Indeed.
Beauty is, as they say, in the eye of the beholder - but to me that's about as tasteful as the current Chrysler 300.......
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oh come on guys - weren't you ever wee boys once? In profile, doesn't that look so much like the Batmobile????? Trouble is I don't look that good in tights - not that I wear them of course - much....
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Just shows how bonkers old car prices are in the USA at the moment - even more wildly optimistic than in the UK.
I guess if you're patient you'll be able to get it for half that price this time next year...
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Fabulous car. The seller seems to have a few others of similar quality for sale as well - the 2-door Impala rather caught my eye & when the $/£ conversion is done, looks almost reasonable.
I know current American cars aren't famed for their interior quality or style, but the examples shown look like they have solid chrome/steel/leather/bakelite interiors & switchgear - knocks the current 'gold standard' slush-formed Audi plastics into a peaked cap, imho.
Apart from the obvious lack of rust-proofing technologies in any cars of that era, I imagine the simple mechanics & lack of electronics make these cars practical long term propositions. Used in their natural environment of wide easy boulevards, predictable summers & cheap petrol, they look eminently fit-for-purpose - and great fun!
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Fabulous! they should be preserved as works of art.
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< Ex RF, Ex TVM >
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That is gorgeous, and so wonderfully evocative of its place and time of origin. My one misgiving (without which, naturally, I'd be reaching for the Buy It Now button) is that black seems the wrong colour for something whose natural habitat is hot, sunny boulevards. I'll wait for one to come along in cream, red or powder blue, I think - and then relocate to San Diego.
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It isn't gorgeous at all. By contrast, Chryslers from two or three years earlier were very handsome indeed.
The body style in the picture was also found on some Dodge models of the same period. It was one of the most uncoordinated bodies made in a period of very uncoordinated styling. AE may find some sort of louche charm in its startlingly inharmonious aggregation of curves, and perhaps he is right. But it's very, very ugly, although not quite as ugly as the huge black Dodge that belonged to a poet I met in Virginia.
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Got the Grumpy Trousers back from the cleaners, Lud? };---)
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Why do you think I'm grumpy, Wildebeeste? Just exchanging a few aesthetic insights in a relaxed sort of way, I thought.
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Only teasing, Lud. Can you link to any pictures of the older Chryslers you prefer?
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Sorry. I'm not much good at this electronic stuff and don't know where to find pix. But I will do a bit of languid Googling through the late fifties and see what I can find.
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Looking forward to it.
Incidentally, this thread has reminded me that I had a dream last night that featured a pale grey Renault 16. Can't remember if there was a black polo-neck too.
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Lud it is not ugly. The simple truth is you have no appreciation of form.
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< Ex RF, Ex TVM >
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The only picture I have found so far is of a model of a 1955 Chrysler Imperial convertible. That has the body style I referred to as handsome. I'm sorry but I can't give the link to it.
While I admit that the original eBay picture has a sort of innocently perverse charm, I can't agree that it has anything resembling elegance or harmony. The simple truth is AE that you can't tell the difference. But honest enthusiasm is your saving grace.
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While I admit that the original eBay picture has a sort of innocently perverse charm, I can't agree that it has anything resembling elegance or harmony.
No, not the grumpy trousers on, but maybe the Brian Sewell ones - mind you, Brian's a great fan of 1986-90 Merc SEC's (he's got one a 500SEC I believe)
But I think even BS would concede that the utterly unselfconcious, camp & almost naive American auto design of the 50's & early 60's can't be contained in or judged by terms like 'elegance' & 'harmony' , but by a simple 'more is more' understanding & aesthetic.
Or by the more direct, 'Cor, look at that!'
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Can't agree woodbines. Some of the designs from that period do have harmony, elegance and restraint, others are as you and I describe them, yet others are half-way between the two.
Any body-style retained for two or three years tended to grow more baroque as more chrome, the odd fin and so on was added to make it look like a new model each year. More often than not, face-lifts don't work on cars. The same is true today.
Don't get me wrong. I like proper American cars and don't expect or particularly want them to be elegant and harmonious looking. Most of today's efforts are pretty miserable by comparison to the products of 1940-1970. After that Mickey Mouse started to take over in Detroit, and canny Americans started buying more and more imports.
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In profile doesn't that look so much like the Batmobile?????
Yes it does! I was wondering why nobody else spotted that
Trouble is I don't look that good in tights - not that I wear them of course - much....
Hey, just turn up in the Batmobile and I'll forgive you for omitting your tights
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why not go to Cuba and buy one for peanuts - give it a good paint job and save yourself $120,000
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Because in Cuba it will have acquired a diesel engine from an old Bedford truck and a random selection of suspension and brake parts.
Very few cars are worth £60,000 really. This one certainly isn't, except to an American collector obviously. It may be in more or less perfect nick but wouldn't you get a bit tired of lurching about in it and pressing those huge great transmission buttons?
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60k ? Get a proper car for that, including an M5 and then some. I know what I'd do !
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I have looked at the whole picture sequence, and I have to admit that I was misled by the single small picture I had looked at originally. The Dodge bodyshell to which I referred above has completely different side mouldings and wing treatment. I was misled by the basking-shark wide-open mouth which is similar in the Dodge. This car is a much more conventional upmarket US barge, and quite handsome in its way (but not as elegant and harmonious as the mid fifties Imperial all the same).
But £60k? What about a nice Lotus Carlton for half the price?
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"quite handsome in its way"
Indeed. The Yanks might not have any taste, but they do have style.
They also know how to restore cars - that looks very nice. Love the dash, and electric windows in 1961 is quite impressive...
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If I was going for something American it'd have to be a muscle car from late 60s, early 70s.
How about this 1970 Chevy Chevelle SS 454 Triple Black - tinyurl.com/24nzfw
Or this 1970 Plymouth Barracuda - tinyurl.com/293wrl
And, yes, my American muscle car would definetly have to be black ;-)
Chris
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Late '60's is my preferred era too Chris.
I've been a bit ignorant of Chevelles, but I saw one on the road last year for the first time and it looked great in the metal.
I wonder how much that 'cuda will sell for, they fetch crazy prices nowadays dont they.
I love lots of stuff but my no.1 preference would be a ?69 Camaro, SS, RS, or Z/28. This one conveniently has a modern Corvette engine in it:
snipurl.com/1qpvf .
But I wouldnt want a red interior and I would have to have more subtle wheels - 16? Torq-Thrusts with primer grey spokes..
:o)
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Mid-to-late sixties Oldsmobile 98. Very plain ordinary looking car in the mid-sixties style, but with real muscle.
There was one in the street I stayed in in Greenwich Village in the seventies, an unmarked example with the single modification of fat alloy wheels (then rare in the US). The academics who owned the flat told me that no one would try to rob and mug me as it was a 'mafia area'. I like to think the Oldsmobile belonged to a hood (it certainly wasn't an intellectual's motor).
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