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While Alfa’s been playing footsie with its electric future (and recoiling from some of it, unsurprisingly), it still lives in hope that you’ll consider taking its current ICE wares seriously. Happily, for now, this stable still includes the Giulia and Stelvio Quadrifoglio, models that we’d cheerily recommend to anyone partial to charismatic internal combustion. Which […]

As the dewdrop on the end of Shed’s warty old hooter indicates, winter is well and truly here, so of course it must be time for a convertible. And here it is, an apparently well-cared-for Mercedes CLK 280 with shiny Obsidian Black paint, a punchy six-pot powertrain, a clean cabin and just one name in […]

It is quite possible that no firm takes its legacy as seriously as Porsche. It has a lot of it, of course, and its respect for tradition is as plain as the long-running nose on the 911’s face. But mostly it’s to do with the sanctity of profit-making, which (until very recently) the firm was […]

Toyota is a company of two halves. On the one side, there’s the endless stream of economy boxes that provide reliable transport for people who couldn’t really give a monkeys about cars. Toyota and Lexus combined shifted over 10 million cars last year and currently controls around 12 per cent of the market. Or, in other […]

Key considerations Available for £12,500 (kind of…) 4.4-litre V8 petrol twin turbo, rear- or all-wheel drive Big all-round improvement on previous 7 Series Comfortable and efficient cruiser Hasn’t been problem-free… …but a properly maintained one for under £20k could be special     BMW’s biggest saloon, the 7 Series, has been around since 1977 when the […]

You wait for buses, two come at once. The Sport Quattro is a rare old bird by any measure; fewer than 200 ever found customers, and many fewer than that are in the UK. We hadn’t seen one in yonks before a terrific red-coloured example turned up in the summer. The vendor wanted £625k for […]

Aston Martin Vantage, 2008, 31k, £35,490 There was a story doing the rounds a couple of years ago that suggested UK’s love affair with the convertible was coming to an end. Fat chance. Open-top motoring promises to combine three preoccupations of the British enthusiast: the fruity sound of a petrol engine, the fluttering kiss of […]

Most of us on this website get a bit giddy over a good homologation special. Audi Sport Quattros, BMW E30 M3s, Lancia Delta HF Intergrales and many more have all brought a pinch of motorsport magic to us mere mortals, providing at least a glimpse of what our racing heroes experienced while on the job. […]

Sometimes it can be hard to believe that the Honda NSX and 964-era Porsche 911 are contemporaries. Both were launched in 1989, both were six-cylinder sports cars that cost a similar amount – and yet they could hardly have been more different. The Porsche was the latest in a long line of air-cooled two-doors already […]

There’s a pleasing consistency to very special Porsche 911s. You know they’re going to look like quite a few other Porsche 911s, for starters; they’ll be powered by six horizontally opposed cylinders; and you’ll often be able to get a manual gearbox as well. With its new layout, the Corvette is drastically different to what’s […]