Posted on 07/22/2023 6:14:14 PM PDT by DallasBiff
You didn't have to be alive in the 1970s to know how crazy they were. John Travolta was disco dancing in bellbottoms and shag was a desirable feature for a rug, not just something you did on it. Serious news from Watergate and the war in Vietnam heavily impacted, well, everything, but ultimately didn't put a damper on style. The cars reflected all of it, from garish excess to the automotive dark ages when the Oil Crisis and the advent of emissions standards combined to cause as much muscle-car agony as Burt Reynolds selling his beloved Bandit.
Some of the cars below would be in the Automotive Hall of Fame if it actually inducted automobiles (but it doesn't, weird right?) and some of them are just gloriously tacky as hell. Either way, they're the 1970s-est cars of the 1970s.
(Excerpt) Read more at thrillist.com ...
And Burgess Meredith did the voice work for Honda Ads on TV.
My father had a 1974 Dodge Monaco 4 door hardtop with a 400. Probably the best car I’ve ever driven.
A Vega vs. Camaro wreck caused life long scars. I wasn’t driving.
BF had a Pacer, rolling eyes at both.
I had a very cool Monte Carlo. Best car I ever drove.
“Just like GM junk..ungalvanized Oriental metal. Pure rustmobile rubbush.”
These days auto enthusiasts call that patina.
I began driving in the 70’s. My first car was a 1974 Nova SS, followed by two Vettes. A Chevette and a Corvette. My g/f now wife had a Vega and then a 78 Malibu Classic. the Vega could not hit 90 if you dropped it from a helicopter. You needed binoculars at Stop signs just to safely get across the intersection.
The Corvette.with the L82 had something like 210 HP. Almost any modern car could easily out run it.
**The first was a brand new 1970 Maverick with a 170 ci six banger and three on the tree.**
Me, in the spring of 72, a farmboy with livestock money to burn, bought a 69 baby blue 2dr falcon from my neighbor. He had bought it new the fall of 68. It had the 170 ci and three on the tree. I envisioned putting a 302 in it, but hadn’t by the summer of 73, when I spied a 71 Mach 1 I wanted.
The original owner of the falcon, a farmer and optometrist, worked a job in a city. He would drive 46 miles round trip, 5 days a week: 6 miles of limestone gravel, and the rest paved. So it got the double whammy when precip came along: lime mud and road salt. He was tight, and wouldn’t ever wash the under side.
Sold it, bought the 71 Mach 1, ... and went through the same disappointment. Only this time the mustang owner drove almost 90 miles a day for his job at John Deere. He didn’t like to wash the underside of a car either.
It was rotting out underneath, in the trunk, and around the tailights by 76.
I owned two of the cars on the list.
Was not surprised to see the Pinto there,
but was surprised to see the X1/9.
I had one of those ‘77 Monzas with the 305 V8.
My 71 Mach 1 was like that, only medium metallic blue with silver. No spoiler or wing. 351 cleveland was a dog. Road salt was working on it out of sight by the time I bought it in mid 73. It was deteriorating fast when I sold it the summer of 76.
That looks like the burgundy 74 vette I had, only mine had a silver interior. I really enjoyed that car. So did the girls.
I had a '73 Vega GT wagon.
Nice! They even managed to make the federal bumpers look good.
We had that car in a red, I learned to drive in that car. 360 engine. The thing carboned up from idling around Fort Knox (low speed limits on military posts, heavily enforced). They had to remove the carb, remove the intake manifold (cast iron?), and burn it out before re-installing.
Car was huge. A living room on wheels for sure.
Over in Europe and Australia it was the Ford Capri. Biggest engine offered was a V6 (although there was one version in South Africa with a 302 Windsor V8). Designer was Philip T. Clark, who was also involved in designing the first-generation Mustang, so some common heritage there.
I raced a new Pinto, a great little car, like Capri, with disc brakes mandatory with optional 2L German drivetrain.
Owned six years, sold for 3/4 of what I paid for it—new.
Hobbyist-racer agrees, “short” at 01:28-on:
I think they ALL looked 70s.
First of 8 Hondas I’ve owned. Took it to Germany when I was transferred there, what a thrill driving it on the autobahn with the Mercedes, BMWs, Audis, etc.
I had a 71 Datsun 240Z I bought in 1974. Had a 74 Vega, 71 C3 Vette and currently have a 75 C3 Vette which at 48 years old is more reliable than the 2023 Volvo the wife has.
I bought a MGB (new) and a few years later, after I sold the MGB, came *this* close to buying a gorgous dark red Triumph TR-6 with a thin red line tires...but remembered the constant problems of the MGB
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