I spotted an (insert obscure car name here) classic car today! (Archived)

omarman

Spotted a 70s Olds Cutlass this afternoon headed west toward Worthington. I couldn't remember what GM called this particular style, so I went looking online for a pic.

What I found was a car design discussion thread with pics referring to this car as having skegs, double skegs, and posters offering "skegshots" of similar examples in GM styling going back to the 60s.

Well, whatever they call it the Olds I saw seemed in fair to good condition and rumbled along at a steady speed while smaller, modern cars zipped and darted around it.

uplanderguy

GM tended to call the '73-77 intermediates "Colonnade". The cut of those Cutlass fenders along the bottom sure led to premature rock chipping, I can remember that. They're great-looking cars though, especially for the period. In '73, the Cutlass line actually outsold the Chevelle line.

kyfdx

My sister got a new Cutlass for college graduation... her first car.. I think it was a '73... that same color..

We thought it was pretty cool...

Mr_Shiftright

it's interesting how some design cues hang in and others come and go really fast.

Actually I misspoke myself. The Avanti did have a design influence of a sort---in the "coke-bottle" styling cue. Not the first car to do it, but one of the most noticeable of the American cars. There are variation in the coke bottle of course, but we see it in the '65 Corvair and the B Body Dodge Chargers, the AMC Javelin and even the Ford Maverick.

fintail

Early V8, really early

"Awkward" doesn't say enough

T-Tops

A good 'Drysdale' vibe, but that upholstery kind of hurts

Andre should have bought another car/mouth to feed

Possibly the best remaining in the world, crazy bids

Somehow it survived...nice bumpers...not

I'd prefer this, lunatic asking price

Cute little gnat

"Silver Pearl"...nice seats

I wonder how this made it over

Thought a 58 Olds couldn't get tackier?

For fans of red wine

Nice Colonnade

Not one of GM's bright moments

If at first you don't succeed, try and try and try and try and try and try and try again

"Flawless"....I beg to differ

Send it home

Take the money, man

Kill it with fire!

Hybrid - 70s Mopar outside, MB W116 inside

jljac

Once again, Mr. Shiftright is damning with faint praise when it comes to the Avanti.

In addition to the first "coke bottle shape" the Avanti had no grille in the front, (rare for a front engine car) rear taillights that blended into the body (almost universally seen on all cars today), long hood and short trunk, large rear window, full instruments with no idiot lights, the first disc brakes standard on a mass-produced American car, and a padded interior roll cage at a time when some Chevys still had metal dashboards and no seatbelts. Even Ralph Nader liked it and used Studebaker as a good example in his book that America did produce safe cars while Chevrolet sold the Corvair.

If you see re-runs of the Rockford Files from the mid 70s, it is amazing how much his very cool Firebird looked like the Avanti. The Camaro of that era appeared to look like the Hawk as well. The Avanti was far ahead of it's time when it first appeared in April 1962 before the first Corvette Sting Ray, Buick Riviera and Ford Mustang were introduced to the public.

Mr_Shiftright

Great basket of cars Fin!

78 Olds Diesel "One Family Owned" -- ( YOU take it....no, YOU take it).

explorerx4

Chaika. also something that looks like a Ford 5.0 under the hood, although maybe a 3.8.

hpmctorque

The all-new '65 Pontiac was the poster child for the coke-bottle design.

Mr_Shiftright

We may see it again, who knows. What I hope we never see again are the "wedge" and the "shovel nose".

texases

What is it with people and the Datsun B210? They were cheap little heaps when they came out, a far second behind the reliable little Corolla heap.

andys120

If you see re-runs of the Rockford Files from the mid 70s, it is amazing how much his very cool Firebird looked like the Avanti

Boy that's a stretch. It's true that the Avanti introduced the long-nose/short tail look a few months before the first Mustang appeared but European Gran Turismos had already been using those proportions for a decade. The Gen II F-birds were Camaros with a different nose and IMO the Gen II Camaro it was derived from was a pretty deliberate (if not exact) copy of the fabulous 250 GT Berlinetta Lusso by Pininfarina.

hpmctorque

By shovel nose I presume to mean the GM '90s GM minivans, right? As for the wedge, I remember the term, but can't remember the car(s).

oregonboy

Wedge:

oregonboy

Sorry about the width of that last post. I was going to try to edit it, but the edit button in under the banner. :sick:

WHY has Edmunds not fixed this problem? It's been this way like forever.

