The De Tomago Mangusta (or Mongoose) is so called because 'It Eats Cobras'
Harrods was one of the first Morgan dealers.
Rolls-Royce refused to sells its Phantom IV to anyone other than a member of the Royal Family (I think they made an exception for Elvis).
The 1911 Stutz Racer which contested the Inaugural Indy 500 took just five weeks to design and build.
The 1922 Trojan had an all-weather 'Indoor' Starting handle.
The 'A Mars a day helps you work rest and play' slogan was first coined by the Famous British Formula 1 Commentator Murray Walker.
Of the 24.3 million cars in Britain , more than 2 million lack a valid tax disk.
The Ford DFV Grand Prix engine won it's very first race and went on to score a record 155 victories between 1967 and 1983.
Luxembourg has the most crowded roads in Europe with 570 cars per 1,000 inhabitants. Britain has just 427.
The Green Monster, Art Afrons 576 MPH, Jet Powered 1965 Record Breaker, Cost £6,000! That's less than a Ford Fiesta!!
By 1905 London had 19 motorised Taxicabs and 10,361 of the horsedrawn variety.
The motoring press welcomed the 'genuine' 150 MPH top speed but it is believed that early test cars were souped-up by the factory.
The car with the highest MPG is the Team 1200 with 9,427 MPG. It could drive around the equator (24,902 miles) on only 2.5 gallons of petrol!!
The Trojan Bubble Car Company also built McLaren racing cars.
The first car to swim the British channel, a 1962 Amphicar, used a triumph herald engine.
Predating the People-Carrier by half a century, James Young Built a Bentley with sliding doors as early as 1935.
Chrysler launched its 1934 Airflow Sedan after deciding that most cars were more aerodynamically efficient when travelling backwards.
Peter Stevens whose credits include the McLaren F1, the Lotus Elan and the Jaguar XJR-15 also designed the sunroof handle for the original Ford Granada.
After crashing at Brooklands in 1913, Percy Lambert was buried at Bropton cemetery in a coffin streamlined to match his car.
Rudolf Diesel's first engine ran on coal dust.
Mini creator Sir Alec Issigonis failed maths three times.
The BMW Z3 is the first German car to be built solely outside Germany.
Racing in temperatures of up to 100°c Keke Rosberg won the Dallas Grand Prix wearing a water-cooled skull cap.
The three highest paid sportsmen of 1996 were all Michaels - Shumacher Tyson and Jordan.
The Queen learnt to drive whilst serving with the wartime ATS.
1940's Racing driver Robert Cowells had the world's first sex-change operation.
When Peugeot bought Chrysler's entire European operation in 1978 they paid the Americans only $1.
A Japanese man has legalised a Reynard F3000 car so it can be driven on the road, this car generates enough downforce at 150 MPH to be driven upside-down.
Mini drivers were offered £6 a month by jeans giant Levi in 1977 if they would let their cars be transformed into mobile adverts. The minis were painted with the Levi Logo, with a huge zipper running down the side Owners could choose whether to keep the paint job for anything between three months and a year.
The first Daimler to be fitted with brake disks was the four-wheeled-drive Scout cars which were made for the war.
A scaled down version of the tricked-out Aston Martin DB5 James Bond drove in the GoldFinger film was one of toy-makers Corgi's best-ever sellers. The 007 model was sold in 137 different countries, and more than 6 million were bought worldwide.
The AA originated from the Brighton Motor Road Patrol which kept watch on the Brighton Road to warn motorists of speed traps.
An airbag moves up to 4500 mph within a second when triggered. A force of 200g is generated. They are designed to explode at an impact speed of 19 mph. The bag inflates within 40 milliseconds of a crash.
Approximately 100,000 people in the UK own an American car
There are 200 million cars in the US - 40 percent of the worlds total
94% trips from an American home involve the use of a car (60% in UK).
Top fuel dragsters accelerate at up to 5g from standing start. The nitromethane injection produces 6000 BHP.
Pro-Stock dragsters are modified Touring cars with approximately eight times more horsepower.
Enzo Ferrari used to drive for Alfa Romeo.
The Ferrari Formula 1 team is unique in that it produces both chassis and engines for its cars.
Ferrari makes a maximum of 14 cars every day.
The Fiat Strada was handbuilt by robots.
There were only 107 models of the Ford GT40 made of which only 7 were road cars.
Wooden wheels were a factory option until 1939 with Mercedes.
The Porsche 911 was originally badged as a 901 until a disagreement with Peugeot who were using the ' 0 ' in their model numbering.
In Rallying your blood group must be displayed on your helmet or overalls.
The Ford Puma is the first Ford to be entirely designed on computer.
