Did you recently take on (or consider) a loan of 84 months or longer on a car purchase?
A reporter would like to speak with you about your experience; please reach out to PR@Edmunds.com by 7/22 for details.
A reporter would like to speak with you about your experience; please reach out to PR@Edmunds.com by 7/22 for details.
Options
I spotted an (insert obscure car name here) classic car today! (Archived)
This discussion has been closed.
Comments
Still, a flashy car compared to some beater Camaro that you'd pay the same for.
Little Frankenstein
Neat, Canada
Early FWD
Anyone want a new Pacer?
Project car
Rain Man
Super Stock
There is always demand for these
Unhappy marriage
One of the few cars I like in white
That White Toronodo is a good car in white. I wonder why the rear end reminds me of the Aurora? It sure shows the resemblance.
And a '62 Mercedes with a step up in the world since it has a Cadillac motor! :shades:
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
I've always noticed that similarity, too. Probably one reason I always liked the Aurora so much.
I know I'm about the only person who likes '58 Fords, but why would the owner be driving it in that kind of weather?
Bill
Oh wow, you mean there's actually TWO of us?! The '58 Ford seems to get ragged on all the time, but I always preferred it best out of the '57-59 generation. I just never liked the jutting, bug-eyed looking headlights on the '57 Ford, although in certain color combinations it tones it down somewhat. The '59 isn't too bad, but just kind of bulky, and really awkward and looks top-heavy from the rear. Only thing I really don't like about the '58 Ford is the taillights, but otherwise I think it's an attractive car.
Shame to hear about a nice one being driven around in the winter and having to deal with salty, messy roads. I hope the owner washes that stuff off regularly!
The people who owned my '57 DeSoto before me (it came from PA, York area), would do that to it, too. When the weather would turn nasty it would be a case of "let's not take the good car, let's take the DeSoto!" :sick: Their "good" car being a 1964 Catalina 4-door.
I'm disappointed that they're exposing it to salt, too.
The 58 looked great in the 500 with the taillight configuration. Wasn't the cheaper model's tailllights different. And they used a shorter, less visually appealing body shape for the Custom models.
The 57 headlights were big. The dual headlamps were new and noticeable, sort of like 22 inch chrome wheels today, but in a different way. Not that I remember...
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
Not sure about the taillight differences. All I remember (and this is from seeing them in pics and at car shows, NOT from when they were new! The '58 Ford pre-dates my birth by about 12 years) is the style that looked sort of like a colon (a ":", not a large intestine) on its side. Basically, this style. Maybe the 300 and Custom 300 just used one red light instead of two?
As for wheelbases, the cheaper 300's were on a 116" wheelbase, while the Fairlanes were on a 118". The 300 only offered 2- and 4-door sedans, although I think all the wagons were on that wheelbase too. The Fairlane offered 2- and 4-door sedans, along with the convertibles, hardtop coupes, and hardtop sedans. IIRC, the 2-door sedan was actually more of a coupe, sort of like they took the hardtop, grafted on a B-pillar, and put a frame around the door window. It was actually pretty sleek for the time. In the Chevy and Plymouth ranks, the 2-door sedan and the 4-door sedan actually shared the same roofline, giving them a more upright, boxy look.
Oddly though, the longer wheelbase model actually had less room inside! I remember reading an old Consumer Reports issue that was griping about this. The 300 4-door sedan was more upright and boxy, and had a larger greenhouse than the Fairlane 4-door sedan. Uglier, but more useful I guess.
Old Westbury NY bought a fleet of Dodges and supposedly they were Hemis (OW is a very wealthy town) but that was probably a (sub)urban legend. I'll be surprised if that '63 doesn't draw a lot more than the 20K now bid.
Other than that and the cool '49 Buick (love the instrument panel!) this week's most desireable car is the Facel-bodied Simca Oceane Plien Ciel. The convertible figures in the movie Monsieur Ibrahim starring Omar Sharif.>
2001 BMW 330ci/E46, 2008 BMW 335i conv/E93
Saw a very nice black Mercedes 190 Ponton putting around in a furious rainstorm yesterday ---good for him! You know, classic car owners, this is WATER not acid. :P
2001 BMW 330ci/E46, 2008 BMW 335i conv/E93
And it was a recession period also?
