OT: Cars--Ever own any of these?

[BumbleBeeDave]

http://community.allstate.com/community/allstate_blog/blog/2012/03/28/one-hit-wonders-of-the-auto-world

I remember riding in both a Le Car and a Yugo one time. The Yugo's seats were upholstered with towel grade terrycloth. :eek::rolleyes:

BBD

[dustyrider]

I've always wanted to ride in a DeLorean, and not just cause Doc Brown made it into a time machine. When I was a little kid in the back seat of my Granddad's Lumina we got flagged down by a guy in a Delorean and when he popped the door to ask for directions I thought it was the "bee's knees!"
I'm sure his beautiful girlfriend in the passenger seat helped impress the car's memory on me too.

[chwupper]

I think my dad had an AMC Pacer for 15 or 20 minutes in the 70s sometime...

[eddief]

they were here for few years. All kinds of room, all kinds of comfort, all kinds of weird, all kinds of "who fixes these things?" I suggested one to a friend, he bought one, and, shall we say, it strained the friendship.

http://en.renault-club.cz/gallery_detail.php?id=281

[BumbleBeeDave]

. . .or should i say "Weird beyond belief!" . . .

BBD

[GuyGadois]

. . . The Citroen's were also weird or should i say "Weird beyond belief!" . . .

BBD

Those are Lemons. No, literally lemons.

[rounder]

It could have been one of these which would have been especially bad...2CV (DeuxChevaux) or somthing like that.

When i was learning how to drive, had these choices...

http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/article/0,28804,1658545_1657867_1657681,00.html

http://www.theautocollections.com/index.cfm?key=3605&action=details&tab=inventory&cartable

The Renault was a pos. Went on a date and the engine caught on fire at a stop light.

The pontiac was cool but a truck to drive. Failed my first drivers test when i knocked over the stick while trying to park (no power steering).

[BumbleBeeDave]

THIS looks like a fun read!

http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/0,28757,1658545,00.html

BBD

[Peter B]

. . .or should i say "Weird beyond belief!" . . .

BBD

My dad had a DS21 when I was growing up. GuyGadois is right--quirky POS.

[don compton]

It could have been one of these which would have been especially bad...2CV (DeuxChevaux) or somthing like that.

When i was learning how to drive, had these choices...

http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/article/0,28804,1658545_1657867_1657681,00.html

http://www.theautocollections.com/index.cfm?key=3605&action=details&tab=inventory&cartable

The Renault was a pos. Went on a date and the engine caught on fire at a stop light.

The pontiac was cool but a truck to drive. Failed my first drivers test when i knocked over the stick while trying to park (no power steering).
The Time's list is bogus after not mentioning the Chevy Vega. I had a '72 GT in college. After 10,000 miles, the car would use a quart of oil before the next gas fill-up ( 200 mi range).:help:

[fishbolish]

this is a lecar......a pissed off one at that..lol!
It was fun.fast & sometimes downright scary(coming on boost in the rain)
owned it for 3 years........also had the opportunity to drive other group b cars(lancia delta integrale & peugeot 205 16v turbo)

[benitosan1972]

^fully flared!!!

Loved the 205 gti

[JLP]

I had a French teacher who would come unglued when someone called that a Le Car. She insisted it was a Renault 3. We would then mention that we with the school were air conditionne.

You had to be there.

[fishbolish]

the R5Turbo 2 came that way from the factory ,mid engined ( although the motor in mine was built for 20lbs of boost)

[eddief]

http://www.conceptcarz.com/view/photo/550508,10540/1980-Lancia-Beta.aspx

http://www.conceptcarz.com/view/photo/550487,10540/1975-Lancia-Beta_Photo.aspx#photo

[Bruce K]

I actually RACED a Le Car at Lime Rock Park, CT in a Little Le Mans endurance race.

It wasn't mine.

It was quite an adventure. Especially when the left front wheel left me going flat out through the West Bend corner.:help::eek:

Those 3 lug nut wheels were mighty sketchy.

BK

[BumbleBeeDave]

. . .riding with me was the most dangerous thing you'd ever done! ;)

BBD

I actually RACED a Le Car at Lime Rock Park, CT in a Little Le Mans endurance race.

It wasn't mine.

It was quite an adventure. Especially when the left front wheel left me going flat out through the West Bend corner.:help::eek:

Those 3 lug nut wheels were mighty sketchy.

BK

[572cv]

. . .or should i say "Weird beyond belief!" . . .