Rob Walker's Dog once jumped through a window to escape from one of the LeMans drivers toy cars.
A Mini Marcos was the only British car to finish the 1966 LeMans but soon afterwards it was stolen.
In the Twenties a vehicle was exempted from car tax if it was only used for driving the servants to the church.
The 1947 Volvo PV444 had a Dash-Mounted flower vase.
Europe's Leading restaurant guide started life as a promotional gimmick for the Michelin Tyre Company.
When the Preston Bypass Britan's first Motorway, opened in 1958 the penalty for reversing up the carriageway was a £20 fine.
Ferrari Or Alfa Romeo didn't make the first sports car, Vauxhall did in 1911.
Herbert Austin, the motoring pioneer built the Austin Village - 199 all-wood bungalows in 1917, to house his factory workers in Longbridge, Birmingham. They were supposed to be temporary but are still lived in today.
It costs £20,000 for an F1 car to compete 1 lap. Designing and building an F1 car's chassis costs from £500,000 to £1 million, a set of four tyres is £1,200 to £1,500, and a 300-mile engine strip-down costs £30,000.
The London motorshow began in November 1895, organised by RAC founder member Sir Evelyn Ellis, It was merely 5 cars in a field, and only 500 people turned up.
Until 1923 in Italy, motorists could drive on the right-hand side of the road in rural areas, but had to drive on the left in towns and cities.
The Worlds longest traffic hold-up was 110 miles long, between Paris and Lyon on the French Autoroute in 1980. A more recent contender for the title was a 100 mile long traffic Jam, near Hamburg in Germany in 1993
Running on hot air was once though of as a good way of powering a car. In Chicago, the makers of the 1902 Caloric claimed that the engine could be started by using a high-power blowtorch to blast the cylinder head, until it got red hot and the petrol in the engine cylinders ignited, I guess safety was not a main concern!
In the twenties, fabric materlials were used to cover car bodywork - partly because it saved in weight. Most fasbrics were green or blue, but towards the end of the decade, car makers started using tartan fabrics to brighten up their cars. Suprisingly enough, the trend soon died!.
The first known automobile was built in 1668, it was a two foot long steam powered model constructed by Ferdinand Verbiest, a Belgian Jesuit preist.
License plates were introduced by the Parisian police in 1893. They were first introduced to Britain in 1903, the first British number plate A1 was secured by the second Earl Russell for his 12 BHP Napier.
The longest custom-built car is the 16-wheeled, 60ft (18.3 metres) Cadillac limousine. It features a swimming pool, hot tub, helipad, satellite dish, crystal chandelier and has 'ample luggage space'.
The most powerful piston enine car is 'Quad Al', designed and built in 1964 by Jim Lytle. It features four Alison V12 aircraft engines with an engine size of 112.1 Litres and can put out 12,000 BHP, it has 4 wheel drive, 8 wheels, 96 exhaust pipes, and weighs 2958 Kg!
Currently, the most powerful car on the road is the 6-wheeled, Jameson-Merlin, powered by a 27 Litre, 1760 BHP Rolls Royce V12 Merlin engine, it weighs 2.65 tons and can travel 300 miles on its 60 gallon tank.
The fastest time for removing a car engine, and replacing it is 42 seconds for a Ford Escort, on 21 November 1985.
The first patrol cars owned by the British Metropolitan Police were so slow, that they couldn't even break the 20 mph speed limit.
Adolf Hitler had a false floor fitted into his Mercedes 770K, making him look 5 inches taller, when he stood up in the car.
To test noises, Saab produced an acoustic hall, that was so effective that you could hear your own heart beat. So commited to are Saab to their sounds, that they decided that the seatbelt inertia reel should make a classy 'r-r-r-r-r-p' noise when the belt was put on, not a cheap, tacky 'tchk-tchk-tchk-tchk' noise.
Funny Car Stories
Charles Rodney of Calgary, Canada invited the golfers at his local course to use his 1985 Saab for target practise, as he was fed up with the repair bills.
Tom Steele, an American DJ from South Carolina was fined after staging a bizarre tribute to blind singer Ray Charles, where he drove blindfolded, with a friend giving him directions from the passenger seat.
An Indonesian man, came to the rescue afterdriving a corpse 93 miles to the funeral on his moped after the herse broke down.
Australian detectives are investigating the theft of a car in melborne - from a Mrs Carless.
A Danish man has been banned for drunk driving, after being spotted overtaking a car at 20 mph on his lawnmower, just after leaving the pub.
A spate of dead Minis in the early Sixties was traced back to an unusual source - a red feather duster. The Minis were coughing due to carburettors clogged by red hairs, the hairs were traced to a feather duster owned by one of the cleaning ladies on the production line.