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
Old Westbury NY bought a fleet of Dodges and supposedly they were Hemis (OW is a very wealthy town) but that was probably a (sub)urban legend.
They were Wedges. 1963 was the first year Chrysler came out with the 426, but wouldn't put the Hemi head on it until 1964. And then, only on racecars, not street cars. In 1965, it was offered in two models, the Coronet Hemi-Charger and the Belvedere I SS, both hardtops, and both intended for drag racing. I guess it was 1966 that the Hemi really started showing up on the streets, although I guess it's possible that some police departments ordered them, too.
Still, even without the Hemi heads, the 426 wedges would put out up to 425 hp with the dual quad cross-ram setup. That's the same hp as what the Hemi was "officially" rated at.
And it was a recession period also?
Yup, 1958 was a serious down year for the American auto industry. I think a lot of it was brought on because the market got oversold in 1955-57, and there were just too many cars. IIRC, something like 8 million American cars were sold for model year 1955, 7 million for 1956, 6 million for 1957, but then down to 4.2 million for 1958. 1959 was a recovery year, with around 5.5 million sold, but then I don't think '60-62 were that much better. It was 1963, I believe, when things really started to take off, and 1965 was a new record year.
The 1958 shakedown hit the middle-priced market the hardest, but actually hurt every domestic nameplate except for Rambler, which soared to new heights. In 1957, the all-new '57 Ford actually outsold the outdated '57 Chevy, something like 1.5 million to 1.4 million. The all-new '58 Chevy put them back in the lead, with something like 1.1 million units. But the Ford has to still be considered a success, pulling in about 900,000 units with just a facelift.
I dunno what, exactly, triggered the recession in 1958. My Mom and Dad would have just been kids back then, so they wouldn't have noticed, unless their parents lost the house or something. My grandparents on my Mom's side were gov't workers, and on my Dad's side were railroad workers, and I think both of those job fields were relatively recession-proof at the time.
Still, there must have been something going on, for people to suddenly start flocking to Ramblers, embracing the imports, and turning their backs, if only momentarily, to the ever growing, increasingly thirsty, full-sized cars.
It's no co-incidence that the '58 GM models are all pretty much single-year styles. In 1959 the GM cars got a complete makeover, even though they had a complete make-over in 1958.
This makes me suspect, given model lead-times, that even GM was horrified at what they had done in '58 and planned to get rid of these styles before they were even on the showroom floors.
Ford and Chrysler didn't go through such dramatic changes in 1959, and this was the time when GM really took off. The other Big Two didn't really catch up on styling until the mid 60s.
The recession period of 58 was a big factor as well as the unusual styles that caused a backlash. I recall Chrysler having lost a styling prototype that was a step forward on the Andrea Doria sinking. Do I recall reading that Chrysler was using Italian styling as an influence while GM and Ford were using more pedantic stylists?
What was the styling lead time in that era? How many years? And the other companies surely had information as the the styling coming out of their competitor's studios in time to adjust their own styles.
I'm sure there's a book that details the styling and engineering race during that time. And Mr. Shiftright probably knows what the title is. If you know, post it and I'll get a copy to read.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
If GM was horrified by their '58 designs (and I admit the Buick and Olds were pretty horrifying!), what did they think in '59 when Chevrolet dropped back down to #2 behind Ford? And do you think a '59 Caddy is better-styled than a '58?
Bill P.
Yeah, but that doesn't explain the success of the 1958 Rambler, an ugly little thing if ever there was one. It also doesn't explain why it was mainly the more expensive cars that took the biggest beating. That recession seemed to zero in right on the middle-priced market. Interestingly the 1958 Olds, which was easily one of the ugliest of the 1958 models, and the most regressive compared to its '57 counterpart, somehow proved to be a popular car. While Olds sales were down compared to '57, they didn't fall near as far, percentage-wise, as Buick, Pontiac, Mercury, Dodge, DeSoto, or Chrysler.
