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

berri

Sometimes I think Detroit would be smart to give up on this European and Asian model nomenclature and go back to actual product line names in order to differentiate themselves. Very few products do well mimicking if they want it to stand out.

andre1969

One of my friends in high school and college had a 1985 Cavalier sedan that had a badge on the trunk that said "CL" or "CS" or something like that. I don't know what, exactly, it signified. It was a fairly basic car. Thinly-padded cloth seats that were black when new, but the tops of them faded to a purplish hue with age. Hard plastic slabs for door panels. Crank windows. It did have an automatic, power steering/brakes, and a pretty nice stereo that looked like the unit in my grandmother's '85 LeSabre, with one odd exception...whereas Grandma's LeSabre only had four presets, the Cavalier had seven! It had four buttons, but if you pressed two adjacent buttons at the same time, that gave you another preset.

I had another friend with an '86 or '87 Cavalier, sedan. I can't remember if it had a trim level designation, but it had a much nicer interior...nicer cloth on the seats, and door panels covered in cloth, with carpeting at the bottom.

toomanyfumes

My Dad's '84 Firebird had the the Delco radio with four presets. Always irritated me- there were five decent stations I programed in whatever car I drove - you couldn't put one more button GM? That car was totally stripped with the iron duke four and a four speed manual. Driving it was basically let out the clutch, floor the accelerator until the engine vibration got too bad, off the gas, shift, and repeat.

uplanderguy

I'm pretty sure I remember that every GM radio I had that was an electronic radio (digital display) with four buttons, you could select seven by pushing two of the buttons at one time, as mentioned by andre above. I'm sure that would've been in the owner's manual, but somebody told me that first--probably my friend whose Dad was a Chevy/Buick Service Manager.

andre1969

In my case, it was my friend with the '85 Cavalier that showed me the hack for the three extra pre-sets. However, for whatever reason, it didn't work on the LeSabre. I don't know if it was in the owner's manual or not, but I think I kept it as a souvenir. I'd be tempted to dig it out and check, but can't remember where it's packed.

tjc78

Those same Delco radios would give you the time when the car was off if you pressed the volume knob.  I remember the preset thing too, funny the things you remember. 

ab348

I retrofit one of those into my '79 Park Avenue. Had to rig up an always-on power feed for the clock, otherwise worked great. A manual would have been helpful though given the hidden features.

fintail

That time thing seems unusual.

Speaking of radios, most MBs up until the COMAND era have radios that can operate independent of the ignition key. It's probably a throwback to the era when MBs came from the factory with a radio delete plate, and you'd have the radio installed at the dealer (or live without). I can speak from experience that if you park a fintail for a week and leave the radio on, it drains the battery.

ab348

fintail said:

That time thing seems unusual.

Speaking of radios, most MBs up until the COMAND era have radios that can operate independent of the ignition key. It's probably a throwback to the era when MBs came from the factory with a radio delete plate, and you'd have the radio installed at the dealer (or live without). I can speak from experience that if you park a fintail for a week and leave the radio on, it drains the battery.

I wonder if that was a Euro car things back then? I remember we bought a new Austin 1100 in 1968 and the Audiovox radio in it was the same way. I believe that was also dealer-installed.

fintail

I think it was, as a lot of old German cars have the same radios.

I am in a small town for Christmas, soon after I got here, spotted a first gen Tempo coupe, first facelift I think. Go ~120 miles and the fleet on the road gets 15 years older.

ab348 said:

I wonder if that was a Euro car things back then? I remember we bought a new Austin 1100 in 1968 and the Audiovox radio in it was the same way. I believe that was also dealer-installed.

fintail

Spotted a Mazda Millenia - it had seen better days.

Merry Christmas

Mr_Shiftright

I haven't seen one of those for at least 1,000 days

fintail

Survival rate on those will soon probably be about 1:1000 - every time I see one, it looks pretty sad.

