Going Abroad – 1984 Alfa Romeo Arna

March 21, 2014

To broaden the scope a little, and to take full advantage of your faithful scribe’s language abilities, we’re going to start an occasional feature looking at listings abroad. We’ll try to restrain ourselves to cars that can legally be brought into any state or province, although you’ll have to ask yourself whether you’d honestly want to do so! And the first car that will incite us to pose that question is a rather unusual car, the product of Italians building foreign cars under license (which was, and kind of is, more common than you might have thought). Check out this 1984 Alfa Romeo Arna, for sale for €1200 (about $1655) in Cassano Magnago, Varese, Italy.

1984 Alfa Romeo Arna right front

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Got Faux-Wood? 1971 Ford Torino Squire

March 20, 2014

With the memory of fleets of these barges on the road fading, and the ability to look at each as an individual and see where the hits and the strikes were, you can see that Ford got it right with the 1970-71 models. Originally a special version of the Fairlane (as the Caprice was of the Impala), the new Torino had taut (if large) styling with tight, sharp corners and Coke-bottle influence that made it look like a custom-fit suit. As with today’s Thunderbirds, the styling was influenced by the supersonic jets of the time, with their big-mouth intakes and aerodynamic-looking profiles. Squires (along with Broughams and GTs) were equipped with the 302ci V8, which was good for 220hp with a two-barrel carb. You can find this 1971 Ford Torino Squire for sale for $2200 in St. Petersburg, FL.

1971 Ford Torino Squire right front

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Suicide Pair – Two 1968 Ford Thunderbird Sedans

March 20, 2014

The fifth-generation Ford Thunderbird, introduced in 1967, was Ford’s effort to move the formerly sporting coupe upwards and away from that young upstart sporting coupe, the Mustang. For 1967, they did a full redesign which turned out to be an odd juxtaposition of future and past – jet-intake-influenced front end, modernistic tail, and vinyl roof with landau irons. On the bright side, 1968 T-birds got the 385-series 429ci engine, pushing out a bold 360hp for some of the best performance any Thunderbird had ever, and it was also recognized for having some of the best brakes of any car sold in America. You can find the first of our two cars, this 1968 Ford Thunderbird Landau 4-door, for sale for $2999 in Portland, OR (and oddly listed on Miami craigslist with a California East Bay Area phone number).

1968 Ford Thunderbird sedan right side

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