Is there an inverse relationship to men’s belt lines and car’s belt lines?
CC Outtake: Belt Lines – An Ever-Changing Fashion
– Posted on July 5, 2012
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Curbside Classics Archives
Is there an inverse relationship to men’s belt lines and car’s belt lines?
An even more interesting juxtaposition:
Yeah. The real car vs. the hacked joke.
yeah, the ‘new’ camaro is a bad joke
Yeah, the new Camaro is a horrible joke, it’ll smoke any old Camaro you can name, and it’s safer, handles better, is more comfortable, and more reliable. And I’m not really a fan of it either.
Concur!
Interestingly, the overall height of the new Camaro doesn’t look to be too much higher than that vintage original.
That said, just about everything else about it is cartoonishly over-sized, along with the beltline and the wheels, which makes the car seem grossly out of proportion.
I like it when even a midsized car still shows a bit of modesty in its size/design.
Exactly the reason I can’t own a Camaro – even in a convertible version. I can’t safely drive anything I can’t see out of without difficulty due to my left eye being legally blind.
These rising belt lines and resulting gun-slit windows are disturbing. That means I must choose a car for its “see-out-of” ability rather than personal preference or style. That ticks me off.
I really detest the Camaro for its gargantuan size. However, it sells like hotcakes so I must be in the minority. I would take a Mustang any day.
I am starting to believe those who say that back windows will soon just be horizontal skylights.
II think if anyone still hates the 71-73 Mustang fastbacks, they’re hypocrites if they like these Camaro’s. Personally I think they look ok but the size is just overwhelming. My “big” Cougar gets dwarfed in nearly every dimension.
Regarding high beltlines, am I the only one who misses the days where you could comfortably rest your left arm(or right for left hand drivers) on the door or out the window? The Camaro eccentuates it since the huge tumblehome just invites me to do it since the window so close, but then I hit my funnybone on the door panel when I make the move lol.
Along with those other “totally uncool” things like a column shifter, bench seat, FR and NA V8, I really insist on a beltline low enough to hang your arm out of.
Besides, it’s summer now and I don’t want to run the A/C when I’m driving in town.
The Camaro is H.L. Mencken brought to life (“No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have searched the records for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.”). That’s not a design, that’s what a bored 5th grader sitting in the back of class while the teacher is droning on will come up with. A caricature of a design.
And don’t get me started on the size or the weight.
i think this rant also applies to the Mustang.
Yes, although the ’05 on Mustang wasn’t as bad. Now it’s getting more and more away from the Mustang, but that’s to be expected – you can’t just keep turning out new versions of the ’65 Shelby GT 350 ad infinitum.
Of the three, the Dodge Challenger has them all on looks. Now, if it was only 3/4-7/8ths size.
Back in the late 60’s/early 70’s, silk screened caricatures of muscle cars made their way onto Tee shirts. The cars were bloated, with oversized tires and usually accompanied a large big block mill sticking out of the car, usually featuring a blower and headers exiting the engine bay. The driver was a caricature too, featuring blood shot eyes and a drool covered mouth grinning in horsepower ecstacy. When this Camaro made the show circuit, the first thing that came to my mind were those old Tee shirts of my youth. This modern day interpretation just hints at the greatness of those original designs and more reflect what the automobile of today has become: overweight and overdesigned. I’m glad it is stil around, but with this new one, there is no purity of design in any one line on this car…..
You mean like the SR-71 caricature I painted for a now-deceased buddy when I was in the air force ‘way back in 1971?
Very nice, Zackman! Yes, your drawing captures the spirit of those Muscle Car Tees. A fitting tribute to your friend and that special jet!
I disagree I really like the new Camaro, is it perfect, no. But its a really good looking car, and the people have voted with their wallets since it has constantly outsold the Mustang pretty much since day one. Even the low spec LS version shown in the picture is a 323hp, technology loaded, cool looking car, people who complain about the high belt lines are the same old farts who probably complained about the loss of sidemounted spare tires and hood ornaments. Yes the Camaro is kinda big and heavy, but it still represents something very cool, its a dream car that you can buy, which is better than a beige Prius. I would buy one, but I like having no car payments.
> people who complain about the high belt lines are the same old farts who probably complained about the loss of sidemounted spare tires and hood ornaments.
I thought old farts were the target demographic for the new Camaro (and the Challenger too). 🙂
‘out sold’ only means there are many people who will buy what ever is called Camaro.. as it has been canceled since what 2002(3?) There was pent up Guido Demand…. lol (PLEASE DON’T ANYONE TAKE OFFENSE)
As the Pontiac G8 this was a lovely car, as a Camaro its far too big and heavy.
