Why do Elephants Have Big Ears?

...Because Noddy wouldn't pay the ransom.

I was never really a fan of Noddy, pictured here with his cruelly-named friend Big Ears and his little yellow taxi-cab.  I'm assuming it's a private hire vehicle although I've never spotted any taxi-plates on it.  In fact, it is probably illegal because a two-seater with bugger-all luggage space is going to struggle to get the appropriate licencing - unless the laws in Toytown are particularly lax.  I'm guessing Noddy must also be bribing P.C.Plod as he always turns a blind eye when he sees Noddy working.

 

Maybe Noddy's had enough now anyway because his car appears to be up for sale.  the Telegraph have the story today.  I think the author may be getting Noddy mixed up with Pinocchio though - I didn't think Noddy was made of wood.

Apparently, this is worth £25000.

 

It is actually a 1969 Fiat Gamine Vignale - a car I'd never heard of that is based on a Fiat 500 - the original one.  If you see the rear of the car it is quite obvious it is based on a Fiat 500 - the original one.

 

If you put that registration number into mycarcheck.com, though, it says it is a Fiat Coupe.

 

No it isn't, mycarcheck - THIS is a Fiat Coupe...

A much more attractive proposition than the Noddy Car and a lot cheaper too.

 

Now, with £25000 to play with, Noddy should be able to afford something a bit nicer to take Big Ears out into the woods in - not that there's anything dodgy about their relationship - just ask Noddy himself.

Take Your Penguin To Work

This drawing (for it is only a concept) of a very short underground train carriage is a Rinspeed Micromax.

You will observe that it has plenty of room for a driver, three passengers sort of standing up, a baby-buggy/wheelchair/shopping cart and a penguin. Not sure why you would want to take a penguin but that definitely looks like Pingu in the front there.

This concept will be appearing at The 2013 Geneva Motor Show and the story is covered by most of the online motoring press including AutoGuide and caradvice.com.au who advise you to "Stand up and strap in" - kinky!

Needless to say in a modern-day Car Show concept - it is all electric and, given it's obvious commutey taxi-cab urban madate, that is the sensible powertrain to be using.

For those not familiar with Rinspeed - they are not a Belgian Dishwasher manufacturer - they are a Swiss vehicle design-and-manufacture outfit. They have produced many vehicles usually taking a familiar product of a mainstream manufacturer and upgrading it - or coming up with a completely new take. Here is one of my favourites:

Pity it's called the ZaZen - daft name.

To learn more, check out their Website or look at their Google Images.

and if you don't want to pick up a penguin...

...you could always grab a Taxi...

Yellow Peril

Last weekend, the lovely Susanna Reid on BBC Breakfast Time mentioned a survey that stated that yellow cars had most problems when bought second-hand. I found that slightly interesting but have had to wait all week to find any further mention anywhere else of that survey. It was the Telegraph who eventually came up with this article. It claims that "14 per cent have some kind of defect such as covered-up repairs, 'clocked' mileage or inadequate paperwork"

My first car was sort of yellow. British Leyland called the colour "Sandglow" but I called it "Vomit Yellow" - it was a Dolomite very much like this one...I didn't have any such problems with it - but then again it was my father's before it was mine.

I still don't see car colour affecting used-cars that much except - this survey was a global survey, so maybe it's been skewed by a load of used examples of these things getting onto the market...

Taken For a Ride

For quite a while now, probably since the demise of Reliant, it has been widely accepted that the largest British-owned car-maker was LTI who make the black cabs that grace our city streets. How irritating for them, you may think, that the Chinese manufacturer, Geely, who are very big in the rip-off of popular European cars market have produced this...



Although it's not quite as blatant as some of their earlier work...
Geely Mercedes anyone? Geely Roller?
How about a Geely Skoda, then?


The sad news here, though, is it isn't simply just a copy. This story from Autocar explains that Geely have actually bought out the parent company of LTI and shipped production to China leading to further job losses in Coventry and another nail in the coffin of the once-gigantic British car industry. I don't understand how this story seems to have slipped under the radar of so much of the motoring media, maybe it's something to do with the election but I'd have thought the Tory press would have picked up on it at least - if for no other reason than to print pictures of Geely fakes.


Like I did.

Looking at the pictures on the Autocar site, the Geely Taxi seems to be quite a bit smaller than the LTI cars making them more manoeurverable, manourverable, maneurverable, handy in town but with the capacity to take only four passengers rather than the usual five which, I imagine, would actually make them less popular with taxi-drivers and late-night parties of drunks wanting to get home.

OK, that's the end of the article, someone call me a cab.

"You Sir, are a cab."

Thank you and goodnight.