Posted on 03/15/2015 9:20:53 AM PDT by artichokegrower
From the mundane to the exotic, these are some of the new cars we were diving in 1965.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
My first car was a $100 69 Opel Kadet wagon that I had to rebuild before it would start. I put on a trailer hitch and it would comfortably seat 6'5" me and my 6'9" dad while pulling the johnboat. It was a great little car that I upgraded with junkyard parts from various other Opel sporty models.
I had a 65 Ford pickup with a 352 and an 18 gallon gas tank behind the seat. On a long straight grade just out of town, it would use 1/4 tank of gas getting to the top.
I had an Opel GT too, gold w black interior. Cool car! Everyone said it looked like a “baby ‘Vette.” I didn’t like that.
Had it up to 115 on the Indiana Turnpike. The tuned exhaust just hummed.
I know they ha e that reputation but really not as bad as all that.
My wife was driving a Corvair sedan when I met her in the early 60’s. One morning when she was driving to work, the car seemed to have a mind of its’ own and ran up an embankment. We could never figure out what happened until Ralph Nader told us many years after.
Beautiful car. Hard to believe they designed it so many years ago, and it still looks futuristic.
So many of today's cars looks like cloned turtles.
Photoshop Reveals How All Modern Cars Look The Same
i still drive a 1965 Chevrolet pickup, one of 5 that I bought.
It’s the low milage one with 1,364.000 miles on it.
My other car is a 1936 Chevrolet, 3 window coupe.
The top was hard but didn’t come off. It was 4 doors.
Well, that one does, but in those days, the stock ride height made them look like they were four wheel drive.
My wife's cars have had the same problem.
Every single one of them.
Bad luck I guess. :)
Beyond looks, not much changed in the years before 1960 other than the use of more plastics and the invention of detergent oil. Most of the changes came after 1980, really.
Regarding size, I’ve always preferred small. The smaller the better. I describe my FR-S as a “comfortable go cart” that I can still fit a bass and small cabinet into for rehearsal.
In the 1960’s I was into MG’s and Porsches.
I’m 6’1” and wanted a Fiat x-19 but I was about 8” too tall for that. I fit perfectly in the GT, but I owned it a long time before I ever sat in the passenger side and found out the hump was NOT in the middle of the car, if you get my drift. :-)
BTW, my wife has a phrase about cars and men: “The bigger the car, the smaller the p***s. And vice versa.”
I did the reverse. The drive train from an Opel GT was basically the same as for the Kadet. One day my rear end gave out. The american version of the Opel GT did not have a rear anti-sway bar but had nylon plugs in the bold holes for one in the frame. I bought a rear axle off a Kadet in the junk yard WITH anti-sway bar. Really improved the handling.
I knew where all six Opel GT’s were in the Seattle junk yards.
And that brings up another point: Until the mid 1980’s I spent a lot of time in junk yards. I’ve not been in one for decades.
I say that my Scion FR-s is very much like what I would expect a modern Opel GT to be like (even though I know they put that stamp on the Saturn SKY). It even has the fun front wheel hoot “bumps”. I put 160 miles on it every work day and I often reminisce about driving the Opel. This is WAY better, though.
My brother had a 66 XKE Roadster when I was in high school, he went in the Navy and I kept the tires turned for him, a whole lot more than he had in mind.
[Well at least we Americans can say we taught them how.]
Can’t argue with that but they showed us what we had to do to keep up in the auto making industry.
Competition is a good thing which we will have re energize again sans this Marxist regime.
My high school sweetheart’s first car was a 57 Hillman minx estate wagon.
Actually lots changed in the 40 years before 1960, in regard to cars, and there would have also been many natural changes in the last 50 years as well.
I’ve always been fine with small cars, but big ones are just fine as well, 1959 Buick, 1961 Pontiac, I always wanted a 1963 Cadillac.
Before the government took over automobiles, people chose cars for what they wanted from a car.
We had the 1968 Wildcat and Mom loved it.
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