C were left, both working to today. The next step was to complete the car, brand new Cragar ss rims were installed with wider tires (265 back and 245 front), this step completely changed the appearance of the car, it gave it a more aggressive look. All the emblems were installed, the F-O-R-D In the front did not come with the car, but it was an optional for this model so, it still maintains the originality, the other hood ornament (The brougham one) was not installed because personally I don't like it, yes I should not have left that hole in the hood, but I still have the ornament in the glove box. When the car was ready it was taken to get out that v8 sound, independent 2" exhaust lines were installed with mufflers, and inox steel tips, I orderd a pair of Flowmaster mufflers but they came too late, even though, the car sounds very good and it passes every thing legally.
The engine was only enhanced, stickers and stuff like that, it is original a 351 Windsor, also the transmission was left inttact. The car runs great, no smoke, 100%, just gas and you can go anywere, last year I went to the mountains (El Colorado) a ski resort and no problems.
The gas price has gone very high so I don't use it very much now, it has become a second car, the price of a liter of gas here costs $1.20, so you would imagine it's not very cheap to use as a daily driver, I used it every day for about two years. I have owned it for about 4, one year was completely used in restoration, and now I enjoy it in the weekends.

The cars driven by the team members and audience at the 24 Hours of LeMons race tended to be more interesting than what you'd see in your typical East Bay parking lot. I saw an AMC Hornet with a trunk-mounted computer, a small-block XJ6 with a wicked-looking hood scoop, and this very clean Fox wagon... which turned out to be owned by Shawn, a helluva good mechanic who showed up as a last-minute crew addition and proved incredibly useful in the Black Metal V8olvo pit action. That's Shawn fueling our car in the gallery below. I can't recall the last time I saw an Audi Fox in any condition, much less one this nice.

I probably shouldn't have tried to write a DOTS post a couple hours after coming home from a crazy weekend of racing, but I did... and totally spaced on the Truck Monday tradition. Not that the Datsun 1200 isn't a great car, but we're supposed to have a truck here to start our week, dammit! To make up for that screwup, I'm going with a truck I've been saving for a special occasion: a rusty, crusty survivor straight from the Alaskan bush!

You don't see a lot of Alaskan plates in Alameda (Hawaiian ones used to be fairly common, with the huge Navy base on the island and many sailors bringing cars from the islands); this truck seems to have become a permanent resident, so we'll probably see boring ol' California plates on it one of these days. I like to imagine this thing grinding down some icy dirt road with a bunch of tools rattling in the back. I'm not sure whether "Scout II Traveler," "Scout Traveler," or just "Traveler" is the preferred nomenclature; you Scout guys can weigh in on this issue.


It's even a diesel (or at least has diesel emblems). The diesel engine for '77 was a six-cylinder, 92-horse Nissan unit.


Looks like the oxidation brigade has been at work here; the Alameda climate will slow the rot to a crawl. I think Jack London himself would have driven this truck, had he lived long enough (102 years) to buy one. In fact, London probably used IHC farm machinery at his Beauty Ranch in Sonoma County.

The little Datsuns of the early 70s are just about gone now, though a few still roam the streets of the Island That Time Forgot. We saw a '75 B210 last fall, and now we've got an even rarer machine in this early-70s 1200. I'm calling it a '71, but it might be a '72 or maybe even a '70; we'll need to rely on the serious Datsun fiends out there to nail down the exact year.

This car may spend most of its time garaged, but I see it on the street in my neighborhood from time to time. It appears to be an original, unrestored time capsule of an early Datsun. I'm hoping I'll be able to find the owner one of these days and ask him about this little jewel's story.


Known as the Sunny back in its homeland, the 1200 was cheap, got great mileage, and was way more reliable than its European and Detroit competition. And it has an interesting Japanese racing history as well!


Who knows, maybe this is the original Yankees bullpen car (though apparently the Dodgers had one too).

We've only seen a couple of Lincolns in this series (a '69 and a '77), and with ten Cadillacs so far, it's time to look at another of Ford's big luxo-machines. I found this '72 parked on the same block as the '70 Volvo 164 and the '87 BMW L6.

I shot this car and the '70 Ford LTD on the same rainy day. Rain might be bad for the camera, but it makes old cars look more serious.


This one is missing the front bumper, but otherwise looks pretty solid. The weird thing is the presence of what appears to be a real convertible top; as far as I know, you couldn't get a '72 Lincoln convertible from the factory. Must be a custom job.


The Mark IV came standard with a big grunt-happy 460 engine, and at 4,800 pounds it needed all that torque.

The '65 Barracuda won our Favorite DOTS Chrysler A-Body Poll back in March, but since that time I've found this '75 Dart Swinger. Would the Swinger, with its name conjuring up images of Malaise Era key parties, have triumphed over the Barracuda? Perhaps I'll have another A-body poll, once we've seen a few more of them; until then, we can only speculate.

