(first posted 7/2/2015) My two-door sedan jag continues unabated. It’s now motivated me to go back through all of my own photo files to seek out every two door sedan I’ve ever shot curbside. Here’s one of my favorites; it sums up everything why these Ramblers were so loathed by kids like me at the time: They were so freaking ugly!!
As I look at this rear end shot, one I hardly ever take of cars, I almost can’t believe this is really…an American car from 1962, a place where Gran Prix and Lincoln Continentals roamed. It’s just so oddly shaped and poorly proportioned; it looks like something cobbled up in East Germany for the really big wigs or such. Der Dorkburg Grosser Kommodant.
Poor Ed Anderson (AMC’s Head of Design); he had to somehow keep this ancient body shell, which dates back to 1955, looking vaguely modern. And 1962 was the end of the road for it, thankfully; in 1963, a totally new (except for all-to many suspension and drive train components) Classic arrived, which allowed us all to enjoy a collective sigh of relief. That left just Studebaker stumbling along trying to perpetually dress up an antique body shell.
Never mind the styling; the really odd thing about this car is that AMC decided to spend the money to create a two door on this body shell after seven years, and then only for one year (1962), as this venerable structure would finally be replaced by the (mostly) all-new 1963 Classic and Ambassador. A total of 27k of these two doors were ever built. Was it worth it??
Yes, there’s a six under the hood, AMC’s ohv conversion of their flathead six dating back to the pre-war years. And in this case hooked up to a Flash-O-Matic automatic (Borg Warner). Now that made for a truly exhilarating combo.
I can just hear its wheezy nasal exhaust as the 196 cubic inch six leans against the torque converter, which tended to convert seemingly too much of the engine’s torque into…nothing. Alchemy.
Woe be to you if you had to ride in the back seat of one of these to school…not…cool.
Today…infinitely cool.
My dad had a 63 two door classic, maroon. Even looking at pictures today I think it is a good looking car. Handsome is the word.
I remember as a boy that when the neighbors came round to see the new car my dad demonstrated the fold back front seat which generated a whole bunch a snarky “nod nod wink wink know what I mean, know what I mean” I didn’t get it. So later I opened the passenger side door and tried the seat myself but still didn’t get it.
And you were how old at the time?
22 I was a slow learner
Hey, the ’63 was a stunner compared to the ’62, relatively speaking.
The true horror of the Fifties-and-not-quite-Sixties. An un-flashy car.
I always found them interesting, although I’m much more fascinated by the terminal horror of the ’61 Ambassador. Hey, somebody had to make a car for those who didn’t care about owning cars, and considered automobile ownership an unfortunate necessity.
As to the era comment, I think the Beatles were still a ‘garage band’ playing in Hamburg at the time, so it wasn’t really the Sixties despite the date. I know they occasionally played in a pub in Liverpool owned by one Terry O’Neil, a local big-time footballer (he now owns Penny Lane in Richmond).
Hey! That’s my Dad you’re talking about!
If they’d just redone the C-Pillar when they redid the cowl, they would have been in a much better place. Unlike Studebaker, they were rolling in profits at the time and probably could have afforded it. Yet they didn’t. Very odd,
Or maybe they weren’t rolling in profits, yet, when this redesign was locked in place sometime in ’58. That could be the case. I bet Pat Foster knows the answer.
Or maybe they weren’t rolling in profits, yet, when this redesign was locked in place sometime in ’58. That could be the case.
Rambler was buried in debt in 56. Romney met with the same bankers that Nance at Packard had a few weeks earlier. Romney didn’t get as much as he wanted, but it was enough to keep them going.
Secondly, I recall reading somewhere, maybe in Fortune, that Romney was heavily criticized for paying out profits in dividends, instead of reinvesting in the company.
So there were a lot of demands on Rambler’s cash flow, and the back window didn’t look that bad, compared to the tailfins.
Ugh. Everything from the rear doors back is a fail.
Reverse rake rear windows were in vogue elsewhere both Ford US and UK Rootes, Vauxhall all had that style untill around 63/4 Ford UK did the whole window no wrap around just reverse rake on their Classic Consul asnd 105E Angle box.
Ugly as sin, but #4 in sales. Beat everything but Chevy, Ford and Pontiac in ’62. Ed must have been doing something right despite himself.
Oh, I don’t know, it has a jaunty little reverse c-pillar with a wrap-around rear windscreen and those rear wheel wells have an artful arch that was no doubt intended to impart a sense of speed. That bolt upright windshield must have imparted fine visibility, something sorely lacking in many new cars today. It has a purposeful face, and is even blessed with dual quad headlights, thus signifying its owner as a member of the politburo elite. The rear is a tad dumpy, but hey, who looks at the back of a car anyway?