Now part of the problem was quality. Chrysler's '57 models took everyone by surprise, and put Chrysler up to something like 20% of the market, but quality control was bad, word got out, and people stayed away in droves for 1958. Chrysler also went through some bad marketing moves, and ended up making the divisions compete more against each other than against GM and Ford. For instance, moving Chrysler down into DeSoto territory, making DeSoto and Dodge overlap more, and in later years, overlapping Dodge and Plymouth more.
Quality control also came back to haunt GM for '58, but luckily, it was mainly isolated to Buick. Buicks had been wildly popular throughout the 50's, but slamming them together and getting them out the door came with a price...slipping quality. As a result, by 1958, many people who had bought a Buick a few years before were reluctant to buy another. I think that reputation was starting to hurt Buick a bit by '57, but it hit hard in '58, coupled with the recession.
I think GM offering all-new cars for 1959 had more to do with cost-cutting than anything else. In the past, GM had the A-body (Chevy/Pontiac), B-body (Olds and smaller Buicks) and C-body (Roadmaster/Super and Cadillacs). The three platforms had very little to do with each other, sharing very little in the way of parts, although I think the B and C body did have some commonality. GM's trend had been to restyle the B/C bodies one year, and then the A-bodies the following year. In order to cut costs, but also to keep up with the trend of increasing demand for larger low-line cars, GM decided to align the different bodies so that they would all be redesigned at the same time, and have much more in common under the sheetmetal. This started for 1958, when that year's Chevy and Pontiac were more like an Olds/Buick than they had ever been before. And even a Cadillac Coupe DeVille's roofline isn't so vastly different from an Impala or Bonneville.
Then for 1959, GM simply decided to start redesigning their big cars all at once instead of staggering them as they had in the past. Plus, it was getting to the point that the styles were changing so fast that even a 3-year cycle was too long, unless it was modular enough that it could be made to look vastly different from year to year. Ford was actually pretty adept at this with the 1957-59 style. Neither year really looks that much like the year before, and overall it was popular enough with the public that Ford beat out Chevy in 1957 and 1959.
Chrysler really threw everybody off with only using the '55-56 style for two years. Ford did something similar, though. The 1955 Fords and Mercurys were actually heavily modified versions of the 1952-54 design, but looked new enough that most people figured they were all-new. But then they were totally redone again for 1957.
Yeah, Chrysler styling really went downhill for 1959. I think that's because they were in the 3rd year of that design, and they could only do so much with it. For the most part, I think the '58 Chryslers are every bit as attractive as the '57 models. There were some hits and misses though. For instance, I thought the '58 Plymouth looked better up front with true quad headlights and a matching sub-grille under the bumper. It no longer looked like it had run up over a Jeep. And the Dodges really looked a lot better up front...less heavy looking. But then they messed a few things up, like the oddly shrunken taillights on the Chryslers, fussier details on the DeSotos, etc.
Now I think GM's 1959 cars, if you strip off a lot of that excess, like the goofy fins and some of the chrome, are a more modern body style than the '58's...or the '59 Fords or Chryslers. They were lower, more squared-off, headlights were now in the grille instead above it, etc. But on the whole, I think I'd take any 1958 GM model over its 1959 counterpart, except maybe for Olds. I thought the '59 Olds was reasonably attractive, although I don't like the widely spaced headlights. And the '59 Pontiac was nice looking.
I think GM cleaned up pretty nicely for 1960, though. That year Chrysler seemed a mixed bag, though. The DeSotos and Chryslers were really nice and clean looking. I thought the Dodges looked good too, although they were a bit outdated. Even though they were an all-new unitized design, the styling, with the big fins and the headlights above the grille, looked more like it belonged in 1958. Plymouth was a real mess for '60, though.
And 1961? I always considered 1961 to be to Chrysler was 1959 was to GM!
As for the '58 Rambler, it was its simplicity that people liked. But I don't know about how popular they were....they still went broke every couple of years.
