Blogs Posts

The annual awards ceremony is a timehonoured ritual at Porsche and a reminder that the company really did make its name through motorsport. Usually held in the third week of December, these days the ceremony is slightly overshadowed by competition from other Porsche evening functions, such as Sound Night and other social media-inspired events. However, 50 years ago when Porsche was still a small company and almost all Porsche racers knew each other, it was the event of the year.

Discover how the Porsche Torque Vectoring system helps to keep your 911 on the road. The driving characteristics of the 911 are well known, if something of a dichotomy. The rear-engined layout permits immense traction out of corners, but at the same time the car is ever-ready to punish driving with less-than-perfect technique. Carry too much speed into a corner, lift off and you have all the ingredients of the classic 911 accident for the inexperienced.

Tracking down your dream 911 can be a less-than-straightforward process. In our heads it’s relatively easy to draw up a wish list of our ideal car, but then we have to find one in the real world. Inevitably, that perfect set of demands may not be for sale. How much compromise should we factor in when searching for ‘The One’? Avantgarde Classic’s Jonathan Aucott is quick to point out that compromise is somewhat inevitable with used 911 purchases.

Discover what to look out for when buying an Aston Martin Virage, Volante or V8 Coupe from the Eighties and Nineties.

The fifth-gen 3 Series is one of the cheapest BMWs you can buy today, and it’s an incredible bargain that represents amazing value for money. However, you need to go in with eyes – and wallet – open. E9x 3 SERIESWords: Andrew Everett Photos: Jason Dodd, BMW Buying Guide: E9x 3 Series The E9x 3 Series is one of the biggest used BMW bargains of the moment, and our in-depth guide will help you pick the perfect car.

By the time I was 15, I’d been to lots of historic trials and race events with my dad, but I’d never spent much time in the workshop. That changed during lockdown, when he and I built an Austin Seven Ulster Rep together. Then I bought an MGB trials car that hadn’t been used for about five years, got it running and did a seasons trialling in it in MCC events, before selling it to put money toward this Peugeot.

Buy wisely and a classic bargain with cult-TV cool could be yours for as little as £10k. Words CHRIS RANDALL Photography MATT HOWELL Get style, dodge the risks - Buy yourself Volvo’s classy and usable 1800 from as little as £10k Buying Guide Get yourself into an iconic Volvo 1800-series for as little as £10,000 Icons don’t come much more usable than Volvo’s 1800-series.

With its combination of electric and petrol V8 traction, the 887hp 918 hypercar was the most powerful Porsche yet. It also had the longest introduction of any Porsche, because the company was determined to get this complex car right first time. A measure of this concern is visible in the photograph.

First introduced on the Porsche 911 997 Carrera S in 2005, Porsche Active Suspension Management (PASM) was created to give the best of both worlds at the press of a button, to the driver’s choosing: maximum comfort, or maximum dynamics. Technology explained PASM To understand the technology, we must step back and look at how suspension works. At its core, a suspension’s job is to keep the tyres on the road.

Buyers who can nail down their dream 911 and spec have an easy ride when purchasing. They search, wait and hopefully find. However, not everyone can pinpoint their next 911 so readily. With this in mind, we asked our trade experts what sort of budget gives you the greatest choice of 911 models, as a used purchase? After only the briefest of pauses, Jonathan Ostroff, sales manager at Hexagon Classics, is straight on a figure to work with: “£65,000” he says.

Anything but basic, the entry-level 981 Cayman delivers a huge number of smiles to the mile without breaking the bank, making it one of the Porsche scene's best buys... Words Robert Smith Photography Thomas Fawdry BUYING 981 CAYMAN 2.7Fast fun in budget-beating coupe.

This fully restored rust-free US-import 356 is completely perfect. But, as Richard Gunn asks, is it too good to use? A lot of money for something not that far removed from a Beetle? This, though, is real early Porsche purity. And it’s in beautiful order, cosmetically and mechanically – all it seems to need is the rear badge fixing more securely and the vibrating brakes attending to.

Sensational on its introduction in 1955 and still extraordinary today, the Citroën DS in any of its forms is a comfortable and fantastically stylish classic. The futuristic looks and the sound if unconventional engineering give it a unique appeal that hasn’t dampened almost 70 years on. The station wagon variant – known variously as Safari (UK and Australia), Break (France) and Wagon (USA) – was added to the range in 1958.

It can be a cheap way into a Cosworth. But tread carefully – parts can be scarce. Words RICHARD DREDGE Photography JOHN COLLEY Buying Guide Snap up the last unhyped Eighties Ford – the Granada MkIII Seven steps to buying Ford Granada MkIII / Scorpio Mk1Eighties Fords have never seemed more expensive. Not an auction seems to go by without another record being broken by the likes of the Capri 2.8i and Sierra Cosworth. Once-commonplace and cheap cars now seem out of the grasp of many.

Building on the reputation of the Audi 100 in the 1970s and the 200 the decade thereafter, the brand’s 500-badged models were introduced into SA throughout the 1990s. This Ingolstadt-based brand stubbornly avoided the temptation to follow its compatriot brands, BMW and Mercedes-Benz down the route of six-cylinder engines powering the rear wheels.