Afternoons spent wandering the Melbourne streets are never wasted; I’m always sure of finding at least one curbside classic. Over the past few years I’ve managed to catch this bevy of Australian Falcon wagons – enough to bring you three end-of-generation models and a fresh beginning.

From day one, our Falcon wagons were different to the US model. I’ve heard of two reasons for this; some Australian terrain conditions didn’t allow for the longer rear overhang of the US wagon (note the comparative ramp angles in red pencil on the wagon); and the one I think was the primary reason – pure economics. The entire 1961 XK Falcon range was rationalised from the b-pillar forward, with no coupe or two-door sedan that required longer doors. All models in the original lineup shared a wheelbase of 109.5″ and the same overall length.

By the time of the end-of-gen 1965 XP, quite a bit had been changed from the XK. The front clip appears to have borrowed its sheet metal from the 1963 Comet, with different chrome application. It gave the car a squarer overall look but compared with the razor-edged US 1964/65 Falcon, the XP still has a roundness to it.

The taillights had been raised flush with the top of the fender on the 1964 XM model. Once we had finished with the T-bird roof version of the original Falcon (our XL), we based our subsequent 2 updates on a revised and toughened version of the original platform. The greenhouse on the wagon remained pretty much unchanged with its distinctive curved side-glass.

This being a Falcon Deluxe model, it was a step above the base Falcon and sat below the new-for-XP Fairmont in the ‘luxury’ stakes.

This wagon is running a Pursuit 170 engine, the middle tier option above the wheezy 144 and the topper Super Pursuit 200 – all straight sixes. The 170 gave us 111 bhp (or 83 kW).

Of all the first gen models, this one is probably your best buy. The XK Falcon was a bit of a disaster with front-end durability issues, but they had been effectively eliminated by the time this model arrived. To change the negative perceptions within the Australian market, Ford conducted a 70,000 mile endurance test at the company’s You Yangs circuit with five examples of these model.

The next generation of Australian Falcons began with the September 1966-launched XR Falcon. It was pretty much the same car as the US 66 Falcon. As with the previous generation we produced our own wagons, utes and panelvans on the same 111″ wheelbase as the sedan with the same 184.6″ length. The US, however, placed their 66 Falcon wagon on a longer wheelbase with an overall length (sources state 113″ or 115″ – commentariat?).

The XR and subesequent 1968 XT used the same body panels, but the 1969 XW used revised sheet metal over the 66 set-up. The body for the 1970 XY, as seen above, was the same as the XW with minor trim variations.

Whereas the XW and XY sedans got a revised roofline, the wagons kept an unchanged XR greenhouse over the newer chunky lower panels. The tell on the XY is its divided grille; the XW had a one-piece number ringed with trim.

This one’s a Falcon 500, one step up from base. The badge on the front quarter tells us this is motorvated by the 250 I6. While the US 66 wagon dispensed with the traditional round taillights, it wasn’t until the 1970 XW that we took the same brave step.

By the time the XY Falcon had ended its run in March 1972, Ford US had already downgraded its compact platform to Maverick status (a short-lived intermediate-sized Falcon stripper notwithstanding). The squareness coming out of the early-mid 60s on US cars had exhausted itself, and been overtaken by curves.

The XY was replaced with the XA. It was a fantastic effort from the Australian styling team. Despite it being an indigenous shape, it borrowed heavily from the design language of its US parent. Having said that, it was a much cleaner shape than the concurrent Gran Torino and Galaxie/LTD.

By the time of the 1976 XC, curves were on their way out. The front clip was given a cleaner, squarer treatment and a revised beltline on the rear doors which, downplayed the previous models’ coke-bottle.

Lovely brown metallic job; patinated and, like our XY, just right for parking outside. The rear end was pretty much untouched from the XA. Taillights differed only in framing, and all the good things about the original shape are evident here. The bulged rear gives this a purposeful demeanour, after all you need the most heft where the load is.

Finally, we got a Falcon wagon longer than the sedan. The XA-XC wagons shared the same 116″ wheelbase as the Fairlane. Using the same rears passenger doors as the sedan, you can see the gap to the rear wheel arch where the length was ‘added’.

Another step-above-base model, the Falcon 500 gave us the simplest of faces. Sporty variants copped another set of slightly smaller roundies, and the Fairmont scored enormous rectangular headlights.

Music-loving stickers on the rear window makes me suspect this might be used for weekend-long gigs. You could carry a couch on that roof rack. And sleep in the rear.

In 1979, Ford introduced the XD range. Whereas in the past Falcon styling was derived from or heavily dependent upon the US models, the XD was based on the Ford Granada out of the UK.

The clean rectilinear lines were starting to make their way around the world when the first XD clays appeared in 1975. With the launch of the much smaller Holden Commodore competitor in 1978, there was a hasty resizing of certain Falcon dimensions although the shape appears almost the same as the clay.

My favourite shot from this selection. The profile of the XD wagon is mesmerising; minimal front overhang, full volumes at the rear and great proportioning makes this longroof look as if its moving forward even when standing still.

I’d take an XA wagon in a heartbeat, but of the examples presented today I’d take this one first. The boxy shape is very well accentuated by that almost acidic yellow. All I’d do is lose the pinstripe.

When I see the US Falcon wagons, I think they look too long at the rear. Americans would see these and think they’re too short. Mama’s Pasta Effect.

Further Reading:

The History of the US Falcon Platform

The Falcons of Argentina

An Australian XC Falcon Ute in the US

An Australian XY Falcon GT

In November 1960, this model had been around for about a year. The car, that is, not the model in the fur hat. Guesses after the jump.

Today’s CC Vinyl took me a long, long time to find. The soundtrack for this Hong Kong Australian co-production was only ever released in Japan and is quite rare. It features a fantastic title track -‘Sky High’ by Jigsaw – and is supplemented by sound library-style chase and mood music by Noel Quinlan. And, despite its mediocre artwork, it has cars on the sleeve.

Here we have a VK Valiant Charger and what I think is meant to be an HK Holden. The van as it appears in the in the film is a Commer and there’s also some motorcycle action.

As well as some sexy action.

Apparently this was written for Bruce Lee, but Jimmy Wang Yu got the job instead. He found himself hand-to-hand against badguy George Lazenby channelling a Bond who’d quit Her Majesty’s Secret Service years ago and joined the darkside to keep earning. I wish they’d used this artwork on the cover of the soundtrack.

For those of you with a lazy afternoon to fill, here is the whole movie. But be warned – it’s in a style known as Ozploitation; that is to say, not quite Eric Rohmer.

If you’re just wanting some car chase, here’s seven minutes of squealing down the mountain where our hero commandeers the Charger to capture an XW Ford Falcon with occasional guest stars such as this EJ Holden.

And here is the title track.

What makes the Japanese pressing so special is that it features a unique version of ‘Sky High’. The cut from the Jigsaw album was a great start, but some super-climactic string and brass reworking by occasional Paul McCartney collaborator Richard Hewson lifts it to a whole new level. The best James Bond song that never was.

Enjoy the hang gliding footage over 1970s Hong Kong, or have a listen while you keep reading CC.

The body of the 1966 Mazda Luce is a masterpiece of sophistication and simplicity. In this extended piece, I look at a relationship between carmaker and carrozzeria that has never been sufficiently explained and try to address something people have been telling me for as long as I can remember – the Luce was a rejected Alfa Romeo proposal.

By July 1975, the design of the DeLorean was complete, just before Giugiaro’s workers went off for their month-long vacation. Bill Collins approved the final full-scale exterior model and interior mockup. He was not however prepared, used as he was to what happened at General Motors, for the next move.

‘Okay,’ he told Giugiaro. ‘The model looks good. Now when can I have the drawings?’

‘What drawings?’ queried the surprised Italian designer.

‘Well, the drawings that define the body surfaces.’

‘I’m sorry, Mr. Collins,’ said Giugiaro. ‘But it is the model that represents our definitive work, not any drawings. You’ll find it clearly specified in the contract.’

– from ‘DELOREAN The Rise and Fall of a Dream-Maker’ by Ivan Fallon and James Srodes.

Carrozzeria Touring Superleggera set the cat amongst the pigeons with their 1952 Disco Volante.

Its shape wrapped like a seamless organic envelope around the wheels and the mechanicals, save a chrome strip along the side marrying the top and bottom halves. This flying saucer was to influence generations of sportscars.

It immediately laid the challenge out to all the other carrozzerie.

Carrozzeria Bertone responded with the 1953 Berlina Aerodynamica Technica 5.

The BAT 5 was a blank-faced sea-creature threatening menace. Those stingray fins were curled prone – ready to strike down with a propulsive thrust. Conceived with misguided aerodynamic aspirations, it was still a most extraordinary sight to behold.

Both cars were built over Alfa Romeo’s first all-new post-war car, the 1950 four-cylinder 1900.

In an effort to generate publicity and provide work to their hungry local industry, Alfa Romeo distributed the new chassis around the coachbuilders of Turin. In all, 38 different types of body would be built by 13 carrozzerie and it would be marketed as ‘the family car that wins races.’

When Bertone received this invitation, they had never really worked with Alfa Romeo before.

During the 1920s and 30s, most of Bertone’s output came on Fiat or Lancia chassis. They could turn out a fine looking sportscar or commercial body, but they specialised in short-series four-door cars clad in a well-proportioned conservatively-cut body such as this 1932 Lancia Artena (middle left) with the occasional flourish being seen on this 1934 Fiat Ardita (middle right).

In that time Bertone had only built two Alfa Romeos; a 6C 2300 limousine in 1932, and a 6C 2500 coupe in 1947.

Giovanni Bertone had started in 1912 as a cartwright, built his first body in 1921 and by 1934 he had a full-blown carrozzeria capable of taking 150 workers in large premises on the corso Peschiera in Turin.

His son, Nuccio, had dabbled in racing and drawing cars, but his greatest contribution to the business came from his salesmanship. With the large new factory came the impetus for volume, and the young Nuccio had traversed the entire country setting up concessions with dealerships and garages, and established an eagerly anticipated yearly roadshow.

Nuccio understood the benefits of getting the family name around.

After the war, the business was in Nuccio’s hands. A fortuitous meeting with Wacky Arnolt had resulted in the construction of hundreds of special-bodied MGs and Bristols to be sold in the USA. For Nuccio, seated here in the Bristol with his head stylist Franco Scaglione, this was a business-saving order and his first substantial overseas foray.

Alfa Romeo was pleased with the BAT 5 and it was followed by the equally extravagant 1954 BAT 7 and the wonderfully simplified 1955 BAT 9 (left column). And there were others.

The 2000 Sportiva of 1954 (top right) presaged elements of the E-type profile. The 1955 Giulietta Spider proposal was a beautiful little topless BAT, but lost out to Pinin Farina for a large production run. The delectable 1957 Giulietta SS, perhaps Scaglione’s finest hour, was a series success with over 2700 examples being made through Giulia SS configuration.

Another Alfa, this cute little model, was to change Bertone’s fortunes.

An in-house prototype of the 1954 Giulietta coupe had been prepared with the help of stylist Mario Boano of Ghia. Ghia was in the midst of troubles between Boano and chief engineer Luigi Segre, so Alfa Romeo turned to Bertone to complete the program. Scaglione’s development of the prototype’s shape was a great start.

It was anticipated that Bertone and Ghia would split the manufacturing duties on the 1954 Giulietta coupe. Alfa asked Nuccio to take it all on. Nuccio was reluctant; the bodies were in the new style called ‘monocoque’ and the first order was for 1000 bodies. He was used to lots in the hundreds or less.

Bertone would ultimately build over 31,000 Giulietta bodies and be forced to find larger premises.

By 1961, Bertone had moved to a new factory in Grugliasco on the outskirts of Turin. It was now a mass manufacturer with 700 employees and a capacity of 7500 bodies per year. Nuccio had entered the volume game. He would need many more coupes and other special bodies to keep his factory busy.

And then there were the sedans. The biggest volume in the game. Maybe building the bodies was too much for Bertone, but there was very good money in the styling prototypes. Nuccio well understood the benefits having his family name on hundreds of thousands of beautiful sedan bodies.

Back in 1950, it was rumoured Alfa head Iginio Alessio had a financial interest in Carrozzeria Touring. Touring got the largest outside order for their beautiful Sprint Coupe.

It was Alessio who initiated the great rush of special bodies on the 1900 but it was also he who decided to keep the sedan’s shape in-house – most probably in the name of appearing impartial. (He did, however, sneak a 1/5 scale model of the sedan to Touring who provided the final detailing.)

So instead of a four-door Sprint Coupe, we got this.

If the 1900 heralded the return of Alfa, the Giulietta was the bedrock of Alfa’s second great epoch.

A twin-cam 1300cc jewel of an engine and superb driving dynamics mark this diminutive model as the template for Alfa Romeo’s future.

The coupe may have been cute. The in-house sedan was twee.

The 1957 2000 Berlina was doomed for two reasons; the new six cylinder engine was never going to be a winner, and the sedan was designed in-house.

It looked like the Lancia Flaminia having a gothic nightmare.

Despite all the beautiful coupes and spiders they commissioned, it became some sort of tradition for Alfa to produce an inelegant sedan.

From its beginnings, Alfa has experienced a number of owners and managers including – in its future – the Italian Government, and its internal machinations on the sedans are inscrutable to me. Giuseppe Luraghi managed Alfa Romeo on and off after Alessio but he was no Valletta – the iron hand at Fiat. Orazio Satta Puliga had been in charge of developing all these models and Rudolf Hruska was a growing influence who would stay the longest. Whomever held the final decision on sedan shapes left a great opportunity wanting.

Today, Alfa Romeo are renowned for great-looking sedans, but back then it seemed there was only two ways to get a sensational body on an Alfa four-door.

Sophia Loren or a carrozzeria.

In 1958 Alfa Romeo turned to Bertone to look at freshening the Giulietta.

The brief called for Bertone to transplant the gothic face and tail of the senior model onto the junior.

A second attempt in 1961 was not much better. Bertone’s cleaner volumes and rectangular headlights couldn’t counter the intrinsic roundness of the Giulietta’s base body. Remember that front clip, though.

But by 1960, Alfa had already prepared this sedan shape in-house for an updated version of the Giulietta known as tipo 105.

The prototype was a literally a flying brick. The body, though an aerodynamic success (surprisingly), was adroit and blocky with embellishments that didn’t add any grace.

No matter, it was to be a superb driving machine.

Alfa Romeo had also been experimenting with a 1000 cc front-wheel drive car. The prototype of the tipo 103 had been developed in-house with a shape very similar to that of the forthcoming 105.

Alfa asked Bertone to suggest an alternative. Nothing came of the project except this scale model, but that proposed shape would prove remarkably prescient.

The second Giulietta proposal and the tipo 103 model were the work of Giorgetto Giugiaro. In December 1959, he joined Bertone as chief stylist after Franco Scaglione had left. By the time he got inside Bertone, he was already running. He could turn over a two-door shape like nobody’s business. Here he is, at age 24 – tasked by Nuccio to turn Enzo’s eye – considering the fruits of this challenge; his voluptuously spare 1962 Ferrari 250GT.

Before joining Bertone, Giugiaro had spent four years at Fiat. Although his talents were recognised there, not one of his shapes ever got made. Being part of this large organisation didn’t suit Giorgetto’s combination of skills and temperament, but he had plenty of time to learn the importance of the family car in the scheme of automotive things.

Dante Giacosa had this image of skirmishing 500s up in his office, and it’s the only Giugiaro art that survives this period.

The same year Giugiaro joined Bertone, Toyo Kogyo released the Mazda R360. In Japan it was a smash success. It set a benchmark for its emerging kei car category in levels of comfort, shape and finish. Toyo Kogyo’s baby grabbed two-thirds of the market.

The early 1960s saw a marked change on Japan’s streets. The 1950s revolved around infrastructure and economic rebuilding, and vehicle manufacturers were very strongly encouraged to focus output on trucks. Cars were the preserve of the wealthy or well-employed, and were either very expensive overseas models or expensive local ones.

The success of the kei cars would result in a consumer and manufacturing push towards larger passenger vehicles.

As with other Japanese automakers, the Toyo Kogyo Company started in a completely different industry category – as a cork factory. They branched out unsuccessfully into motorcycles with the Mazda-go truck in the early 1930s. It was truck production that got Mazda back on its feet after the war with the 1958 Romper and the R360 coupe would also get a stablemate in in the three-wheeler K360.

Before the war, they had looked at producing a small family car and got as far as this 1940 prototype.

The 360 range was the styling work of Kosugi Jiro. Jiro was an independent designer and a founding member of the Japanese Industrial Designers Association in 1952. There’s very little out there about him, Mazda’s publicity material called him a ‘guru’, and his versatility is demonstrated by output including a sewing machine and scooters. The success of the R360 would have placed him at the forefront of Toyo Kogyo’s styling ambitions in the early 1960s.

His latest brief was a four-door car

1961

Jiro’s four-door Mazda 700 was shown at the 1961 Tokyo Motor Show. There are touches on this car that will show up again on subsequent shapes, such as the relatively flat sides and c-pillar treatment.

A meritable try, but really just an upscaled kei. It got a watercooled 360cc engine (and for a short time a 600cc version) and was sold as the Carol.

If Toyo Kogyo was going to built a large four-door sedan, they were going to need some help.

1962

Toyo Kogyo consulted with Hideyuki Miyakawa on their passenger car aspirations.

Hideyuki Miyakawa was a resident of Turin. Earlier in life he had jumped on a motorcycle and began a journey with no destination in mind. Whilst travelling through Italy, Miyakawa met Maria Luisa Bassano, fell in love, got married and settled to raise a family.

By 1962, the Japanese carmakers had turned towards Italy almost en masse. It started with a Prince Skyline by Michelotti, and soon Nissan was turning to Pininfarina, and Daihatsu to Vignale.

Miyakawa suggested Bertone.

The contract was signed in April 1962. By June, Bertone had prepared this drawing of a baby Iso Rivolta for their new client.

At the November 1962 Tokyo Motor, however, another Mazda sedan was shown. The 1000 SSA. This was the work of Kosugi Jiro with a heavy dose of the 1959 Corvair. The front end is hard to discern in the pics I could find, but it appears to have a similar treatment to Jiro’s 700 concept/Carol production car.

1963

The Mazda Luce 1000/1500 was shown at the 1963 Tokyo Motor Show. Those fender badges and the Italian name – pronounced ‘loo-che’ and meaning ‘illumination’ – marked this as the first public manifestation of the collaboration between Mazda and Bertone.

But something got lost in translation, because the relatively benign original sketch had turned into a weirdly bloated presence, where the lower side surface bulged proud of the upper side.

The rear gave us a better angle. the curves tapering into a nice tightly defined rear, but this car is somewhat underwhelming.

‘The brief from the Japanese firm laid down proportions in length, width and height that were discordant from the outset.’ states the Giugiaro Catalogue in his defence.

Fortunately or unfortunately, the Luce was upstaged by two other Mazdas at the Motor Show.

The first upstaging came from the Mazda Familia Van. Another Italian name. Presented as a light commercial, it succeeds everywhere the Luce doesn’t. The proportions are right, but the surfaces are flat where the Luce’s are rounded. It was a more cohesive shape than the bubble Mazdas, looking attractive enough to have emanated from a European manufacturer.

This is the sedan version of the Familia, launched the following year. It is pretty much Kosugi Jiro’s 1000SSA shown at the 1962 Tokyo Show. Giugiaro has been credited with this shape, but when I consider his work prior to and immediately after this, I can’t see that he had much to do with it other than provide the front end from his Iso Rivolta and Mazda Luce. Whether he did this voluntarily, or Toyo Kogyo did it of their own accord is probably best summed up by one diffident sentence in the long 1963 Luce entry of the Giugiaro Catalogue.

‘The Familia took up some of the motifs of the Luce, such as the entire layout of the grille.’

The coupe was a gem. A tight little shape that looks top of its class. When we see such assurance of proportion and line, we cannot but assume Giugiaro’s hand. Mazda literature places a team of young in-house stylists under Jiro at the heart of the Familia and the 1000 SSA showcar certainly provided the basis for the shape.

The second car to upstage the Luce appeared at the Motor Show but never entered the building. Toyo Kogyo President Tsuneji Matsuda arrived in an extraordinary looking coupe he had driven through the Tokyo streets to the show. No-one had announced the car. No-one was told what it was. The press only got a glimpse.

It was a publicity tease to announce the engine that had powered this coupe; a rotary.

Matsuda had seen something in Wankel’s rotary engine, and in 1961 took the rights for the Japan and Asia. The engine still needed development when purchased, and over the next three years Toyo Kogyo adopted a twin-rotor model, and had also eliminated a crucial seal problem with the help of a pencil. As much as Matsuda, the successful application of the rotary was due to the perseverence of Kenichi Yamamoto’s 47 Ronin. The mysterious car was not shown inside the show, but its engine was on display.

After all this Mazda excitement at the 1963 Tokyo Motor Show, who would have remembered the Bertone Luce?

1964

Giugiaro had mastered the coupe. From his first job – the Alfa 2000 – he improved on his second – the Gordon GT – and then shrank it to around the rear-engined Simca 1000 coupe (left column).

His ‘Testudo’ study on a Corvair had initiated another vernacular that was to make its way through the best-ever-Ferrari-that-isn’t Iso Grifo and the forward looking Alfa Canguro on its way to the Miura…

Added to this list was a couple of Ferraris, a prestigious Maserati 5000GT and the Aston Martin DB4 Jet as well as more Alfa coupes.

His most enduring shape from this period was something he had sketched on a train during his army conscription. The 1963 tipi 105/115 coupe shape would remain virtually unchanged on a range of models and 220,000 bodies were produced through to 1977.

In contrast, his sedan output was almost non-existant. Apart from the Mazda and Alfas, the only other sedan jobs to come through Bertone had been some detail work on an Audi and a Simca. For a stylist the sedan represents a different, somewhat greater challenge than a coupe, because the parameters are stricter. Giugiaro already had enough world-beating coupes under his belt, so maybe the next challenge lay elsewhere.

Did he already crave mastering the family car?

The 1964 sedan shape was dominated by three key influencers.

One, the 1959 Corvair, had inspired a wide range of carmakers as typified by this BMW 1500 with its high waightline lip. The second, the 1957 Pinin Farina Florida II, had seen a similar diaspora of styling cues into cars such as the Simca 1500.

In some ways, these two influences combined to create the latest phase of the fullsize US sedan, as gloriously demonstrated by this Oldsmobile Ninety Eight. No-one could master these dimensions as well as the Americans, and the fullsizers were entering a golden phase.

This is, of course, a gross generalisation of the 1964 sedan year. There were others sustaining their own unique language, but none had caught on like the Corvair, Florida and US fullsizer.

Carl Renner’s and Ned Nickles’ 1959 Corvair showed the world how to treat a circumference lip.

But there was another GM shape from that year which would also also be greatly influential – the Stingray XP-87. Prepared in secret by Bill Mitchell and styled by Pete Brock, it was a crisper interpretation of the Disco Volante with a much cleaner circumference crease.

By 1962, Pinin Farina had tried this language on the Corvair-based Rondine, and Goertz’ Nissan Silvia was about to be seen at the 64 Tokyo Show.

In terms of four-door sedans, the 1965 Corvair got there first. Styled out of Ron Hill’s GM studio, this has come to be one of the archetypes of this language. The absence of a grille accentuates the crisp crease that sits around the whole shape. The upper and lower volumes are perfectly in proportion and – while the two-door is a peak styling moment with its slenderly curvaceous c-pillar – the four door with its Riviera-inspired c-pillar was only slightly less successful.

In April 1964, before he ever saw the 65 Corvair, Giugiaro sketched this. He had come to his own epiphany on the family sedan. Here he has created a fully cohesive shape using his emerging vernacular with a four-door greenhouse to create a shape speaks its own.

But this car has no logo, and those look like Alfa Romeo wheels.
And the front clip looks like Bertone’s second Giulietta sedan refresh.

It was even photographed with an Alfa in the Grugliasco yard.

In 1963, Alfa had released their in-house Giulietta and in 1964 the dead-end senior saloon got an ineffective refresh. Alfa Romeo hadn’t asked Bertone for this shape. Nor would they have used it.

The key to the top photo lies in the a barely discernable logo on the c-pillar of the Bertone prototype.

It’s a rotary logo. Top left is the CSI enhanced version of Giugiaro’s logo that appears on the c-pillar. To its right is what Mazda ended up putting on their rotary models.

The second Mazda Luce had been briefed to Bertone as a front-wheel drive rotary sedan. The prototype became known as the S8P and was anticipated to run the same rotary from the mysterious coupe. The S8P body was delivered to Mazda in June 1964, two months after the date of the sketch.

Being a front-wheel drive brief may explain the elongated beak of the prototype, but something was definitely missing from the April drawing when the prototype was built. The language was correct, but scale had brought out its deficiencies.

Apparently the rotary engine for the S8P prototype never arrived, and development stalled.

It was not shown at the 1964 Tokyo Show. Instead, the mysterious coupe from the year before took centre stage.

That was the L10A version of the rotary prototype coupe, otherwise known as the Mazda Cosmo. Styled in-house by Heiji Kobayashi, here was a flamboyant exercise in interstellar travel. No conventional beauty with its jumble of disparate cues, it wowed the audience.

1965

Mazda still wanted a large sedan. The decision was made to produce a conventionally-engined RWD car which was shown at the 1965 Tokyo Motor Show. But how it got there is a bit hazy.

This picture is in the Giugiaro Catalogue captioned ‘1964 Mazda Luce’. The calendar above the drawing board doesn’t show its year, but it does have ‘Toyo Kogyo’ printed under it. The black upright grille logo doesn’t conform with that of any Bertone clients at the time.

This is not the S8P prototype, nor is it the car that would emerge as the Mazda Luce 1500. The shoulder line has a slight kick over the rear wheel, the c-pillar is wider and the rear light clusters are larger.

But assuming it is a Mazda, then I think we are looking at Bertone’s first response to Mazda’s revised large sedan brief. I think Nuccio wanted to make more money by providing yet another prototype with a different body.

Instead someone decided to modify the S8P prototype body. And they put in place the final piece of this masterpiece’s jigsaw. This is the stage that took the Luce from droopy contender to upright victor with a few key decisions.

First and foremost, the nose was shortened. That substantially added to the proportioning, and was complemented by lifting the crease above the front wheel arch. With the greenhouse made slightly more upright, the car took on a different demeanour. It now seems to sit back, pert and ready. Those few changes have transformed this into one of the finest-looking saloons on the market.

The face goes on to prove the transformative effect of detailing. The mouth of the prototype is raised, and the cavity is emptied of its squared-off headlights and grille. The aperture shape is retained, but the setback twin-set headlights and grille is a infinite improvement and more sophisticated than even its most obvious twin, the Fiat Dino Coupe. The sullenness of the prototype is replaced with a much brighter outlook.

Apparently the changes from S8P to 1500 were at the hands of Mazda employee Tainanji Oda. If so, this has to be one of the best editing jobs in the history of car-styling.

‘Designed with the help of Italian automotive genius Nuccio Bertone, the Mazda 1500 is slim, sleek and stylish – smoothly sculpted with classic contours.’ So goes this ad for the Mazda Luce. Maybe they were underselling Bertone’s contribution, but they weren’t overselling its shape.

It’s as cleanly rendered as a fresh bar of soap.

One reason I rate this shape more highly than the 1965 Corvair four-door is the roofline and c-pillar. The Mazda uses an interpretation of GM’s flying wing rear roof lip seen on the 1959 Corvair. Those thin pillars all round are, to me, a better solution than the wider c-pillar of the updated Corvair four-door.

The 1500 sedan was joined by a gorgeous wagon. Everything good about the sedan shape, but with an even better greenhouse. The extended floating roof takes the body’s curve well, and the pillars are beautifully thin.

The Luce 1500 came with a newly-created but underpowered 77 hp 1490cc SOHC engine mated to a 4sp gearbox or optional automatic. They came with drum brakes all round and a live rear axle.

The 1500 SS had the flash grille and badge. A twin-carb set up boosted the engine’s output to 86 hp and the front end received disc brakes. You got better breathing and a floorshift but this car didn’t really deliver a compelling driving experience.

Something more powerful emerged with the 1800 released in 1967. You got a powerbulge on the hood and a stroked 1800cc engine putting out 103 hp. In 1971, the 1800 became the first Mazda Luce to reach the US with a 98 hp version of the engine.

There was no 1800SS, but you could get these hood pods to make your Luce look sportier.

Aaron Severson has made the claim – which makes a lot of sense – that the Mazda Luce was not received so well in Japan for its lack of embellishment. As the Japanese domestic market was being introduced to US-inspired larger cars from local manufacturers during the 1960s, so too came the expectaton that these cars should have relatively ostentatious trim – something the Luce pointedly lacked.

I’ve seen these twice, once in Adelaide and more recently in the Melbourne CBD on this example. I don’t know whether they are factory or aftermarket, and appear to have no functional benefit.

For the biggest hauling job, there was the 1800 wagon. But it wasn’t the Luce range topper.

That honour fell to the coupe.

At some point in its development, it looked like the Luce coupe was going to be a Cosmo.

The original Cosmo was still living large.

This comic book hero with endearing eyes made its way into the hearts of the people and lasted longer than was probably originally intended. Kobayashi’s exotic shape would sustain, with only the tail from the initial prototypes undergoing substantive change.

What started as a test car and a show car became a production car, police car and even racer. It served as an much-loved halo for Toyo Kogyo and retired to see its children go out and take on the world.

What a great life.

A pre-production run of the L10A Cosmo was conducted during 1965 and 66. The L10A featured a 982 cc rotary putting out 108 hp driven through the rear wheels. Toyo Kogyo prepared 20 in-house prototypes, and put another 60 into the hands of their dealers. This run of prototype bodies are quickly discernable from the actual production models in having a rotary silhouette with chequered flag pattern badge sitting on the c-pillar.

The production L10A – Series I – was released to market in May 1967 at a third of the price of the Toyota 2000GT. 343 examples would be made to the middle of 1968. All production models got a vent in the c-pillar with a chrome accent.

Series 2 was the L10B. The rotary stayed the same size, but better breathing gave it 128 hp and it now came with five gears.

Externally the wheels were enlarged to 15”, and the front wheels were moved forward 5.9”. The biggest change came under the front bumper with revised venting. Some were badged ‘110 S’ but I think most came with the ‘Cosmo’ hoodscript. 1176 were produced until production ceased in Sep 1972.

It raced once. At the Nurburgring in 1968. Two cars were entered in an 84 hour endurance race and one came in fourth, the other dropping out near the end. An auspicious beginning, but the Mazda racing mantle was very soon handed over to the smaller R100 Familia Rotary Coupe.

With the Cosmo still going strong, the Luce Coupe debuted as the RX 87 in 1967.

I wonder if this is the first time Nuccio Bertone and Giorgetto Giugiaro laid eyes on it.

As rakish as the Corvair coupe, more dynamic than Giugiaro’s similar BMW 3200CS, and more restrained than the Cosmo. Most remarkably, it takes almost the exact same lower body with elongated nose from the S8P and makes that droopiness look shark-like. Only thing is, I don’t think Giugiaro did this roofline.

Both the Bertone and Giugiaro Catalogues mention the 1963 Tokyo Show Luce and the 1964 Luce four-door prototype. The Giugiaro Catalogue also mentions the Familia in passing. But neither mention the Luce Coupe at all.

Not a peep. As if it didn’t exist.

It looks like the coupe was an internal effort.

These are two prototypes known as M10P. They had received the larger rotary from the L10A Cosmo and there were also to be M12P and M13P prototype coupes to follow.

As development of the cars progessed, so did the opportunity to try styling alternatives. The rear view shows the cars wear slightly different rooflines, the one closer to camera with a larger rear window and slimmer pillars with more acute kink, the other sporting something close to final. As you can see, the face of the car was subject to a variety of options as well.

It appears that Mazda had taken the lower part of the S8P four-door and were using the run of prototypes to finalise the coupe’s shape and detailing themselves.

Nor did Bertone get the production run for their Grugliasco factory.

As the R130, the Luce Coupe was released to the public in 1969. Although it still carried RX 87 badges along its flanks, the R130 differed primarily in its revised visage. Gone were the horizontal bars placed awkwardly across the grille and headlights, and in their place was a treatment similar to that of the sedan. Turning signals were attached under the front bumper and a rather unbecoming optional vinyl roof option seems to have been popular.

The L13A engine was larger than that of the Cosmo, being two rotors of 655cc swept volume putting out 124 hp.

In ‘Super De Luxe’ form, the Luce Coupe was the most expensive offering in the Mazda passenger car lineup. While the ‘De Luxe’ Luce Coupe was priced under the Cosmo, the Super De Luxe featured servo-assisted steering, power windows, airconditioning and most probably the hidden headlights shown in this 1970 Mazda publicity still.

Ultimately, this model would come to serve as the luxury four-seater coupe alongside the sporty two-seater Cosmo. The Cosmo’s front wheel drive gave it more passenger compartment space, but I don’t know how well it drove. Interestingly, while the Cosmo had a live rear axle, the Luce Coupe came with IRS. In the end, less than 1000 were built making it the rarer of the two.

Was this a rejected Alfa?

No. The unique specification, the April date of this sketch and the June completion of the prototype body says that this shape was only ever a Mazda commission.

Alfa’s attitude towards their sedans suggests they weren’t even looking for something like this.

What emerged from that sketch was entirely keeping in its character, a seamless extrapolation.

It was Giugiaro’s near-complete vision.

But how do we value Tainanji Oda’s contribution?

Never as directly influential as the 1957 Florida II or 1959 Corvair, nor as demonstrative as other examples from Giugiaro’s celebrated output.

But it is a subdued masterpiece. There is hardly an extraneous line, juncture or surface in this whole shape. Simplicity is easy, but sophisticated simplicity is something else entirely.

I’m reminded of a quote by Miles Davis; ‘It’s not the notes you play, it’s the notes you don’t play.’

When we read of the Mazda rotary, we think of performance.

But, as Aaron pointed out to me, maybe the rotary was used with front wheel drive on the original four-door for its efficient packaging and the larger cabin it affords. Imports to the US came later for the Luce; it was created primarily for the domestic market where performance in a family car was not so desired. It was an inward-looking car for people stepping out of a kei and about 150,000 were produced.

The 1967-72 Datsun 510, in contrast, was borne of Yutaka Katayama’s beloved BMW saloon duking it out with Alfas on regional US racetracks. An utterly conventional application of technology, but refined to greater state of tune. To someone stepping out of a US fullsizer, or even a compact, there was no discernable difference in size between the car-next-door handsome 510 and slightly larger, more beautiful Luce. But behind the wheel there was a big difference. 400,000 510s were made.

The Luce may have had a world-beating shape.
But the 510 was the world-beating car.

I would suggest both parties entered the relationship with cross-purposes.

Bertone expected that Toyo Kogyo would return again and again for their expertise.

Toyo Kogyo, on the other hand, wanted to extract as much understanding about automobile aesthetics as possible in order to use it themselves.

It was a commercial arrangement. And ultimately Toyo Kogyo had the upper hand.

The Morning After

In 1967 Alfa unveiled their Bertone 1750 sedan styled by Giugiaro in 1965. Another wasted opportunity.

It’s hard to criticise this car, because drivers really love it and it’s not really ugly. But it is simple, and with a fraction of the Luce’s sophistication.

When you consider the Alfa coupe and spider, the Luce makes perfect sense as the accompanying sedan. The Luce body draped over the tipo 105 mechanicals. Wishful thinking.

By the time the Alfa 1750 saloon reached the market, Giorgietto Giugiaro was long gone from Bertone. The motor-cycle loving Giugiaro had struck up a friendship with the motorcycle-loving Hideyuki Miyakawa and it was Miyakawa who counselled him in his new job at Ghia.

One of this first assignments was the Isuzu 117 Coupe.
Ghia also provided the Florian sedan.

Giugiaro on a bad day or someone else at Ghia?

Soon Giugiaro would join with Miyakawa and three others to form a styling and manufacturing consultancy that quickly became known as Italdesign.

And he would return to Alfa Romeo to revisit that small family car shape.

Giugiaro’s replacement at Bertone was the young and talented Marcello Gandini. Once he had found his feet, he created a succession of definitive shapes including the 1967 Lamborghini Marzal concept.

The Marzal language was immediately translated into a more conventional upright arrangement as the Fiat 125 Executive which was shown at the 1967 Turin Motor Show and offered to Fiat. Fiat declined.

In 1967, Bertone also secretly prepared a four-door version of the Fiat 125 Executive for Toyo Kogyo. The Japanese firm was undergoing a complete revision of its passenger vehicle design.

Bertone delivered a better solution than the Executive; an attractive shape and an elegant follow-up to its Mazda predecessor. This is the only image I can find of the four-door but you can just see the front end which I would suggest looks a lot like that of the Fiat.

The Bertone Catalogue refers it as the 1500 Luce, but elsewhere it’s referred to as S15A. That might suggest it housed the mighty 1500cc experimental rotary engine. Wishful thinking indeed.

The new Mazda Familia shape was launched in 1967. At a first glance it looks to have been influenced by the Gandini’s proportions, but its details make it a more transatlantic shape.

I think this series was one of Japan’s finest-looking ever. A four-door sedan, a two-door sedan, a four-door wagon and two-door wagon/van, a pickup and a fastback coupe with none of these variants lacking in aesthetics. I’ll return to this model at some point, but for now I’d say it’s not a Bertone shape. I’d love to know who did it.

I do think the Gandini Luce influenced the front end of the Familia rotaries.

After the Familia came the 1970 Capella. This was a slightly smaller series based on the Luce and targeted at the 510 with a rotary range. That face looks familiar. I don’t think Bertone rendered this diluted Dino Coupe shape either.

The next time Bertone and Mazda were publicly associated together would be in 1981 for the MX-81 sportscar prototype.

The Gandini Luce prototype is apparently still in the possession of Mazda, hidden away and unseen by the public. The next Luce was to be styled in-house and they did a fine job of the shapes.

They put RWD on the coupe and a rotary in the sedan.

Rejection of the Gandini Luce must have been swift. In 1968 Bertone prepared this sedan shape for Alfa Romeo.

Alfa declined. Then they came back.

The Bertone Catalogue entry for this version explains things thus: ‘The state of relations between Bertone and Alfa Romeo induced the latter to omit the name of the Grugliasco carrozzeria from the presentation of the new model.’

Alfa Romeo finally got a great-looking sedan.
It came from a rejected Mazda proposal.

Many thanks to Aaron Severson of AteUpWithMotor for his help with this piece.

Further Reading

Curbside Classic: 1974 Mazda Luce RX4 Rotary Wagon

AUWM on the Mazda Rotary Part 1

S8P Prototype on display

Paul N. on the Alfa Romeo Twin-Cam Four

Pininfarina and Nissan

Body art. A moment of indecision, a lifetime of regret.

I’ve never bought a car with a decal or any other body art. I can’t figure out why people want something like this on their vehicle – are they an overlooked delete option?

Sometimes it works, such as this Tron-ist interpretation over a superb Tron-ist shape.

QOTD with parameters. What are the the most egregious examples of automotive body art? No hand-painted Eugene-mobiles or Krappy Kustom sprayjobs allowed. It has to be a decal, commercial stencil job or suchlike. Caravans most welcome.

Managed to catch a selection of Chrysler products loitering around Melbourne’s streets. They’re not uncommon here, but much more visible in their hometown of Adelaide. Let’s start with a 1966-67 VC Wayfarer. US-derived ’66 front clip is cleaner with our (less distinctive) grille ahead of an AP5/6 rear. I’m not sure if that’s a factory colour but it works. My favourite of our 60s Val utes.

1970/71 VG Safari coming home after a day at work.

VG Hardtop with homebake ragtop. I remember a rage for sawzall action on these back in the 1980s; a place down the road had a few of them as funmobile rentals as well as Beetles similarly emasculated. Shame, because the Dart fastback roofline combined with our VG front clip made this a great-looking coupe.

Rare on the streets is a CH Chrysler by Chrysler, as opposed to a Valiant by Chrysler. These got the loop bumper and a longer wheelbase than the VH Valiant with the same body. Super-rare is the two-door hardtop, which rivals the Fuselage coupes for deck/hood to cabin ratio. I see this one semi-regularly and it’s in nice curbside condition.

1975-78 KB or KC Centura. Probably rarer on the streets than the CH, these Cortina rivals derived from the euro Chrysler 180. Ours came with a two-litre four, or the 215 or 245 /6 versions of our ‘hemi’.

Rarer again would be this 1959 Imperial. It just glided on by one quiet Sunday morning.

Didn’t get the whole ute in our final shot; was too distracted by that smile.