Ok, seriously, if I were a kid in 1962 and my dad came home proudly proclaiming this to be our new family sedan, I would have run away from home. I would have begged that family with a new Pontiac Grand Prix to take me in. I would have looked into the local child welfare laws. And my dad would have said, “You’re welcome to get a job of your own, and buy the car that you want.” And I would have grown up 5 years in 5 seconds and done just that.
Back then I thought it was really cool the way the “RAMBLER” letters were UNDER the grille. But then I was five at the time…..
It doesn’t really look styled as much as it looks cobbled together with different parts they had leftover from the 50s.
If my dad came home with this in 1962 I would have thought we won the lottery. We had 51 Studebaker in 62.
A bullet nosed Champion? Those are really cool, actually.
A bullet nosed Champion? Those are really cool, actually.
Been there, done that too.
That’s a great photo. Reminds me of old pictures my parents have from the 40s and 50s. Waves of pleasant nostalgia…
My maternal grandfather’s first car was a ’50 Champion, bought used in ’53. He was 30 years old before he ever owned a car–lifelong NYC resident to that point. But he was moving up in the world, two years later that Champion would carry his family to their new home in the suburbs, Fair Lawn, NJ.
Right after he bought it:
Our family car when I was a little kid. Somehow although it had a plastic bullet shaped thing where the clock was supposed to be, it had the deluxe steering wheel like this. The standard one was really Soviet.
Here’s the standard Champion steering wheel, although this one does have a clock instead of a plastic nose matching bullet shaped cover.
Studebaker invested in two different dashboards for cheaper and more deluxe models, spending a lot of money where no one else did for no apparent reason when there were a lot of other obvious needs.
When Nissan adopted the reverse C-pillar for one of their large SUVs, it reminded me of nothing more than the 1954 Plymouth. But then, we HAD a 1954 Plymouth.
Maybe that was why I thought those Nissans were so frumpy.
Poor Ed Anderson (AMC’s Head of Design); he had to somehow keep this ancient body shell, which dates back to 1955, looking vaguely modern.
Another worthy effort. Punches holes in Hudson’s argument that you can’t restyle a unibody car. This was the third body on the 56 platform. Only the roof carried over. imho, more attractive than anything with a Mopar badge on it that year. The rear in particular, with it’s vestigial tail fins also carries a family resemblance to the American of that year.
I can just hear its wheezy nasal exhaust as the 196 cubic inch six
Yup. I know that nasal sound of an OHV 196 well. Mom’s 64 Classic had that same engine, with a three on the tree. fwiw, the 170 flattie in Dad’s 60 Lark sounded about the same, those the wheeze was a little lower pitched.
Of course you can restyle a Unibody car Vauxhall and Opel had been doing so since 1939, Unibody wasnt new when Hudson thought of it, 1903 was when the first chassisless car went into production.
I think it was the way Hudson had structured their unibody that made modernizing difficult. From pictures I’ve seen, it’s sort of a halfway house between a spaceframe and a unibody, with beefy structural members throughout the body – massively strong to the point of being overbuilt – which was typical Hudson. From underneath you could be forgiven for thinking it had a separate chassis, there are so many rails going this way and that. A LOT of metal. Okay, this is a picture of a model, but this is how Hudson built them. Not your average unibody.
If they hadn’t persisted with the Jet, they would have been able to do something to the Stepdown, though it wouldn’t have been as easy as it was for Nash/Rambler, as there was so much unseen structural ‘black metal’ providing hard points for Hudson to work around. Going to a notchback (which they needed to do) would be a major tear-up of the rear of the body, and they’d still be stuck with that deeply-veed front screen which was pure thirties.
Cool as Stepdown Hudsons are to look at nowadays, they were way out of step styling-wise by 1952 at the very latest, and looked like a five-year-old car at at time when people wanted to be able to flaunt the fact that they had a new model. Twin-H-Power or not.
1962 childhood horror edition: Rambler or Studebaker? Even now, I’m not sure which I like least.
1962 childhood horror edition: Rambler or Studebaker?
Having lived with both a 60 Lark and a 64 Rambler, I would have to come down in favor of the Rambler. Remembering when both were new, I remember there were things about the Rambler that I thought were pretty neat. The neatest thing about the Rambler was the seat belts had spring loaded retractors that rolled them up into holsters beside the seat. The 64 Galaxie XL that replaced the Lark did not have retractors, the outboard end of the belts laying on the floor, or dangling out the door, which was a common sight at the time.
The 64 Rambler always seemed to me a much more modern car than this 62. A shame your parents didn’t go Rambler 2 years earlier so that you could give us a better personal comparison. 🙂
As much of a Stude homer as I am, there is something about the 62 Lark that has always been completely offputting to me. The “new” styling was just bad, the dash design was a low point, there is just nothing attractive to me about the 62, unless maybe it is a convertible, and even then, I would prefer a 60-61 or a 63-64. And not by a little.
’62 is definitely the low-water mark for the Lark. Everything aft of the rear wheel is just so awkward, and the dip in the character line just makes it look broken (an error Alfa Romeo repeated with the 75/Milano years later).
