Seven Automotive Deadly Sinners

Anger: Toyota Tacoma Pikes Peak

The Rod Millen Motorsport Toyota TacomaToyota Tacoma 'Pikes Peak...Japan, 1998 > present4 photos
1 video
is not only the angriest Toyota ever but probably the angriest car in the planet. Since its victories at the 1998 and 1999 Pikes Peak in America, the Tacoma has become an icon of this challenge.

Driven by the New Zealander Millen, the car wowed the audience once again at the Goodwood Festival of Speed in 2007.

Gluttony: Lamborghini LM002

Only in the mid-1980’s (1986 to be exact) could a manufacturer like Lamborghini unveil a car like the LM002Lamborghini LM002Italy, 1986 > 19935 photos
2 videos
(it is worth pointing out that the Humvee was first produced in 1984). It came with the 7.2 litre petrol V12 used in Class 1 offshore powerboats or the relatively sensible 5.2 litre petrol V12 from the Countach and weighed 2.7 tonnes unladen. Fortunately it came with a 290 litre fuel tank.

Some synergies can be drawn with today, when BentleyBentleyUnited Kingdom, 1919 > present37 models
1460 photos
5 videos
has unveiled its new SUV and Lamborghini their own, with the target market was not the traditional European enclaves but the sandy shores of the Middle East.

The LM002 symbolises an era of excess and gluttony just before the crisis of 1987 when stock markets around the world crashed and the LM002 became obsolete even in its infancy.
 

Sloth: The 1.0 litre hire car!

We have all been there, we have landed at the idyllic destination that we have booked for our well-earned week of rest and wandered over to the hire car counter with trepidation.

What will it be? Hopefully we will be upgraded but it is unlikely because we have booked the cheapest possible option and then gambled that the ‘budget hatchback’ option will fit all of our luggage in, a couple of sets of golf clubs and our tired bodies. Usually we are not upgraded and we are stuck with the 1.0 litre supermini that we paid for, and with the air conditioning coughing lightly cooled air into our faces we go into battle on unfamiliar roads.

What we then realize as we pull onto the highway, probably with a slight gradient, is that our new car, replete with 13” wheels, is pathetically slow and needs 6000 screaming revs to get to the hotel without holding the local farmer up on his tractor.

Cross your fingers for the hotel.

Greed: Mercedes Pullman/Zil

Whether we talk about the dictatorships of the cold war we think of black limousines transporting the elite through Central Africa and Eastern Europe.

The Mercedes PullmanMercedes-Benz 600 Pullman...Germany, 1965 > 19811 photo
1 video
has transported Idi Amin, President Ferdinand Marcos of the Philippines, Saddam Hussein and even the Pope. It is powered by a mighty, for the time, 6.3 litre engine and rode on complex air suspension.

The Laundaulet is the most iconic and production finished in 1980, although there was an slowdown in production after the oil crisis of 1972.

ZiL produce trucks as well as cars, but it is the limousine division that is the most famous, despite its low output. They are priced in-line with Rolls-RoyceRolls-RoyceUnited Kingdom, 1904 > present31 models
1281 photos
1 video
and MaybachMaybachGermany, 1909 > present15 models
48 photos
2 videos
cars and tend to transport government ministers.

This advert really conveys what the USSR was all about!

Pride: BMW 3 Series

Above anything else the 3 SeriesBMW BMW 3 Series Gen.6 [F30/F31]Germany, 2012 > present115 versions
355 photos
1 video
has become the middle management status symbol. Of course, it is a very good car, possibly the best car on sale today, but it is also a symbol for many people that they have made it and they want everyone to know about it.

The 3 Series has moved with the times in Western Europe, once the average man drove a MondeoFord Mondeo Gen.4United Kingdom, 2007 > 2013244 versions
344 photos
1 video
, and he was called Mondeo man, but today the 3 Series far outsells the Ford. We have become richer and credit has become more easily available and the 3 Series symbolises that change like no other car. And we are proud of it.
 

Lust: Mercedes 300SLR (Car number 722)

The most valuable car in the world? It is the common consensus that if it ever came onto the market car no. 722Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR Roa...Germany, 1955 > present6 photos
1 video
driven by Stirling Moss and co-driven by Dennis Jenkinson would surely be it.

Car no. 722 won the Migle Mille in 1955 in a time of 10h7m48s at an average speed of 97.9mph. Moss and Jenkinson did it without a rest and with the pioneering use of pace notes. It only weighed 810kg but was powered by a 310bhp straight 8 that came with desmodromic valves. However, car no.722 would have weighed a fair bit more with its 70 gallon fuel tank brimmed.

Imagine flying through the Italian countryside at up to 180mph with only drum brakes or stone walls to stop you and the fact that you have been at the wheel for 10 straight hours and you will understand why this car is so incredible.

It is the car that every billionaire collector would want in his museum but he can’t have it. Mercedes BenzMercedes-BenzGermany, 1924 > present197 models
9852 photos
33 videos
will never sell car no. 722. It is part of their history.
 

Envy: Porsche 911 Turbo

The haves and the have nots. They exist all over the world but never more so than in a bull stock market and what do those city slickers drive? Stuttgarts’s finest of course.

I have picked the TurboPorsche 911 TurboGermany, 2009 > present3 photos
because it is the one I most associate with pin stripe suited stock brokers. It has a body kit and the word Turbo in its title. What else could they possibly want?

I have included this video of a RUF YellowbirdRuf CTRGermany, 1987 > present3 series
3 versions
6 photos
1 video
quite simply because this article is gratuitous by its very nature and I will quite happily use any excuse to watch this video!