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Old Motors Old Motors

Automotive History Online

1925 Hispano-Suiza H6C

The Counterfeiter’s Car: 1925 Hispano-Suiza H6C

in French Cars on 12/29/2019 12/29/2019 Share Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email

Hispano-Suiza was named for its original home country (Spain) and co-founder Mark Birkigt’s home country (Switzerland) but became famous for building cars – and aero-engines – in both Spain and France. This particular car, however,…

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1974 Austin Marina GT

Too Little, Too Late: Austin Marina

in British Cars Junkyarding on 12/28/2019 12/28/2019 Share Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email

Like so many vehicles created in changing or troubled times for their manufacturer, the Morris Marina was intended as a stopgap model. It was meant to last only four, maybe five, years and was aimed…

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1993 Ford Explorer

SUV Mania: 1993 Ford Explorer Limited

in American Cars Trucks on 12/24/2019 12/24/2019 Share Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email

The year was 1985. A year earlier, Bob Lutz had returned to Dearborn from a hugely successful stint at Ford of Europe where, among other things, he had shepherded the creation of the Ford Sierra….

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1996 Audi A4 1.8T

Reversal of Fortune:
Audi A4 Mk1

in German Cars on 12/23/2019 12/23/2019 Share Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email

In 1992, Audi struggled to move less than 15,000 cars in the United States. Ten years later, it moved more than 85,000. Although Audi reinvented its entire lineup in that time, one car more than…

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1953 Cadillac Coupe de Ville

Cream of the Crop: 1953 Cadillac Coupe de Ville

in American Cars on 12/22/2019 01/08/2020 Share Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email

If you wanted to say you’d “arrived” in 1953, there were few better ways to get that point across than a Coupe de Ville. In the immediate postwar years Cadillac solidified its dominant position as…

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1968 Moretti Sportiva

Dino in Miniature: Moretti 850 Sportiva

in Italian Cars on 12/21/2019 12/21/2019 Share Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email

Moretti as a manufacturer came to an end thirty years ago this month, after 64 years of producing motorcycles, sports cars, and what it was best known for by 1989 – Fiat based specials. The…

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1988 Volvo 780 Bertone

Sprezzatura, Swedish Style: Volvo 780 Bertone

in Swedish Cars on 12/19/2019 12/19/2019 Share Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email

At the time of Volvo’s first collaboration with Bertone in 1976, Volvos were still distinctly middle-class cars. By 1991, they were “premium” machines, at least in the U.S. At the very top of the line…

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1976 Mazda Cosmo

The Malaise Mazda: Cosmo AP/RX-5

in Japanese Cars on 12/16/2019 12/16/2019 Share Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email

It was planned when Mazda was riding high on Rotary success in the early 1970s. That decade was the golden age of “personal coupes,” be they Toyota Celicas or Lincoln MkIVs, so it made perfect…

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1993 Oldsmobile SIlhouette

The Cadillac of Minivans: Oldsmobile Silhouette

in American Cars on 12/15/2019 12/14/2019 Share Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email

GM’s first attempt at minivans, the long-lived 1985 Chevy Astro/GMC Safari, were more “van” than “mini.” This wasn’t so surprising since they were designed in a hurry and therefore based mostly on off-the-shelf truck components….

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1958 Sachsenring P70

Designed in Duroplast: Sachsenring P70

in Eastern Bloc Cars on 12/14/2019 12/14/2019 Share Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email

Chances are good you’ve at least heard of the Trabant, national car of the Deutsche Demokratische Republik (DDR); but the Trabant wasn’t invented overnight. This dour gentleman is standing next to a Sachsenring P70 –…

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1991 Honda Beat

Slave to the Rhythm:
Honda Beat

in Japanese Cars on 12/12/2019 12/12/2019 Share Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email

By itself it doesn’t look so small – but when it’s parked next to something like that towering Vanagon, you realize how tiny the Honda Beat really is. Taken with a wide angle lens (10mm),…

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1971 Iso Lele

Glorious Swan Song:
Iso Lele

in Italian Cars on 12/10/2019 12/10/2019 Share Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email

