1957 Chevrolet Bel Air 2-dr hard top
Sold at $56,000
RM Sotheby’s, Phoenix, AZ, January 18-19, 2018, Lot 219
VIN: VC570163461
One of the more controversial moments of this year’s ACC Insider’s Seminar at Barrett-Jackson came when Carl Bomstead called out Chevrolet’s Tri-Five cars as one of his two “Sell” picks in the current market.
There’s probably no more iconic classic American car than the 1957 Chevrolet, and for years, they’ve been safe bets in terms of Read More
1973 Ford F-100 pickup
Sold at $41,250
Mecum Auctions, Indianapolis, IN, May 17, 2019, Lot F111
VIN: F10HKS27097
GM trucks from ‘70s have been achieving big prices at auction for over two years now. Fords just haven’t had the same meteoric rise in values. Why not?
To highlight just how large the discrepancy is, a search Read More
1975 Chevrolet Cosworth Vega Coupe
Sold at $13,750
Mecum, Phoenix, AZ, March 15, 2019, Lot F91
VIN: 1V77E5U215244
American car manufacturers applied the “no replacement for displacement” mantra when designing cars up until the 1970s, when the growing demand for fuel efficiency and government-required emission standards all but ended the life big-horsepower, big-displacement V8s.
Chevrolet adapted by releasing the uninspiring 80-ish hp Vega in 1971 — a low point in Chevy history that remained until 1975 with Read More
1982 Pontiac Trans Am KITT
Sold at $66,000
Mecum Auctions, Harrisburg, PA, August 2–4, Lot S139
A few years back, I was reviewing cars at an auction for Sports Car Market with a couple of older friends when we happened upon a Knight Rider KITT conversion. Everyone else in my group laughed at it. I secretly wanted it.
Why? Because I was a kid in the 1980s, when David Hasselhoff was Michael Knight, and his jet-black Read More
1984 AMC Eagle sedan
Sold at $3,850
Mecum Auctions, Chicago, IL, Oct. 25–27, 2018, Lot T35
VIN: 1FAFP42X1YF206398
People want cars that do it all. Part sedan, wagon, SUV and minivan. But with all those requirements, we have ended up with the endless amount of crossover-types clogging up our roads. They have it all, yet do nothing well — and most of them look like jelly beans left out in the sun.
When editor Pickering sent me Read More
1966 Plymouth Valiant Signet convertible
Sold at $8,960
Bonhams, Greenwich, CT, June 3, 2018, Lot 213
VIN: VH27B62594626
A few years back, the classic car world fired up with excitement over a brand-new 1957 Plymouth that had been buried in a concrete vault in Tulsa, OK. Opened in 2007, a time-capsule finned wonder was to emerge, educate the future on the past, and be handed over to one lucky drawing winner.
Hindsight may Read More
1974 Ford LTD Country Squire wagon
Sold at $45,920
Gooding & Company, Amelia Island. FL, Mar. 8, 2019, Lot 85
VIN: 4J76S162122
Utility was the strength of a 1970s wagon. Beautiful? No. Fast? No. Good at hauling the family around town? Now we’re talking.
At just under 19 feet long, over 6.5 feet wide and weighing 5,004 pounds, the Country Squire was like a 2001 Ford Excursion SUV before its time. Instead of a 7.3-L Power Stroke Read More
Will automatic-transmission cars eventually be worth more than the manually shifted ones?
It’s a sort of bigger-picture question that needs to look at shifting demographics and project them into the future.
How many of us have a teenager or 20-something who can shift? How common is the joke that a manual is the new theft-prevention device? Let’s also account for how few manually shifted cars are rolling out of factories around the world, and Read More
We have a lot of trucks. In our household of two people, there’s a good seven haulers on the property. One for every day of the week.
It’s a well-known fact that everyone needs a truck, and people who deny needing a truck are just a yard project or a moving-day away from being a great annoyance to their truck-owning friends.
Truck ownership is even more crucial if you own a classic car, because there comes a day (perhaps long Read More
By Jack Tockston
The Goodguys’ 29th Pacific Northwest Nationals enjoyed perfect weather at the Washington State Fairgrounds in Puyallup, WA, from July 29-31, 2016. Over 2,700 rods, customs, muscle cars, trucks, and collectables filled the 160 acres. Spectators’ cars from eleven states and two Canadian provinces overflowed both gigantic (free) lots.
This marks my 25th year attending this gathering. Goodguys promotes twenty such events across the country, and this one has historically been well attended. Part of the success here has to Read More