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The 2,000,000th Land Rover Defender. Images courtesy Jaguar Land Rover.

By any measure, it was an unusual auction: A single lot was presented on stage at Bonhams’s Bond Street showroom in London, England, and all proceeds from the sale went to a pair of charities, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, and the Born Free Foundation. When the hammer fell on the 2,000,000^th Land Rover Defender built (a number that also includes Series I,II and III models) a buyer from Qatar had paid 400,000 pounds (roughly $600,000) for the SUV, believed to be a record price for a Land Rover model sold at auction.

The 2,000,000th Defender rolls off the assembly line in May 2015.

Constructed at Land Rover’s Solihull plant in May of 2015, the Defender 90 model was assembled with the help of celebrity line workers with ties to the company’s history. Perhaps best known to American readers was Bear Grylls, the former Special Air Service member who’s turned wilderness survival into a television career, along with British actress Virginia McKenna OBE, who played the role of Joy Adamson in the 1966 film Born Free. Stephen and Nick Wilks, sons of the brand’s founders, also contributed labor to the 2,000,000^th Defender, and Arthur Goddard, the head of the engineering team for the original Land Rover, traveled from his home in Australia to witness the truck roll off the assembly line.

Befitting such a unique vehicle, the Defender 90 included an engraving of Red Wharf Bay, Anglesey, Wales, the spot where the shape of the original Land Rover was first etched in the sand by Maurice Wilks for his brother, Spence. The leather seats carry the same motif, along with “Number 2,000,000” embroidery. Fitted to the driver’s seat, an aluminum plaque bears the signatures of everyone involved in the vehicle’s assembly, and even the S90 HUE registration plates pay homage to the tags on the first pre-production Land Rover model, HUE 166.

Arthur Goddard, age 94, enjoys a ride in the 2,000,000th Land Rover Defender.

The final Land Rover Defender is slated to roll off the assembly line in Solihull in early 2016. A replacement model, which reportedly will be offered to U.S. buyers, remains under development.

Now, another common misconception amongst my clients is that ‘Lean’ and efficiency improvements all started with Toyota – wrong.

1913: At the Highland Park Plant in 1913, Henry Ford introduced the first moving assembly line for cars. Within 18 months it took only 1.5 man-hours to build a Model T. The modern auto industry was born.

Cover: Patrick Depailler’s Tyrell P34 at the 1976 Dutch Grand Prix. Photos courtesy of McKlein Publishing.

Do you have a passion for racing in the 1950s through the 1970s? An interest in Formula One, sports cars, touring cars and rally cars? Do you subscribe to the theory that when it comes to art, bigger is better? If so, the 26-inch by 19-inch, 26-page Motorsport Classic calendar from McKlein Publishing is worthy of your consideration.

The Motorsport Classic calendar has been produced by McKlein Motorsport Publishing since 2001, making the 2016 edition its 16^th publishing. Each is produced in a limited quantity, though the company has increased the printing run from 1,500 copies in the early years to 2,000 copies today. Photos come from McKlein’s own archive, which includes the works of motorsport photographers like Alois Rottensteiner, Lars Olaf Magnil, Hans Georg Isenberg, Hugh Bishop, and Robert Kroeschel.

March: Hans Stuck, father of Hans-Joachim Stuck, drives a BMW 700 RS on its debut outing at Rossfeld in 1961. Two such 70-horsepower models were built by BMW exclusively for hill climb competition.

Each month presents two alternative black and white photos, printed on heavyweight stock and representing an event 40, 45, 50, 55 or 60 years in the past. There’s no particular bias towards any one series, and the diversity of images contained is impressive.

June: Tony Brooks drives the Aston Martin DBR1 shared with Reg Parnell at Le Mans in 1956. A broken axle ended the car’s race after 246 laps.

Want to see F1 World Champion perched atop the engine bay of a Ford Lotus Cortina at the 1966 RAC Rally? How about Niki Lauda pumping fuel during a 1976 test of the Ferrari 312T, or Stig Blomqvist wheeling his Saab 96 V through the snow in the 1971 RAC Rally? Remember when Niki Lauda pulled his Ferrari 312T into the pits in protest at the 1976 Japanese Grand Prix, conceding the F1 Championship to James Hunt? There’s a shot of that, too.

October: Luigi Musso examines the broken steering of his Lancia D50 at the 1956 Italian Grand Prix. With three laps remaining, Musso had worked his way into the lead when his steering failed; though he lost the race (to winner Stirling Moss, driving a Maserati 250F) he was fortunate to escape without injury.