BBD

Hmm. Am I the only forumite with a Citroen? Perhaps. If so, a bit of a defense of the marque is in order. Putting them in the same group as the OP list is not defensible. Citroens of the era are genuine marvels of cutting edge engineering, whose features were widely copied. They focused on safety, ride, handling, and economy of operation and repair.
The approach to achieving these things was sufficiently different that it required a learning curve, particularly for mechanics. In this country, not many bothered to do this, and so, key maintenance intervals were overlooked, which translated into poor reputation, albeit somewhat undeserved. What did Citroen (founder's name, not a citron ) bring to the table first in a production car?
- Radial Tires
-Seat Belts
- Side impact protection bars ( that's why the DS bulbs out at the sides)
- crumple impact zones
- steering wheel had one arm so it could tilt and give in crash
- all cars were front wheel drive, inboard brakes to pull in rotational mass
- disc brakes in the 1950's
- first gas shocks- yes, that is what the hydraulic suspension was. The hydraulic oil pushed against a diaphram in a sphere at each shock tower, the other side of which was charged with nitrogen.
- eye level rear lights, indicating turns
- front wheel track wider than rear, for better tracking, handling
and much more.
- first designed in a wind tunnel for aero resistance

My car is the bottom of the line car. It was developed so not-affluent people could, after WW2, have a car they could afford to own and repair. It gets 60 miles to the gallon. It is aircooled, front wheel drive. the list of simplifications to make it easier to use and repair is a long article, not a post, but suffice it to say that its reliability is part of what made it the most widely sold car in the world at the peak of its run, though its lack of power did not help sell it here, where power was the thing.

Anyway, my rant is over. I urge anyone interested in automotive engineering to take a more serious look at these cars. It is quite a story.

[velotel]

Anyway, my rant is over. I urge anyone interested in automotive engineering to take a more serious look at these cars. It is quite a story.
Very true, great cars. There was one version built with a Maserati engine. Quite a few experts in the world of car design consider the DS the single greatest automotive advance in the history of the car. Super comfy, in fact beyond just comfortable. Lots of them still running around here in France. Always good to see a club of them motoring along. I love their looks.

[572cv]

Very true, great cars. There was one version built with a Maserati engine. Quite a few experts in the world of car design consider the DS the single greatest automotive advance in the history of the car. Super comfy, in fact beyond just comfortable. Lots of them still running around here in France. Always good to see a club of them motoring along. I love their looks.

The one with the Maserati engine was the SM. It would turn 170 mph off the showroom floor.

The DS suspension was beyond supple. When I had one, a favorite trick was to approach a speed bump with someone on your tail at a nice steady 45 or 50 mph. The car would go over the speed bump without the body moving at all. Then you watched your rear view mirror to see the guy in the Chevy behind you hit the ceiling with his head.....
And you could adjust the suspension for stiffness and ground clearance, with a lever by the driver's left leg. I was stuck in traffic approaching the George Washington Bridge in NJ, so I just raised up , climbed over the curb and down onto a parallel road w/o the issue. The guy next to me in the Corvette was fuming.
In France, the DS is pronounced by some in such a way as to evoke the pronunciation of the word for "goddess". There's something to that.

[zap]

The one with the Maserati engine was the SM. It would turn 170 mph off the showroom floor.



The SM with a small V6 Maserati engine was rated at an optimistic 180 hp..........still, the SM was an interesting vehicle.

Anyhow, I had the pleasure of being driven around in a socialists wet dream......the Trabant.

[Brian Smith]

And you could adjust the suspension for stiffness and ground clearance, with a lever by the driver's left leg. I was stuck in traffic approaching the George Washington Bridge in NJ, so I just raised up , climbed over the curb and down onto a parallel road w/o the issue. The guy next to me in the Corvette was fuming.
In France, the DS is pronounced by some in such a way as to evoke the pronunciation of the word for "goddess". There's something to that.

Great stuff!
Are you coming to town (http://www.driveshesaid.com/Drive_She_Said!/Home.html) this year?

[gdw]

Citreon? No thanks. I was riding in one of their marvels on the autobahn between West Berlin and West Germany during the dark days of communism when one of the rear wheels collapsed, the axle snapped. Not fun.

[Bob Ross]

Citreon? No thanks. I was riding in one of their marvels on the autobahn between West Berlin and West Germany during the dark days of communism when one of the rear wheels collapsed, the axle snapped. Not fun.

One of my friends in high school was the son of a Citroen dealer. At 17 years old he got to bring a different car home from dad's showroom every weekend! We would smoke a lot of weed and then see if the SM could really do 170mph (somewhere around 130 we chickened out), or try to see if we could "confuse" the suspension by rapidly going back & forth from extreme up to extreme down...

But the weirdest Citroen he ever brought home was their Méhari, ostensibly an off-road vehicle like a Jeep but in execution perhaps more like a Volkswagen Thing. He jumped so many curbs with that thing that the plastic body cracked completely in half on the way home from band practice one day.

[bart998]

I had a '74 Pinto wagon that I loaded my buddies in and drove to races. I was a great car until someone stole it in '81. Friend had a Le Car that we took to races after that.

[572cv]

I commented earlier on the thoughtful and deep engineering concepts of Citroen. Some have conceived that this requires a totally different process of gestation:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=BiuHxf565kw

:)