KEY POINTS:
Missouri man Terry Franz, who calls himself the Car Santa, collects vehicles from donors and gives them to needy people in America's Midwest. "The cars aren't new," Franz says. "Most have done anywhere from 40,000 to 250,000 miles. Some have rust, and most have dents and dings. But each one is inspected to make sure they're safe and that they run properly." A few years ago Franz gave away a 26-year-old Ford. "It wasn't pretty but it ran good. The guy we gave it to was walking 11 miles (18km) to work every day. He cried, he was so happy." Franz will give away more than 100 vehicles this month.
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Jowett owners in New Zealand have been celebrating the British marque's 100th birthday. Built by Yorkshire engineering brothers Benjamin and William Jowett, the car with its 6-horsepower twin-cylinder engine was hardly known outside Yorkshire for the first few years after 1906. But the nameplate gained international recognition in 1926 when British MP Frank Grey drove one 6000km across Africa. The most famous models are the Javelin and the Jupiter from the late 1940s.
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Mitsubishi is expected to take the wraps off the go-fast Lancer Evolution X at the Detroit motor show in a couple of weeks. A year ago in Japan, the Good Oil clapped eyes on what Mitsubishi executives said was the nearly completed production version. The carmaker pretty much swore the visiting group of journos to secrecy and cellphones with cameras had to be handed in at the door of the design studio. The Evo X uses bold styling, including front-end cues from the aircraft industry. An incomplete four-wheel-drive Pajero was on show, too. The design of its dashboard and centre console might be the best in the 4wd business. The Pajero will be here in February.
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This item appeared here earlier in the year, when a ban on cellphones at the wheel wasn't on the Government's agenda. Donna Maddock, 22, caught applying her makeup at 50km/h while driving along a London road, was fined the equivalent of $700 and her driver's licence was endorsed with six penalty points. A spokesman for the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, Roger Vincent, said: "Nowadays there are enough distractions without motorists literally making up their own".
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The item that tickled most readers' ribs this year:
Norman Frey figured he'd celebrate a Colorado football game with a bang, so he filled a balloon with acetylene - the welding gas - put it on the back seat of his car and took off to a party, where he planned to explode the balloon at the end of the televised game. The Rocky Mountain News reported that police found Frey's car with its windows blown out, doors hanging loose, and a 30cm-bulge in the roof. They traced Frey, 46, and a friend to a hospital, where they were being treated for burns and shrapnel wounds. Investigators believe static electricity ignited the gas in the balloon.
* This column resumes on January 13. Have a merry Christmas and a happy New Year. Drive safely. Remember the late motorsport champion Ashley Stichbury's advice: "Only when you have found your way out of a corner have you found your way into it."