The Rambler is ugly, but in an endearing way. And the rear 3/4 view is actually not bad, if you ignore the taillights.
Steve, you obviously missed the “childhood” in JPC’s question. Do you think kids cared about seatbelt retractors in 1962? I don’t remember even being aware seatbelts existed in 1962; nobody I knew used them. And even if they had, I doubt that’s what kids would have cared about.
Do you think kids cared about seatbelt retractors in 1962?
When mom got that 64, I was a few months short of my 11th birthday, and I noticed. I remember being so impressed that I showed them off to my dad.
Mom’s 64 660 was as much of a penalty box as she could make it: no radio, no clock, weird instrument cluster, scratchy nylon upholstery that was so common then, weird compressed fiber stuff for the headliner…painted steel dash, three on the tree and a wheezy six were routine for the segment then. It didn’t have to be that downmarket, but it was still a serviceable car with some nice touches. Even the chrome plated metal seat belt buckle with the Rambler logo was nicer than it needed to be.
“…or dangling out the door, which was a common sight at the time.”
YES! And you could always tell who didn’t use their seat belts by all the road rash on the buckle. 🙂
64 with our brand new PB Velox, the seat belts hung neatly on the B pillar and stayed there from memory it was years later wearing them became compulsory around 71 I think.
The sign of an upmarket car, having somewhere to hang the belt. I remember installing hooks for that in my Cortina ten years later.
I wish I had the time to Google all the pix necessary for this comparo, but really?
The Rambler was the worst looking car of the 1962 compacts?
I know I will p!ss off all of my Mopar buddies by saying this, but in the context of what I know now, I would still rather be in a 1962 Falcon, Comet, Lark or Rambler compared to a 1962 Valiant… Or a Chevy II for that matter.
Its not like Valiant was the hot babe,,,,(vomiting!)
They were also quieter, rode better, handled better, were more powerful, and had a much better automatic transmission than Falcons. Plus: push buttons. And optional power steering, integral not an add-on like on Ford products including the first Mustangs.
The 1962 Valiant deemphasizes the fender shapes by not having trim on them, and had a new squared off instrument cluster.
What’s not to like?
But the Studebaker has a Brougham grille! That has to count for something around here.
Was Rambler trying to use up some old 50s era windshields or something? Why did they put a wrap-around windshield on the back window of their Classic?
Put me down as preferring the Lark over the Classic.
Why did they put a wrap-around windshield on the back window of their Classic?
That generation Classic dated from 56. Wrap around rear windows, and windshields were popular in the mid 50s. While they had updated the front and rear of the car twice, and unwrapped the windshield, the curved rear window, reverse slant C pillar and the roof carried over.
The “Lowey coupe” that Studebaker produced had that curved rear window and reverse slant C pillar as well.
Even the mid 70s Chevy Camaros had that same style rap around rear window. So it was a bit trendy off and on for a while. It looks better on a sports car, not so much on a sedan. Another car I can think of were the 1st. Barracudas.
That rear window looks like it wants to be a windshield. Kinda makes the whole car look like it should be going the other way.
Didn’t look so odd when it came out in 56, with a wrap around windshield. Good thing they didn’t do the windshield wrap as extreme as GM did, as that would have resulted in both the A and C pillars slanting toward the center of the car at the bottom.
The original 1956 Rambler was a wholly original and cohesive if a bit fussy design. Roof integrated into the body at the C pillar, front end concept like a 1961 Lincoln. Then of course they tried to make it more normal every year without the money for an actual new or at least rebodied design.
I find that the looks of these, and others like them, have grown on me over time. Maybe I admire the spirit of the underdog, or that the designs from the independants and Mopar through the 50’s and 60’s always seemed to be a foreigner’s take on American exuberance.
I grew up in Windsor Ontario, just across the river from Detroit, during the 50’s and 60’s, and being so much closer to Kenosha and South Bend (and Hamilton Ontario) must explain the high percentage of AMC and Studebaker products on the road. My parents owned a ’61 American 2-door, and our next door neighbours owned a 59 Studebaker Lark wagon (replaced in 1967 by a brand new Pontiac Bonneville 2-door fastback!), and there were another couple of Studes and even a ’62 Studebaker Hawk. I remember a Hudson Hornet and a ’53 Ford Tudor a couple of houses down.
This would have been 1963 through to 1970 – but by the time we moved away in 1970 most of the 50’s and early 60’s iron had already been replaced. It was a prosperous time for middle income folks and everybody was replacing cars every couple of years.
Had a ’62 Lark same color as the photo. Mine had 4 doors and wheel covers. The one I had was a V-8 with Overdrive and Twin-Traction. Got it for $75 in 1969 with about 78K as I recall. Needed something to drive to work while I searched for a Coupe or Hawk that I could swap parts into. Pleasantly surprised by the performance. These looked much better in a dark color though. Turned out to be one of my all-time favorites. Never did buy a coupe.