The Swinger was the name Chrysler put on the 2-door Dart with the Custom mid-level trim package. The Special Edition series was the priciest Dart, though the real hot ticket was the $254 "Hang Ten" package, which got you surfer-esque graphics and tape stripes.


The standard engine on the '75 Dart was the 96-horsepower Slant Six 225, though you could get the Dart 360 Sport with a V8 boasting 200 horses.


This Swinger is in decent condition, with all four hubcaps still present and accounted for and no visible rust. The vinyl top is bad (of course), but other than that it's weathered 33 years quite well.

We've been getting some great Down On The Street Bonus Edition photos from our readers (so many, in fact, that it's getting tough to post them as fast as they come in- which is a good problem to have). However, when you find and photograph a daily-driven Citröen Traction-Avant on the streets of your city, you get jumped to the head of the line. Such is the case with Warpig, who has gone on an unprecedented DOTSBE binge in his hometown of Oslo, Norway. He's sent in literally hundreds of photos of interesting old cars found on Oslo's streets, and today we're going to look at some of the Citröens he's shot. Good work, Warpig, and we'll be showing more of your photos in the near future!

Try to imagine a not-so-hot pursuit between a Malaise Triumph Spitfire and a smog-motored mid-70s cop Mopar Ford. Will the single-digit gas mileage of the police car result in a drained fuel tank before the British Leyland build quality of the Spitfire sends it coughing to a halt on the shoulder in a cloud of wire-insulation smoke? We'll never know, because it turns out the Triumph wasn't running from the cops after all. Whew!

We've reached another milestone in the Down On The Street Series, with today's vehicle being the 250th vintage (or at least interesting) street-parked vehicle I've photographed parked on the streets of Alameda, California. It's been a little over a year since we saw the very first DOTS car, and I never thought I'd be able to find as many as I have. Doing this series has turned me into an annoyingly slow driver when I'm in Alameda, as I'm constantly cruising at minimum speed and scanning parked cars for potential DOTS candidates; by this time I've developed the ability to pick out an interesting parked car just from a nanosecond's glimpse of a grille at a distance of several blocks. So make the jump and check out the cars!

Since our server hamsters all die when we try to show more than 200 images in a post you can just go to the 200 DOTS post to see the earlier DOTS cars, I'm just going to show you cars #200 through #250 here. Those of you with questions about why this small island city has so many old cars on the street should check out the explanations here.

1941 Chevrolet Pickup

1950 Ford

1956 Ford F-100

1958 Mercedes-Benz 220S

1960 Volkswagen Transporter

1962 Ford Falcon

1963 Dodge D100

1963 Porsche 356

1964 Ford F-100

1964 Chrysler 300

1964 Mercury Comet Cyclone

1965 Mercury Comet

1966 Buick Riviera

1966 Dodge Coronet 440 Convertible

1966 Mercedes-Benz 250S

1967 Plymouth Barracuda

1968 Porsche 912

1968 Mercury Cougar

1969 Volkswagen Beetle

1969 Ford Mustang

1970 Cadillac Coupe de Ville

1971 Chrysler Newport Royal

1971 Chevrolet Blazer

1971 Dodge Dart

1973 MGB

1974 Ford Maverick

1974 Chevrolet Camaro

1975 Chevrolet El Camino

1976 International Harvester Scout II

1977 Oldsmobile Custom Cruiser

1977 Fiat 124 Sport Spider

1977 Volvo 244DL

1978 Dodge Monaco Brougham

1979 Porsche 928

1980 Plymouth Arrow Pickup Truck

1981 Fiat Strada

1982 Datsun 280ZX Turbo

1982 Toyota Corolla

1982 Mazda 626 Luxury

1983 Toyota 4x4 Pickup

1984 Plymouth Reliant

1984 Jaguar XJ6

1986 Pontiac Fiero GT

1987 Mitsubishi Starion

1989 Alfa Romeo Graduate

1989 Chevrolet Camaro RS

1969 Cadillac Sedan de Ville

1965 Chevrolet C10

1983 BMW 633CSi

There's a Volvo 262C parked in a driveway scant blocks from my house; it would be a super-cool DOTS car, but it's off-limits. Not so for the Bertone in ejacobs' neighborhood, which is on the street and set up for easy photography with no other vehicles nearby. These things sold for 15 grand back in the day, well over twice the price of a regular 242; this one has some rust, but looks pretty complete.