Instead we get features that nobody wanted, like the orange member info balloons
that pop up when you mouse-over the poster's name. :lemon:

Small wonder that the membership is drifting away....

uplanderguy

The all-new '65 Pontiac was the poster child for the coke-bottle design.

True, but I am hard-pressed to remember any coke-bottle styling at all domestically, prior to the Avanti.

I have a book with virtually every Avanti magazine article from '63 and later. Even when new, a lot of writers considered it a 'work of art'. It was the most-talked about Stude among 'car guys' in a decade, and I have to think other designers at least took note.

Orders came pouring in; however, the bodies from MFG in Ashtabula, OH were off-spec which caused Stude to decide to build their own bodies in South Bend, but not until a lot of unfilled orders went away.

imidazol97

>but the edit button in under the banner.

Sometimes picking a post number several earlier of the one you want to see the buttons on will put the 4 buttons in the blank area below the banners on the right-hand side frame.

The width of pictures is maximum 650 pixels.

uplanderguy

I might add, I really admire the '65 big Pontiacs in a lot of ways...mostly the instrument panel of Bonnevilles and Grand Prixs.

A couple later styling features with a direct Avanti styling influence would have to be the quarter windows on Gremlins and later, Mercury Cougars. Nothing else had anything like it.

Of course, to me, without the forward rake and huge, wraparound rear window (biggest ever to that time), those quarter windows on Gremlins and Cougars don't have the same effect.

Mr_Shiftright

Maybe, but you've never seen another car that looks like the Avanti, and future Avanti "tribute" cars failed badly in the marketplace.

The Avanti is "period interesting" in design but definitely a "one-hit wonder".

Like other things that some find interesting, such as certain forms of sushi, or anchovies---the Avanti is an acquired taste that didn't seem to appeal to the majority of people over time.

uplanderguy

Another Studebaker influence, although short-lived, was the sliding-roof GMC Envoy of a few years back. I remember hearing that in the earliest stages of thought by GM on that vehicle, they contacted the Archives Dept. of the Studebaker National Museum for blueprints on the Wagonaire (which the Museum had and provided). Of course, GM's roof ended up being more modern and electronically-controlled.

Mr_Shiftright

I wonder if the Lark Wagonaire roof design was thought to be as ugly as the Envoy is regarded now? It's definitely unique but again, few seemed to like it then, or now.

Here's a good shot of it:


Here's an example of a roof influence that did contribute to future automotive designs.

This is a pre-war Peugeot retractable hardtop:

uplanderguy

To my eyes, ugly wagons of that period were the GM full-sizes. Through '64 GM outsourced their wagon bodies...I could never stand that rear door/window frame that was just a perfect rectangle...straight up in the front, straight up in the back, and no ventipane or anything else to break up the boredom.

uplanderguy

Here's an early '60's compact wagon beauty:

http://www.gluck.net/paul/carhistory/62PlymouthValiantWagon.jpg

Larks were marketed against Valiants then.

Mr_Shiftright

I have to say I do admire how you fashion every bad move Studebaker ever made into a triumph of sorts. This is true love, no doubt about it. :P

Well sure, ugliness can attack every automaker in the world, but the automaker has to be healthy enough to recover from its errors.

So, the bottom line is that Plymouth outlasted Studebaker by another 40+ years.

jljac

Maybe, but you've never seen another car that looks like the Avanti, and future Avanti "tribute" cars failed badly in the marketplace. The Avanti is "period interesting" in design but definitely a "one-hit wonder".

Everything said about the Avanti above also applies to the 1937 Cord Model 810 (the Coffin Nose Cord) which continued to be produced by three different automakers years after the parent company went out of business. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cord_Automobile

Reportedly conceived as a Duesenberg and nearly devoid of chrome, the 810 had hidden door hinges[2] and rear-hinged hood,[2] rather than the side-opening type more usual at the time, both new items. It also featured pontoon fenders with headlights (modified Stinson landing lights)[2] that disappeared into the fenders via dashboard hand cranks, a concealed fuel filler door, variable-speed windshield wipers[2] (at a time when any wipers were rare, and those were likely operated by hand), and the famous louvered wraparound grill, from which its nickname "coffin-nose" derived.[2] Its engine-turned dashboard included complete instrumentation, a tachometer, and standard radio[2] (which would not become an industry standard offering until well into the 1950s).[4]
=========================================================

Since nobody ever produced another car that looked like a Coffin Nose Cord, it must have been a one hit wonder too. Never mind that many cars of today are low, have hidden door hinges, hidden headlights, front wheel drive, a tachometer and no running boards. They don't look exactly like the Cord, so the Cord must not be a classic automobile.