After six years of only four door Ramblers on the ’56 platform, the addition of the two door sedan for the 1962 Classic and Ambassadors made no sense. Last year of the body, 1962-only doors and quarter panels tooling to be scrapped at the end of the year, who made that stupid decision?
Without calculating the percentage of total two door ’62’s sold of overall Classic and Ambassadors, which was a minor amount, it makes one scratch one’s head why the two door couldn’t wait until 1963. AMC didn’t have money to waste on such dead-end foolishness, even then…..but they kept doing it again and again over the succeeding years
Maybe they thought they’d garnish incremental sales with an ultra-stripped 2-door model. Everyone looking for a Rambler was bargain hunting already, so perhaps AMC thought they’d grab a few more people willing to sacrifice a door in order to save 2 bits.
Somehow, AMC buyers were “bargain hunting” and wanting to save two bits ? And what were VW and Renault buyers doing? Were they just doing it to be “different”? Or being thrifty, conservative with their money and saying screw you to Detroit’s excesses?
Like AMC buyers.
I’m just saying that it doesn’t make AMC or Studebaker buyers of modestly equipped vehicles “too cheap to buy something better” or non “enthusiasts” [as one poster claimed in another Rambler article].
Buying flash on time to impress the neighbors doesn’t represent real “wealth”.
Debt is not prosperity. That people recognized this and spent accordingly does not justify the regular slagging AMC buyers and products get.
Somehow value low running costs and practicality are derided and excess is to be applauded.
Makes no sense to me and probably a real driving factor behind AMC’s sales. Add in Hudson and Nash loyalists and you have AMC’s market. And VW’s and Toyota’s and Datsun’s.
It’s okay in their case, but not in AMC’s I guess.
Well, I don’t know exactly what VW, Renault, or Rambler buyers were doing. But all those cars were among the lowest priced models on the market in the early 60s. So it’s safe to say the target customers had a different mindset than a Don Draper ad exec type going into a Cadillac showroom and writing a check for a brand new Coupe DeVille.
They sought value and economy, not status and planned obsolescence. But I think you’d have a hard time making the case that a Rambler buyer was a car enthusiast. Compared to the VW or Renault driver, they probably weren’t interested in engines located where the trunk should be and funny swing axles guaranteed to give you either European handling or a nasty dose of lift throttle oversteer. No one buying a Rambler was interested in a challenging drive, and they probably weren’t very interested in cars, period.
Note that I’m not deriding low running costs or practicality. I think the Rambler probably had early Beatles and anything from France beat on that count. One thing about Ramblers and AMCs in general is they usually looked like 8/10s scale versions of the big three’s big cars. All the foreign jobs struck their own design cord, and had superior driving dynamics. Yes, Japan did pretty much copy other car designs and added their own odd detailing, but in the end who survived and thrived?
I wish there were room in the market for a 4th American independent. The AMC Eagle was the absolutely last gasp of life for the plucky little car maker. They did prove that in order for an independent to survive, you have to find a small niche that the big boys won’t even bother with. I think it was Car And Driver who wrote that AMC produces about 65,000 cars per year (1980) and Chevrolet loses more than that through the cracks. Think of the vast economies of scale that GM enjoyed over AMC back then. On a cost per unit basis, it’s a wonder they survived as long as they did.
With more modern engineering and a more focused product line, AMC could have become an American Subaru. As a nation, we clearly have an insatiable appetite for AWD/4WD, if not the actual need. But I think at the time, they couldn’t beat anything from Japan cost wise. And gas prices were sky high (again) and those pesky Subarus could get in the mid 20s with AWD. The Eagle was just too inefficient with gas at an inflation adjusted $3.50/gallon.
I personally love looking at old AMCs, just because you don’t see them that often and they really stand out. Often, they had the nicest styling in their segment, and if you read old road tests they matched or beat their Ford, GM, or MOPAR competitors. But perception and image equal reality in the car biz game. And a massive dealership network doesn’t hurt either.
DweezilSFV
Debt is not prosperity. Words of wisdom to share with my grandchildren. Thanks.
Last year of the body,
It’s normal for a body late in it’s life cycle to be offered in a special discounted package. I have seen several generations of Civic offered as a “value pack” late in life. Right now, VW is doing that with the Passat.
Decontenting is one thing, As you say, tooling for new doors and quarter panels is a lot of money to invest. Just in case, I looked at a pic of a 62 Classic 4 door to make sure the front doors are longer on the 2 door. Yes they are. They didn’t go the Studebaker route of simply welding the back doors shut, or, if that is what Rambler did, at least they filled the seam between the rear door filler and the rear fender.
Studebaker didn’t just weld the back doors shut. They did have a longer door on the two doors. What they did was weld in a filler panel so they could use the same quarter panel on all sedans whether two doors or four.