It ended up being the company’s last new production car, although nobody could have known that when the Iso Lele debuted in 1969. Meant to replace the original Iso GT, the Iso Rivolta IR300 that…

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  • Volvo 242 GT: Adding Spice
  • Buick Apollo: Stuck in the Middle
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  • In the eighties, the entire “hot hatch” genre was much more of a European phenomenon than an American one, and the USA got hardly any of the most iconic ones - 205 GTi, R5 Turbo, Uno Turbo. VW’s GTI didn’t arrive stateside until 1983 (though Canadians got it from 1979) but, once it did, it ushered in many competitors. The most unlikely and extroverted of which was the Dodge Omni GLH. The Omni was the slower selling half of the L-body Dodge Omni/Plymouth Horizon duo; designed mainly by Simca/Chrysler Europe but reworked for Americans and introduced in early 1978. Although it had gotten a big-ish 2.2L engine in 1981 courtesy of its K-car brethren, it was a bare-bones economy car to most potential customers. Until Carroll Shelby got involved. - The year was 1982 and Lee Iacocca, a close colleague and friend of Shelby’s since their time working on Ford’s racing programs 20 years prior, asked Shelby to be a consultant for Chrysler and hot up Chrysler’s tidal wave of front-drivers. They set up the Chrysler Shelby Performance Center in Santa Fe Springs, CA., and immediately trained their sights on the L-body - both the 5-door and the Scirocco-aping Omni O24 coupe. For 1984, his first two products were ready - the Shelby Charger (formerly O24), and the GLH - which in Shelby’s own words stood for “Goes like Hell.” The first GLH was visually subtle and only quietly advertised, but it was fast. Shelby’s reworked, high-comp, cammed 2.2 put 110 hp into the 2,100-lb. Omni - evenly matching it with the GTI. Subtle graphics, skirts, a chin spoiler, blackout trim, and fog lights were added, but the interior was stock Omni. - 1985 and 1986 were far more exciting - with a turbo option added to the GLH, now packing 146hp and handily outpacing the GTI. The Turbo GLH could be a workout to drive with all that power on the front wheels and bore no relation to older performance Mopars, but there was no denying how fun it was, though it was never a huge seller. In 1986, Chrysler and Shelby fielded the Shelby-branded, intercooled GLH-S (“Goes like Hell some more”) with 175hp, before the hot Omni faded away in favor of other Chrysler-Shelby performance modes like the Dodge Shadow CSX.
  • A Chinese car for #ChineseNewYear - a 1974 Hongqi (pronounced “Hong-Ch’i,” meaning “Red Flag”) CA770. The CA770 replaced the earlier CA72 in the mid-1960s and was the de facto transport for high-ranking government officials in the PRC from then until the late 1980s. Aside from the Shanghai SH760, it was one of the very few domestically-produced Chinese cars that the world was aware of, often playing a supporting role in diplomatic visits or parades. In size and purpose it mirrored other long-lived state limos like the Mercedes 600 and the Russian ZiL-114. - The long period of instability in China from the late Qing era until the end of the Chinese Civil War in 1949 largely prevented car production from taking root there. As a result, it wasn’t until the PRC’s first “five year plan” that the first steps toward car production actually began. In 1953, the “First Automobile Works” (FAW) was set up with Soviet help, producing licensed ZIS trucks from 1956. The year 1958 saw a wide array of proposed new cars from various Chinese light industrial companies including the first series-produced FAW car, the Simca-influenced Dongfeng CA71. Few of these cars got beyond the prototype stage and even the “Volume” CA71 saw fewer than 50 cars made, but state officials did need domestic “official” vehicles and Mao Zedong was keen to prove China could build its own. - From 1958-60, a trio of cars - the Beijing CB4, the Tianjin He-Ping (“Peace”) limo, and the Hongqi CA72 all vied to become China’s top transport, with the Hongqi getting the nod. The CA72 was based on a 1956 Chrysler and retained much of the Chryser underneath, though it had an all new body with sober new styling. The factory wasn’t entirely satisfied with the looks, so it was reworked into the lower, longer, seeker CA770 starting in 1963, again with Mopar LA V8 power, later standardized on the 340 V8. State officials also used the SH760, produced in much greater numbers, but the CA770 was the top dog limo until the 1980s. Many versions were made - Landaulet “Inspection cars” for military parades, stretch limos, even a trio of pickups. Production trailed off in 1981 (874 made), though a few were buit as late as 1984.