The French car beat the German one in our last Choose Your Eternity matchup, which means we need to give France's cross-Channel rival an opportunity to snatch the PCH Trophy (which features several rods hanging out the side and a spreading pool of oil below) today. We're going with something a bit different this time, however; ever since the What Should Mad_Science Drive To Work QOTD, we've been thinking about non-petroleum-fueled car projects. Not boring ol' electric cars that can barely buzz up to highway speed, or seen-one-ya-seen-em-all veggie-oil-powered Mercedes-Benzes, though. Something fun! Something... HELL!

There's no law that says you have to run dinosaur juice in your diesel; vegetable oil or animal fat works just fine! Oh sure, some worrywarts will tell you that you need to use some kind of witches' brew of methanol, lye, and who-knows-what-all and make actual biodiesel, but that's only if you want to run the stuff in an unmodified diesel engine. However, this is Hell, where nothing is unmodified! Not only that, most of the cars in Hell are French... like, say, this '79 Peugeot 504 diesel, which can be purchased in running condition for only $1,500. Put in a bunch of filters and fuel heaters and start making friends with the manager of your local donut shop, because you're breaking free of the oil companies' stranglehold! We suggest adding turbocharging and intercooling, because there's no reason you need to be slow while you're saving the planet, right?

A veggie-oil diesel looks pretty good on the greenhouse-gas balance sheet, all right (assuming you're using played-out cooking oil as fuel; once you start pouring fresh veggie oil into the tank you get into a maddening internal debate about how much carbon was generated making the oil), but it still spews out all manner of icky particulates in the exhaust- which is hell on folks with asthma- not to mention lots of unpleasant nitrogen compounds due to the high compression and combustion temperatures inside a diesel. But there's an alternative, you green-minded Hell Project demon, you: electric power! How about a full-hybrid vehicle, in which a small internal-combustion engine charges the batteries of an electric drive system, just like a railroad locomotive? You can optimize the ICE engine with fuel-delivery and camshaft trickery so's it runs at optimal efficiency, and plug the car into household current (or, greener still, solar panels on your roof, thus relieving you of the maddening internal debate about the "remote polluting" effect of electrical generation via nonrenewable resources) so the generator hardly need run at all! Of course, you wouldn't want to drive some glorified golf cart or you wouldn't be reading this site, so we've found just the car for you: this '74 Austin Marina, already converted to a full-hybrid powertrain! Yes, it's a British car with an aircraft starter motor and a 7HP gasoline engine running a generator (we'd suggest a propane conversion on the engine, for seriously low smog output). Hmm... British... electric... Malaise Era... what could go wrong? The car is in pretty nice shape, so you might not have to spend more than many months a week or so chasing super-rare Austin parts for it, and best of all is the price: only 600 bucks!

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The cage door creeeeeaks open, (perhaps suggesting the rust that will soon assail most Malaise Lincolns and Mercuries), and the angry mountain lion struts out into a field full of parked cars. The Continental... the Marquis... Montego... Comet... Cougar... they're all here, and they're all packing more bloat and less power than ever before.

No car illustrates the concept of Long Term Model Bloat better than the Civic (for a good example of Short Term Model Bloat, compare the 1970 Mercury Cougar with the 1974 version). Here's Honda boasting about the ability of the '78 Civic hatch's ability to swallow four shopping bags. The '78 Civic hatchback weighed 1,708 pounds... about 1,000 pounds less than the '08 Civic sedan.

Those of you who believed El Suburbanimo to be the ultimate New Jersey vehicle might want to reconsider after you take a look at this '73 Datsun 240Z. Back in the early 80s, with just 19,721 miles on the Z's clock, its owner decided some custom touches were in order. A little body kit here, some stripes and TURBO emblems there, and then the finishing touch: a small-block Chevy engine. It's awesome! BZR found this gem for us; make the jump to read his description. [eBay Motors]

Like a time warp straight out of the 70s, with every optimistic Malaise-denying piece on there. Every angle induces another "Oh my God" reaction, every feature seems like some unholy caricature of a kitsch utopia. Makes "Black Gold" look restrained and tasteful by comparison, and pretty much every other 70s special edition seem subdued as a result.

If you're featuring this car on Jalopnik (and I sincerely hope you do, it's too good to pass up), it would be a crime against humanity not to feature the skewed front bumper with "AWESOME" scrawled across the front (the only way it would be cooler is if it was backwards, like the TURBO markings on a BMW 2002) and the He-Man-inspired fantasy art on the hood scoop. Clearly the owner had a massive polyester-panted hard-on for shaggin-wagons as well as the beauty and majesty of the upcoming 1980s, a better time improved by TECHNOLOGY! Is it any surprise this car is from Jersey?

Oh, and it's got no engine. Natch.

