Rare Rides: The 1997 Tatra 700, One Last Hurrah

Rare Rides featured exactly one Tatra automobile previously, and it was the grandfather of today’s subject. While today’s blue beauty doesn’t have the state authority and terrorist provenance of the black Tatra displayed on these pages before, it’s important for a different reason: It was the last attempt Tatra made to sell a passenger car.

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Rare Rides: The 1971 Tatra 2-603 II, East Germany's Stasi Transport

Today’s Rare Ride has a checkered history, as it served as quiet shuttle for secret police and terrorist spies alike. Let’s find out more about this rear-engine Czechoslovakian V8 luxury car.

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Rare Rides: This Skoda 120 From 1985 is Red, Like the Communism That Built It
Late last week, on our Rare Rides entry for the Renault Alliance GTA, commenter scott25 alerted me to a Skoda he spotted on Kijiji (which is what eBay is called in Canada or something). As most people in North America have likely never seen a Skoda, this odd little sedan should do nicely as today’s Rare Ride.Come along, comrades.
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Trackday Diaries: Have to See a Man About a Dog.

“Say, Rodney,” I inquired via phone, “I wonder if you might be interested in helping me look at a Town Car in Pataskala for a guy in Czechoslovakia.”

I wonder,” Rodney responded, “if you might be interested in bringing a pair of motherf**king McChicken sandwiches over to where I’m staying at so that it might lubricate my willingness to perform this inspection. And remember, I said two McChickens, you cheap cracker.”

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What Kind of Person Would Sell a Communist Car?

At the height of the Second Red Scare, a Southern California man named Willy Witkins imported and sold East German Wartburgs and Škodas. The hate mail came rolling in.

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  • Clive Most 400 series highways in Canada were designed for 70 MPH using 70 year old cars. The modern cars brake, handle, ride better, and have much better tyres. If people would leave a 2-3 second gap and move to the right when cruising leaving the passing lanes open there would be much better traffic flow. The 401 was designed for a certain amount of traffic units; somewhere in the 300,000 range (1 car = 1 unit 1 semi+trailer =4 units) and was over the limit a few minutes after the 1964 official opening. What most places really need is better transit systems and better city designs to reduce the need for vehicle travel.
  • Kira Interesting article but you guys obviously are in desperate need of an editor and I’d be happy to do the job. Keep in mind that automotive companies continually patent new technologies they’ve researched yet have no intention of developing at the time. Part of it is to defend against competitors, some is a “just in case” measure, and some is to pad resumes of the engineers.
  • Jalop1991 Eh?
  • EBFlex Wow Canada actually doing something decent for a change. What a concept.
  • 3-On-The-Tree To Khory, I was a firefighter as well and the worst thing about car fires was the fumes from all the plastics and rubber, tires etc.