Camaro out weighs Mustang by 400-600 pounds that’s like having eight to 12 (8-12) 50 lbs bags of cement in your car. That’s a lot of weight!
Don’t think ‘ponycar’ think ‘Elephantcar’…
Pent up “guido” demand doesn’t last 4 years sweetie…….
No, this unfortunate car’s problem is that its manufacturers ‘needed’ a sales success. This wasn’t a ‘clean sheet’ redesign of Camaro, It’s a ‘Camaro Suit’ grafted over a Holden Commodore VE (an Australian four door family sedan, think Pontiac G8).
The result is a totally too friggen big and heavy “sportscar”. Yeah, the ‘SS’ is fast – any car with a 6.2 ltr V8 would be, eh? It really needs to be 2/3s its current size. But GM was in a big hurry.
This “Camaro” is as big as a bloody family sedan, because that is what it really is, a big bloody family sedan!
It’s okay though, most men don’t care about their weight or their cars weight.
photo – 2010 HOLDEN COMMODORE SS V REDLINE VE Series II
GM was in a hurry? Seems like they were showing off pre-production versions of the Camaro for years before the car hit the market.
I believe that the wheelbase was shortened on the Camaro, but yeah, they were in a hurry, they showed the concept and had a complete production car ready withing 2 and half years or so, which considering they had to design everything for the car from with the exception of mostly the chassis, approve it, crash test it, meet all the crazy government regulations for how may lumens the reverse lights put out, engineer the stamping and production sequences for the car, build mules and test them, come up with a marketing program and bring the whole thing to reality while GM was in the midst of its bankruptcy, I’d say they did a pretty good job, or does anyone here think they could do better?
Point well taken Carmine. I definitely recall that there were a lot of cries of “Stop showing us teaser photos and get these things into showrooms already!!!” by the time it came out. GM was trying really hard to keep the car in the news until it was ready to sell. Automakers don’t usually display cars that they plan to actually produce until they are close to production, so it seemed like a long time.
they’ve been throwing the ‘Camaro Suit’ on many concept cars over the years. Sheet metal is easy to modify compared to a complete chassis… Commodore was the easiest to modify to Camaro especially after the Pontiac G8.
The fact that it’s really a 2door skin on a Holden Commodore is possibly why I actually kinda like the Neue Camaro… though given the choice I’d probably choose the Holden.
Also I’d say this is less a case of being “in a hurry”, and more a case of platform sharing as an afterthought. If the VE Commodore and Camaro programs were better co-ordinated/had a bigger budget there’d possibly have been more scope for making the Neue Camaro small (as I gather it should be) while still sharing platform & drive train with its Aussie progenitor.
We get both the Holden and the Camaro theres nearly 50k price difference though, despite that I prefer the Holden but can afford neither
Aside from all the Camaro hating, I think there’s a larger point being made here.
What happened over the 25 years between this ’87 Civic Wagon, a trim toaster sold to middle-aged suburbanites, and today’s Kia Soul, a very similar car objectively, but now aimed at baggy-pants hoodie hamsters.
You”re definitely onto something here, Paul.
Unfortunately mike, the two photos look to be of different focal lengths, the Kia a bit closer in than the Civic.
A quick look st the specs revealed they arent’ all that different in size or weight.
Kia Soul:
100.4″ wheelbase
162″ length
63.4″ height
70.3″ width and a curb weight of 2945#
The ’87 Civic wagon
157.1″ length
63.9″ width
58.3″ height
2083# curb weight
and has a 96.5″ wheelbase
The overall length is 4.9″ difference, with the Soul being longer
width is 6.4″ difference, with the Soul wider
the height is 5.1″ taller for the Soul
The Soul has 3.9″ longer wheelbase
And it’s also quite a bit heavier too.
The big difference between the two is that they are both still small, just that I think the shape of the Soul makes it appear bulkier than it actually is though when you look at the #’s, the Soul is obviously larger than the Civic wagon of the day.
Of course, the point is they are so similar, except for the belt lines!. All glass in ’87 changed to windows the size of gunslits today.
High belt lines, thick pillars, it’s the gangsta look. Camaro, Soul, Chrysler 300 started it.
I don’t think I want either a Camaro or a Mustang. I don’t know about the beltline of the cars but I lost my beltline years ago. It’s sort of like tying a string around a balloon anymore. Suspenders are the answer.
Oh, and MikePDX, make that a Nissan Cube instead of a Soul. They found a market of one with this baggy pants (bib overall) wearing old guy. I absolutely love it as our primary car. As a secondary car if it won’t carry a round bale of hay I have no use for it.
Eeewww!!! (TMI!) Your “string around a balloon” comment immediately made me think of this:
That’s pretty ugly Ed. I think I resemble that remark.