PF_Flyer

Mr_Shiftright said:

I haven't seen one of those for at least 1,000 days

That Kracks me up

Mr_Shiftright

grazie mille!

PF_Flyer

Oh, you're batting 1.000 now

andre1969

Eh, subtract 71. I'd rather have one of those

hpmctorque

ab348 said:

The thing about full-size American cars of the '60s isn't that they were great cars overall - of course they weren't. Lousy brakes, numb steering, boat-like handling. Properly equipped they could go fast in a straight line and that's about it dynamically. It is the experience of driving one that matters - the exterior size, the heft, the ride, the interior in the luxe models, the ability to cruise the interstate like no import of that era could ever hope to, the interior and trunk space, the overall sense of "dammit, I don't care so get out of my way!" they give off. It was an old way of designing and building cars that just doesn't exist any more.

They were much more differentiated than today's mass market cars, which made them more interesting.

Also, when equipped with the low-cost optional heavier duty suspension and front disk brakes, they weren't as bad on most curvy American roads as they're made out to be here. Let's also remember that most European mass market cars of the mid '50s-mid '70s weren't exactly paragons of flawless handling either. The same could be said about the Japanese cars of the latter half of that 20 year period. My opinion.

hpmctorque

imidazol97 said:

Michaell said:

Of course, what we didn't know at the time was the massive corruption going on within the sales force of American Honda.

"Arrogance and Accords" from Steve Lynch documented the whole thing from an insider's perspective.

Glad to see you mention that book. That was a very good book. I also enjoyed Bob Lutz's book, Car Guys Versus Bean Counters. Another book that was good is The Making of the Car That Saved Ford [Eric Taub].

I know you're referring to the Taurus, but earlier the 1949 Ford also saved that company.

stever

I'm pretty sure my folks wound up in a '49 Ford after the war.

imidazol97

hpmctorque said:

I know you're referring to the Taurus, but earlier the 1949 Ford also saved that company.

Didn't remember that. My brother had a 50 Ford two-door in white. I learned to drive a car in that car. I could drive John Deere tractors, but he had me put the gear in 3rd and let out the clutch. That flathead worked after almost stalling but pulling out and I was off. I was 12-13, or maybe younger. That was a long time ago.

kyfdx

stever said:

I'm pretty sure my folks wound up in a '49 Ford after the war.

1949 Ford was my grandfather's daily driver until 1968 (when, they moved to town.. lol)

fintail

Cleaned out my phone, found a couple cars from the local special interest dealer:

Something not seen every day:



Bright color:

imidazol97

The Mustang in the top picture is a distraction. LOL
The Mercury is a 1950?

And a red Eldorado? I haven't seen one at a car show/
cruise-in for quite a while. I believe a few years back
there was one in red, a convertible.

Must be some other interesting cars in that showroom
based on the background behind the Eldo. Any good
pictures to post?

fintail

Yep, 50 Mercury. I think the Eldo is a 69. I think the cars in the background are early Corvettes.

Here's their website - pricing can be a bit optimistic, but I think their business model is built on negotiation.

imidazol97

fintail said:

Here's their website - pricing can be a bit optimistic, but I think their business model is built on negotiation.

I'd llike to spend some time browsing their cars. I can't find the green car next to the red Eldorado in your picture. It looked like another Eldorado front fender.

I like this from their catalog:

fintail

The green car was this - I actually snapped a pic a couple months ago, as it was striking. Apparently it sold:



IIRC, this was a low mileage (<1000 miles) car.

ab348

Ah, I remember this being discussed here I believe - we were debating the color.

Mr_Shiftright

Spotted a Karman Ghia trying to keep up with freeway traffic on Route 80 in California. He wasn't succeeding but he parked in the left lane anyway. Nice condition, though. Car sure moved around a lot within the lane.

fintail

Saw 2 Acura NSX today, both facelift cars with exposed headlights, both modified.

omarman

fintail said:

Saw 2 Acura NSX today, both facelift cars with exposed headlights, both modified.

