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erm, there is none...! Saw two older cars whole time we were there, both of which were BMW e30s. One was obviously enthusiast owned and one looked about ready to die. Other than that no car in Hong Kong is more than 20 minutes old, and a good 80% of them are Mercedes. No line We walked up Kowloon and one street had nothing but S calss mercs on it, and as I was commenting on it we walked up another street and that was all S Class as well, Seriously, no other make or model... The Taxis are cooler, a lot of 90s Toyota CROWN Comfort and Nissan Cedrics though. I think the Nissans are being phased out as it was far less likely you'd see one of these than the CROWN. And Taxis make up about 80% of the traffic on the roads. Except for the guys poncing about in their new Mercs in Central and a few MPVs I saw it seems that nobody drives in HK. Most odd. I also saw a car which was a Japaense clone of a Ford CROWN Victoria! No idea what it was but other than the rear window lines it looked prettymuch the same LOL. Anyone any idea what it might have been? some pics... Terrible blurred street snap of one of the e30s I saw.... Toyota CROWN Comfort CROWN Comfort plus tram in Admiralty cabs queue up... downtown street scenes... thats a lotta Toyotas... Mostly Mercs, but some J-tin I'm thinking that those CROWNs have it in them to get the treatment. Seriously. According to my Bro the CROWN Comfort which is the Taxi base is based on a 70s RWD platform and sold only to cab fleets, cops, etc. but the other CROWN (sold as a luxury car) is a whole other platfrom but with the same (CROWN) name... Meh. Anyone know much about these?
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Last Edit: Aug 6, 2007 13:55:55 GMT by akku
1941 Wolseley Not Rod - 1956 Humber Hawk - 1957 Daimler Conquest - 1966 Buick LeSabre - 1968 Plymouth Sport Fury - 1968 Ford Galaxie - 1969 Ford Country Squire - 1969 Mercury Marquis - 1970 Morris Minor - 1970 Buick Skylark - 1970 Ford Galaxie - 1971 Ford Galaxie - 1976 Continental Mark IV - 1976 Ford Capri - 1994 Ford Fiesta
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so you didnt get tangled up in a rush hour style triad ring? wondered where you'd disappeared off to.
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Funny you should say that Tony I actually got caught in the middle of a "riot". Although when they said it was a riot I have to say they are a lot more civilised about this sort of thing than we are. Mind you marching up to the police cordon in a morning suit and cravat and anouncing "excuse me, British citizen coming through!" still works 10 years after the handover. Ace. Got a few photos. This is slightly retro related as the big assed protest was about the HK SAR government tearing down some historic pier. Anyone who can produce photos of the Cedrics as used in the taxi format is also going to win my good favour. Again, these are the old 80s style Cedric (Like Dez's wagon) but slightly more modern lights and stuff - the "civilian" Cedric moved on and got a new platform, body, etc. but the old style one was kept on with odd updates as a utility model. You gotta know its the utility model gets the love every time... but the Cedrics are few enough between I couldn't even manage to find one when I needed a Taxi so all I rode in was the CROWN.
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1941 Wolseley Not Rod - 1956 Humber Hawk - 1957 Daimler Conquest - 1966 Buick LeSabre - 1968 Plymouth Sport Fury - 1968 Ford Galaxie - 1969 Ford Country Squire - 1969 Mercury Marquis - 1970 Morris Minor - 1970 Buick Skylark - 1970 Ford Galaxie - 1971 Ford Galaxie - 1976 Continental Mark IV - 1976 Ford Capri - 1994 Ford Fiesta
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Note to self: Do not move to HK.
...or, move to HK and start a Retro revolution...
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Hong Kong is fantastic, I have worked there quite a bit recently, and yes most cars are non-retro. Late night HK is when you see the meat - lots of Skylines and 350Zs and RX7s and the like. There is some very high speed driving to be had through the tunnels, into TST and through Kowloon on the flyovers.
Lots of modded Honda Jazz and other small moderns around during the day too.
There are old cars around but it is very expensive to own a car in HK so they tend to be newer. Classic car events happen sometimes.