In a stunning upset, the Borgward Hansa wagon handed Germany a one-sided victory over the Peugeot 304 in our most recent Choose Your Eternity poll. With France long reigning as the world's lone HyperGalactic PCH OmniPower, we would be remiss if we didn't give the French a shot at prying the oil-leaking, stripped-fastener-thread PCH CryptoChampion trophy from the Germans, in order to prove that the Borgward's victory wasn't just some one-shot fluke. That's why we're rolling out some Hell Project heavy artillery today, with a pair of undeniably cool- yet just as undeniably nightmarish- machines vying for long-term residency in your Garage Of Torture.

It wouldn't be fair to break out the H-bomb of French Hell Projects (the Citröen SM), because we're fairly certain that nothing on the planet can beat the SM in a Project Car Hell matchup. But how about the Citröen CX? The early CX has many of the features that made the SM so wonderful and terrible, but with the added bonus of having been manufactured by a company in complete financial shambles (and with the involvement of both the French and Italian governments). So head on down to lovely Plant City, Florida, and hand over $2,500 for this 1975 Citröen CX 2000 (go here if the ad disappears). The seller doesn't mention anything about mechanical condition, because it's totally unnecessary; you know this car doesn't run! All we get from the seller is "4 cylinder cinline,its standard with red interior seats and holds up to five people," which leaves a whole lot to your darkest imagination. But maybe it will fire right up, the hydropneumatic suspension will leap to the proper height, and you'll roar off into the Plant City sunset with a Hell-free car experience... but that ain't the way to bet.

We all know that Porsche engineers don't compromise performance for any reason, including the sanity of the mechanics who will one day work on their cars. So if long-suffering (yet well-paid) wrenchmen Hans und Günter have to sweat out 72 hours of labor (using all manner of single-purpose, Porsche-only tools) in order to replace some tiny component buried beneath a fiendish labyrinth of impossible-to-reach fasteners... well, if that's the way to make the car perform 0.0019% better, that's exactly how Porsche will do it! And the 928 might be the purest expression of that philosophy, with its engine compartment completely packed with one of the most complicated V8s that ever made a veteran mechanic weep with frustration. And it's not just the engine- the whole car is a lunatic monkeypuzzle, and it will drive you mad. Of course, all is forgiven when you actually get to drive your 928, but getting an affordable one to that point takes some work. Nothing you can't handle, though... right? Right! So come on out to Redding, California, and peel off twelve Benjamins for this running, driving '81 928 (go here if the ad disappears). Yes, just $1,200 for a running 928! It's not perfect; the seller admits that it "nees some luv." We can see evidence of some family strife in the car's description ("bought it to fix up with my boys but they think it is ugly i say they have no class, anyway here it is"), so here's your chance to swoop in and grab this jewel before the boys reconsider. Hey, did Porsche paint those wheels at the factory?

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The Hillman Hunter was the Chrysler Europe machine that eventually became the Iran Khodro Paykan (and was related to many other British cars of its time). In 1970, Australians could buy themselves a rally-ized version called the Hustler, equipped with a twin-carb 1725cc engine, four-speed box, and one of the most bongo-riffic Sideburn Era ads we've ever seen. Here comes Hustler!

We've already seen a 928 in this series, but I always consider the Malaise Era 928s to be the best ones. Sure, the later 928s were way faster, but late-70s car freaks didn't have much reason for optimism during a period of declining horsepower, disco tape stripes, and huge bumpers, and the then-new 928 was one of the few bright spots. So here we go with another JFG/DOTS combo car, which I found parked near the 1970 VW Transporter pickup.

The 219-horsepower V8 in this car doesn't sound like much today (and, yes, you Yurpeans got more power in your 928s... and dirtier air), but [insert horsepower rating of any 1979 Detroit V8 here].


That power didn't come cheap, however; you'd have to move a lot of white powder to come up with the $28,500 (about 84 grand today) list price of a '79 928. You could get yourself a new Ferrari 308 for about the same price... or three Corvettes.


This example is a little battered, but it moves frequently enough to indicate that it runs. Malaise 928s are quite affordable these days, due to the ungodly complicated mechanicals and don't-even-ask price of parts. Someday we might even see one in the 24 Hours of LeMons!

First 200 DOTS

While Farrah Fawcett merely allowed a cougar to sit on the roof of her car in her '75 Cougar ad, Cheryl Tiegs lets a mountain lion ride shotgun in her '78 (equipped with the hyper-Malaise "Midnight Chamois" option package). Not only that, but her hair totally out-feathers Farrah's, and her haunted mansion gives her more of an air of mystery. Did we mention the 134-horse 302 that came standard in this 3,800-pound car?

Since helping our Czech friend BobAsh get a Malaise Corvette from California to his homeland was so easy, I agreed to keep an eye open for a nice Crown Victoria Police Interceptor for him. After all, roaring through the streets of Prague in a genuine California cop car would be almost as much fun as roaring through the streets of San Francisco in a genuine Tatra 603. Last weekend I stopped by the auction yard at which I bought my Crown Vic a few years back, and found that the inventory included quite a few early 70s Ford Thunderbirds. In fact, the inventory was almost entirely 1970 and 1971 T-Birds. Make the jump for more photos and the rest of the story.