Exposed modified and searching for decent plural expression. What can we do to make NSX plural? The plural of fox is foxes. Sex is sexes and ox is oxen. And I think Prii should be banned to the Weather Channel's list of storm names.

uplanderguy

A Chevelle SS is usually a car I goof on for being so ubiquitous at shows and such, but that '67 is gorgeous IMHO. I love original/authentic and that car has it--tire size, wheelcovers, exterior color, exterior trim, etc.--all the way it would've been in '67. The current owner has attention to detail in those apparent things.

And a color that's not red or black--yes!!!

And the last year the coupe was on a wheelbase more than only an inch greater than a Nova--which in the later cars made the back seat mostly useless and the trunk a joke for a car of the size.

explorerx4

A light green LWB Land Rover

andre1969

uplanderguy said:

And the last year the coupe was on a wheelbase more than only an inch greater than a Nova--which in the later cars made the back seat mostly useless and the trunk a joke for a car of the size.

I wonder how the '68-72 models compared with the '73-77, on that split 116/112" wheelbase? I used to think the cars were just new bodies using the old frames, but supposedly the '73-77 frame was all-new; it just happened to share the same wheelbase dimensions.

The '73-77 models feel a bit roomier up front to me than the '68-72 models did, but I wonder if that came at the expense of back seat room? I don't think I've ever sat in the back of a '68-72 coupe, but I've tried getting into the back seat of my '76 LeMans, and surprisingly, it's more comfortable than I thought it would be. The seat is fairly well-padded, and the backrest has a nice recline to it. My head doesn't hit the ceiling, and there's good footroom underneath the front seat. I could probably fit back there okay if an average-height driver was behind the wheel. But, I couldn't fit behind myself!

stickguy

putted past my house today, a late 80s vintage Golf (the version that came out for 1985). have not seen one of them in a while.

fintail

Saw a BMW E30 on gold BBS wheels and it had rear window louvers - I don't recall seeing those before. Lowered, definitely a bro car.

ab348

My '68 2-door is Ok in most dimensions in the back seat but again I couldn't sit behind myself unless I moved the front seat forward a couple of inches.

uplanderguy

andre, I remember the '73 Chevelle brochure showing the coupe's rear-seat legroom to be 32.9", which I believe they advertised as up a half-inch. The trunk in the '73 was 15.3 cu. ft. (going from memory) but I want to say the '68-72 was only something like 12.6 cu. ft. I'll have to look at the brochures online.

I recall the '73 Nova coupe (which we had) was actually roomier in the back seat than the '73 mid-size coupes--33.4" versus 32.9". The trunk was 14.7 cu. ft., larger than the '68-72 Chevelle coupes, going from memory.

ab348

Trunk space in my '68 Cutlass is supposed to be 17.5 cu ft according to the brochure. Rear legroom is 32.7" in the 2-door. The 1973 generation quoted 33.7" of rear legroom and a 16 cu ft trunk for the coupe. That jibes with my recollection of my '77 LeMans which had a trunk I always found disappointingly small due to it being pretty shallow.

andre1969

IIRC, the trunk on the '73 LeMans was even more shallow, enough that GM redesigned the rear deck a bit for '74. I have a beer/drink cooler that I take with me to car shows, and in the LeMans, I would have to position it at just the right spot in the trunk...as far forward as it would go, to the passenger side, and sort of angled up against the full-sized spare. I'd put a towel over the top of it to keep it from rubbing against the bottom of the trunk lid.

I think a compact spare tire would have benefited these cars greatly.

On my '79 5th Ave, I used to have to position the cooler in a similar fashion to the LeMans...its trunk is much larger than the LeMans, but still pretty shallow. However, a few years back I took out the full-sized spare and put in a compact, and it freed up a lot of trunk space. On the R-body, the compact spare stows upright, all the way to the passenger side, in a drop down well outside of the subframe rails. However, a full-sized spare won't fit there, so if you got a full-size, it stows far forward, in the center of the trunk.

