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Truck Thursday: Logan's Run – Dacia Logan dCi Pickup
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Walking on the Helsinki street, I noticed this humble-but-useful Dacia Logan pickup. Since trucklets such as this are favorably looked upon around these parts of the Internet, out came the cameraphone. The Dacia is a couple years old, with the 1.5-litre Renault-sourced turbodiesel. Of course, everything you see here is Renault-sourced. Even the Volvo S40…
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For Sale – Forest Find: 1960s Skoda Octavia Combi
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Along with the Samara and the Peugeot 404, the local auto club has a third donated car they want to offload. This was left on the auction/show venue’s parking lot on Sunday as a decorative element of sorts, and no-one really wants it too much. So, since I’m probably one of five club members born…
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Perestroika time – Polishing up a 1987 Lada Samara for auction
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As mentioned in the earlier Peugeot 404 article, the local auto club is auctioning off two cars this coming weekend. In addition to the Peugeot, there’s this, a 1987-model Lada Samara 1300 that is going under the hammer and sickle on Sunday. In the true spirit of перестройка, the Lada was reformed after spending five…
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L'Étranger – Dusting off a Peugeot 404 for auctioning
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The local auto club, of which I’ve been a member for a little while now, is auctioning off two world-weary old cars. This is the older one of the two, a mid-1960s Peugeot 404. Both cars have been donated to the club years ago, and the powers-that-be-brewing-the-coffee would rather see them go to the hands…
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Eyewitness: Gumball 3000 rolls into Helsinki
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[Disclaimer: Write-up and photos courtesy of Lauri Ahtiainen, known spotter of quality Mercedes-Benzes and driver of a Miata] During the last couple of days, three large car events have been held around Europe. As I write this, dirty and tired cars are still racing around the Nürburgring race track in Germany, with only two hours…
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Helsinki Weekend Edition – Lada 2105 1200S
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So yeah, while last weekend Finland beat Austria with a nice 7-2 score and I was full of hockey-induced vigour, this weekend it all went down the toilet. We (or the team, however you look at it) lost to Sweden and USA, which means Finland didn’t even get the bronze medal. To commemorate the Finnish…
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Helsinki Weekend Edition – 1982 Mitsubishi Galant
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Moving from the luxury that the drop-top BMW offers, to absolute day-to-day basicness. This 1982 Mitsubishi Galant is the 1600cc basic model, and I don’t think there’s much else there than door locks and steerable front wheels. And this is pretty much how a 30-year-old Japanese car looks like in Finland; it’s not mollycoddled, but…
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Helsinki Weekend Edition – 1986 BMW 320i Cabriolet
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Like the Skoda featured in the preceding post, this BMW has something to do with open-air fun. But the E30 here ditches the top completely. Despite the ostentatious looks, this 1986 3-series Cabriolet is a mere 320i. So no revvy 318i, or burlier 325i – just the middle-of-the-road M20B20. But cosmetically, it’s perfect. The location…
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Helsinki Weekend Edition – Skoda Felicia Fun Pickup
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The yellow Saab isn’t the only yellow thing you’ll be seeing this weekend. No, I present to you the 1998 Skoda Felicia Fun: a product of the time when Skoda dialed up the zaniness in their product portfolio. You see, not only did Skoda clad the plumber favorite Felicia trucklet with a substantial amount of…
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Helsinki Weekend Edition – Elcat Cityvan, the electric Subaru van from Finland
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For some time, this white box was what Finns thought about when electric vehicles were mentioned. The Finnish company Elcat, owned by a larger energy company, churned out electric vans converted from Subaru Domingos until 2002. The Elcat Cityvan saw use by municipalities, graveyards and the like, including the Finnish Post. Before the Fiskers came…
