Autoblog

More than twenty years ago, Pontiac dealers sold their two-seat Fiero with a special "option" called the MERA. Essentially a complete re-body over the Fiero's then-advanced space frame, brand-new cars rolled out of the showroom looking much like a Ferrari 308. Over the next two years, 247 Fiero MERA models were built before Ferrari dropped a legal hatchet on the operation, and Corporate Concepts was forced to end production of their "kit."

We had put this blasphemy out of our minds until this week, when police in Rome uncovered a counterfeit car operation once again making fake Ferraris. In the Italian case, real customers (the police called them "car fanatics on a budget") were found to be paying upwards of $30,000 for each of these pseudo-Ferraris. The police report mentions that "donor cars" were involved, but they don't name names.

Photos released by the Italian police quickly confirmed our fears. In one image, a dusty red crackle-finish intake manifold proudly bears the Ferrari name. We recognize it as the 2.8-liter, 140-hp V6 that powered the Pontiac Fiero GT in 1988. The interior bares more irreverence as a knock-off Ferrari steering wheel tries to hide 80's-era GM switchgear. It is painfully obvious that the "Polizia" have stumbled upon an illegal reincarnation of the Fiero MERA, but this time on sacred Italian soil and offering more than one model. It is hard to imagine a criminal ring going this far to make a buck, but we are more stupefied by the knuckle-heads who actually paid them for these cars.

Thanks for the tip Mike!

[Source: Reuters]

Neenah, Wisconsin has such a speeding problem that it can't keep up. Even with a full court press of law enforcement, drivers continue to speed and have even sped by other motorists receiving their obligatory revenue-production invoice. In an effort to keep drivers on their toes while also leaving time to fight real crimes, the Neenah PD will post cardboard cutouts that look like an officer pointing a radar gun in strategic locations. Like something out of Weekend At Bernie's, the paper tigers will be rotated with living, breathing officers so that the ruse has a chance of effecting change. At this point, it's less about filling the coffers and more about quelling an epidemic of overly-velocitized drivers.

[Source: Winding Road, Photo: brentkmoore.blogspot.com]

There's nothing more eye-catching to a thief than a new car or bike. Your brand new pride and joy is just asking to be stolen, especially if you leave it parked on the street. That's why designer Dominic Wilcox made stickers to fool stupid thieves into thinking your wheels aren't worth stealing.

Despite the fact they look quite convincing in the photos. Wilcox doesn't offer any guarantees his stickers will actually work. He does say, however, that he placed them on his bike and it hasn't been stolen yet. What more evidence do you need?

Part of the appeal of owning a new car is showing it off, which you clearly can't do with these stickers applied. However, if that means you get to keep the aforementioned item from being stolen while parked in unseemly parts of town, it's all good.

[Source: Dominic Wilcox via MoCo Loco]

We're surprised that this gag can be retailed without disclaimers. CarPool Kenny is an inflatable head and torso that is marketed on the premise that you can cruise the carpool lane in passengerless peace, your inflatable pal offering impunity. People have tried this, and many have had their ruse detected. When you do eventually get hooked by the long arm of the law, it's going cost a lot more than this $20 useless hunk of plastic. Think hundreds.

Your odds of getting caught are likely rather high, since police officers tend to operate on the assumption that all is not what it seems, and Kenny looks so fake that he's just asking to get busted. Our own healthy sense of schadenfreude would kick into overdrive if we cruised by a schmuck whose bluff got called.

Using one of these things to circumvent the rules just means you'll bypass a jam and have to attend to being productive sooner than the rest of us left surfing for that mythical NPR station that's not fund-raising.

Thanks, Jason, for the tip.

Click the pic above to see a gallery

This faux Jeep gets a pass, because it comes out looking so close to the real thing, though Jeep faithful will likely pick it to pieces. Pieces is how the story begins, with a Bejing Jeep 2020 that has a tryst with a Sawz-all. Predictably, the 2020 gets all broken up after its torrid affair, and needs to be put back together. Two talented Chinese bodymen took up the mantle and reinvigorated this unloved, down and out conveyance.

The outcome sees the Jeep better than has ever been, which is the hope of anyone who ever partakes in an intervention, isn't it? While this facsimilie has been whipped up most of the way around the world, it's definitely got some Jeeper spirit going on. There's plenty of backyard-assembled CJs here in the homeland that don't look anywhere near as good as this totally fake Rubicon. Sure, the paint's not great (well, it does look shiny, that counts), and the mechanicals are a crapshoot, but the caution (and safety equipment) be damned attitude that these fellas show as they forge ahead and make something from nothing is true Jeep ethos. Besides, we'd much rather cruise the streets of China in the red faux Rubicon than the Chairman-Mao Green thing it started as. It's not the first time someone's made a replica out of a totally unrelated car, anyway. We're not generally fans of the practice, but we see the effort here and applaud the results.

[Source: China Car Times via Hemmings]

click the pic above to view a gallery

Why is it that people feel the need to saddle perfectly good cars with replica bodywork to make them look like exotics? There's nothing wrong with the last generation Toyota MR2, true, it's no Ferrari, but then again, you can buy an entire MR2 for very much less than a Ferrari 360; an amount closer to the downpayment, most likely. We'd keep the bodykit away from the MR2 and spend the extra dough on suspension and engine mods. If you really must project the image that a Ferrari brings (you know – this car costs more than your house, and I'll sell it for more, too. Yes, that does make me better than you) you could follow the lead of this MR2 Spyder's owner.

If you can stomach the truncated proportions that haven't survived scaling well, your MR2 will make a solid basis for you to become a total poseur. From what we can see, the car pictured has had time and energy lavished on it. The extra-wide door gap is not pretty, but overall, there's a lot of detail here, and the pictures show something that's reasonably turned out, instead of a total hack job. It's a very well done tribute, in fact. At least you can be fairly certain that the MR2 will have more uptime than the Ferrari, and when it does need to go see the doctor, the prescription's cost will lean more toward ibuprofen, not radical walletectomy.



[Source: Carscoop]

It's a pretty serious charge to level at what is, admittedly, a trend. But John Manoogian, Cadillac's lead exterior designer, believes that fake side vents will wipe out the current trend of stylized-yet-functional side vents. Manoogian says "I've seen Chrysler 300s where guys are buying these stick-on portholes, and I'm thinking, 'What are these people thinking?' They are literally stick-on parts." Yet imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and if every other carmaker (including Saturn) and aftermarket shop has hopped on your coat tails... we'd think you'd pat yourself on the back. Sure, it might be aesthetically disappointing to see your lovingly crafted design turned into a chrome flake applique, but that's what happens to trends. Besides, there are far more egregious styling fakeries, as in companies copying significant chunks of another maker's entire design language, that haven't managed to kill original automotive expression. We doubt the lowly side vent spells the end. It's intriguing, though, when Manoogian says, "When it gets to be that ubiquitous, then we are going to have to say, 'We need to do something different here.' " Exactly. Isn't that what car designers are for?

[Source: Auto News - sub. req'd]

A few Autoblog readers have sent us a link to this video news report about fake Ferraris being produced in China. The European Union is starting to get really miffed about the influx of counterfeit items, like Ferraris, and is considering upping the punishment for offenders to four years in prison and a 300,000 Euro fine. That's about $378,000, enough to buy yourself a real Ferrari.

We’re not quite sure which Ferrari the news piece is referring to, so kudos to whichever reader can accurately tell the rest of us which model the Italian automaker only produced six examples.