Rambler just got lucky like the Japanese did....right car at the right time, for a while at least.
But unlike the Japanese, Rambler couldn't repeat the successes. They were doomed.
American Motors reintroduced the 1950-55 Nash Rambler as the 1958 Rambler American. The stylists opened up the enclosed wheel wells and gave the old car a new grille and sold it as the Rambler American.
It actually sold well, and went over the 100,000 units-per-year mark in 1960, and stayed there through the mid-1960s - which is pretty impressive considering the import and domestic competition on the scene by that time, and how obsolete the basic design was. You could still buy a Rambler American with a flathead six in 1965! (The styling, however, was much improved for 1964 - the car still looks good today, especially in two-door hardtop and convertible form.)
The "standard" Ramblers were introduced for 1956, and were available as four-door sedans, hardtops, wagons - and even a four-door hardtop wagon! They were the first of what we would call the "intermediate" cars. They were extremely popular - especially the four-door wagons. These larger Ramblers sold in ever-increasing numbers - in 1963, they helped AMC set a sales record for both the company and for any independent auto maker - until the advent of the GM intermediates for the 1964 model year.
By the mid-1960s, however, the Ford Mustang and Olds F-85/Cutlass and Buick Special/Skylark were proving that "small" didn't have to equate with "cheap" or "homely," and Ramblers fell out of favor. The company tried to compete with the Big Three across the board, but it couldn't afford to spread tooling costs for three separate lines (American, Classic/Rebel and Ambassador) over its small production base, let alone facelift its models every two years, so by 1967 it was almost bankrupt.
As for GM's 1958 models - the stylists hated them, but GM was originally committed to keeping those bodies at least through 1959. The models originally planned for 1959 were not much better than what was produced for 1958.
GM was on a three-year body cycle in those days. The Buick, Olds and Cadillacs had been all-new for 1957, while Chevrolet and Pontiac were all-new for 1958. Chrysler's radical 1957 models changed those plans, although the advent of compacts for 1960 and 1961 encouraged GM to increase body sharing for the "standard" size cars in all of its divisions.
Every medium-priced make was hit hard by the 1958 recession, but Oldsmobile, which was the ugliest one of the lot, suffered the least saleswise, probably because it hadn't been associated with any major quality problems in prior years. Dodge, Mercury, Buick, Chrysler and DeSoto had all suffered serious build quality and/or reliability problems at one time or another during 1955-57.
60 Falcon was dreadful as well. The little Valiant was the best of the lot of the new "import fighters" (ahem), bizarre though it might have been in appearance. '60 Corvair? Nuff said.
I remember the Valiant because sporting an alternator was like this BIG DEAL---LOL!
A Stutz. Not sure which model, but looked to be a fairly recent one. Man, does that look out of place in the real world.
It was a 2 door, not the limo version!
2020 Acura RDX tech SH-AWD, 2023 Maverick hybrid Lariat luxury package.
The Falcon did what it was supposed to - Americans said that they wanted simple, reliable transportation that could seat at least four adults, and Ford gave it to them.My grandmother had a 1962 sedan, and it served her faithfully until it was hit from behind in 1969. Ever since, the sedans have always struck me as the perfect "grandma" car.
The car was a huge sales success for the time, and served as the basis for the Mustang, Cougar and then the Maverick, all of which sold very well. The Falcon was also made in Australia and South America, and was in production for years after the American Falcon was killed.
I'd bet that the Falcon platform had one of the highest returns on investment of any car made in the 1960s, regardless of nationality.
The original Falcon was slow as molasses and dull as a doornail, but I sure wouldn't mind a 1963-65 Sprint V-8 convertible or hardtop.
The Valiant styling was...unique. The post-1962 cars are pretty good looking, especially the hardtops and convertibles.
