Muscle Cars to Malaise Era - Part 10
The transition years, 1969-1974
It’s time for the first front-wheel-drive entrant in this Muscle Cars to Malaise Era series. As you can probably guess, we won’t be talking about Toyotas.
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Muscle Cars to Malaise Era - Part 9
The transition years, 1969-1974
After putting so many American cars through the transition trial, I think it’s time to examine that British sports car icon, the Jaguar E-Type. Yes, the symptoms of Malaise were not limited to our native brands, nor to muscle cars and personal luxury cars. While European and Japanese automakers found their stride in the 70s building sales on the newfound demand for lighter, fuel-efficient autos, all car companies were subject to the same economic, social, and environmental challenges.
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Muscle Cars to Malaise Era - Part 8
The transition years, 1969-1974
In the eighth installment of this series, I’m headed back MOPAR country where I began with an analysis of the Dodge Charger. Today, I’m looking at the Plymouth Satellite, with a focus on the GTX and Road Runner muscle models. Read on to find out which generation I have dubbed “the transition years” and why.
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Muscle Cars to Malaise Era - Part 7
The transition years, 1969-1974
As one of the longest running nameplates in automotive history, the Chevy Camaro had its highs and lows. Today, I am looking at the early Seventies transition era.
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Muscle Cars to Malaise Era - Part 6
The transition years, 1969-1974
In this multi-part series, I have loosely defined the transition era as 1969-1974. While not all the models will slot precisely into that six-year timeframe, it provides structure for the discussion. Another convention – I limited my design analysis to the two-door models in the lineup, ignoring any convertible, sedan or wagon stable mates. The specialty hardtops had the most interesting styling as the designers were given a bit more freedom to stretch, with swoopy fastbacks and trick rear window shapes that were not possible on the workaday models.
The Ford Mustang and Mercury Cougar were adorned with some of the swoopiest shapes, but morphed into very different cars in this period.
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Muscle Cars to Malaise Era - Part 5
The transition years, 1969-1974
Over the past four days, I’ve been looking at the cars that moved us from the Smokin’ Sixties to the Somnambulant Seventies. These are the transition cars, the ones whose styling got a bit convoluted compared with the simple purity of the “peak” generation before it. They didn’t all have opera windows and vinyl roofs but such frippery became more frequent, under the guise of “broadening market appeal”. Transition cars warmed us up for the Malaise Era, and reflected (or perhaps reacted to) the massive cultural changes that our country was experiencing.
See how the Ford Torino and its twin the Mercury Montego transitioned with those changes.
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