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The twists and turns of crowdfunding

3 July, 2017

It seems every second article you read has a crowdfunding appeal attached. Of course, some are to help cure disease or help out those in need — and we tip our hats to those noble causes — but this one seems so pure and ridiculous in its simplicity, we can’t help but applaud the team behind it.

In 2011, Dominik Farnbacher drove a 2010 Dodge Viper SRT10 ACR around the main 12.9-mile circuit at Nurburg in just 7:12.13, breaking the road car track record in the process.

But a lot of water and horsepower has flowed under the bridge since then with the Lamborghini Huracán LP 640-4 Performante, the Porsche 918 Spyder, the Lamborghini Aventador SV, the Nissan GT-R Nismo and the Mercedes-AMG GT R having walloped the Viper’s time. But since the 5th generation Viper was introduced, staunch Viper fans have been desperate to get the newest generation ACR back to The Ring for another crack at the title.

With no appetite from the factory to break the record again, a few hardy souls led by Russ Oasis took a truly 2017 approach, started a GoFundMe account and threw their hat on the pavement. They had managed to convince Viper Exchange (a Viper dealer in Texas) to stump up a couple of 2016 ACRs should they raise enough money.

The fund was to cover the costs of getting the cars to Germany as well as a whole lot of gear and a couple of reputable drivers capable of taking the Viper back to number one (Farnbacher is back alongside Luca Stolz). The US$156,000 target was hit last month, and now an extra few grand sits in the account which should keep the Vipers on track for an extra half a lap or so.

Given that the Lamborghini Huracan Performante managed to knock around 20 seconds off the 2010 Viper’s lap time, we wish the newer Vipers godspeed and look forward to hearing the result later this month.

Almost mythical pony

25 July, 2024

The Shelby came to our shores in 2003. It went from the original New Zealand owner to an owner in Auckland. Malcolm just happened to be in the right place with the right amount of money in 2018 and a deal was done. Since then, plenty of people have tried to buy it off him. The odometer reads 92,300 miles. From the condition of the car that seems to be correct and only the first time around.
Malcolm’s car is an automatic. It has the 1966 dashboard, the back seat, the rear quarter windows and the scoops funnelling air to the rear brakes.
He even has the original bill of sale from October 1965 in California.

Becoming fond of Fords part two – happy times with Escorts

17 July, 2024

In part one of this Ford-flavoured trip down memory lane I recalled a sad and instructive episode when I learned my shortcomings as a car tuner, something that tainted my appreciation of Mk2 Ford Escort vans in particular. Prior to that I had a couple of other Ford entanglements of slightly more redeeming merit. There were two Mk1 Escorts I had got my hands on: a 1972 1300 XL belonging to my father and a later, end-of-line, English-assembled 1974 1100, which my partner and I bought from Panmure Motors Ford in Auckland in 1980. Both those cars were the high water mark of my relationship with the Ford Motor Co. I liked the Mk1 Escorts. They were nice, nippy, small cars, particularly the 1300, which handled really well, and had a very precise gearbox for the time.
Images of Jim Richards in the Carney Racing Williment-built Twin Cam Escort and Paul Fahey in the Alan Mann–built Escort FVA often loomed in my imagination when I was driving these Mk1 Escorts — not that I was under any illusion of comparable driving skills, but they had to be having just as much fun as I was steering the basic versions of these projectiles.