Arias Pistons 12.5:1 Compression 82mm Bore Honda B-series on 2040-parts.com

Festival of the Unexceptional: the bad cars we love

Ever been to a classic car show and noticed how many old MGBs and sports cars of yesteryear have turned up, driven by their proud owners, but wondered what happened to all the more mainstream stuff? There are twice as many Ferrari 308 GTBs on the roads in the UK than Austin Allegros, because the everyday cars of the past fail MOTs, get chucked away and replaced with shiny new hatchbacks. Fortunately, there is a select group of people in the UK who care for the mundane stuff of yesterday and, because of this, a new event for “unexceptional” cars will be taking place this summer.

What’s a Range Rover ‘Vouge’?

Now the 2013 Range Rover is out in the wild, they’re becoming a common site on our roads and in car parks. So when one of the Cars UK team was sat waiting patiently in the Waitrose car park for his beloved to finish replenishing stocks, he wasn’t particularly surprised to find a nice new Range Rover Vogue slowly pass-by looking for a parking space. It looked a completely standard Vogue – the entry-level Range Rover – with no personalisation of any sort.

2013 Skoda Superb Facelift: Price from £18,555

When Skoda sent us the first details on the new Superb they did say it would go on sale in June, but that’s now slipped to mid-July, but in advance of that revised date Skoda has now decided how much they want you to cough up for their take on the VW Passat. Starting point for the new Superb is £18,555 for the 1.4-litre TSI 125PS S hatch, with prices rising to the range-topping Laurin & Klement Estate at £32,455, but there’s plenty of engine and trim versions in between to fit your budget. There’s a total of six engine options on offer – 1.4 TSI, 1.8 TSI, 3.6 V6 are the petrols and a choice of 1.6 TDI and 2.0 TDI with 140PS or 170PS for the diesels – with trim choices of S, SE, Elegance and Laurin & Klement with a couple of Eco ‘GreenLine’ models in the mix too.