Further Reading:

History of Valiant in Australia Part 1

History of Valiant in Australia Part 2

Dodge Dart of Brazil

The Adventures of the Dirty Dart

There are many names that send a pulse of adrenalin coursing through the veins; Sunny, Tiida, Q, GTI, GTI-R, NX, EXA, GXE, Ti, SSS, GL, Primera, Vector, Sabre, Arex, Langley, Cherry, Sentra, Bluebird Sylphy, Liberty Villa, Holden Astra, Alfa Romeo Arna and Audi Grinny. And all they have one thing in common. Nissan Pulsar. Today we take a random selection from Melbourne’s curbs and see how they stack up.

1990-94 Nissan Pulsar GTI-R

An early entrant in the all-wheel-drive turbocharged flourish. An air-to-air intercooled Garrett T3 turbocharger was mated to the Pulsar’s 2 litre aluminium twin cam and drove an ATTESA four-wheel-drive with a viscous centre coupling to give a 50/50 split.

Prepared to homologate a Group A rally car, Nissan instead withdrew from rallying so it could never really be measured in battle against its STi and Evo counterparts. There was also a lightweight JDM-only version offered which shaved 30kg off the 1220 kg weight.

This one’s a JDM grey import, we never got these in their day. The UK got 70 of them as the Sunny GTi-R.

Max Power: 220 PS @ 6400 rpm
Torque: 196 lb ft @ 4800 rpm
Max Speed: 134 mph (lightweight 139)
0-60 mph: 6.1 secs (5.9)

1987-91 Nissan Pulsar Q

Nissan did a JV with Holden as part of a policy of rationalisation in the Australian automotive industry during the early eighties. Holden badged theirs Astra, and both were powered by the GM-sourced Family II 1.8 litre four-cylinder engine. The Q was a local market budget sporty trim level for the Pulsar, above the base GL and beneath the fully sicker SSS and luxo Ti.

Max Power: 107 PS @ 5,600 rpm
Torque: 111 lb ft @ 3,600 rpm

Key Standard Equipment
2 Speaker Stere0, Power Door Mirrors, Disc Brakes Front Ventilated, Power Steering, Disc Brakes Rear Solid, Spoiler – Rear, Limited Slip Diff

1984-85 Audi Grinny

A ill-fated foray into rallying with the disastrous Quattro all-wheel-drive cars had Audi in despair. A team of VW negotiators was secretly despatched to Japan to find a quick remedy. Subaru was approached first, but declined. Nissan jumped at the chance to utilise a lightened Patrol arrangement and in return they got a (JDM-only) prestigious European brand atop their staggeringly tall Pulsar hierarchy.

The Grinny delivered the exhilaration of the Alfa Romeo Arna with all-wheel-drive.

Yeah… nar… made that up.

This isn’t a photochop, though.

hehehe

Further Reading:

1979-82 Nissan 310 Coupe and Hatchback CC

1983 Pulsar CC

1983 Alfa Romeo Arna

1983-85 Pulsar NX CC

1991-95 Australian Spec Pulsar CC

1992 Pulsar NX 2000 CC Capsule

… I found a book in a second-hand shop called ‘Architecture Without Architects’ (Bernard Rudovsky, pub. MOMA, New York, 1964). It’s a superb compendium of buildings and structures from history designed by ‘non-pedigreed’ architects. About halfway through I came across this desert fortress in Southern Morocco. Was I seeing things?

I first heard of this craft in a Melbourne schoolyard as the ‘Aluminium Falcon’ in 1977. Probably from the same kid who would later tell me of ‘Injunary Jones’. I got to see the movie during its first run, and was enthralled. How could I not love this amazing-looking and fully-kinetic adventure?

The best spaceship in the whole movie was this ‘piece of junk’.

The Millennium Falcon was originally planned to look like the above. It was, after all, a smuggling ship so it seemed logical to give it a lengthy cargo configuration like most freighters of the 19th and 20th centuries. Things got as far as the construction of the shooting model, which would ultimately be used instead as a background spacecraft.

George Lucas had been alerted to the fact that it bore some resemblance to the Eagle Transporter from television’s ‘Space: 1999’. Legend has it he looked at a half-eaten hamburger and decided to base his new shape on that.

Joe Johnson, who designed the replacement Millennium Falcon for the film, doesn’t mention the burger. ‘George insisted on a different look entirely, something that wouldn’t look like it had been inspired by anything we’d ever seen.’

‘He may have said at some point that it could have the essence of flying saucer.  I’m not sure about the conversation that happened almost forty years ago, but I do remember that it was a situation of “anything goes!” I started with identical upper and lower dish shapes that looked like they had been cut away around the edges to enclose components that had been hot-rodded together. Landing gear bays on the bottom and the com dish on the top helped to break up the symmetry and give it a distinct top and bottom.’

A similar treatment was used by Paolo Martin on the 1970 Pininfarina Ferrari 512S Modulo.

‘I did several sketches with the cockpit centered, just above the loading arms, but I really liked the offset cockpit. It also let me add another asymmetrical tube shape that looked like it housed the corridor to the cockpit. Even though the ship is supposed to be a “spice freighter” I didn’t want the shape to give any indication of its purpose. It’s a big hot rod pure and simple.’

None of Johnson’s original concept sketches of the Falcon have seen the light, but these storyboard frames and Ralph McQuarrie’s unfinished keyframe show how the ship evolved; firstly without the side-mounted cockpit, then with a vestigial version, towards something that broke out of the fuselage more convincingly.

According to Wookieepedia (yep), the YT-1300 light freighter was built by the Corellian Engineering Corporation. It was first owned by the Corell Industries Limited shipping firm, who had the ship for twelve years and utilised it as a shipping vessel in the Corellian system. ‘Millennium Falcon’ was not actually the model’s name, but rather one of a number of titles bestowed upon the craft by its various owners.

Technical Specifications

Length – 34.37 meters
Width – 25.61 meters
Height/depth – 8.27 meters (including lower cannon and upper sensor array)

Maximum speed (atmos) – 1,050 km/h
Engine unit(s) – 2 Girodyne SRB42 sublight engines (heavily modified)
Hyperdrive rating – Class 0.5; Backup class 10

Hyperdrive system:
Avatar-10 hyperdrive (original)
Isu-Sim SSP05 hyperdrive generator (heavily modified),
Later upgraded to a Series 401 hyperdrive motivator

Power plant:
Quadex power core
Incom N2I-4 power converter
Konesayr TLB power converter
CEC emergency power generator
Cryogenic reserve power cells

Lando Calrissian won it in a game of sabaac, but lost the ship in another game of sabaac to Han Solo years later. Han’s personal enhancements included upgrading the armour plating, weapons, engines, sensors, and sensor jammers.

When we first met the Millennium Falcon, Han had just shot first and now he was taking Luke Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi, C-3PO and R2-D2 off Luke’s home planet of Tatooine in search of a woman bearing a peculiar bun hair-do.

And the shenanigans commenced.

As of this week it has appeared in five of the Star Wars movies. George Lucas gave it a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo in ‘Revenge of the Sith’, and it featured in all three middle films; ‘A New Name’, ‘The Empire Strikes Back’ and ‘Return of the Jedi’.

The appearance of Millennium Falcon was the goosebump moment of the first trailer for ‘The Force Awakens’.

It also made an appearance in 1982’s ‘Blade Runner’. This science fiction film starring Harrison Ford had nothing to do with Han Solo or Star Wars. It was a difficult shoot with a very limited budget for special effects, but the crew knew they were working on something special. Some of the model makers brought in their own creations to help populate the visual environment. Bill George provided his scratch-built Millennium Falcon and Jon Roennau his Dark Star ship.

The Millennium Falcon was converted to a building, sitting upright on its rear with its distinctive maw filled in. It sits at the centre of the above shot.

And, thanks to furiousfanboys, here’s where it appears in the film. I don’t think the Disney lawyers could make a case. It’s also apparently hidden somewhere within ‘Star Trek: First Contact’.

I’m not sure George Lucas, as prescient as he was at that time, suspected that the Millennium Falcon would become so singular. Most of these are the theatrical posters from the first US release of the film. Also shown is the production poster (top left) and the poster that came with the soundtrack (bottom right). As you can see, there is more emphasis on the X-wing fighter and Luke’s landspeeder – which gets a nice Drew Struzan (with Charles White III) interpretation.

The Millennium Falcon only makes an appearance on the soundtrack poster, hidden somewhere near the middle.

There were just as many (if not more) alternative poster artworks for 1979’s ’The Empire Strikes Back’, one of which included the Millennium Falcon quite prominently.

By 1982, the Japanese theatrical re-release of the first two films makes it clear who was really becoming the star of the series.

The Millennium Falcon had become a character in its own right.

Quietly handsome and passively moody, it was the George Harrison of the group dynamic. Han was sardonic John, Chewy was the band’s cuddly teddybear Paul, and the droids combined in light comic relief and crucial percussive noise to match Ringo.

And just like George with his songwriting, the Millennium Falcon was capable of stratospheric (if intermittent) brilliance.

It stands as the single most iconic spaceship in fiction. 2001’s cartwheel space station, Star Trek’s Enterprise configuration and Thunderbird 2 also come to mind, and there is a whole universe of great spacecraft shapes out there, but none have the endurance and broad recognition of the Millennium Falcon. It’s also likely to outlast the memory of the Apollo needle rocket and the space shuttle in the minds of non-enthusiasts.

It represents its kind with the simplest of silhouettes.

Of course, its endurance was not insignificantly enabled by George Lucas’ gamble on merchandising. That first large toy at top left was a unicorn even amongst my more privileged friends. Today Lego have an influential franchise and it’s a natural fit for gaming.

It wasn’t just about fanbois, either. Kayla Kromer of Lounge Geeks fashioned this bespoke creation in 2009, although I’m not sure how many were made.

Ultimately, I wonder whether it’s something deeper inside us – a collective psyche or pan-generational remembrance of visitors past – that feeds into the Millennium Falcon’s popularity.

Or maybe I’m just seeing things.

Further Reading:

Joe Johnson on his Millennium Falcon

Wookieepedia Profile

Some interesting thinking on the shape’s development

The Millennium Falcon School

Jim Klein finds a distant ancestor

Paul Niedermeyer on the history of the Ford Falcon platform

Yesterday I brought you an overview of the career of Rolls-Royce stylist John Blatchley. In that article I made mention of his posited involvement with the 1952 Bentley Continental. Today I’m going to take a closer look at the origins and development of this iconic shape.

Every so often, the European automobile industry produces a car that lifts its head above its peers. Not necessarily for being the fastest, nor the prettiest; certainly one that sits in the upper echelon of those categories but comes to market with an extra hint of the exotic. I hesitate to use the term ‘supercar’, but it serves its purpose here.

The 1952 Bentley Continental was one such car.

It had long been stated, whether assumed or otherwise, that the shape of the Continental was the work of Ivan Evernden and John Blatchley.

In 2003, Blatchley disclaimed credit for the shape.

A Long Tradition

In 1913 a factory team of specially-prepared Rolls-Royce Silver Ghosts was entered in the Austrian Alpine Trials, and distinguished themselves winning seven awards, including the Archduke Leopold Cup. Replicas of the team cars were produced by Rolls-Royce for the public and these models were called ‘Continental’.

Bentley Motors was established by Wilfred Owen Bentley and his brother in 1919 and by 1921 they had built their first car in a small premises in Cricklewood. With the company motto “To build a good car, a fast car, the best in class.” In 1924, Bentley entered a team of cars in the Le Mans 24 hours race and won. An attempt to emulate this win in 1925 proved financially disastrous for the business.

Bentley cars were particularly admired by a prominent but small coterie of wealthy and adventurous types, who became known as the ‘Bentley Boys’. One of these gentlemen, diamond fortune heir Woolf Barnato (pictured here with his Gurney Nutting bodied Bentley Speed Six) bailed the company out, and Bentley was able to achieve four more wins at Le Mans between 1927 and 1930.

In 1931, however,  Bentley Motors went into receivership and was purchased by Rolls-Royce.

H Ivan F Evernden joined Rolls Royce in 1916 and by 1922 was working in the design department as a protegé of Sir Henry Royce. In 1930, Royce had him prepare a special version of the Phantom II then in production. The wheelbase was shortened and a Barker body was fitted to  experimental chassis 26EX to produce the prototype of the Phantom II ‘Continental’ models (top).

The lower picture shows a 1933 3 1/2 litre Bentley with Park Ward body, prepared by Evernden in order to demonstrate the advantages of weight saving and streamlining to his colleagues. It would appear to have no chassis rails, but I suspect that was a mistake by the artist contouring the actual photo before placing it against a new background.

I note the term ‘design’ is used here and in this article to denote the drawings for the fabrication of componentry and the configuration of a car, whereas ‘styling’ denotes the shaping of the car’s body. The sketch of 26EX is by Evernden, showing he was clearly capable at styling.

In 1935, a young man named John Blatchley was taken on by coachbuilder J Gurney Nutting & Co. as a car stylist under AF McNeil. Blatchley appears to have excelled at his tasks , and when when McNeil left Gurney Nutting for James Young in 1936, Blatchey was appointed chief stylist at the age of 23. Blatchley was to remain with Gurney Nutting until 1940, when orders dried out with the onset of the war. These undated sketches by Blatchley are from this period in his career.

In his authoritative book ‘Bodies Beautiful. A history of car styling and craftsmanship.’, John McLellan notes this: ‘Certain houses, Gurney Nutting prominently among them, had a name for sporting bodies…’(1)

The 1935 or 1936 Alfa Romeo 6C 2300 Pescara Berlinetta Aerodynamica was one of a series of ‘Pescara’ body styles produced by Pinin Farina in that period. Named after a win by an Alfa 2300 in the Pescara 24 hours race, this particular body does not appear to have a race history. It was a one-off built for Count Theo Rossi of Montelera and displayed at the Milan Motor Show. Although its image was used by Pinin Farina in their press advertising, it was to be quickly overshadowed by their even more avant-garde 1936 Lancia Aprilia Berlinetta Aerodynamica.

The French concessionaires for Rolls-Royce and Bentley was a company named Franco-Brittanic Autos, run by Walter Sleator, a good friend of RR. In 1938 and facing declining sales, Sleator proposed a special Bentley model to RR management and offered to handle the project in order to protect RR from any possible fallout.

A wealthy financier, André Embiricos, was to fund the first example. Stylist Georges Paulin took stock of his influences and provided the shape. A wooden model was subjected to aerodynamic tests before Pourtout of Paris produced the car’s lightweight body in aluminium. Under the skin was a relatively standard 4 1/4 litre Bentley. Embiricos raced the car, yet it was composed enough for him to use it as a road car as well. It achieved a lap run at 115.5 mph in the hands of George Eyston at Brooklands and was to go on to finish 6th at the 1949 Le Mans as an eleven year-old machine.

This Embiricos Bentley was a cause célébre, but alas generated no further orders for Walter Sleator. In its track capability, road docility, and general shape outline, this car would serve as the template for the 1952 Bentley Continental.

The 1939 ‘Corniche’ 4-door saloon. It was another initiative of Sleator’s. Georges Paulin was again to style the vehicle, this time in conjunction with Ivan Evernden. The coachwork was built by Van Vooren of Paris but the project faltered with the onset of war. It was to lend its name to the Continental project during development.

The 1946 Bentley Mark VI Standard Steel saloon. This body-on-frame car was to provide the basis for a variety of specials from many coachbuilders, as well as donate its underpinnings to the running prototype of the 1952 Bentley Continental.

In 1948, Pinin Farina accepted a commission from Walter Sleator and prepared the Bentley Mark VI Berlina (above). In collaboration with Facel Metallon, a small series of these cars were produced for customers. They were named ‘Cresta’ and differed primarily from the above model in featuring a narrower grille. Modifications to certain internal components from the donor Bentley Mark VI used on the Cresta were to be incorporated into the Continental.

The General Motors fastback was magnificently expressed in the Cadillac V-16 Aero-Dynamic concept car shown at the 1933 World’s Fair in Chicago. By 1942 there was a fastback for each of the car marques owned by GM, and in 1948 a new interpretation of the concept was released as the Cadillac Series 61 and 62 Club Coupe (top) and Oldsmobile 98 Club Sedan. In 1949, this new look made its way down through the rest of the GM car marques to the Chevrolet Fleetline range (bottom).

The Bentley Blizzard. There is scant information on this car; some sources state this was being developed as a US-focused sportscar in the vein of the Jaguar XK120, initiated in late 1949 and cancelled with the success of the Jag. Another source states that it was cancelled with the arrival of the Jag, which would place it closer to 1948. Either way, this sketch with its accompanying profile view by Cecily Jenner and line drawing suggests the Blizzard was in serious consideration immediately prior to the Continental project.

In yesterday’s profile I made note of Blatchley’s seniority within this small team. Ivan Evernden, by now Chief Projects Engineer at Rolls-Royce Car Division and head of the Styling Department, clearly had an aesthetic appreciation and capability. I would suggest that by this time he was leaving the shaping to his team; providing general instructions mostly, specific instructions occasionally and approving work. I note the numberplate, which is sometimes used as an informal code for the project’s lead. In this case they appear to refer to Evernden.

The Blizzard is most likely the work of John Blatchley guiding Cecily Jenner and Bill Allen, under the authority of Ivan Evernden.

Coachbuilder HJ Mulliner was held in high regard by Rolls-Royce. Established in 1900, by the 1920s Mulliner had established a reputation for bodying Bentley cars. In that decade alone they clothed over 240 Bentley chassis. This reputation continued after WW2, however with diminishing orders Mulliner was eventually purchased by Rolls-Royce in 1959.

This 1949 Bentley Mark VI fastback was the one of the first to be built by Mulliner in their all steel coachwork and body framing construction developed by their Technical Director Stanley Watts. This technique involved using ‘Reynold’s’ metal alloy extrusions for the framework and aluminium panels for the body panels.

In 1950 a wealthy Milanese, Signor Luigi Bressani, commissioned a one-off Rolls-Royce Silver Dawn Sport Coupe from Pinin Farina. In late August 1950, a Rolls-Royce chassis was delivered to Pinin Farina, and by April 1951 the car was on display at the Turin Motor Show.

At some point, this car’s shape went from being a ‘three-box’ shape to a fastback. Pinin Farina had been working with this fastback roofline/side-window aperture configuration beginning with a Fiat 1100 shown in March 1949 at the Geneva Motor Show and encompassing a series of different bodies before finding its most famous expression in the Lancia Aurelia B20 GT of 1951 (bottom right). It’s not clear whether the change was at the request S. Bressani, or the decision of Battista ‘Pinin’ Farina.

This body is believed to have led to discussions between Rolls-Royce and Pinin Farina on the possibility of putting it into production. The idea was not pursued as the cost to produce this body was said to be prohibitive. I can’t find a date for those discussions.

A Most Important Project

Early in 1950 Ivan Evernden was called into a meeting and emerged with the brief for the project known initially as ‘Corniche II’. He was to develop a car that was to “not only look beautiful, but possess a high maximum speed coupled with a correspondingly high rate of acceleration, together with excellent handling qualities and roadibility.” (2)

Evernden had a lot to do.

The engine for the Corniche II was to be based on an enlarged 4,566cc version of that used in the Mark VI. This upgrade, still in its experimental stage, required further modification but needed to retain the attributes of smoothness and slience as was required for the Bentley marque. Other mechanical compoenents needed to be fabricated or adapted.

This shape of this car was to be aerodynamically tested. Rolls-Royce Aero Division had wind-tunnel facilities at Hucknall, Nottinghamshire, not far from where the Car Division Experimental Department was housed at Belper, Derby.

A lighter body was decided upon in an effort to further enhance the car’s performance. Evernden had direct access to Park Ward, a coachbuilder purchased by Rolls-Royce in 1939, but chose Mulliner on the basis of their new lightweight frame and body construction technique.

Evernden (pictured above at a later date with the project’s running prototype) had been tasked with a project of considerable prestige and importance, and required the best of what Rolls-Royce could muster. The Company’s very reputation was at stake.

Evernden’s brief to his senior stylist John Blatchley was to use the Embiricos Bentley as the starting point for a four-seater two-door body.

‘In his retirement, however, (Blatchley) disclaimed any credit for this project and recalled that his contribution was confined to some very early drawings of the basic concept required by Ev, from which Miss Cecily Jenner produced a water colour perspective…’ (3)

This perspective is shown above.