  • You never hear about it now, but the mid-to-late 1970s were a really rough time for Volvo, particularly in regard to its U.S. operation. Currency swings made its cars more expensive in the U.S., and the new 200-series, while later beloved, wasn’t so hot it was new. By December, 1976, a huge inventory of unsold 200-series cars sat on dealer lots, mostly in Europe. The backlog led Volvo cut production in 1977, furloughing thousands of workers. It also had to abandon a plan for a factory in Virginia - but only after spending $4.5M on the project. Volvo’s U.S. sales fell by nearly 1/3rd in 1976, and were only marginally better in 1977. - A few years earlier, Volvo had both the 1800ES sportwagon and the 142 as “exciting” cars - the 142 might have been a 1960s breeze block to look at, but it could hold its own with the BMW 2002 and Datsun 510. The 1800ES had departed in 1973, a victim of U.S. regs. The silhouette of the 142 remained in the new-for-1975 242/262 2-door sedans, but their sober looks and quiet manners were described at the time as “substantial, but not glamorous.” This, some at Volvo felt, was part of the sales problem. To juice up the lineup, two new 2-doors would bow for 1978. One was the Bertone-bodied, luxury 262C. The other was arguably the most interesting Volvo of 1978 - the 242 GT. - The GT took the regular 242 package and added gas-pressurized shocks and chunky stabilizer bars, plus all-around discs, the forward ones vented. The car got a visually unique front end with an air dam and 14” alloys. The whole thing was clothed in metallic Mystic Silver (or black in some markets), blackout trim, and a 1970s tape stripe job. I know you’re saying “I don’t see any tape stripes here.” Mystic Silver didn’t hold up too well and many have been repainted. In 1978, all GTs used the B21F (F is for Federal) 2.1L four just like the regular 240s, but in 1979 everybody except U.S. customers got a B23. Though no faster than the 242, the GT looked good and was definitely sharper to drive. The special edition cars continued in the USA into 1980. In 1981, the 240 GLT inherited most of the under-the-skin goodies, but expanded their availability to 4-doors and wagons.
  • Ford’s 1958 Thunderbird gave birth to the modern personal luxury car - a genre that peaked in the 1970s, but curiously, #Chevrolet did not respond directly to the T-bird for many years because Lee Mays, head of Chevy’s sales organization in the 60s, didn’t like such cars and didn’t feel the had a place at Chevy. - That feeling would prove quite incorrect. The original Monte Carlo was developed almost immediately after Mays retired and piggybacked onto the 1969 Pontiac Grand Prix redesign. It proved enormously and instantly popular - and even more so in its second 1973-77 iteration. The “Colonnade” era GM Personal/Luxury coupes were the best selling of all - but in late 1977 the time came for downsizing, like the full-size models a year earlier. - Some of the downsized A/G #coupes lost much of their personality in this downsizing, but not the Monte Carlo; although it was clear that “peak personal luxury car” had come and gone - the new ‘78 Monte sold 316,000 units to the outgoing 1977’s 411,000. But #GM had done a good job of preserving the curvy neoclassic look of the previous car. Sweeping front fenders flowed into the doors, which cleverly used the frames from the Malibu to reduce cost. - 1978 and 1979 were still good years for the car, and having lost 13 inches in length and 700 lbs., it was lighter and better to drive than the tail end Colonnades, but had no real performance engines - a range of Chevy and Buick V6s were the low end, topped by the 305 V8 and Olds Diesel 350. With little organic speed but a big engine bay and good styling, these cars were often hotted up with the vast array of aftermarket Chevy performance parts. - The ‘78-’80 Montes, like the other A/G cars, have been popular as #lowriders and customs since they were new - but in 2001, they got an especially large popularity boost from a starring role in Antoine Fuqua’s “Training Day” alongside Denzel Washington. - Given the drastic downsizing of 1978, the car had relatively few changes through 1980 - most of which were confined to the front clip, taillights, and trim - 1979’s car grew a little more ornate, 1980’s a little more subdued, with quad headlights. A major restyle arrived for 1981.
