Car-wise, what did you hate about the 70's?

I liked my '70 Riviera, faster than fuck, horrible braking and handling and it only got 10 mpg max and then in '71 every American became a slug, by '73 they were postal worker slow.

I loved the '70s as a decade though, that's where I got to do the maximum amount of teenaged damage. We destroyed everything, from Vivas to Minis to Bond Bugs, nothing was sacred.

I was there for punk rock.

Best of all, there was no AIDS and how I miss big hairy porn bush.

 

in 10 years, the 70's will be cool again...no worries. its a shame the 80's are "cooler" than the 70's already though. boy i cant wait until the 90's are cool again.

I for one, love the 70's vans...(big titted artwork especially).....actually i like the 70's cars, especially 70's foreign cars. not so much muscle cars, but some.

 

I am of the opinion the big 3 stopped building cars in 1973.

at that point, they started building parts sources for all the other cars they had already built.

and whoever hired the blind guy to start designing Dodges is hopefully basking in a lake of fire. Sheesh- Mopars weren't particularly attractive to begin with, but they got so ugly there was no going back...


that said, I need to go finish the engine swap on my Trans-Am (the race,not the car) style 67 Cutlass...with the large sized tires on all 4 with the raised white letters on the outside.

you can take a boy outta the trailer park, but you can't take the trailer park outta the boy.

 

BROWN GREEN AND YELLOW ON EVERYTHING!!!

 

my birth. it's a horrible year for cars.

 

The 90s sucked more than anything has ever sucked.
70s foreign cars? Why???

 

male clothing, pollution control but other than that the 70's for the most part were great! girls would wear the tightest clothes possible and car parts seemed cheaper

 

The 70's!! Wow. Graduated high school 71. Married in 73. Fraz born in 77. had a 69 Dodge with a 225 and auto.

Good milage and looked decent too. Got creamed in passenger door. Bought a 79 chevette. Called it the Shovette. 41 thou new motor. POS to the max.

Dad bought a AMC Spirit right off the showroom floor. paid 3600 cash.

Now is better. I was younger thinner, but jobs sucked, and so'd about most everything else.

Nah I like now better.

 

I agree...I had some great times and good cars in the 70's. They were 60's cars that you could buy cheap. Actually all the decades of my life I think I liked...I've had a wonderful life...every time a bell rings an angel gets it's wings...sorry!

PS I'm 54

 

It's pretty sad that I'm the coolest thing to come out of the 70's. I'm really not that cool. Handsome, yes.....cool, no.

 

I hated most that in the 70s I wasnt old enuff to drive cars myself - besides those R/C thingies.

 

500 ci Cadillac in 1974 210hp
460 ci Ford in 1974 190hp
How the hell did that happen, a chimp could make more power with that many cubes.

 

And disco ruled, still does.

 

The only reason Boogie Vans have shag carpet on the walls is to muffle the screams coming from inside..

Shawn

 

I kinda liked the 70's as evidenced by my '75 Monte...but of course I don't discuss her on the HAMB. I save her for the HSOMB (Hokey Smogged Out Message Board). But I will say this...once you pull all that garbage off the engine...they run a million times better. I also had a '71 Catalina with just a little 350 Poncho and it ran great and quick for a full size.

Also...somebody said something about 5 mph bumpers...My Monte has 'em and they came in handy once when I backed the ass end into a wooden light pole in my alley...put a hydraulic spreader behind it and it pushed the bumper back into place perfectly. I praised that 5 mph bumper that time.

The Monte is one of my daily drivers...so simple and CHEAP to fix. That's what I like about it. It's got antique plates so no emissions tests in Illinois, first year for HEI, disc brakes in front, 2 door, full frame, RWD...what more could you want.

 

Cars I owned and drove in the 70's, mostly in order
'60 MGA roadster
'60 Chevy Wagon
'60 Valiant 2dr
Porsche 914 powered '69 VW bug
'61 VW bug
'65 Sunbeam Alpine
'74 Vega GT
'74 Subaru coupe
'69 Fiat 850 Spyder
'55 Olds 88 2dr ht
'55 Olds 88 2dr ht (eventually parts car for the other one)
'74 MGB roadster
'75 Camaro, with factory 8 track!
During the so called "gas shortage" rode a Daimler-Puch moped 14 miles one way to work at a Chevy dealer. Never waited in a single line for gas!

While working at an Olds dealer in '77-'79 I thought that the 70's Nova - Omega body size cars might make the next generation's "tri-five" chevy replacement, not on looks, although they are the same kind of utilitarian "box" shape, but on basic simplicity of the mechanicals.

As far as Customs and Rods go, in the early 70's the hobby was was still in a state of EVOLVING like it had for the previous five decades.
There was NO sense of NOSTALGIA or widespread desire to "do it like they used to". (Not until the aftermath of "American Graffitti" anyway)
The name of the game was still visual one-up-man-ship for the customizers and faster ET's no mater what it takes for the racers.
Ther was no mainstream trend towards collecting anything old.
That was what those weird restorers did, yuckhh!

I think the first "known" retro-traditional rod build was the Bud Bryan A-V8.

The rest, even Retro Rods were still the next page, the next trend, style, fad, whatever, in the dialectic.
OUThouse rod anyone?

I liked, and still like true to the ideal Retro Rods.
They were built with the ideal to reserve as much of the original car in it's stock state as possible but with a modern drive train.
Stock uncut firewalls, all the lights and fenders and luggage carriers the cars came with or were accessorized with when new.
Sort of the Street Rod parallel of Lowrider "Bombs"?
I like them too, but not enough to want to spend what it takes to build one
Anyway, The '70's Hobby was kept out of extinction by lowriders.
So, whether you like lace paint or murals or "tricked out vans" or not, embrace them because they were the life support of the Hobby that got it through to where we are now.

Someone's probably going to mention Surfer vans...
I never met a surfer who cared any more about his car/van/woody any more than it was the vehiclular utility that carried his prescious boards to the beach, and was a sometimes home away from home.
I'm not talking about car guys who also surfed, I'm talking about surfers who lived for the surfing.
"Hippy vans" are like that too.
They weren't Customs (big C) or Rods.
They may have been modified/customized but they were usually more in the "artcar" realm of trinketry (is that a word?)

 

If you think about it, the bumpers weren't any more massive than the ones found on cars of the late 50's and earlly 60's....big and bulky, yes, but they form a design element on Chevelles, Torinos, my Satellite, Dodge Chargers, etc.

Granted all of them weren't pretty, like the giant ones on 74 Gremlins as compared to the 71's, but then again, all of the 30's cars didn't look great either.

And... I LIKE the 70's Camaros & Trans Ams. If you've ever owned one, you know they are fun as hell to drive. Same with the 70's Corvettes and V8 Mavericks...

 

look no further than the 77-79 t birds...short rear deck long hood, opera window, slant back front windshield, great wheels on the town landau, but they messed up with the 351...should have offered the 460 with dual exhaust.

They called them the tornio birds ...same dimensions and bumppers.. and those three years were fords highest sales for t birds...the public hath spoken.

later