Charlie
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I saw a few HUGE people carrier things which loioked like they might be modded, but TBH I have no idea what they should look like as stock (JDM stuff) so no idea.
Saw no real evidence of a car culture there at all really TBH. Just LOTS of Mercedes...
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1941 Wolseley Not Rod - 1956 Humber Hawk - 1957 Daimler Conquest - 1966 Buick LeSabre - 1968 Plymouth Sport Fury - 1968 Ford Galaxie - 1969 Ford Country Squire - 1969 Mercury Marquis - 1970 Morris Minor - 1970 Buick Skylark - 1970 Ford Galaxie - 1971 Ford Galaxie - 1976 Continental Mark IV - 1976 Ford Capri - 1994 Ford Fiesta
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When I was in Japan, the locals said that the HK boys buy quite a lot of their AE86s and ship them over - so they must be out there somewhere!
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Loads of cool J people carriers, Nissan Cubes, and various well-detailed square wagons cover Kowloon. I know I know, pictures, pictures pictures. Sorry. I have none.
Asian car culture is something else. Retro doesn't figure. In fact retro doesn't figure in any scene. Old = not as good as new. Shiny and new and bling is better than old and battered. In fact Asian girls and boys cannot understand why we appreciate old things.
Charlie
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maybe if I'd got more uphill Kowloon side I'd have seen more. I was staying out on Lantau and coming in by MTR to Central and working out from there by ferry or whatever.
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1941 Wolseley Not Rod - 1956 Humber Hawk - 1957 Daimler Conquest - 1966 Buick LeSabre - 1968 Plymouth Sport Fury - 1968 Ford Galaxie - 1969 Ford Country Squire - 1969 Mercury Marquis - 1970 Morris Minor - 1970 Buick Skylark - 1970 Ford Galaxie - 1971 Ford Galaxie - 1976 Continental Mark IV - 1976 Ford Capri - 1994 Ford Fiesta
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Have you seen the price of second-hand cars in HK? Massively expensive new, and then peanuts at just 10 years old.
A lot of old early 90's Corollas and the like around up in North Kowloon.
Cedric cabs are few and far btween. You get any CROWN Comforts that had manual column shift, still a few of the older ones lurking about.
I really, REALLY wanna move out to HK, loved my 3 years there!
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gtxtra
Part of things
Posts: 491
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this is a storm mk1 run by a scirocco register chap called 'lonniecho' over there - the rego is for real too. hk, spent a lot of time there in 97. loved it despite the constant whiff of dead chickens. would definitley like to go back at some stage.
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91 Scala, 87 GTX 16V, 87 GTX BRM 152, 85 GTL, 81 GTi
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Hirst
Posted a lot
This avatar is inaccurate, I've never shaved that closely
Posts: 3,930
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I'm thinking that those CROWNs have it in them to get the treatment. Time to bring one of my favourite cars of all-time out again! Toyota decided in 2003 to produce a limited special edition of their Toyota CROWN Comfort, the actual idea being to make it into an "80's tuner car" type thing. They took the normal Comfort model, boshed a supercharger on it, loaded it up with goodies like bucket seats, extra gauges, fancy suspension and RS Watanabe wheels. The end result was this: And here is a video I uploaded: I'm told they weren't incredibly fast (think they're quite heavy), but the idea just fills me with delight. Why don't more companies do stuff like this?!
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I'm thinking that those CROWNs have it in them to get the treatment. Time to bring one of my favourite cars of all-time out again! Toyota decided in 2003 to produce a limited special edition of their Toyota CROWN Comfort, the actual idea being to make it into an "80's tuner car" type thing. They took the normal Comfort model, boshed a supercharger on it, loaded it up with goodies like bucket seats, extra gauges, fancy suspension and RS Watanabe wheels. The end result was this: And here is a video I uploaded: I'm told they weren't incredibly fast (think they're quite heavy), but the idea just fills me with delight. Why don't more companies do stuff like this?! because there is no way that that CROWN will ever, ever, EVAHR be beaten in terms of awesome tat-regeneration-ness! aww man if ford only still had escort cossie tooling, if mazda had kept the rx7 presses, and citroen hadn't thrown away the DS datasheets... actually, someone should write to them.