  • No doubt the designers in the Dodge studio were a little shocked when they saw the 1965 Pontiacs, with their curvy coke-bottle sides. A totally restyled 1966 Dodge Coronet was waiting in the wings, but typically of Chryslers in the prime of the Elwood Engel era, it was full of straight lines - “Filling in the Rectangle” as historian and former Dodge designer, the late Jeffrey Godshall put it. The ‘66-’67 Coronets would do fairly well, actually, but Dodge’s stylists, working under the sharp-suited, Porsche-driving Bill Brownlie, were already at work on the next iteration of Dodge’s mid-sized cars due in 1968. The “Coke bottle” look would come to Dodge’s Coronet and, in more extreme form, to the revised ‘68 Dodge Charger. These cars would share many panels and all of their architecture with Plymouth’s B-body cars, best remembered now for the Roadrunner and GTX. - These cars are best known as muscle cars, of course, and the entire lineup benefitted to some degree from the emphasis on the performance two-doors so popular at the time. Both Dodge and Plymouth leaned into the muscle car era, with Charlie Mitchell, Frank Ruff, and Harvey Winn also helping manage the design on the Dodge side. The most dramatic of the new cars was the Charger, but every 1968 Coronet looked like a muscle car, even taxis and family-fare station wagons. The most sedate version was the wagon - which had to retain the earlier roofline for cost reasons. - Most Coronets could also be optioned like muscle cars. From 1968 wagons could no longer be ordered with a street hemi - the ultimate sleeper but a car built in extremely tiny numbers in ‘66-67. It was still possible (though infrequent) to load up a Coronet 440 (the mid-level trim) wagon with an actual 440 V8, but you had to spec it yourself. The R/T and the Super Bee (a Dodge version of Plymouth’s Roadrunner idea) were coupes only. The muscle car look worked for sales - which were way up in 1968. Most wagons at the time were just family transportation and in later years wagons often donated parts to hardtops. Later on, when Muscle wagons became unique and desirable builds, the wagons sometimes got the performance goodies intended for coupes.
  • Convertible factored into the evolution of the VW Beetle very early on - the prototype “V2” and circa-1938 KdF type 803 were both quite similar to what emerged later. But the war postponed the arrival of the Volkswagen and any real consumer-oriented convertible thereof. Crawling out from the rubble and facing a very uncertain future, VW solicited convertible designs to expand the appeal of the only product it had, which resulted in a pair of factory-sanctioned droptop Beetles from Karmann and Hebmüller. The latter was devastated by a fire that summer, and only about 700 of the pretty 2-seat “Hebs” were made. Karmann, on the other hand, would continue producing it’s 4-place cabrio until January of 1980. - Cabriolets were only a fraction of overall Beetle production, but they were popular right up until the end. Cutting off the top of the #Beetle sedan made both convertibles flexible flyers - so for production there were structural changes including beefed up sills and some rigid bracing. The Cabriolet was also a fairly luxurious item by the standards of the original Beetle, and got moreso over time. The VW was designed to be simple and spartan, the Cabriolet, with a full headliner and insulation underneath it’s fabric top and a variety of other luxury touches (ashtrays, wheel trim rings, a vanity mirror - simple stuff but not seen on regular #Beetles for years afterward), was a totally different concept. - The thickness of the top gave the car its distinctive look when the top was down - revealing it as the old-fashioned 1930s touring car it was. With the huge top folded, the rear-view mirror pivoted upwards to compensate for the enormous blind spot it created. Changes to the Cabriolet, essentially a hand-built car, followed those of the regular sedan. Changes were many but probably the biggest was the advent of the Super Beetle in 1971, with its MacPherson struts up front. All Cabrios were Supers, like this one, after that year. Big bumpers were soon to join thanks to U.S. regs. By the very end, the car had achieved a certain “future collectible” status, at least in the USA, and a rather high price too. In all, 331,847 were made by the time production ended.

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