I am not aware that anyone produced any type of Plymouth after it was discontinued. I am not aware of any classic car that made alot of money for its parent company. The Avanti and the Cord are similar stories about Indiana car companies approximately 25 years apart. These great cars car did not save their parent company, but they were still great cars or they would have died with the parent company.

lemko

Very nice black 1984-85 Buick LeSabre sedan going south on Comly Street off Rising Sun Avenue and a black 1965 Pontiac LeMans two-door hardtop in fair condition going west on Rhawn Street near Bingham in NE Philly.

andys120

I had no idea there was such a thing as a nice '80s LeSabre. :P

fintail

Those are fighting words to Andre and Lemko

andre1969

I had no idea there was such a thing as a nice '80s LeSabre.

Heck, my grandmother's '85 Limited was so nice, GM saw fit to put "Collectors Edition" on the hood ornament! :P Actually, for what it was, that thing was a nice car. Good, comfy highway cruiser, reasonably economical, pretty reliable. And if you shifted it manually, it was faster than it looked. And good looking and pretty luxurious, in that 80's fashion. For better or worse (and truth be told, it's a bit of both), they don't make 'em like that anymore!

uplanderguy

I think those are pretty nice cars. I think the competition--the Grand Marquis--just didn't look as nice. I have a friend who says Ford's quality was better than GM's in the early and mid '80's--and that's probably true--but I think GM had the first-impression stuff down. The interior, and instrument panel, of those LeSabres looked very expensive.

ab348

The width problem with that picture has caused all the "Reply" commands to disappear from the previous page so I am posting a new message instead of a reply.

I had a '78 Delta that looked exactly like that on the outside - same color, same vinyl top, same hubcaps. Mine was lacking the "Diesel" hood ornament and trunklid badge, thankfully, as it was equipped with the fine 350 Rocket gas V-8. It was bought as a beater when it was 19 years old and it served me well for 5 years. Those cars -- really all of the 1977-up rear-drive GM B-bodies, but to my mind, especially the Olds and Buick versions that could be had with Rocket V-8s, were really outstanding cars. They could be made to handle very well, were as smooth and quiet on the highway as any car even today, and had scads of room inside. Of course, they are huge and odd-looking by today's standards, but at the time they were quite handsome. I have not seen one with a black cloth interior like that Diesel before. That one is really a stripper with just an AM radio, no remote mirror, and crank windows. Mine was a stripper too but at least it came with a remote mirror - I tracked down an AM/FM factory radio to replace my AM-only version. One wonders if the low mileage on that example is due to the diesel being non-functioning much of its life. Having said that, I know a guy locally who worked at an Olds dealer in the service dept at the time these cars were sold, and took all the training to learn how to fix them. He drove one as a daily driver up to a few years ago, since he knew everything about how to keep them running.

That '80 98 has been for sale on ebay for nearly 10 years now. The price has gone down slightly but it is obviously still a no-sale. I corresponded with the owner 7-8 years ago and he wanted $14K at the time for it. I wished him luck.

uplanderguy

I'm a big fan of '77-79, especially, GM B-Bodies. I like the Caprice coupe best, with 350 and F41 suspension. But I'd also like a '79 Bonneville with anything besides a 301 (could you get a 350 or 403 then?) with no vinyl top and bucket seats and console.

That Diesel Olds on eBay looks nice, but it's had some paint/bodywork (and I guess the seller does say something like 'some paint touched up'). It's missing the RF fender "Delta 88" nameplate, and on the trunk, "Oldsmobile" s/b on one side and "Diesel" on the other (as opposed to "Oldsmobile Diesel").

That's always been a pet peeve of mine. Not a day goes by when I don't see that kind of thing out on the street. Otherwise, the car looks good but emblems in the wrong place, missing, etc. Isn't the idea of good bodywork to be that nobody can tell? All because the body guy is too lazy to take a photo of where it belongs or write it down.

fintail

I like the hood ornament on that diesel, just for its oddness. Who'd make a hood ornament that says "diesel"? It's funny to me.

