Fast Car Magazine September 1996 Mint Sauce Escort Cavalier Peugeot 205 Golf (1503)

Original Fast Car magazine – September 1996, a highly characteristic mid-1990s UK modified-car and tuning issue featuring a colourful mix of custom builds, performance testing, technical articles, car audio and styling features.

The front cover is dominated by the striking “Mint Sauce” convertible, a radically modified turquoise Escort-based convertible, presented with colour-coded bodywork, matching five-spoke wheels and an extremely distinctive 1990s show-car appearance. This is exactly the sort of outrageous styling for which Fast Car became known during the period.

Publication: Fast Car
Date: September 1996
Cover Price: £2.80
Genre: Modified Cars / Tuning / Performance / Styling / ICE
SKU: 1503

Main Cover Features

The September 1996 cover advertises a strong selection of modified cars and technical features, including:

• Mint Sauce – topless Cossie-kitted Escort
• Pink ’n’ Perky Peugeot 205
• RS GT, Uno & R5T Burnout
• Aussie-built Cavalier
• Blue Blood Golf
• Red Hot Zender Corsa
• Louvres
• Clutch testing
• 10-inch subwoofer testing
• Water injection
• Performance and tuning features covering turbocharging, ICE and chassis/mechanical upgrades

The cover itself is especially eye-catching thanks to the large turquoise convertible and the magazine's bold period typography.

Feature Cars

The contents pages reveal a particularly varied collection of 1990s modified machinery.

Strewth! – Aussie Touring Car Cavalier
A feature on an Australian-built Cavalier-inspired touring-car style machine, reflecting the magazine's interest in modified and competition-influenced builds.

Pink ’n’ Perky 205
A highly conspicuous bright pink Peugeot 205, shown on the contents spread with lowered suspension, aftermarket alloy wheels, body styling and an unmistakably 1990s custom-car appearance.

Blue Blood
A feature devoted to a heavily modified Mk1 Volkswagen Golf, another enduring favourite of the UK tuning scene.

Grey Expectations
A grey Renault 5 Turbo feature, giving the issue further appeal to collectors and enthusiasts of classic French hot hatches.

Building Blocks
Coverage of Moto-build's well-known modified Ford Five, showing the type of specialist-build culture surrounding tuning magazines of the period.

Red Hot Chilli
A modified Zender Corsa feature with styling-focused treatment.

The cover car itself is described as “Mint Sauce”, with the photographs showing a very heavily customised convertible finished in turquoise/green with matching wheels, sculpted bodywork and a dramatic show-car stance.

Technical & Performance Content

The issue contains a substantial technical section aimed at readers actively modifying their cars.

Visible features include:

• Power Cat Test
• Water Injection
• Clutch Test – road versus race clutch comparison
• Louvres – styling/bodywork feature
• Turbo Popular Front – group testing of three turbochargers
• Performance-oriented modifications and tuning information throughout

This gives the magazine interest beyond the feature cars themselves, particularly for anyone researching how the UK modified-car scene approached power upgrades and chassis/mechanical modifications during the mid-1990s.

ICE / Car Audio

Fast Car was heavily associated with the booming 1990s in-car entertainment scene, and this issue includes dedicated audio coverage.

Highlighted features include:

• Huge Sub Test – comparison of large 10-inch subwoofers
• Barb Wired 2 – in-car wiring techniques
• General ICE installation and audio-related coverage

This material is a good period reference for early custom car-audio installations before modern integrated infotainment systems became commonplace.

1990s Tuning Culture

This issue is an excellent snapshot of the era when modified-car magazines embraced:

• Bright custom paint
• Large aftermarket alloy wheels
• Wide body kits
• Convertible conversions
• Turbo upgrades
• Water injection
• Competition-style clutches
• Loud exhausts
• Subwoofer installations
• Colour-coded styling
• Extreme show-car builds

The combination of Ford, Peugeot, Volkswagen, Renault, Vauxhall and other modified cars makes it particularly appealing to collectors of classic UK tuning magazines.

Condition

Pre-owned vintage condition with noticeable age and handling wear.

Please study all supplied photographs carefully.

Visible condition points include:

• Front cover remains colourful and clearly legible.
• General surface rubbing, scratches and handling marks are visible.
• There is edge and corner wear, particularly along the left/spine edge and lower corners.
• The bottom-left area shows noticeable rubbing and small creases.
• Spine has visible wear consistent with reading and storage.
• Cover has some light bends/creasing rather than lying perfectly flat.
• Top edge shows minor handling wear.
• Interior contents pages remain colourful, clean-looking and easily readable in the supplied photographs.
• The centre/spine area shows normal opening and handling wear.
• Rear cover has visible rubbing, edge wear and some small creases.
• Bottom and spine edges show additional shelf wear.
• Overall structure still appears intact from the photographs.

Overall, this is a well-used but very presentable original September 1996 Fast Car, with excellent period modified-car content and considerable nostalgic appeal for collectors of 1990s tuning, hot hatches and custom-car magazines.

Please use all photographs as the primary guide to exact condition, as they form part of the description.

SKU: 1503