When I was a kid, the general look of cars such as these completely turned me off. Back then, as opposed to now, I didn’t bother to consider and appreciate the artistry and aim of the designers. Another Leno find and restoration, his story on this one (perfect body color for the coachwork, btw), involves a couple of Boston cops.
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I’m reminded of this magazine cover that’s been permanently etched into my brain after seeing it as a kid:
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For what it’s worth, $3990 in February 1986 would be worth $11,675 today. (According to the CPI calculator. Which is astonishingly still working.)
The cheapest new car today is apparently the Nissan Versa, which starts at $18,330. (Or $6264 in 1986 dollars.)
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It’s crazy how few cheap cars are available in America right now, and I certainly hope that changes soon. The Ford Maverick had the right idea when it first came out but it didn’t take long for them to hike up the price and stop including the hybrid drivetrain as the cheapest, standard option.
That said, at least the cheapest new cars today are generally safer and more reliable than the cheapest new cars from 40 years ago. I bought a base model Honda Fit and got 330,000 miles out of it before it died. Most cars from the 1980s didn’t make it anywhere near that long.
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I think I have seen 1, 2 (1&2 gen), 3 & 4. I think there is like one 1 in Finland because the one I saw had the same licence plate that all pictures I have seen of Polestar 1 in Finland.
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I’m glad they didn’t set off the fireworks too soon.
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So is that just one step below their planned “Axiom Class” ships? Looks like we’re getting pretty close!
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This may or may not qualify for this thread since it doesn’t actually have any motors installed yet, but the new Bezos car company has an unorthodox marketing strategy:
(Crawling underneath the vehicle revealed that it’s just an empty shell with no drivetrain or even a suspension.)
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Not to mention it’s almost certainly parked illegally.
The fact it’s just a shell isn’t surprising. That’s how most concept cars are. They often don’t even have an interior which is why they will usually have limo tint on their windows. To see it parked on the street is definitely unusual.
As for the overall profile? Well…
It just kind of reads “Temu Land Rover” to me. I don’t know how many people are clammoring for a 2 door SUV these days.
Fun fact: Lamborghini got their start building farm tractors. Ferruccio Lamborghini got rich from his agricultural machinery business and bought several Ferraris. He complained to Enzo Ferrari directly about many quality and service problems that Ferrari promptly ignored. Feeling slighted, he decided he could build a better sports car than Ferrari could (and make a hell of a lot more profit from them over his farm machinery). Out of that spite, Automobili Lamborghini was born.
Anyway, I can definitely see that rugged farm machinery influence in the LM002.
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Mid-century technical solutions can get interesting.
Note to self: No one has made any significant design improvement to or replacement for the 19th century apple peeler.
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Any day now. They just haven’t added AI yet.
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Perfect peels and toxically-contaminated apple chunks would be my guess.
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Or somethig along the lines of this Soviet-era joke heard in the movie Chernobyl:
“What’s as big as a house, burns 20 liters of fuel every hour, puts out a ton of smoke and noise, and cuts an apple into three pieces?”
“A Soviet machine made to cut apples into four pieces!”
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Holy crap! Rear Admirial Fletcher was a time traveler!
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