For sure, these cubical Cube / xB / Element / Soul cars are super functional. Just noticing the belt line coming up as Paul points out, not only on Camaro but on Soul, 2G xB, etc.
PS: Just browsing through xB’s family tree, Wikipedia says this about the Toyota bB, a JDM relative of our Scion xB: “The vehicle was designed as “A Car-shaped Music Player” to satisfy the preferences of the younger generation.”
I holidayed in Vegas a few weeks ago and was saddled with a base Camaro (in pussy magnet yellow, mind you!) as they had run out of Mustangs. As someone used to smaller Japanese (and Australian) cars…well, it was certainly different. Didn’t seem to have enough power to get out of its own way but made a lot of noise while trying to do do something. But my biggest complaint (as someone mentioned above) was the lack of anywhere comfortable to rest my elbow! It did look better in the flesh than I thought it would, though.
Umm, is your regular ride a Veyron or something? How can 300hp not get out of its own way?
It may have 300hp (…really? It certainly didn’t seem like it!) but with the weight of it, it was slow to respond to any acceleration requests. Obviously the auto box sapped some power and response, but honestly my partners Mazda Protege felt more responsive. Lots of noise, no response. Was fine as a cruiser though.
For the record my regular ride is a FWD Mazda 323 with 250hp atw….or a 62 Beetle with about a tenth of that!
I thought it was that the new Camaro was designed as effectively a caricature of the 69 Camaro, but the difference is they retained the exact proportions of the concept through to production whereas normally the roof line would be raised a bit, perhaps belt line dropped slightly together with the normal smaller wheels, bigger mirrors & bumpers.
I remember reading that there was a lot of headache involved in conforming to that original concept shape, much like what they had with the new Ford GT.
it was ‘sized’ to fit on its chassis….
Like the 1971 Buick Riviera. Originally Bill Mitchell design for the ’71 Riv (called Silver Arrow pictured with the ’63 Riv which looks gigantic in comparison) for the 1969 Pontiac Grand Prix’s slightly stretched version of the intermediate GM A platform. GM forced it to be sized up to share the ‘E’ platform and the production car suffered as a result…
The ‘new’ Camaro isn’t an ugly car, its ungainly and over-weight like the 71 Riv.
Note Bill Mitchell used the Silver Arrow as a daily driver according to the Motor Trend article the car was featured in…
Hate to break it to you, but the Boat Tail Silver Arrow is just a modified regular Riviera, with a bigger rear window and a chopped to, the other Riviera in the picture, is the original Silver Arrow concept, based on the first 63 Riviera, the reason that the 71 Riviera used the full size platform is because Buick management demanded that the car share the same cowl and glass as the LeSabre B-body cars. They didn’t want to tool up to make the Riviera on the new Grand Prix-Monte Carlo G-body.
I guess now is a good time to share a pic I snapped last week while in Ypsilanti…
Here it is…
Make sure it’s a jpg file, Richard.
About the belt line change though…not conducive to driving with the elbow perched, one of the simple pleasures of driving.
Something I like about my Minx my elbow out the window fits perfect
They’re chillin’ with the AC. Behind tinted glass.
Cupping the sideview mirror in my hand just adds to the bliss of arm-on-the-ledge driving.
Rising beltlines look cool, but I miss great all-round vision. I luuuuuurve the new Jag XJ more than any other new car out there, except I sat in one recently, and the visibility was poor. Mind you my all-time fav Jag 420G is a tad hard for 5’8 me to see out of too (not that I can afford a 420G though, I just sat in one once).
Modern cars’ high beltlines are a key reason why I stick with my ’97 Nissan Laurel. Low belt line means easy (and comfy) to drive with an elbow on the sill (or hanging down outside the door). Best car I’ve ever been in for all round visibility is any XD/XE/XF Ford Falcon/Fairmont/Fairlane/LTD. Huge windows, superb visibility:
The beltline of the side windows being lower than the hood/trunk line on these cars was a huge issue the designers fought for, head office wanted one continuous line rather than the step down. It is hard to imagine how they might have turned out.
My uni lecturer worked on the design of the XD. He showed some of the design sketches. The continuous cowl/beltline just looked very old fashioned.
I know I’m late to this post (catching up on some web reading), but the high beltline is my biggest complaint with modern car styling. I understand why it is popular, but I don’t have to like it.
Just something I whipped up in PowerPoint…
I remember when Hondas had the lowest cowl height in the business, thanks to double wishbone front ends, when the rest of the industry was using McPherson struts. I also remember reading that drivers felt exposed and vulnerable, so Honda started raising the cowl.
Today’s supplemental restraint technology has evolved to the point where we can relax those beltlines a little, so I don’t have to crack my driver’s door when backing into a space, like I’m docking the frekin’ RMS Olympic or something (!)