Remembering my promise to write a post on the Petersen Automotive Museum in L.A., I don’t want to keep you in suspense any longer. Today I discuss the supercar exhibit at the Petersen showing through October.
When it is wet and rainy out in L.A. (which it almost never is), fancy car sightings are about as rare as seeing an elephant in front of your house! That left my Grandpa and me few choices to car spot. We decided to go to the Petersen Automotive Museum to gawk at the supercar and hybrid/alternative fuel exhibits. The hybrid exhibit was cool enough, but the supercar exhibit was even cooler. The hybrids and alternative fuels cars included a: Toyota Prius, Ford Focus Electric, Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG E-Cell and a classic Chevy truck converted to coal power. Those cars could be cars of the future! (Minus the Prius! Which is car of the present.) What about that old Chevy? Coal power is terrible for air quality and is fossil fuel dependent.
Meanwhile, the Supercar exhibit. Perchance to dream… Let me tell you what mine eyes saw within that treasured vault. The cars included a: 1963 Ferrari 400 Superamerica, a 1968 Bizzarini Manta, a 1988 Porsche 959, a 1990 Ferrari F40 and 2006 Bugatti Veyron Grand Sport, just to name a few. Those makers are some of the most well-known supercar makers that are around today (with the exception of Bizzarini). BOOYAH!! (Thanks, Uncle Bob!)
The Porsche 959 was the fastest car of its day, with one even hitting 202 mph! Much of the technology that was inside the 959 was so good that it has been used on all the Porsche 911 Turbo’s!
The Bizzarini Manta was a one-off (one-off means that the vehicle is just a crazy idea made into reality by some random person) car that was converted from a Le Mans prototype into a street car. About 30 were made total, only about 8 remain today.
The Bugatti Veyron Grand Sport is the second fastest production car in the world. The fastest is its big brother, the Veyron Super Sport. The Grand Sport can hit 253mph and go from 0-60 mph in just 2.8 seconds. The Veyron Super Sport can hit 268 mph and go from 0-60 mph in just 2.6 seconds.
The definition of a supercar is:
1. It must have all or many of the latest technological goods equipped on it.
2. It must be very easy to drive at high speeds.
3. It must have very good performance to actually be a supercar.
4. It must have a very high top speed.
5. It must have a very high price tag (just joking!)
6. At least one must be sent to me! (Just in case that I ever crash, I will have extras.)
Some of the cars that I would have liked to take home from the exhibit are the: Porsche 959, Ferrari F40 and the Bugatti Veyron Grand Sport. Okay…I wish I had a souvenir such as a Porsche 959…
Unfortunately, the website shows a lot of cars, and we only saw about 15 cars in the exhibit. We thought that we would be there for most of the afternoon. We were bummed out! We saw a security guard and asked him “why are there so few cars in the gallery?”
He said “Some of the owners wanted their cars back. My job is just to guard all of them. Sorry”
It was still a very cool exhibit. I am attaching the website of the Petersen with the supercar exhibit for you to read. http://www.petersen.org/default.cfm?docid=1081
I have already done a biography on Robert E. Petersen.
Here is the link to my Petersen post. Feel free to read it.
The Unmuffled Auto News 
My definition of a supercar would be if it could put the groceries away after we got home. To each his/her own!!
Cynthia