A few weeks ago, I was reading old Popular Mechanics Owners' Reports on the Valiant, Falcon, Comet and Corvair. (It's interesting to read what owners thought about their cars when they were new.) People really loved their Corvairs, but also had a fair amount of problems with them. They liked the Valiants' handling and power from the Slant Six, but quality control problems - in particular, serious water leaks - turned off customers. Falcon and Comet customers reported the fewest problems, but complained about the lack of power.
A Sprint coupe would be a nice car---basically like a Mustang but more unusual. I'm sure it could be modified to handle decently enough on the flats.
You won't see this make every day on this continent
These are interesting
A real Packard
Another one where you are guaranteed not to pull up beside yourself at a light
Rain Main II
Fun movie provenance
Some nut restored a lowline fintail
The holy grail of fintails, one of the last of its type
The base fintail is kinda cute--sure looks nice. Let us know what it bids up to. About 1/4th the cost of restoration I'd guess.
RAIN MAIN-- I actually appraised the "Rain Main" Buick. Full of rust.
Body held onto frame by one two bolts.
Send me a big envelope full of cash and I promise to go pick it up for you.
2020 Acura RDX tech SH-AWD, 2023 Maverick hybrid Lariat luxury package.
The W112 is a sad case. It's certainly not economically reasonable to restore something like that, but someone might anyway. 112 cars have a small obsessive cult following, not unlike Universals or 6.3s. As it sits it is bid to 4 grand, someone sees something in it. There might be 20 roadworthy LWB W112s left in the US. I'd be all over it for 4K if it was pristine.
Skoda Octavia - I always liked those, especially the Estate Car, which was a lot rarer here than the saloon.
DKW van - that would be a real rarity here, as I don't think they ever sold it in UK...
Citroen Visa - I pass an example a few streets from here most mornings on my way to work - although I don't think there are many left. .
Well, a Chevy Monza came with a wide variety of engines, ranging from a 2.5 Pontiac Iron duke 4-cyl with 85-90 hp, on up to a Chevy 305 with 135-145 hp. A 350 was offered for a year or two around 1975-76, but was so choked down it only had 125 hp. Given enough time, the 2.5 should be able to break 80 mph, while a Chevy 305 would probably get up there quick enough that it would look good by today's standards...although it would probably warp the suspension and chew up the tires while doing so!
As for the VW Bug, I'm sure it's a tolerable commuting car, as long as you don't have to do much highway driving. In stock form, I think they topped out around 70-75 mph, unless you had a long, downhill stretch and a good tailwind. In fact, VW used to jokingly brag in their period advertisements that a Bug could reach its top speed quicker than just about any other car! Nevermind, we're talking 70-75 mph, versus 100-120 mph, or even more, for other cars.
A higher line 6cyl fintail can take such driving with little problem. Mine can cruise at 70-80 for hours on end with no complaints.
And this Bentley
That I saw at a show here several months drove past my place this morning. Nice to see they are taken out and exercised now and then.
Yeah I used to drive my 220Sb at 80 mph all day long. No problem.
A diesel fintail would self-destruct at those speeds.
I also saw a big ca. 1928 Lincoln touring car on a city street, it really stuck out due to its height. Maybe there was a small show or something today...but I heard nothing about one.
Volkswagen Bugs-
-A mid-late '60s Beetle being towed behind a late 80s style Volvo 242 DL
(?)
-Another Baja-style Beetle zipping around under it's own power, This one retained it's
sedan bodywork minus roof and upper door frames to create a kind of faux dune buggy. An array of lights was mounted atop the remnant of the windshield frame.
The lack of roof is not an issue in arid Southern Arizona but I suspect structural integrity is badly compromised, possibly even to a dangerous degree.
Looks cool though. :sick: :lemon:
2001 BMW 330ci/E46, 2008 BMW 335i conv/E93
He also owns a stable of other high end and significant cars, This Bentley being one of them. I want to say he has some early Ferraris too.
Also saw an early 80s BMW 7er, a Daihatsu Rocky, and one of those Subaru 2 door HTs from the early 80s.
I looked up models and front grills. But I can't find a 47 page with various models. Based on 46 models it might have been a coupe sedan. I don't think it was the short coupe with the big, big trunk.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,