That guy with the 98 will end up willing it to his kids.

fintail

I get the same kind of annoyance from some later model MB with "V8" "Kompressor" etc badges...but in those cases it is usually to make a car look higher than it is.

ab348

Clearly, the right rear quarter on that 88 has been repainted with a very poor attempt at matching the color. I ended up getting the left rear quarter on mine repainted to repair a large dent, and thankfully the body shop matched the paint perfectly.

It appears as though someone went a bit crazy with a rattle can of blue engine paint and a bottle of ArmorAll on the car.

Looking at those pics and reading the description takes me down memory lane. The headliner in mine sagged as well. I went to a local junkyard, found a similar car with a perfect red headliner that was a good match for mine, and installed it one Saturday -- a painful, but not too terrible job, as it turned out. That junkyard provided all sorts of useful parts for that car. All gone now, though I still have a bunch of parts in my basement for it.

Mr_Shiftright

Well, not a fair comparison in my opinion. Two very different classes of automobile.

The Cord is beautiful, the Avanti is....well....*interesting*....the Cord is worth 10X what an Avanti is....and perhaps most importantly, the Cord had revolutionary mechanics, like FWD, electrically shifted transmission, and supercharging--a car well ahead of its time, wouldn't 'you say?. The Avanti was behind its time technically. It can't really claim much of anything that wasn't "been there, done that" except the styling---which is really all it has going for it. You take the body off an Avanti and you have a naked 1949 Oldsmobile.

Alas, the Cord tribute cars all failed financially as well, so in that sense, there are similarities.

Why do people keep doing this? I guess they all want to be Shelby Cobra replicas?

Sometimes it's best to let history rest in peace I think.

jljac

You take the body off an Avanti and you have a naked 1949 Oldsmobile.

I had to look up an image of a 1949 Oldsmobile to see if it looked like an Avanti, and wondered why you picked that year.

I found that 1949 was the first year that Oldsmobile quit selling the public warned over pre-war models and finally produced full-width bodies instead of having the separate front wheel fenders like a VW Beetle.

With that more up to date styling, Oldsmobile was a handsome car, but it looked more like a 1947 Studebaker Champion than a 1963 Avanti and I don't think anyone will be putting that orphan car back into production any time soon.

oldcem

I was on a business trip earlier this week. While on the interstate, I came up behind one of the really old style teardrop shaped small camping trailers. When I switched lanes to pass it, I discovered it was being pulled by a stock looking 49 Packard. Must have been one of the models with a straight 8 in it, because he was doing 70 with this rig.

Regards:
Oldengineer

uplanderguy

With that more up to date styling, Oldsmobile was a handsome car, but it looked more like a 1947 Studebaker Champion than a 1963 Avanti and I don't think anyone will be putting that orphan car back into production any time soon.

I had to chuckle, too, at the '49 Olds comparison. I didn't remember a '49 Olds having disc brakes, a supercharger, an automatic that could be shifted manually through three forward gears, etc. Also, I know this is part of the body structure and that was not his point, but the Benz door locks and integral roll bar (which over the years have been proven to be lifesavers in Avanti accidents) are things that were not seen in the domestic market at the time either.

People knock that Stude still was using kingpins in the '60's. I'm not convinced that ball joints were better, probably only cheaper to make and install. Note that trucks continued to use king pins. I gotta say, I've owned my '63 Daytona 22 years and I'm always amazed at how straight and steady she goes down the road and also around curves. I always remember an immaculate-looking '62 Bel Air hardtop passing me on the interstate one time, and it was pitching and bobbing along. To be fair, I don't know its situation though, but it looked like a complete restoration.

uplanderguy

That must have been a cool sight!

I never knew what a Packard was when I was a kid, except for the '48-50 "Pregnant Elephant" models. I think that's when Packards were still well-built even though stodgy. I remember an olive green one around town. Ends up it was driven by our local Stude-Packard-MB dealer, who I'm friends with. He said it kept on coming back as a used car at their dealership. I was born in '58 so if I remember it, that tells you how old it was at the time! My friend the dealer said that straight eight was smooth.

kyfdx

.. a Porsche 924.. late '70s model, I think... Looked all of its 30+ years..

