Enthusiasts Blogging Our Favorite Classifieds
Two S85 V10 swapped 3 series in a week? Sure, we can do that! The crazy Hartge-modified H50 built on a base 325 is back and now for sale on eBay. The “Buy It Now” is the same $105,000 asking price as last winter, and with no new photos still this one is still a bit of a head scratcher in a few ways – especially since you can grab a S85 V10 M5 in the $20K range now. But it’s rare, it’s fast, and I’m sure there are still a host of people who’d like it – I’m just not sure at this price, though.
Volkswagen specials are nothing new; cheap, reliable and easy to obtain parts, the basic construction of the original Beetle has been the basis for numerous custom hot rods and replicas. One of the more interesting, though, didn’t come from Germany at all. Built from the remnants of the DKW-Vemag custom business in Brazil of making modified DKWs, Puma was launched in 1967 now with Volkswagen underpinnings instead of the now Volkswagen subsidiary DKW. The look of the new coupe – dubbed the 1600 GTE – was reportedly based upon the Lamborghini Miura, though hints of other Italian exotics certainly show through. Still, as with most of these customs, finding a nice one you’d actually drive it pretty unlikely. But the seller of this custom custom went to great lengths to mimic Ferrari inspiration, and I have to say the results are impressive:
While I’m sure we’ve all had moments of regret, I’ll share one of mine. It involves a crazy story of how close I got to a owning Quattro. Several years ago, my then brother-in-law was really into Toyota pickup trucks from the 1980s, and seemingly was buying every single one on Craigslist. He called me,quite excited, one day saying that he needed a hand picking one up not far from where I lived. As a bonus, he told me, the guy owned an “old Audi race car” that I’d like seeing. This somehow turned into me driving to my parents home to get the car trailer, then back to the guy’s home to pick up this Toyota. The wheels were locked and I had to use the tow straps as come-alongs to tow the wreck of a pickup onto the trailer. Once done, sweaty and annoyed I turned my attention to the boxy silhouette that lay behind where the truck had been. The red and brown stripes were unmistakable in their journey over the flared arches and up over the angular C-pillar; it was an Audi Quattro. And, it was in a horrible state; sitting in weeds, the composite hood was warped and full of holes; no engine lay under where it haphazardly lay. Closer inspection revealed that the flares were larger than normal, too – but it was a bit of a wreck. Proudly the owner told me how he was going to restore this car to it’s former glory as an SCCA ProRally car; I nodded in the knowing way that it was unlikely under his ownership to turn another wheel judging by the pickup I had just dragged onto my trailer. I left, shaking my head a bit that it was a car wasted.
Fast forward a few years and I got a call from my brother-in-law; he had heard from the seller of the pickup who wanted to get in touch with me about the Quattro. I told my relation that I wasn’t really in a place to pay for another car – especially one which looked like that car did. But a call to the owner revealed he was in a spot of bother and needed to get rid of the car. If I simply turned up and dragged it out, it would be mine. Hurriedly, I jumped in my truck and was off to pick up the trailer. About 3 miles from my parent’s home, a loud “BOOM” greeted me when leaving a stoplight. The truck still moved but the transmission was obviously not right. I got underneath to find a large hole in the transfer case; so began my complete hatred of General Motors. I called the owner, disappointed, telling him I couldn’t make it. He, too, was disappointed, but put a call in to another potential party who turned up to pick up the car. I was about 20 miles from classic Audi Quattro ownership, and it slipped through my fingers. True, it was probably a mixed blessing – the car needed a full restoration and would have been a bit of a money pit, and it wasn’t an original factory works car but one that had been converted – but running across a listing like today’s similarly converted car makes me wonder what it would have been like:
Here is a beautiful 1993 928 GTS. As you know, mint GTS’s fetch a pretty penny on the rare occasion that they come up for sale. In fact, I’d say that this is certainly the most pristine example to come up for sale publicly this year in the United States (that Midnight Blue ’95 5-speed in Germany that we featured about a month ago would be the nicest worldwide).
This particular example comes with a somewhat monochrome color combination of Polar Silver Metallic over Classic Grey leather. Breaking up the monotony is the eye catching red piping and rootwood shift lever, which were extremely rare options on GTS’s. Additional rare options featured on this GTS include Porsche crests in the headrests and a leather shift boot. It’s hard to tell if the luggage cover is also leather.
A quick search on the 928 Registry indicates that this car was last for sale at Gaudin Porsche in Las Vegas in 2002 when it had around 16K miles. According to the Carfax, it has lived in Florida, Nevada, and has been in Pennsylvania since the 2002 sale. I spoke to a very nice salesman at Marshall Goldman who informed me that the asking price is $89,900. Although that price does set (I believe) a new ceiling for automatic 1993 GTS’s, I’d say that this car is certainly worthy of it.
I was in Stuttgart in 1998 when what I thought was someone’s version of a good joke rolled by me. It was a dark green Mk.2 Golf; not particularly abnormal since they were still mostly less than a decade old and Germans notoriously care for their cars better than most other nations. However, it was about a half-foot taller than it should have been, equipped with some cool looking Speedline wheels, brush guards and a spare tire mounted to the rear. Germans have an odd sense of humor, so it seemed to fit that this was one mullet short of a Hasselhoff Fan Club. I had no idea that I was looking at a factory model; remember, this was in the infancy of the internet and as an American, knowledge of every single European model of the Mk.2 was hard to come by. But the “Country” graphic scrolled down the side gave me a clue, and after some research I found out that this was more than just a one-off. Underneath the standard looking exterior was a Viscous Coupling all-wheel drive setup shared with the Rallye Golf and Golf Limited, amongst others. The engine was more pedestrian with a standard 1.8 8V, but in total an amazing 438 non-standard parts went into the creation of the Golf Country. Since new, they’ve always commanded a premium and have been the object of lust for American Volkswagen fans who like to do things just a bit different:
