14 cars that are 50 years old in 2020 – Axon's Automotive Anorak

Range Rover

Developed by Rover with late 1960s prototype test mules badged as Velar, the ground-breaking Range Rover of 1970 might not have been the world’s first comfortable on-road off-roader (the long-lived Jeep Wagoneer SJ appearing seven years earlier), but it was a true game-changer. It combined tarmac class and comfort with admirable mud-plugging capabilities.

The Range Rover was an instant success, the high-riding three-door appealing to all, from farmers to aristocrats, setting the standard for all other 4x4 ‘pretenders’ (Mercedes-Benz G-Wagen, Toyota Land Cruiser Station Wagon, Ford Bronco, Monteverdi Safari, etc.) to aspire to.

During its extensive 26-year production run, the first Range Rover improved with age, as did its sales. The original 3.5-litre Rover V8 was eventually joined by an Italian-produced VM Motori turbo diesel in 1988, with a five-door body style (originally conceived by Monteverdi in Switzerland) officially added in 1981 to meet demand for such a configuration, with a long-wheelbase version coming later.

Ahead of this, a huge number of coachbuilding conversion specialists chopped and stretched the Range Rover throughout the world in the 1970s, offering convertible modifications, six-wheelers, falcon hunting specials, fire tender – you name it, it existed.

When the much-anticipated second-generation Range Rover (P38A) debuted in 1994, demand for the original 1970 model was still so strong that Land Rover rebranded the 4x4 the Range Rover Classic, with production continuing until 1996, and the legacy of this influential luxury off-roader still very evident in today’s fourth-generation L405 model.

Alfa Romeo Montreal

A pair of outstanding, exotic European GTs were introduced in 1970s, conceptually quite similar, but very different in their execution.

The first of these was the Marcello Gandini-styled Alfa Romeo Montreal. It took its name from a Bertone prototype, first shown at the Expo 67 in Quebec, Canada, in 1967. Bertone’s Expo 67 concept car was met with such a positive response that Alfa Romeo chose to make the car, the production model making its debut at the 1970 Geneva Motor Show with a few subtle detail changes, chief of which was the adoption of Alfa’s competition derived Tipo 33 2.6-litre V8 engine.

With its distinctive fold-away headlamp ‘eye brows’ and B-pillar vents, the 2+2 Montreal cut a dramatic dash on 1970s roads, with around 3,900 examples built before production came to an end in late 1977.

Photo by James Lynch.

Citroën SM

Citroën’s take on the long distance high-performance GT was very different to Alfa Romeo’s V8, rear-wheel-drive solution for the Montreal. Like the Alfa, the jaw-dropping Citroën SM was also launched at the 1970 Geneva Salon, where the avant-garde French car maker also introduced its mass-market GS (we’ll get on to that in a minute).

Citroën’s bold simultaneous launch of the ground-breaking SM and GS at the same time was to prove too ambitious, taking its toll on the Company’s finances (also being drained at the time by the costly development of the yet-to-be-revealed CX of 1974). Ultimately it lead to former rival Peugeot acquiring the Paris marque in 1974, and in turn the premature demise of the overly complex and costly SM.

The short-lived SM itself briefly revived the classic French grande routier breed of motor car, once the pride of France and typified by marques such as Bugatti, Delage, Delahaye, Talbot-Lago and Facel Vega.

The SM used a V6 engine to drive the front wheels (making it the world’s fastest and most powerful front-wheel-drive car at launch), cut down from a V8 Maserati motor, with the legendary Italian marque owned by Citroën at the time. The SM was a uniquely Citroën-esque solution to a grand tourer, combining DS-derived high-pressure hydro-pneumatic self-levelling suspension with a smooth wind-cheating profile, intelligent ergonomics and incredibly direct go-kart-like steering, known as DIRAVI, and carried over to the latter CX.

Citroën GS

Deservedly the winner of the 1970-71 European Car of the Year, the advanced Citroën GS shone head and shoulders above any other contemporary lower-medium B-sector family car.

