Archive for May, 2013

Second Place – 1979 Renault LeCar

May 23, 2013

Since I had a ride in a friend’s mom’s LeCar back in the eighties in Montreal, I’ve been fascinated by these cars. They squeeze in a significant amount of space for their footprint, and if they have a ragtop as hers did, they feel even more spacious. Heck, you could probably haul a bunch of lumber in there just by having it sticking out the roof. Funny enough, this car only got second place in the European Car of the Year awards. The Audi 80 won out, although the Renault 5 absolutely won out in sales and production lifespan – the Audi only ran from 1972-1978, while the Renault lasted until 1996 in Europe, went on to license production in various developing countries, and is still in production in Iran! Since we Americans are not allowed to import anything from Iran, we’ll have to settle for this bright yellow LeCar, listed for $2300 in Vallejo, CA as part of a combination “Ebay parts business” and car package.

1979 Renault LeCar front left

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Breaking the Law – 1975 BMW 2002

May 19, 2013

You may have wondered over the past couple years where RustyButTrusty has been. Lately he didn’t seem so interested in you, or the cars he wrote about so regularly. In spite of the title, which suggests he was in jail for some kind of white collar crime, he was actually taking a break to focus on family and career. Depending on your perspective, good fortune or fate has brought him back to write here again. And so here we have our first feature car in a long time, a 1975 BMW 2002.

Oh, why the title? There’s a fairly recent addition to the fleet. The Lancia Beta Berlina moved along a couple of years back (if you look, you can see the new owner has it listed for sale) and there is now another vehicle which has taken its place: a 1972 BMW 2002 tii. So far, the cars I’ve written about and purchased have been no more than a few thousand dollars and often a little frayed around the edges. While technically the new member of the fleet fulfills a couple of the criteria, I defy anyone to find a running, driving 2002 tii in that price range! Anyway, see the Fleet section in the near future for updates on that.

On to our subject car – a refrigerator white 1975 BMW 2002. Prices for these cars seem to be steadily going up, but if you look around, you can still find some apparent deals. So you can find an unmolested-looking example for $2500 in our state’s lovely capitol, Sacramento, CA.

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