Only other car maker I can think of who did this was Austin, with the A30/35.
Two-door VW Type 4s (including all wagons) were like that too, and Saab did the same thing on the 92/3/5/6 without a four door in the line at all!
Right. Forgot about them, thanks. We didn’t get the Type 4 in my country, and those early Saabs were so rare here as to be invisible.
Studebaker had bolt on rear fenders right up until the end.
Oh krikey! I forgot that this two door only came out for ’62! I thought it had come out a year earlier. That is totally insane!
That should have been my story…oh well.
Don’t feel bad, its a great write-up, I enjoyed it.
Now, find a CC ’58-’60 Ambassador by Rambler Custom Cross Country four door hardtop station wagon. They’re unicorns: 1958: 294; 1959: 578; 1960: 435.
Or maybe a 1961 Ambassador Custom 400 sedan: 831. Its a five passenger with bucket seating!
Found it! No interior shots though.
A unique body type for just one year? That must’ve hurt the bottom line.
I can sort-of understand Studebaker having a one-year hardtop for ’52 (and again for ’58) – it was a hot body type in the fifties – but a one-year two-door sedan? Why?
As a somewhat “student” of auto history, total redesigns by AMC are one of the most interesting things for me since they were a fraction of the size of the big 3, yet had to pay similar retooling costs. especially sad was the total redesign of the ’67 models after the disastrous ’66 season and their sales STILL decreased. But one of the most perplexing decisions was the 1962 2 door introduction which rqd. major investment in rear qtr, front door and body stampings but much of the rest of the car (2 dr AND 4 dr) had new stampings too. In fact the only carryover sheetmetal was from the cowl forward; even the windshield and associated surrounding stampings were new. All this for only one year before the totally new ’63s… how could they justify it??
How could anyone buy this car in 1962 when a base two door sedan Falcon, Fairlane or Chevy II was available?
During my 1962 rounds of downtown dealerships to pick up brochures I almost always skipped the Rambler and Studebaker places – though I do remember a 1/25 scale unibody demonstration model of this era Rambler that instigated a very small bit of interest in me. But not much; a few blocks away one could see T-Birds and 500XLs.
That Jo Han 1/25th scale unitbody- demo/promo model is worth a pretty penny today.
The normal 1962 Rambler promo was a four-door sedan. Later reissues as model kits by JoHan called it a taxi.
Although many people made fun of them back in the day, these were well built cars that got good gas economy-in 24 cents per gallon gas days,and were comfortable to drive and ride in. My uncle had a `62 Ambassador coupe,a rare model that was based on the Classic with the 8 cylinder and air conditioning. He loved that car and got good use out of it for almost 10 years.Even I thought it was cool,but then again, I always liked Ramblers and their underdog image.
Speaking from experience, riding in the back seat of one of these to meet the school bus was the most uncool thing. Albeit, the one we had was a 4 door. It all started when Dad decided to buy a second car for him to drive to work. I, of course, was all for it and I knew exactly what he needed. My plan was that we would come home with a nice ’66 or ’67 Fairlane. When we arrived at the Ford dealership, I combed through the rows of used cars in the lot. In the middle of them all was this ’62 Rambler Classic. I distanced myself from that car as quickly as possible, and headed to the corner of the lot where I had spotted a couple of Fairlanes. While I was deciding which one we were going to buy, Dad called to me, “Hey, Johnny, come look at this”. There he was, standing next to that Rambler, and I knew from the look on his face that the shopping was over. It was in exceptionally good condition, but In my mind I was saying, “For Pete’s sake Dad, it’s 1969. Move up a few years.” And I felt betrayed by my favorite Ford salesman who, for once, was not on my side. I could not understand it. It turned out that Johnny hated Ramblers and was more than happy to see this one go. So, that was that. And yes, Paul. Six cylinder with push-button Flash-o-Matic transmission. I suffered that car for a few years. I have attached a picture from the 1962 brochure which, other than being an Ambassador, is the spitting image of Dad’s Rambler Classic. Now, is that cool, or what?
Fabulous story! I can only imagine the reaction. Something like this? 🙂
Yeah! How did you know?
How many years of therapy did it take to get over that? Or is it still ongoing? 🙂 Maybe there’s a name for that: Rambler Syndrome.
“Home Alone” meets “The Scream”. I love it!
+1.
My neighbor had a ’62 Classic Cross Country (wagon) which wore the reverse C-pillar a little better with the long roof.
He gave it to my older brother who used it as a first car in his senior year of high school in 1972-73. As a GM family who owned a ’64 Chevy Impala wagon and a ’70 Buick Estate Wagon , we marveled at the Weather Eye air conditioning, the Flash-O-Matic pushbutton tranny controls (no contemporary Chryslers for us, so for the kids at least, this was a first) and the solid construction. You didn’t have to drive it to notice it felt like a small tank.