With an all-new air-cooled engine, slippery aerodynamic two-box coachwork, signature Citroën height-adjustable hydropneumatic suspension, advanced instrumentation and ergonomics, the GS was in a different league to the average smaller family saloon, embarrassing the lesser Ford Escorts, Renault 12s, VW Beetles, and what have you. Only the Fiat 128, Autobianchi A110 and BL’s Austin-Morris 1100-1300 got anywhere near the Citroën for driving pleasure, ride comfort and overall refinement, but none could compare to the GS’s compelling overall package of style and dynamic prowess.

Plugging a gaping hole in the Citroën range between the quirky Ami and seminal DS, the GS proved a strong seller for Citroën, with around 2.5 million examples made, and the model morphing into the more practical GSA hatchback model for 1980, remaining in production until 1986. For a ‘regular’ family car, the GS was truly exceptional, and still excels today, half-a-century after its launch.

Bond Bug

Resembling a wedge of Red Leicester cheese, cars don’t come much more 1970s than the distinctive Bond Bug three-wheeler (available in any colour you liked, as long as it was tangerine orange!), first seen 50 years ago.

Designed by tom Karen of Ogle – the creator of that other great 1970s British wheeled icon the Raleigh Chopper bicycle – the Bond Bug was a youthful two-seater, using the contemporary three-wheeled Reliant Regal as its base. It had a dramatic forward-hinged canopy to gain entry into the car, along with canvas door skins, plastic side screens and a flop-down matt black boot lid made of a plank of wood. 

Production of the Bug only lasted four years, with 2,270 examples made before Bond’s owners Reliant sadly pulled the plug, helping to make three-wheeler now something of a cult collectors classic car, with the Bug particularly popular in Germany and the Netherlands today.

Ford Cortina MK 3

Half-a-century ago a raft of adequate but uninspiring British family saloons were announced, all selling in reasonable numbers within the UK’s shores, but all also failing to make much of a dent in important export markets, ultimately contributing to the demise of the mainstream British motor industry.

The most successful of the 1970 British family saloon debutants – in pure sales terms – was the third iteration of the Ford Cortina, this time dropping the clean-cut straight lines of its Mark 2 1966-70 predecessor for a then-fashionable ‘Coke bottle’ shape first seen the USA in the late 1960s. Though quickly looking dated, the Cortina Mark 3 dominated the UK new cars sales charts for most of its six-year career; the car proving to be the darling of the company car fleets with endless trim derivatives.

Vauxhall Viva

Like Ford, Vauxhall introduced a third generation of its most popular model, the Viva, in 1970, this new Viva HC model aimed more directly at the Escort rather than Cortina, but with aspirations to encroach on the latter’s territory with subsequent Viva-derived larger 1.8- and 2.3-litre engine capacity models; the Firenza coupe and Magnum. The Viva HC was to last in production for nine years.

Hillman Avenger

The final new British saloon for 1970 was the Hillman Avenger. The Avenger was met with some success, having a long and complex career both in the UK and overseas, with the model built as a far afield as New Zealand, Iran, Brazil and Argentina (it lasted in Argentina until 1990 branded as a Volkswagen!) Ahead of this, the Avenger morphed from being a Hillman to a Chrysler and then a Talbot, with Sunbeam, Dodge and Plymouth badges also applied to the car over the years.  

Triumph Stag

The stylish Triumph Stag promised much on its 1970 debut, with an attractive Michelotti-designed 2+2 semi-coupe/convertible body surrounding a plush interior and brand-new 30-litre V8 engine, developed in-house by Triumph before the Coventry brand became part of the vast British Leyland empire in 1968.

On paper the Stag was an affordable alternative to a Mercedes-Benz SL, with great looks and a unique three-branch roll-over bar. The new V8 engine would soon prove to be the sporting model’s undoing though, due to cooling problems inherent in the V8’s engineering, plus a keen appetite to munch its way through head gaskets. These engine problems soon earned the Stag a poor reliability reputation, hurting sales and foreshortening the Triumph’s planned production run by a few years. The car unceremoniously disappearing in 1977.

Much conjecture surrounds Triumph decision to use its own new V8 engine, rather than adopt the available Buick-derived 3.5-litre V8 already proven in-house by Leyland partner Rover, a decision with hindsight that would have secured the Stag’s true potential. Today the Triumph’s V8 mechanical problems are known and fully resolved, making a Stag a desirable and useable classic with a huge owners club and support. If only the car had enjoyed such enthusiasm when it was first revealed fifty years ago.  