It turns out that I was looking at the estate of a recently deceased collector of '70 and '71 Thunderbirds, with at least 35 examples going under the auctioneer's gavel. Some two-doors, some suicide-doors, all with 429 engines... and every one of them had been sitting for at least a decade. Several were in great shape, several were hideous beaters, most had pretty good interiors, and many had fresh, if cheap, paint jobs. Many 8-track players. Most could be made to start and run (after a fashion), but it was clear that fuel systems, transmissions, and brakes had all felt the impact of a decade or more of inactivity and major sweat and money would need to be invested to get any of these cars into driving shape. Still, I was tempted to pick one up for a personal Hell Project, especially after it became clear that the ratty ones were going for $300 and the nicest ones were fetching under two grand. However, cowardice reason had the final word and I left in a T-Bird-less condition.

We had another nail-biter yesterday, with the Subaru XT6 edging out the BRAT by a 234 to 228 vote count in the Choose Your Eternity poll. We're going to declare that one a tie, and that's a good thing; after all, what's Hell without difficult choices? Today we're going to park a pair of European machines just inside the gates of Hades, where they will beckon enticingly to you with their only-one-in-town obscurity and double-take-inspiring appearance. It's lots of fun having an oddball car whose mere presence makes onlookers question your sanity respect your taste in fine automobiles, and either of these two could be a life sentence highly fulfilling project. Thanks to HotRodElectric and Franzouse for the tips!

You love wagons, we love wagons, everyone loves wagons! But old Detroit station wagons are a dime a dozen, and parts obtainment is just too darned easy. You need something European, preferably from a defunct manufacturer and packed with weird engineering. We've definitely got you covered here, and we're sure that once you lay eyes on this 1961 Borgward Hansa 1100 Wagon" (go here if the ad disappears) you'll be a believer in a boxer-four-powered 47-year-old hearse-esque German wagon! Don't worry about the body, because it's "almost free of rust," and your Subaru-driving friends will be envious of your wagon's engine: "Subaru bought the blueprints and maybe some tooling too. I am told it uses a VW 36 horse cam and crank." Imagine the fun of getting this engine of dubious ancestry running again (normally we'd advise swapping in a turbocharged Subaru mill, but it would be a sin to dump an engine this hopeless rare). Best of all, the Project Car Hell meme continues to gain fresh territory: "Need a small hearse to carry you off to project car hell?" You bet you do!


They made Borgwards in Mexico into the 70s, so you might be able to get some parts for that Hansa without having to pay vast amounts for shipping, which means you could be taking the easy way out with that car. How about a machine that wasn't even sold in North America, a machine that will raise, then dash, your hopes repeatedly as you scour the world for parts, all the while taunting you with the fact that it was built by one of the world's major manufacturers and should be easier than this? Come on down to eBay and drop a big bid on this 1971 Peugeot 304! There's no reserve price, and the top bid is sitting at $100 with only a couple days to go. Come on, a 37-year-old front-wheel-drive French sedan that's been sitting since 1990... for a hundred smackers? You can't go wrong! We're a bit put off by the seller's punctuation and spelling (where's the traditional eBay CAPS LOCK, not to mention the requisite "i saw restored one a thees go for $$$49000$$$ dollars resently" statement?) but the spare transmissions, heads, etc. compensate for that drawback. And hey, the seller says "it was every bit as reliable and efficient as, and much more "substantial" than, my 77 Honda Accord," so you figure it will be a bulletproof daily driver once you've got it running again!

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Since we've already seen the Chrysler LA and Chevrolet small-block engines in this series, we're about due for the V8 Ford made by the millions during about the same span of decades: the Windsor small-block. Starting with the 221- and 260-cubic-inch versions in 1962, Ford put Windsors in cars and trucks for the next 40 years (and you can still buy brand-new crate 302s and 351Ws from Ford today). Ford didn't make the Windsors quite as friendly for component mix-and-match fun as did their Detroit competitors (and perhaps the 351W is different enough to deserve its own EOTD entry), but the numbers don't lie: the Windsor was a true workhorse. Make the jump to hear a Windsor-equipped Cobra in action. Engine photo credit: Stephen Foskett. [Wikipedia]

Commenter Andy_Wallwhore suggested yesterday that some auditory engine pr0n might be a good idea for these posts, so we're trying out the idea.