Ramblers of that vintage certainly didn’t sell on style, but I’m sure more than a few people liked that solid feel. I’m guessing, though, fewer people were ashamed to be seen in a 1963 model with its trim styling.
George Romney (Mitt’s dad) played to Rambler’s strengths back then, and AMC was in good shape overall. It was only when they started to bite off more than they could chew trying to be a full-line manufacturer that they ran into trouble.
I can think of 62 Ramblers that look even worse, the Ambassador and the American with their ugly frowning faces. If I were to pick a 62 Rambler, it would be a wagon. I also wouldn’t mind having a cute Metropolitan.
Notenufcars
This is one of life’s lessons. It’s called “Where you are in the pecking order.” Dad was at the top, you weren’t.
My 1970s version of dad picking up an uncool car would be my grandfather buying a brand new 1974 Gremlin, purple, black vinyl seats and cop car hubcaps. Then, my dad topped it, with a new 75 Gremlin, orange with tan vinyl and a horrible stripe kit.
Pop loved his Gremlin, my dad only kept his a year. When the radiator support welds broke and the radiator fell back into the fan, that was it. It has already spent half its life at Wullenweber Motors in the service bay for other “gremlins”.
I hated being seen in those little turds, and the front shoulder belts whipped around and made terrible sounds if the car was driven with the windows down.
I am too young to remember Ramblers or Studebakers when they were new…maybe that’s a good thing.
a brand new 1974 Gremlin, purple, black vinyl seats and cop car hubcaps.
With a couple thises and thatses, not a bad looking proposition.
Now, that’s a snazzy Gremlin, relatively speaking.
One odd thing I remember about my pop’s car was that it has a 3sp on the floor, and he was short enough that the shift lever rubbed the seat in 3rd gear, and kept wanting to pop out of gear. The dealer had to heat the shift lever and straighten it so it didn’t hit the seat. Pop was about 5 ft 6, so it’s not like he was a dwarf or anything…
That sounds about right for AMC for the 70s,cincydave. Hence the “Buyer Protection Plan” in 72. Judging by the 71 Gremlin and 72 Ambassador my parents owned, it didn’t do much to improve the end result. Sad.
They had a 62 Classic wagon. Engine blew because we were out in the middle of nowhere, driving back home from the Letterkenny Arsenal Pool [PA] and my Mother didn’t know what else to do when it overheated but keep going. It had had cooling problems from when it was purchased in 68.
Turns out the engine had been rebuilt once
[ 62000 miles when my parents got it ], and the rebuilder had used the wrong head gasket which blocked water flow.
My Grandfather had torn it down and discovered the problem. Mom and Dad should have had a used or rebuilt engine put in. The rest of the car was well built and the engine problem was due to incorrect head gasket and abuse. Not AMC’s fault.
The problems they had with their 70s AMC products were not their fault. The 62 was jewel like in it’s assembly compared to those two. [And I still loved them, but I’d be lying if I said they were well made vehicles.
That sounds about right for AMC for the 70s,cincydave. Hence the “Buyer Protection Plan” in 72. Judging by the 71 Gremlin and 72 Ambassador my parents owned, it didn’t do much to improve the end result. Sad.
My Aunt’s 70 Amby wagon was not a happy car: ill fitting plastic bits on the dash, squeaks and rattles. What compounded the problems was there was only one AMC dealer in the area, and he was pretty shiftless. Ironically, my Grandfather had recommended AMC to her as he had done all the maintenance on Mom’s 64 and had been impressed with how well that car was put together.
In 71, AMC took the usual beancounter approach to high warranty claims expense and cut the warranty to 90 days.
The 90 day warranty didn’t seem to help customer’s perceptions of the cars, hence the BPP in 72.
The 74 Amby wagon I drove while working at the foundry was screwed together light years better than my Aunt’s 70. Tight, quite, stable on the road and it went like the hammers.
A 90 day warranty? On a new car? Yikes. I know they weren’t as long back then, but that’s absurd.
Warranties were usually 6 months or 6000 miles in Australia. I can just remember the excitement generated by a “12/12” warranty. I don’t know what warranty Rambler had then, but 90 days would be a deal-breaker for sure.
A 90 day warranty? On a new car? Yikes. I know they weren’t as long back then, but that’s absurd.
iirc, my Aunt’s 70 had a 12month/12,000 mile warranty on everything and a 5/50,000 on the power train. A good thing too, because the Borg Warner tranny was not the strongest. Combine being the biggest, heaviest car AMC made, plus when she took road trips in the summer she loaded the wagon up with camping gear, and hitched on a small camping trailer, with no “towing package”, extra tranny fluid cooler and such. in the car, and she liked to head for the mountains, The B-W gave up at 48,000 miles. She said the tranny fluid turned green(?!). The shiftless AMC dealer did come up with a new tranny, in warranty. But, true to form, when they put the new tranny in, the mechanic didn’t clip the speedo cable into it’s retaining clip. The speedo cable sagged down onto the exhaust pipe. The heat from the exhaust pipe made the speedo cable sieze and break…so off to the shop again.
