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Porsche has made a habit – and a good habit at that – of using the final model year of any 911 to release a few special variants to send the model off with a bang. The cynics might say that Porsche is simply trying to push every last chassis (and squeeze every last dollar) onto the market, but even if that’s the case those final model years have provided some fantastic machines. Here we have one such final-year make: a Midnight Blue Metallic 1994 Porsche 911 Carrera 4 Widebody with 61K miles on it. The Carrera 4 itself first debuted with the 964 in the narrow-body design standard to most any naturally-aspirated 911. For its final production year Porsche stretched those rear fenders to give it the Turbo-look appearance. In the right shades, these can be some of the best looking 911s you’re likely to come across.
Please give a warm welcome to our newest writer at GCFSB, Andrew Maness. Andrew is active with his own page over at Jalopnik, The Road Less Driven. Welcome Andrew!
Given that I am currently a card carrying member of ACLA (Audi Club Los Angeles) and I am about to put my B7 S4 Avant up for sale, I am frequently asked “well what kind of Audi are you going to get next?”. It’s a bit presumptive on the persons part to assume that just because I’m a club member that I’m going to stick with the brand. True I do have a lot of love for Quattro driven vehicles but since moving to Southern California from Vermont that love has wained a bit over the last 6 years.
I fell in love with Audi because they’re the oddball of the German brands and I like things that are different. These days their vehicles have lost some of that character but I suppose that’s to be expected given how much the brand has grown in the last decade. 2009 marked a turning point for the brand as that’s when they killed off arguably the best body style they ever had (B7 pride!) and dropped their partnership with Recaro. However 2009 wasn’t all bad news as they also offered an S model of the TT coupe for the first time. I’ve always had a soft spot for the TT ever since Tom Cruise spun one off a cliff in MI:2 and the second generation body style is one of my favorite Audi designs. It looks especially good in white but one must resist the urge to “stromtrooper” the vehicle. Black wheels are overrated people, trust me, been there done that. I would however support powder coating the signature TTS gas cap, that’s a tasteful modification.
We paid tribute to the W124 Mercees-Benz E-class on Monday. It’s hard to believe it has been three decades since this car was unveiled, as you still see plenty of these cars roaming the roads. A lot of the W124s I run across are run down and seem to be on their last legs, but like the W123 that preceded it, they go from strength to strength. This 300CE coupe for sale in Louisiana is a well preserved example with under 50,000 miles on the clock, making this quite an appealing modern classic.
It would be easy to credit the BMW M5 as the first super sedan, and in many ways, it is. With a motorsport-derived twin cam 24V inline-6 under the hood good for over 280 horsepower in Europe, the E28 M535i and M5 were nothing to trifle with. However, well before the Motorsports division of BMW had their way with the E28, they built the prototype for what would become the definitive sports sedan in the E12 M535i. Granted, the E12 didn’t have the super M1 motor under the hood. However, like the later M5 would, the E12 had upgraded brakes, a re-tuned suspension featuring unique springs and Bilstein shocks, a deep front air dam and rear spoiler and BBS mesh wheels. Because this was basically still the 1970s, they also received some spectacular Motorsports stripes outside to help differentiate them as something special. Inside you got special Recaro seats with a unique corduroy fabric and an M1 steering wheel – not a bad touch. All of that was coupled with the uncatalyst M30B34 seen in several other BMWs, good for 218 horsepower. It was in just about every way the stepping stone to creating the M5. They were even produced in similar numbers to the M5, with only around 1,400 made – 450 of them being right drive like this 1980 example for sale today:
These are the cars I love coming across. Not just that it’s a 911 Turbo, but the exterior color and the contrasting interior – basically everything about the appearance of this car makes me stop in my tracks. This is about as period correct a color combination as we’re likely to come across, and as I’ve noted in other features of similarly-colored cars it is extremely rare to see a modern car, from any marque, produced in these shades. This particular Turbo seems to have taken that period correct color scheme to another level. The metallic paint with a slight golden hue flashes and sets it apart from many of the other brown shades I’ve seen. It’s earthy and smoky, while also vibrant. There’s definitely some very nice photography at work here, but still this car looks pretty great! Here we have a Tobacco Metallic 1980 Porsche 911 Turbo with around 53,000 miles on it, and as the ad notes this color was only available in 1979 and 1980.