This is an undated, un-numbered and unsigned set of drawings. They appear to be Rolls-Royce drawings rendered in a style very similar to that of Cecily Jenner (see notes).

The slope of the grille, length of the bonnet, side window aperture, rear fenders and sloping rear appear little changed from the watercolour. Significantly, though, the front end treatment is not as was proposed in the watercolour. It appears that these drawings were prepared with the recent ‘Blizzard’ car as a reference for the front end. The front fenders bear the crease-at-the-crown style used on the Mark VI standard saloon that also appears on the Blizzard sketch. The headlights have been repositioned inset from the watercolour and lower than the Mark VI and Blizzard, and turning lights have been repositioned as well.

Author Malcolm Bobbitt writes of a set he has sighted; ‘After some compromise the definitive design was arrived at and drawings were finalized, showing the side, plan, front and rear views. These are dated 11 September 1950 and are in 1/16th scale, having been signed by Ev (Ivan Evernden), Aln (Bill Allen) and CKJ (Cecily Jenner).’ (4)

Slightly later he states; ‘A look, however, at the original drawings of the car would show a much lower rear wing line than that eventually designed. Stability tests had proved that a raised wing line was ultimately more successful than the deeply curved shape that dropped gently down to meet the tail at bumper height.’ (5)

The Definitive Expression

This is a set of Rolls-Royce drawings signed by Bill Allen dated 27/2/51, and numbered RBS 1287. The car is still refered to as ‘Corniche II’ but from hereon I will refer to it as the ‘Continental’.

The roof has been flattened with a more distinct juncture to a flattened sloping rear. The front fender top contour falls lower as it continues along the side of the body, and a side accent that begins ahead of the wheels and stops half-way along the door as seen on the Blizzard renderings has been included. The grille appears vertical and the bonnet flatter. In plan view, the sides are flatter with less variation in body width. The windscreen is more curved in plan view, and the side window aperture less pointed at the lower trailing edge.

Of much significance is the revised tail. The rear fenders are taller at the trailing edge in elevation. The trailing edge of the body when seen in plan view does not feature the same amount of tapering seen in the undated drawings. The crease along the top of the rear fenders now follows the fore-aft line of the car more closely. The tailfins are not as substantial as they would appear on the full-size prototype.

I note captions on RBS 1287 state; ‘This is drawing is a revision to RBS 1270’ and ‘For seating data see RBS 1270’.

In the absence of the 11 September 1950 set, RBS 1270, any clear images of the scale model and considering other images I can locate, these mark the first visual evidence of the ‘definitive expression’ of the Continental shape as it was to appear on the running prototype.

The running prototype for the project delivered to Rolls-Royce by Mulliner by August 1951. It was known affectionately as ‘Olga’ due to her road registration plate ‘OLG 490’. Very little differs between the RBS 1287 drawings and this final form.

The grille is again sloped, but the most significant change appears in the rear fenders, which bear the same crown crease as the RBS 1287 but are now taller at their trailing edge.

I have not been able to ascertain when construction of this body started. I note this, it would take Gurney Nutting 6 weeks to build and finish a wood-framed metal-covered body from Blatchley’s working drawings during his tenure there. I would suggest it took longer for Mulliner with the all-metal Continental prototype, but how much longer I cannot say.

In September 1951, Olga was handed to Walter Sleator to conduct some road testing. It was partly a gesture of thanks for the efforts he had made in encouraging this project.

This is an undated, un-numbered and unsigned set of drawings from Mulliner. Author Martin Bennett captions this image thus; ‘Plan and seating layout of the early Bentley Continental, actually based on the prototype’s shape and dimensions…’ (6)

It’s unclear when these drawings were prepared, Bennett’s text suggests they might have been for the production Continental prior to the decision to lower the roofline slightly.

This is a set of drawings prepared by Mulliner draftsman Herbert Nye. The date of the drawing is indistinct, but Bennett’s accompanying text states that this has been prepared for the ‘production’ Continental, which would date these after the other drawings presented above. It follows the same general shape of RBS 1287, albeit with deeper rear fins and slanted grille.

The Wind Tunnel

For this project Evernden’s assistant, Milford Read, conducted wind-tunnel tests at Rolls-Royce Aero Division facilities at Hucknall. A quarter-scale model of the Continental was to be used in these tests. I cannot confirm a date for these tests.

At this time aerodynamics for road cars was still an inexact science, and although it is suggested Rolls-Royce were involved in wind-testing for the Embiricos Bentley, testing the aerodynamics of the Continental in the wind-tunnel would have been an unfamiliar practice to the Car Division.

Without making too light of things, this above Silver Cloud prepared by the Experimental Department for later unrelated wind tests shows what an aerodynamicist might come to when left to their own devices.

Certainly, at this crucial phase of the body’s development, the aerodynamics of the shape needed to be determined alongside aesthetic considerations. Bearing in mind that the Continental had to ‘look beautiful’, a stylist was most likely present with Milford Read to shape and refine the amendments to the model as testing progressed.

Although the above picture appears posed for the camera, sculpting models was a requirement of the job as a stylist. These scale models needed to be expertly crafted, detailed and finished in order to ascertain how effective the shape might be ‘in the round’. It was John Blatchley (centre) who introduced ‘malleable material’ modelling to Rolls-Royce with plasticine, which would ultimately be replaced with modelling clay. Blatchley was certainly known for his manual crafting dexterity, and Jenner and Allen would also have had those skills.

More importantly, at the wind-tunnel phase the shape was most likely still being determined. With all due respect to Cecily Jenner and Bill Allen, their task at Rolls-Royce was to take a shape that had already been decided upon and render it either in technical drawing, general impression drawing or as a scale model from drawings. No source I can find credits them with determining any final shape for Rolls-Royce.

In January 1954, an article appeared in ‘The Rolls-Royce Bulletin’ entitled ‘The Continental’. The article was an overview of the Continental from the early Rolls-Royce models, but most of its text refers to the 1952 model. The article featured the above image with the caption;

‘Aerodynamics in car design. Testing a model of the Bentley Continental in the wind tunnel of the Rolls-Royce Flight Establishment at Hucknall.’ (7)

I have blown up the model being subject to the tests (inset) and it is hard to discern whether we are looking at its front or rear. It’s hard to tell whether this is the Continental model at all.

This is an accompanying image in the article, following next in sequence. The caption reads;

‘The contour of the rear wings, which contributes to lateral stability at high speed, was decided upon as the result of wind tunnel testing.’ (8)

The fins and the rest of the rear appear to have had clay added to the original model. This addition has been smoothed and shaped in a most expert manner, and aesthetic issues appear to have been considered as well as aerodynamic ones.

You might note this four door model is not the Continental.

It is, in fact, a version of the Mk VIII – a model not mentioned in the article’s text.

11-B-VIII

“I spent years working on one full-size mockup of ‘the new car’ only to be told when it was finished to put it on the bonfire. (…) It was too modern. So I was asked to do a quick sketch of something more traditional, more in keeping with the Rolls image, which I did in about 10 minutes. (…) It was taken into a board meeting and they decided to make it there and then. I suppose it did look very Rolls-Royce but it was pretty orthodox.” Blatchley would tell author Giles Chapman. (9)

The replacement for the Mk VI/R type 4 door saloon went through various phases. One phase was generally called Mk VIII and this particular stage of Mk VIII was known as 11-B-VIII. The top two images bear the letters JPB in the number plate. This stage appears to have been under Blatchley’s direct authority and also close to his heart.

Blatchley’s efforts to place the headlights in the fenders and to maintain a high top edge and relatively flat side to the front fenders as they trailed over the rear doors was clearly too modern for the Rolls-Royce board. His ‘10 minute’ drawing is pictured lower left, and this initial scale model is dated September 1951.

This is Rolls-Royce drawing RBS 1054 signed by Cecily Jenner. The date shows the year ‘50’ clearly, but the number for the month is indistinct, but appears to be a ‘1’. When I factor in another Rolls-Royce drawing, RBS 1072, in which the month shown appears to be either a ‘3’ or a ‘5’ – and assuming a chronological progression of drawings – I would date this above set as prepared in the first half of 1950.

The wind-tunnel version of the 11-B-VIII was most likely prepared between early to mid 1950 and September 1951. Given Blatchley’s close attention to this stage of the Mk VIII’s development, I would suggest that it was he who was determining the tailfin amendments to the wind-tunnel 11-B-VIII shape.

I have also found the suggestion Blatchley was in the wind-tunnel for the Continental, although I cannot verify their sources. The relatively parallel timings of the two projects, however, would suggest Blatchley was present at this crucial stage of the Continental’s shaping.

From whence came the tailfins?

Milford Read’s testing found that the tailfins contributed to lateral stability at speed as well as minimising the effect of crosswinds. It appears to be sometime between these two drawings that the tailfins became a functional element. In the absence of any other evidence, I would suggest the quarter-scale model was initially based on a shape approximating the first, and amended to come to a shape approximating the second.

The model itself was most likely a smoothed clay outer layer over a basic wooden buck. The outer layer would have been subtracted from or added to as testing progressed. The tailfins might have been added as ‘yaw control’ issues became apparent.

There is mention of a cowled radiator being considered, but rejected by Rolls-Royce who insisted upon the traditional Bentley grille being in place. They did ultimately allow a reduction in height of the grille of one and a half inches, and the grille was permitted to be inclined three degrees.

Olga’s fins were to be even deeper than RBS 1287. It’s possible that the revisions to RBS 1287 relative to RBS 1270 included setting the grille upright and reducing the size of the tailfins in order to to assuage elements within Rolls-Royce known to be vacillating over the project. It’s also possible further wind-tunnel tests were conducted beyond RBS 1287 to determine an optimum aerodynamic effect balanced against aesthetic considerations and corporate dictates.

Factoring in a relatively bluff front-end, I would suggest aerodynamic considerations would have been of paramount importance for the rest of the body; and that the tailfins were considered as functional elements first, with their aesthetic aspect following.

“Viewed from almost any aspect except head-on, Olga’s two-door fastback body bore a rather unfortunate resemblance to one of the lower priced Chevrolets of the late Forties. This, however, must have been coincidental, for apart from the inconceivability of J. P. Blatchley drawing inspiration, consciously or otherwise, from such a source, his body owed its shape to exhaustive wind-tunnel testing and experimentation with quarter-scale models.” (10)

– Dennis May, ‘Genesis: R-Type Continental’, Automobile Quarterly, Spring 1968

“It was difficult not to be influenced by the American cars, and I was particularly amazed by the Cadillacs.” (11)

– John Blatchley, discussing American cars of the ‘40s and ‘50s with Giles Chapman.

The rear fenders of the MkVIII bear some similarity in elevation to RBS 1287, but considerably more similarity in plan view; especially when compared against the plan view of the undated Continental drawing.

I must acknowledge similarities between the Continental trailing edge in plan view with that of the Mulliner Mark VI fastback, and similarities between the rear fin shape in side-view elevation with the rear fenders of the Pinin Farina Silver Dawn.

I must also acknowledge that correlation in itself does not imply causation, but when I consider the totality of the material I have found for this piece, I cannot help but form the impression that John Blatchley was involved with the Continental as its shape progressed.

HJ Mulliner

“My contribution might have been the original concept, but I never did any of the working drawings. (…) Evernden designed the car in conjunction with Mulliner.”

“Evernden gave me some credit for it (the Continental), but I don’t feel it’s right. I had some early input, but it’s how you struggle with the realities, all the calculations, to make it work that counts.” (12)

– John Blatchley, quoted by Richard Feast. Quotes dated 2003.

According to Malcolm Bobbitt, the order from Rolls-Royce to HJ Mulliner for the supply of the prototype body was placed only after positive tests on the quarter-scale model had been obtained. At that stage Rolls-Royce were proving hesitant over the project and Evernden succeeded in his entreaties to continue to the prototype stage.

I cannot locate any evidence of Mulliner’s direct involvement with the shaping of the Continental prior to this point.

The decision by Rolls-Royce to favour HJ Mulliner was made early in this project. Discussions were most likely had between the two parties prior to the order being placed, but the timing or the extent of those discussions I cannot quantify. Sometime in 1950, Mulliner Managing Director Arthur Johnstone and Technical Director Stanley Watts travelled to Italy and visited with carrozzerie including Pinin Farina to consult on methodologies in bonding alloy panels to metal framework. I cannot say whether this visit was related to the Continental, but it suggests Mulliner were looking to refine their construction process.

I can find no mention of the quarter-scale model being sent to Mulliner. It would be more likely scale drawings were supplied by Rolls-Royce which would then have needed to be enlarged and extrapolated by Mulliner into frame and skin components for the construction of the full-size body.

It has been suggested that the final interpretation of the Continental shape was under the auspices of Stanley Watts. Watts himself produced the full-size drawing prior to construction, but with facets of the full-size body being determined by Rolls-Royce in single degrees of inclination and increments of an inch in height, it’s not clear how much scope was left for interpretation at this point.

George Moseley, who would go on to style the sublime Flying Spur Continentals for Mulliner, has also been suggested for this shaping; however his obituary in The Times states he joined in December 1951, after ‘Olga’ had been delivered. Perhaps he started earlier; the obituary does note that he worked from Blatchley’s sketches on the project but it’s more likely he was hired to extrapolate Watt’s full size drawing. His previous cars would suggest no special ability with either sporting cars or aerodynamics and I can’t see that he, or Herbert Nye, had any role within the wind-tunnel phase.

It would appear that the decision to use HJ Mulliner was based primarily on their ability to provide a superbly crafted lightweight body. Which they did, admirably.

1952-1955 Bentley Continental Sports Saloon.

The first production Continentals were delivered to customers in June 1952. They differed from Olga in minor aesthetic aspects; the roof was lowered an inch and her split screen became a single curved piece of glass. The initial cars were in fact based on the Mark VI, with all subsequent models based on the Mark VI update, the R type. As the Continental progressed through A, B, C, D and E series, it would gradually move away from its purist lightweight origins.

208 examples were built including Olga. The great majority were bodied by Mulliner, but a small selection received coachwork from other builders. Top left is the Park Ward fixed head – styled by John Blatchley. Top right is a body from Franay, who would also produce some fastback bodies. Bottom left is a one-off from Pinin Farina and bottom right is a body by Graber. Rolls-Royce would allow these alternative bodies on the proviso that they conformed to certain weight parameters. I consider none as beautiful as the Mulliner fastback.

From 1955, the S series of Continentals replaced the previous models, which became known retrospectively as R type Continentals. For the Mulliner S1, the general silhouette was retained, but some of the tautness of the original shape was lost.

The 1952 Bentley Continental was Ivan Evernden’s masterpiece.

Evernden was evidently working with Cecily Jenner, Bill Allen and Milford Read on the shaping of this most beautiful body, and with HJ Mulliner on its full-size construction.

However, given the enormity of the task and the many facets of preparing and building this car that needed to be managed, I find it difficult to believe that Ivan Evernden was not also relying on the specific abilities, if not the aesthetic guidance, of John Blatchley – former chief stylist for sporting-body specialists Gurney Nutting and on the cusp of being appointed Chief Styling Engineer for Rolls-Royce – as this most important project progressed.

Blatchley was known to be reticent about self-publicity during his 24 years designing cars for Rolls-Royce. It would be another 27 years before he was persuaded to attend a gathering of the Rolls-Royce Enthusiasts’ Club and meet with his work colleagues Bill Allen and Martin Bourne for the first time since he retired in 1969. He was said to be firm in his views, but measured in expressing them. He was proud of his work, but did not seek recognition for it. His output included the very definition of classicism, yet his yearnings were for modernity.

Perhaps he felt a strong association with this ‘supercar’ was overshadowing the work for which he felt more directly responsible. Perhaps this car did not accord fully with the modernist aspirations he strove for in vain during this period.

Or perhaps I have come to the wrong conclusions.

Nevertheless, I find John Blatchley’s denials curious.

See Page 2 for Notes, Citations and References

With the silly season coming to an end, for many of us that means back to work. To celebrate this less than momentous occasion, I bring you a superb company car. Chad uses this Rover P6 3500 to ferry around his plumbing tools, to advertise his business, and to let the world know that he is a man of discerning tastes.

I’ve seen Chad’s 3500 a few times; on this occasion I even managed to have a short conversation with the man himself. This beauty is a non-problematic daily driver, and the only downside is petrol bills. Then again, his capital expense is not so high, so he can theoretically offset the fuel costs against the non-existent lease payments and still come out ahead. Maybe.

CC correspondents are continually inundated with an avalanche of lucrative endorsement opportunities. Me, I prefer to save my imprimatur for worthy causes. Such as Chad’s Plumbing Solutions.

Nice ride Chad.

Further Reading

Paul Niedermeyers’s CC/COAL on another hard-working Rover P6

David Saunders on a forlorn storage field example

Roger Carr on some pristine show circuit examples

Back in the early 1970s, Toyota started to put some different thinking into recreational transportation. The 1971 RV-1 was the first of a series of concept cars that seem like a dead-end in of themselves, but played their part in anticipating the current trend for cross-over vehicles.

The RV-1 was based on the Celica launched the year before. It came with its own trailer – the lid of which could be flipped and used as a boat with an outboard motor attached.

The rear owes something to the Triplex Scimitar with its fixed rear-side windows, and came before the Chinetti/Panther Ferrari 365 GTB4 shooting brake with its gullwing application. Can anyone think of an earlier example than this Toyota?

The 1972 RV-2 was built over Crown underpinnings. What I find really interesting about this shape is how handsome it is up to the b-pillar. With a better grille treatment, and deletion of that side swage, this could have been a saloon or coupe to rival anything on the market in looks.

It shared a similar body configuration to the RV-1, but with a completely different application. And apparently it could sleep four; two in the rear and two occupying the folded back front seats. Somehow.

The 1977 CAL-1 was the product of the newly opened Toyota CALTY Design Research out of California and this… er… riva’d rumbleseat derivative of the A40 Celica Supra was prepared as a concept car first shown in Japan.

The 1983 CQ-1 cared little for the outdoors. This was a ‘concept in automobile communications technology’. I’m not sure whether any of that technology included gaming, but it certainly signals the movement towards the great indoors and all the life experience we can binge upon without even leaving the home. Or the car.

With Toyota Week firing on all four cylinders, now is probably the right time for some respite in the form of a gargantuan US ragtop. To my memory, this is the first 1971-76 B- or C-bodied Buick I have ever encountered in the metal, and it wasn’t until I sat down to do a capsule that I realised how relatively rare the Centurion was.

1971 saw an overhaul of the fullsize GM cars across the board. Buick had been lagging in the B- and C-body looks department for the last few years but jumped to first place with this new platform.

As Jerry Hirshberg, who was involved with the styling of this range, told Collectible Automobile; “In an era of edge and boxiness, I think what we introduced with this car was the beginning of three-dimensionality, and that was unique for a big car. For example, the line that crossed over from the hood, which usually would have intersected the base of the windshield, swept over at the bottom of the A-pillar and became a side line.”

However the cars were longer, wider and heavier; which did not augur well for the future.

The Centurion replaced the Wildcat as the top trim level B-body Buick, taking its name from a 1956 plexi-cabined show car. It featured the 455 as standard, with the high performance version also available. The Wildcat’s sporting pretensions were downplayed in favour of a more distinguished look featuring less chrome trim, a unique and discrete grille, deluxe steering wheel, but still no ventiports.

In 1972 not much changed, although the quoted output for the 455 was reduced from 315 hp to 225 hp, and from 360 hp to 270 hp for the high performance variant – a change from gross to net figures (if I have absorbed correctly from my CC readings). Visually, the grille was ‘dropped’ in a similar fashion to the Chevrolets of the same year. As per 1971, the Centurion was available in four-door hardtop, two-door coupe and two-door convertible bodies – all sitting on the 124″ wheelbase.

1973 would be the Centurion’s most successful year, selling nearly 45,000 examples across the three body styles. The quasi Electra-like prestige over the shorter wheelbase seemed to make more sense as the full size ranges gave up any lingering pretensions towards sportiness, but with thrift increasingly part of the purchaser’s intent, the 350 cu in engine became standard for the Centurion.

The Centurion range provided the only Buick droptop for 1973. The new A-bodies didn’t feature an open air version, the LeSabre convertible was a one-year omission and there had not been an Electra convertible since 1970. Only 5,739 of these were produced, apparently about half with the 455.

1973 marked a precipitous decline in styling for these cars. With tougher impact laws affecting bumpers, a lot of the beauty was lost in the process. The turnunder that was such a compelling aspect of this shape was not served well by the new front-end termination.