Mr_Shiftright

Okay, I'm going to take up other people's suggestions and start a STUDEBAKER HISTORY Topic, since we seem to be getting into "Topic Drift"--away from the original intent of spotting obscure cars.

So, any future "at length" Studebaker comments will be moved to the new topic and I invite all interested parties to join us over there.

thanks!

Shifty the Host

omarman

Out shopping with a friend when we spotted a black/gold Trans Am special edition for sale and parked on the corner of a busy intersection. It looked completely stock with all color, trim, and hood chicken intact-even stock wheels.

When I looked to my right and saw it, I told my friend that selling off a prized 70s wooly worm is a sure sign of winter coming soon. She pointed left and said, "There's another sign to explain it!" Gas price at the corner was $2.89 and heading north to 3 bucks fast. That's been the trend here anyway.

stickguy

I saw a younger guy drive one of those down my street not too long ago. Early nost version though I think

oldcem

Well, I was born in 46. I remember that a lady that worked at my father's store in the early 60's had a 40's something vintage green Packard Convertible. She tried to put the top down on it one time, and, a bunch of the wiring caught fire. The car wasn't badly damaged, and, she had it fixed. Back then we even had a customer who used to come into town to shop in an really ratty looking 36 Ford 4 door sedan. Oh well - gonna crank my 48 Chevy up in the morning and go to a Toys for Tots cruise in.

Regards:
OldCEM

fintail

On my way to the airport what seems like 100 hours ago, I saw a Renault Fuego in what looked like very nice condition, and a Subaru XT6, both white, within about 3 minutes of each other - at the departure drop off area. Weird.

Now I am about 5000 miles away, so "obscure" is relative...but in about 15 minutes as a passenger on the road, I noticed a 90s Firebird and a Hyundai Excel - probably a dozen of those sold new in Germany, so it has to be rare in roadworthy condition today.

lemmer

You saw a Fuego in nice condition? That must have been a dream. They were falling apart new on the dealers' lots.

Mr_Shiftright

Maybe it was preserved in amber, like those prehistoric insects that paleontologists find on occasion. :P

Saw a '62 Cadillac, 4D HT, Series 62, 4-window. Had a For Sale sign on it. Some peeling paint, dirty seats, dash chipped, body looked straight and rust free, some rust on rear bumper. Looks good from 25 feet away. Asking price was $10,000. Lots o' luck with that. Try $6K tops, I would think.

fintail

I couldn't believe it either. Been a decade since I've seen one on the road probably.

Went out for a walk, saw a few oddballs...rubber bumper MGB-GT, debadged BMW E30 sedan with flamboyant period body kit, early Kia Sorento diesel that sounded less smooth than a fintail 200D.

andre1969

I'm a big fan of '77-79, especially, GM B-Bodies. I like the Caprice coupe best, with 350 and F41 suspension. But I'd also like a '79 Bonneville with anything besides a 301 (could you get a 350 or 403 then?) with no vinyl top and bucket seats and console.

In 1979, I think Pontiac stopped offering the 400 and 403 in the B-body coupes and sedans, but kept it in the wagons. There was still a 350, but I think it was a Buick 350. At least, I remember test driving a '79 Bonneville that a local guy was selling years ago, and its 350 was a Buick engine. I wasn't all that impressed. It seemed a bit slower than my grandmother's '85 LeSabre, which just had a 307, but benefited from a 4-speed automatic versus a 3-speed, and a quicker axle I'm sure. I think the LeSabre had a 2.73:1 axle, and I wouldn't be surprised if that Bonneville had the same awful 2.41:1 that my '76 LeMans has.

I guess that Bonneville would have made a nice beater car, but at the time I just didn't see it as an improvement over the 1989 Gran Fury copcar I was driving at the time. Plus, I had my grandma's '85 LeSabre. It was a fairly basic Bonneville too...vinyl interior, those hubcaps with the little dots in them that were common on '77 Catalinas and LeManses, crank windows. Not a bad looking car though...white with a light blue interior.

I think the one '77-79 GM B-body that turns me on the most is the '77 Catalina. There's just something about the front-end, with its clean split grille that looks downright sporty for a big car. And to me at least, it still looks like a more impressive car than an Impala or Caprice, but I guess the general public wasn't falling for it anymore. The Impala and Caprice were a smash hit that year, while at Pontiac the Bonneville was moderately successful, but the Catalina was almost forgotten.