So far in this series, we've seen lots of car clocks from Japan, Europe, and Detroit, with a couple of VDOs as the last two. This week, we'll be looking at our first South Korean timepiece: a UNICK from a 2004 Kia Amanti that I found in a wrecking yard in Oakland, California.
The Amanti was based on the Hyundai XG350, which itself descended from the Mitsubishi Debonair. It had a goofy-looking face that was part Jaguar, part Mercedes-Benz, but its price tag was cheaper than the much smaller Toyota Avalon's and the build quality was decent. Naturally, such a car needed a classy chronometer and UNICK, a South Korean car-parts manufacturer, supplied one.
Both the XG350 and Amanti sold well enough, but they didn't hold their value so well and these early attempts at selling South Korean luxury in America now show up in wrecking yards with depressing regularity.
It gets harder to find stand-alone car clocks that aren't just stepper motors controlled by the car's ECU as you get deeper into the 21st century, so the UNICKs used in Amantis may be among the newest clocks you can swap into your silly car-parts projects.
Source: Read Full Article