Hamilton Herald Masthead

Editorial


Front Page - Friday, May 16, 2014

Brainbuster – Make your brain tingle!




We’ve been helping a family member car shop lately, trying to get the best vehicle for the need and the money. It can be an intense experience, especially when it comes down to the money! Anyway, during all of the browsing of different cars, I got to wondering about some of them. I remembered my first car – a 1969 VW Beetle my dad bought for me. I loved it. My second car was a lime green, four-door Ford Mustang. I loved it, too!

How much do you know about cars? Take this little quiz and find out.

1. Which automobile company makes the Intrigue? Cadillac; Ford; Buick; Oldsmobile.

2. Which American car company made the Pacer? Ford; Oldsmobile; Chrysler; AMC.

3. Who made the GNX? Oldsmobile; Chevrolet; Ford; Buick.

4. If you were going to take a brief pleasure trip in a Ford, what vehicle would be the perfect choice?

5. The world’s first commercially mass-produced and marketed hybrid automobile was the Toyota Prius. It became available on the Japanese market in what year? 1995; 1997; 1999; 2000.

6. What’s the horsepower of the Ford Mustang SVT Cobra R produced in 2000? 355 bhp; 385 bhp; 390 bhp; 400bhp.

7. When was the Chevrolet Corvette first produced? 1950; 1953; 1958; 1960.

8. What car company was headed by the venerable Gordon Buehrig? Duessenburg; Packard; Chrysler; Auburn.

9. What Chrysler convertible was featured in the 2001 movie Pearl Harbor? Chronos; Newport Dual Cowl; Chrysler Windsor; Chrysler Crusade.

10. Yes or no: Was the Ford Edsel a failure?

ANSWERS: 

1. Oldsmobile. 

2. AMC. (Typing up Car Titles and Loan Papers at the AMC dealership in Memphis, Tenn., was one of my first jobs as a teen.) 

3. Buick. 

4. The Ford Excursion. Your excursion could turn into an off-road adventure since that’s what it’s built to do. 

5. 1997. While the Honda Insight was the first hybrid-electric vehicle to reach the US market in 1999, Toyota pulled out all stops to get its Prius to market in Japan in October, 1997. 

6. 385 bhp. The Ford Mustang SVT Cobra R comes with a 5.4L supercharged V8. It does 0-60 in 4.9 seconds and has a top speed of 170 mph. The SVT Cobra R from 1995 had a 5.8 liter engine and was 300bhp. 

7. 1953 – a good year since that’s also when I was born! 

8. Auburn. 

9. Chrysler Windsor. 

10. Yes. Even Lee Iococa said it was a failure!