A supporting actor in countless Malaise Era cop movies and TV shows, the 4-door early-70s Plymouth Satellite has just about disappeared from American streets by now... and now the number of street-driven Satellites has been reduced by one. I found this example (painted in the Malaise color I'm going to call Diminished Expectations Blue) in a local self-service junkyard. Can you just imagine this thing with a gumball machine on top, screeching through turns in a frenzy of understeer during pursuit of a sideburn-sportin' perp scumbag in a Chevelle?

You'll have fun in the sun, "motoring tops-down" in a spiffy new late-70s MGB, TR6, or Spitfire. Note how the horrifyingly ugly bumpers of the Spitfire are barely glimpsed as we see happy Americans driving hundreds of yards with no apparent electrical malfunctions. Sure, British Leyland gave up on the idea of selling MGs and Triumphs in the US just a year or two after this ad, but can't you feel the optimism here?

I've found quite a few early-70s big Chryslers on the island, including this '71 Newport 4-door, so it's time to get another one of of these Detroit survivors its day of fame. I found this '71 Newport Royal 2-door hardtop in the same neighborhood as the '42 Pontiac Torpedo, and it parks on the street every day- no garage coddling for this C-body!

The Newport Royal was the entry-level big Chrysler for '71 (yes, the Royal was cheaper than the regular Newport). The real high rollers (those who didn't go for the Imperial) bought New Yorkers.


The standard engine in the Newport Royal was the 360 small-block, but the 383 and 440 big-blocks were reasonably inexpensive options. At 4,060 pounds, this brute was even heavier than the new Challenger, so the bigger engine was worth getting.


I've always thought the C-body coupes of this era were great-looking cars, and someday I want to build my own '70 Hurst 300H clone (with a 4-speed, to remedy Chrysler's slushbox-only mistake on the original 300Hs). Someday.

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First 200 DOTS

With today's Engine of the Day being the AMC inline six, it seemed only good and proper that we have a Choose Your Eternity dilemma featuring a pair of vehicles powered by that fine powerplant. It's also good to have a couple of American cars, which I really can't use very often in this series because the stuff out of Detroit is too simple and parts obtainment is too easy to make for true hell. Not so with Kenosha products, though- even though the drivetrain parts are easy to find (thanks to the Jeep connection), the body and interior components are another story entirely. And today's trip into Hell isn't just about restoring an old AMC- it's about hot-rodding the six-cylinder engine so you get at least 300 reliable horsepower out of it. The road out of Hell is steep, you see, and you'll need plenty of power to climb out of the boiling sulfur!

When you see an American rear-drive car with a big fiberglass hood scoop, brightly-colored racing stripes, and rear tires so wide they protrude past the big plastic fender flares, you usually assume the presence of a V8 under the hood. How boring! But put a souped-up inline six in that same car and you've got something a bit different. Say, for example, this 1979 AMC Spirit, which can be purchased for the lure-to-Hell cheap price of just $2,800. It's already got some go-fast goodies on the engine (which is of unspecified displacement, though at least it's been bored 0.030" over). You might keep the intake and headers and drop in the good ol' 258 crank/rod combo into a common-as-dirt 4.0 Jeep block, giving you a ring-gear-shattering 280 cubes of inline torque! Thanks to the Jeep freaks, a bewildering array of camshaft options may be found, keeping you up late at night trying to puzzle out just the right combo for your Spirit. We don't know what kind of transmission is in this lil' red devil, but it goes without saying that you need a 4-speed for it, so you'll need to start shopping if the car comes with a slushbox.

Cool as the Spirit is, those Camaro owners won't be able to figure out what the hell it was that just smoked them at the dragstrip with just six cylinders. For AMC name recognition, you can't beat the Gremlin- why, even folks who wouldn't even recognize an AMX can slap an instant ID on the odd-looking shorty Hornet hatchback from deep in the heart of the Malaise Era. We've managed to find a genuine 1974 AMC Gremlin X for just 100 bucks more than the Spirit, which means it's your lucky day! Yes, for only 2,900 clams, or bones, you can head out to Kansas City and claim your own purple Gremlin X. Purple! Put on your darkest shades and take a peek at that two-tone interior- you know you must have this car! You get a 360 engine as part of the deal, but you'll be selling that off to buy some speed parts for the crazy inliner you'll be whomping together for this thing. It's been sitting for a while, so the brakes don't work, the carb gaskets are bad, and so on and so on. Oh, and there's rust. But don't picture yourself endlessly replacing rusty sheetmetal with impossible-to-find patch panels. Picture yourself rampaging around town in the baddest six-cylinder Gremlin X ever to burn 110 octane!

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We're being buried under a deluge of car photos from Kitt and EJacobs, our dog-walking, camera-wielding friends in Denver, so we'd better keep 'em coming if we're ever going to get caught up. Today we're going to look at a battered but proud Malaise Matador, courtesy of Kitt. We can't be sure that this car is equipped with today's Engine of the Day, but there's a good chance a torquey AMC 258 motivates this survivor; otherwise it has a 304, 360, or 401.

