There is a bit more to the story of the Cricket. Chrysler thought that since GM had purchased Holden and Adam Opel, they should do a ‘me too’ and buy the Rootes group. This consisted of Talbot, Hillman, Simca, and Sunbeam.
The reality is Chrysler was left with a Dog of a car company. They thought the Cricket might catch on due to its image as a gas miser, but it really wasn’t too great on MPG. The build quality was awful, and customers found that the other MOPAR ‘captive import’, the Dodge Colt built by Mitsubishi, was a terrific car with great MPG, and priced a bit cheaper.
One great thing did evolve from the Rootes group for Chrysler; the Dodge Omni and Plymouth Horizon. These were billed as America’s first FWD 4 cylinder car that could compete with imports. Basically, it was a Talbot Horizon that had been on the market in the UK for many years. Chrysler did do dome re-engineering for the US market by adding a FWD version of the bullet proof Torque Flite auto trans (A413), and used VW Rabbit 1.7l 4 cylinder engines rather than the ‘shake and bake’ Peugeot motor in the UK version. Omni and Horizons were a hit, and reasonably reliable (my first new car was a 1982 Horizon TC3 that was reliable to 120K miles and then fell apart).
Lee Iacocca ended up giving the Rootes group away to Peugeot in the late 1970s in exchange for some stock and 4 cylinder engines for the Europe marketed MOPARs.
I’ll stop here so I do not go onto the era of the great K CARs HA HA.
As I’m sure you’ve heard or witnessed first-hand, Hurricane Irene threw her wrath against the eastern seaboard with initial landfall in North Carolina as a Category 1. Although predicted to be a Category 3 at landfall, this storm was still nothing less than a monster. This major hurricane realeased havoc from Myrtle Beach up to Maine as it churned along leaving major paths of destruction behind and massive amounts of rainfall. Power outages became widespread up the east coast, (includes my family in Pennsylvania at this current moment). Streams and creeks became raging rivers taking out roads, bridges, one being a 156-year-old hand-hewn bridge in upstate New York. It destroyed houses and stranded people in or away from their homes. Evacuated people are now stranded wondering the fate of their homes and personal belongings. Washed-out roads and bridges have left complete towns stranded without a way to get to or out like these towns in Vermont that have over 260 roads closed.
This storm has caused massive destruction and that has effected some of our own Mustang enthusiasts. Member, RobTRoma from PA, joked about getting a photo of his car next to a hurricane in our Mustang game thread. Featured above, what looks like a very nice ROUSH S-197 Mustang is sinking in a Subway parking lot in North Carolina during Irene’s throw-down. It almost has an ambience of Jaws coming out of the water before Roy Sheider exploded it.
One of my readers sent me the video below. It’s the second in a series of 3 of a California K-Car club, headed out for car-a-van. Now generally the Chrysler K-Car was and is a but of many jokes. It wasn’t their best plan but these cars have a following.
I’ve gone on similar runs with my Vette and Mustang, same amount of planning, etc, ( we just get there a ‘bit’ faster – :^P). This video show that it’s true…It doesn’t matter what you drive…if you love it. 425px;margin:0 auto;”> [vodpod id=Video.15330551&w=425&h=350&fv=%26rel%3D0%26border%3D0%26]
I was recently talking to a coworker of mine who own a 1949 Pontiac Silver Streak Delivery Van (link – http://wp.me/pKHNM-Bx ) and we were discussing his 6 volt system and the troubles with low amperage.
Well I just ran across a couple of interesting articles dealing with that subject. Now I will tell you I am not “the guy” for electrical work – nope not me (I had a bad experience – ok – a couple of bad ones). But even this one I can understand.
Increasing the power supply often means that you need to convert to 12 volt and maybe 15 years ago yes, but now 6 volts are readily available. So here is what you do (sorry no pics)
Take two 6 volt batters and link them in parallel by connecting the two negative terminals to each other and the two positive to each other. The main positive cable goes from the positive terminal of the first battery to ground and the main negative cable is connected to the negative terminal of the second battery. Of course in some case you may have to modify the batter shelf, but it will sure help kick up the cold cranking amps.
Folks seem to like this segment so let’s continue with 1950.
19 major car makers existed back then and Chevy topped the production totals with 1,498,590 units followed closely by Ford with 1, 208,912. The rest of the field were all less than have that.
So you’ve read my review and I promised to drop a note as to the “Long Lasting” part of Griot’s Garage’s – Long Lasting Tire Dressing.
Now is has rained nearly every day since I applied the dressing.
So take a look at the tires with 2 applications and 3 applications.
Tires with 2 applications of tire dressing
Here is the tire with 3 applications of tire dressing
Here is what I think as a wrap up. Long lasting to me doesn’t necessarily mean just duration, but can it stand up to everyday driving – oh—yeah…just in case I failed to mention, the Vette is my daily driver. It lived up to the Griot promise. I’ll continue using this product.
From Michael Woodword – hey, I just got a 1993 thunderbird with a 5.0 HO. every time I come to a stop, the oil pressure drops dramatically. I was wanting to know if you would have any idea what could cause this. Thank You
But when I get back up to speed its fine.
It would be nice to get an opinion from an expert which ar
nt easy to find
ANSWER: Michael. The pressure should drop when you stop, dramatic swings in the gauge could be a problem with the gauge or you need replace your oil sending unit.
I recent attended a showing of the latest Transformers movie (“Dark Side of the Moon“) and if you know anything about this series or of the cartoon of years gone by, you’ll know that the main characters are machines that turn in to robots. Most of these are vehicles, cars, trucks, semis and even military aircraft.
The car group included a lot of chevys this time, a Camaro which is one of the main stairs, an Impala and a Corvette (actually a representation of a prototype Corvette). The Corvette transformed into a rollerblading robot – which I thought unfitting of my favorite car.
There is the human hero and of course a hot model as his object of desire.
When the hot model was threatened or in harm’s way you could hear the audience get involved. But when an evil robot was about to execute the Camaro character the audience got really vocal. Kids cried at that images, thinking that the Camaro was about to get wacked, forget about the girl….just don’t hurt the car!!!
Yes we love your cars. Oh and the good cars – the Chevy‘s– saved the world again.
But that’s movies and you can just enjoy it with no lasting harmful effects..unless you are me or maybe it wasn’t me but the subliminal messages. I left wanting a Camaro, but not just any 2012 Camaro, but a yellow with black striped bumble bee Camaro.
It must be subliminal messages, I had the same desire after watching Will Smith zip through the empty streets of New York City in the 2007 Shelby GT500 Mustang in his move ‘I Am Legend’ yes the red with white stripes.
Let’s jump up 13 years from 1926 to 1939 and see what the numbers look like.
1939 shows Chevy in the lead for production numbers with 577,278 units produced. Ford is about 100k behind at 487,031 (half of what they were producing in 1926). The rest of the makers finished up like this:
