1999 Pontiac Firebird Interior Door Panel Left And Right...charcoal on 2040-parts.com

Concept Car of the Week: Alfa Romeo BAT 7

This week sees the Concept of the Week title go to Alfa Romeo and Bertone for their collaboration on the Alfa Romeo BAT 7, the second addition to the BAT series that began in 1953 and finished in 1955. First seen at the 1954 Turin motor show, this wildly futuristic ‘dream' car came about after Alfa Romeo contacted Giuseppe "Nuccio" Bertone of the Bertone carrozeria to commission three concepts with the lowest possible drag coefficient. The cars were named BAT for "Berlinetta Aerodinamica Tecnica." Built upon the Alfa Romeo 1900 chassis, the BAT cars featured large rear bumpers and curved fins, and the concepts achieved a drag coefficient of just 0.19 - an impressive result.

The first Volkswagen Beetle in America looked like this

On Jan. 17, 1949, the Holland America Line Westerdam pulled into New York Harbor from Rotterdam carrying the seed of an automotive empire. It had been only four years since Volkswagen resurrected operations in Wolfsburg, the factory heavily ruined by Allied forces and now under the command of Major Ivan Hirst.

Ferrari 599 GTB 60F1 (2011) first official pictures

Ferrari is launching a special pack of paint and trim options on the 599, called the 599 GTB 60F1. It's designed to mark six decades of winning in Formula 1 (not something the scuderia has done much of in 2011). Froilan Gonzalez won Ferrari's first F1 race in the 375 F1 car back in July 1951; 60 years later, Fernando Alonso won Ferrari's first race of the current season in the 150° Italia.