Those tiny 14" wheels that Chrysler put on the Volare? Pizza cutters! Shopping-cart wheels! Try adding another ten inches of diameter to a Volare's wheels and you'll finally fill up those unsightly wheelwells, as we can can see in this '76. You need to keep the air shocks fully inflated in order to keep rear wheel scrapage to almost-tolerable levels, and there appears to be about 3/4" of space between the fronts and the wheelwells... but just look at it! Thanks to LTDScott, Porcubimmer Pilot for the tip! [Craigslist Stockton, go here if ad disappears]

Perhaps you breathed a sigh of relief after Chevy-Powered Porsche Hell was over with, figuring that (with the small-block-motivated 911 winning so decisively) you would be spared the temptation of a hacked-up Porsche sporting a non-Stuttgart engine for quite a while. However Project Car Hell doesn't work that way; just because you were able to walk past the fiery gates once doesn't mean you won't be lured right back in by the same kind of bait! That's why we're returning to Porsche Engine Swap Hell today, this time going for six cylinders instead of eight.

914 owners often talk about the 914-6 when that starts-with-a-V car manufacturer is brought up. Yes, if it has a Porsche emblem on the hood and a six-cylinder engine in back, it's got to be a real Porsche, right? Not so fast, though- what if you were to put a Volkswagen six-cylinder in your 914? What would you have then? We're not sure, but you'll be sure to come up with an answer to that question soon after buying this 1974 Porsche 914 with Volkswagen VR6 engine (go here if the ad disappears). Yes, someone has gone ahead and swapped the VR6 engine out of a '93 Corrado into a Porsche 914, then slapped on a fiberglass body kit for good measure. Don't worry about the quality of the swap, because the seller assures us that a "30 year professional" (professional beekeeper? bathysphere repairman? ocarina player?) did the work; however, you should be aware that this project "needs alot, but its a great start." There's no cooling system, but you'll sort that out right after you figure out where to put the fuel tank. Hey, how about adding the supercharger off a G60 Corrado while you're at it?

When you hear the name "Porsche," what comes to mind? Aside from Ferdinand's ripoff of Tatra's patents, that is? That's right, you think of the 911 (and its identical-looking sibling, the 912)! So why beat yourself senseless trying to get a crazy engine-swapped 914 working when you could just as easily push a crazy engine-swapped 912 project up that infinitely high mountain? And we're going to make it even easier on you by giving you a shot at a 912 with an engine using the same boxer-six configuration as the Porsche powerplant that fit just fine in the 911. That's right, we've got a 1966 Porsche 912 with a turbocharged Chevy Corvair engine (go here if the ad disappears) for you, and the price is only four grand! You'll have to spend some time fixing the rust "underneath," then get to work on making the engine run again. And no worries about getting a Powerglide, because this car comes with what must be the Porsche 5-speed and perhaps an adapter plate from JC Whitney.

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When you're caught in flagrante delicto by your special lady's husband and have to flee on foot while dressed in a towel, you might breathe a sigh of relief when you discover he plans to chase you in a Triumph Stag; after all, the timing chains probably won't hold out as long as your legs. But then, in one of those cruel twists of fate that seemed all too common in Malaise Britain, you find yourself in the waking nightmare of being forced to choose another Triumph in which to make your getaway!

Once I found the Fiat Strada, I knew I'd have to be able to find a 124 somewhere on the island. Sure enough, on the same block as the aquamarine '65 Impala, here was this fine example of Italian Malaise. These things used to be quite common on the island (as were MGBs), but... well, you know the rest of that story.

This Fiat has a few dents, but all the parts are there, there's no (visible) rust, and it's in pretty good shape. It must drive, too, because it's not always in the same parking space.


With just 86 horsepower to haul its 2,180 pounds, the '77 Spider wasn't exactly fast. And with a list price of $6,115, buyers were likely tempted to shell out the extra $884 for the Japanese reliability and 149 horses of the Datsun 280Z.


Of course, the Z wasn't this car's true competition; British Leyland products like the MGB and TR6 were. So let's have a poll to see whether the Jalopnik readership would choose the 79-horsepower red MGB over the 86-horsepower red 124!

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First 200 DOTS

A woman who feels great passion for a Chrysler A-body with Slant Six power and takes one on a test drive through a corn field? While we're pleased that Ethel has such an excellent sense of priorities, her mother seems hell-bent on getting her to stick a big icepick through her Mopar-loving frontal lobes, find a husband, and settle down for some serious breeding. But then why does Mom take A-body-addicted Ethel to the Duster pusherman?

