History The Best Custom Material... 1960 Models.

the song is actually titled 'Detroit Made', more recently covered by Bob Seger.

 

1960 Merc was a beutifull car, often overlooked

 

Starliner for me. Kinda fun to remember back when it was fun to go look at the new model year cars.

 

1960, year of my birth. Always wanted a 60 GM hardtop, Caddy being first choice. That bubbletop roofline of the late 50's early 60's, sexy.

 

That '60 Pontiac is a really pretty, really clean design for 1960, can't argue with that. And a 389 for power!

Another really clean 1960 design is the Edsel Ranger hardtop, which is basically a Starliner with some different trim but a very pretty package, shame so few were made.



Then on the extreme opposite end is the 1960 Plymouth. I have a '60 Fury (not pictured below) and while driving it I've heard from several different people "They didn't actually come that way, did they?"

These cars look like those whacky clay model exercises that designers would use while they were figuring out what worked and what didn't, but then they just took the first one and ran with it.


Look at that steering wheel!?



I love these. Some people think they're ugly, but those people are stupid.

 

Take me back to 1970-
I've seen old classifieds and dealer ads, you could buy 1960 models for dirt cheap, they were just ugly old cars that nobody wanted.
Wrecking yards just crushed them all day long.

 

I guess I'd have to go with a '60 Starliner. Mostly because that's what I'd wished the old man had bought instead of the white two-door box-top Galaxy in'60...

 

Hello,

In 1960, I was introduced to a 4 door hardtop Pontiac. It was a pure family car. My high school friend used it for his first drive and took all of us everywhere. That car had air conditioning, but we loved lowering the windows down to make one big cruising air flow. There was room for a ton of teenagers to have fun driving around. The trunk was perfect (meaning a lot of room) for a couple of kids hiding as we drove into the myriad of local drive-in theaters that dotted the whole Long Beach area.

We tried the mix and match wheel covers, including the Moon Discs, but these huge things just needed to stay stock. Plus, my friend's parents had other ideas on how they wanted to spend their money, for family things.

Then in 1962, we had our own hot rod/cruisers, but my friend’s mom and dad bought a 62 Pontiac 4 door cruiser, again. We were all into 2 door coupes and sedans, while our parents loved 4 doors. Electric mirrors were the big thing for the top of the line Bonneville 4 door sedans. My friend had a way to move the mirror around to flash the high beam guy behind. That immediately put a stop to the high beams during normal driving. There were no high off of the ground SUVs or 4x4 trucks back then, but those idiots that kept the high beams on for night driving.

Jnaki

Those big old cars were our introduction to family size cruisers. The fun thing was that our 55-58 Chevy cars did not have air conditioning, so when a long drive out to the Colorado River or High Desert was in the making, the family cruiser was the way to go in comfort. Being frugal as parents were, they did not want much in the way of custom accessories to the big road hugging family cruisers.

Today, there seems to be a movement to get these big 4 door hardtops back on the road, just to be different. In our neck of So Cal, we have seen a couple of big 4 door Cadillac hardtops and one Chevy. Who else had big 4 door hardtops?

 

440 cross ram

 

That is one beautiful car! Bones

 

Starliner for the win!

 

All of the GM 60 models have such great lines, but I would probably go Cadillac, Olds, Pontiac, Buick, Chevy. They all look great though.

And to think about 20 years ago I parted out a great condition 60 Olds four door hardtop. I guess the good part is all of the parts went to people working on 2 door versions. Now I would keep that car as it was a great cruiser, just had ratty interior. I still have the full drivetrain (394, controlled coupling auto and rearend) that I still want to use in a 30/31 Roadster project someday. But using a manual trans, I really need to get rid of that auto trans.

As for one being a donor for custom or hot rod parts, I think the order is Olds, Pontiac, Buick, Chevy and Cadillac.

 

There is just something about taking 1-1/2 parking spaces (lengthwise) that just feels right. Ha, take that 4 door pickups!

 

In 1960, just about all of the automakers were putting out factory customs. I believe GM was the leader of the pack, though. Hmm, there's an unintended '60s song title. I wud rank those GM cars as Pontiac, Buick, Olds, Cadillac, and Chevy. Next in line for the automakers wud be the Chrysler Corp. All of their models were about the same in advanced styling with the Chrysler and DeSoto lines leading and the Dodge and Plymouth lines following. If anyone thot the '60 Plymouth was over the top, they must have really flipped their lid when the '61 Plymouth came out. Last, but not least, of the automakers wud be Ford. The one-year body style Starliner was a winner as was the design on the Edsel. Mercury and Lincoln rounded out the model lines.

 

Thanks. Pops had it done about 8 years ago, I built the engine. Fun car to cruise...


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