#conversions

There’s still quite a bit of bad blood between General Motors and the now-defunct Holden brand’s Australian dealers, with the retailers seeking compensation for the automaker’s February pull-out.

As that saga plays out, GM announced that it will remain in the Aussie market, offering right-hand-drive specialty models grouped under the new GMSV brand. The brand officially rolls out in the fourth quarter of this year, with a former partner once again handling the conversions of select models for a country that drives on the wrong side of the road.

Think back to the Eighties, that optimistic decade when automakers hired aftermarket companies to create convertible versions of their two-door models. The big three Japanese brands each offered their own aftermarket “sports themed” convertible in the first half of the decade.

Which masterpiece is worth a Buy?

The sexiest car ever built rides again, only this time it won’t emit pollutants from its slender, chrome tailpipes. Jaguar Land Rover Classic, the automaker’s parts and servicing arm for old British tin, has announced a production version of its 2017 E-Type Zero concept will be made available to buyers.

Yes, this is the vehicle that Prince Harry and his bride, Meghan Markle, drove away from Windsor Castle in following their May nuptials.

Boasting a body long considered the equivalent of automotive porn, the E-Type Zero uses a restored E-Type Series I as a starting point. Beneath the car’s shapely flanks, however, it’s strictly 21st Century living.

Let’s face it: when it comes to modern cars, no model is as maligned as the diminutive two-seat Smart Fortwo. Well, maybe the Mitsubishi Mirage.

Measuring just 8-feet-10-inches in length, the rear-engined Smart looks less like a car than a rolling phone booth, or perhaps the bubble that would take Patrick McGoohan back to The Village in the TV show “ The Prisoner.”

Jokes and instances of car-tipping aside, the Smart harbors a secret ability that sets it apart from its larger peers — and it took an Ontario mechanic to find it.

Please welcome TTAC reader “psychoboy” as he tells a story of a rare encounter with the rarest of Honda Preludes — JB

A few months ago, I was convinced to get involved with what has turned out to be The Worst LeMons Car Of All Time, the mighty ‘Super K’ Plymouth Reliant wagon, as part of the “K-It-Forward” program. As bad of an idea as that was, it turns out that, compared to my attempt to buy a chop-top Prelude, it might have marked a bit of a high point in my automotive adventures this year.

Way back, way way back, in 1979, my family decided to trade in our nondescript late-Seventies Chevy Sedan on the newest, hottest, sports car to come from Japan: the brand new Prelude. Silver paint, Bordello red velour interior, giant moonroof, luggage rack on the trunk. This car had it all. It even beat Lexus to the market by a few decades with a concentric speedo and tach, and Chevrolet by ten years with an irreplaceable (in the sense that you couldn’t find a replacement) radio in the cluster shroud.