Cars are the world’s most recycled consumer product. With more than one billion on the road today it is easy not to appreciate some of the unique cars gone by in history. We have made this list celebrate the distinctive features & qualities of classic cars ever made.
10.Reliant Robin
Reliant Motor Company made this car. The Interesting thing is that it is classified as a motorcycle that makes insurance for the vehicle much cheaper. Though the catch is that it rolls over easily. On the tv show “Top Gear” Jeremy Clarkson manage to roll it several times before abandoning it. Even after that, it is statistically one of the safe cars on the road in the UK, only 0.9 percent of them are reported to have crashed.
9. Morgan Three-Wheeler
Another British three wheeler but this one is known for its sheer speed. Morgan is small family firm based in England, and they make these custom cars with utmost delicacy. With 40,000 colors to choose from and 50 different leather options, customers have a lot to choose from. The most interesting thing about the car is that it is still made in classical design and uses ash wood as the primary building material.
8. Stout Scarab
This car was actually the father of all minivans today. Made by an American Aircraft engineer William Bushnell Stout. The car was publicized as a luxury people carrier with airplane-inspired design and styling. Ambient lighting and thermostatic controls were also made available.
7. Aston Martin Lagonda
Aston Martin has a long history of designing beautiful cars. This car however was the first one to possess digital LED touch-sensitive dashboard in 1976. Later models even had recorded voice commands in English, Arabic, French and German.
6. Dodge Viper RT/10
One of the most iconic cars. But seldom do people know that the initial model was sold for 50,000$ with a huge engine, body and virtually nothing else. Not even Air conditioning, exterior door handles or even side windows. Early users had to deal with plastic side windows much like those of a tent.
5. Citroen DS
Citroen has always been known to produce cutting edge technolog. Their 2CV is most remembered for looking like a duck and one of the most popular cars in France in the immediate post WW2 era. Released in 1955, the DS had a very smooth suspension, so much so that people dubbed it the magic carpet. The tech behind it was revolutionary in using not traditional springs and gas-filled shock absorbers but a combination of hydraulics and pneumatics.The car was also responsible for saving the life of then France’s president Charles de Gaulle. The story goes that “While he was on a drive to Orly airport through the Parisian suburbs, assassins opened fire on de Gaulle’s DS, bursting all four of its tires. The complex suspension adjusted to this unforeseen inconvenience and allowed the car to retreat at full speed,” escaping the assailants.
4. Ferrari 250 GTO
Every year Internation Automobile Federation(FIA) gave an award to the sports car that performed the best during the season. In 1962, they changed the rules to allow publicly mass produced cars to enter the competition. Ferrari needed something to keep them in the competition. The result was the 250 GTO, a total of 36 were produced which were a lot for a unique racing model. Because of their less number, they are one of the most expensive cars ever sold today, in 2014 a model was sold for $34 Mil. Each car built was unique and each one of them is different.
3. Mercedes-Benz 600 Pullman Limousine
This car was expensive and offered extreme customization possibilities. So you won’t be surprised to know that its buyers included a bunch of powerful dictators including “Saddam Hussein, Mao Zedong, Fidel Castro, Nicolae Ceausescu, Idi Amin Dada, and Kim Jong-Il “. Though a unique thing about the car was its complex hydraulic system that runs virtually everything in the car. The system is pressurized at 3,200 psi and only takes mineral oil.
2.Lamborghini Countach
The car was designed to have the “AW” factor. The name itself is an exclamation—“countach” in a Piedmontese dialect conveys exclamation. It’s the equivalent of the English word “wow”. The car pioneered the cab forward design, in which the drive is pushed forward and still being followed by super cars today. The car was not comfortable though, as it was notoriously loud and had such a narrow foot well that often drivers had to remove their shoes. An Oh, if you are a basketball player then forget about riding it as tall people had difficulty adjusting. Simply said “The Countach was meant to be an aesthetic sledgehammer“.
1. McLaren F1
Released in 1993, it was the most expensive production car at a massive $857,000. British car designer Gordon Murray wanted to combine space age materials and Formula One technology in 1988 to make an ultimate road car. Only 64 were ever built and though the record is now broken several times, it was the fastest road car at 391Km/h. The F1 was the first production car to be made out of carbon fiber and the interior leather was shaved to reduced weight. The car itself was designed entirely from hand-drawn blueprints, its stainless steel instrument dials featured hand-painted numbers, and each tachometer needle was individually machined by hand. The car notably had a three seated configuration with the driver seated centrally to enhance the driving experience.