Now that we've got two photographers out shooting Denver DOTSBE cars while out walking their respective dogs, we can expect to see plenty of vintage machinery from the streets of the Mile High City. Today we're going to look at a solid-looking 1970 or 1971 Datsun 240Z (Z experts, please help out on the exact year here) shot by Ejacobs, who brought us the late-40s International Harvester KB-3 last week.

Yo, we got to dust these boys off! Whenever I hear the Public Enemy song, I always picture a car pretty much exactly like the Malaise Olds 98 that Schweppes Maymar has very kindly captured for us on the mean streets of Windsor Toronto, Ontario. Make the jump to read what Schweppes Maymar has to say about this fine automobile.

I came home from work today, to find this '76 Oldsmobile 98 moored (parked doesn't feel like the right word) in front of my apartment. Unfortunately, neither my camera, or my ability with said camera can capture the epicness of this car. Still, far more interesting than most of the late-model commuter capsules populating Toronto (I'm waiting on a couple older cars to come out of hibernation though).

Incidentally, Oldsmobile's tagline for '76 was "Can we build one for you?" I wish they still could.

57% of answered in the negative when asked whether third-gen Camaros belong in this series, which means that it's been well over half a year since our most recent DOTSworthy Camaro (though if I can find the right '82 I'll go ahead and shoot it). Second-gen F-bodies are fairly plentiful on Alameda's streets, so it was no sweat finding a good example of an Early Malaise machine for today's post. I ran across this '74 in the vicinity of the '50 Dodge pickup and at least a half-dozen other DOTS vehicles; truly, this car's neighborhood is a rich vein of street-parked classic iron.

The Camaro for '74 hadn't quite reached the overwhelming level of Malaise tape-stripe/plastic-snout overdecoration it would achieve a few years later, but you could see it coming. The 5MPH crash bumpers weren't quite as tragic on this car as on many of its peers, but the 145-horse 350 engine (185 horses if you went for the optional dual-exhaust powerplant) moved the car's 3,500 pounds with somewhat Camry-esque authority.


This car looks pretty good and serves its owner in daily-driver capacity. However, the inevitable GM rear-window rust has a toehold, which means the trunk floor probably has a few holes as well. Plenty of time to solve this problem, given that it's taken 34 years to reach its current state.


I'll try to remember not to let such a long time go by before our next Camaro, lest I become the victim of donuts on my lawn.

First 200 DOTS

I had meant to put more Volvo 240s in this series, since the island is full of good examples (and, besides, I'm racing one next month). But somehow a few months have gone by since the last one, so here's a somewhat earlier example I found parked near the '82 Mercedes-Benz 380SL. And yes, I noticed that '79 Civic across the street while I was shooting this Volvo; don't worry, Honda fans, I shot it while I was there.

Did Volvo paint half their Malaise 240s this particular shade of mustard yellow? Or was it two-thirds? These cars were pretty pricey when new, with the list on this one set at $6,595 (well over two grand higher than the '77 Malibu sedan and a bit under a grand less than a new BMW 320i).


This one is pretty banged up; I could have photographed many nicer examples of Malaise Era Volvos on the island, but this car seems to capture the tough-survivor essence of the Volvo Brick. It drives every day and doesn't care if you think it looks frumpy. And hey, it's got the mighty Lambda Sond (i.e., oxygen sensor-equipped) 130ci engine!


We've got some California-style body rust here, no doubt caused by rainwater getting into the trunk after the sun and smog turned the weatherstripping into black crumbly powder. At the current rate of decay, the rust will force this car's retirement by about the year 2089.

First 200 DOTS

How is it possible that a car weighing just over 2,200 pounds and equipped with a 2-liter engine can drive from Phoenix to Los Angeles at the maddeningly geriatric speed of 50 miles per hour and manage only a pathetic 32.4 miles per gallon? Yes, that's the best the '74 Capri could do! We're thinking it was the weight of several tons of Malaise pushing down hard on the car during the trip (not to mention the restrictive first-gen catalytic converters and miserable engine compression ratios of the era). The six-cylinder Comet made the same trip and grunted out an Saudi-oil-baron-pleasing 26.6 MPG, so we shudder to imagine the sort of single-digit mileage a 460-equipped Country Squire would have achieved.

There was a time, maybe a decade ago, when Cadillac Eldorados with high-compression 500-cubic-inch engines were plentiful in self-service junkyards. These days, months can go by between sightings of non-Malaise 500s. As I learned when I helped a friend pull a 500 one sweltering, bloody-knuckled day, the Eldo's front-wheel-drive setup makes engine removal approximately 50 times harder than your typical Detroit rear-driver, but so what? Five hundred cubic inches! Power was a little down in '71, but this car's engine was still rated at 365 horses... and an 18-wheeler-esque 535 foot-pounds of torque.