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Hirst
Posted a lot
This avatar is inaccurate, I've never shaved that closely
Posts: 3,930
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I'd love to import one just so I could bosh a 53 (or whatever) plate on the front and tell people I finally got a sensible new-ish Toyota. Winners all round!
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That CROWN Comfort reminds me of a Mercury Marauder in miniature.
Never rode in a manual one. All the ones I rode in had the correct number of pedals (more than one per leg is wrong)
Saw a few Cedric cabs. Mostly on Lantau. I think they go their to retire as a lot of the blue cabs have red door shuts... They look the nuts. I'd have one just as it came out of taxi service, love the mad LPG logo decals on the boot lids, look at some big power under the hood and some black steelies... and a little altitude adjustment...
be the biz.
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1941 Wolseley Not Rod - 1956 Humber Hawk - 1957 Daimler Conquest - 1966 Buick LeSabre - 1968 Plymouth Sport Fury - 1968 Ford Galaxie - 1969 Ford Country Squire - 1969 Mercury Marquis - 1970 Morris Minor - 1970 Buick Skylark - 1970 Ford Galaxie - 1971 Ford Galaxie - 1976 Continental Mark IV - 1976 Ford Capri - 1994 Ford Fiesta
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Good to hear what you've been up to AK. I always like to see a few J-tin taxi spec pic's. I'd imagine most Cedric taxis would be the Y31 like this /\, they kept the pillared sedan going for yonks for business use after the hardtops had moved on to Y32, Y33 etc. /\ This is Y30 like Dez's estate. They stopped the pillared sedan and hardtop when Y31 came out (though estate continued for ages), so while they undoubtedly were used as taxis for one to be still going after 20 years would be a rare sight indeed. /\ This is the Nissan Crew, very similar looks to the CROWN Comfort! I think also primarily intended for business use.
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Hirst
Posted a lot
This avatar is inaccurate, I've never shaved that closely
Posts: 3,930
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If we're moving onto "business use" cars (not sure why we don't have a similar thing going in this country), we need a Nissan Ad Van! Very dull looking. Those Nissan Crew wheels look to be the facelift 180/200SX ones.
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mercmad
Posted a lot
Flush Hard,it's a long way to McDonalds.
Posts: 1,740
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Have you seen the price of second-hand cars in HK? Massively expensive new, and then peanuts at just 10 years old. A lot of old early 90's Corollas and the like around up in North Kowloon. Cedric cabs are few and far btween. You get any CROWN Comforts that had manual column shift, still a few of the older ones lurking about. I really, REALLY wanna move out to HK, loved my 3 years there! I was passing through HK in 98 and met some Chinese car dealers.Really funny setup,they rent car spaces etc to store cars for sale. I mentioned to some mates that I saw 911 porsches for $3000 ,thats HK dollars,which was then about $500 AUD. next day I got a phone call from HK,my mates had flown over and scored some cars,several 911's,merc W126s'( 18!!) and a Ferrari.All landed in OZ for $14,000.One of the W126's sold for $27,000 straight away. And yes the car movement is big,but you need to kniow people in the old car scene to see them.Mostly high end stuff. And with average speed of 40kph,it's hard to really get a decent drive.You can drive to the mainland now so more and more are venturing over to try out the new roads etc. What blew me away was the fact that at the new airport I had to check my baggage in then catch a train to the plane... ;D
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Many years ago I changed my driving style to cope with rising fuel prices; I have now reached the stage where I am contemplating keeping my eyes shut in order to lower wind resistance.
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yup, Y31 like that top one. WHen did they stop making them?
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Last Edit: Aug 7, 2007 7:18:04 GMT by akku
1941 Wolseley Not Rod - 1956 Humber Hawk - 1957 Daimler Conquest - 1966 Buick LeSabre - 1968 Plymouth Sport Fury - 1968 Ford Galaxie - 1969 Ford Country Squire - 1969 Mercury Marquis - 1970 Morris Minor - 1970 Buick Skylark - 1970 Ford Galaxie - 1971 Ford Galaxie - 1976 Continental Mark IV - 1976 Ford Capri - 1994 Ford Fiesta
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