The one after the Fiat 600 Multipla is not a Fiat 500, but a Fiat 600.
Fiat 500 had a twin inline engine of 499cm3, 18 bhp.
600 had a more modern 633 cm3 straight 4 cyl, 21 bhp. The same engine has been produced by Fiat and put in the Fiat Cinquecento (1991-1998) produced by FSM in Poland. It had a different displacement (899 cm3) and EFI for a wow power of 39 bhp.
The same engine has been used by Autobianchi in the car pictured in the first image of the post, the model A/112. It had a 903 cm3 engine with 45 bhp.
The same engine in Abarth models used to reach over 110 bhp, for very small and fast machines (Please see models OTR1000 and OTR1000 Radiale)

These are awesome.

But you had better not even think of driving them on the Audubon or the LA freeway during peak hours

The CityEl looks very much like the "Ellert" which was an electric car produced in Denmark in the late 80's

http://www.ellert.info/ (only link i could find with Ellerts)

Some of these cars are wonderful! I particularly like the Goggomobil Dart. If they only made 700 of them 40-50 years ago, they must go for a mint, now.

I swear I saw someone driving an Avion the other day, or something very much like it (and how many types of three-wheel mini-sportscar can there be?). There are enough old people with more money than sense, around here, for it to be possible.

The Goggomobil in the picture is an Australian bodied Dart made by Buckle Motors, Sydney.

The Davis Divan isn't a micro car. Being 15' long, 6' wide and about 2400lbs it is about the size of most modern family sedans.

@ Miss Universe

why? I don't think they drive pretty fast in rush hours in those places.. And in U.S. of A. the speed limit is 55 mph anyway (correct me if I'm wrong) and e.g. the Fiat 500 could run at 65 mph (I had one that could touch easily 140 Km/h - 87mph, please check it here --> http://www.cardomain.com/ride/2221353/4)

Does anyone know what the green pickup with the crate in the bed is?

We had some small cars made in Brazil by Gurgel and Dacon (regional companies) in the 70's and 80's.
Gurgel XEF
Gurgel
Dacon

Hi, just skimmed through, my toddlers love this site..
Anyway, you might have missed the Thundersly Invacar, it was a three-wheeler vehicle which was quite common on the UK's road at one time.

http://www.3wheelers.com/invacar.html

The CityEl is indeed (pretty much) identical to the original Danish Ellert (correct name: Mini-el), and the German website also acknowledges this.

How could you miss the Peel P50 the smallest car in the world? 49ccs one door one light (not headlight light period), and no reverse gear.

Instead of a reverse gear it featured a handle for the driver to drag the car backwards.

Also in regard to the "Mutt". Mutt was a nickname for the M151. Featuring a short narrow wheelbase and fully independent suspension it was one of the most dangerous vehicles ever built. It would flip over going around a 35mph corner.

Rayceeya - Peel car is discussed at length in Part 1. Thank you for other info :)

FYI, Fiat 600 and Zaporozhets are not the same design at all. Only common thing between them is the design principle, but the ZAZ has no common parts with the Fiat. Fiat 600 has a water-cooled inline 4-cylinder engine whereas ZAZ has air-cooled V4 arrangement. There are basically no interchangeable parts between them.

Oh, and the three-weeled Goliath thing stayed in production in India until 2000 as the Bajaj Hanseat.

Hope this information is of any use.

55mph speed limit in the US? Not since the 70's. It's 70mph on most interstate highways and in Texas we have a few that are 80mph. Up north in Montana there are highways with no speed limit.

Your mystery photo is Johan Lorbeers.

More info http://damncoolpics.blogspot.com/2008/04/johan-lorbeers-still-life-performance.html

you can post photos like the strange frog or glamorous insect?? i like it!

www.ilrolla.blogspot.com

Heh, that Bruce Willis pic cracked me up. What is the source on that?

not quite sure... came from email")

LHC = large hadron collider. LHC collider = PIN number = stupid mistake.

The Pope's background looks vaguely like cannabis leaves. < <

real men don´t drink and drive

ah, the not so distant future.
Wait, we don't even have flying cars yet. drats.

The black-and-white illustrations show amazing artistry. Makes me long for the more innocent times of early SF. Thanks for posting them.

>> Wait, we don't even have
>> flying cars yet.

Let's be clear about one thing. We DO have the knowledge and technology to make flying cars for everybody. We DON'T have cheap enough energy to afford them.

It's amazing that these SF authors never sat down and did the math. It's easy to figure out the energy cost of sending a rocket to the moon. It's relatively easy to figure out what you might find there and how much energy you will get back from it. And to see that lunar travel for mining purposes will not happen, because it incurs an energy loss. Hence the non-appearance of the spaceships depicted in '2001'.

I see they based some work on the classical Adamski UFO... http://forgetomori.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/07/adamski.jpg

Anonymous, it's called Science FICTION for a reason ;)

Kristoffer, we do have flying cars, it's just that they are neither affordable nor are they safe :)

Like Kristoffer said, we don't have flying cars. I don't have one, and neither do you.

yes, Mikado - I was surprised by the level of detail in these illustrations.

Superb art, thanks for sharing it!

I notice that image 13 from the top reproduces some of the "ancient astronauts" in prehistoric art, as popularized by Erich von Daniken - the goggled Japanese statuette is on the cover of his "In search of ancient gods" (1972). I didn't know that this master of pseudoscience had penetrated the iron curtain...

my parents actually own some of the books with Kazantsev illustrations, what a flashback!

Nice images. I always liked the soviet-style design of the rockets.

my god... i have re-read all of these books times and times again when i was a kid.... simply amazing sci-fi in the best of soviet tradition of "realistic sci-fi" thank you.... andrei

Nice illustrations. Post linked with Spanish translation. Ciao.

The "great fake" seems very unlikely to be a fake... that's just what opossums look like.

The flat turtle is a Cantor's giant turtle form Cambodia.

the fake isn't fake--it's called a Solenodon, and they live in Cuba and Haiti:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solenodon

--TwoDragons

Your "monkey emoting" looks strangely like an ape.

Great collection.

Not just any ape, Anonymous @ 6:27 -- that's Snowflake, aka Copito de Nieve, an albino gorilla.

The Cantor's giant turtle is by David Emmett: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/05/photogalleries/wip-week29/photo3.html

Tali - thank you. Updated.

The Soledonon criature reminds me of those garbage rats from Jim Henson's Fraggle rock.