Hirshberg continues; “The most difficult areas were the corners of the car. Suddenly, the profile could not be clean and simple. There was this big step that was three-dimensional because everything had to be protected from an angle hit, and there was so much expensive real estate that had to be protected. That was tough. The cars got long at the bottom, front, and rear, and the early ones were pretty crude. We called them ‘cowcatchers’, like on trains.”

I have to agree, but I also find the revised sculpture around the headlights and grille to be really disappointing; longer yet more snub and not anywhere near as attractive as the 1971 and 1972 frontal treatments.

The rear bumpers on the 73 were more in keeping with the earlier years, but by 1974 these were remodelled as well. And the front bumpers became even larger.

Although this Harvest Gold example sports twin exhausts, I’m assuming it carries the 225 hp version of the 455. The 1973 brochure shows both 455s available, but my Standard Catalogue of American Cars doesn’t list the high output version for this model year. Hopefully the CCognoscenti might know.

In truth, the success story for the 71-73 Buick B-body was the LeSabre Custom, outselling both the Centurion above it and the LeSabre below. Comparing prices across the three levels for the hardtop sedan see the 2bbl 350 LeSabre at $4,125 and LeSabre Custom at $4,217 and the 4bbl 350 Centurion at $4,390. Splitting hairs really.

This convertible started at $4,534 – however that was without the 455.

The 1973 models were the last of the short lived Centurions, which were replaced atop the the B-body lineup with the LeSabre Luxus in 1974. The LeSabre Custom disappeared for 1974 and then reappeared in 1975, when the Luxus disappeared. Buick in branding fluxus.

This Centurion is an even more uncommon sight in Australia given that Buicks were not a part of GM’s import program in 1973. These days you can fully register LHD vehicles here in Victoria, so I’d guess this is not a recent RHD conversion either.

I saw it more recently bearing registration plates. Just in time for a pleasant summer cruise.

Further Reading:

Woodgraincoasty on his 1971 Olds Custom Cruiser

Chris O’Bryant on his 1972 Olds Delta convertible

JPCavanaugh on a 1973 Buick LeSabre Custom

Tom Klockau on a 1974 Buick Estate Wagon 

Paul Niedermeyer on a 1975 Buick Estate Wagon

JPCavanaugh on a 1976 Buick Electra

From some perspectives, the Toyota Crown was the car that paved the way for the great leap upwards into the Lexus brand. In hindsight, its existence seems pre-ordained but even by 1967, Toyota still hadn’t really figured out what it stood for. In today’s CC, I look at the origins of the model and discuss the significance of the S40 Toyota Crown.

Japan 1953.

US occupation personnel were taking advantage of their tax-exempt status and in that year alone had sold 12,503 newly imported cars into the Japanese market as second-hand vehicles.

In contrast, over the same period all the Japanese manufacturers combined sold 8,789 new cars.

1953 saw the release of what would become Toyota’s biggest selling car to date – The RH.

It wore a similar body to their preceding 4 cylinder SF model but had a larger engine. By 1955, 5,845 RH models would be produced, with a great many of them entering taxi fleets around Tokyo and the rest of Japan.

Under the hood of the RH was something new – the R engine; another 4 cylinder but larger at 1,453 cc and capable of producing 48 hp. Seen here at left with the R engine is the father of the Crown – Kenya Nakamura.

Nakamura was a singular individual. Not one for formal pleasantries, he was known to be a prickly and outspoken. Though an engineer, he would not wear a tie under his overalls as was tradition. Intensely loyal to Toyota, he was once demoted for accusing a board member of having ‘no dreams’ for the future of the company. Despite this, he put his ambitions on hold as he diligently helped Toyota focus on commercial vehicles to bolster the nation’s rebuilding.

Mindful that 80% of the US vehicle production consisted of passenger cars, behind Nakamura’s piercing blue eyes lay a vision of the future.

Others high up harboured similar ambitions for the company, including engineering executive directors Shoichi Saito and Eiji Toyoda – cousin of recently departed President Kiichiro Toyoda and friendly with Nakamura. With Kiichiro’s blessing (despite his no longer being in charge, he was still the son of the founder), a new passenger car initiative commenced; the RS model. Nakamura was chosen to lead the project.

The RS would be powered by the R engine developed for the RH. Unlike Toyota’s previous cars, though, the RS would not be built over a truck chassis. And instead of being bodied by an associated Japanese firm, it was to be shaped and skinned within Toyota.

By April 1952, four full-scale styling prototypes had been prepared for the RS programme.

Prototype No. 1 was based on the US ‘Henry J’ model.

Prototype No. 2 was based on the Cadillac.

Prototype No. 3 was based on the Nash.

And Prototype No. 4 was based on the British Ford Zephyr.

What emerged seems to have been the averaged estimation of those four prototype body styles, with some individual quirks thrown in for good measure. The 1955 RS Crown was built in a newly constructed production line facility with high speed presses. Underneath was the most sophisticated passenger car yet conceived by Japan. It featured a low floor thanks to a custom-made chassis. And up front was a particular preoccuation of Nakamura’s; independent suspension.

And yet this new model had no real market to sell into when it was launched. Domestic incomes could not afford such a large and luxurious mode of transport. The mini kei-cars were still years away, and anyone in the market for this sort of car would probably be inclined to buy a more prestigious import.

To hedge their bets, Toyota had a parallel program developed alongside the RS. It was known as the RR and was aimed at a quantifiable market; taxi fleets. It had a more rudimentary body and, with concerns about the durability of the RS’s independent front suspension, the RR had a solid front end.

It would form the basis of the commercially-focused Masterline models released the same year as the Crown.

In 1957, the Crown was sent to the US. That export programme was a disaster. While it’s one thing to borrow from their styling and engineering, Toyota was to discover that it was another thing entirely to compete with the most advanced automotive industry in the world on their own turf. Among other bugbears, the Crown was woefully underpowered (and underilluminated – note the missing headlights on the above examples) and as a result exports to the US had ceased by 1960.

It wasn’t all bad news from overseas. At the urging of the Japanese Consulate in Australia, Toyota entered a Crown in the 19 day 1957 Round Australia Reliability Trial. It scored 47th out of 52 finishers, a bit more acceptable when you consider 86 cars started the trial. And that this was Toyota first ever official entry in competitive driving. In a car that was pretty much off the showroom floor.

Despite initial misgivings about the front suspension, Toyota had come to the realisation that it was more than adequate for the domestic market. In 1957, the RR Masterline series was discontinued and replaced with the same platform and body as the RS Crown.

The first Crown lasted seven years in production and was updated through S20 and S30 series. Over time it received minor styling upgrades, a very slow-selling diesel engine, overdrive for the 3 speed column shift manual, an optional semi-automatic transmission and, most importantly, an enlarged 1,900 cc engine. Note the lettering on the hood – Toyopet. This was the marque name for used for smaller Toyota vehicles (as opposed to trucks).

The Masterline range continued to flourish. In addition to the sedan, Toyota now produced two pickup bodies, a van slash wagon and this extended wheelbase rarity.

The Crown, best considered a qualified success at this stage, had inherited an identity problem. The prestige passenger car for Toyota looked the same as the workaday variants.

And in truth, neither were very attractive.

1957 saw Toyota’s first showcar – the Proto. It was another sign of Toyota’s efforts to be seen as a progressive automobile manufacturer. Clearly derived from the 1955 Lincoln Futura, it was also a very clunky interpretation.

Despite the many Japanese carmakers who would seek direct input from European and American stylists in the 1960s, it had been a specific policy within Toyota that they would go it alone. In 1940 they had started to gather employees capable in ‘design and colour’ and by 1954 a dedicated Design Department was formed within Engineering. But it was recognised that a deeper understanding of automobile styling and design was required, and in 1958 Toyota started sending employees to art schools in the US and Italy to observe and learn at the source.

Future Corolla stylist Kazuo Morohoshi was one who benefited from this initiative. “The cars Japan produced prior to opening up and studying the market lacked the right proportions. For us, the essential thing was to understand what shape a car should have.”

It wasn’t all grand theory; during his sojourn in the US Morohoshi was exposed more broadly to the outside cultures he was required to design for, and along the way to come across crucial details such as the fact that pedals needed to accommodate larger western feet.

The fruits of this endeavour were soon visible. Despite rigid dimensional parameters, the 1960 Tiara (top left) and 1961 Publica (top right) production cars demonstrated a greater maturity in body styling. Though not exemplars of their types, the cleaner surfacing and crisper volumes were a step in the right direction.

The 1961 Toyopet-X, on the other hand, was purely for show.

The Toyopet-X was based on the Crown. And inspired by Pinin Farina.

Ok, maybe the term inspired is being used a bit loosely, but the ‘interpretation’ was far more accomplished than the 57 Proto or RS ‘Cadillac’. Though lacking in some of its detailing, it had the grace of the Fiat 1500 and Peugeot 404 Coupe (*dodges fusilade from Paul*). Thanks to a consummate understanding of proportioning on the part of its unnamed Toyota stylist, it was closer than both to the grandest iteration for this specific language – the 1959 Cadillac Starlight.

The shape received further refinement and was shown at the 1961 Tokyo Motor Show as the 1962 Toyopet-X.

The revised roofline borrowed more from the Starlight, but the face was uniquely Toyota. In fact those cats-ear turning signals actually predated a similar use on the Touring-bodied Sunbeam Venezia (although that’s not really something to be too proud of).

During the Belle Epoque in Paris, art students would be sent to the Louvre, told to set up a canvas and copy a work on display. It was one very effective way to learn for one’s self how the masters came to their expressions. In that context, the Toyopet-X was a success. Highly derivative of a masterpiece, yet positively inflected by the renderer’s own hand.

Not perfect, and certainly not to be credited in the absence of its inspiration, the learnings from the Toyopet-X would be instrumental in placing the Crown ahead of its peers.

In late 1962, the S40 Toyota Crown was released. The influence of the Toyopet-X is immediately apparent, but this was a shape more of itself. Longer, wider and lower than its predecessor, it was also up-to-the-minute in its flatter and more rectilinear styling – in the case of our feature CC helped no doubt by its being dropped on its suspension.

Though I’m not enamoured with this shape, I do have a lot of respect for it.

It was the first in a series of cars to emanate from Japan that would take the supreme proportioning of the fullsize US car and downscale it to sub-compact (in US terms) size. Something even the US was not as capable at for a very long time.

It was clearly a generation ahead of its domestic rivals.

The 30 series Nissan Cedric had been released in 1960, and this 1962 styling refresh from Pininfarina (in the front clip) was not enough to counteract the dated underlying language.

By the 1970s, the 230 and 330 series Cedrics would display the best application of this downscaled US proportioning, and were most certainly shown the way by the S40 Crown.

The 1962 Prince Gloria was ahead of the Cedric, but still looking backwards to the 1959 Buick Invicta.

The irony here is that the Michelotti-styled 1960 Prince Skyline Sports was the first Japanese car to work with the flat deck language. It was the car that would initiate the rush amongst the Japanese for European input, but Prince would not or could not (they were soon to be taken over by Nissan) transfer this language soon enough to the four door Gloria (and Skyline upon which the Gloria was based).

The 1961 Isuzu Bellel wore a very Austin-like body that was old the day it was born.

The other Japanese manufacturers had not yet been able to produce a car in the Crown category. Though the 1964 Mitsubishi Debonair was to occupy an emerging ‘super-prestige’ stratum, it still demonstrated that successfully styling a car upon outside influences was not a given – despite the fact that this was from the hand of Hans Bretzner, formerly of GM.

It was not a direct competitor with the Ford Cortina (probably closer to the Corsair), but this convenient juxtaposition demonstrates the success of the S40 Crown’s shaping. The body appears longer and shallower thanks to a new cruciform chassis sitting underneath.

The Cortina was released the same year as the S40, and although to some its a more pleasing shape, it too already appears dated against its contemporary. The same could be said for a host of other European cars of the time.

The notion of setting the headlights inside the grille was taken directly from the 1960 Ford Falcon, although the aperture shape was Toyota. This car would seem to have all four eyes focused on the US market.

The S40 was powered by the same R series 4 cylinder 88 hp engine as its predecessor. All models were coil sprung at the front, with premium models having a coil rear and lesser models on leaf springs. Brakes were drums all round. The 3sp with O/D was available with the 2sp Toyoglide optional – initially as a semi-automatic but by 1963 as a fully automatic.

Early versions of the S40 had these distinctive rear light clusters, known as ‘watery eyes’.

In late 1963, this cluster was changed along the lines shown above. Our CC is an Australian car, however, and I think those amber lenses might have been unique to our market. I’ve seen other images where the lenses are clear and referred to as reversing lamps, which makes me think the red lenses might have originally been used for braking as well as indicating turns – as was used occasionally in the US but outlawed here in Australia at that time.

This angle shows another curious aspect to the shaping. Despite the S40’s ‘flat deck’ language, the rear quarter panels seem to bear echoes of the 1961 Dodge reverse fin. Perhaps trying to give this shape some personality or simply trying to break up the expansive flatness or maybe both.

The wagon retained the clean flat deck look and was available with an extra row of seats folded under the rear floor.

The wagon was actually a part of the Masterline range, though it was marketed as a Crown in various territories. The commercially-orientated van was decontented and would sometimes feature bars across the side rear windows. Wikipedia lists the wagon as an inch narrower than the sedan, but I’m not sure if that’s because those measurements were taken from a model bereft of exterior side trim, or if the body was indeed narrower.

The sedan would appear on Tokyo streets as a taxi badged as a Crown, further blurring the distinction between prestige and utilitarian.

The pickup was an attractive member of the Masterline fleet, and a generously sized ute to boot. Note the lack of chrome ornamentation along its flanks.

The double cab pickup was the unicorn of the fleet, although it had appeared in the previous generation’s range, and would appear in the subsequent S50 lineup as well. Despite two rows of seats, it only provided ingress for the front row, which I can only assume folded forward in some way. Exactly who was buying these is hard to pin down. Dealers or purloiners of antiquities by the looks of this publicity image.

Though there were not yet any Crown coupes, a handsome convertible was presented at the 1963 Tokyo Show. It never entered production. This image from a Japanese film may well be the same car repainted.

In 1964, the Crown Eight was released. This was a JDM-only car made for the emerging though minuscule super-prestige category. Aimed at the top end of the corporate sector, it was to compete with fullsize US cars by leveraging national pride in Japan’s technological prowess. It was a super-sized Crown in all but height – six inches wider and five inches longer.

It was powered by Japan’s first production eight cylinder, a 113 hp 2.6 litre V8 and came with climate control, automatic headlamps, electrically powered windows, electric cruise control, a three-speed version of the Toyoglide automatic transmission and electromagnetic door latches.

The Crown Eight was proposed for the official car of the Japanese Imperial Family, however it lost out to Nissan and was eventually replaced in the Toyota range by the 1967 Century.

In all, a bewildering amount of Crown variants. And it was only to get more confusing; by the mid-1970s, there would be 63 different Crown models of varying body styles, trim levels and powertrain combinations.

July 1965 saw the only real update to the body style. Up front, the turning signals sitting in pods atop the bumpers were now integrated into the bumpers. At the rear, the light clusters were reshaped and the rear panel was recontoured.

November 1965 brought the introduction of a new 6 cylinder engine. Though marginally larger than the 1,900 cc four, the new M-series SOHC 1,995 cc straight six came in two levels of tune – a 105 hp and a 125 hp twin carburettor version. Sportier Crown models matched this new engine to a 4sp gearbox with floor-mounted lever, upgraded suspension, reclining bucket seats and a tachometer. These new M-engined Crowns were distinguished by a red badge set in the grille.

Though this was the same engine as would appear in the 2000GT, the sportscar’s DOHC version of the M-series put out 150 hp in road tune.

The Crown and 2000GT were to compete head to head in the 1967 James Bond film, ‘You Only Live Twice’. Soon after 007 fools no-one by pretending to be interested in purchasing a consignment of smoked salmon, he finds himself the focus of a particularly menacing black Crown. A white 2000GT appears, and it’s on.

The 2000GT simply cannot shake the M-engined four-passengered Crown and reinforcements are called in. An apt way to mark the end of the S40’s lifecycle.

At home, the S40 Crown was a success for Toyota, sustaining category market leadership against the Nissan Cedric – a mantle that was not to slip until 1970.

Overseas, things were not so positive.

As GN showed us yesterday, the re-introduction of the Crown to the US market met with a… chilly consumer reception.

In 1963, the Crown finally entered Europe. Erla Auto of Denmark brought in an initial batch of 190 cars, but it can’t have been an easy sell. While the Americans were enjoying the novelty of radically downsized cars, this was the norm in Europe and the Crown was up against some highly sophisticated competition.

In 1965 Australian Motor Industries established a Toyota franchise building CKD imports with a healthy modicum of local content. As with the US, the Corona would prove to be the arbiter of acceptance within this territory. The Crown was assembled here as well from February 1967, although our CC’s front bumper suggests it preceded this. Though the utility and wagon were also sold here, the S40 never really made its mark in Australia.

The assumption that prestige could be bought by low sticker price coupled with high accessorisation was inadequate. International consumers had initially flocked to the smaller Toyotas not as a preference, but as an incomparable value proposition. There was no way they would aspire to a higher Toyota in the way a Chevrolet owner looked to a Cadillac. In these westernised markets, the Crown serviced an almost non-existent sector.

The S40 may be have been a generation ahead of its compatriots at its inception, but by 1967 it was old news. Hampered primarily by its body-on-frame construction, it was to be completely overwhelmed by a host of comparably sized unitary-body European and Japanese models that were more focused on driving dynamics. And the concept of vehicular prestige would distance itself further and further from mere trinketry.

The S40 Crown was never intended as a performance saloon. Its one successful foray was in the 1963 Japanese Grand Prix at Suzuka where a four-cylinder piloted by Soukichi Shikiba came third overall and first in class.

Its place in the Toyota pecking order would eventually be supplanted by the slightly smaller but more capable Corona MkII/Cressida – perhaps the truer progenitor of the Lexus brand. In time, the Crown would be reduced to a range built only for taxi fleets.

After its failed attempt at emulating US cars, the 1968 S50 Crown would look to Europe, and more particularly Triumph, for its next identity crisis.

However obliquely, the S40 Crown can still be said to have played its part in the maturation of Toyota and its national competitors.

In 1967, the Japanese motor industry built 1,375,800 cars.

I came across this pristine Range Rover parked very close to home. This shape has long been an object of my adoration, and my eyes popped when this example presented itself. So, having captured it for CC posterity, I can now indulge in an extended analysis of this highly influential automobile.

The JET 1 was a Rover prototype ultimately capable of 152 mph. Debuting in 1949, it was the first public manifestation of a gas-turbine programme within Rover that had commenced during the war and continued until the mid-1960s, culminating in a passenger car conceived for series production and a Le Mans racer.

Its shape was based on Rover’s first new post-war car, the P4.

When launched in 1949, the P4 emerged as somewhat of a surprise. The local press were proudly hailing the Austin A90 Atlantic with its flowing wings as the ‘new English Line’. Instead Rover had delivered something at odds with that aesthetic; a square-rigged shape derived from the 1947 Studebaker with curiously modern details such as the centre-mounted headlight. A brave step for this conservative upper middle-class brand.

Before the P4 was launched another programme was rushed through development.

With excess manufacturing capacity, a weak domestic market and the UK government’s insistence upon export products, Rover decided to build a utilitarian vehicle based on the Willys Jeep.

The 1948 Land Rover was originally conceived as a stop-gap; a nightwatchman as CC correspondent Roger Carr has so aptly described it in cricketing parlance, or a perhaps a pinch-hitter for those in the land of Mickey Mantle.

Not quite as exciting as a gas-turbine.

The Willys Jeep had emerged from the war victorious. This light and nimble 4WD vehicle would come to represent the US forces more evocatively than any helmet shape or uniform could. After the war, civilians would jerry-rig a weatherproof body around surplus Jeeps, and in 1946 Willys made a significant stride in the evolution of the modern SUV with their all-steel ‘Station Wagon’ model. Initially a RWD, it was not too long before a 4WD version came to market.

Upon the launch of the Land Rover, the 80” Station Wagon was also made available. This wooden-bodied variant by Tickford was not a success, with less than 650 sold during its two year lifespan.

Despite this minor setback, the nightwatchman Land Rover continued at the crease, piling on the runs as the spectators cheered from the pavilion in pride and amazement.