Quality and exclusivity come at a price, and the Motorsport Classic calendar sells for $83, including shipping to addresses in the lower 48 United States. For fans of the Word Rally Championship, McKlein also produces “The Wider View,” a 36-inch wide calendar of shots from contemporary WRC competition, along with a Desktop Rally Calendar that includes both vintage and present-day shots, in a more manageable size and price.

For more information on the Motorsport Classic calendar, visit P-Sport.com.

1972 AMC Javelin AMX print ad, courtesy Production Cars.

In 1971, Mark Donahue delivered American Motors’s first Trans-Am championship behind the wheel of a Javelin AMX. The manufacturer wasted no time in promoting this, and a 1972 print ad proclaimed the new Javelin AMX was “The closest you can come to owning the Trans-Am champion.” More revolutionary, however, was the year-long “Buyer Protection Plan” offered by AMC for the 1972 model year.

AMC wasn’t the first manufacturer to offer a warranty to consumers, but it was the first to offer such comprehensive protection for such an extended duration. Excluding tires, the manufacturer agreed to pay for repair or replacement of any part found defective in materials or workmanship, for the first 12 months or 12,000 miles of operation. If repairs stretched overnight, AMC dealers were even obligated to provide a loaner car at no charge, and customers still dissatisfied were given a name and a toll-free telephone number to discuss the issue with a company representative. In return for this Buyer Protection Plan, customers were expected to have their cars serviced by an AMC dealer in accordance with the provided schedule.

Today, a 12-month, 12,000-mile bumper-to-bumper warranty is a given, with limited warranties sometimes stretching out as long as 10 years (typically for rust-through). In 1972, however, long-term accountability was something that automakers on any continent attempted to avoid.

On the performance side, the $3,109 1972 Javelin AMX came standard with a 304-cu.in., 150-horsepower V-8, fed by a single two-barrel carburetor. For additional thrust, buyers could opt for a 360-cu.in. V-8, rated at 175 horsepower with a two-barrel carburetor or 195 with a four-barrel, or the 401 V-8, which put out a satisfying 255 horsepower and 345 pound-feet of torque. Transmission options included a three-speed manual or Torque-Command automatic with most engine choices, but the four-barrel 360 and 401 came with the buyer’s choice of a four-speed manual or Torque-Command automatic.

The Go Package also included dual exhausts, a T-shaped hood stripe, a blackened rear panel, Rally-Pak instrumentation, a handling package, a fiberglass cowl-induction hood, heavy-duty cooling, a Twin-Grip differential, power front disc brakes and E60x15 raised white letter Goodyear Polyglass tires. With the 401, such a car would have stickered at $3,614, about $400 more than a 396-equipped Camaro SS.

Ronan at Ran When Parked recently came across this postcard scene of a ski resort parking lot somewhere in the Alps, and with a little digging, we think we’ve pinpointed it as Serre-Chevalier in the far southeast of France. When it was taken continues to elude us, so let’s try to identify the cars parked in the lot and extrapolate a date from the ages of the cars. What do you see here?

10 Best Concept Cars That Never Were

Car makers have long designed cars that stretched the boundaries of technology and novelty as part of their effort to develop new ideas and new designs. In many cases, manufacturers never intend these so-called concept cars to enter production. Instead, these cars test possibilities and inspire new designs as part of the effort to bring better cars into the marketplace. The following list includes some of the best concept cars that testified to the brilliance of their designers, but, regrettably, never became available for sale.

1. Mazda Furai

Mazda Fuari

Maserati Birdcage

BMW M1 Hommage

Bertone Jaguar B99

Ford GT90

Citroën GT

Ferrari P4-5

Lamborghini Estoque

2010 Renault DeZir Paris

Mercedes-Benz

Pontiac’s mid-engine, rear-drive, two-seat Fiero debuted for the 1984 model year, and consumers immediately began asking for a more powerful engine than the 2.5-liter “Iron Duke” four-cylinder found beneath the hood. For 1985, Pontiac responded with a 2.8-liter six-cylinder option, which increased output from 92 horsepower to a slightly more sporting 140 horsepower, still not quite enough to threaten Corvette sales. Standard equipment on the GT trim level, the V-6 was also available on SE models, like this 1985 Pontiac Fiero 2M6 SE, for sale on Hemmings.com. Unlike many of its surviving brethren, this example is an unmodified one-owner car, with less than 46,000 miles on the odometer. It’s even equipped with the four-speed manual transmission, making it among the sportiest variants available in the model’s early years. From the seller’s description:

1985 Pontiac Fiero 2M6 SE;

2.8 Liter six cylinder port fuel injected engine;

4 Speed manual transmission;

SE trim package, power windows and locks, removeable sunroof, factory audio;

One owner since new, totally original, never abused, runs and drives like new;

All original paperwork, clear NJ title;

Clean inside and out, non-smoker;

New tires 500 miles ago

Photos courtesy Building the Legend, except where noted.

