Category: Car Photo Of The Day

Just another place to look at car stuff.

Car Photo of the Day: Emblematic.

I thought about calling this post “Still life with Jesus-easting snake” but thought better of it. This is a photo of the emblem on Alan Chockie’s 1958 Alfa Romeo Giulietta Spider. As I photographed it at a rally rest stop a notable Alfa Romeo expert wandered by and commented that these emblems have always confounded him. Not their imagery but their construction! Made of flimsy pot metal, they are very hard to restore or reproduce. He said that Alan is very lucky that his is still in such great shape.

It is one of those mysteries that we find in old cars. Funny why they chose to cut corners here, while spending lavishly in other areas of construction. Likely these tales have simple answers in human frailty and pettiness. Corporate infighting? Parts bin raiding? Somebody’s nephew with a contract? All I know is never attribute to malice that which can be explained by incompetence.

I still want an Alfa though.

Car Photo of the Day: Weekend Stumper

Sorry for the crappy cell-cam shot. I saw this car one day while out running an errand and all I had was my cell phone to capture it. This might be an easy one to ID if you are familiar with the obscure origins of this car or know the place in the Seattle suburbs where I saw it parked. If you fall into the latter category (you know who you are!) hold off on naming it if possible and let’s see how the other folks do in the mean time.

Car Photo of the Day: XK on the Beartooth

A discussion came up on a mailing list I’m on of places one should see before they die. I tossed in my contribution, which boils down to a list of highways one should drive. Always about the road with me I guess. Of course I listed CA 1/US 101 on the west coast, and the Cabot Trail on the east coast, but I also had to mention the Beartooth Highway on the Montana/Wyoming border just NE of Yellowstone Park. Truly one of the most spectacular drives on this continent.

What better way to see this road than in an open two seater vintage Jaguar? I’ve driven it twice in the E-type, one time accompanied by this Jaguar XK 140 pictured above.

Still Life with Rusty Timing Chain

While I prefer to display gorgeous vintage engines with polished aluminum or turned finishes, occasionally I show the other end of the continuum. Oxidation is the eventual fate of all of man’s automotive engineering efforts as rust indeed never sleeps, while man too often does.

I found this tired old engine in a field off Burn Road here in Arlington. A man there has accumulated a cache of two makes, one European, and one domestic, and a buddy of mine was picking over them for parts. I tagged along to get some photos and knowing that my Jaguar shares an air filter with one model of one of the makes thought I might just fine a canister for it if I was lucky. I wasn’t, but I did see a lot of rust.

Can you name the make and model of this vehicle based on the photo?

Since we’ve seen nary a guess, here’s a hint: