The last ones are blasted in 4L Trophy

More seriously, with more than 8 Millions cars produced, and the last ones sold just 20 years ago, I don't think we should already consider this car as an endangered species...

But you're right, they are less and less often seen, older ones are now showing in classic cars meetings while less older cars appear in old cars magazines.
Just for the fun, I'll try to check how much R4 I see in a week

You're totally wrong with that thinking.
Especially about these cheap mass-produced cars noone took care. When they are worn out, they were junked. The R4 belonged to those vehicles, the TÜV-engineers were very picky with, due the notorious rust problems. So the very most R4 here were wrecked already in the 80ies, that much, that were not many left over for the Abwrackprämie-scrappage sheme in 2009.
And think about the new medial hysterias in the last years, with safety, fuel economy, etc.
And remember its bigger brother, the R6. How many were built of it in Europe, over 2 millions, as I read. To Germany over 200.000 R6 were imported - and absolutely all are gone. Over 10 years ago there was an article about a German R6-freak. He said, that over here less than ten survivors are known, only three still officially registrated.

Seeing an R4 here in West Germany? Outside classic car meetings (even there they are rare, sometimes you spot there more Alpines A110/A111 than R4), in daily usage? Maybe one or two ... per year!
You see rather a 2CV with that purpose. Or in East Germany a Trabant. And yes, all-day VW Typ1 are extinct here, too.

I like the way you make friends

I drove the "used R4" of a friend not that long ago, and there is still some of them in the street. Maybe you should consider French old cars are still existing in France, where they were mainly sold⁽¹⁾. Making a world statement just from what you see in Germany may be quite a bit irrelevant...

I said I'll check in the street, so I'll be able to see if they have disappeared or not. Until then, I'll stay with my "totally wrong thinkings"
________

(1) Except for old Citroën, because Dutch people buy all of them in France and take them back in Netherlands
_________

Edit: a very fast search gives 75 + 23 classic and used R4 for sale, just within the 5 first links. You may now understand why I don't see that car as a very rare one in France...

a) No problem, you're welcome

b) Not that much any more, especially no DS and CX any more, since the Dutch rules were changed at the beginning of 2014. Now cars, older 40 years are tax-free. In the last years cars, older than 25 years were tax-free. The result was, that Holland was flooded with old and big clunkers (clunkers, not classics). These cars, as the mentioned big Citroen, but also masses of junky Benzes, BMWs and US Cars were converted to LPG-usage and then used as cheap all-day-drivers. As not many of them had been classics, the owners today have really problems to sell them again.
In NL now you have to pay high taxes for those and re-re-importing back to Germany makes not much sense. Yes, for cars older than 30 years we can have a tax- and insurance-reduced historic registration (the "H-plate"), but the cars should be in not too rough condition - and a LPG-conversions makes the acceptance by the TÜV nearly impossible.

@so folks all around here: if anyone is interested to purchase an older bigger junky car for a good price, go to Holland ...until they are all crushed.


c) about the R4-offers. These are the actual ones in Germany: http://fahrzeuge.autoscout24.de/?atype=C&mmvmk0=60&mmvmd0=1974&mmvco=1&make=60&model=- 1974&pricefrom=1000&cy=D&ustate=N,U&fromhome=1
really not much, eeh? Especially with reminding, that for many years the R4 was the most sold import car.

I can count those seen in a year here in Brussels. I think two, maybe three this year, but not more I think...
I think I saw more often a DS (at least three recently).

I guess that in France they live longer, partially due to a less strict technical inspection (and much more were sold there originally than in Belgium).

UK figures - Renault 6 - 26 left, plus 10 SORN; Renault 4 about 250+, and more SORN, but I can't be arsed to track all the different entries (cars, vans, pickups etc). More Renault 6 than I'd expected - I would have guessed single figures.

Thanks for the cliché
This was maybe true 15 or 20 years ago, when the technical inspection started in France, but it is somewhat stronger (fr), nowadays. I could no longer drive my (just used, at that time) "rusty lace" Simca 1100 break as I did in late 90s, with today's rules

And successive French government scrapping incentives "helped" lot of potential classic cars to disappear...


2009 French statistics said there was still about 150 000 R4 in France. I just wonder how many disappeared during the last 5 years.
(We have no "SORN" possibility, in France)
__________

My own statistics, as I promised: I saw 2 R4 (a Savane and a normal blue one) this week. Which means one hundred or so per year, "à la louche"

Edit: by "normal blue", I mean not "EDF blue" nor "Gendarmerie blue"
And speaking about Renault 4 from gendarmerie...

Still less strict than here I think
For example the last time I failed the technical inspection was because the battery wasn't properly fixed; according to that table, in France it does not require a second visit.



Yes, that's sad

I spotted this one yesterday in Sweden.
Its a 1987 Mustang LX with a four cylinder (66 kW) engine, imported in 1989.
What caught my interest was the repeater on the front fender and the red reflectors on the rear bumper.



