A different kind of autoerotic experience:

A man who claims to have had sex with 1,000 cars has defended his “romantic” feelings towards vehicles.

Edward Smith, who lives with his current “girlfriend” – a white Volkswagen Beetle named Vanilla, insisted that he was not “sick” and had no desire to change his ways.

“I appreciate beauty and I go a little bit beyond appreciating the beauty of a car only to the point of what I feel is an expression of love,” he said.

“Maybe I’m a little bit off the wall but when I see movies like Herbie and Knight Rider, where cars become loveable, huggable characters it’s just wonderful.

“I’m a romantic. I write poetry about cars, I sing to them and talk to them just like a girlfriend. I know what’s in my heart and I have no desire to change.”

He added: “I’m not sick and I don’t want to hurt anyone, cars are just my preference.”

Mr Smith, 57, first had sex with a car at the age of 15, and claims he has never been attracted to women or men.

But his wandering eye has spread beyond cars to other vehicles. He says that his most intense sexual experience was “making love” to the helicopter from 1980s TV hit Airwolf.

As well as Vanilla, he regularly spends time with his other vehicles – a 1973 Opal GT, named Cinnamon, and 1993 Ford Ranger Splash, named Ginger.

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Mr Smith is now part of a global community of more than 500 “car lovers” brought together by internet forums.

I’ll never leave my car unattended in a parking lot again.

It’s only a matter of time before Rowan Williams pens an erudite thesis on how man-car love is “comparable to marriage”, Michael Ingham campaigns for full inclusion of Herbie humpers in the life of the church and mechaphobia is declared a hate crime.

After all, car lovers have no choice: God made them that way.