Autoblog

Anyone worried about their legacy would do well to pay attention to the rise and fall of automotive punchlines. More like fall and rise. Cars that were once four-wheeled jokes are gaining in value, demonstrating that history usually plays out far differently than you'd planned. Insurance man McKeel Hagerty noticed that cars once sneered at were increasing in value. Hagerty's insurance company is the number one insurance provider for collector car owners, and the values of the vehicles were suddenly climbing. Hagerty polled his customers and asked them to vote on the worst car designs of all time; a way of researching what's primed to increase in value.

AMC was the big winner of the dubious honors. Consistently undercapitalized compared to the big three, AMC had to be very creative and clever with their resources. The company made it as long as they did by taking more risks, so it's not that much of a surprise to see the Pacer, Gremlin, and Matador honored. Ford's Pinto must be charming a new generation of buyers with its firey personality, because we can't imagine that rampant nostalgia has started to take hold of the rolling jokes yet. Then again, many Boomers might fondly regard what may have been their first car. Prices for musclecars have gotten stupid, are we going to see a three-million dollar Bobcat in the next five years?

[Source: Business Week via TTAC]

The recreational car show season is about two-thirds of the way done for 2007, at least here in New England. There will be good cruise days sprinkled in until about Halloween, but as the summer winds down, so does the practice of four-wheeled gatherings. Every year as I stroll past rows of shiny fenders, my thoughts wander to what fun there is to be had with that vehicle that doesn't participate in workaday drudgery.

For project cars, it's a veritable prerequisite to have a garage. Note the shot of my driveway, and its distinct lack of a garage. Lacking a place to store all the accoutrements of the vehicular addiction hobby, let alone provide a proper roof over the heads of my vehicles makes upkeep of even our regular rides that much more difficult, never mind keeping the shine on anything special.

And the Gremlin and the Pinto. Yeah, all scale models, but didn't your jaw drop just a little after reading the headline? Mine did after spotting these at a major discount retailer's toy department last week. Available in 1:60, 1:24 and as a remote control 1:16 scale, these bad-rep rods of the 70s are part of the Fresh Cherries lineup from Motormax.

Surrounded by other, more respectable models like a Bugatti Veyron, the 2006 Camaro Concept, and a Ferrari F40, the 1:60-sized Gremlin on my work desk has sparked many conversations. The kitsch factor of these small mechanical monsters goes to 11. At less than $4 for the smallest versions, you can afford to have your very own ignoble garage, or recreate an 80s-era used car lot. For even more realism, set the Pinto on fire, and leave the Mustang II next to the Gremlin in the yard to build up some nice rust. We imagine the remote control Mustang II might cost more than a 1:1 scale version, though it would probably hold its value better.

We can't wait for the next round. What should be on that list? Hmm. Vega, Citation, maybe a Le Car.

Check the jump for a larger promotional photo from Motormax.

While it is perhaps not terribly far-fetched to think that there are folks who like the Pacer, this just seems like an unhealthy attachement. In the process of keeping his own very fine looking '76 alive, Curt Uhrin felt guilty about just stripping bits off those cars that gave their lives so that his may live on. Guilty enough, in fact, to create a website devoted to keeping their memories alive. Curt took pictures of the junkyard cars as they lay in state and wrote wistful descriptions that make us want to go cuddle their rounded little fenders and restore them to their AMC funk-shack glory daze.

While the Pacer wasn't a bad car, per se, it was really uniquely styled. This was probably the car's most off-putting feature, as the running gear was pretty solid stuff.. Enough time has passed to make this once hideous car look almost cool. Kind of like E.T. -- so homely it's cute. One thing is for sure, AMC lovers definitely have underdog complexes, and what better underdog to love than one that's not only quirky (all AMCs are quirky), but pug-faced, to boot?

[Source: Hemmings]