I wonder how common the inline-four was, especially combined with the LX-trim?

I found KITT's brother and Opel with Vauxhall front i think..

Uh..you do know KITT's brother is KARR, right?

My brother-in-law has bought annother old ambulance:















Spotted this March in Oakland/CA

A Maya car?

Now a plenty of impressions of my most favourite classic car event http://oldtimermarkt-bockhorn.com/ from yesterday

Due the pure amount of participating cars (and you have to check the offers on the spare parts market, too), I photographed only the (for me) most outstanding cars, resp.cars, which may be interesting for you.






Asking price 9990 € - acceptable?





The little badge left says "FANTOMAS"





The bad behaviour of the musclecar-owner disturbed me a bit - he was smoking, when the ADAC-mechanic tried to fix the defect










@Gamer: I forgot to check, if it's a Camper-conversion




It was a conversion, made by a Renault-dealer, not officially by Renault itself:






Two very very early versions:






























This one was towed by the ADAC-service-car:




Very short communication to the owner (I don't want to disturb her, because the Bartwurst was just well-done):
- "Real?"
- "Yup!"
...and every VW-connaisseur knows, what it's meant






Was this an original or aftersales market-option? I've never noticed that before!






Although I had to realize by myself, that the times are going on, I've registrated these two offers under "funny jokes"

1000 € for





2300 € for






"Do not lick the paintwork!" was written on the windscreen. The "paintwork" was that asphalt-sort, you have on bitumen felt


















The parking disc was from Visby/Gotland:


















One of the most embarassing sights there. The "chrome" was made with this simple matt-siver colour, you paint stovepipes with

















Dutch paint sheme, I think:













For sale. @rjluna2: one of these high-roof-parcel Transporter of the Deutsche Bundespost:















Even two of this rarities had been there:




Yes, it has a trailer-coupling! And it was towing this camping-trailer!






Rare in LHD-version, I think:









One of the most bizarre sights - absolutely unthinkable, that all this stuff could ever be placed in a car with a German plate! (except it's owned by an exiled Dutchman:












It is very careless to leave the key in the ignition lock! Bad things as car thefts can happen so easily!





For the ladies, to concilate them with our hobby But with prices between 125 € and 165 € not really a bargain...




When I saw this bike, I've phoned my brother-in-law, if this would be an interesting offer and if he may know it (it was originally used by a police-unit in this area). He answered "Yes, a specific bikes, I rode on patrols by myself
The price -2500 € fixed- is bit more than these 1993 MZ 500 RF had cost, when they were sold by an uction in 2007: 800 €











Hardcore luxoury, the whole complete trim. It must have been incredible expensive back then
I'm a bit unsure about the originality, because this plate (invalid, placed there only for decoration) could be original from that car, but otherwise it has the US-spec sidemarkers. STH-plates weren't issued any more since 1974.
Does anyone know, if all of these extra options had been available in the USA? My question is, if this was a later re-imported US-version (if yes, and if the plate belonged to that car, this had been happened before 1974) or the first owner had ordered not only all extra option, but also these US-spec items.
The last theory may be plausible, because Stadthagen (since 1975 they have SHG-plates there) is not too far away from Hannover, where the Volkswagen Transporter-plant is located, plus the fact, that until the lates 80ies in STH/SHG the main office of "EuropCar", former "InterRent" and before that "Selbstfahrer Union" was located. Back then it was a VW-owned company.
Two reasona, why there may had been people with a big personal influence into the Volkswagen AG, for whom special treatments had been possible. Actually these "special treatments" had been possible (in different extents) for many thousands of VW-employees.






On the way back, tractor-pulling with 130 km/h. Why not? It's a Porsche...

Nice selection

I like the Renault convertible

Great pics Ingo! Lots of unusual cars. I see a lot of American models infiltrated the show.

Yes, this year they had the motto "American way of drive", with a special invitation for US Cars. So for that reason there were more US Cars than the last years. But I haven't photographed them that much, because I was unsure, if they are worth it. About the classic German cars I can widely estimate, if they are rarities.

Maybe today there are even more US Cars, but I'd been there only yesterday. On Saturday the free access for vehicles is limited until 1980, on Sunday until 1989. As usual on such events, the hardcore-spare-part-hunters are active on Saturday morning, even on Friday afternoon, and un Sunday there are mostly visitors, who want to look around, no classic car enthusiasts (so more boring for us freaks).



And now to something totally different. Didn't know that :

http://www.vredestein.it/car-tyres/giugiaro-design/giugiaro

It's a lot of years that at Italdesign (Giugiaro) draw everything for money, even Dutch tyres. This applies also for Pininfarina, for example:

And by the way, what a nice series of cars! Unfortunately, it's almost impossible to see so much interesting things here...

Nice, ingo



I see you found this 1970 version of Volkswagen Station Wagon here