Practical Performance Car magazine shuts down

[Ben Allen]

Sad to see this news today. PPC posted on their Facebook page today to announce that the new (August 2022) issue of the magazine will be their last.

Here's the announcement

Launched in 2004 by Will and Kev from Practical Classics magazine. They had a great innings - will be a shame to not see this on the shelves any more

[SteRB5138]

Thats sad to hear, even though I never bought the mag another magazine bites the dust.

I noticed in my local largish Sainsburys at the weekend how small the magazine section is now, half an isle now, its shrunk the last few months.

[Megaflow]

Not really a surprise. I was a regular reader from the first issue, but it soon became apparent Kevin never had any itentiotof ever finish a project, just buying more

[wpa1975]

Sadly car magazines seem to be dying a slow death now so it does not surprise me.

[anonymous-user]

Car tuning and modification is now a dying art, with the exception of very expensive classics / retromods.

All the info required is now online too, with forums providing the service that magazines used too

[anonymous-user]

I used to regularly buy car magazines, back in the 90s I was buying Max Power, Revs, Top Gear and several others every month. I don't actually remember the last time I bought a magazine of any description, it must be getting on for ten years ago now.

Whenever I pop into WH Smiths I am actually amazed there are so many magazines still around, especially as some of them are so niche they must be selling low thousands of copies a month.

All replaced by YouTube and Facebook now, even the majority of Forums are dying, with Pistonheads appearing to be the exception.

[V8covin]

I've been getting e-magazine versions of all the popular titles free of charge from my library for years.
Presumably they have to pay but it can't be as much as they're missing out on from physical sales

[Grumbly]

A sad day, but the writing has been on the wall for a while now.

I will miss it for it's refreshing no nonsense style, and will need to find an alternative toilet read now.

[Olivera]

Yes the regular monthly magazine is dying (always trotted out on PH), but there have been a number of premium car magazines successfully launched in recent years:

https://theroadrat.com/
https://www.automobilsport-magazin.de/en/automobil... (English edition)
https://www.magnetomagazine.com/subscribe/

Someone also mentioned on PH the other day that the market for premium car coffee table books (example was a new book called GT40 Uncovered) was booming, with people happily paying into the thousands for a limited edition book.

So yes the cheap monthly car mag is suffering a slow death, but the premium car magazine or book is having a renaissance.

[george123]

Olivera said:

Yes the regular monthly magazine is dying (always trotted out on PH), but there have been a number of premium car magazines successfully launched in recent years:

https://theroadrat.com/
https://www.automobilsport-magazin.de/en/automobil... (English edition)
https://www.magnetomagazine.com/subscribe/

Someone also mentioned on PH the other day that the market for premium car coffee table books (example was a new book called GT40 Uncovered) was booming, with people happily paying into the thousands for a limited edition book.

So yes the cheap monthly car mag is suffering a slow death, but the premium car magazine or book is having a renaissance.

Don’t know about the others but the road rat is just a vanity project for that bloke from Coldplay. No way it would have lasted this long otherwise

[samoht]

Max_Torque said:

Car tuning and modification is now a dying art, with the exception of very expensive classics / retromods.

My impression is different, at least in terms of number of cars being tuned. Almost every performance car now uses forced induction, and the number of 'remapping' companies that boost these cars, with a greater or lesser degree of knowledge and care, seems to me to be at least as high as it's ever been. Golf GTI? Remap. BMW M4? Remap. AMG E63? Remap.

Tuning in the past probably involved more significant mechanical improvements; and with the switch to EVs it's very unclear what future of aftermarket tuning is. But just looking at the present, mid-2022, I feel there are as many cars being modified for increased performance as ever.

[visitinglondon]

george123 said:

Olivera said:

Yes the regular monthly magazine is dying (always trotted out on PH), but there have been a number of premium car magazines successfully launched in recent years:

https://theroadrat.com/
https://www.automobilsport-magazin.de/en/automobil... (English edition)
https://www.magnetomagazine.com/subscribe/

Someone also mentioned on PH the other day that the market for premium car coffee table books (example was a new book called GT40 Uncovered) was booming, with people happily paying into the thousands for a limited edition book.

So yes the cheap monthly car mag is suffering a slow death, but the premium car magazine or book is having a renaissance.

Don’t know about the others but the road rat is just a vanity project for that bloke from Coldplay. No way it would have lasted this long otherwise

I get The Road Rat and Magneto. Enjoy them both. Hadn’t heard of the third one.

[amstrange1]

Megaflow said:

Not really a surprise. I was a regular reader from the first issue, but it soon became apparent Kevin never had any itentiotof ever finish a project, just buying more

Agreed.

I binned off my subscription about 5 or 6 years ago when the editing got all sloppy and the content very samey. Seemed to focus too much on the bodge-it-and-scarper approach at times too.

Replaced it with a Practical Classics subscription, which has a lot more content and also covers modified cars - but generally focuses on how to do stuff properly, and more often than not is reasonably well written.

[RumbleOfThunder]

Ah that's a shame. I was a PPC reader for years in my younger days. Always enjoyed reading about the Meteor SD1, the Transit V8 that never seemed to get finished, and of course the eclectic mix of featured cars throughout every issue. I'd long grown out of Fast Car and Redline, but found stuff like Octane too stuffy and not modern enough for my taste at the time. PPC was an ideal fit that no one else catered for.

[ettore]

I liked this mag despite nit being practical personally - enjoyed the irreverence.

Does anyone know what happened to Kev and Will?

[Ben A]

ettore said:

Does anyone know what happened to Kev and Will?

They're still around! Will is working on a Merc W126 coupe which he had stored away for years and Kev is still working on various projects (allegedly he even completed a Mini a while back!).

[ettore]

Ben A said:

They're still around! Will is working on a Merc W126 coupe which he had stored away for years and Kev is still working on various projects (allegedly he even completed a Mini a while back!).

Good. Do they have some form of media outlet?

[Ben A]

ettore said:

Good. Do they have some form of media outlet?

Not at present (but never say never )

[j555]

PPC Magazine seems to have risen from the ashes and is currently putting out content on YouTube.

Worth a look if you enjoyed what they did before. Best of luck to them!

[Sebring440]

j555 said:

PPC Magazine seems to have risen from the ashes and is currently putting out content on YouTube.

Worth a look if you enjoyed what they did before. Best of luck to them!

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...