Tuesday, November 01, 2005

A Trio To Tickle The Tastes!



Top is another Euro-German, the Smart Sportster.
In the middle is a TVR, a modern British sportscar, and at the bottom of course, just for contrast, is the Morgan.

The Smart is rare because it won't be built anymore since Smart has been unable to do it profitably.
It has two-tone bodywork where the panels fit into the chassis cage.
The panels can be changed in about an hour if you get tired of the colour. That is a Smart featured service.
The Smart is actually powered by a three cylinder 660cc turbo made by Mercedes. The real drawback is the lack of manual transmission; it has paddle-operated 'TipTronic', which apparently ruins the driving experience due to clunky operation with glacial lag.

Another reason it is on the way out.

The TVR; Yorkshiremen say that the only good thing to come out of Lancashire is the road to Yorkshire. The TVR comes from Blackpool, Lancashire, so they may be wrong.
The body is glass-fibre, but before you think that this is a 'kit-car', think again; the all-alloy six-cylinder engines are hand-finished TVR originals, not bought in like the Morgan.
Sadly(for Americans), TVR couldn't give a toss about North American emissions compatibility, so it isn't available there.
Legally.

I included the Morgan again because it is beautiful and I took a reasonable picture this time.

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