The BPP in 72 coincided with AMCs switch to the Chrysler Torqueflite tranny, which was a lot stronger.
My older brother’s girlfriend back in the day wanted to buy a new 1973 Javelin. However, she didn’t have the $$’s and her credit only qualified for a Gremlin. Hers was a little strippo Gremmy in green with the six and the 3 speed manual transmission.
It had some issues as I recall her complaining about, but I don’t remember what they were. Even at the tender age of 10, I was not impressed with the stripper Gremlin, it just seemed so joyless compared to my other brother’s friend’s Vega GT.
But the Gremlin (once sorted) served her well. IIRC, my brother ended the relationship sometime in early 1976, but I would still see her around town in the same car until 1978 or so. By then it was a rusty hulk.
But, after having spent some time in higher trim Gremlins, and particularly ones with V8s, I changed my tune. But to each their own. I guess a stripper car most often is just as miserable as you want it to be.
As I started reading this story, I thought Paul was being a bit harsh, but as I began to remember what my 6 year old self would have thought, I think he’s spot-on. It’s not just the styling; the whole Rambler image was anathema to an any car-crazy kid. Sure, the Valiant looked bizarre, but it had that push-button transmission and leaned over engine. Rambler, blah. Not to sound offensive, but the only person we knew who drove a Rambler in the early ’60’s was our priest. And I think it was his job to avoid any hint of pleasure. Post-Loewy Studebakers were up there too, but at least my friend’s parents’ Lark was a cheerful bright yellow. Is there a car like a Rambler today? Mitsubishi Mirage or 4 door Yaris, perhaps.
When I was a kid back in the 1970s, there were still several early-1960s Ramblers in daily use (desert town, so no rust, but plenty of paint and upholstery fade). And they were universally driven by old geezers and blue-haired grandmas.
The youngest person I knew who owned one live two houses down and he was about 60 at the time. He did an in-frame rebuild on the straight 6 right in his driveway which impressed the heck out of me. And he had the manual transmission with overdrive as well, getting into the low 20s for highway fuel economy.
I like it now but I don’t think I’d have done so at the time.It’s ugly but cute like my French bulldog. Maybe it’s being British and sticking up for the underdog,I also follow 2 not very good football teams(West Ham & Blackpool).I did see the odd Rambler as a kid growing up near a USAF base but the opposition easily outnumbered them over here at the time.
I do recall seeing the odd one of these around but they were far from cheap economical cars over here any US vehicle attracted a lot of tax in those days, but new cars were very hard to get in Havana of the south pacific you needed foreign currency to play and finance was an impossibility for most, we were still riding in a Vauxhall from 1954 and would continue to do so another 2 years.
Not common in Australia either, despite being locally assembled. Maybe they only built one every second day. I was in the back seat of a ’55 Morris Oxford then, and would be for another two years.
In NZ in the 1980s my walk to primary school took me past a house with a well-kept 4dr example of these in a deep pink colour. There was also one of the later Classics on my street, parked in a front yard and providing a habitat for lichen. Overall, Ramblers were a rare sight for me when vehicles from the 60s were still commonplace.
Cool only in the hipster sense… God, it looks like a kid’s drawing of a car done in the ’60’s.
No thank you to the Rambler and no thank you to the forthcoming PBR, either.
Urp*
I was born in ’64 so by the time I was old enough to be interested in cars, 5-6, these things were already thin on the ground and I hardly remember seeing any of them in the ’70s.
Poor, poor AMC, always going for the cheap end of the market and completely forgetting what made the original Rambler so successful at the start – a small car that was by no means stripped down but rather nicely styled and equipped, a little car people wouldn’t be embarrassed to be seen in. A few tweaks could have made this car so much better; the front end up to the doors isn’t bad, but those rear wheel arches need to be a little bigger and better shaped, and the taillights more fully integrated rather than looking tacked-on. Oh, and that reverse-slant backlight, well, maybe in the ’50s it was ok but by 1962 NO, NO and NO!!!!!!
The ’62 Ramblers take the prize for the most uninspired styling in the industry, beat out the Lark by a dull, characterless bumper. Ed Anderson and team can be forgiven for losing interest in another restyle of a body that was due for replacement two years before. Anyone else notice in the profile view that the windshield A-pillar is tallest and the upper window frame slopes toward the rear….how’d they arrive at that?
For all their dull lack of style and frugal appeal, they speak of a time when a share of the population sought only inexpensive, reliable transportation and didn’t think their self-image was so fragile they had to spend excessively to impress others. The current market suggest none of those folks still exist.
