Road-test articles about YOUR car, and oldschool favorites

  • Thread starter Wolfe
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Wolfe

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I don't know about any of you guys, but I find it interesting to read what automotive journalists thought about older cars back when they were first released -- specifically my own car, and any "oldschool" cars I'm a fan of.

I've only managed to find one article about my car on the internet, circa 1984, although I know that Road & Track tested it around the same time. I'd love to see what they thought, even though I know they'll complain about the price... :lol:

As for oldschool favorites, there's a bunch of neat E30- and E30-M3-related article scans at this website. My favorite in that list is "Clash of the Teutons," an article Road & Track did in 1991 that compared the E30 M3 Evo III, E190 Evo II, and Coupe S2. :)


What neat articles can you guys find? Who here has seen the road-test article for their own car (the older, the better)?
 
Virtually none about my parent's car, which I'll be driving for some time. A 1990 Oldsmobile Eighty Eight Brougham. Actually, the review was about the 1994 model which was facelifted but is virtually the same except for the sheet metal.

Can't seem to find that page now...
 
By the way, I love those old Bimmers. Almost picked one up myself from a relative a while back. Just lovely little cars.

Oh boy. :lol:

My current one isn't that old, so at least the articles are easy to find. Too bad it isn't the exact same badge or skin, but the mechanicals are all the same (Minus 17" Racing Harts, Potenzas and that ridiculously heavy stereo and subwoofer).

The US Version, the Mazda Protege MP3, was featured in several places, but isn't as well-exposed as, say, a Civic Si or a Nissan SE-R because they made so damn few of them.

Reviews:

Great Grip! - Road and Track 2002

Of course it lost. It's the cheapest and slowest car in the comparo, and it's the only "family" car. The Evo doesn't count. But check out the 70.2 mph slalom speed, just two ticks behind the Elise, and at par with a 996 Turbo. Probably more due to Brian Herta's driving than anything else, but fun to think about, though... which is probably why I keep clipping the inside cones on the track... :lol:

Budget Banditos Car and Driver 2001

Where, despite being the slowest car, it wins. I just love C&D's biased articles. :lol: I have this issue just for that report. :lol:
 
Nice finds, guys!

Poverty -- the idea was to find articles from the time when the car came out, but that's still an interesting read. :)
 
I don't really care to find any old road tests about my Volvo, but one of the most interesting things happened when I was running through a 1996 issue of Road & Track - they had a quoted 0-60 time for the vehicle in the back of their issue, and they claimed 6.1 seconds, which is absolutely astonishing (and, when you consider the power, weight, and transmission, effectively impossible). I've long claimed 7.1 seconds, which is about 0.1 seconds below what the real time probably was back in 1996.
 
Can't find any. I suspended my subscription to C&D when my car came out, didn't get back into it until 1998 or so.

I'm tempted to take it out of the library, or worse, scan microfiche (which is what we car nuts had to do 15-20 years ago). My high school had C&D, R&T, ad MotorTrend going back to the late 1970s, which made for some interesting reading.
 
Actually I almost never read about the 330i. Most people either discuss the M3, or one of the all-wheel drive models. In fact, the 330i is basically non-existent where I live. I saw one yesterday (he tried to race a G35 coupe) and I was a bit interested. And I've only seen a couple with the performance package - including a convertible the other day!
 
I don't need to find any TT articles, they all seem to say the same.

"Dull but pretty".
 

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