My '67 Catalina's trunk is nice and deep, so clearance issues aren't a concern.

uplanderguy

I couldn't find interior dimensions in the Chevelle brochures. I did used to have both the 1971 and 1973 showroom albums, which had much more information. Sold the '71 at Carlisle probably 25 years ago for $60 at my friend's space, and I sold it in the first ten minutes I was there. I regret that. The '73 book I had was out of the hard cover, and I gave it to a friend a few years back. Regret that too.

Found this site and on page 97 of 135 for the '72 Chevelle, it shows 32.3" of rear-seat legroom in coupes and 12.8 cubic feet of usable luggage space, close to what I'm remembering. I'm surprised a '68 Cutlass would have four more cubic feet of luggage space on the same wheelbase. Maybe the key word here is "usable". The similar thing online for '69's which I looked at didn't have any capacities for luggage space, unlike the '72 version I'm quoting here. I had to download the dumb thing to get to the page I wanted.

https://www.gmheritagecenter.com/docs/gm-heritage-archive/vehicle-information-kits/Chevelle/1972-Chevrolet-Chevelle.pdf

andre1969

At one time, Consumer Reports used to do a luggage test to calculate trunk capacity. They would measure it by how many suitcases and overnight bags they could fit in. So the reading might be "4 suitcases plus 3 overnight bags". I'm not sure when they started quoting trunk volumes in cubic feet, but I suspect you're right, that some of those numbers might be "useable" space, as defined by some metric, whereas the larger number might be if you stuff every nook and cranny with smaller items.

At some point, they had to have changed the way they measured trunk volume. For instance, I'm looking at the 1967 Pontiac brochure online right now, and it shows the Catalina 2- and 4-door sedans, as well as the 4-door hardtop, as having 31.4 cubic feet of trunk space. The hardtop coupe has 37.2! And even the convertible has 31.0. Yet, look at the '76 Caprice brochure, and they list the 4-door models as having 18.9 cubic feet. However, the '67 brochure mentions "total luggage compartment volume", whereas that '76 calls it "useable luggage space." Anyway, I know the '71-76 cars were less space-efficient than '65-70, but they weren't THAT less efficient!

I can guarantee you my convertible does NOT have 31 cubic feet of trunk space. If I was to take a guess, I'd say maybe 16-17 cubic feet? The well area for the top does take up some trunk space, but it's not really a whole lot...mostly just that raised area above the rear axle.

For some of those older measurements, I wonder if they took the spare tire out?

fintail

Out this morning, saw a clean enough 1989+ 560SEL in a pleasant grey with lighter interior - not perfect, but looked after, and nice for a 25 year old car. Also a W126 380SE - this was odd in that it had US lights, Euro bumpers and hubcaps - but that model was actually imported here in 84-85. Most grey market cars tend to be models never seen here.

Mr_Shiftright

Rare Bird of a car--let's see if the auction hype comes true

1956 Mercedes "Binz"

roadburner

Saw a very clean pre-1974 Vega GT Kammback on a transporter...

fintail

I bet it hits 300K at least, easily. It's a hot speculative market out there, wagons are hot, it's been well-restored, it's rare, and Europeans will want it.

Mr_Shiftright said:

Rare Bird of a car--let's see if the auction hype comes true

1956 Mercedes "Binz"

Mr_Shiftright

Yeah but Europeans are sucking wind with a weak Euro.

fintail

I think those who can afford a 350K wagon can handle it - they probably shorted the Euro and made up the difference.

Mr_Shiftright

We'll see...the Europeans have certainly dropped out of the US market in 2015 so far when it comes to vintage exotic cars.

ab348

andre1969 said:

My '67 Catalina's trunk is nice and deep, so clearance issues aren't a concern.

But the liftover is brutal, recollecting my dad's '67 Pontiac from when I was a kid.