AMC Gremlin­

AMC’s unfortunately-named Gremlin (plus its booted Hornet compact sedan sibling) holds the distinction of being the first of America’s VW Beetle and Japanese ‘import busting’ compact hatchback ‘economy’ cars of the 1970s, beating Detroit’s ‘Big Three’ vehicle groups off the line.

Twelve months later Ford joined the American economy car party with its flawed Pinto, followed some time later (1976) by General Motors’s unremarkable Chevrolet Chevette and Chrysler’s Dodge Omni/Plymouth Horizon duo in 1977.

Perhaps appropriately launched on April 1^st 1970, the truncated-tailed Gremlin featured the first US two-box hatch bodyshell, the frontal section shared with the larger Hornet. Despite being promoted as America’s first import-busting economy model, initially the Gremlin’s smallest capacity engine offered by AMC was a six-cylinder 3.3-litre, with a thirsty 5.0-litre V8 also available – hardly economic! A smaller four-cylinder, 20-litre motor, produced by Volkswagen for its US-built Rabbit (Golf) ,was eventually added to the range, something that was somewhat ironic given that the Gremlin was created to seduce would-be American VW buyers away from VWs!

The Gremlin survived until the 1979 Model Year when struggling AMC replaced it with the Spirit, a heavily revamped version of the model with a more conventional fastback coupe bodystyle. Widely regarded in the USA as something of a motoring joke in period – just as we Brits sniggered about the Austin Allegro – almost 675,000 Gremlin’s were sold over its eight-year life, making the model something of a surprise sales success for AMC.

Opel Ascona

The Opel Ascona was the ex-General Motors brand’s first post-war, mid-sized family model, slotting between the smaller Kadett and larger Rekord. Available in both two and four-door saloon and attractive three-door estate forms, the rear-wheel-drive Ascona proved to be a popular seller in mainland Europe (less so in the UK), starting Walter Rohl’s successful rally career, and spawning the original Manta coupe.

The 1970 Ascona (A) was replaced by the new B model just five years later, forming the base for the first Vauxhall Cavalier in 1976, with Manta B headlamps and nose grafted into the front of the Ascona B’s body. The third-(and final) generation Ascona appeared in late 1981, based on GM’s new global J-Car front-drive platform, with Vauxhall, Holden, Isuzu, Chevrolet, Buick, Pontiac and Oldsmobile-badged versions of the model offered around the world. The Ascona name was retired in 1988 to make way for the new Vectra.

Volkswagen K70

Technically more significant, but commercially less successful than the Opel, Volkswagen’s very first front-wheel-drive (and front-engined) model was also introduced in 1970 as a direct competitor to the Ascona. Despite its VW badging on the grille, the new Volkswagen K70 had in fact little to do with the Wolfsburg marque, this modern and stylish saloon being fully developed earlier by previous VW rival NSU (it was taken over by the then-fledgling Volkswagen Group and absorbed into its more prestigious Audi brand).

The advanced K70 led the way from Volkswagen’s own in-house-developed front-wheel-drive winners, including the 1973 Passat, 1974 Sirocco and Golf, plus the 1975 Polo, with the accomplished but unloved K70 quietly dropped too soon from the VW range in 1975.  

Opel Manta

When Ford introduced its Cortina-based ‘Car You Always Promised Yourself’ Capri in 1969, the customer demand for a stylish four-seater coupe was instantly proven – the model instantly becoming a strong-seller.

Ford’s rivals were keen to dial into the Capri’s success, with two important saloon-derived rivals launched in 1970. The first of which was the Opel Manta.

The Capri’s closest European rival, the Manta quickly proved to be a popular competitor, although its sales never quite reached those of the Ford, either in its original 1970 Manta A form, or the later svelte B of 1975 that outlived the Capri with production ceasing in 1998.

Toyota Celica

The Capri (and Manta’s) first serious coupe competitor from the Land of the Rising Sun was the Toyota Celica, a blatant Japanese take on Ford’s iconic Mustang. Initially available in pillarless three-box notchback form only, Toyota added a fastback hatchback Celica Liftback was added in 1973 for the domestic Japanese market, with exports commencing in 1974. Through seven generations, the Celica name lived on until 2006, giving way to today’s GT84 as the original 1970 model’s spiritual sporting coupe successor.