” Anyone else notice in the profile view that the windshield A-pillar is tallest and the upper window frame slopes toward the rear….how’d they arrive at that? ”
I think that’s a hangover from the old wraparound windshield they used to have, The roof was high and full of side-to-side curvature at that point (can’t think what the engineering term is – old age!), so when the wraparound went, and they tried to flatten out the roof in line with sixties thinking, I’d guess there was some “hard point” there the body engineers had to maintain.
Unless there was some management directive that the upper edge of the windshield had to be at such-and-such a place relative to the driver’s eyes, to enable you to see overhead traffic signals – though that sounds more like GM.
That, or just plain bad design. 🙁
I think you mean tumblehome.
Tumblehome is the angle of the side windows. Besides being pre-curved flat
glass, the original 1956 design had fairly vertical windows which were as far out as possible to maximize interior room. Side windows have to roll down so having a narrower greenhouse compared to body width narrows the interior. Rambler designers were trying to make the biggest interior possible with a more compact exterior, and that’s one thing they succeeded at.
“Crown” was the word I was thinking of. Remembered it six years later!
I miss the sound these things made, that strangled “wheezy nasal” sound. One of the sounds of my long gone childhood. There aren’t a lot of straight sixes left on the road. Too bad.
This appears to be a nice straight complete survivor. The styling is dull and conservative but that keeps it from looking like some kind of freak, like a Pacer. If this had a decent paint job and some hubcaps it would be a pretty cool little machine. I guess my old age is turning me into a contrarian but I like these under dogs. Geez, see what happens when you drive a six cylinder Mustang!
The Eastern European analogy is appropriate. I’d even go so far as to label the ’62 Rambler Classic 2-door as a domestic version of the Trabant. In that regard, it’s very weirdness has a certain charm, certainly more than the stifling blandness of the ’65-’66 Rambler Classic that was also recently featured. It’s nothing short of amazing how AMC went from one extreme to the other in just a few short years.
In fact, I’d be hard pressed to decide which is more charmingly weird for a MY1962 compact car, the Rambler or the Valiant. In the words of former Mercury 7 astronaut Gordon Cooper, “If you can’t be good, be colorful”.
Honestly, when you think about it, 1962 was really quite a year for distinctive compacts. Just look at the list and how different each one was from the others:
Falcon
Corvair
Valiant
Rambler
Lark
Tempest
Not to forget the VW Beetle which, supposedly, was the target buyer at which each of the above was aimed. Considering that, maybe it’s not so strange that the Rambler comes off as being from East Germany.
Here’s an idea for Chrysler. Bring back the Rambler name !! They already use half of it on their pickups, Dodge Ram. Since they bought out AMC, they should go back and use some AMC names. They could use that name on their Fiat Jeep. Jeep Rambler. Wonder how that would affect sales ?
They already re-used Concord and Spirit, so why not?
Fifty years from now we will be looking at a CC of a 2015 Toyota Camry and criticize it as we are this Rambler…a redone body that essentially has been on the same platform since 2001.
This is a 4 door but it sure looks good to me. Vaguely European.
Works much better as a four door.
That is pretty awful. That window and roof treatment was not meant to be made into a two door. It is like the times when kids in gym class forgot their gym shoes, and the coach required that they wear black dress shoes with their school shorts and uniforms.
Those alloy wheels and dark glass were really ahead of their time.
In the late seventies a friend bought his great-aunt’s 1962 automatic two-door Rambler for $200. He was actually a really cool guy, but in the most uncool car possible.
Back then there were TV ads featuring Lorne Greene of “Bonanza” fame blasting a Chevy Blazer through a snow bank. Tourists from all over would fly in, rent a Blazer, then get hopelessly stuck in the ski area parking lot.
My friend drove his Rambler up and down the mountain to Alta on a pretty much daily basis every winter for three years for his job with the ski patrol and claimed he never got stuck (I believed him then and still do). The only change from stock was four Michelin radial snow tires. Not cheap back then (maybe cost more than the car), but what a difference in traction.
Most of the time, safe driving in the snow has a heck of a lot more to do with the driver than the vehicle.
I never thought 62 Ramblers looked uncool, curtainly any more than Falcons, Novas, Larks, or Valiants from the same year looked. It looked far better than the ’56 Rambler with which it was forced to share a body, and the updates since then struck most of the 50’s-ness from the style, with only the reverse C pillar and perhaps the overly bulbous windshield looking from another time (and Mopars and Studes still had fishbowl windshields in 1962 too). Plus those awesome recliner bed seats. 62 Ramblers are fine by me.
“I can just hear its wheezy nasal exhaust as the 196 cubic inch six leans against the torque converter, which tended to convert seemingly too much of the engine’s torque into…nothing. Alchemy.”
Nay good sir, energy is neither created nor destroyed. The torque is likely converted into uselessly heated transmission fluid, which must then be dissipated by the transmission cooler!
I reread Paul’s quote and your comment a few times. You two actually seem to be in agreement. I don’t see anything about energy being created.