Toyota LiteAce

(Photo by me)

Sometimes, abandoned cars look like they could actually still be usable for many years and thousands of kilometres. This Toyota standing in a parking lot in a small town in Greece is quite the opposite. Hardly displaying any undamaged parts, this LiteAce from the early 1980s wears the traces of having been used hard for about three decades.
As this is what those small commercial vans were built for, not many have survived until today. And as almost nobody is interested in collecting this kind of car, they are likely to become extinct soon.


(Photo by andrewcarspotter98)

Volvo 262 C

(Photo by racin jason)
Somewhere in New South Wales (Australia)there is a farm with lots of awesome cars not being moved or cared for.
This Volvo is one of them, just like the Rolls-Royce and the Porsche I presented earlier here.
But although Porsche or Rolls-Royce may sound more exclusive, the Volvo 262 C, which was designed by Bertone, is far rarer. With just 6622 examples produced, good cars of this model are hard to find and expensive (more than 10000€) today.
Especially the right-hand-drive models, like the one in the picture, are extremely rare.
The 262 C was produced from 1977 to 1981, the one in the picture is a late example (1980 or '81).
Strange fact: It has alloy wheels on it, which seem in good condition but don't fit the style of the car at all.
If the car was in good condition, too, it would look like that one:

(Picture by Mick Travis)

Simca 1100

(Photos by deudeuche)

Won't write too much this time, the pictures speak for themselves.
The Simca was produced more than 2 million times between 1968 and 1981.
Later, the make was converted to Talbot by the owner, Peugeot.

For comparison, the car in better days:

(Photo by renault19872000)

Plymouth Arrow

(Photos by dmitriy79. Click here for more photos of this car and higher resolutions.)

The driveway of a house is a strange place for an abandoned car.
However, this 1976 Plymouth Arrow 160 has been left there and does not look like it will move soon.
In fact, the Plymouth Arrow was a Mitsubishi Lancer Celeste, but as Mitsubishi did not officially sell cars in North America at this time, this model was sold as a Plymouth in the USA and as a Dodge in Canada from 1976 to 1980.
144000 cars were sold. Interestingly, Plymouth used the name "Arrow" for a truck from 1981 on.
The example in the picture is equipped with the basic 1.6-litre engine.
Notice the white-wall-tire and the original extra-headlamps.
Here you see a Dodge Arrow in better condition:

(Picture by dave_7)

Citroën CX Break

(Photo by Deudeuche)
This Citroën CX Break is obviously completely lost. Standing in the middle of bushes, it is rusting away and many parts are missing.
The CX, which was produced from 1974 to 1991, was sold more than 1 million times.
The Break (estate-version) was introduced in 1976 and made up a big part in the sale numbers. It was also available with 8 seats.
But as many of these cars have been scrapped, you can almost call the CX rare and extremely good examples can cost 20000€ now.
When it was new, the Break looked like that:

(Photo by citroen-cx.info)

Peugeot 504 Coupe

Here we have a Peugeot 504 Coupe just standing on a street in the Netherlands.

(Photo by Skitmeister)

The car looks more or less undamaged, only the paint will probably have suffered from the dirt on it.
But the fact it has two different rims could tell that the owner did not care about it all too much even before he abandoned the car on the roadside.
The 504 was one of the most successful models by Peugeot. First introduced in 1968, the last 504 was built in Nigeria in 2005. In Europe, the production ended in 1983 though.
The Coupe, just as the convertible, was built in the same time, but in much smaller numbers. So nowadays, this model is rare and quite expensive.
The car in the photo was built after 1975, recognizable by the large taillights. So it has 106 or 144 bhp.
Originally, the car looked like this:

(Photo by Robotriot)

As you can see, the abandoned car does not have the original bumper and front rim anymore.

Jaguar XJ Series II

(Picture by Martin van Duijn)
This is a Jaguar XJ6 Series II, which has been built from 1973 to 1979. The car in this picture does not look to rusty, just the dirt coming with time has covered the paint. It has been abandoned in the garden of a house nobody lives in anymore. The car seems to be a bit customized with tinted windows, extra chrome around the wheels and white sidewall tires. So somebody seemed to have liked it before it was left to rot.
It once was a large luxurious limousine with 3.4 or 4.2 litre engines. Nearly 130000 Jaguar XJ Series II were sold, including the coupe-version. The XJ6 cost around 65000$ at that time.
Nowadays, it is not especially rare or expensive, although very good examples can cost more than 25000$.
In better condition, the car looked like that:

(Image from a seller on mobile.de)

Ford Escort Mk2

Welcome to my new blog.
Here, I will show you cars left to rot somewhere, compared to what they looked like when they were new.
Sometimes, I will also write about abandoned car dealerships, showing pictures and telling as much of their story as I can reconstruct.

This first post is about the Ford Escort Mk2 you see here:

(Photo by paul70allen, click on the picture for a higher resolution)
This car is standing on a car graveyard and somehow looks like it's been shot at.
The Escort Mk2 has been produced from 1974 to 1980.
Here you see the 3-door-version, that was also available as the sports-model "RS2000", which looked a bit different and had 110hp. The Escort was also sold as an estate or with 5 doors.
When it was new, it looked like this:

You can still recognize the original rims and some chrome parts on the abandoned car. The mirror is on the right side because the car is British.