Some of the junkyards I’ve been to have a small area in front where occasionally they sell some of the cars. The establishment where I found this thing at had one of the larger for sale areas but one of the worst selections. The same went for the yard itself, it was mostly junk which shouldn’t be a surprise, but…tucked in the weeds between the lot and yard like a diamond in the rough was this little gold nugget.
At first I thought it was a CitiCar, then I realized it was actually a Comuta-Car, which is the renamed version. The CitiCar was produced by Sebring-Vanguard between 1974 and 1977, after which the company was sold to Commuter Vehicles, Inc., who took over the tooling and with some changes including the name revived production.
It’s a little hard to make out, but the bumpers were extended significantly as compared to the original in order to move the batteries from under the seats to within the bumper assemblies and rework the frame to meet safety standards that were changed since the original vehicle was produced. The design holds eight 6V batteries. While apparently the structure did comply with all applicable safety standards in effect at time of production I’m not sure that I’d want eight acid-filled batteries popping if this was crushed between two cars although there is an aluminum cage-like assembly under the plastic skin.
The motor was a 6hp GE unit and this vehicle would run at up to 40mph for up to 40 miles of range. It is a little unclear if it could actually do 40mph for 40 miles though (I doubt it). The wire hubcaps are a nice touch and serve to class the thing up, Tesla tries to do something similar with their “Aero” wheel covers I think but they aren’t gold and thus look worse than no covers at all.
It’s no Tesla inside either but our readers at CC seem to prefer knobs and buttons so we are all set in that regard, there seem to be a fair number of them and at least there’s no touch screen to go bad. I’m sure all this stuff works just fine once you hook the battery charger up to it or maybe insert a couple of AA’s somewhere. That instrument panel has a wood finish under the dust all the way across the cabin. Hey, just like a Tesla Model 3! And the vents are hidden here as well, or at least I can’t see where they are.
Speaking of batteries, this one was under the seat, so I’m not entirely sure what’s going on here, they are supposed to be housed outboard as I mentioned above. That’s perhaps the charging unit to the right of it.
At least there’s a wiper, and the windows are glass sliders. It also apparently had a heater but no A/C. Here in Denver you can do without the A/C if you have to but no heat would be a problem, although in the winter you’d better have a very short commute, perhaps you wouldn’t have time to get cold anyway. (Side note: I had a hard time focusing with that sweet little Honda in the background, but it was in a fenced enclosure so I couldn’t get closer.)
Production finally ended once and for all in 1982 with over 2100 Comuta-Cars and some Comuta-Vans(!) produced. This is in addition to the 2300 or so CitiCars. Every now and again one pops up at a show or on ebay or the like. This one below may actually be for sale too but wasn’t explicitly marked as such. How much? Who knows but you know what they say: “If you gotta ask….”
Note: a rerun of an older post.
Related Reading:
The Cohort has provided a Comuta-Car in fine form
Tesla Model S Commuter Car Rental Review
Nice! What’s with the white three wheeler in the background?
That’s a Zap Xebra made when you could still legitimately laugh at Chinese made cars (less than 20 years ago). We’ve covered them a couple of times here. That one was for sale, I doubt it sold, and have seen several others since this post first ran. The Denver area has seemingly been a hotbed of EV early adopters for a long time now.
It looks to be an early fiberglass model, the final year was infamously subject to a recall-buyback because it was given a new steel body with hatchback but the brakes were not upgraded to handle the extra weight.
Honda Z600 in the background of the seventh photo.
And some people think the “new for 73” 5 mph Bumpers were overkill….
Gosh, it’s just a little bit tempting isn’t it. Due to the nature of the construction and technology, it wouldn’t really take that much to re-commission to rough-but-working status, probably with a major upgrade in battery chemistry/management. And at that point it would be a real head-turner for the quick little pop to the shops.
I hope someone picked it up. They’re not going to make any more of these (!), so it would be good to save as many as possible.
Nice – that gets my vote for “Find of the Year” award.
I read the backstory on these in a mag years ago – it’s quite entertaining.
Poor, sad, toad-faced creature. I feel pity.
I know a guy who loves his electrics and has one of these plus several other electrics from the 1970’s .
-Nate
My Dad’s co-worker and neighbor bought a Citi-car probably in 1974; my father actually kind of upsized a little, buying a Datsun with an automatic to replace his Renault R10 with a standard so my Mother might drive it some rather than the ’73 Country sedan with the 400 she normally drove.
Not sure what happened to the Citi-car; we moved to Vermont for the 2nd time in ’75 and they moved down to Boca Raton. I followed my Dad when he moved to central Texas (still here) in ’82, and got a job at the same company…I had many business trips to Boca Raton and stopped in on one of them to see him (probably right before he retired)…he made a big fuss and called his wife to tell her who he had in his office.
His didn’t have the huge bumpers, that might have come later, but makes you wonder about priorities…yeah maybe your body wouldn’t get scratched up but I’d worry more about myself being injured, those Citi-cars were indeed tiny…don’t know how they compare to a Smart car but think the Smart is even a bit larger than the Citi-car.
Hey does anybody happen to know which junkyard this was at and if it might still be there? I’m planning to purchase one of these soon and desperately need parts, any info helps thank you!
It was at Colorado Auto and Parts in Englewood, CO. No idea if it’s still there but it wasn’t in the general population, it was sort of out in front / on the side with various other kind of more interesting stuff that looked vaguely like a collection of some sort… good luck and if you get one of these running again, please send us a note and write a post about it! Note that this post was a rerun, the original and pictures date from around 2021 or so if I recall correctly…but the yard doesn’t look like it has changed much since oh, the 1980s…