That's grand, man.

Not sure if you ever the saw the 1964 film "Topkapi," but I love the cars in that movie. In a cool role reversal, the "bad" guys (the Turkish police detectives) drive Volkswagen Beetles, while the "good" guys (the jewel thieves) drive a 1964 Lincoln Continental Convertible. As I own a 1964 Volkswagen and a 1966 Lincoln, I've always liked that movie even more than I normally would.

And by sheer coincidence, I have a licence plate frame on my Lincoln that says "Official Mafia Staff Car."

What type is your Volks?

Just a stock Beetle, nothing fancy. I may post pictures of both cars, seeing as how everyone else does.

You should.

I drive a 64 bug myself.

AND we both live in California! We should hang out or something.

That's right! :D

That's classic.

I blame those old spy movies for my love of 50's-70's European autos. :P

I prefer the sticker, "We Brake for Nobody." Granted, it's from Spaceballs, but the KGB would adopt it like a shot.

Dude, you called it a Heckflosses. I thought I was the only one who used that word.

Naw, it's common amongst the vintage Benz crowd. :D

it's german for "tailfin". mercedes used to dub them "parking help", though, trying to indicate they didn't indeed fell prey to the tailfin fashion which not only ran rampant on US rides. the Auto-Union F1000 Coupé looks suspiciously like a '55 Thunderbird, for example. :)

True story: My '72 250 (/8) was parked in a snowstorm. By chance, the wind was blowing in the direction of travel, and after the storm, the wind had formed perfect Heckflosses on the boot. So, DB's claim that the fins were wind-tunnel designed has merit.

aha. little mercedes with little tailfins. I guess you know the 190 and 200/220 types share the same body, only that the 220 had a longer front to allow a straight-six engine.
they have become rare here these days, especially the early 190 types. everybody wants a 280S, here in Stuttgart there must be a dozen around of all types and bodies. and a lot of pagode SL... as if they built more of those that of the budget rides.

This one was a 220b, with the straight-six engine.

http://www.furaffinity.net/view/2654870/

I rather miss the little beggar.

a cracked engine block? still it doesn't explain why it fell victim to the authorities... didn't they care to auction it off at least?

their diesen engines can take a lot of abuse. in my time at a little auto shop we had a customer who dragged an early 190D along. they bought it in switzerland where it ran as a daily driver until a couple years before, and was apparently aged with pride (aka. lots of patina). why they never bothered to check for engine oil is beyond me, though, which is among the first things you do if you want to drive it as it is... change all the oils, check weardown parts, and so on.
so, at one point, the engine creaked to a halt. so we pulled the car ionto the shop, and checked the oil; there was none. we opened the drain, and nothing came out but tar-like residue. we removed the lower oil pan (the engine has a large made of aluminium, and a smaller at the bottom, allowing to reach oil pump and timing chain), and it was filled with tar. the engines insides were dry, literally, the crankshaft was blue, and fused firmly with the main bearings and piston rods...
so, the owner brought an engine to replace the original which was obviously beyond repair. I would like to know under which stone they found it: partially taken apart, sealing surfaces rusted, every hole and nudge full with cobwebs and dirt... nobody could tell if it ever has run in the first place.
in the end they packed everything in and took the car away.

I am not a mercedes fan, but it hurt a lot.

I'm hoping they auctioned it off and it found a new home, but knowing bureaucracy, they may have simply crushed it.

(sigh) If ever there was a city agency that deserved utter extermination...

Sorry, that should read

this reminds me of a story I read in a german classic car magazine...

there it happened in the city of Wuppertal that some guy who had a freshly restraurated VW 1303A, nicely painted in orange and equipped with many expensive parts drove it out from it's parking lot and out onto the street and had it parked on the wayside. then he went off to have it registered and licensed. a hour later he came back and the car was gone. alerting the authorities he found out the police had it towed off - you are not allowed to park a non-registered/insured vehicle on a public traffic space- and placed it at a comunity-owned car yard. when the car's owner came there a half hour later his poor Beetle was already stripped to the barest bone... technics, interior, glass, everything was gone and nobody could tell where the parts went.

problem: the police wasn't authorized to tow the car immediately. they can do it only if it hinders traffic or endangers the environment w2hen oil or other stuffs leak out... in any other case they MUST put on a pink sticker with a six-week notice to it. also, stripping the car without any hint at the original owner was illegal, too. later, a court sued the city to replace the parts worth, which numbered to more than DM17.000... nedless to say, the guy got only recompensed on a little bit of work he put into. :P

When city officials start getting strung up from lampposts, it's going to be little incidents like this which trigger it...

or when they think their duty is not to serve the public, but their ministry, or their superior, or whatever they get into their rules-infected brains, and abuse the wriggle space most governmental rules leave them to decide on bordering cases to harass the public. when we received a new law regarding classic cars (one tax price for all, some other rules exceptions, in exchange for the need to keep your classic ride in shape and contemporary conditions; so, nothing that can't be done) some authorities thought they had to make sure people paid full tax for their big-engine classics and denied theclassic registration. which is against the law, in fact, but you first need to sue the respective minister. and that is a bitch to work out...

Like I said. Give a bureaucrat a little power...