Excerpts taken from world famous ‘Hemmings Auto Blog’
No clutching, no shifting, no problem, right? Automatic transmissions have become more than just ubiquitous in recent decades – they’ve become all but the only transmission available in newer cars. But it took decades of development and a number of missteps and half-steps before the first mass-produced fully automatic transmission Read more
1965 Sunbeam Tiger Mk 1. Photos courtesy Auctions America. Touted for its versatility with ad copy that read, “Drag it! Race it! Swing with it!,” the Sunbeam Tiger followed the formula – made familiar by the Allard and Cobra – of stuffing a Ford V-8 engine between the front fenders Read more
One of the Briggs Cunningham Jaguar Lightweight E-types, raced at Le Mans in 1963. Photo courtesy Blackhawk Automotive Museum. The 1963 Jaguar Lightweight E-type was Coventry’s response to the dominance of Maserati’s Tipo 151/1 and Ferrari’s 250 GTO in sports car racing. Produced exclusively for privateer teams, just 12 examples Read more
All classic car original air conditioning systems were filled with dichlorodifluoromethane or R-12/CFC-12 Freon. Even newer cars used the standard R-12 until the EPA, under section 609, in an attempt to reduce atmospheric ozone depletion, mandated that manufacturers phase out its use by the end of the 1994 model year. Read more
Here’s an interesting item we dug up this past week that illustrates how Hemmings Motor News would put an ad together back in the 1970s. We take for granted these days how easy it is to change the font of a word, or add italics, but it was a little Read more
The resolution on these old postcard photos is never that great, but still passable enough to discern some details, and in the case of this postcard photo of downtown Sandpoint, Idaho, taken in the early 1960s and discovered through Kyle S.’s Flickr stream, the photo actually shows better detail than Read more
We usually try to pick Finds of the Day that have better-than-average photography, but we’ll happily make an exception for this 1992 Lotus Carlton for sale on Hemmings.com. One of the world’s great cult cars, venerated in its native Britain, the Carlton was an exotic sedan that could show its Read more
1966 Chevy II Nova SS L79. Photos courtesy Mecum Auctions. In 1966, at his father’s insistence, Roger Burleson ordered a black-on-black 1966 Chevy II Nova SS with the optional L79 V-8 engine as his high school graduation present. Over 48 years, it’s accumulated just 52,000 miles, none of them in Read more
1956 Mochet CM-125Y Berline, from the Lane collection. Images courtesy the Lane Motor Museum One of our favorite collections of offbeat and obscure cars – and perpetual champions of the automotive underdog – the Lane Motor Museum, will host its inaugural Microcar Meet on Memorial Day weekend, Friday, May 23, Read more
The Verrill Wolf Wagon during reassembly. Photos courtesy Pennsylvania College of Technology. It’s nearly 24 feet long, and tips the scales at more than 5,100 pounds. Its creator, Tom Verrill, was a University of Maine mechanical engineering graduate who reportedly worked in the aircraft industry before later embarking on a Read more