Generally the rarer a car was to begin with, the greater likelihood that somebody will eventually replicate it. Indeed, two reproductions set to debut in England early next year take inspiration from two of Jaguar’s rarest vehicles: the XK180 concept car and the one-off XJ13 Le Mans car.

Malcolm Sayer‘s design work for the latter started in the late 1950s and the car itself ran in 1964, but it took until the early part of 1966 for Jaguar to complete the mid-engine racer and then another year for the company to begin testing it. By that time, the XJ13 had become outdated for racing, but Coventry kept testing it, interested in developing its experimental V-12 – essentially a pair of the company’s double overhead-camshaft inline-sixes paired together on a common crankcase – for its road cars.

The testing came to an end in January 1971, in part because the Series 3 E-Type debuted with the production V-12 not long after, but moreso due to the infamous crash of the XJ13 at the MIRA test track in Warwickshire. Blamed on a separated tire or wheel, the crash at triple-digit speeds sent test driver Norman Dewis tumbling, and while Dewis emerged from it unhurt, the car appeared totaled. After a couple years in storage, Jaguar then had it rebuilt, though not exactly as it was before the crash.

That’s what Neville Swales intends to rectify with his reproduction of the XJ13. While the original remains with Jaguar, as a part of the Jaguar Heritage Trust Display in the British Motor Museum, Swales – prodded on by his discovery of a 5.0L double overhead-camshaft V-12 from the XJ13 program – has spent the last few years researching and piece-by-piece re-creating the XJ13 in its original pre-crash form, enlisting the help of North Devon Metalcraft in bodying the car in aluminum.

“The project has been supported by surviving members of the original XJ13 Project Team and we have enjoyed the co-operation of Jaguar Heritage which has allowed us unfettered access to its archive,” Swales said in a press release. According to Swales’s buildlog for the reproduction, surviving members of the team who contributed to the project include Gerry Beddoes, Mike McElligott, Peter Jones, Peter Wilson, Frank Philpott and Jim Eastick.

Swales also intends to build a series of customer cars using what he’s learned and the parts he’s replicated for his reproduction. While the reproduction will use the prototype 5.0L V-12 that Swales uncovered, the customer cars will use production-line single overhead-camshaft Jaguar V-12s, though Swales has plans to recreate the XJ13 V-12 as well.

Photo courtesy JePe Specials.

Though not as storied as the XJ13, the XK180 concept car that Jaguar exhibited in 1999 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the XK120 still caught the attention of Eric Fintelman who, disappointed with existing replicas of the XK180 on the market, decided to build his own. As with Swales, Jaguar gave Fintelman access to the two show cars, and Fintelman went about recreating the XK180 in aluminum with series production in mind, designing it specifically to mount on an XKR or XK8 chassis.

Both reproductions will debut at next year’s London Classic Car Show, which will take place February 18-21 at ExCeL London. For more information, visit theLondonClassicCarShow.co.uk.

A circa-1964 Polaris Sno Traveler. WinterFest photos courtesy of Owls Head Transportation Museum.

The Owls Head Transportation Museum used to include a display of snow machines as part of its (formerly) annual WinterFest, but per public relations director Jenna Lookner, this event hasn’t been held in several years. On January 23, the museum will dedicate a day to one of WinterFest’s most popular attractions: the vintage snow machine. Focusing on hardware built before 2000, “The Evolution of Snow Machines” will take place on the grounds of the Owls Head, Maine museum.

A Model T snow machine conversion.

The event is open to all pre-2000 mechanical snow machines, including Model T conversions, snowmobiles, Sno-Cats and others. Those wishing to display vehicles are asked to register in advance with the museum, as indoor display space is limited to the first 50 entrants. Additional display space for running snow machines will be available outside, on the museum’s Runway 17, and short trails on the property will be available for running displays.

A Tucker Sno-Cat on the trails.

Judging will left to museum visitors, and categories will include Best of Show, Best Original/Preserved, Most Innovative Design and Best Restored Machine. Registration and setup begins at 7:30 a.m. on January 23, with the show open to the public from 10:00 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. The usual $12 adult entry fee covers admission to the event, and those over 65 get in for $10. Those under 18, as well as active duty and retired military, get in free.

The Evolution of the Snow Machine is the first in a series of 2016 events planned by the museum. For more details on upcoming exhibits and special events, visit OwlsHead.org.