In 1951, the Road Rover was created to complement the Land Rover. Although bearing similar front wings to the ‘Landie’, the Road Rover was in fact based on a shortened P4 RWD platform. Crudely shaped in flat aluminium panels for ease of manufacture, the first Road Rover did not proceed past development mules. It was noted for its sprightly performance, a product of its light weight coupled with low gearing; and employees Gordon Bashford – the vehicle’s developer – and Spen King found themselves in possession of Road Rover mules for their own use.

In 1957, the Road Rover Series II was prepared. Although still rather crude in detailing such as its external door hinges, it was a more serious attempt to make a shape akin road cars. It bears similarity to Rover Chief Stylist David Bache’s 1958 P5 sedans, but he denies authorship and I cannot trace who laid down the lines for this body.

These scale clays give a better indication of the Road Rover II’s Chevrolet Nomad origins, but it’s the image shown bottom right that’s most telling. This is not a Rover styling model. It’s an over-scale prototype produced by Mettoy for the inclusion of the Road Rover in their Corgi Toys die-cast range.

With the Land Rover’s volumes exceeding those of their passenger cars, Rover had great hopes in the Road Rover. To such an extent that they had supplied Mettoy with top secret plans for this new model. Rover clearly intended for this vehicle to be a flagship of sorts.

Ultimately, the Road Rover programme did not proceed to production.

By 1966 Charles Spencer ‘Spen’ King (above) was head of Rover’s New Vehicle Projects team. One of his assignments was the 100 inch Station Wagon, known internally as the 100” S/W. This was not a continuation of the Road Rover programme, nor was it part of Land Rover’s development. It was a fresh-sheet project calling for a vehicle as comfortable, silent and attractive as a road car, yet with all the off-road capability of a 4WD.

Coincidently, Rover had asked employee Graham Bannock to conduct some comprehensive market research on the Land Rover. The findings showed that the Land Rover, nearing its 500,000th unit, commanded a third of the world’s market for vehicles of its type. Bannock was surprised to discover an emerging trend, with owners using these vehicles for recreational or road use as opposed to specific agricultural duties as had originally been intended. These findings reaffirmed Rover management’s decision to proceed with the 100” S/W.

With Gordon Bashford and a team of 20 engineers, work on the 100” S/W commenced. As King, in discussion with journalist Anthony Curtis, related; “I realised that a modern motor car suspension, particularly in terms of its rates and travels, could be astonishingly good in cross-country motoring.”

Curtis continues; ‘The Range Rover showed that live axles, given proper location, generous travels and soft springs had unsuspected virtues. But very careful design and development was needed, the front suspension in particular incorporating a number of subtleties which together make an important contribution to the excellence of the Range Rover’s handling.

‘To minimise intrusion into the engine space, for instance, an ingeniously-designed single pair of leading control arms simultaneously resist the braking and engine torque reactions imposed on the live front axle while at the same time providing it with fore-and-aft location. Lateral location is provided by a Panhard rod of the same length as the steering drag link, mounted parallel to it, and fixed at its inboard end to the chassis via the steering box. In this way bump-steer is kept to an absolute minimum.’

The vehicle was to feature a ladder frame chassis, rigid steel frame and unstressed aluminium skin. The 4WD system was permanent with high and low ranges, at the rear was a self-levelling unit and there were servo-assisted disc brakes all round. The aluminium 3.5 litre V8 engine had a compression ratio of 8.5:1, producing 135bhp @ 4750rpm and 185lb/ft @ 2500rpm.

The V8 derived from a 215 cu inch Buick engine. Rover Managing Director William Martin-Hurst had been visiting Carl Kiekhaefer’s Mercury Marine with the intention of selling Rover’s gas turbine technology (although Mercury turned out to be more interested in the diesel Land Rover engine for the Chinese market), and had stumbled upon the Buick engine as adapted for marine use. Martin-Hurst was mindful of approaching Chrysler during that trip for one of their small capacity V8s to use in Rover road cars, but when he saw the Buick mill he found exactly what he was hoping to source.

It first found its way into the P5 road car, but it was another Rover V8 project that would be more directly analogous to the Range Rover story.

The 1967 Rover BS (‘Buick Sport’) mid-engined sports car was developed by King and Bashford in their spare time along with some engineers from the newly acquired Alvis company. The styling department at Rover was too busy to help, so the team shaped the prototype themselves. Although it was to receive a makeover from David Bache before the project was cancelled, the original shape as depicted above was a remarkable effort for this cadre of styling ‘amateurs’.

The flat planes with creased edges contrasted with the softer forms that had emanated from Bache’s studio. The proportioning and line made for a handsome vehicle. Of particular note is the tall and airy greenhouse providing excellent all-round visibility, a characteristic not shared with the more exotic mid-engined cars emerging from Europe.

Gordon Bashford sketched out a body for the 100” S/W test mule. According to King, things “sort of evolved naturally – the shape just came as we worked out what was needed in terms of space.” The flat plane and creased edge language of the BS was used, and the sketches also addressed some elements of the vehicle’s packaging such as the pod-style instrument binnacle for the dash.

Meanwhile, David Bache set to work on the final production shape. Although crisper than his P6, it still featured enough curvature to demonstrate a familial resemblance. His shape also anticipated the styling upgrades that were to be included on the 1970-onwards P6 range, namely the use of a black-themed strip face.

By 1967, a full-size prototype had been built. The driver sat high in the airy greenhouse, allowing for superb visibility all-round and – importantly – downward where the wheels met the sometimes tricky terrain. It proved so attractive that it was decided to use this body as the basis for the production model.

To David Bache’s eternal credit, going with this shape was his decision. His adroit attention to the detailing capped off one of the finest-looking vehicles to emerge from Great Britain. An instant archetype and a timeless classic.

Production prototypes bore the letters ‘Velar’ above the grille in an attempt to disguise the manufacturer, and the naming the vehicle ‘Range Rover’ was one of the last decisions made before putting the vehicle to market.

In June 1970, the Range Rover was launched to a rapturous reception.

‘The Range Rover makes use of the same very light 3 1/2 litre V8 that has featured in the Rover 3.5 and 3500 cars for some time, detuned and recarbureted so as to run on any petrol and on any gradient. Four-wheel drive at all times (not using the Ferguson type employed by Jensen) gives this new Rover outstanding traction to match the high performance assured by the engine, and a surprisingly effective suspension system ensures ride and handling are up to the same exceptionally high standards.’

‘Both axles are carried on radius arm systems and both have 8 inches of working travel, coil sprung and controlled at the rear by a Boge Hydromat road-pumped self-levelling strut. It is this last item which allows the suspension to be designed for comfort and handling, without worrying about the effects of the 1,500 lb payload which is carried entirely by the rear axle. In sum, this go-anywhere car (and it is fit for anywhere, having the mobility and the smartness) is quite brilliant, full of admirable details and adequate to an incomparable variety of duties. It is fair to rank it as one of the three most outstanding cars to be introduced anywhere in the world in 1970.’

L.J.K.Setright. The British Motor Industry, World Cars 1971

It was first offered in six hues that perfectly complemented the lack of ostentation in the styling; Tuscan Blue, Masai Red, Bahama Gold and Lincoln Green. Our CC is in Sahara Dust and Davos White was also available. The blacked out rear pillar (in vinyl) which first appeared in 1974 is, for me, the preferred treatment.

As demonstrated by our feature CC, the interior was not so much opulent as it was pragmatic. The luxury with which this vehicle would come to be associated was preceded by a sense of the Scandinavian; spacious, sophisticated yet austere.

Emergency services took a shine to this extremely capable on-and-off-roader. It was included in police fleets around the country. And – as is shown bottom left in this (most likely) Swiss example – also abroad.

The body-on-frame basis of the Range Rover made it an almost endlessly customisable option for ambulances as well.

A six-wheeled version was built by Carmichael for use as fire tenders and rescue vehicles requiring a longer rear platform. The rearmost axle was not driven for the 400-odd examples built, but I believe there were a handful that did actually have a 6WD arrangement. Carmichael was to also produce ‘civilian’ 6 wheelers.

The Queen received a customised Range Rover, as did the Pope. And, if you had the money, you too could have a Range Rover prepared to almost any configuration, or taste.

The Range Rover would be a boon for coachbuilders, but it also signalled the demise of another of their staples – the shooting brake.

In automotive form, the shooting brake was a bodystyle for the well-to-do; built over a prestige chassis to be used on rural properties to ferry hunting dogs, long-barrelled guns and the occasional guest. By the time the Range Rover appeared, the shooting brake had become a shadow of its former self – driven by the type more likely to spray you with Brut 33 than with buckshot.

While development of the 100” S/W vehicle was progressing, Graham Bannock had conducted some anonymous market research specific to this new vehicle. 500 people participated, including 200 who owned station wagons and only 50 who were Rover owners. Participants were presented with the following description:

‘A new vehicle which would combine the comfort and appearance of a saloon car with a stronger more robust estate car that can go easily over non-paved roads, country tracks, or over the beach.’ 70% expressed a positive view of the mooted vehicle.

As had been happening around the world since the war, the British station wagon – or estate car – had evolved into a family affair more commonly found in the lower-caste brands. Rover road cars had not followed this trend, although one could purchase the coachbuilt P6 Estoura with its awkwardly sloping rear roofline.

There had actually been an earlier British attempt at a comfortable 4WD station wagon. It was the brainchild of Harry Ferguson and this 1962 example was styled by Giovanni Michelotti, no less.

Ferguson – of tractor fame – was an ardent proponent of all-wheel-drive himself. After breaking with Massey-Ferguson, he continued his efforts with a company called Harry Ferguson Research focusing AWD around roadholding and safety. The R4 saloon was an early attempt at an AWD car, and the R5 wagon was the next step in this progression. Although I cannot find any information about the Michelotti car, I suspect it was a reskinned R5.

Ferguson would abandon his bespoke creations to focus his efforts on the cars of others. He built a number of AWD Ford prototypes, including some Mustangs and this Zodiac 6 wagon as tested by the Lancashire County Constabulary. Ultimately his system would find use in the Jensen Interceptor FF.

On the domestic front, it seemed the only rival for the Range Rover was… the Land Rover.

Across the pond, Jeep had delivered another significant step in the progression towards the modern SUV. Launched in 1962, the Wagoneer received a styling refresh with a more car-like face in 1964 and marketing to reflect its urban aspirations.

But it lived in the land of the giants. While these fullsize pickup-based passenger vehicles were small in comparison to the US standard-sized cars back then, they were oversized for almost all urbanised export markets. However, this model was certainly on Rover’s radar when the 100″ S/W project commenced.

Almost identical in footprint to the Range Rover was the 1960 International Scout. These, along with the subsequent Ford Bronco and short-lived car-face Jeep Commando, could best be described as ‘recreational’ as opposed to ‘comfortably urban’.

As part of his research into the Land Rover, Bannock had visited the US to discover the Landie had good penetration into that market. But the Range Rover was only imported to the US in small, ‘unofficial’ batches. This appears to be for a combination of reasons; the investment required in meeting safety and emission regulations was perhaps too onerous for parent company British Leyland (the Land Rover was withdrawn from the US in 1974) and demand elsewhere was more than sufficient to meet supply.

By the time the Range Rover was officially released in the US in 1987, it had already made its mark there. The sub-fullsize category had started to splinter and mature, one result of which was the downsized 1984 Jeep Cherokee (above) which was to sit underneath the larger 1993 Grand Cherokee – both being influenced by the Range Rover aesthetic. Their jeep-face continued with the Wrangler.

During the 1970s the influence of the Range Rover was still a meandering stream. To find the first instances, we follow the money.

In 1976, Peter Monteverdi of Switzerland placed a bespoke Fissore body on International Scout II underpinnings to create the 1976 Safari. It bore more than a passing resemblance to the Range Rover and – with luxurious fittings and an exorbitant pricetag – also found favour amongst the moneyed European elite as well as in the Middle-Eastern markets.

Monteverdi supplemented the Safari with the cheaper Sahara (top right), a short or long wheelbase Scout II body with new face and plusher interior.

Compatriot Willy Felber; creator of custom body desecrations upon Ferrari, Lancia and the Pontiac Firebird, followed suit. The Felber Oasis (top right) was a refaced, nay defaced, Scout II body with upgraded interior. Unlike the Sahara, Felber also changed the Scout’s distinctive rear pillars and it looks like the roof is actually fixed. When the Scout was discontinued, Felber created the Oasis Mk.II on the Chevy S-10 Blazer.

In Germany, Erich Bitter had already tried an upmarket and refaced K5 Blazer in 1976 (bottom left), but the project never went past this first prototype.

As we saw earlier, this hyper-prestige market was also occupied by custom-built Range Rovers but found probably its most insane iteration in the Lamborghini LM002. Conceived for the US Army as the proto-Hummer Chrysler-engined Cheetah, it was repurposed with a 4 litre V12 engine and luxury interior and struck oil money. This sole wagon version was prepared for the Sultan of Brunei.

Similar to the LM002 was the 1979 Mercedes-Benz G-Wagen (hehehe). Initiated at the suggestion of Daimler Benz shareholder the Shah of Iran as a military vehicle, it was also released to the civilian market.

The product of eight years development in conjunction with Steyr-Daimler-Puch, it is clearly a Land Rover type with better ergonomics but deliberately rudimentary in appearance. Yet it persists to this day in civilian guise but with vastly improved appointments and an undiminished desirability.

And the Australian Army, for one, has just replaced its fleet of Land Rovers with these.

The mid-1970s VW Project 1021 came very close to production. Volkswagen of South Africa were tossing up between manufacturing the Golf or the cheaper option of retaining the Beetle. The brief to stylists Tim Fry and Reg Myatt was for Beetle variants in pickup and wagon bodies that looked like the Range Rover – the wagon having a single door on one side and two on the other. Six prototypes were prepared, passed through crash testing and approved by Wolfsburg before the decision was made to go with the Golf.

Italy brought us the Moretti ‘Sporting 4×4’ based on Fiat Campagnola underpinnings – probably the single most blatant attempt to mimic the Range Rover’s styling.

In France, the Range Rover had found itself sitting inside the Louvre in 1971 being celebrated as an ‘outstanding piece of modern sculpture.’

It also appears to have provided some inspiration for another significant step in the evolution of the modern SUV; the 1977 Matra Simca Rancho.

The donor vehicle was the humble front wheel drive Simca 1100 hatchback. Behind the front doors on a lengthened platform was a fibreglass body styled by Antonin Volaris. This car, aimed at a younger-skewed urban/recreation market, referenced the Range Rover’s boxy, crisply faceted and airy language with some extra touches. It took the blacked wheel arch flares of the Jeep CJ-series and added side molding ‘armour’ to create a ‘style-over-substance’ off-road aesthetic.

Which is not to say the Rancho was incapable off-road, but the look it delivered served to amplifiy the message. A 4WD variant was planned, however the Rancho was not adequately supported by a succession of corporate parents and production ceased in 1984.

This car would in turn come have its own influence on others.

Peugeot had effectively provided the French Range Rover without the need for 4WD. These middle class sedans and wagons had demonstrated their thorough competence on the challenging terrain of Africa since the colonial days. The 1979 504 Loisirs (leisure) concept from Heuliez was an over-the-top Rancho and the 1980 Dangel 504 4WD conversions could take you where even the standard 504 couldn’t.

By the end of the 1970s, Japan had a very broadly applied 4WD industry.

The 1971 Subaru AWD wagon marked yet another significant step in the evolution of the crossover. And like the Range Rover was to be sui generis for a long time.

From the mid-1970s, Suzuki and Daihatsu offered some micro-sized 4WD pickups and wagons marketed as both commercial and recreational vehicles. Towards the end of the decade, the Hilux class of pickup had spawned a 4WD and a steel longroof was not far off.

The 4WD had been part of Japan’s automotive output for some time. In 1951 the US asked Toyota for 100 Jeeps built to Willys Bantam specification for the Korean War. These were continued as the special order only BJ series but apparently Jeep (and local licencees Mitsubishi) took exception and Toyota started modifying it with their own body and componentry. They were named ‘Land Cruiser’ in 1954.

1955 saw the all-Toyota FJ series for the consumer market which was soon joined by the Nissan Patrol 60 series. As with the Jeep and Land Rover, these Japanese 4WDs were available in a variety of body styles; open and closed cab, and short and long wheel-based pick-ups and wagons.

In 1967, Toyota joined Jeep in offering a car-faced 4WD wagon alongside its jeep-faced offerings. Though not quite as car-faced as the Jeep Wagoneer, FJ50 (bottom) signalled Toyota’s growing understanding of the 4WD product diffusion it was to eventually master.

Although British Leyland had prepared a four door prototype in 1972, a lack of funds precluded its development. Monteverdi produced a number of very expensive four doors sold through Rover channels before BL finally put a cheaper ‘factory’ version to market in 1981.

It was built over the same 100” wheelbase resulting in awkward proportioning. The distinctive door handles, a small but effective styling element of the original, had to be discarded. Nevertheless, it was a great success, with demand for this variant soon outstripping that for the two door. In 1992, the LSE was launched, featuring a 108” wheelbase with longer rear doors. The engine was enlarged to 3.9 litres in 1990 and the LSE received a 4.2 litre version.

Levels of luxury had gradually accreted in the Range Rover culminating in the 1984 Vogue. The models sent to the US went standard with air-conditioning, automatics and cruise-control.

The Cleanfoot Paradox

Toorak Village sits on the edge of one of Melbourne’s innermost old-money suburbs. Although this photo was taken in the 1930s, not much has changed. The trams are newer, the shop windows more garish, but the tudor facades and low-rise silhouette remain.

For a very long time, Australia lived ‘off the sheep’s back’, whereby our economy was heavily dependent upon rural output. This is where a lot of our old-money came from, and many denizens of Toorak have maintained rural holdings long after our economy has stopped depending on them. One legacy of this history was reduced import tariffs for certain 4WD vehicles. That the Range Rover fell under this classification only added to its appeal.

While it may be chauvinistic and overly reductive to describe things in these terms, it was the Toorak housewife who gave the urban SUV much impetus. The Range Rover was the enabler; already sitting in the driveway, easy to pilot thanks to its car-like dynamic, easy to load for grocery runs down in the Village, easy to offoad offspring at the schools nearby and not unattractive to be seen in. During the 1980s, an alliteratively brilliant term emerged to describe this phenomenon.

Toorak Tractor.

The Toyota Land Cruiser gave the Range Rover its first serious challenge on this paved turf.

The 1980 FJ60 series was a marked refinement over its FJ50 predecessor. Strip-face notwithstanding, it was not a slavish replication of the Range Rover aesthetic. But it was still attractive, well-appointed, well-mannered on the road and also a superb offroader. And cheaper than the Range Rover.

While snob value can be said to be a factor in the appeal of the Range Rover, things were (as ever) not so simple. There is a particular subset of ‘old-money’ that can be characterised as ‘frugal old-money’. This is a higher form of snobbery, whose holders eschew conspicuous consumption in favour of conspicuous economy despite their wealth. I like to think of them as the ‘frayed-tweed set’, and they were starting be seen behind the wheel of a Toyota Cressida.

For them the Land Rover Wagon was more than adequate, but the FJ60 Land Cruiser became another way to demonstrate their disdain.

Australia provided an ideal market for this confluence of 4WD brands. Our umbilical relationship with the mother country had British cars ever present, and our physical proximity to Asia gave us early-adopter exposure to their emerging motor industry.

By the late 1950s Land Rovers, Land Cruisers and Patrols were working side-by-side on the massive Snowy River Hydro-Electric Scheme that would also employ tens of thousands of recently arrived European migrants. And the hardworking diligence of these newcomers earned the (initially grudging) respect of the colonial occupants.

In the wake of the FJ60 came a tsunami of Japanese Range Rover lookalikes; the Holden Jackaroo (née Isuzu Trooper) and the Mitsubishi Pajero (Montero/Shogun), the Nissan Patrol and its later-to-the-party badge-engineered sibling Ford Maverick.

Though these were primarily aimed at the high-volume US, there was always going to be a market here for the right-sized comfortable 4WD wagon. It would facilitate our love of recreation in this vastly expansive great outdoors; carrying our families and towing our caravans, boats and trailers. Traditionally the domain of our standard sized cars – the Ford Falcon and Holden Kingswood/Commodore – the new wave of Japanese 4WD wagons would allow for urban use as well as even deeper off-road excursions at a more accessible price point than the snooty Range Rover.

But another demographic took a shine to these vehicles; and not because they suddenly found the urge to get their tyres dirty. Even if one could not actually afford rural holdings, it was now possible to emulate one’s betters on the road and let assumptions be made. Before long there were some in the inner-aspirational suburbs trading their aspirational wagons for an aspirational 4WD wagon.

And then the paradoxical ‘cleanfoot’ user emerged within other demographics over here, less for their social pretensions and more for other reasons – but not because they had any specific need for an off-road ability.

The Chelsea Tractor certainly existed in the UK before the term was coined and with the Matra Rancho we get a deeper understanding the cleanfoot. In the 1970s Fergus Pollock of Chrysler UK worked with Antonin Volaris to come to the famed ‘orange drawing’; the mooted replacement for the Rancho. Whether or not this was planned with 4WD, we can see a shift in emphasis to people-mover.

The rise of the van-based passenger vehicle in the 1980s also played its part in the cleanfoot; giving the direct experience of an elevated driving position to those would never have bought a 4WD.

In the US the cleanfoot user had found its gateway in 1935 with the aptly-titled Chevrolet Carryall Suburban. It was initially RWD only but by 1957 these were available with a 4WD option. As was the case with International (middle row), Dodge (bottom left) as well as the Jeep up until 1971.

During the 1970s, the sub-fullsize US recreational vehicles had mostly grown to be short wheelbase versions of their seniors. In the early 1980s they were downsized in the form of the Ford Bronco II and Chevy S-10 Blazer, as well as the Jeep XJ Cherokee. The Scout III (above) did not make it to production when International discontinued their passenger vehicles in 1980.

Despite the US manufacturers’ prolonged exposure to this type of consumer, they appear to have been spurred into action by the incoming Japanese Range Rovers.

By the turn of the millennium, this regionally disparate cleanfoot mindset had coalesced into global cross-manufacturer categories. When Toyota released the Rancho-armoured 1994 RAV4 in both 4WD and 2WD, it typified the semantic transition from ‘recreational’ to ‘lifestyle’.

Meanwhile Subaru and Audi were heeding Harry Ferguson’s lessons…

There is the ongoing discussion of the ‘appliance’ versus the ‘enthusiast’s automobile’. As has been noted within the CC community – this is not a binary condition; it occupies more of a spectrum.

In terms of this new vehicular norm – the loosely-defined crossover/SUV/CUV/4WD/AWD/2WD lookalike – there are multiple factors at play. For some its a necessity, for others an indulgence. Some may take their vehicles deeply off-road, others don’t leave the paved surface. Some may favour the visibility afforded by a higher driving viewpoint, while others may bask in self-important hauteur over the standard car. For some it’s about increased cornering velocity, for others it’s added precaution. Some may appreciate the ease with which they can attend to their children in the rear seats, while others may prefer the more upright seating position for themselves. Some may be beholden to neighbourly one-upmanship, others to a broader association with the outdoors. Some require extra durability, others because gangsta. Some may have too much money to spend, others not enough.

For some it’s a personal statement, but for others it’s just family transport. Our purchasing decisions are the product our individual biases – cognate and unconscious, real or imagined – which sit in combination, and not in mutual exclusion.

I think what presently underpins the rise of this type of vehicle is an enhanced sense of security or privacy. This might be evident when comparing the original Range Rover and its present Vogue sire. Proportionally speaking, the greenhouse has diminished and the body has expanded in all directions. Robust practicality has been replaced by a stylised fortress on wheels.

Where the original Range Range seems to welcome in its surroundings, the new one appears to rebuff them.

4WD had been invented in 1893 by Joseph Diplock, and the 1900 Lohner-Porsche had an electric motor driving each wheel, but I suggest the ur-crossover was the Ford Model T; a light and nimble urban vehicle that was conceived from the start through Henry’s agrarian bent to cross over into off-road use.

How significant the 1970 Range Rover was in the continuum to the present day comes down to your own perspective.

The thankless task of producing a new Range Rover shape was long coming. A refresh – for want of a better term – was considered and rejected in 1980 (bottom left).

In 1994, the P38A Range Rover replacement was launched. It was attractive, and still as capable both on and off the road. But consumer affection for the original shape was so strong that it survived until 1996 as the Range Rover Classic.

Despite its consistent market presence, Range Rover has been owned by a host of manufacturers.

British Leyland Motor Corporation swallowed up Rover in 1967, during the Range Rover’s development. In 1978, Land Rover (and its Range Rover brand) was separated within British Leyland from Rover. However, it was part of the Rover Group when taken over by British Aerospace with the demise of BL.

In 1994, BMW bought Rover Group which included the Land Rover stable and Jaguar as well as others including Mini. The Rover Group was known internally (and unflatteringly) at BMW as ‘The English Patient’, and in 2000 it was broken up. Land Rover and Jaguar were sold to Ford. BMW kept Mini.

In 2006 Ford sold Land Rover and Jaguar as well as rights to the names ‘Rover’, ‘Daimler’ and ‘Lanchester’ to Tata Motors of India, who retain ownership to this day.

Since then Tata have done a superb job with Range Rover, sustaining its position in the face of a tidal wave of prestige challengers. Soon we will have a Tesla, a Bentley and a Maserati in the category, and Tata has sufficient confidence in Range Rover to announce a Jaguar SUV (above).

Although Tata bought a solid range of products, the real value lies in the brand equity, or in quainter terms, the goodwill.

And a lot of the Range Rover goodwill is conveyed by that handsome face. Early in its life, this look was considered for the stillborn Rover P8 saloon. Top right is the SD5 prototype; a Land Rover variant bearing more resemblance to its uncle than to its father.

The 1989 Discovery was the first Range Rover diffusion product put to market, with a styling nod to the Rancho. This was followed by the 1997 Freelander, again with ‘input’ from the Rancho. While both these vehicles were marketed as Land Rovers, they were far more visually reliant upon the Range Rover.

Today, there are seven distinct product lines in the stable. Six of them carry the same face, whether branded Land Rover, Discovery or Range Rover.

As for the seventh, its eyes wandered outward in 1968 where they have sat since – long enough to be even more familiar than the original – but I wonder whether the recognition prompt might also be in those cheekbones.

BMW’s canny stewardship of MINI and Rolls-Royce are ample evidence of the value of a face. Tata has proven the same with Range Rover. But with the final Defender having left the Solihull production line, and with the 2011 DC100 concept bearing so little similarity to its forebears, is Tata about to squander this valuable facial asset?

Does Tata see the value, as Jeep and Toyota still do, in keeping both a car-face and a jeep-face?

The alterations to the Range Rover face over time have made for fascinating viewing. Every element of the strip has been completely changed from the original – headlight/setting, turning signals, grille grain and texture, bumper and even the strip’s silhouette, and yet resemblance is retained. That clamshell hood with lettering and castellated cheekbones definitely plays its part.

A masterclass in visual evolution. Having said that, their product-line differentiation is increasingly lacking – which might actually be the point.

The latest version broke more ground by sloping the face plane back. I recall hearing an interview with someone from Land Rover who spoke of much internal wringing of hands over this decision, but it doesn’t seem to have put the buyers off.

One clever touch can be seen in the Vogue’s profile shot with the optional detailing – matt silver in this case but also available in black for lighter-coloured models. The three ‘vents’ in the front door are clearly referencing the original door handles and can be specified without the lower lengthwise highlight. But with the lower highlight it looks like an external exhaust manifold and pipe. Interestingly, most of the ones I’ve seen on the road have the lower highlight without the highlighted vents.

Over here the original Range Rover suffered the fate shared by many a Mercedes-Benz W123 and Volvo 240 wagon; a handmedown that became an increasingly tatty presence on the road. Or else they were exiled to the farm and used as paddock-bashers. Which makes survivors like this extremely rare and increasingly valuable.

The current owner bought it from its first owner, a family friend who had treated it with respect for 30-odd years and it remains unrestored.

It now shares garage space with a host of Range Rovers up to a 2009 Vogue, as well as a Defender workhorse and a 2014 Toyota Land Cruiser company car. But when the weather’s ideal, our Range Rover connoisseur loves to drive this and I would see it quite often before he moved his offices elsewhere.

This Range Rover doesn’t appeal to me because of its capabilities or for what it might represent.
I love it because it is still better-looking than pretty much every other vehicle on the road.

Or off it.

My thanks to John H, Roger Carr and Ed Stembridge for their help with this piece.

This image does a lot for me. It’s the ideal combination of vantage point and subject matter. We’ve covered the Riviera quite a bit here, but CCommenter ‘jim’ has taken a superb shot worth sharing. I just love how those metallic planes capture the light, and how this angle really emphasises the mastery of the shape.

I’m taking the bar in the grille and italicised ‘GS’ fender badge as indication that this is a 1967 model. It marks a definite line in the sand for me; this body was introduced in 1966 but the 68-70 versions suffer from too much heavy-handed restyling for the sake of appearing updated. Something that was mostly avoided with the 1963-65 series, which had an admittedly shorter lifespan.

It’s pretty hard to find a bad angle on the 1966/67 Buick Riviera, and here’s another great one. That faceting on the rear surface plane is just… well, perfect. Maybe it’s time for a cold shower. Thanks jim.

Further Reading:

1963-65 Riviera Appreciation by Aaron65

1964 Riviera CC by Paul Niedermeyer

1966 Riviera CC by Paul Niedermeyer

1968 Riviera CC by Perry Shoar

1969 Riviera In Motion by Joseph Dennis

1970 Riviera Sawzall Special photographed by CJCars

1972 Riviera CC by Paul Niedermeyer

1972 Riviera ‘Silver Arrow IV’ by Bill Prince

The conundrum of Grandpa’s Axe, sometimes known as Lincoln’s Axe, is a simple one. The handle gets worn or broken and replaced. Then the head for whatever reason needs replacing. Over time and generations of owners, each component is replaced and replaced again, leading to the question – is it still the same axe?

Since the 1930s, Australia had a category of commercial vehicle based on passenger cars known initially as the coupe utility and which had subsequently morphed into shorter-cabin ‘utes’. The 1968 Holden HK (pictured above) was a typical example of these styleside-type utes from the big three, a body type that was also supplied by other manufacturers in varying sizes.

When the shark-like 1971 HQ Holden was introduced, it came with two trim levels of ute and a panelvan. There was also a curious new commercial entry in the range, shown bottom right.

The Holden One Tonner was a cab-chassis vehicle, and defined a new sub-category for this type of arrangement.

GMH had not brought in the GMC/Chevrolet in any serious numbers allowing the Ford F-series to dominate the ‘relatively light’ cab-chassis market, and the Japanese were starting to make in-roads with their more diminutive offerings. The Holden One Tonner sat somewhere in the middle.

The HQ passenger range was essentially a 3/4 length monocoque body with the front end supported by a short chassis terminating under the b-pillar (top illustration), comprising a 111” wheelbase sedan and coupe as well as 114” wagon and ‘Statesman’ luxury sedan.

The HQ commercials, on the other hand, were underpinned for their entire length by a perimeter-frame chassis.

Sitting on the chassis was a unitary cabin and a front end arrangement shared with the rest of the range. The driver received the ergonomic benefits of the standard-setting HQ passenger cars; improved visibility and NVH, flow-through ventilation and a relatively generous seating position.

The One Tonner had a 120.4” wheelbase whereas the ute and panel van sat on a 114” wheelbase. This extra length in the driveshaft initially precluded a V8. At first the 173 cu inch I6 was the only engine available, but it was followed by the option of the 202 cu inch I6 in November 1972, the 253 cu inch V8 in February 1973 and finally the 308 cu inch V8 in August 1975.

While the utes were Gross Vehicle Mass (or Weight) rated at 2,155 kg (4750 lbs) for the six cylinder models and 2,200 kg (4851 lbs) for the V8s, the One Tonner was allowed 2,600 kg (5732 lbs) for the 202 I6 and 2660 kg (5864 lbs) for the V8. The One Tonner came with a heavy duty Salisbury diff while the rest of the commercials had the banjo-type diff as standard. To cope with the heavier loads, wheels were seam-welded instead of the four-spot welding used for the rest of the HQs.

Its exterior detailing made it perhaps the most removed from the rest of the HQ range. The cavity grille was replaced with a pressed steel ‘grate’, the crudely-shaped heavy duty bumpers had no integrated turning signals, which were instead mounted between the headlights and grille as blister units. The trim detailing was either in white or grey, but an optional ‘Styling Package’ (later renamed ‘Appearance Package’) emerged with the grille, bumper and Holden lettering being chromed along with Kingswood hubcaps.

The One Tonner came delivered from the factory as a cab-chassis only, and pretty much every one I’ve seen in the metal has a flat or dropside metal tray. This above image was used in the brochure, but it’s an airbrush job. I don’t recall ever having seen this type of rear on a One Tonner; if you were needing something like this then the panel van would have been more than adequate. Unless you baked super-heavy bread.

There was also an ambulance variant, initially an informal option from the factory. The front clip was replaced with the more refined passenger version (in this case the quad-headlight Premier) and interior appointments were also upgraded. I’m not sure, but I suspect these were supplied straight to the body-builder without the rear wall on the cabin; in some cases a third door was added at the factory for side ingress to the rear compartment. (Image: sv1ambo)

Here we have a Kingswood (or Belmont) front clip, but with an aftermarket lazy axle. This is an Em-Care version built by Australian Bodycraft Sales in South Australia who specialised in this configuration. I’ve also seen a six-wheeler flat tray One Tonner in the past.

In late 1974, the HQ was replaced with the HJ (top). A step backward in styling sophistication and more broughamified with its pronounced grille and squared off corners. 1976 saw the introduction of the HX series (bottom), with minor changes to trim and specification.

The HJ and HX One Tonner retained the HQ front sheetmetal, but GMH formalised the ambulance version as the B06 package using the upgraded sheet metal from the Premier passenger cars. The B06 could be ordered for non-ambulance use, but given the One Tonner was the least appearance-conscious workhorse in the range, up-speccing was the preserve of the few. (Image: sv1ambo)

I’ve been waiting for an original One Tonner to appear in front of my camera, and its been a while coming. These commercials were the proverbial Grandpa’s Axe; being put through heavy-duty use and with components and body panels easily replaced. Survivors are relatively numerous, but given their tradie custodians, they have mostly been customised by those good with their hands.

When I saw this example, I jumped out of the car for a few shots. The grille and lettering is original spec, but the bumper is – alas – taken from the passenger cars. And that centre-mounted Holden crest is an additional addition.

This one was shot near home, but it has a Kingswood front clip in its entirety.

These have the split grille from the top-of-the-line Statesman; a popular enhancement when those nose cones were still freely available at the scrap yards.

And of course there are the GTS tributes.

I got talking to the owner of this one. Stupidly, I can’t remember what it’s running, but as you can see from the photos he treats it very well.

Then I saw this badge, and I thought he was putting me on. Nup; this is an HZ One Tonner with Radial Tuned Suspension.

When the HQ was in development, Chief Engineer George Roberts decreed that the car would have a ‘boulevard ride’ much to the dismay of his colleagues. Formerly at Cadillac, Roberts’ inclinations veered towards cruising and away from performance. Hence the HQ suffered terminal understeer that was post-rationalised as a passive safety feature.

It was not until the 1977 HZ that this shortcoming was rectified. The entire front suspension was overhauled with, as Joe Kenwright describes it: ‘new front suspension upper control arms and location, new positive castor and negative camber front end geometry, uprated springs, bushes and shock absorbers all round and an anti-roll bar at the rear for all models’, and given the name ‘Radial Tuned Suspension’ – a term used in the US as well but I’m not sure if it denoted a similar configuration.

Around Christmas I found what looked like an original One Tonner. Grille – check; correctly mounted turning signals (amberised in 1973) – check; Holden lettering – check; bumper bar – check. An ‘Appearance Package’ model.

And although the fender badges are not visible in this shot, this one’s an HZ as well.

So here we have the best of the breed; HQ front sheet metal with RTS. As I was delighting in its presence, its guardian appeared out of the bottle shop. He’s the second owner of this recent acquisition and, although not subjected to a Pebble Beach Survivor Class appraisal, he thinks it’s all original and is pretty chuffed with it. He plans a respray and adding LPG to the 253 and that’s about it. I never thought to ask, but apparently the chassis is prone to cracking, so I wonder whether it might have been replaced. More likely repaired if at all.

In 1978, Holden released the Commodore. This was a strange time for GMH; they had originally planned for this model to supplement the larger HQ-based passenger cars and the HZ continued until 1980. But ultimately plans for the HQ platform-replacing WA series were discarded, and the Commodore became the ‘fullsize’ range.

But the Commodore was a downsized model, and the 1980-onwards WB series continued with the ute, panel van and One Tonner, as well as the Statesman at the prestige end. The One Tonner received WB sheet metal with a headlight, grille and bumper treatment shared with the panel van.

Within a year the WB One Tonner was wearing the face of the ute. As you can see here, it was still differentiated from the WB Statesman shown on the trailer. For a look at the teardown and buildup of Tunner’s Holden 1 Tonner, click here.

The WB One Tonner was the last of the line, finishing up in 1984. From 2003 to 2005, Holden briefly revived the One Tonner in VY II and VZ form. Ford belatedly introduced their own version for the 1999 AU which continues to this day.

I remember the originals from my youth, the white detailing leaving a vivid impression. I don’t recall ever seeing the grey-trim version, so maybe that’s something to start searching for. But to be honest, after finding this example I’ve emerged quite satisfied from my quest for the elusive genuine Grandpa’s Axe Holden One Tonner.

Further Reading:

Joe Kenwright’s comprehensive overview of the One Tonner at Truck Jungle

Em-Care 6-wheeler ambulances

HQ Holden Analysis by Paul Niedermeyer

Capsule of Ford F-350 Cab-Chassis by Jim Grey

Parked at the rear of some mechanical workshops were these zaftig wonders. A 1975-80 Beetle Cabriolet and a 1959-67 Jaguar Mk2 3.4. Two completely different expressions of the automobile, yet joined in their respectively iconic utilisation of body curvature.

Gorgeous, both.

I recently came across a fascinating intellectual property hearing from last year. It concerns replicas of the Batmobile, and provides an interesting perspective as to what constitutes the character of a car. This extended piece begins with some excerpts from the appeal ruling.

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

No. 13-55484
D.C. No. 2:11-cv-03934-

RSWL-OP
OPINION

DC COMICS, Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.

MARK TOWLE, an individual, DBA Garage Gotham,

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of California
Ronald S.W. Lew, Senior District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted February 5, 2015—Pasadena, California
Filed September 23, 2015

Defendant-Appellant.

Before: Michael J. Melloy, Jay S. Bybee, and Sandra S. Ikuta, Circuit Judges.
Opinion by Judge Ikuta

‘Defendant Mark Towle produces replicas of the Batmobile as it appeared in both the 1966 television show and 1989 motion picture as part of his business at Gotham Garage, where he manufactures and sells replicas of automobiles featured in motion pictures or television programs.

‘Towle concedes that these replicas copy the designs of the Batmobile as depicted on television and in the motion picture, though they do not copy every feature. Towle then sells these vehicles for approximately $90,000 to “avid car collectors” who “know the entire history of the Batmobile.” Towle also sells kits that allow customers to modify their cars to look like the Batmobile, as it appeared in the 1966 television show and the 1989 motion picture.’ (p.7)

‘The Batmobile also has consistent character traits and attributes. No matter its specific physical appearance, the Batmobile is a “crime-fighting” car with sleek and powerful characteristics that allow Batman to maneuver quickly while he fights villains. In the comic books, the Batmobile is described as waiting “[l]ike an impatient steed straining at the reins . . . shiver[ing] as its super-charged motor throbs with energy” before it “tears after the fleeing hoodlums” an instant later. Elsewhere, the Batmobile “leaps away and tears up the street like a cyclone,” and at one point “twin jets of flame flash out with thunderclap force, and the miracle car of the dynamic duo literally flies through the air!”’ (p.16)

‘The design of the Batmobile did not directly copy any iterations of the Batmobile as it appeared in the comic books. As in the comic books, however, the Batmobile in the 1966 television show maintained a bat-like appearance and was equipped with state-of-the-art weaponry and technology.’ (p.5)

‘… the Batmobile is almost always bat-like in appearance, with a bat-themed front end, bat wings extending from the top or back of the car, exaggerated fenders, a curved windshield, and bat emblems on the vehicle.’ (p.16)

‘Furthermore, the Batmobile has an ability to maneuver that far exceeds that of an ordinary car. In the 1966 television series, the Batmobile can perform an “emergency bat turn” via reverse thrust rockets.’ (p.17)

‘Courts have recognized that copyright protection extends not only to an original work as a whole, but also to “sufficiently distinctive” elements, like comic book characters, contained within the work. Halicki Films, LLC v. Sanderson Sales & Mktg., 547 F.3d 1213, 1224 (9th Cir. 2008).’ (p.11)

‘In Halicki, we considered whether “Eleanor,” a car that appeared in both the original 1971 and 2000 remake motion picture Gone in 60 Seconds, could be entitled to copyright protection as a character.

‘Considering Eleanor’s persistent attributes in both the original and remake of Gone in 60 Seconds, we concluded that Eleanor met some of the key factors necessary to qualify for copyright protection. We first noted that Eleanor was more like a comic book character than a literary character given Eleanor’s “physical as well as conceptual qualities.”’ (p.13)

‘We also stated that Eleanor “displays consistent, widely identifiable traits and is especially distinctive.”

‘First, we noted that “in both films, the thefts of the other cars go largely as planned, but whenever the main human character tries to steal Eleanor, circumstances invariably become complicated.” Second, we noted that in the original, “the main character says ‘I’m getting tired of stealing this Eleanor car,’” and in the remake “the main character refers to his history with Eleanor.” (p.13)

‘Eleanor’s ability to consistently disrupt heists by her presence was more pertinent to our analysis of whether the car should qualify as a sufficiently distinctive character than Eleanor’s make and model. Indeed, Halicki put no weight on the fact that Eleanor was a customized yellow 1971 Fastback Ford Mustang in one film, and a silver 1967 Shelby GT-500 in another.’ (p.14)

‘The panel affirmed the district court’s summary judgment in a copyright and trademark infringement action brought by DC Comics against a maker of Batmobile replicas.

‘The panel held that the Batmobile, as it appeared in the Batman comic books, television series, and motion picture, was entitled to copyright protection because this automotive character was a sufficiently distinctive element of the works.

‘The panel held that DC Comics owned a copyright interest in the Batmobile character, as expressed in the 1966 television series and the 1989 motion picture, because it did not transfer its underlying rights to the character when it licensed rights to produce derivative works.

‘The panel held that the defendant’s replica cars infringed on DC Comics’ copyrights.’ (p. 2)

Nowhere in the above opinion is reference to the 1955 Lincoln Futura showcar. It was mentioned by the defendant in their initial motion, but for the summary judgment and this appeal ruling it’s an irrelevancy.

The judges relied on the characteristics of the Batmobile, and not the specific form.

George Barris is not mentioned in the appeal ruling either and he had even held a patent on the Batmobile’s design.

In September 1965, Barris entered into an agreement to construct the Batmobile. With a scant three weeks to produce the car for the TV series pilot, Barris suggested modifying an old Lincoln showcar he had sitting outside his showroom.

What follows are excerpts from that contract.

‘It is hereby agreed on this 1st day of September, 1965, TWENTIETH CENTURY-FOX TELEVISION, INC., and GREENWAY PRODUCTIONS, INC. thereinafter referred to as “Producer”, and LESTER E. TOMPKINS, IRVIN KUNS and GEORGE BARRIS, individuals doing business as Barris Kustom City (a partnership), hereinafter referred to as “Owner”, as follows:

1. Owner shall mechanically and structurally construct and modify the interior and exterior of its proto-Lincoln Chassis pursuant to and in accordance with:

(a) Those three (3) certain drawings of the “Batmobile” motor vehicle (hereinafter referred to as “Batmobile I”) prepared by Owner at the request and direction of Producer and heretofore delivered to Producer,

(b) Those three (3) certain sketches and one (1) working drawing subsequently prepared by Producer and delivered to Owner which alter and modify said drawings prepared by Owner, and

(c) That certain list of requirements heretofore delivered to Owner by Producer which are to be included in Batmobile I.’

‘3. Producer shall pay to Owner the following sums:

(a) Five Thousand Dollars ($5,000.00) upon execution of this agreement by Owner.

(b) Four Thousand Dollars ($4,000.00) if merchandising rights are obtained as provided for in Article 8 hereof prior to the commencement of the pilot motion picture tentatively entitled “BATMAN” (hereinafter referred to as the “Pilot”), or Nine Thousand Dollars ($9,000.00) upon completion of principal photography of the Pilot if said merchandising rights have not been obtained prior thereto.

Upon completion of the Pilot, Producer will deliver Batmobile I to Owner at Producer’s place of business

6. Owner grants to Producer the alternative options to (i) either rent Batmobile I from Owner at the rental rate of One-Hundred Fifty Dollars ($150.00) per day (during which rental time Producer shall retain possession of Batmobile I) or, (ii) to require Owner to construct and sell to Producer a motor vehicle (hereinafter referred to as “Batmobile II”)’

‘8. Subject to the approval first and obtained in writing from National Periodical, Producer shall have the right to acquire and own all or any part of the merchandising rights in and to Batmobile I and II.  Merchandising rights are defined herein as the right to license the use of the design of Batmobile I and II in connection  with such items as clothing, toys, games, jewelry and replicas thereof.

‘Out of one hundred per cent (100%) of the gross profits received from such merchandising rights in and to Batmobile I and II Producer shall deduct and pay all costs and expenses incurred in connection therewith and thereafter the net profits from said merchandising rights shall be divided and distributed as follows:

‘(a) A sum equal to twenty-five per cent (25%) shall be paid to Greenway Productions, Inc.
(b) A sum equal to twenty-five per cent (25%) shall be paid to Twentieth Century-Fox Television, Inc.
(c) A sum equal to twenty-five per cent (25%) shall be paid to Owner.
(d) A sum equal to twenty-five per cent (25%) shall be paid to American Broadcasting Company.

‘Not withstanding the foregoing division of net profits, if National Periodical demands a percentage of the net profits from the aforesaid merchandising rights, then such percentage shall be deducted pari passu from the shares of Greenway Productions, Inc., Twentieth Century-Fox Television, Inc., Owner and American Broadcasting Company.’

‘EXHIBIT “E”

BATMOBILE REQUIREMENTS

Owner shall either provide and install or provide for the installation of the following items:

1. The Switches and Hand-throttle knob for the Turbo-electric Drive.
2. The Bing-Bong Warning Bell and Bat-Light Flasher.
3. The Mobile Phone between the seats with Beeper and Flashing Light.
4. The Batscope, with TV-like Viewing Screen on the dash with control buttons and Radar-like Antenna with aimable parabolic Reflector outside, with cockpit controls.
5. Anti-theft System- Flashing Red Lights- Piercing Whistle- Little rockets built into tubes at the back of the cockpit that fire straight up with a fiery whoosh.
6. Anti-fire Control System- Flood of Foam from Secret Nozzle.
7. Turn-off switch for Protection Systems.
8. Radar-like screen that Beeps and Blips and points an arrow as it picks up Robin’s directional signal.
9. Mechanics for Emergency Bat Turn- Red Lever so named on Dash- Reverse Thrust Rockets beneath headlights- Ejection Parachute Mechanism at rear.
10. Bat-Ray Projector Mechanism- Lever on Dash so names- Hood Hydraulic Projector Device. (With possibility of ray coming from Bat-Eyes).
11. Portable Fire-Extinguisher.
12. Receiver and Sender Computer to be installed in trunk of Batmobile.
13. Bat symbols on hubcaps.
14. The color of the Batmobile and the Bat Symbols to be placed thereon shall be mutually agreed upon between Owner and Producer prior to the completion of the Batmobile.
15. Special luminescent paint to define Bat outline at night, the placement of which shall be mutually agreed upon between Owner and Producer prior to the completion of the Batmobile.’

‘7. Any and all right, title and interest in and to the design of Batmobile I resulting from the application of the required Batmobile features in and to Owner’s proto-type Lincoln chassis, save and except the name “Batmobile” and the Batmobile features set forth in Article 10 hereof and in the drawings and exhibits attached hereto, and of the completed Batmobile I provided for in Article 2 hereof, shall forever be vested in and owned jointly by Owner and Producer, subject only to any and all right, title and interest of National Periodical Publications, Inc. (herein referred to as “National Periodical”) in and to said Batmobile features in said design.’

Throughout the contract with the ‘Producer’ Fox/Greenway, Barris Kustom City is referred to as the ‘Owner’ of the ‘Batmobile I’ artifact itself, with the ‘Producer’ renting ‘Batmobile I’ beginning with some initial lump payments. Fox/Greenway didn’t require physical ownership of the vehicle, they just needed use of it. Note that the contract attempts to offset some upfront costs against later royalty streams.

The proposed merchandising royalty split appears to give Fox, Barris, Greenway and ABC an equal share after National Periodical’s share had been determined and deducted.

It would appear that Fox/Greenway and Barris together had contractual ownership of the design minus the bat elements, but not so.

What’s interesting is that the Lincoln was purchased by Barris from Ford (for $1) in December 1965, after the agreement to build the Batmobile had been fulfilled.

What’s more interesting is this May 1966 response to a query from Emmett Lavery, Director of Business Affairs at 20th Century Fox Television. Maybe Mr Lavery’s query concerned Barris’ patent over the vehicle.

In March 1966, four months after the first Batmobile was delivered, Barris applied for a patent on the car’s shape. This patent covered the ‘ornamental design for an automotive vehicle or similar article’. There are two vehicles depicted, the lower set featuring missile launchers and rear parachute pods (which were actually specified in the list of Batmobile requirements in the contract with Fox/Greenway).

This patent appears to co-opt the design minus (most) bat elements into Barris’ possession.

Daniel Strohl at Hemmings relates this story;

‘Dean Jeffries told Tom Cotter that he was originally tapped to build the Batmobile and had proceeded to cut up a Cadillac to do so, but the studio moved up the timetable on him, thus giving Barris the opportunity to provide the car. “The producers didn’t like working with Barris, but they were locked into him because he had the rights to the car,” Jeffries said. “They said, ‘We’re not going to deal with him again,’ so that’s how I ended up building the Green Hornet car and Wonder Woman’s car.”’

In August 1966, Barris was commissioned to build replicas of the Batmobile by Fox/Greenway to meet publicity needs.

A cast was taken of the Futura-based ‘Batmobile I’ shooting car and three fibreglass bodies were prepared over 1965/66 Ford Galaxie platforms with one to become the 427 Dragster. The vehicles were completed in November 1966.

The three replicas came with their own fender-affixed legal notice. The construction contract dated August 15 stated;

‘BARRIS agrees to affix permanently upon each vehicle produced hereunder appropriate copyright and trademark notices and supplied by NATIONAL PERIODICALS in the following form…’

‘“Batmobile”–The Barris Kustom Insignia–“Powered by…” The Ford Oval Insignia–“Greenway Productions…Mr. W. Dozier”–“Filmed at “20th” Century T.V.”–“National Periodicals Inc. “67”–“Design Patent…George Barris”–“ABC-Television…Batman”’

In October 1966, a synopsis of an Exhibition Agreement and Side Agreement with Barris was drafted by Fox/Greenway.

‘In this side agreement, Fox and Greenway waive the right to recoup from merchandising income accruing from this specific design of the Batmobile, the cost of the first car and rental in excess of $10,000 before any participation by Barris. 

‘It is questionable, however as to whether Barris would be entitled to any a share of merchandising income in the first place, as the original Batmobile Agreement was deliberately worded to make Barris’ participation conditional on Fox and Greenway acquiring and handling merchandising rights, which, of course, they never have. However, even if he were to be adjudged entitled to share in merchandising income accruing from National Periodicals owning and handling merchandising rights, the amount waived is small by comparison to the saving on rent and the elimination of the “headaches” of the past year, – with the offset, also, of whatever new income share Fox and Greenway get from exhibition royalty.’

The exasperation with Barris is palpable, but neither party saw any royalties from merchandise because National Periodicals had arranged the merchandising themselves. Barris’ patent covered an automotive vehicle, and not a toy, so I’m not sure if he saw a cent from the merchandising revenue.

Barris’ patent lapsed in 1980. Given that he was not recognised as a rights holder in the Batmobile in both the initial summary judgment and subsequent appeal ruling for the recent case against Mark Towle, it would appear the rights for this vehicle have now been subsumed by DC Comics.

But as the legal notice on this current Hot Wheels Elite model listing shows, George Barris (who died late last year) presently receives a design ‘credit’ for its shape. How that credit is structured legally I don’t know.

In 2013 Barris sold the original ‘Batmobile I’ shooting car for $4.62m.

The Futura had cost $250,000 to build in 1955, but back then its value to the Ford Motor Company had been priceless. It was a strident and very visible manifestation of their future view; confident, wondrous and imaginative.

Maybe not so imaginative.

Ford’s showcars of the 1950s experienced little of the cultural resonance enjoyed by the ‘Dream Cars’ of GM and Chryco. As you can see above, some were just variations on a ‘semi-fastback bubbletop canopy and tailfins’ theme that had no real place in the world of tomorrow.

It has to be said, though, that the Futura was probably the most cohesive and accomplished of this bunch.

Where it most excelled was in previewing the look of the 1956 Lincolns for the public.

Before the grotesque 1958 and sublime 1961 Lincolns, the 1956 range was a handsome effort – probably the best from the decade. Those distinctive headlight cowlings were introduced that year, to be overstuffed with stacked twinsets in 1957. They had been suggested on the attractive Lincoln XL-500 showcar of 1954, and the Futura had clarified their scale and positioning as they were to be applied to the passenger models.

After a few years on the show and dealer circuit, the Futura was old news in the automotive world.

It found its way to Hollywood, where it was painted red and used in the 1959 movie ‘It Started With a Kiss’ with Debbie Reynolds. Eventually it found its way into storage with Barris, who had been involved with Ford on the showcar circuit.

From there it seemed to fall into that quagmire known as the law of unintended consequences.

The Futura was the brainchild of Lincoln/Mercury Division head stylist Bill Schmidt. It was apparently inspired by a fishing trip he took in the Bahamas with his friend Bill Mitchell, the same fishing trip that also inspired the shark-like 1959 Corvette XP-755.

The showcar was completed under Schmidt’s aegis, with Roy Brown working on styling details and Ghia of Turin building the actual functioning vehicle.

As a high-level ‘creative’ in the automobile industry, Schmidt would have been paid well; ample recompense for the fact that any rights over his output were contractually transferred to his employer. He had no ownership of his work for Ford, nor should he have – really. He was there to help build and sell cars, not to create Art.

There’s one thing that can never be denied him, however – authorship credit for the original Futura shape. A credit shared with others certainly, but his contribution the most substantive and his name first.

Comic artist Bob Kane was the co-author (along with writer Bill Fingers) of Batman. This excerpt from Mark Waid explains how thing operated in the comic world;

‘From the beginnings of American comics in the mid-1930s right up until the early 1980s, comics artists and writers were what we call today “work-for-hire”–they were paid a per-page rate by publishers, nothing else, and had no ownership stake in or claim to their creations. There were exceptions: though Siegel and Shuster were unquestionably undercompensated for Superman, they at least shared heavily in the royalties of his lucrative newspaper strip.

‘Bob Kane cut a hell of a deal with DC on his co-creation Batman in the late 1940s by threatening to throw his weight behind Siegel and Shuster when they sued for Superman ownership unless DC renegotiated with him–consequently earning a hefty gross percentage on all things Batman until he relinquished most of his rights in the late 1960s for a reported million dollars.’

That’s a happy Kane with his arm around Barris.

In the eyes of the law, the Batmobile has become a generic type of vehicle – by necessity all examples of which sharing similar characteristics.

So what is it that makes the 1966 Batmobile so special?

Strip away all the generic Batman legal definition stuff.

And its true character is revealed.

Further Reading:

Summary Judgment: DC Comics v. Towle

Appeal Ruling: DC Comics v. Towle

The Fox/Greenway/Barris agreements, FoMoCo letters and Barris patent
were sourced from 1966Batmobile.com,
a fantastic trove of all things related to this vehicle.

Daniel Strohl’s piece at Hemmings
on the then-forthcoming auction of ‘Batmobile I’

Mark Waid’s article on DC Comics contracts at Thrillbent.com

‘History of the Batmobile’ infographic
sourced from Comicbookresources.com

My piece follows observations made by
the esteemed and learned Paul Niedermeyer

RR Auctions in Boston have just announced an extremely rare consignment; an actual NASA lunar buggy prototype. The Local Scientific Survey Module prepared by Brown Engineering Company never actually made it to the moon, and NASA seems to have let it slip out of their hands many years ago.

Here it is with Saturn V (and others) rocket scientist Wernher von Braun at the Marshal Space Flight Centre in Huntsville, Alabama. Aeronautical research engineer Otha Vaughan worked with von Braun during this period. According to an interview with Vaughan;

‘Vaughan said NASA built two sizes of rover models, and both were called Local Scientific Survey Modules (LSSMs) at one time. “But then von Braun wrote an article in 1966, I guess it was, about the LSSM and he called it the Lunar Scientific Survey Module. I don’t know why he call it that. So, officially, they can have different names and that’s what’s confused all the people.”

“In the beginning,” Vaughan said, “(von Braun) wanted to build some kind of small vehicle he could play around with. He got Brown Engineering (now Teledyne Brown Engineering in Huntsville) to build this small LSSM, which was called the Brown LSSM.”‘

Brown Engineering had been involved with earlier lunar mobility projects and von Braun bypassed regular procurement processes to get them involved with this Mobility Test Article, although ultimately they would not be asked to tender for the Apollo lunar vehicles.

The Brown LSSM was constructed with as many commercially-available components as possible; for example each wheel on the LSSM was powered by an electric motor fed by standard truck batteries. It had a theoretical 10 mile ‘radius of action’ and Popular Science suggested (after a test drive on Earth) that it would be best to keep the speed below 20mph.

Knology.net outlines the LSSM’s contribution as such;

‘This vehicle was later flown in early 1967 in the USAF KC-135 Low Gravity aircraft while the aircraft was flown to simulate the 1/6 G of the lunar gravity. These flight helped in the redesign of the seats and hand holds with the astronauts climbing into and exiting the vehicle as the flight profiles were being flown. The vehicle was also operated in remote mode to determine the accelerations at both axles, and vehicle center of gravity, vehicle bounce heights as it traveled over simulated obstacles and vehicle speed. Results helped in the design of the hand controller later used in the rover design and in the requirement for an energy absorbing suspension system and a very soft wheel design while driving in the lunar environment.’

It was anticipated that the LSSM would be carried to the moon on one of two Saturn V rockets, mounted on the Lunar Module Shelter. The second Saturn V would carry the astronauts, who would lower the vehicle to the moon’s surface. Cost issues precluded the scope of this project. This image appeared in November 1966 issue of Popular Science, but by then it seems the project had progressed beyond the Brown LSSM.

This archive photograph shows something similar to the sketch in Popular Science, but I’m not sure if this was the other LSSM mentioned by Vaughan.

I think this is the other vehicle mentioned. It was prepared by Bendix, and was to include a laboratory module mounted amidships.

It’s easy to get distracted on this subject. For example, here is one of a few GM vehicles developed for NASA. Rather than go too far off-subject, anyone interested can click to knology here.

The Brown LSSM seems like a crude version of the more delicate-looking Lunar Roving Vehicle, a design icon in itself. Nonetheless the Brown LSSM is part of the gloried history in which man attempts to broaden the moon’s CC credentials.

Back in October of last year, Jason Koebler at Motherboard wrote about the Brown LSSM’s apparent demise:

‘According to NASA, the now-destroyed rover was a Local Scientific Survey Module designed, built, and tested at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in 1965 and 1966. A US Air Force Historian who happened to be passing through the small town of Blountsville, Alabama spotted the rover in the backyard of the person who ultimately ended up selling it, and alerted NASA in February of 2014. NASA apparently dragged its feet in recovering the rover, however: By December, it had been destroyed.’

But not so. Follow the story of our Auction Classic’s rediscovery below.

Someone in Alabama sold a priceless lunar rover for scrap metal

Heroic junkyard owner says he saved priceless moon rover from scrap heap

NASA can’t legally claim a rover prototype that was sold to an Alabama scrapyard

As many of the CCognoscenti here will know, the Citroen DS was named after a pun; ‘Déesse’ being French for ‘Goddess’. Of course this (French?) blue example may well be a lesser ID model (‘Idée’ – idea), but still I couldn’t help but notice the juxtaposition with the celebrity-endorsed billboarding for a new apartment complex.

It seems these two goddesses have met before. Charlize Theron has just been announced as a villain in the eighth Fast and Furious movie. I wonder what she’ll be driving.